LORD STANHOPE ON THE ART AND FACULTY OF PUBLIC SPEAKING.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume XIII, Issue 1371, 22 September 1858, Page 4

LORD STANHOPE ON THE ART AND FACULTY OF PUBLIC SPEAKING.

The observations of the Times, on this important topic might, we think, be studied with advantage by many of our public men, few of whom seem to have thought that to study the art of speaking correctly, if not eloquently, formed any part of the duty of a legislator:— The address of Lord Stanhope to the Unirersity of Aberdeen deserves a high place in what has now become a numerous and important class of compositions. We have seldom read anything so likely to apply the needful stimulus to the often smouldering fire and fitful ambition of academic y<.uth. A Scotch precedent is about the lust that is likely to obtain weight at our English universities, and one of them has for its chancellor a man who teaches eloquence, at least, by his own most distinguished example. Yet even Lord Derby could bring that example more home, and make it more available, if he would some day inform the scholars and reasonera, but very indifferent talkers, of his university, how he came by his marvellous command of words, and power of exposition. This is not meant to imply that the example is perfect, for, like one of the representatives of the same University, Lord Derby is occasionally carried away in 'the torrent of his own words. When, however, we see a man, the chief of his party, able to rallv it and bring it into power once and a a ain under the most adverse circumstances,—when there is no subject cn which he cannot deliver himself'so as to rivet the attention of all hearers, disarm their hostility, and for the time even overbear

their convictions—it is idle to criticise a faculty which everybody must envy and desire. So, by what process is Lord Derby an orator ? How did art assist nature ? Can he impart the secret to that crowd of students, —the hope of England,—from whom our Parliament, our pulpits, our courts, our magistracy, our hustings and platforms, are to be supplied ? Lord Stanhope has given his view of the secret, which, indeed, is in general terms that to which every distinguished orator, ancient or modern, has given his authority. It is labour, study, practice, drudgery, application, or whatever else we may call it. We should only take up needless time if we were to attempt an enumeration of the splendid examples and emphatic admonitions in favour of early, constant, various, and systematic training, in the case of everybody called upon to speak in public. The early statutes and usages of our universities bear witness to the paramount importance of the faculty in the estimation of our forefathers. The old scholars of Oxford "disputed” their way from term to term, from one degree to another. Till the Restoration we believe we are justified in saying that no sermon was ever read in the Univeisity pulpit, and even elsewhere a manuscript was as great a confession of weakness us a printed book would be in these days. Yet these were ages in which the universities had a far stronger hold on the nation than they now have. They were not behind ours in solidity of scholarship, in depth of philosophy, and strength of conviction. The art of speaking did not dilute learning and weaken vigour of mind ; but ministered to them. Scholars then not only held their own, but went forth, and taught, and persuaded, and governed the world.

In this age, however, which brooks no com parison w : th any age that went before it, it is a plain fact, which cannot be disputed, that neither at our universities, nor at our public schools, nor in any other places and systems of education in vogue amongst us, is any attempt made to teach the art of speaking. What may be adduced in the way of exception is utterly inconsiderable From the time a gentleman’s son goes to school to the happy moment when he sees his mime, perhaps, in the list of wranglers or the “ Class List,” he has most probably never recited English poetry or prose, never even read either aloud, much less has he ever made an oral statement of facts or views to a greater length than a short sentence in reply to a short question. Up to the age of three-and-twenty it is matter yet to be ascertained whether the intended clergyman can read a verse in the Bible as it ought to be read; whether the intending barrister can make a legal statement, attempt to convince without giving disgust, or to persuade without making himself ridiculous. He may at that age lie able to do many' things seldom required. He may be deep in Greek and Roman antiquities, and able to construe and even scan anv chorus; he may write Greek and Latin verses in a dozen metres ; he may be a good mathematician, and even compuse a tolerable essay. He mav have these and many other accomplishments, which may never be called into practice once in a whole life, except in the production of written sermons, or in some correspondence of unusual gravity. What, however, every man must do in one way or another, what is the common gift of all classes, all professions, all ages from infancy, what is the first and foremost difference between man and brute, and between one man and another, is left to chance, without any assistance whatever from schools or universities. Some men have naturally better organs of articulation, some are in better society and more among good talkers than others; some are mure sociable; some begin to talk a year or two before others, and have that start upon them ; some prefer society to study from mere idleness; some are early seized with an ambition to be orators. Nature and circumstances interfere in many ways, and make one man a speaker, another a mute, and others all shades between these extremes, but education in these days has nothing to do with the result. A schoolboy’ is all his time declining, conjugating, parsing, construing, scanning, —all grammatical and critical exercises ;— reciting first Latin doggerel about genetives and preterites ; then, it must be admitted, Latin and Greek speeches and poetry. The universities merely complete this course of training. But the habit of mind imparted by all these exercises is rather adverse to method, facility, and elegance of expression, than conducive to those qualities. It often helps to make men hesitate, boggle, and stammer, to be at a loss for a word, or give two or three words instead of one, contradict themselves, explain, repeat, and fall into every vice of utterance. The question, as Lord Stanhope very properly savs, does not refer only to public speaking. The tongue is continually called into service, and is liable to failure for want of a proper training.

The result is lamentable, and often disagreeable. The first education that the country can give offers no security whatever that a man shall not offend and disgust when he should please und inform. Eater church after church, in the metropolis or elsewhere, and vou shall hear the prayers read by a machine,'and the sermon read by a drone. The supplications are solemn without being serious ; the exhortations have only that gravity that conduces to sleep. The one a pious form, and the other an unpleasant necessity. It is not our present purpose, and certainly is no wish of ours, to enlarge upon defects which are the staple of almost every conversation in respectable houses between the hours of 1 and 2 on Sunday afternoon. Nor is this state of things confined to the Church. Hundreds of excellent gentlemen aspire to Parliament, and get in or not, with the same ultimate ill success. The moment they try to speak, all their feelings, thoughts, facts, and purposes, either crowd to the tongue, or fly all together, and leave it utterly bankrupt of words. Those that can speak do not often bring credit on the gift. Indeed in this country there is nothing which is so often the subject of a sneer as fluency of speech. It has become an nffectation with many that they can not express themselves, and they find excuses enough alike in the shortcomings and excesses of others. A large part of the wisdom, the experience, and the actualpower of the country is unrepresented in Parliament, through the taciturnity or defective expression of our public men, while, as a natural consequence, many who have little else than a ready command of words obtain an influence beyond their just worth, J ll ®,P eo P'. e blind, a one-eyed man is king;” and in an assembly of bad speakers or mutes, a very ordinary orator will get more than his due. It must be so at the bar, and in the pulpit also. At the former there are men who have been sneered at for their garrulity, their vulgarity, their tautology, and utter defiance of all the rules of rhetoric, ever since they opened their mouths, but when they obtain practice, wealth, and rank, they can afford to laugh at their briefless brethren. In the pulpit the scholar and gentleman from the university

pines and moulders in his curacy without even the conviction of ministerial success, while an ignorant Ranter carries away half his flock, and the vulgar Dissenter, with every fault of manner and style, with solecisms innumerable and unpardonable outrages on social propriety, is run after by thousands, would fill a Coliseum and has everything a clergyman can wish for except a palace, a peerage, and “My Lord.” The chief foundation of his power is not merely his own eloquence but the utter want of that quality in most of his competitors. He has been preaching every day to u small party or a large one, ever since he was >en years old. He has been among preachers. When another ended he began ; and when be was tired another took it up. His whole life, short as it is, has been one course of preaching. The Oxford or Cambridge divine has got up 20 textbooks, can read the scriptures in tbe original, has read the fathers and the old English theologians, but never preached except by book, and has scarcely heard a sermon that was not a written one, and read accordingly.

No doubt, people must have begun early to speak well. The child who is allowed to tell his long story all about nothing at all, or the tale he has read that morning in his nursery book, is in training for an orator. He will very soon have his little audience, while the philosopher is left on his stool, and the sulker is left to go were he will. This is domestic training, which, whether by precept or example, has more to do than schools. But, if schools are good for anything, they ought to help here too. Boys ought to practice that which they will have to do in future life ; to describe what they have read, seen, or heard ; to read from other languages, into good English, as Lord Stanhope says was part of Pitt’s training to state cases and arguments and in everv possible way to acquire readiness, nerve, a good vocabulary, a gentle tone of voice, neither over-bearing nor timid, and even a bearing that shall not be positively ridiculous. It stands to reason, and is certainly borne out by multitudes of instances, that if a child is ever to speak well it ought to begin as soon as it has the use of its tongue ; and the course ought not to be intermitted at school or college. At present all tbe rhetorical training a boy has at either of these places he picks up for himself. If he does this his future career is often a triumph of self-will over duty, or rather of nature over learned follv. While the good boys are plodding over their tasks, writing no end of verses, racking their brains to find matter for a theme, or turning over the leaves of dictionaries and grammers till they are dizzy, some indolent fellow is following his own bent, talking all kinds of nonsense, playing off his jokes on everybody, trusting to his good fortune and address to propitiate the master. Thirty years hence he is likely enough to be a great man, and, in his way, a useful man, while his dutiful and plodding contemporaries are settling into obscurity and insignificance. It ought not to be, but it is so, and will remain so, as long as the art of speaking well is utterly neglected, in all its stages and applications, and nothing is cared for but headwork and penwork, as applied to ancient languages and pure mathematics.