Two kinds of preparation contribute to the production of eloquence. One is the preparation of the speaker, the other of the speech. The first is fully as important as the second. In ordinary cases both are indispensable. Some “born orators” speak well without appearing to pay any attention to the improvement of their faculties. Others are occasionally eloquent on a topic without special preparation. Yet these cases when closely examined will be found apparent rather than real exceptions to the rule above stated. The man who seems never to have cultivated the power of speech, and is yet able to blaze into fervid eloquence at will, has usually concealed his preparation or carried it on in such uncommon methods that they have not been recognized as preparations. On the other hand, a man who speaks well without a moment’s warning can do so only when the subject is thoroughly familiar to him. A ready and self-possessed speaker may grasp thoughts which have been long maturing in his mind, and give them forth to an audience in obedience to an unexpected summons, but if he is called upon when he knows nothing whatever of his subject, failure is inevitable, though he may possibly veil it more or less in a stream of platitudes. Ask a man at a moment’s warning to give an astronomical lecture. If he is perfectly familiar with the subject in general, and is also a practical orator, he may succeed well without preparing a special speech. But if he is ignorant of Astronomy, what kind of an address can he make? If he is the most eloquent man in the nation that faculty will avail him nothing, for he cannot extemporize the names of the planets, the laws which govern their motions, or any of the facts out of which his lecture must be woven. Precisely the same necessity of adequate information exists in every other field of intelligence. The ignorant man cannot possibly tell that which he does not know, although he may make a great show of knowledge out of small material; but even to do that with certainty requires careful premeditation and arrangement.

In this and following chapters we wish to treat of the kind of cultivation which makes a man ready to speak. The field is here very wide and some general considerations must be introduced, but we hope also to give valuable practical directions, especially to those who are yet at the beginning of their career.

In considering man as a speaker, we may classify his faculties into two broad divisions; those which furnish the materials of communication with his fellows; and those which furnish the means of such communication. The first class gives rise to thoughts and emotions in man’s own breast; the second enables him to arouse similar thoughts and emotions in the breasts of others. Our course, therefore, will be to consider, first, thought and emotion, and afterward those powers of body and mind by which we express, that is, press out from ourselves toward the receptive faculties of our fellow beings.

Thought, in the broad sense here given, embraces the knowledge of all facts, and all the reasoning that may be based upon those facts. Emotion is the mental feeling or response to knowledge, and comprises love, hate, joy, fear, sorrow, and hope. These two elements are the broad basis of all eloquence. Keen, profound, far-reaching thought—in other words, thought raised to its highest terms—and quick, sensitive, powerful emotion, are necessary to the highest eloquence. Compared with them, mere verbal fluency is less than dust in the balance. But such a combination—the highest degree of both thought and emotion—is rare, and many degrees less than the highest of either is available for genuine eloquence. To increase either or both, if it can be done without any corresponding sacrifice, is to increase eloquence in precisely the same proportion.

Education in the popular sense is the cultivation of thought with the added faculty of language. But we prefer to consider the latter power separately as one among the means of communicating thought.

How, then, shall thought-power be increased? There is no royal road. Every one of the faculties by which knowledge is accumulated and arranged or digested into new forms grows stronger by being employed upon its own appropriate objects. Exercise is then the means by which the material of knowledge is gathered, and all faculties strengthened for future gathering. Each fact gained adds to the treasury of thought. A broad and liberal education is of exceeding advantage. This may or may not be of the schools. Indeed, they too often substitute a knowledge of words for a knowledge of things. That fault is very serious to the orator, for the only way by which even language can be effectively taught, is by giving terms to objects, the nature of which has been previously learned.

But many persons need to speak who cannot obtain an education in the usual sense of the words—that is, college or seminary training. Must they keep their lips forever closed on that account? By no means.

A thousand examples, some of them the most eminent speakers the world has produced, encourage them to hope. Let such persons learn all they can. Wide, well-selected, and systematic reading will do wonders in supplying the necessary thought-material. Every book of history, biography, travels, popular science, which is carefully read, and its contents fixed in the mind, will be available for the purposes of oratory. Here a word of advice may be offered, which, if heeded, will be worth many months of technical education at the best colleges in the land; it is this: have always at hand some work that in its own sphere possesses real and permanent merit, and read it daily until completed. If notes are made of its contents, and the book itself kept on hand for reference, so much the better. If some friend can be found who will hear you relate in your own words what you have read, this also will be of great value. Many persons, especially in our own country, spend time enough in reading the minute details of the daily papers to make them thoroughly acquainted in ten years with forty volumes of the most useful books in the world. Think of it! This number may include nearly all the literary masterpieces. Which mode of spending the time will produce the best results? One newspaper read daily would amount to more than three hundred in a year, and allowing each paper to be equal to ten ordinary book pages, the result would be three thousand pages annually, or six volumes of five hundred pages each. In ten years this would reach sixty volumes! This number, comprising the world’s best books in history, poetry, science, and general literature, might be read slowly, with meditation and diligent note-taking, by the most busy man who was willing to employ his leisure in that way. Libraries and books are now brought within the reach of all, and the mass of what man knows can be learned in outline by any student who thirsts for knowledge. While thus engaged the student is on the direct road toward oratorical efficiency, though such knowledge will not in itself constitute eloquence. It is but one of its elements. Neither will the speaker have to wait until any definite quantity of reading has been accomplished before it becomes serviceable to him. All that he learns will be immediately available, and, with proper effort, the facility of speech and the material for speaking will keep pace with each other.

