Extempore Speech: How to Acquire and Practice It

It does not follow from anything we have said that the pen should be discarded by the extempore speaker. Because he is not obliged to write each word, he should not feel excused from writing altogether. Few greater misfortunes could happen to a speaker than being deprived of the power of recording and preserving notes for the purposes of oratory. The most tenacious memory is burdened by the weight of a large number of intended discourses, especially if they are long and complex. No person can feel sure that he will remember all parts of the speech he intended to utter even in outline, unless it has been reduced to regular form so that one part will suggest another. In going to a store to purchase a few articles the pen is very useful in making a memorandum; if the errand boy neglects that precaution some of the most essential things may be forgotten. Among illiterate people a great many mnemonic signs have been employed, such as associating things to be remembered with the fingers, etc.; but among intelligent persons all of these have been superseded by the use of writing, and it would be very absurd to advocate a return to the old modes on the plea that the memory might be so strengthened that all items could be safely remembered. The reply would be ready: “Yes, it is possible; but we have a far better and less burdensome way of accomplishing the same object and have no motive in returning to the more difficult mode.” Thus while it may be possible to arrange in the mind all the outlines of a long discourse, it is not easy to do it, and there is no gain in the extra labor involved. Everything bearing upon a discourse may be written in brief outline, and then a selection made of what is best, throwing out all other portions. The remainder can then be far better arranged when in such a position that the eye as well as the mind can glance at it. The preparation for the intended speech thus assumes the shape of a miniature or outline, and may be filled out at any point which needs strengthening.

But even if it were possible to construct the plan and speak well without any previous use of the pen, this would, in the majority of cases, be insufficient. The orator needs to preserve the materials, if not the form of his oration, either for use in future speeches or for comparison with later efforts. It is very wasteful to throw away valuable material once accumulated, and then search the same ground over again when required to treat the same topic. This would be acting in the spirit of the savage who eats enough to satisfy his appetite and throws away all that remains, as he feels no further need for it, and only begins to gather again when hunger spurs him to exertion.

The pen is the instrument of accumulation and preservation, and should be diligently employed. No speaker can rise to permanent greatness without it. The instances given to the contrary are mere delusions or evasions. If the service of other pens can be employed, as in the case of short-hand reporters and amanuenses, this is but doing the same thing under another form.

The principal purpose of this third division of the work is to show how the pen may be used in such a manner as to preserve and arrange all the material we may gather, elaborate, or originate on any subject, so as to bring to the moment of unfettered extempore speech all the certainty of result and accumulated power of which our faculties are capable.

Bacon says: “Reading makes a full man, writing an exact man, and conference a ready man.” All these means should be used and all these qualities attained by the eloquent speaker.

We now enter upon the most practical part of our subject. We have seen what natural qualities are indispensable, and how these, when possessed, can be improved by training. The importance of a wide scope of knowledge bearing upon oratory, and of understanding and having some command of the powers of language has been pointed out. When a man has all of these, and is still a diligent student growing daily in knowledge, he is ready to consider the methods by which all his gifts and acquirements may be concentrated upon a single speech. Some of the directions in this and the immediately succeeding chapters are of universal application, while others are thrown out as mere suggestions to be modified and changed according to individual taste or particular circumstances.

A plan is necessary for every kind of speech. A rude mass of brick, lumber, mortar, and iron, thrown together as the materials chance to be furnished, does not constitute a house until each item is built into its own place according to some intelligent design. A speech has the same need of organization. A few minutes of desultory talk, whether uttered in a low or high voice, to one person or to many, does not make a speech. The talk may be good, or useful, or striking: it may be replete with sparkling imagery, and full of valuable ideas that command attention, and yet be no real discourse. The question, “What was all this about? what end did the speaker have in view?” is a fatal condemnation. The subject and object of every discourse should be perfectly obvious—if not at the opening, surely at the close of the address. The only safe method is to have a well-defined plan marked out from beginning to end, and then to bring every part of the work into subordination to one leading idea. The plan itself should be constructed with some clear object in view.

It is better that this construction of the plan should be completed before delivery begins. If you are suddenly called to speak on some topic you have often thought over, the whole outline of the address, with a plan perfect in every part, may flash upon you in a moment, and you may speak as well as if you had been allowed months for preparation. But such cases are rare exceptions. The man who attempts, on the spur of the moment, to arrange his facts, draw his inferences, and enforce his opinions, will usually find the task very difficult, even if the topic is within his mental grasp, and his memory promptly furnishes him with all necessary materials.

We will now consider the subject and object which every true discourse, whatever its character, must possess.

First, as to the object: why is it that at a particular time an audience assembles and sits in silence, while one man standing up, talks to them? What is his motive in thus claiming their attention? Many of them may have come from mere impulse, of which they could give no rational explanation, but the speaker at least should have a definite purpose.

A clear aim tends powerfully to give unity and consistency to the whole discourse, and to prevent him from wandering into endless digressions. It binds all detached parts together and infuses a common life through his address. Such a ruling aim cannot be too definitely recognized and carefully kept in view, for it is the foundation of the whole discourse.

