But also as to order. Oh, the weak-kneed or the purblind presidents, that allow the talking, whispering, walking about of a few to filch from the many half the value of the meetings! Stop the speaker. Call a halt on the entire convention. Don't proceed another step till quiet is restored, and maintained. Be a platform czar, and your audience will be your happy serfs.
Then, the president is master of ceremonies. So much in acquaintanceships depends on tactful introductions! He should deliver to each successive speaker an audience that is in a glow of anticipation, and when the speaker is done,—yes, and all through,—his own cordial hands should lead the hearty applause, and he should take time for an appreciative word before passing to the next topic.
If the presiding officer is to do all this, he must plan beforehand almost every sentence he will use in introducing speakers or opening the discussions. He is to be suggestive; he is to set brains a-throbbing with eagerness and tongues aching with things to say; and he is to do it all in twenty words. Brevity, good humor, suggestiveness,—these, in this order, are the chairman's prime virtues.
At the opening of every convention the key-note of formality, routine, and perfunctoriness is struck in the address of welcome and the response. Their every word could safely be predicted in advance. The world is waiting for a programme committee that will be courageous enough to leave them out. If the pastor of the entertaining church has helpful ideas on Sunday-school work, by all means place him on the programme somewhere; but don't make a rut of him.
At the very outset strike the key of prayer. Insert here and there throughout the programme a quiet ten minutes with the great Teacher. By all means close with a devotional half-hour—not a hasty prayer punctuated with the snapping of watches. Sentence prayers by scores, prayer psalms softly repeated, prayer hymns read with bowed heads,—the convention should furnish an inspiration and model for the devotions of all the schools represented.
Scarcely less important is the element of song. Unconsciously to themselves, the audience should become a normal training-class, learning how to conduct the singing of their schools in fresh and uplifting ways. Many, if not all of the methods mentioned in my chapter on this theme find fit application to the convention.
The social features deserve careful attention. Set the teachers to talking together; conversation was Socrates' university. One of the most helpful events may be a light supper given by the entertaining church. A small fee is charged, all sit down together, and at the close a series of happy speeches will bring out flashes of wit and bushels of sense.
The business should be kept under. Introduce it a little at a time, rather than spend a fatiguing hour and a half. Make no parade of money-raising. Giving should be done quietly. Teach your teachers the grace of envelopes. Reduce all business to a minimum, remembering that the convention comes together not for legislation, but for inspiration.
The Sunday-school convention is not only a conference, but an exposition. Here should be gathered whatever new teaching apparatus any school has bought: wall-maps, sand-maps, relief-maps, material for object-lessons, portable blackboards, colored pictures illustrating the lessons, specimens of class tests, library catalogues, new kinds of class-books, collection-envelopes, singing-books, new editions of the Bible, lesson helps of all kinds,—it is clear how varied and valuable a collection may easily be brought together when once the teachers and officers understand what is wanted.
The library of the entertaining school should be open for visiting librarians to examine books and methods. The best new books might be brought in from all the libraries of the district, and if each school sent only one or two, the entire exhibit would furnish many a suggestion to wide-awake library committees.