But personal observation of life and nature are just as necessary as reading. The world of books is very extensive, but it yields its treasures only to persons who bring to its study some independent knowledge of their own. We cannot hope to add much to the world’s stock of knowledge by what we see with our own eyes, but what we do see and hear will interpret for us what we learn from the far wider world of books. Gibbon tells us that his militia service, though of no great advantage in itself, was afterward very useful to the historian of the Roman Empire. What we behold of the landscape around us lays the foundation for understanding what poets and travelers tell us of other landscapes we may never see. Book knowledge will become real and vivid just in proportion as it is brought into comparison with the observation of our own senses. To the orator, this is far more important than to the ordinary student, for it adds greatly to the royal faculty of imagination. A description from the lips of a speaker who beholds at the moment a mental picture, accurate as a photograph, and bright with color, will be very different from another description built up only of words, however well chosen and melodious the latter may be. A little dabbling in natural science, a few experiments tried, an occasional peep through telescope or microscope at the worlds they open, and all other means of bringing knowledge under the scrutiny of our own senses, will greatly contribute to the power of the orator.

The reasoning faculties must also be trained by exercise upon their own objects. The knowledge which has been gathered from personal observation or from the testimony of others in books will furnish material, but will not enable us to reason. Logic and mathematics have considerable utility as guides, but they cannot supply the want of continuous application of the processes of argument and deduction. No man becomes a reasoner from merely learning the mode in which the reason operates. Of two persons, one of whom understands every mood of the syllogism and the source of every fallacy, while the other has no technical knowledge of logic, but has been engaged in careful reasoning, discussion, and argument, all his life, it may easily happen that the latter will be the better reasoner of the two—just as a man might learn from the books all the rules of the game of croquet, and yet be beaten by another who continually handled the mallet, but had never read a single rule. Practice makes perfect. Essay writing, constructing arguments, tracing effects back to their causes, making careful comparison of all things that can be compared, in short, bringing our judgment to bear upon all facts, forming our own opinions of every event, and being always ready to give a reason to those who ask,—these modes of exercise will make the faculty of reason grow continually stronger. It is not pretended that these or any other modes of cultivation can make all minds equal, but they will improve any one—the lowest as surely as the most active—though the interval after both have been thus exercised will remain as great as before.

Extempore speech itself, when practiced upon carefully arranged plans or models as recommended hereafter, is one of the most powerful modes of cultivating the logical faculty. To construct plans, so that all thoughts accumulated upon a given subject may be unfolded in a natural and orderly manner, cannot fail to exercise the reasoning faculties, and impart corresponding strength to them.

But how shall emotion be cultivated? The wisest speech, if deep feeling neither throbs in the words nor is manifested in delivery, cannot be eloquent. The orator can only speak forth from an aroused and excited nature. There is a kind of intellectual excitation kindled by the presentation of truth which is sufficiently effective when instruction is the only object. But to persuade and move men—the usual aim of the orator—requires passion. No pretense will avail the extempore speaker. He will infallibly be detected if counterfeiting, and to succeed in exhibiting feeling he must really feel. There are but two things which can arouse feeling—care for a cause or for persons. Many a man is eloquent when “riding his hobby,” though at no other time. He has thought so much upon that special subject, and has so thoroughly identified himself with it, that everything relating to it becomes invested with personal interest. Any cause which can thus be made personal will be apt to arouse feeling. It would be wise, therefore, for an orator to identify himself as closely as possible with all manner of good causes which come within his reach. Then such well-springs of emotion will gush out easily and frequently.

This mode of excitation is largely intellectual in its character. The next to be described has more to do with the affections. The clergyman wants to secure the welfare of his congregation, and the better he is acquainted with them individually the stronger will be this wish. The lawyer is but a poor attorney if he does not so identify himself with his client as to feel more than a professional interest in the latter’s success. The politician needs no exhortation to rouse his enthusiasm for his party and his chief. All these are instances of that care for persons which adds so greatly to the powers of effective speech. The plain inference, therefore, is that the speaker will gain largely by identifying himself as closely as possible with the interests of men, and by cultivating love for them. A cynical or indifferent spirit makes a fearful discount from the possibilities of eloquence. Only the greatest qualities in other directions can prevent it from proving fatal.

The power and sensitiveness of emotions founded upon intimate knowledge and partnership of interest go far to explain the wonderful eloquence of the old Greeks. Their country was the native land of eloquence. This arose not so much from the character of that gifted race as from the fact that each speaker personally knew his audience and had an intimate, material interest in the affairs he discussed. They regarded their opponents as terribly bad men. Their own lives and the lives of many of their friends were not unfrequently involved in the questions they discussed. The States were so small, and the personal element so important, that strongly aroused feeling became inevitable. The discussion of war or peace before an audience who knew that if they voted war their town might be besieged by the enemy within a fortnight, was sure to be eagerly listened to. No platitudes would be tolerated. The orators spoke before their neighbors, some of them friendly, others bitter enemies who were seeking in each word they uttered an occasion for their ruin. Much of the wonderful power of Demosthenes arose from the deep solicitude felt by himself and excited in his hearers as they watched the swiftly coming ruin of their common country.

It is also a law of human nature that we feel deeply for that which has cost us great labor. The collector of old china or of entomological specimens learns to greatly value the ugly dishes and bugs he gathers, though others may despise them. The more of real work we do in the world, the deeper the hold our hearts take upon it. This is one of the secrets of the power of goodness as an element of oratory. It was long ago declared that a good man, other things being equal, will be a better speaker than a bad man. His affections are called forth by a greater variety of objects. Yet hate can make a man eloquent as well as love, and some of the most eloquent orations ever uttered partook largely of this baleful inspiration. But the occasions on which noble feelings may rise into eloquence are far more numerous and important.

Why should not a man train himself to take a deep interest in all that is brought familiarly to his notice? This wide range of sympathy is one of the marks which distinguishes a great from a small mind. It has been said that “lunar politics” can have no possible interests for the inhabitants of this globe. But who can be sure of this, if there be such a thing as “lunar politics”? The wider our knowledge the more we recognize the possibility of interests which we had not before dreamed of. If there are inhabitants on the moon, and if we have an immortal existence, it is far from impossible that we might some time be brought into the closest connection with them. No man can tell the bearing of a new fact upon human welfare, more than he can write the history of a new-born babe. At any rate, every fact is a part of the great system of truth which lies all about us, and which is adapted to the needs of our intellect. Let it also be remembered that all men are kindred, and that we should make common cause with them. When this comes to be the habitual attitude of the mind, not as a mere sentiment, but as a strong and steady impulse, impassioned speech on any great theme affecting the interests of nations or individual men will be easy.

Emotion cannot be feigned, neither can it be directly roused by an effort of the will. We cannot say, “Now I will be in a furious passion,” or, “Now I will be inflamed with wrath against this great wrong,” for the mere sake of speaking better upon the subject in hand. But we can gaze upon a great wrong, and meditate upon the evil it involves, until the tides of indignant emotion arise in our breast. Many a well-prepared speech has failed of effect, because the orator was so anxious about the form of his address and his own popularity as to lose interest in the subject itself. Sometimes speeches read or recited fail from an opposite cause. The interest has once been aroused, and having burned during the protracted period of composition, it cools and cannot be recalled. No energy, declamation, or elegance of diction can redeem this capital defect.

To tell a man in general terms how he may widen his sympathies and enter into the closest bonds with his fellows is difficult. It is much easier to tell him what not to do. The hermits of the desert took exactly the wrong course. They lost the power of eloquence except upon some theme which could be wedded to their solitary musings. Peter the Hermit was roused to fury by the tales of wrongs to pilgrims in the Holy City—almost the only thing that could have made him eloquent. But on that one topic he spoke like a man inspired and was able to call all Europe to arms. Whatever separates from the common interests of humanity must diminish the power or at least the range of genuine emotion. To know a great many men, to understand their business affairs, to enter into their joy and fear, to watch the feelings that rise and fall in their hearts, is sure to deepen our own feelings by unconscious imitation and sympathy. Each new friend is an added power of noblest emotion—a new point at which the world takes hold of our hearts. How many persons are eloquent for a cause only! On the other hand, some men care nothing for general principles, but will throw their whole soul into a conflict for friends.

That man is well furnished for eloquence who knows a great deal, who can mentally combine, arrange, and reason correctly upon what he knows, who feels a personal interest in every fact with which his memory is stored, and every principle which can be deduced from those facts, and who has so great an interest in his fellows that all deeds which affect them awaken the same response in his heart as if done to himself. He will then possess all the necessary treasures of thought, and will himself be warmed by the fires of emotion. The only remaining problem will be to find the manner of communicating his thought and emotion in undiminished force to others through the medium of speech.

The mode of cultivating the powers necessary to this end will next engage our attention.