8. Indifference is the difficulty most speakers have to face. What three qualities in the speaker himself will go far toward removing indifference?

9. Recall the speaker who seems to you the most sincere man you have ever heard. How does this sincerity modify his speaking?

10. A very important point in this lesson is the wisdom of referring in your introduction to something that has been said or done or has happened just before you begin to speak. Plan some such extempore remarks for the following situations:

(a) A preceding speaker has cast reflections on your sincerity. (b) The presiding officer has referred to you as "eloquent." (c) There has recently occurred a public disaster.

(d) A man in your town has received some merited public honor.

(e) You are the member of a defeated faction in recent election.

(f) The preceding speaker has taken a large part of your time.

LESSON 4

THE PURPOSE OF THE INTRODUCTION (Continued)

In our last lesson, we dwelt upon the necessity of having the audience well disposed. In this connection we considered the first purpose of an introduction, namely, to put the audience in a state of favorable feeling. All hostile feelings must be overcome at the outset and a strong effort made to secure the positive good will of the hearers. But the student must not get the notion that a few magic words in the introduction will establish pleasant relations once and for all. Quite the contrary; throughout the whole address, the speaker must, by his frank, modest, and earnest manner, by his careful statement of some things and his tactful avoidance of others, preserve and cultivate the desired mood of his auditors. Great trial lawyers have been known to labor with jurymen for hours in order to touch the responsive chord in each one. Such master-students of the human heart are too wise to proceed with a contention until they are sure that the hearers are in a sympathetic emotional state. And whenever new material is to be introduced or a change of viewpoint is necessary, these men seek to establish the new trend of thought without spoiling the favorable attitude.

(B) TO AROUSE INTEREST AND SECURE ATTENTION

Besides this first purpose of creating friendly feelings. there are two other ends which the speaker must accom

plish and toward which he usually begins to work in the introduction. One of these is to arouse the interest of the auditors in order to secure their best attention. Although related, it is distinct from the emotional set just considered. We need not demonstrate the necessity of attention. Without it, the speaker can no more hope to deliver his message than a telegraph sender can expect to transmit a message with the receiver asleep at the other end of the wire. The various devices to be used to gain the attention may be classified under two main headings: those which are of the nature of abrupt shocks and those which are promises of reward. The audience may be thrilled into attentiveness or they may be won by the expectation of hearing something of advantage to them. Either or both of these kinds of artifices may be used. By attention, we mean a state in which the hearer excludes other meditations and concentrates his mind upon the words of the speaker. It is a condition of intellectual acuteness.

THE STRIKING STIMULUS TO ATTENTION

As we have noted, the shock is one means of securing attention. It is especially valuable at the very beginning of a speech, but it may be used at any place where the speaker perceives that he is losing his grip upon the audience. French orators are very fond of the striking opening. Notice the effect of these words of Victor Hugo, used at the beginning of his defense of his

son:

Gentlemen of the jury, if there is a culprit here, it is not my son,-it is myself,-it is I! I, who for these twenty-five years have opposed capital punishment,-have contended for

the inviolability of human life, have committed this crime for which my son is now arraigned. Here I denounce myself, Mr. Advocate General! I have committed it under all aggravated circumstances, deliberately, repeatedly, tenaciously. Yes, this old and absurd lex talionis-this law of blood for blood-I have combated all my life-all my life, Gentlemen of the Jury! And while I have breath, I will continue to combat it, by all my efforts as a writer, by all my words and all my votes as a legislator! I declare it before the crucifix; before that victim of the penalty of death, who sees and hears us; before that gibbet, to which, two thousand years ago, for the eternal instruction of the generations, the human law nailed the Divine!

Robespierre began his last speech, delivered two days before his death, with these words:

The enemies of the Republic call me tyrant! Were I such they would grovel at my feet. I should gorge them with gold, I should grant them immunity for their crimes, and they would be grateful. Were I such, the kings we have vanquished, far from denouncing Robespierre, would lend me their guilty support. There would be a covenant between them and me.

Henry Ward Beecher is said to have begun a sermon, one hot Sunday morning, while mopping his brow, with the remark: "It is hotter than hell!" Naturally this shocked his very moral audience into attention, and he did not lose his initial hold on them until he had completed his talk on the punishment of sin. Once, when he was to speak in the Broadway Tabernacle, on the Death of John Brown, he waited in an ante-room, not going to the platform until the very moment his lecture was to begin. Then, suddenly opening the door, he sprang to the platform, dragging a massive chain after him. Facing the audience, he cried out: "These shackles bound the limbs of a human being; I hate them;

I trample them under foot!" and suited the action to the word.

Henry W. Grady, a Southerner, speaking before the New England Society, in New York, introduced his address on the New South as follows:

"There was a South of slavery and secession-that South is dead. There is a South of union and freedom-that South, thank God, is living, breathing, growing every hour."

These words, delivered from the immortal lips of Benjamin H. Hill at Tammany Hall in 1866, true then and truer now, I shall take for my text tonight.

In all these examples, we see that an unusual or unexpected thing was said. It forced attention. A paradox, epigram, or striking sentiment may always be depended upon to have the desired effect. But attention attracted in such a way is, as a rule, momentary only. If prolonged concentration is wanted, other agencies must be used to sustain the interest.

ATTENTION THROUGH PROMISED GAIN

The influence to be used to get and maintain more permanent attention is the promise of gain. The audience must have some hope of reward. If all can be made to believe that the speaker will treat a very vital subject -one touching their welfare or affecting those enterprises in which they are engaged, they will remain attentive.

Patrick Henry, in his Appeal to Arms, impressed the hearers with the importance of the discussion not only to their own but also to the nation's destiny.

Mr. President-No one thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as the abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen