ostentatious impressiveness. He sat some
time before he was introduced, seeming vast and overpowering--a very
Matterhorn of consequence. After introduction he stood with one hand
thrust in the breast of his tightly buttoned frock coat, and looked
tremendously all over the audience for perhaps an entire minute.
Everybody was awed; he looked so great. We all said to ourselves,
"What a mighty man this is!"

And when that effect had been produced upon us, the first and great
point of effectiveness had been destroyed: the speaker had made us
think about himself, his manner, his appearance, his personality. All
the evening we had to wade through that slough, trying to follow his
thought. And this reminds me of a saying of one of the most astute
politicians and most capable public men of recent development:

"The surest sign that a man is not great is that he strives to look
great."

I think that the best speech I ever heard for obedience to the rules
of art was an address of about ten minutes by a young Salvation Army
officer on the streets of Chicago. I listened with amazement. He was
perhaps twenty-three years of age, with delicate, clear-cut features,
sensitive mouth, and marvelously intelligent eyes. I was just passing
the group as he stepped into the circle that always surrounds these
noisy but sincere enthusiasts.

He took off his cap, and in a low, perfectly natural, and very sweet
voice, speaking exactly as though he were having a conversation with
his most confidential friend, he began: "You will admit, my friends,
that human happiness is the problem of human life." And from this
striking sentence he went on to another equally moving, showing, of
course, that happiness could not be secured by traveling any of the
usual roads, but only the straight and narrow path which the Master
has marked out.

It was as simple as it was sincere. And it was as conversational as it
was quiet. Before he had finished, his audience had gathered into
itself every pedestrian who passed during his discourse--business man,
professional man, working man, or what not.

The fight above described suggests the key to the matter as well as
the manner of speaking. The American audience properly demands, above
everything else, that the speaker get to the point. Our lives are so
rapid; the telephone, telegraph, and all the instantaneous agencies of
our neurotically swift civilization have made us so quick in seeing
through propositions; a