"Public speaking" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the confession. The meeting was announced two weeks ahead. It was a fine day, and through curiosity a great crowd assembled. I had never been in the pulpit before, nor made any remarks in the church except to pray. The brethren had a Bible-class every Lord's day when there was no preaching, and no public speaking was indulged in except a few remarks at the Lord's table, by one of the elders. Though I was accustomed to speak in public, I felt a responsibility in this matter that I never felt before. I decided upon three things as insuring success, or at ...
— Autobiography of Frank G. Allen, Minister of the Gospel - and Selections from his Writings • Frank G. Allen
... are spent in the military or naval service of their country are not, as a rule, accustomed to public speaking. It is actions, not words that are demanded of them, those actions, properly conducted and carried out being the safety ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson
... translation of the Greek terms used by physiologists side by side with the originals. We cannot too strongly insist upon the necessity of forming a scientific basis for teaching singing, and, indeed, for training the voice for public speaking, &c. We congratulate Herr Behnke upon the patience and perseverance with which he has pursued his investigations with ...
— The Mechanism of the Human Voice • Emil Behnke
... be lost who on the day of battle should bethink him that the enemy's cause might after all perhaps be just. The debater does not ask, 'Is this true?' He asks, 'What is the answer to this? How can I most surely floor him?' Lord Coleridge inquired of Mr. Gladstone whether he ever felt nervous in public speaking: 'In opening a subject often,' Mr. Gladstone answered, 'in reply never.' Yet with this inborn readiness for combat, nobody was less addicted to aggression or provocation. It was with him a salutary maxim ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... debating societies which met at the villages or schoolhouses were then common. They were usually well conducted, and they were excellent incentives to study, affording good opportunity for acquiring habits of debate and public speaking. They are, unfortunately, no longer common. These lyceums I frequented, and participated in the discussions. I taught public school "a quarter," the winter of 1852-53, at the Black-Horse tavern schoolhouse, on Donnels Creek, for ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... resolutions as had never before been heard in Worcester; and when he sat down, the same informant said that "not a man of the whig party thought a single word could be said,—that old Putnam, the tory, had wiped them all out." Timothy Bigelow at length arose, without learning, without practice in public speaking, without wealth,—the tories of Worcester had, at that day, most of the wealth and learning,—but there he stood upon the floor of the Old South Church, met the Goliath of the day, and vanquished him. The governor of Massachusetts Bay, and ...
— Reminiscences of the Military Life and Sufferings of Col. Timothy Bigelow, Commander of the Fifteenth Regiment of the Massachusetts Line in the Continental Army, during the War of the Revolution • Charles Hersey
... established a club entitled the New Salem Literary Society. Before this association, the studious Lincoln was invited to speak. Mr. R.B. Rutledge, the brother of Anne Rutledge, says of the event: "About the year 1832 or 1833, Mr. Lincoln made his first effort at public speaking. A debating club, of which James Rutledge was president, was organized and held regular meetings. As Lincoln arose to speak, his tall form towered above the little assembly. Both hands were thrust down deep in the pockets of his pantaloons. ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... HAVE COPIED THE WORKS OF THE OTHER?" Ovid held him in no less admiration; and Plutarch has been lavish in his praise: the old rhetoricians recommend his works as the true and perfect patterns of every thing beautiful and graceful in public speaking. Quintilian advises an orator to seek in Menander for copiousness of invention, for elegance of expression, and all that universal genius which is able to accommodate itself to persons, things, and affections: but that which appears to us more ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... busy with his French Revolution and so did not make as careful preparation as he might have made. Yet he was so full of his subject that if he could overcome the difficulties of public speaking, he was bound to be interesting. As the day approached both he and his wife grew nervous. For diversion he drew up a humorous ending: "Good Christians, it has become entirely impossible for me to talk to you about German or any literature or terrestrial thing; one request ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... Public Speaking—Organize the class as a club. Let the officers arrange a program consisting of declamations, debates, essays, dialogues, etc. This day may also be used for the reading of the best articles that members of the ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller
... speaker's voice fade away and are forever lost. Too often the ideas which the voice proclaimed drift into the background and presently disappear. This is the crowning limitation of public speaking. The lecturer should be, first of all, an educator, and his work should not be "writ in water." The lazy lecturer who imagines that his duties to his audience end with his peroration is unfaithful to his ...
— The Art of Lecturing - Revised Edition • Arthur M. (Arthur Morrow) Lewis
... genius as he was superior to him in the arts and foresight of a political leader. He better understood the people than did his great political rival, and more warmly sympathized with their conditions and aspirations. He became a typical American politician, not by force of public speaking, but by dexterity in the formation and management of a party. Both Patrick Henry and John Adams were immeasurably more eloquent than he, but neither touched the springs of the American heart like this quiet, modest, peace-loving, far-sighted politician, since he, more than any other man ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XI • John Lord
... novelists and playwrights employ to galvanize the public mind and compel its attention, are to be found again, in their rudiments, in our most commonplace conversations, in our letter-writing, and above all in public speaking. Our performances in language compared to those of a man well-balanced and serene, are what our hand-writing is compared to that of our fathers. The fault is laid to steel pens. If only the truth were acknowledged!—Geese, then, could save us! But the evil goes deeper; it is in ourselves. ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... this kind properly handled. Perhaps the best man on this sort of thing in the campaign was Mullins, the banker. A man of his profession simply has to have figures of trade and population and money at his fingers' ends and the effect of it in public speaking is wonderful. ...
— Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town • Stephen Leacock
... names attached, which could in any way be tortured into a libel. Parris lets fall expressions which show that he was on the watch for something of the kind to seize upon, to transfer the movement from the church to the courts. Entirely unaccustomed to public speaking, these three farmers had to meet assemblages composed of their opponents, and much wrought up against them; to make statements, and respond to interrogatories and propositions, the full and ultimate bearing of which was not ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... of doing public speaking as her only means of earning her living. She continued to look for positions, but without success. Finally she took a district school in Bucks County, at a monthly salary of twenty-five dollars. So interested was she in the "Progressive Friends'" Sunday meetings that she went home every second ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... the platform the noise suddenly stopped, for all were much surprised to see Stephen Frenelle standing there. Never before had he been known to do such a thing, especially at a political meeting. What could he have to say? All wondered. And Stephen, too, was surprised. He was not accustomed to public speaking, and shrank from the thought of facing so many people. But he was very calm now, and in his eyes flashed a light which bespoke danger. In his right hand he clutched several papers, which all noted. He looked steadily over the ...
— The Fourth Watch • H. A. Cody
... the Indian took his seat with the other; and it was my turn to speak. I was very near beginning, "Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking;" but I knew that such an acknowledgment would in their estimation, have very much lessened my value as a warrior; for, like the Duke of Wellington, one must be as valuable in the council as in the field, to come up to their notions of excellence. ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... a French official with the exclamation, "Well, it sounds good to hear someone even swear in old Anglo-Saxon!" After two months of enforced silence, she was buoyant in reaching the British Islands once more, where she could enjoy public speaking and general conversation. Here she was the recipient of many generous social attentions, and, on May 25, a large public meeting of representative people, presided over by Jacob Bright, was called, in our honor, by the National ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton
... to public speaking I was taught to "elocute," and I remember in every mournful detail the occasion on which I gave my first recitation. We were having our monthly "public exhibition night," and the audience included not only my classmates, but their parents and friends as well. The selection I intended to ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw
... acquaintance among the class which it was necessary to reach. He knew the men who at the University had been the digs, and jays, and grinds, and who were now the prosperous farmers, the bankers, the school-trustees, the leading men in their communities; and his geniality, vivacity, and knack for informal public speaking made him eminently fitted to represent the University in the somewhat thankless task of coaxing and coercing backward communities to expend the necessary money and effort to bring their schools up ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... ready and prompt, his conceptions seemed to me almost intuitive. His voice was fine, softened, and, I think, improved, by a slight lisp, which an attentive observer could discern. The great theatres of eloquence and public speaking in the United States are the legislative hall, the forum, and the stump, without adverting to the pulpit. I have known some of my contemporaries eminently successful on one of these theatres, without being able to exhibit ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... Charlie, "I advise you to speak at political meetings, and I hope you will speak here first. It will be the best thing you can do. If I possessed your abilities for public speaking, I would do it in ...
— The Bobbin Boy - or, How Nat Got His learning • William M. Thayer
... or piously sentimental anecdotes, the whole glued together by platitudes of the Martin Tupper or Samuel Smiles variety. It is certainly an obvious but greatly neglected truth that simplicity and candor in public speaking, largeness of mental movement, what Phillips Brooks called direct utterance of comprehensive truths, are indispensable prerequisites for any significant ethical or spiritual leadership. But, taken as a main theme, ...
— Preaching and Paganism • Albert Parker Fitch
... that he completed his education at the capital city, Booker Washington seems to have been tempted in a strange and unexpected way to give his life and energy to public speaking and politics. He took part in the agitation as a representative of a committee—which resulted in Charleston taking the place of Wheeling as capital of West Virginia. By effective platform work he no doubt ...
— From Slave to College President - Being the Life Story of Booker T. Washington • Godfrey Holden Pike
... Holmes as President of the day, at the annual dinner of the Harvard Alumni Association, in Cambridge, July 19, 1860, inaugurating the practice of public speaking at the "Harvard Dinners." That year also took place the inauguration of President C. Felton, an event to which the speaker alludes in his graceful reference to the "goodly armful of scholarship, experience ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... of extemporaneous reply. My manner, they say, is cold and wants care. I feel this myself. Nothing but strong excitement, and a great occasion, overcomes a certain reserve and mauvaise honte which I have in public speaking; not a mauvaise honte which in the least confuses me, or makes me hesitate for a word, but which keeps me from putting any fervour into my tone or my action. This is perhaps in some respects an advantage; for, when I do warm, I am the most vehement speaker in the House, and nothing strikes ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... Isador Loeb of the University of Missouri for a course of lectures on government. All the women's clubs united into one school. The course included principles of government, organization, publicity, public speaking, suffrage history and argument, parliamentary law ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... art of printing was invented, public opinion was molded almost entirely by public speaking, and for a great many years afterward the orator was the greatest of leaders. By the magic of his eloquence he changed the views of men and inspired them to deeds of valor. The fiery orations of a Demosthenes, of a Cicero; the thrilling words of a ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... any ambition to appear respectable among people of education, whether in conversation, in correspondence, in public speaking, or in print, must be aware of the absolute necessity of a competent knowledge of the language in which he attempts to express his thoughts. Many a ludicrous anecdote is told, of persons venturing to use words of which they did not know the proper application; many a ridiculous ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... The varied literary productions of Cicero have also come under our notice, [Footnote: See page 202] but they deserve more attention, though they are too many to be enumerated. Surpassing all others in the art of public speaking, he was evidently well prepared to write on rhetoric and oratory as he did; but his general information and scholarly taste led him to go far beyond this limit, and he made considerable investigations in the domains of politics, history, and philosophy, law, theology, and morals, besides ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... Posthumous Works,' edited by Helen Taylor, were published in 1872. Among these are a lecture on 'Woman,' delivered before the Royal Institution,—Buckle's single and very successful attempt at public speaking,—and a Review of Mill's 'Liberty,' one of the finest contemporary appreciations of that thinker. But he wrote little outside his 'History,' devoting himself with entire singleness ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... me of those creatures," said Bob, "those men-women, those anomalies, neither flesh nor fish, with their conventions, and their cracked woman-voices strained in what they call public speaking, but which I call public squeaking! No man reverences true women more than I do. I hold a real, true, thoroughly good woman, whether in my parlor or my kitchen, as my superior. She can always teach me something that I need to know. She has always ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... warned at the Dumont Estate that a brass band had been sent to the Riberao Preto station, where some notabilities were awaiting my arrival in order to greet me with the usual speeches of welcome. As I particularly dislike public speaking and publicity, I managed to mix unseen among the crowd—they expecting to see an explorer fully armed and in khaki clothes of special cut as represented in illustrated papers. It was with some relief that I saw them departing, with disappointed faces, and with their brass instruments, big drums ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... there that America could produce so finished a gentleman as Mr. Lowell; and perhaps they had had some reason to doubt this, if they judged by the average American tourist. They wondered, too, at his delightful public speaking,—a thing to which Englishmen are not as much accustomed as Americans. They have a heavy, labored way of speaking, extremely painful to listeners accustomed to the ease of American speakers; and they were never weary of listening to the pleasing and ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... am so sorry." Saying this she laid her right hand on Phillida's lap caressingly. "Tell me, beloved, what it is all about?" Mrs. Frankland was still in a state of stimulation from public speaking, and her words were pitched in the key of a peroration. At this moment she would probably have spoken with pathos if she had been merely giving directions for cooking the ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... trained his reading-classes in the Art of Gesticulation in Public Speaking, and Miss Margaret found the results of his labors so entertaining that she had never been able to bring herself ...
