Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1874-03-08
HABITS OF ORATORS.
some Peculiarities of EnglaRd's
Grenf Men.

Great Men,
The London correspondent Of the
Mssg York Times furnishes the follow
ing:
Mr.. Bright has just written letter
to a young theological student. in
which he gives his opinions ON the art
Of public speaking. He is for extern
pore speaking when a man knows his
subject and has a good hold OF it; but
for preacher who has to deliver SER
mon a week ON the same topic to the
same people, written sermon is, he
says, almost indispensable; ''Only men
of great mind, great knowledge and
great power can do this with success,
and he wonders that any man can do it
at all. The best preparation for speak
ing E, he suggests, to think over
what is TO be said, and to
form an outline In a few brief notes.
He says he has never been In the habit
of writing out his speeches, certainly
not for more than thirty years past, the
labor Of writing being bad enough, saad
the labor of committing to memory IN
t0lerable. The statement must, how
ever, be taken with a certain qualtica-
ton. Mr.. Bright, / believe, does not
write out all his speeches, but hewrites
out the most important and highly
worked passages. and gets them by
heart. The rest he fills in as he goes
along, and any one who examines his
speeches carefully ear tell by the great
precision and point Of the language in
| certain parts what has been written
and what spoken Of-hand. All
his speeches are very carefully
prepared, but chiefly In his head.
He goes over the points he
wishes to bring out for weeks, and, per-
haps, months, and broods over the sub
| iect till it takes form and substance IN
his mind. He has a small slip of letter
paper with notes on it of the points IN
their order, and IN the House Of Com
mons l have oftened noticed him for
hours before he rose coming over his
notes and rehearsing passages with his
eyes on the ceiling. Mr.. Gladstone
uses notes, but only for facts, and the
order of his points, and trusts exclusive
ly to the moment for his words. Lord
| Palmerston always spoke extempore,
and scarcely ever condescended TO refer
to a paper His great speech, five
hours long In the Don Pacltco debate,
was delivered IN this manner; he had
only a set Of the dispatches before him
in order TO make exact quota
tions. Long practice IN dieta-
tions to private secretaries had
given him a mastery of precise and
easy language, but he was not a flowing
speaker. He thought great deal more
about how a speech would read than
how il sounded at the moment, and was
determined not to use any but the
words he really wanted. This made
him hesitate occasionally. Mr.. Lowe
acquired similar precision from dletat
ing leader articles for the TiBless MIR
Disraeh despises notes, except notes oi
dates and other figures. He prepares
his speeches with great care, planning
them out, grouping his points artist
cally, and polishing up his eplgrams
but his speeches, though partly drafted
beforehand, are not repeated from
memory. The late Lord Derby wa
an lmpulsIYe eNtempOfe speaker, DU
his son writes his speeches from begin
ming to end, and learns them laborious
ly. Lord Granville speaks of-hand
and is very unequal in his style, whlcl
is, for the most part, loose and sloven
ly. Lord Russell also trusts to tn
words of the moment; and this, l Inn
agine, was the rule with all the speak
ers of the last generation. MIR. Hors
/, man, have heard, writes his speeche
! many times over, each time destrOyin
the manuscript, and then writing an
other with as many improvements a
he can think of. The object Is, o
course, to procure a firm hold on tn
subject generally, as well as on his pre-
meditated language, so that be ma
drop the latter if he chooses, and mser
anything that occurs to him.