g, lectures, oratory and orators, using personal experiences
for illustration.

We have about eight thousand Chautauqua days, and fifteen thousand
lecture courses in this country every year, and yet comparatively few
persons know the history of the platform. Many have an idea that free
speech, like free air, has ever been a boon to mankind. They have no
conception of what it has cost, in imprisonment, exile, blood and
tears.

I am indebted to "Pond's History of the Platform" for facts and
illustrations in the early history of the platform in England. Two
hundred years ago in our mother land, the word platform meant no more
than a resting place for boxes and barrels. A religious service was
simply a routine of ritual, while such a thing as a public man
addressing the masses was unknown. Sir William Pitt, one of England's
greatest statesman and orators, in all his public life uttered only
two sentences to the public outside of Parliament. If William Jennings
Bryan had lived in Pitt's day, he would have been ignored by the Prime
Minister of England.

The first leaders of thought to come in contact with the people and
thrill them by the power of speech were John Wesley and George
Whitefield. "On a mount called Rose Hill, near Bristol, England,
George Whitefield laid the foundation of the modern platform." From
Rose Hill his audiences grew until on Kensington Commons thirty
thousand people tried to get within reach of his captivating voice. It
has been truthfully said: "At the feet of John Wesley and George
Whitefield the people of England learned their first lessons in
popular government."

This innovation, however, met with sneers, jeers and persecution from
the established conservatism of church and state, and when the
platform attempted to enter the arena of politics, Parliament decided
the "public clamor must end." A bill was framed forbidding any public
gatherings except such as should be called by the magistrates.

In advocating this bill a member of Parliament said: "The art of
political discussion does not belong outside of Parliament. Men who
are simply merchants, mechanics and farmers must not be allowed to
publicly criticise the constitution." To this the platform made reply:
"From such as we the Master selected those who were to sow the seed of
living bread in the wilds of Galilee." The bill passed by an
overwhelming majority. Punishment ran from fine and imprisonment to
years of exile from the country, a