— Tillie: A Mennonite Maid - A Story of the Pennsylvania Dutch • Helen Reimensnyder Martin
... Remarkable Memory. His Costume and Personal Habits. His Library. His Theology. His Adherence to Quaker Usages. Capital Punishment. Rights of Women. Expressions of gratitude from Colored People. His fund of Anecdotes and his Public Speaking. Remarks of Judge Edmonds thereon. His separation from the Society of Friends in New-York. Visit to his Birth-place. Norristown Convention. Visit from his Sister Sarah. Visit to Boston. Visit to Bucks County. Prison Association in New-York. Correspondence ...
— Isaac T. Hopper • L. Maria Child
... the foreman very well. He was a carpenter and joiner in whose shop he had often played—a big, bluff, good-hearted man whom any public speaking appalled, and who stammered badly as he read from a little slip of paper: "Guilty of assault with intent to commit great bodily injury, but recommended to the mercy of the judge." Then, with one hand in his breeches pocket, ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... qualities in a leader upon which his authority so often rests, for there can be little doubt that their appeal is more generally to instinct than to reason. In ordinary politics it must be admitted that the gift of public speaking is of more decisive value than anything else. If a man is fluent, dextrous, and ready on the platform, he possesses the one indispensable requisite for statesmanship; if in addition he has the gift of moving deeply the emotions of his hearers, his capacity for guiding the infinite ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... forest organization in the Government Service in the United States and in the Philippines, and in the service of the States; for handling large tracts of private forest lands; for expert work in the employ of lumbermen and other forest owners; for public speaking and writing; for teaching; ...
— The Training of a Forester • Gifford Pinchot
... ignorant, and relieve the sorrows of human-kind. This idea has not taken so firm a hold of the christian public as its importance deserves. How useful might some, who have little talent either for learning or public speaking, become, would they disinterestedly devote their lives to the acquisition of money for purposes of beneficence. Wealth, pursued with this spirit, will never beget avaricious desires, and thus acquired, will be a treasury of blessings to multitudes here, and a source of enjoyment to ...
— The Faithful Steward - Or, Systematic Beneficence an Essential of Christian Character • Sereno D. Clark
... which had gathered to greet him, but he persisted in speaking on the following day at Indianapolis. He paused in Chicago only long enough to give a public address, and then passed on into Iowa.[878] Among his own people he unbosomed himself as he had not done before in all these weeks of incessant public speaking. "I am no alarmist. I believe that this country is in more danger now than at any other moment since I have known anything of public life. It is not personal ambition that has induced me to take the stump this year. I say to you who know me, that ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... to certain expressions in your letter, I ought to say, you will presently be undeceived. Though I am fond of writing, and of public speaking, I am a very poor talker and for the most part very much prefer silence. Of Charles's beautiful talent in that art I have had no share; but our common friend, Mr. Alcott, the prince of conversers, lives little more than a mile from our house, and we will call in his aid, as we often do, to make ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... of his wound nor the rebukes of his friends could make him feel that he had done anything more than justice, and he bore his sufferings with the spirit of a knight who had been wounded in defense of his "faire ladye." While at school he manifested a marked talent for public speaking, and took the highest rank in elocution in the Kinmont Academy, and I think that all through his life this gift of eloquence gave him a power over those with whom he mingled. I recall distinctly my sisterly pride in him when at an exhibition ...
— 'Three Score Years and Ten' - Life-Long Memories of Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and Other - Parts of the West • Charlotte Ouisconsin Van Cleve
... Mistress Perrote, speaking in a voice not exactly sharp, but short and staccato, as if she were—what more voluble persons often profess to be—unaccustomed to public speaking, and not very talkative at any time. "Your name, I think, ...
— The White Lady of Hazelwood - A Tale of the Fourteenth Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... wrought in Cicero's own impassioned oratory. He was no doubt thinking of that change when he wrote the words we have here. — SERMO: 'style of speaking'; a word of wider meaning than oratio, which only denotes public speaking. — QUIETUS ET REMISSUS: 'subdued and gentle'. The metaphor in remissus (which occurs also in 81) refers to the loosening of a tight-stretched string; cf. intentum etc. in 37 with n. With the whole passage cf. Plin. Ep. 3, 1, 2 nam iuvenes confusa adhuc quaedam et quasi turbata ...