This object should not be too general in character. It is not enough that we wish to please or to do good: it may be safely assumed that speakers generally wish to do both. But how shall these ends be reached? “What special good do I hope to accomplish by this address?”

When you have made the object definite, you are better prepared to adapt all available means to its accomplishment. It should also be stated that the more objects are subdivided the more precision will be augmented, though there is a limit beyond which such division would be at the expense of other qualities.

Your object will usually have reference to the opinion or the action of those addressed, and the firmer your own conviction of the truth of that opinion, or the desirableness of that action, the greater, other things being equal, your persuasive power will be. If you do not know exactly what you wish, there is little probability that your audience will care to interpret your thought; they will take it for granted that you really mean nothing, and even if you do incidentally present some truth supported by good arguments, they will consider it a matter not calling for any immediate consideration or definite decision on their part.

The speaker’s objects are comparatively few and are often determined by his very position and employment. If you are engaged in a political canvass you are seeking to confirm and retain the votes of your own party, while persuading over to your side the opposition. Votes constitute the object you seek, and to win them is your purpose. But there are many ways by which that desirable end may be accomplished—some wise and noble, others ignoble. But a political orator will gain in power by keeping clearly in view his purpose and rejecting from his speeches all things that merely arouse and embitter opponents, without, at the same time, contributing to strengthen the hold of the speaker’s own party upon its members.

If you are a lawyer you wish to win your case. The judge’s charge, the jury’s verdict, are your objective points, and all mere display which does not contribute directly or indirectly to these ends is worse than wasted, as it may even interfere with your real purpose.

Much of your success will depend upon keeping the right object before you at the right time. If you aim at that which is unattainable, the effort is not only lost, but the object which you could have reached may in the meantime have passed out of your reach. Everybody has heard ministers arguing against some forms of unbelief which their hearers know nothing about. This is worse than useless; it may suggest the very errors intended to be refuted; and if this does not result, to think that the refutation will be stored up until the time when the errors themselves may be encountered, is to take a most flattering view of the length of time during which sermons as well as other discourses are remembered. You may avoid these errors by selecting some object which is practicable at the moment of utterance: the first right step makes all after success possible.

There is a difference between the object of a speech and its subject; the former is the motive that impels us to speak, while the latter is what we speak about. It is not uncommon for talkers to have a subject without any definite object, unless it be the very general one of complying with a form or fulfilling an engagement. When the period for the talk comes—it would not be right to call it a speech—they take the easiest subject they can find, express all the ideas they happen to have about it, and leave the matter. Until such persons become in earnest, and get a living object, true eloquence is utterly impossible.

The object of a discourse is the soul, while the subject is but the body; or, as we may say, the one is the end, while the other is the means by which it is accomplished. After the object is clearly realized by the speaker, he can choose the subject to much better advantage. It may happen that one object is so much more important than all other practicable ones that it forces itself irresistibly on his attention and thus saves the labor of choice; at other times he may have several different objects with no particular reason for preferring one of them in the order of time to another. In this case if a subject fills his mind it will be well to discuss it with an aim toward the object which may be best enforced by its means.

After all, it makes but little difference which of these two is chosen first. It is enough that when you undertake to speak you have a subject you fully understand, and an object that warms your heart and enlists all your powers. You can then speak, not as one who deals with abstractions, but as having a living mission to perform.

It is important that each subject should be complete in itself, and rounded off from everything else. Its boundaries should be run with such precision as to include all that belongs to it, but nothing more. It is a common but grievous fault to have the same cast of ideas flowing around every subject. There are few things in the universe which have not some relation to everything else. If we do not, therefore, very strictly bound our subject, we will find ourselves bringing the same matter into each discourse and perpetually repeating our thoughts. If ingenious in that matter, we may find a good excuse for getting our favorite anecdotes and brilliant ideas into connection with the most opposite kinds of subjects. An old minister once gave me an amusing account of the manner in which he made outlines of the sermons of a local celebrity. The first one was a very able discourse, with three principal divisions—man’s fallen estate, the glorious means provided for his recovery, and the fearful consequences of neglecting those means. Liking the sermon very well, my informant went to hear the same man again. The text was new, but the first proposition, was man’s fallen estate; the second, the glorious means provided for his recovery; and the last, the fearful consequences of neglecting those means. Thinking that the repetition was an accident, another trial was made. The text was at as great a remove as possible from the other two. The first proposition was, man’s fallen estate; and the others followed in due order. This was an extreme instance of a common fault, which is by no means confined to the ministry. When an eloquent Congressman was once delivering a great address, a member on the opposite benches rubbed his hands in apparently ecstatic delight, and remarked in a stage whisper, “Oh! how I have always loved to hear that speech!” In a book of widely circulated sermon sketches, nearly every one begins by asserting that man has fallen and needs the helps or is liable to the evils mentioned afterward. No doubt this primary statement is important, but it might sometimes be taken for granted. The fault which we have here pointed out is not uncommon in preaching. Occasionally ministers acquire such a stereotyped form of expression that what they say in one sermon is sure to recur, perhaps in a modified form, in all others. This is intolerable. There is an end to the patience of man. He tires of the same old ideas, and wishes, when a new text is taken, that it may bring with it some novelty in the sermon. The remedy against the evil under consideration is found in the careful selection and definition of subjects. Give to each its own territory and guard rigidly against all trespassers. A speaker should not only see that what he says has some kind of connection with the subject in hand, but that it has a closer connection with that subject than any other he may be called upon to discuss at or near the same time. A very great lecturer advertises a number of lectures upon topics that seem to be totally independent. Yet all the lectures are but one, except a few paragraphs in the introduction of each. This is really a less fault in the case of an itinerating lecturer than in most other fields of oratory, as the same people hear the lecture but once. Yet even then the false assumption of intellectual riches implied in the numerous titles cannot be justified.

