Nervonsness of Orators.

Waikato Times, Volume XXV, Issue 2039, 1 August 1885, Page 6 (Supplement)

Nervonsness of Orators.

Grfat orators are almost invariably nervous with apprehension when about to mako an important fpecoh, Luther, to his last yv.rs, trembled when he entered the pulpit, Tne name is true of Robert Hall. Mr. Gough confesses that he is always in a tremor when ooming before an audience. Many of the leaders of the House of Commons have given similar testimony. Canning said ho could always tell in advance when he was about to make one of the best speeches by a chill running through him, caused by a fear of failure. Lord Derby, the father of the present Earl, when a young man, was one of the beat speakers in Parliament. He was known as the " Prince Rupert of debate," and seemed so eelf-posseflsed as to be inoapable of embarrassment. But ha said, " When I am going to speak, my throat and lips are an dry as those of a man who is going to be banged." He also told tho lato Sir A. Alison that " he neter roeo to speak, even in an after-dinner assembly, without experiencing a oertain degree of nervous tremor, which did not go off till be warmed to the subject." It is recorded of Cicero that " he Bhuddered visibly over bis whole body when he first began to gpeak." In the " Life of Lord Lyndhurst," by Sir Theodore Martin, we are told that he did not prepare his speeches, "Though, like all great orators, he never ro<?e to speak without nervous emotion, this in no way interfered with hia power qf thinking as he spoke, and calling into play the fittest language to erprcan what he thought. The intensity with which hia intellect worked became contagious, He got his hearerß' minds within his grasp, he made them think with him, see things with the pamo clearness as he himself saw them, and co led them irwenaibly np to his own conclusions." Tierney, whom Lord Macaulay calls one of the moat fluent debaters ever known, said he never rose in Parliament without feeling htH kncoi knock together. It is one of the compensations) of nature that the nervous temperament which ocu.i'uona tho tumbling in nlao on<> of ii o cautes of oratorical success, In fwH, it nvij almost be imid thaf no one c>>. bi >\ (.n t orator, or a real!, di otiV « lfc A „ v > . i not exporieaeo the ftclin;;.