— Cato Maior de Senectute • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... orator's years of hard work and close study told on him and that serious illness impended. It may be added, as a link with the past, that on hearing; Lincoln and Douglas in their debates, his courage and hopes as to advance through public speaking fell; yet he was ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... change of fortune, we have a resource in ourselves, from which we may be able to derive an honorable subsistence. I would, therefore, propose not only the study, but the practice of the law for some time, to possess yourself of the habit of public speaking. With respect to modern languages, French, as I have before observed, is indispensable. Next to this, the Spanish is most important to an American. Our connection with Spain is already important, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... with none of the exhaustion that follows the morning service. Many people have no idea, nor even suspicion, of the difference between praying and preaching for an hour, with the whole mind and heart poured into it, and any ordinary public speaking for an hour. They seem to think that in either case it is vox et preterea nihil, and the more voice the more exhaustion; but the truth is, the more the feelings are enlisted in any way, the more exhaustion, and the difference ...
— Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D.D. - Edited by his Daughter • Orville Dewey
... customs. There is, besides, the agora, or popular assembly, where debates take place among the chiefs, and to which their decisions, or rather the decision of the king, on whom it devolves finally to determine every thing, are communicated. Public speaking, it is seen, is practiced in the infancy of Greek society. (2) Customs. People live in hill-villages, surrounded by walls. Life is patriarchal, and, as regards the domestic circle, humane. Polygamy, the plague ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... to read that they might read the Bible; thousands sang who had never tried to sing before; and although the singing may have been of a very crude quality and the public speaking below par, yet it was human expression and therefore education, evolution, growth. That Wesley thought Methodism a finality need not be allowed to score against him. His faith and zeal had to be more or less blind, otherwise he would not have been John Wesley; philosophers with the brain of ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... monstrous phenomena, which in earlier ages attended the production of a genuine prodigy. We are not aware that Mrs. Green's favourite Alderney spoke on that occasion, or conducted itself otherwise than as unaccustomed to public speaking as usual. Neither can we verify the assertion of the intelligent Mr. Mole the gardener, that the plaster Apollo in the Long Walk was observed to be bathed in a profuse perspiration, either from its feeling compelled to keep up the good old classical custom, ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... marry, she's the sort. Feminine and all that, you know. Upon my word, I thought Jane was too much of a sportsman to go tying herself up with husbands and babies and servants and things. What the devil will happen to all she meant to do—writing, public speaking, and all the rest of it? I suppose a girl can carry on to a certain extent, though, even if she is married, ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay
... HOW TO MAKE THEM In this work Mr. Kleiser points out methods by which young men may acquire and develop the essentials of forcible public speaking. Cloth $1.50, ...
— Fifteen Thousand Useful Phrases • Grenville Kleiser
... County, where they held a number of meetings. The Diary reports Brother Daniel Thomas as taking the lead in preaching at nearly all the appointments. And well was he worthy of the honor. Few men are ever endowed with better natural abilities for public speaking than was Brother Daniel Thomas. His voice had the rare power of making every word he uttered to be distinctly heard all over a large audience, without any apparent effort on his part. Besides, it was ...
— Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary - Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk • John Kline
... or girl should strive to become a good reader. In the first place, good oral reading is an accomplishment in itself. It affords a great deal of pleasure to others as well as to ourselves. In the second place, it improves our everyday speech and is also a preparation for public speaking; for the one who reads with distinctness and an accent of refinement is likely to speak in the same way, whether in private conversation or on the public platform. Moreover, it is only one step from reading aloud before the class to recitation, ...
— The Ontario High School Reader • A.E. Marty
... Rose Test Garden as much from the fear of publicity that we, his friends, could not refrain from giving him, as for any other reason. He regretted in his later years that he had given up, during his editorial career, the little public speaking that he had previously done and had gotten so out of practice that, with his disposition, he could not again take ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 13th Annual Meeting - Rochester, N.Y. September, 7, 8 and 9, 1922 • Various
... eloquence, than any thing we met with in England. Any one who is acquainted with the natural inborn fluency in conversation of every individual whom he meets in France, may be able to form some idea of the astonishing command of words in a set of men who are bred to public speaking. One bad effect arises from this, which is, that if the counsel is not a man of ability, this amazing volubility, which is found equally in all, serves more to weaken than to convince; for the little sense there may be, is spread over so wide a surface, or ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison
... elocution is a desirable attainment, few will venture to deny. In my judgment it is the crowning grace of a liberal education. To the highest success in those professions which involve public speaking, it is, of course, indispensable. No person, whatever is to be his destination in life, who aspires to a respectable education and to mingle in good society, can afford to dispense with this accomplishment. If a young man means to ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... Tarbell resolved that her next effort at public speaking should be made before an American jury, or not at all. Indeed, she went so far as to think it a great mistake to suppose that woman's cause could not be advanced without calling meetings and haranguing them till eleven o'clock at night. Very likely her ideals ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 • Various
... distances without fatigue, make speeches in the open air without catching cold, sleep anywhere, eat anything, and even drink port with a grocer's label on it, at five in the afternoon. Then again, I had a natural and inborn love of public speaking, and I have known no enjoyment in life equal to that of addressing a great audience which you feel to be ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... reckoned among the symptoms of the decline. There is the want of method in physical science, the want of criticism in history, the want of simplicity or delicacy in poetry, the want of political freedom, which is the true atmosphere of public speaking, in oratory. The ways of life were luxurious and commonplace. Philosophy had become extravagant, eclectic, abstract, devoid of any real content. At length it ceased to exist. It had spread words like plaster over the whole field of knowledge. It had ...
— Phaedrus • Plato
... accomplished man of great public experience. It was written in the plainest language, and did not contain an obscure word. It was delivered with perfect propriety, with the confidence that comes from the habit of public speaking, and with artistic skill of articulation and emphasis. As an illustration of memory it was remarkable, for it was but the second time that the address had been spoken. It occupied an hour and a half in the delivery, and yet the ...
— From the Easy Chair, vol. 1 • George William Curtis
... instruction, in which you could measure your daily progress by brilliant feats of skill. Not only did the parents of those young students pay readily large sums for their instruction in what it was found so useful to know, above all in the art of public speaking, of self-defence, that is to say, in democratic Athens where one's personal status was become so insecure; but the young students themselves felt grateful for their institution in what told so immediately on their fellows; for ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... particular business," continued Mrs. Lawson, with undisturbed equanimity; "I only judged her to come of a consumptive race by her face and form. Public speaking would be an excellent remedy for her weakly appearance. That enlarges the lungs, and creates confidence and reliance on one's own powers. Miss Malcome, would you not like to attend some of ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... inevitable that this elevation of the written should be accompanied by a corresponding degradation of the spoken word. This must largely account for the somewhat remarkable fact that the art of oratory and public speaking has never been deemed worthy of cultivation in China, while the comparatively low position occupied by the drama may also be referred to the same cause. At the same time, the term "book language," in its widest sense, covers a multitude of styles, some of which ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... of hearing his last, and, it would seem to me, his greatest speech. Toward the close of the last Presidential campaign, I found him in the interior of the State, endeavoring to recruit his declining health. He had been obliged to avoid all public speaking, and had gone far into the country to get away from excitement. But there was a "gathering" near by his temporary home, and he consented to be present. It was late in the evening when he ascended the "stand," which was supported by the trunks ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various
... only speak by counsel. But do not regret that, for his own sake, as he is not used to public speaking, and has some impediment in his speech besides. He writes wonderfully—there he shines—and with a facility quite astonishing. Have you ever happened to see any ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... self-reliance, which enabled me to communicate my thoughts to others, and within a few weeks I had acquired a fluency of speech whereby I could talk for hours without embarrassment. During my first attempts at public speaking, few people would remain more than a moment or two to hear what I had to say, but with the increased force and power of speech, which I acquired with practice, my audiences grew larger and larger, until finally the streets were blockaded with their numbers at these ...
— Born Again • Alfred Lawson
... I heard a good deal of Mr. Chamberlain's public speaking when he first came to the front as a public man, and it was impossible not to be interested, edified, and oftentimes amused by the intelligence, point, and smartness of his speech. At the same time there was—especially ...
— A Tale of One City: The New Birmingham - Papers Reprinted from the "Midland Counties Herald" • Thomas Anderton
... meetings, school examinations, opening their places of worship, et cet. I accompanied my friend Lewis Tappan to attend an anti-slavery meeting at Newark, in which Theodore Weld was expected to take a part for the first time after an interval of five years' discontinuance of public speaking. Several years before, he had been carried away by the stream in crossing a river, and had very narrowly escaped drowning. This accident caused an affection of the throat, and eventually disqualified him for public ...
— A Visit To The United States In 1841 • Joseph Sturge
... of a more suitable person?" he asked, with a faint note of truculence in his tone. "You have seen us all together. I don't wish to flatter myself, but as regards education, service to the cause, familiarity with public speaking and the ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... what a voice Joe has for public speaking," persisted the irrepressible Jim. "Last night he was a ...
— Baseball Joe Around the World - Pitching on a Grand Tour • Lester Chadwick
... the Rev. Isaac M. See, pastor of the Wickliffe Church, of Newark, N. J., a member of your body, with disobedience to the divinely enacted ordinance in reference to the public speaking and teaching of women in churches, as recorded in I. Corinthians, xiv., 33 to 37, and I. Timothy, ii., 13, in that: First specification—On Sunday, October 29, 1876, in the Wickliffe Church of the city of Newark, N. J., he did, in the pulpit of the said church, ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... style of public speaking was an incident in the Prince of Wales' career which exercised considerable influence upon his personal popularity. The pronounced factors in his style were not oratory, gestures, or brilliancy. Plain in matter ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... not allow the Bible to be treated with anything but the most extreme reverence, whether in public speaking, in writing, or in ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus
... not accustomed to public speaking, but I could not repress my sentiments. And I've now only to propose to you the health of our host, Richard Avenel, Esquire; and to couple with that the health of his—very interesting sister, and long ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... public speaking perhaps added to the excitement, for Norman May and Harvey Anderson, for once in unison, each made a vehement harangue in the school-court—Anderson's a fine specimen of the village Hampden style, about Britons never suffering indignities, and free-born Englishmen ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... very large, and well suited to public speaking. When I entered the room, there were vigorous cheers from the coloured portion of the audience, and faint cheers from some of the white people. I had been told, while I had been in Atlanta, that while many white ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... favorite subject, showed a want of self- government but little calculated to inspire respect. Even his eloquence, various and splendid as it was, failed in general to win or command the attention of his hearers, and, in this great essential of public speaking, must be considered inferior to that ordinary, but practical, kind of oratory, [Footnote: "Whoever, upon comparison, is deemed by a common audience the greatest orator, ought most certainly to be pronounced such by men of science and erudition."—Hume, Essay 13.] which reaps its harvest ...
— Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan V1 • Thomas Moore
... to Talk: A Pocket Manual of Conversation, Public Speaking, and Debating." New York. Fowler and Wells. ...
— How To Behave: A Pocket Manual Of Republican Etiquette, And Guide To Correct Personal Habits • Samuel R Wells
... little to say. They were business men, so they said, and unaccustomed to public speaking. Each made an appeal to the people to support the new clergyman, to repair the rectory, and to give more liberally toward the support of the Church in their parish. They were given an attentive hearing, and when they were through, the chairman brought the meeting ...
— The Unknown Wrestler • H. A. (Hiram Alfred) Cody
... tell you that you are the person the least sensible of the members of the House of Commons, how much glory you acquired last Monday night; and it would be an additional satisfaction to you that this testimony comes from a judge of public speaking, the most disinterested and capable of judging of it. Dr Hay assures me that your speech was far superior to that of any other speaker on the colonies that night. I could not refrain from acquainting you with an opinion, which must so greatly encourage you to proceed, and to place the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... spoke the House filled up, not only with the contingent attracted by the prospect of anything spicy, but by grave, financial authorities, Ministers and ex-Ministers, who listened attentively to his acute criticism. His public speaking benefited by a rare combination of literary style and oratorical aptitude. There was no smell of the lamp about his polished, pungent sentences. But they had the unmistakable mark of literary style. ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 28, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... I'll do something! see if I don't. You see, the fact of the matter is, there are some men who are cut out for leading in a movement, and I have the kind of feeling—well, for one thing, I'm readier at public speaking than most. ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... by subjects. This language is now almost totally lost, not more than two dozen words of it being preserved. In early times, the Quichua language was much cultivated. It was used officially in public speaking, and professors were sent by the Inca family into the provinces to teach it correctly. For poetry, the Quichua language was not very well adapted, owing to the difficult conjugation of the verbs, and the awkward blending of pronouns with substantives. Nevertheless, ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... cannot be supposed to know that Dowler rose at the same time, having been told by his pert young friend that he was expected to perform that duty in consequence of the groom's-man being "unaccustomed to public speaking!" Dowler, although not easily put down, was, after some trouble, convinced that he had made a mistake, and sat down without making an apology, and with a mental resolve to strike in at the ...
— Saved by the Lifeboat • R.M. Ballantyne
... in Manchester, he completely broke down and the chairman apologized for his failure. Sir James Graham and Mr. Disraeli failed and were derided at first, and only succeeded by dint of great labor and application. At one time Sir James Graham had almost given up public speaking in despair. He said to his friend Sir Francis Baring: "I have tried it every way—extempore, from notes, and committing it all to memory—and I can't do it. I don't know why it is, but I am afraid I ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... profession of law he could come in contact with the great mass of the people in a way to make just such an impression upon them as he wished. In the practice of law, too, he could bring out his powers of oratory, and cultivate a habit of public speaking. It would, in fact, be a school in which to prepare himself for a broader sphere of action in the legislative halls of his country; for, at no point below a seat in the national ...
— The Last Penny and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur
... was her recognised ideal. "A free woman should be bounded by the street door," says one of the characters in Menander; and another writer discriminates as follows the functions of the two sexes:—"War, politics, and public speaking are the sphere of man; that of woman is to keep house, to stay at home and to receive and tend her husband." We are not surprised, therefore, to find that the symbol of woman is the tortoise; and in the following burlesque passage from Aristophanes we shall recognise, ...
— The Greek View of Life • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson
... dishonorable.[45] Quintilian's precepts, however, are more in line with Aristotle than his definition. He busies himself throughout twelve books in teaching his students how to use all possible means to persuasion. The consensus of classical opinion, then, agrees that the purpose of rhetoric is persuasive public speaking. ...
— Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance - A Study of Rhetorical Terms in English Renaissance Literary Criticism • Donald Lemen Clark
... two or three Englishmen whom he already knew were active in his behalf. William Brokedon, his old friend the painter, conducted him to the dinner of the Royal Geographical Society, where a curious thing happened. Cavour's first essay in public speaking was before an English assembly. After several toasts had been duly honoured, the Secretary of the Society, to his unbounded astonishment, proposed his health. Taken unawares, he expressed his thanks in a few words, which were ...
— Cavour • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... Beethoven Festival, in a new overture entitled "The Music of the Marshes." This piece will contain several obligato passages written expressly for our Bull-Frog. After this, we shall challenge Mr. GEORGE FRANCIS TRAIN to compete in public speaking with the Frog of PUNCHINELLO, for a purse of $20,000—Mr. TRAIN to speak ten minutes solo; the Frog to croak ten minutes; and then both to speak and croak in duet also for ten minutes—the most sonorous ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 13, June 25, 1870 • Various
... abashed, under the impression that he had betrayed himself into some act of gross impropriety. This was his first appearance in the character of juror and judge; he was literally unaccustomed to public speaking, and did not ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... fine mentality enabled her to grasp quickly the most obtuse scientific and economic problems, and her natural taste for belles lettres making languages and general literature comparatively easy, she soon distinguished herself above the other girls of her class. Especial talent she showed for public speaking, having a good command of English, with forcible delivery and sound logic. So successful, indeed, was she in this respect, that in her final year, as graduation day drew near, she was picked out from among three hundred and fifty girls to deliver ...
— Bought and Paid For - From the Play of George Broadhurst • Arthur Hornblow
... all that had to be done was to select a chairman and commence the debate. I can give from memory a sample or two of these first attempts. "Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking, I rise to make a few remarks on this all important question— ahem—Mr. President, this is the first time I ever tried to speak in public, and unaccustomed as I am to—to—ahem. Ladies and Gentlemen, ...