The subject should be so well defined that we always know just what we are speaking about. It may be of a general nature, but our knowledge of it should be clear and adequate. This is more necessary in an extempore than in a written speech, though the want of it will be severely felt in the latter also. A strong, vividly defined subject will give unity to the whole discourse, and probably leave a permanent impression on the mind of the hearer. To aid in securing this it will be well to reduce every subject to its simplest form, and then, by writing it as a compact phrase or sentence, stamp it on the mind, and let it ring in every utterance; that is, let each word aid in carrying out the central idea, or in leading up to it. Those interminable discourses that begin anywhere and lead nowhere, may be called speeches or sermons, by courtesy, but they are not such.

To always preserve this unity of theme and treatment is not easy, and calls, often, for the exercise of heroic self-denial. To see in the mind’s eye what we know would please and delight listeners, pander to their prejudices, or gain uproarious applause, and then turn away with the words unspoken, merely because it is foreign to our subject—this is as sore a trial as for a miser on a sinking ship to abandon his gold. But it is equally necessary, if we would not fall into grave rhetorical errors. Any speech which is constructed on the plan of putting into it all the wise or witty or pleasing things the speaker can think of will be a mere mass of more or less foolish talk. Shakespeare is often reproached with having neglected the dramatic unities of place and time; but he never overlooked the higher unities of subject and object. These remarks do not imply that illustration should be discarded or even used sparingly. The whole realm of nature may be ransacked for these gems, and if they do illustrate, they are often better than statement or argument. If the thing to be illustrated belongs to the subject, then every apt illustration of it also belongs there.

It is possible that men of genius may neglect the unity of subject and object, and still succeed by sheer intellectual force, as they might do under any other circumstances. But ordinary men cannot with safety follow the example of Sidney Smith. His hearers complained that he did not “stick to his text,” and, that he might reform the more easily, they suggested that he should divide his sermons as other ministers did. He promised to gratify them, and the next Sabbath, after reading his text, he began: “We will divide our discourse this morning into three parts: in the first place, we will go up to our text; in the second place, we will go through it; and in the third place, we will go from it.” There was general agreement that he succeeded best on the last head, but preachers who are not confident of possessing his genius had better confine themselves to the former two.

A true discourse is the orderly development of some one thought or idea with so much clearness and power that it may ever after live as a point of light in the memory. Other ideas may cluster around the central one, but it must reign supreme. If the discourse fails in this particular nothing else can redeem it. Brilliancy of thought and illustration will be as completely wasted as a sculptor’s art on a block of clay.

A man of profound genius once arose to preach before a great assemblage, and every breath was hushed. He spoke with power, and many of his passages were of thrilling eloquence. He poured forth beautiful images and solemn thoughts with the utmost profusion; yet when at the end of an hour he took his seat, the prevailing sentiment was one of disappointment. The address was confused—utterly destitute of any point of union to which the memory could cling. Many of his statements were clear and impressive, but he did not make evident what he was talking about. It was an impressive warning against erecting a building before laying a foundation.

After the subject upon which we are to speak has been determined the logical order of preparation is, first, gathering material; second, selecting what is most fitting and arranging the whole into perfect order; third, fixing this in the mind so that it may be available for the moment of use. These processes are not always separated in practice, but they may be best considered in the order indicated.

When a subject is chosen and the mind fastened upon it, that subject becomes a center of attraction and naturally draws all kindred ideas toward it. Old memories that had become dim from the lapse of time are slowly hunted out and grouped around the parent thought. Each hour of contemplation that elapses, even if there is not direct study, adds to the richness and variety of our available mental stores. The relations between different and widely separated truths become visible, just as new stars are seen when we gaze intently toward the evening sky. All that lies within our knowledge is subjected to a rigid scrutiny and all that appears to have any connection with the subject is brought into view. Usually a considerable period of time is needed for this process, and the longer it is continued the better, if interest in the subject is not suffered to decline in the meanwhile.

But it is somewhat difficult to continue at this work long enough without weariness. The capacity for great and continuous reaches of thought constitutes a principal element in the superiority of one mind over another. Even the mightiest genius cannot, at a single impulse, exhaust the ocean of truth that opens around every object of man’s contemplation. It is only by viewing a subject in every aspect that superficial and one-sided impressions can be guarded against. But the continuous exertion and toil this implies are nearly always distasteful, and the majority of men can only accomplish it by a stern resolve. Whether acquired or natural, the ability to completely “think out” a subject is of prime necessity; the young student at the outset should learn to finish every investigation he begins and continue the habit during life. Doing this or not doing it will generally be decisive of his success or failure from an intellectual point of view. Thought is a mighty architect, and if you keep him fully employed, he will build up with slow and measured strokes a gorgeous edifice upon any territory at all within your mental range. You may weary of his labor and think that the wall rises so slowly that it will never be completed; but wait. In due time, if you are patient, all will be finished and will then stand as no ephemeral structure, to be swept away by the first storm that blows, but will be established and unshaken on the basis of eternal truth.

M. Bautain compares the accumulation of thought around a subject upon which the mind thus dwells with the development of organic life by continuous growth from an almost imperceptible germ. Striking as is the analogy, there is one point of marked dissimilarity. This growth of thought is voluntary and may easily be arrested at any stage. The introduction of a new subject or cessation of effort on the old is fatal. To prevent this and keep the mind employed until its work is done requires with most persons a regular and formal system. Profound thinkers, who take up a subject and cannot leave it until it is traced into all its intricate relations and comprehended in every part, and who have at the same time the power of easily recalling long trains of thought that have once passed through their mind, have less need of an artificial method. But their case is not that of the majority of thinkers or speakers.

We will give a method found useful for securing abundant speech materials, and allow others to adopt it as far as it may prove advantageous to them.

The things we actually know are not always kept equally in view. Sometimes we may see an idea with great clearness and after a time lose it again, while another, at first invisible, comes into sight. Each idea should be secured when it occurs. Let each thought that arises on the subject you intend to discuss be noted. A word or a brief sentence sufficient to recall the conception to your own mind will be enough, and no labor need be expended on composition or expression. After this first gathering, let the paper be laid aside and the subject be recommitted to the mind for further reflection. As other ideas arise let them be noted down in the same manner and the process be thus continued for days together. Sometimes new images and conceptions will continue to float into the mind for weeks. Most persons who have not tried this process of accumulation will be surprised to find how many thoughts they have on the simplest topic. If some of this gathered matter remains vague and shadowy, it will only be necessary to give it more time and more earnest thought and all obscurity will vanish.

At last there comes the consciousness that the mind’s power on that particular theme is exhausted. If we also feel that we have all the material needed, one step further only remains in this part of the work; the comparison of our treasures with what others have accomplished in the same field. It may be that this comparison will show the worthlessness of much of our own material, but it is better to submit to the humiliation involved and be sure that we have the best that can be furnished by other minds as well as our own. If we prefer, we may speak when we have gathered only the materials that are already within our own grasp and thus have a greater consciousness of originality, but such consciousness is a delusion unless based upon exhaustive research. Nearly all that we thus gather will be the result of previous reading, and almost the only thing in its favor over the fresh accumulations that we make by reading directly in the line of our subject, is the probability that the former knowledge will be better digested.

But more frequently, after the young orator has recollected and briefly noted all that bears upon his subject with which his own mind furnishes him, there remains a sense of incompleteness, and he is driven to seek a further supply. He is now hungry for new information, and on this state there is an intellectual blessing corresponding to the moral blessing pronounced upon those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. He reads the works of those who have treated the same or related topics, converses with well-informed persons, observes the world closely, still putting down every new idea that seems to bear upon his theme. Whenever an idea is found which supplies a felt want, it is received with great joy. It often happens that instead of finding the very thing sought for he strikes upon the first link of some chain of thoughts in his own mind that leads up to what he desires, but has hitherto overlooked. The new idea is only the more valued when it has thus been traced out.

Now, we have on paper, and often after much toil, a number of confused, unarranged notes. They are destitute of polish, and no more constitute a speech than the piles of brick and lumber a builder accumulates constitute a house. Indeed, this comparison is too favorable, for the builder has carefully calculated just what he needs for his house, and has ordered those very things. But usually we have in our notes much that can be of no use, and at whatever sacrifice of feeling it must be thrown out. This is a matter of great importance. It has been said that the principal difference between the conversation of a wise man and of a fool is that the one speaks all that is in his mind, while the other gives utterance only to carefully selected thoughts. Nearly all men have at times ideas that would please and profit any audience; and if these are carefully weeded out from the puerilities by which they may be surrounded, the remainder will be far more valuable than the whole mass. Everything not in harmony with the controlling object or purpose must be thrown away at whatever sacrifice of feeling. Read carefully your scattered notes after the fervor of pursuit has subsided and erase every phrase that is unfitting. If but little remains you can continue the search as at first, and erase and search again, until you have all that you need of matter truly relevant to the subject. Yet it is not well to be over-fastidious. This would prevent speech altogether, or make the work of preparation so slow and wearisome that when the hour of effort arrived, all freshness and vigor would be gone. A knight in Spenser’s “Faery Queen” entered an enchanted castle and as he passed through eleven rooms in succession he saw written on the walls of each the words, “Be bold;” but on the twelfth the inscription changed to the advice of equal wisdom, “Be not too bold.” The same injunctions are appropriate to the orator. He should be careful in the selection of his material, but not too careful. Many things which a finical taste might reject are allowable and very effective. No definite rule, however, can be given on the subject, as it is a matter of taste rather than of calculation.

