5. To increase your stock of words.

6. To store your memory with facts.

7. To analyze an author's thoughts.

8. To broaden your general knowledge.

2. FORM THE NOTE-BOOK HABIT

Keep separate note-books for the subjects in which you are deeply interested and on which you intend some time to speak in public. Write in them promptly any valuable ideas which come to you from the four principal sources—observation, conversation, reading, and meditation.

You will be surprized to find how rapidly you can acquire useful data in this way. In an emergency you can turn to the speech-material you have accumulated and quickly solve the problem of "what to say."

Keep the contents of your note-books in systematic order. Classify ideas under distinct headings. When possible write the ideas down in regular speech form. Once a week read aloud the contents of your note-books.

3. DAILY STUDY YOUR DICTIONARY

Read aloud each day from your dictionary for at least five minutes, and give special attention to the pronunciation and meaning of words. This is one of the most useful exercises for building a large vocabulary.

Develop the dictionary habit. Be interested in words. Study them in their contexts. Make special lists of your own. Select special words for special uses. Note significant words in your general reading.

Think of words as important tools for public speaking. Choose them with discrimination in your daily conversation. Consult your dictionary for the meanings of words about which you are in doubt. Be an earnest student of words.

4. SYSTEMATICALLY DEVELOP YOUR MENTAL POWERS

Give some time each day to the development of a judicial mind. Learn to think deliberately and carefully. Study causes and principles. Look deeply into things.

Be impartial in your examination of a subject. Study all sides of a question or problem. Weigh the evidence with the purpose of ascertaining the truth.

Beware the peril of prejudice. Keep your mind wide open to receive the facts. Look at a subject from the other man's viewpoint. Cultivate breadth of mind. Do not let your personal interests or desires mislead you. Insist upon securing the truth at all costs.

5. DAILY PRACTISE COMPOSITION

Frequent use of the pen is essential to proficiency in speaking. Write a little every day to form your English style. Daily exercise in writing will rapidly develop felicity and fluency of speech.

Test your important ideas by putting them into writing. Constantly cultivate clearness of expression. Examine, criticize, and improve your own compositions.

Copy in your handwriting at least a page daily from one of the great English stylists. Continue this exercise for a month and note the improvement in your speech and writing.

6. PRACTISE IMPROMPTU SPEAKING

At least once a day stand up, in the privacy of your room, and make an impromptu speech of two or three minutes. Select any subject which interests you. Aim at fluency of style rather than depth of thought.

In these daily efforts, use the best chest voice at your command, enunciate clearly, open your mouth well, and imagine yourself addressing an actual audience. A month's regular practise of this exercise will convince you of its great value.

7. STUDY SUCCESSFUL PUBLIC SPEAKERS

Hear the best public speakers available to you. Observe them critically. Ask yourself such questions as these:

1. How does this speaker impress me?

2. Does he proceed in the most effective manner possible?

3. Does he convince me of the truth of his statements?

4. Does he persuade me to act as he wishes?

5. What are the elements of success in this speaker?

As you faithfully apply these various suggestions, you will constantly improve in the art of public speaking, and so learn to wield this mighty power not simply for your personal gratification but for the inspiration and betterment of your fellow men.

MODEL SPEECHES FOR PRACTISE

AFTER-DINNER SPEAKING

BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

My Lord Coleridge, My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen:—I confess that my mind was a little relieved when I found that the toast to which I am to respond rolled three gentlemen, Cerberus-like into one, and when I saw Science pulling impatiently at the leash on my left, and Art on my right, and that therefore the responsibility of only a third part of the acknowledgment has fallen to me. You, my lord, have alluded to the difficulties of after-dinner oratory. I must say that I am one of those who feel them more keenly the more after-dinner speeches I make. There are a great many difficulties in the way, and there are three principal ones, I think. The first is having too much to say, so that the words, hurrying to escape, bear down and trample out the life of each other. The second is when, having nothing to say, we are expected to fill a void in the minds of our hearers. And I think the third, and most formidable, is the necessity of following a speaker who is sure to say all the things you meant to say, and better than you, so that we are tempted to exclaim, with the old grammarian, "Hang these fellows, who have said all our good things before us!"

Now the Fourth of July has several times been alluded to, and I believe it is generally thought that on that anniversary the spirit of a certain bird known to heraldic ornithologists—and I believe to them alone—as the spread eagle, enters into every American's breast, and compels him, whether he will or no, to pour forth a flood of national self-laudation. This, I say, is the general superstition, and I hope that a few words of mine may serve in some sort to correct it. I ask you, if there is any other people who have confined their national self-laudation to one day in the year. I may be allowed to make one remark as a personal experience. Fortune had willed it that I should see as many—perhaps more—cities and manners of men as Ulysses; and I have observed one general fact, and that is, that the adjectival epithet which is prefixt to all the virtues is invariably the epithet which geographically describes the country that I am in. For instance, not to take any real name, if I am in the kingdom of Lilliput, I hear of the Lilliputian virtues. I hear courage, I hear common sense, and I hear political wisdom called by that name. If I cross to the neighboring Republic Blefusca—for since Swift's time it has become a Republic—I hear all these virtues suddenly qualified as Blefuscan.

I am very glad to be able to thank Lord Coleridge for having, I believe for the first time, coupled the name of the President of the United States with that of her Majesty on an occasion like this. I was struck, both in what he said, and in what our distinguished guest of the evening said, with the frequent recurrence of an adjective which is comparatively new—I mean the word "English-speaking." We continually hear nowadays of the "English-speaking race," of the "English-speaking population." I think this implies, not that we are to forget, not that it would be well for us to forget, that national emulation and that national pride which