— Life in Canada Fifty Years Ago • Canniff Haight
... time that he "was very much scared," and "very glad of a short curtain across the platform that hid my shaking legs from the audience." Such experiences are not uncommon in the career of men afterward noted for their ease in public speaking. I can recall such, and so doubtless can any man of academic or college training. I wish to impress upon my young reader that Garfield was indebted for what he became to ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... for public speaking, and seldom missed an opportunity of addressing the assembled officers and crews of the ships he took, before liberating or otherwise disposing ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse
... can be no doubt of that; but there were differences, and upon the whole I am inclined to think that Reynolds's address was more perfectly adapted to his hearers than Stairs's would have been if his had been given that evening. Reynolds's diction in public speaking was not quite his conversational speech, because nothing like slang, nothing altogether colloquial crept into it, but its simplicity was notable; it was the diction of a frank, earnest child. There were none of the stereotyped phrases of piety; yet I never heard a more truly ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... his visitor continued, "for the first time in my life—and I may say that I have been accustomed to public speaking and am considered to have a fair choice of words—for the first time in my life I confess that I find myself in trouble as to exactly how to express myself. I want to convince you. I am myself entirely and absolutely convinced as to the justice of the cause I plead. ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... same thing) other languages besides his own; and concurrently with these studies he must endeavour to develop in himself the personal qualities demanded by his high office—health and activity of body, quick comprehension and decision, a tenacious memory for names and faces, capacity for public speaking, patience, and that command over the passions and prejudices, natural or acquired, which is necessary for his moral influence as a ruler. On what percentage of his subjects is such a curriculum imposed, and what allowances should not be made if a full measure of ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... the Todborough contingent must show with its chief at its head. Who knows but you may want to contest the county again some of these days? and if you don't, why, perhaps I shall. I assure you I have a very pretty talent for public speaking—at least, so our fellows all say. Isn't ...
— Belles and Ringers • Hawley Smart
... stockings, his face alight with the glow of a freshly kindled pleasure, rose from his chair and held out his hand. "The introduction should be quite unnecessary, Mr. O'Day," he exclaimed in the full, sonorous voice of a man accustomed to public speaking. "You seem to have greatly attached these dear people to you, which in itself is enough, for there are none better in ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith
... disliked public speaking, and had a firm conviction that I should break down every time I opened my mouth. I believe I had every fault a speaker could have (except talking at random or indulging in rhetoric), when I spoke to the first important audience I ever addressed, on a Friday evening ...
— Autobiography and Selected Essays • Thomas Henry Huxley
... to both of which occupations Aeschines gave his youthful hand and assistance. He became in time a third-rate actor, and the duties of clerk or scribe presently made him familiar with the executive and legislative affairs of Athens. Both vocations served as an apprenticeship to the public speaking toward which his ambition was turning. We hear of his serving as a heavy-armed soldier in various Athenian expeditions, and of his being privileged to carry to Athens, in 349 B.C., the first news of the victory of Tamynae, in Euboea, in reward for the bravery ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... as the days went on. Not that he did any less, but the temperance campaign was on again, all racial and religious prejudices forgotten, in the glory of the fight. Lawyer Ed was quite content that his young partner should let him do all the public speaking, and so neither side was offended at the young man's careful steering in a middle course. Roderick himself hated it, but there seemed no other way, on the road he was ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... some particular thing."—Ibid. "So much depends upon the proper construction of sentences, that, in every sort of composition, we cannot be too strict in our attention to it."—Blair's Rhet., p. 103. "All sort of declamation and public speaking, was carried on by them."—Ib., p. 123. "The first has on many occasions, a sublimity to which the latter never attains."—Ib., p. 440. "When the words therefore, consequently, accordingly, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... though not very well known in House, much less to fame outside. Was in the 13th Hussars; is now promoted to the Lieutenant-Colonelcy of 1st Cinque Ports Rifle Volunteers. Has sat for Rye these seven years, but never yet spoke. This the more remarkable since he is a trained student of art of public speaking; has, indeed, just written profound treatise on the business. FISHER UNWIN sent me copy from Paternoster Square. Sat up all night reading it. The speech of "our worthy Member," proposing "The Town and Trade of X," is thrilling. Another, put into the mouth of "the youngest ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 25, 1892 • Various
... disaster should have been sufficient for one day, but it was not. That night there was to have been public speaking in front of the Western Hotel, by many prominent politicians. Opposite the hotel was a two-story brick building, with a veranda built around it. All of the offices on the second floor opened on this veranda. ...
— Out of Doors—California and Oregon • J. A. Graves
... indispensable instrument for effecting its own end. In fact, the oratorical contests are something more than agencies for interesting undergraduates in the peace movement. The cultivation of the art of expression and of public speaking, now very generally provided for in college and university curriculums, is of especial significance to the work of this association. For it is not alone of importance that the graduate who leaves his alma mater should be ...
— Prize Orations of the Intercollegiate Peace Association • Intercollegiate Peace Association
... system of Hermagoras; who, though he furnished but little assistance for acquiring an ornamental style, gave many useful precepts to expedite and improve the invention of an Orator. For in this System we have a collection of fixed and determinate rules for public speaking; which are delivered indeed without any shew or parade, (and, I might have added, in a trivial and homely form) but yet are so plain and methodical, that it is almost impossible to mistake the road. By keeping close to these, and always digesting ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... political preferment, need not expect great success, even though he may acquire some temporary advancement. The day is past when lawyers could monopolize every high place in the state. The habit of public speaking is not now confined to the learned professions. Our peculiar system of education has trained up a legion of orators and politicians outside of the bar. Now-a-days a man must have other qualifications besides the faculty of speech-making to win the prize in politics. ...
— Minnesota and Dacotah • C.C. Andrews
... Lincoln's interest was aroused in public speaking and he soon began to exercise himself in this direction and to attend meetings addressed by those skilled in the art of oratory. Many stories are told of his local reputation as a speaker and story-teller even before ...
— Lincoln's Inaugurals, Addresses and Letters (Selections) • Abraham Lincoln
... with the spread of the newspaper public speaking would decline—but the prediction has not been fulfilled and its failure is easily explained. In the first place, the written page can never be a substitute for the message delivered orally. The newspaper ...
