CHAPTER III.
Lessons from the Experience of Eminent Orators.
Although unwritten speech is popular and has innumerable arguments in its favor, many persons yet maintain that eloquence of the highest character cannot be reached without trusting to the memory and the pen. In vain we urge that it is more natural to find words at the moment of utterance; that a better framework may be constructed by confining preparation to it alone; that the hearer and speaker may thus be brought into more perfect accord; that this, in short, is the method of nature, which permits the solid part of the tree to stand through many winters, while its graceful robe of foliage is freshly bestowed every spring. With the emphasis of an axiom, opponents declare that the words of a great orator must be previously chosen, fitted, and polished.
A speech-writer is apt to have one argument drawn from his own experience which outweighs all argument. His own most satisfactory efforts are those in which nothing is left to the chance of the moment. But even experience sometimes misleads. We may be bad judges of our own performances. When extemporizing, the best utterances are often immediately forgotten by the speaker, whose mind is crowded with other “thick-coming fancies.” But in writing we may linger lovingly over each sentence, and return to enjoy it as often as we wish. If anything is imperfect, we can correct and improve down to the moment of speech. And while in the act of reading or reciting we are in a much better position to admire our own work, than when carried away by such an impassioned torrent as to scarcely know whether we have been using words at all. If our auditors declare their preference for the latter, we can find a ready explanation in their want of taste and culture.
It is not denied that great effects may be produced by memorized words. The popularity of the stage is sufficient proof of their power. Actors often cause uncontrollable tears to flow. If a man can write powerfully, and then recite well, he may greatly move an audience. Massillon, Bossuet, and our own John B. Gough, have each achieved great popular success in that manner. But while such men will be listened to with eagerness and pleasure, they will be regarded as great performers rather than as authorities and guides. They have placed themselves on a level with those who deal in unreal things, and must be contented to remain there. Doubtless, it is more noble to speak in the words that were once appropriate to our feelings and sentiments, than to deal only in the words of others; but the resemblance between quoting our own previously prepared language and the language of other persons is felt more keenly by the people than the difference between the two processes.
But even in momentary effect, declaimers of memorized words have been surpassed by extemporizers, as numerous examples demonstrate; while in power of thought and lasting influence the superiority of the latter is so great as to make comparison almost impossible.
The great examples of Demosthenes and Cicero are often quoted to prove that eloquence of the highest type must be written. Of these men it may be said that Demosthenes had an assemblage of great qualities that, backed by his tireless industry, would have made any method the road to brilliant success. But he did not always recite, and he would not have dreamed of using manuscript. Cicero was at least as great in literature as in oratory, and his speeches are now read as literary models. Some of them were never spoken at all. It may be allowed that he ordinarily recited previous preparations, but some of his most brilliant passages were purely extemporaneous. The outburst that overwhelmed Catiline upon the unexpected appearance of the latter in the Roman Senate was coined at white heat from the passion of the moment. Hortensius, the great rival of Cicero—perhaps his superior as an advocate—spoke in spontaneous words, as did many of the most eminent of the Roman orators, whose fame now is less brilliant than Cicero’s, mainly because no effective means then existed of preserving extempore speech. As an offset to the example of Demosthenes, the great name of Pericles may be fairly adduced. He did not write his addresses, and direct comparison is therefore impossible; but his speech established a sway over the cultivated democracy of Athens in the day of their highest glory more indisputable than Demosthenes ever attained.
The case in regard to the ancient world may be thus summed up: Manuscript reading was not considered oratory at all; all speeches were either recited or extemporized; the latter have inevitably perished, while some of the former have survived, and, becoming a part of school-book literature, have conferred a disproportionate fame upon their authors. An orator who was compelled to write his speech in order to preserve it had a much greater inducement to write than exists since the invention of shorthand reporting. Yet some speakers of the highest eminence did not adopt that mode, and others did not confine themselves to it.
In the modern world the weight of example is decisively on the side of unwritten speech. A few instances are all that our space will allow us to adduce.
Augustine, the great Christian writer and preacher, has not left us in ignorance as to which mode of address he preferred. He enjoins the “Christian Teacher” to make his hearers comprehend what he says—“to read in the eyes and countenances of his auditors whether they understand him or not, and to repeat the same thing, by giving it different terms, until he perceives it is understood, an advantage those cannot have who, by a servile dependence upon their memories, learn their sermons by heart and repeat them as so many lessons. Let not the preacher,” he continues, “become the servant of words; rather let words be servants to the preacher.”
This advice will be equally applicable to others than preachers who may possess a serious purpose. But the charity of Augustine allows of reciting under certain circumstances. He well says: “Those who are destitute of invention, but can speak well, provided they select well-written discourses of another man, and commit them to memory for the instruction of their hearers, will not do badly if they take that course.” No doubt he intended that due credit should be given to the real author.