No part of the orator’s work is more important than that of constructing a good plan. If this is not well done the fullest success is impossible. In speech all thoughts are expressed by the slow process of successive words. If these are badly chosen and so arranged as to carry forward the current of thought in the wrong direction, almost endless hindrance and distraction may follow. And as these words, in extempore speech, are given forth on the spur of the moment, it becomes necessary to make such an arrangement that the proper idea to be dissolved into words shall always be presented to the mind at the proper time.

In some cases this disposition of parts is very easy. A course indicated by the very nature of the subject will sometimes spring into view and relieve us of all further embarrassment. A lawyer may find the discussion of the testimony of each of several witnesses, together with the formal opening and close, to be all the plan that he needs. But more frequently this portion of the orator’s task will both require and repay severe thought.

Many different kinds of plans have been pointed out by preceding writers, but we will indicate those only which have considerable practical importance.

The first of these may be called the narrative method. It is most frequently used when the recital of some history forms the principal part of the discourse. Certain leading events, either grouped together according to their nature or following the order of time, furnish the primary divisions. This kind of a discourse follows the same laws, in the arrangement of the different parts, as histories, romances, and narrative poems. The order of time is the most obvious method of constructing it, but this order should not be adhered to when the story can be better and more dramatically told by varying from it. Both introduction and conclusion should be very carefully selected—the former to arouse attention and direct it in the right course; the latter to leave the strongest impression and the one most in harmony with the object of the speaker.

The second method is the textual, and is especially though not exclusively adapted to sermons. In it a verse from the Bible, a motto, a sentence used by an opponent, or some definite form of very significant words, affords a basis for each part of the discourse. The order of the discourse may, however, be different from that of the words in the text, any change being allowable which secures more of the advantages of the narrative or logical methods. When the text is itself well known, a plan based upon it has an obvious advantage in assisting the memory both of speaker and hearer, by suggesting each part of the discourse at the proper time. When any lecture or oration has a formal motto which sums up and fairly expresses the subject discussed, the textual plan will be as well adapted to it as to a sermon.

The logical or mathematical method is the third and probably the most symmetrical form the plan may assume. A topic is taken, and after the introduction, which may be the mere statement of the subject, or of the relations of the speaker or of the audience to it, that subject is unfolded with all the precision of a proposition in geometry. Each thought is preliminary to that which follows, and the whole ends in the demonstration of some great truth and the deduction of its legitimate corollaries. This method is the best possible in those cases adapted to it—particularly those in which some abstruse subject is to be unfolded and proved.

The last method we will describe proceeds by divisions and subdivisions. It is the military method, for in it the discourse is organized like an army, into corps, brigades, and regiments; or it is like a tree, which divides into two or three principal branches, and these again subdivide until the finest twigs are reached. All the detached items that have been selected are brought into related groups, each governed by a central thought, and these again are held in strict subordination to the supreme idea.

A subject will many times arrange itself almost spontaneously into several different parts, which thus form the proper divisions, and these again may be easily analyzed into their proper subdivisions. Even when this is not the case, we will see, as we examine the jottings we have made while gathering our materials, that a few of the ideas stand out in special prominence, and with a little close study of relations and affinities all the others may be made to group themselves around these. The individual ideas we put down on the first study of the subject usually form the subdivisions, and some generalization of them the divisions.

It is not well to make the branches of a subject too numerous or they will introduce confusion and fail to be remembered. From two to four divisions with two or three subdivisions under each, are in a majority of cases better than a large number. The tendency to multiply them to a great extent, and then to name them in the moment of delivery, in their order of firstly, secondly, etc., is in a great measure responsible for the popular estimate of the dryness of sermons, where this kind of plan prevails more than anywhere else.

Examples of the different kinds of discourses here alluded to may be found in the New Testament. The sermon of Paul on Mars Hill was logical in its development. The introduction is an exquisite adaptation of his theme to the position of his hearers, and from that point each thought is a development from the preceding thought, until the whole weight of argument converges to the duty of repentance because of the coming of a day in which Jesus Christ will be Judge. But when Paul told the story of his conversion before Agrippa, the narrative form, with strict adherence to the order of time, was naturally adopted. No better example of the divisional form can be found than Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, in which the three chapters about correspond with the general divisions, and the paragraphs devoted to such topics as blessing, prayer, fasting, and forgiveness, with the subdivisions.

When we have accumulated our materials, stricken out all that is unfitting or superfluous, and determined the general character of our discourse, the remainder of the work of finishing the plan must be left to individual taste and judgment. No rules can be given that will meet every case. We might direct to put first those statements or arguments which are most easily comprehended, and those which are necessary for understanding other portions of the discourse, and also whatever is least likely to be disputed. Something strong and impressive should be held well in reserve. It will not be according to the principles of that highest art which is the best mirror of nature if we exhaust interest in the opening and then close tamely. Beyond these obvious considerations little help can be given to the orator in this part of his work. He must form his own ideal and then work up to it. We do not advise any one to borrow other men’s outlines for the purpose of filling them up and then speaking from them as if the work was original. This is a most profitless kind of plagiarism. Such sketches may be useful to the very young speaker, merely as indications of the kind of excellence in plans or sketches at which he should aim. And when he hears good discourses he may look beneath the burning words and criticise the merits of the framework upon which they rest. This may render him less satisfied with his own plans, but such dissatisfaction ever affords the best hope for future success.