— In His Image • William Jennings Bryan
... received with loud cheers, said, "Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen, I feel very proud that my name should be coupled with the toast of Australian Exploration. I assure you I feel altogether unequal to the toast so aptly proposed by our worthy chairman, my forte not being public speaking; still, I will try to do as well as I can. (Cheers.) Since I arrived at years of discretion, I have always taken a very deep interest in exploration, and for the last five years I have been what is generally ...
— Explorations in Australia • John Forrest
... dinner at Lord Medwyn's to-day—very pleasant—rather an exception this to dinners: how dull the routine! October 22: succeeded in my resolution of rewriting the whole of my sermon, and found the advantage; in fact, nothing in the way of public speaking can be done without a thorough preparation. How high parties are running! It has a sad effect on my mind; but my refuge must be in keeping off controversy and adhering to edifying and practical subjects." In the same month he records the death of a dear friend, whom he visited ...
— Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character • Edward Bannerman Ramsay
... nearly all the writing and public speaking of the world, setting so the fashion in thought, women, naturally extolled with true sexual extravagance, came to be considered, even by themselves, as a very superior order of beings, with something in them of divinity which was denied ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce
... I am to public speaking, Mr. Speaker, I feel myself on the present occasion called upon not to give a ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... intervals of public speaking, she made frequent visits to the Government hospitals, and became a most welcome guest among our soldiers. In long conversations with them, she learned their individual histories, experiences, hardships, and sufferings; the motives that prompted them to go into the army; ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... people; but such charges could no longer wound. The events following the Duke's birthday had served to crystallise the schemes of the little liberal group, and they now formed a campaign of active opposition to the government, attacking it by means of pamphlets and lampoons, and by such public speaking as the police allowed. The new professors of the University, ardently in sympathy with the constitutional movement, used their lectures as means of political teaching, and the old stronghold of dogma became the centre of destructive criticism. But ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... there was a power in his tone and manner which he had never used before; a power which would affect a judge or a jury, as it had affected Willie. The curse cursed here too! It was that hasty, nervous disposition, which gave manner and tone to his very public speaking; which made his arguments unconvincing, his pathos unaffecting. It was just that calm, deep, serene feeling and manner, which was needed at the bar as well as with Willie. Arguing with that feeling and manner, he felt, would convince irresistibly. ...
— Words of Cheer for the Tempted, the Toiling, and the Sorrowing • T. S. Arthur
... and reading, that the art of speaking distinctly, correctly, and agreeably, has become very much neglected. Practice in declamation accomplishes, as a general thing, very little in this direction. But we may expect that the increase of public speaking occasioned by our political and religious assemblies may have a favorable ...
— Pedagogics as a System • Karl Rosenkranz
... public speaking has always been entirely free from rhetorical artifice. He seldom made use of metaphor or imagery, or elaborate periods, or variety of gesture. His language was extremely simple and straightforward; but his mobile expression—so variable ...
— Ulster's Stand For Union • Ronald McNeill
... the right thing, the only thing, the solution required by every one she knew, and a great part of her meditations was spent in tracing every instance of discomfort, loneliness, ill-health, unsatisfied ambition, restlessness, eccentricity, taking things up and dropping them again, public speaking, and philanthropic activity on the part of men and particularly on the part of women to the fact that they wanted to marry, were trying to marry, and had not succeeded in getting married. If, as she was bound to own, these symptoms sometimes persisted after marriage, she could only ascribe ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... the Treviri and Lingones, and addressed 73 them as follows: 'Unpractised as I am in public speaking, for it is only on the field that I have asserted the superiority of Rome, yet since words have so much weight with you, and since you distinguish good and bad not by the light of facts but by what agitators tell you, I have decided to make a few remarks, ...
— Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and II • Caius Cornelius Tacitus
... that he should be chairman at a meeting to promote the abolition of the slave trade, and made his first public speech in advocacy of justice between man and man. This speech was no small effort to a young foreigner, who, however accomplished, was certainly not accustomed to public speaking in a foreign tongue. It was like delivering a maiden speech under great difficulties, and as it was of importance that he should produce a good impression, he spared no preparation for the task. He composed ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... to practice, he was admitted to the bar in Warrenton, where for two or three years he practiced his profession. His father dying in 1813, he abandoned his law practice, which he did not like, because he could not overcome his diffidence in public speaking; and, for quite a period, he had the management of ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... is not to be expected. There is much more canvassing done, I think, by legislative candidates in France, and much less public speaking than in America or in England, and the pressure of the Government upon the voters is very much greater here even than it is in America. The proportion of office-holders to the population is much more considerable, ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... accomplishments of the body, that they, like the ancient Greeks, may know that every muscle will obey the brain. A shy, awkward boy should be trained in dancing, fencing, boxing; he should be instructed in music, elocution, and public speaking; he should be sent into society, whatever it may cost him at first, as certainly as he should be sent to the dentist's. His present sufferings may save him from ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... was called to do. "None, O my God, but Thyself, knows what I go through for every public meeting!" she exclaimed in her diary. Yet, though this shrinking was combined with exceedingly delicate health, she never shirked her duty, but went steadily on with housekeeping, farming, nursing, or public speaking, just as the Lord gave it to her to do—even consenting to stand upon a horse-block at Huddersfield to address a crowd whom otherwise she could not have reached. "Indeed, for none but Thee, my Lord," she cried after that ordeal, "would I take up this sore cross!... O ...
— Fletcher of Madeley • Brigadier Margaret Allen
... Chairing, Dinner, etc., take place to-day. Everybody is interested about him, as he is very young and it is his first appearance in the character. His speeches have delighted the whole County, and he is, of course, very much pleased." This faculty of public speaking was perhaps his most remarkable endowment. He had an excellent command of cultivated English, a clear and harmonious voice, a keen sense of humour, and a happy knack ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell |
