Cleveland morning leader. [volume] (Cleveland [Ohio]) 1854-1865, 1865-03-02
DAILY Err
The Atlantic for Mareb---Dr- Holland

on the System Of Popular Lectures.
The Atlantic for March has a very read.
able article from the pen of Dr. Holland on
Popular Lectures. We quote one of Dr.
Hollands criticisms upon bad feature oi
the system. He says:
Another requisite to popularity upon the
platform is esrnestness. Those who i'm
sgine that 8 permanent hold upon the peo-
pie can be obtained by amusing them are
widely mistaken. The popular lecture has
fallen into disrepute with many worthy
persons in consequence of the admission Of
bufoons and trihers to the lecturers plat
fJrm; and It is an evil which ought 70 be
remedied. 1t is an evil, indeed, which is
slowly working its own remedy. It is 8
disgrsceful fact, that, in order TO draw to-
gether crowds of people, men have been ad-
mitted 70 the platform whose notoriety was
won by the grossest of literary chariatsn-
ism-men whose only hold upou the public
was gained by eztravsgsnces of thought
ana expression which would compromise
the dignity and destroy the self-respect of
any man OF character and common sense.
1t Is not enough that these persons quick
ly disgust their audiences, and have q brief
life upon the list. They ought never to be
introduced to the public as lecturers and
sny momentsry augmentation of receipts
that may be secured from the rRbble by the
patronage Of such mountebanks is more
than lost by the disgrace they bring snd
the damage they do to Whist is called the
HLecture System" 1t is an insult on any
lyceum and audience tOsuppose itcan have
ssirong and permanent interest in trifer
and 1t is a gross injustice to every respect
able lecturer in the field 10 introduce into
his guild men who have no better motive
and no higher mission than the stage clown
and the negro-minstrel.
But the career of trifers is always short.
Only he who feels that he has something 10
do in making the world wiser and better,
and who, in a bold and manly way, tries
persistently to do it, is always welcome;
and this fsct-an incontrovertible one-is |
q sufficient vindicatiOn of the popular lee
ture from all the sspersions that have been |
cast upon it by disappointed aspirants for
its honors, and shallow observers Of its |
tendencies and results.
Ofthe plstform as the standpoint for the
of free thought, the writer says;
The popular lecture, it has been the de-
voted, consistent, never firing champion of
liberty. If the popular lecturer
has not been power in this nation for the
overthrow of American slavery-for its
overthrow in the conscientious convictions
and the legslsnd conventional Businesses of
.he nation-then have the friends of op-
preston grossly lied for none have receiV-
cd their malicious and angry objurgstions
more unsparingly than our plsih-speskiDg
gentleman who makes his yearly circuit
among the lyceums. No champion of
slavery, no advocate of privilege, no apollo
yist for systematizsd and legalized wrong
has ever been able to establish himself as
popular lecturer. The people may listen
to such a man once; but, hsv-
Dg heard him, they drop him forever. In
ruth, man cannot be q popular lecturer
Who does not plant himselfupon the eternal
,Tiuciples of justice. He must be demo-
rat believer in and an advocate of the
iqusl rights of men.
a slRvery-loving, slavery-uphelding
ecturer would be just as much of an sno-
nsly as q slsvery-loving and slavery sing
ng poet. The tsint so vitistes the whole
es.hetic nature, so poisons the moral sense,
o pslsies the finer powers, so destroys all
rue sympathy with universal humanity,
hat tho composition of an acceptable lee
ure becomes impossible TO the man who
,ears it. The popular lecture as it has
cen described in this article, has never
xisted at the South, and could not be tol-
rated there. Until within three years If
as never found opportunity for uttersnce
4 the capital of the nation; but where
iberty goes, it makes its way, and helps to
resk the way for liberty everywhere.
1t is noteworthy fact, that the popular
scturer, though the devoted advocate of
reedom TO the slave, has rarely been re-
arded as either trustworthy or an i'm
lortant man in the party which has rep
esented his principles in this country.
ie has always been too free to be psrti-
an, too radical and intractsble for party
eeking power or striving to preserve it.
10 party of any considerable magnitude
SIS ever regarded him as its expositor. A
housand times have party speakers and
srty organs, protesting principles identi-
81 with his own, washed their hands Of
Il responsibility for his uttersnces.
Even now, when the sound of falling
hRckles is in the air, and the smoke Of the
orment of the oppressor fills the sky, old
artisans of freedom cannot quite forget
heir stupid and hsckueyed snimositiss,
ut still bemoan the baleful influence of
his frery itinersnt. Representative of
one but himself, disowned or hated by all
srties, acknowledging responsibility to
iod and his own conscience only, he has ,
one his work, and done it Well-done it
mid careful quesLionings and careless
urses-done it, and been royalty paid for
/, when speakers who fairly represented
be political and religious prejudices of the
,eople could not have called around them
bakers dozen, with tickets at half price
T at no price at sll.
When the cloud which now envelops
be country shall gather up its sulphurous
olds and roll away, tinted in its retiring
y the smile of God besmIng from a calm
Ky upon q nation redeemed to freedom
nd justice, and the historian, in the light Z.
f that smile, shall trace home to their
ountains the streams of influence and
,ower which will then join to form the
liver Of the national life, he will find one,
tarting far inland among the mountains,
onger than the-rest and mightier than
most, and will recognize it as the conhuent
of living, Christian speech,
rom ten Thousand lecture platforms, on
which free men stood and indicated the
light of man TO freedom.
rho sFaI,1H Gauafa 0fa vvhfeY, nafpnf. |