The true mode of improving your plans is to bestow a great deal of time and thought upon them, and to make no disposition of any part for which you cannot give a satisfactory reason. This direction relates only to the beginner. In time the formation of plans will become so natural that any variation from the most effective arrangement will be felt as keenly as a discord in music is felt by a master in that art. From such carefully constructed plans, firm, coherent, and logical discourses will result.

There are certain general characteristics that each plan should possess. It must fully indicate the nature of the proposed discourse and mark out each of its successive steps with accuracy. Any want of definiteness in the outline is a fatal defect. You must feel that you can rely absolutely on it for guidance to the end of your discourse or be always in danger of embarrassment and confusion.

Each clause should express a distinct idea, and but one. This should be repeated in no other part of the discourse; otherwise, we fall into wearisome repetitions, the great vice, as it is often claimed, of extempore speakers.

A brief plan is better, other things being equal, than a long one. Often a single word will recall an idea as perfectly as many sentences, and it will burden the memory less. We do not expect the draft of a house to equal the house in size, but only to preserve a proportionate relation to it throughout. The plan cannot supply the thought, but, indicating what is in the mind, it shows how to bring it forth in regular succession. It is a pathway leading to a definite end, and, like all pathways, its crowning merits are directness and smoothness. Without these qualities it will perplex and hinder rather than aid. Each word in the plan should suggest an idea, and be so firmly bound to that idea that the two cannot become separated in any exigency of speech. You will find it sorely perplexing if, in the heat of discourse, some important note should lose the thought for which it previously stood and become an empty word. But with clear conceptions condensed into fitting words this cannot easily happen. A familiar idea can be expressed very briefly, while a strange or new conception may require more expansion. But all thoughts advanced by the speaker ought to be familiar to himself as the result of long meditation and thorough mastery, no matter how strange or startling they are to his hearers. Most skeletons may be brought within the compass of a hundred words, and every part be clearly indicated to the mind that conceived it, though perhaps not to any other.

There may be occasions when a speaker is justified in announcing his divisions and subdivisions, but such cases are exceptions. Hearers do not care how a discourse is constructed, so it comes to them warm and pulsating with life. To give the plan of a speech before the speech itself is contrary to the order of nature. We are not required first to look upon a grisly skeleton before we can see a graceful, living body. There is a skeleton inside each body, but during life it is well hidden, and there is no reason that the speaker should anticipate the work of the tomb. It is hardly less objectionable to name the parts of the discourse during the progress of the discussion, for—continuing the former illustration—bones that project through the skin are very unlovely. The only ease, I presume to think, where it is justifiable to name the parts of a discourse, either before or during its delivery, is where the separate parts have an importance of their own, in addition to their office of contributing to the general object. Much of the proverbial “dryness” of sermons arises from the preacher telling what he is about to remark, firstly, before he actually makes the remark thus numbered. Whenever we hear a minister read his text, announce his theme, state the parts into which he means to divide it, and then warn us that the first head will be subdivided into a certain number of parts, each of which is also specified in advance, we prepare our endurance for a severe test.

What great speeches require are deep, strong appeals to the hearts of the people, through which shines the radiance of great truths and the lightning of intense convictions. These can all find their place in the most logically constructed address if the logic be not brought out and paraded in its offensive nakedness. No matter if the orator’s mode of work is less understood. A tree is far more beautiful and impressive when covered with waving foliage, even if some of the branches are hidden. Let the tide of eloquence flow on in an unbroken stream, bearing with it all hearts, but giving no indication of the manner in which it is guided; or, better still, let it move with the impetus of the cannon-ball, but without proclaiming in advance the mark toward which it is flying.

The plan should go just as far as the intended speech, that we may know exactly where to stop. Then we can arise with confidence, for we are sure that we have something to say; we know what it is, and, most important of all, we will know when it is finished. Most of the objections urged against extempore speaking apply only to speeches that have no governing plan. But when a firm and clear plan is prearranged, there is no more danger of saying what we do not intend, or of running into endless digressions, than if every word was written. Indeed, there is no better way of guarding against undue discursiveness in a written speech than by arranging such a plan before beginning to write.

But it may be urged that this laborious preparation—this careful placing of every thought—will require as much time as to write in full. It may at first. The mind needs to be drilled into the work, and it will be of great value even as a mental discipline. No study of logic or of metaphysics will give such practical insight into the nature of the mind’s workings as this pre-arrangement of thoughts and words to frame a speech. But the work grows continually easier with practice, until the mature speaker will save three-fourths—or even more than that proportion—of the time consumed by the speech-writer.

