Elocutionary manuals properly devote much space to the consideration of gesture, for the eye should be addressed and pleased as well as the ear. But we doubt whether the marking out of special gestures to be imitated can do much good. A few broad principles like those formulated by the celebrated French teacher, Delsarte, may be profitably studied and made familiar by practice upon a few simple selections. After that the principal use of training is to give confidence so that the speaker may be in the full possession and instinctive use of all his powers. Fear often freezes the speaker into ice-like rigidity; and hearers are apt to feel the same deadly chill when listening to some one whose dominating sentiment is the fear that he may do something ridiculous, or fail to win their favor.
The secondary use of training in gesture is to discard awkward and repulsive movements. Timidity and fear may be overcome by a firm resolution, and the object is well worth the effort. Bad or ungraceful actions are far better in the case of a beginner than no action at all. The saying of Demosthenes, that the first, the second, and the third need of an orator is “ACTION,” does not fully apply to the modern speaker. He needs many things more urgently than action, even when that word is taken in its widest sense. But action is important, and when graceful and expressive, it does powerfully tend to arrest attention, and even to help the processes of thought on the part of the speaker himself. We have heard several eloquent men who scarcely moved during the delivery of an address, but never without feeling that good gesticulation would have been a great addition to their power. It is unnatural to speak for any considerable period of time without moving. None but a lazy, sick, or bashful man will do it. Let the laziness be shaken off, the sickness cured, and the bashfulness reserved for a more fitting occasion! A man who is too bashful and diffident to move hand, head, or foot in the presence of an audience should in consistency refuse to monopolize their time at all!
Practice will usually overcome this fault. When a man has stood a great many times before an audience without receiving any serious injury, and has a good purpose in thus claiming their attention, and something which he thinks they ought to hear, he will forget his fears and allow his mind to be engrossed, as that of a true speaker should be, with the subject he has in hand. Then all his gestures will have at least the grace of unconscious and spontaneous origination.
But when fear has been overcome so that the speaker is not afraid to use his hands, he needs to enter upon a determined and comprehensive campaign against bad habits. If anything is truly natural—that is, true to the higher or universal nature—it will be beautiful; but early examples are so often wrong and corrupting that it is hard to say what nature is: Nature may be a bad nature—the reflection of all that is low and sordid as well as that which is high and ennobling. That nature which is in harmony with the sum of all things, which is the image of the Creator’s perfectness, must be right and good; but we must not too hastily conclude that any habits of our own have this high and unquestionable source. Hardly a speaker lives who does not at some time fall into unsightly or ridiculous habits. The difference between men in this respect is that some steadily accumulate all the faults they ever have contracted, until the result is most repulsive; while others, from the warnings of friends or their own observation, discover their errors and cast them off.
A mode by which the solitary student may become acquainted with his faults, and from which he should not be driven by foolish ridicule, is by declaiming in as natural and forcible a manner as possible before a large mirror. Thus we may “see ourselves as others see us.” Repeated practice in this manner will enable you to keep the necessary watch upon your motions, without so much distracting attention as to make the exercise before the glass no trustworthy specimen of ordinary habits. In speaking, you hear your own voice and thus become sensible of audible errors, but the glass is required to show improper movements that may have been unconsciously contracted. It is not advised that each speech, before delivery, should be practiced in front of the mirror. It is doubtful if such practice would not cherish a self-consciousness worse than all the errors it corrected. But the same objection would not apply to occasional declamations made for the very purpose of self-criticism.
By these two processes—pressing out into action as freely as possible under the impulse of deep feeling, and by lopping off everything that is not graceful and effective—we may soon attain a good style of gesture. When the habit of suiting the action to the word is once fully formed, all anxiety on that subject may be dismissed. The best gesticulation is entirely unconscious.
CHAPTER VI.
Confidence.
How may that boldness and confidence which is indispensable to an orator best be acquired? On your success in this direction, hinges all other kinds of improvement. So long as a nervous dread hangs about you, it will make the practice of extemporaneous speech painful and repulsive, paralyzing all your faculties in the moment of utterance.
You must acquire confidence in your own powers and be willing to trust to their guidance.
But it is not necessary that you should exhibit or even feel this confidence at the beginning of a speech, for it may then appear like boastfulness or egotism. It is enough if you then have confidence in your subject, and in the fullness of your preparation. You may then without injury wish that some one, that you imagine more worthy, stood in your place. But if this feeling continues all through the address, failure is inevitable. Many a man begins while trembling in every limb, especially if the occasion be of unusual character, but soon becomes inspired with his theme and forgets all anxiety. If your fear be greater and more persistent, keeping you in perpetual terror, it will destroy all liberty and eloquence. When laboring under such an influence, you lose self-possession, become confused, all interest evaporates from your most carefully prepared thoughts, and you sit down at length, convinced that you have failed. It is but little consolation to believe that you had all the time in your brain the necessary power and material to achieve splendid success, if you had but possessed the courage to use it aright.