For thirty years Faraday was the foremost of lecturers on science in London. From the first occasion when, in 1823, as Sir Roderick Murchison narrates, he was called upon unexpectedly to act as substitute for Professor Brande at one of his morning lectures at the Royal Institution (then held in the subterranean laboratory), down to the time of his latest appearance as a lecturer in 1862, he was without a rival as the exponent of natural science.
As no man could achieve and retain such a position without possessing both natural gifts and appropriate training, it is fitting to inquire what were those gifts and what the training which were so happily united in him.
I was (he said) a very lively, imaginative person, and could believe in the Arabian Nights as easily as in the Encyclopædia; but facts were important to me, and saved me. I could trust a fact, and always cross-examined an assertion.
From the very first Faraday had an appreciation of the way in which public lectures should be given. In his notes of Davy’s fourth lecture of April, 1812, he wrote:—
During the whole of these observations his delivery was easy, his diction elegant, his tone good, and his sentiments sublime.
His own first lecture was given in the kitchen of Abbott’s house, with home-made apparatus placed on the kitchen table. To Abbott, after only a few weeks of experience at the Royal Institution, he wrote the letters upon lectures and lecturers, to which allusion was made on [p. 15]. These show a most remarkably sound perception of the material and mental furniture requisite for success. From the third and fourth of them are culled the following excerpts:—
QUALIFICATIONS OF A LECTURER.
The most prominent requisite to a lecturer, though perhaps not really the most important, is a good delivery; for though to all true philosophers science and nature will have charms innumerable in every dress, yet I am sorry to say that the generality of mankind cannot accompany us one short hour unless the path is strewed with flowers. In order, therefore, to gain the attention of an audience (and what can be more disagreeable to a lecturer than the want of it?), it is necessary to pay some attention to the manner of expression. The utterance should not be rapid and hurried, and consequently unintelligible, but slow and deliberate, conveying ideas with ease from the lecturer, and infusing them with clearness and readiness into the minds of the audience. A lecturer should endeavour by all means to obtain a facility of utterance, and the power of clothing his thoughts and ideas in language smooth and harmonious, and at the same time simple and easy.
With respect to the action of the lecturer, it is requisite that he should have some, though it does not here bear the importance that it does in other branches of oratory; for though I know of no species of delivery (divinity excepted) that requires less motion, yet I would by no means have a lecturer glued to the table or screwed on the floor. He must by all means appear as a body distinct and separate from the things around him, and must have some motion apart from that which they possess.
A lecturer should appear easy and collected, undaunted and unconcerned, his thoughts about him, and his mind clear and free for the contemplation and description of his subject. His action should not be hasty and violent, but slow, easy, and natural, consisting principally in changes of the posture of the body, in order to avoid the air of stiffness or sameness that would otherwise be unavoidable. His whole behaviour should evince respect for his audience, and he should in no case forget that he is in their presence. No accident that does not interfere with their convenience should disturb his serenity, or cause variation in his behaviour; he should never, if possible, turn his back on them, but should give them full reason to believe that all his powers have been exerted for their pleasure and instruction.