The speech is now clearly indicated. A plan has been prepared that fixes each item in its proper place. There is no further danger of the looseness and desultoriness with which extempore speech has been reproached. Yet there is abundant room for the inspiration of the moment. It is possible, in all the fire of utterance, to leave the beaten track and give expression to any new ideas that may be called up by the ardor of speech. But a sure foundation is laid—a course is marked out which has been deeply premeditated, and which gives certainty to all we say.

Now that the plan is completed and fully written out, the next question arises as to what shall be done with it. It may either be used or abused. To read it to the audience or exhibit it to them would be an obvious abuse. Possibly if the speaker possessed a large blackboard, the latter course might, in special cases, have some advantages. But even then it is better that the students should, in most instances, exercise their own ingenuity in gathering out of the body of the speech the central thoughts which they wish to preserve in their notebooks, than that the work should be done for them in advance by having the whole plan of the lecture placed in their sight.

The writer has experimented on this subject by repeating the same lecture to different classes with the outline in some cases exposed to view, and in the others concealed: the interest has always seemed to be greater, and the understanding more complete in the latter case. If this is true where instruction is the only aim, it is still more necessary where persuasion is the object of the speaker. The exposing in advance of the means by which he intends to work, will put on their guard the very persons whose hearts he wishes to capture, and thus lose him all that advantage of surprise which is often as momentous in oratorical as in military affairs.

There are two other ways of using the plan to be considered. One is to keep it in the speaker’s sight, so that he may step along from one item to another, thus keeping a foundation of written words in the midst of the uncertainty of his extemporaneous efforts, like that afforded by stepping-stones to a man crossing a running stream. There are some advantages in such use. The speaker will feel freer in making those pauses which are sometimes necessary for the sake of emphasis. He is better able to collect his scattered ideas in case any untoward circumstance should break the thread of his discourse. If he is confused for a moment, he may look down to his paper and recover himself, while if thoughts and words flow easily he can ignore the plan which lies before him.

But all the reasons for thus using the plan are the most emphatic condemnation of the practice. They are all make-shifts. They are based upon the thought that the great object is to secure the speaker from danger and confusion; in other words, they put him on the defensive, instead of the aggressive. Were the question to be stated, “How can a man best preserve the form of extemporaneous speech while shielding himself from the most dangerous incidents of that mode of address?” it might plausibly be replied, “By making a very full plan and concealing it at some point within the reach of his eyes, and using it whenever that course becomes easiest.”

But we have not sought to point out the mode of speech which will best protect the speaker from risks incident to his work. For real effectiveness, compromises are usually hurtful, and this expedient forms no exception.

To have a plan in sight tends powerfully to break up the speech into fragments and destroy its unity. A series of short addresses on related points, affords no substitute for a concentrated discourse. The speaker who publicly uses his sketch, speaks on until he reaches a point at which he does not know what is to come next, and on the brink of that gulf, looks down at his notes, and, perhaps after a search, finds what he wants. Had the thought existed in his mind, it would have blended the close of the preceding sentences into harmony with it. Direct address to the people, which they so much value in a speaker, is interfered with in the same way, for his eye must rest for a portion of the time upon his notes. He will also be apt to mention the divisions of his speech as they occur, because the eye is resting upon them at the same time the tongue is engaged, and it is hard to keep the two members from working in harmony.

If notes must be used the same advice applies that we have already offered to those who read in full. Be honest about it; do not try to hide the notes. Any attempt to prove to an audience that we are doing what we are not doing, has in it an element of deception, and is morally objectionable. The use of notes is not wrong, but to use them while pretending not to use them is wrong.

Some speakers carry their notes in their pockets for the sake of being able to take them out in case they find their memory failing, and thus they guard against the misfortune which once befell the eloquent Abbe Bautain, who, on ascending the pulpit to preach before the French King and Court, found that he had forgotten subject, plan, and text. This method is honest and unobjectionable, for the notes of the plan are either not used by the speaker at all, or if he takes them from his pocket, the people will understand the action.

The only remaining method, and that which we would urge upon every extempore speaker, is to commit the plan, as sketched, to memory. It is put in the best possible shape for the expression of the subject by the labor which has been previously bestowed upon it, and now such review as will give the mind a perfect recollection of the whole subject in its orderly unfolding is just what is needed for final mastery. Previously much of the work of preparation was given to detached fragments. Now the subject as a whole is spread out. The time given to a thorough memorizing of the plan need not be great; it will indeed be but small if the plan itself is so well arranged that every preceding part suggests what follows; but it will be the most fruitful of all the time spent in preparation. It puts you in the best condition for speaking. The object is then fixed in the heart and will fire it to earnestness and zeal, while the subject is spread, like a map, before the mental vision. All the power you possess can then be brought to bear directly upon the people. Do not fear that in the hurry of discourse you will forget some part of what is clear when you begin. If you are in good mental and physical condition, the act of speech will be exhilarating and stimulating, so that every fine line of preparation will come into clearness just at the right time, and many a relation unperceived before, many a forgotten fact, will spring up in complete and vivid perception. There is a wonderful luxury of feeling in such speech. Sailing with a swift wind, riding a race-horse, even the joy of victorious battle—indeed, all enjoyments that arise from the highest powers called forth into successful exercise—are inferior to the thrill and intoxication of the highest form of successful extemporaneous speech. To think of using notes then would seem like a contemptible impertinence! Imagine Xavier or Luther with their notes spread out before them, looking up the different items from which to address the multitudes spell-bound before them! The Presbyterian Deacon who once prayed in the presence of his note-using Pastor, “O Lord! teach Thy servants to speak from the heart to the heart, and not from a little piece of paper, as the manner of some is,” was not so very far wrong!

