y for a well-trained man, who is also carefully
and fully informed upon the subject under debate, to exert an influence
and not infrequently he may succeed in securing the acceptance of his
opinions.

But study alone will not make a good or even an acceptable speaker,
unless there is added also a period of careful practice. There are
many men of learning whose faculty for speaking is so limited that
their awkwardness is more conspicuous than their knowledge. The Lyceum
may be made a school of practice. The business should not be limited
to topics that do not excite feeling. The contests of the world rest
largely upon feeling, often degenerating into mere passion. Those
who are to take part in such contests should learn at an early period
of life to control their feelings and passions. Such benign results
can be reached only by experience. Let the debates of the Lyceum deal
with questions of living interest, and those who take part in such
contests will learn to control their feelings and thus prepare
themselves for the business of life.

John P. Robinson, of Lowell, was the best equipped member of the House
of 1842. He was then in the prime of life in years, but already
somewhat impaired. He was a thoroughly educated man, a trained lawyer,
of considerable experience in country practice--a practice which
renders the members of the profession more acute than the practice of
cities. In the country the controversies are about small matters
relatively, but the clients are deeply interested, the neighborhood
is enlisted on one side or the other, and the attendance at court of
the friends of the parties is often large. The counsel is tried quite
as rigorously and critically as is the case. Such was the condition of
things previous to 1848. Robinson was not only a good English scholar,
but he was devoted to the classics, and especially to the Greek
classics and history. Afterwards he became a resident of Athens where
he lived for several years. He was a good speaker in a high sense of
the phrase. In the sessions of 1842 and 1843 the system of
corporations was in controversy. The Democrats were in opposition
generally. The Whig Party favored the system. In the session of 1842
or 1843 citizens of Nantucket presented a petition for an Act of
Incorporation as a "Camel Company." The town had been the chief port
in the world for the whale-fishery business. Its insular position
rendered it necessary to obtain su