He was elected mayor of his town, and sent to the legislature, although he could not speak a grammatical sentence. It was all because he had a heart in him; he was a man.
CHAPTER XVII
IF YOU CAN TALK WELL
When Charles W. Eliot was president of Harvard, he said, "I recognize but one mental acquisition as an essential part of the education of a lady or gentleman, namely, an accurate and refined use of the mother-tongue."
Sir Walter Scott defined "a good conversationalist" as "one who has ideas, who reads, thinks, listens, and who has therefore something to say."
There is no other one thing which enables us to make so good an impression, especially upon those who do not know us thoroughly, as the ability to converse well.
To be a good conversationalist, able to interest people, to rivet their attention, to draw them to you naturally, by the very superiority of your conversational ability, is to be the possessor of a very great accomplishment, one which is superior to all others. It not only helps you to make a good impression upon strangers, it also helps you to make and keep friends. It opens doors and softens hearts. It makes you interesting in all sorts of company. It helps you to get on in the world. It sends you clients, patients, customers. It helps you into the best society, even though you are poor.
A man who can talk well, who has the art of putting things in an attractive way, who can interest others immediately by his power of speech, has a very great advantage over one who may know more than he, but who cannot express himself with ease or eloquence.
No matter how expert you may be in any other art or accomplishment, you cannot use your expertness always and everywhere as you can the power to converse well. If you are a musician, no matter how talented you may be, or how many years you may have spent in perfecting yourself in your specialty, or how much it may have cost you, only comparatively few people can ever hear or appreciate your music.