It is advisable to commit the plan to memory a considerable time before speaking. It then takes more complete possession of the mind and there is less liability of forgetting some portion. This is less important when the subject is perfectly familiar, for then “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh,” but those subjects which have been recently studied for the first time are in a different position; and some meditation upon that which has just been arranged in its best form will be very serviceable. Even if the salient points are firmly grasped, some of the minor parts may require further close consideration. No study is ever so profitable as that which is bestowed after the plan is complete, for up to that time there is danger that some of the thoughts to which our attention is given may be ultimately rejected and others radically modified. But when the plan is finished each idea has settled into its place. If obscurity rests anywhere, it may be detected at once, and the strength of the mind be brought to bear for its banishment. Impressions derived from meditation are then easily retained until the hour of speech, because associated with their proper place in the prepared outline. Such deep meditation on each division of the discourse can scarcely fail to make it original in the true sense of the term, and weave all its parts together with strong and massive thoughts.

After the plan has been memorized we can meditate upon it not only at the desk, but anywhere. As we walk about or lie in bed, or at any other time find our minds free from distractions, we can ponder the ideas that cluster around our subject until they grow perfectly familiar. Even when we are reading or thinking on other topics, brilliant thoughts will not unfrequently spring up, or those we possessed before take stronger and more definite outlines. All such gains can be held in memory without the use of the pen, because the plan furnishes a suitable place for them.

The course here described we would urge strongly upon the consideration of the young speaker. If carefully followed, its results will be invaluable. Arrange the plan from which you are to speak as clearly as may be in the form of a brief sketch; turn it over and over again; ponder each idea and the manner of bringing it out; study the connection between all the parts until the whole from beginning to end appears perfectly plain and simple. So frequently has this mode of preparation been tested that its effectiveness is no longer a matter of experiment.

It is advantageous to grasp the whole subject, as early as possible, in a single idea—in the same manner in which the future tree is compressed within the germ from which it is to spring. Then this one thought will suggest the entire discourse to the speaker, and at its conclusion will be left clear and positive in the hearer’s mind. For some acute auditors this may be less necessary. They are able to outrun a loose speaker, arrange his scattered fragments, supply his omissions, and arrive at the idea which has not yet formed itself clearly in his own mind. Such persons often honestly commend orators who are incomprehensible to the majority of their hearers. But the opinions of such auditors are an unsafe guide, for they form a very small minority of any assembly.

There is one further step which may sometimes precede the moment of speech with profit—the placing upon paper of a brief but connected sketch or statement of the whole discourse. If this is made in the ordinary writing there is danger that its slowness will make it more of a word-study than what it is intended to be—a test of ideas. A thorough mastery of shorthand, or the service of some one who has such mastery, will supply this defect. If the plan is well arranged there will be no pause in the most rapid composition, and if the whole discourse can at one effort be thrown into a dress of words there may be full assurance that the same thing can be accomplished still more easily and effectively when the additional stimulus of an audience is supplied. There should be no attempt, in the moment of speaking, to recall the very words used in writing, but the command of language will undoubtedly be greatly improved by having so recently used many of the terms that will be again required. Frequently there will be fine passages in the speech which you have thus struck off at white heat that you may be unwilling to forget, but it is better to make no effort to remember them, for you are almost sure to rise still higher in the moment of public delivery.

When this rapid writing is not available, a partial substitute for it may be found in writing in the ordinary hand a brief sketch or compact model of the whole discourse. You will be surprised to notice how short a compass will suffice for a discourse requiring an hour or more in delivery, without the omission of a single material thought. Such a sketch differs from the plan in clearly expressing all the ideas that underlie the coming speech, while the latter would be nearly unintelligible to any but its author. The one is only a few marks thrown out in the field of thought by which an intended pathway is indicated; the other is a very brief view of the thoughts themselves, without adornment or verbiage. Some speakers who might feel insecure in trusting the notes and hints of the plan would feel perfectly safe in enlarging upon a statement of their thoughts so brief that the whole sketch of the speech would not require more than three or four minutes to read. But this whole plan of writing, either in full or in brief, is only an expedient, and need not be adopted by those who have full confidence in their trained and cultivated powers.

After you have prepared your plan it is well to preserve it for future use, which may be done by copying it into a book kept for that purpose: or, what is more convenient in practice, folding the slip of paper on which it is written into an envelope of suitable size with the subject written on the back. These may be classified and preserved, even in very large numbers, so as to be easily consulted. From time to time, as your ability grows, they may be improved upon so as to remain the complete expression of your ability on every theme treated. On the back of the envelope may also be written references to any source of additional information on the same subject, and printed or written scraps, valuable as illustrations, or for additional information, may be slipped inside.