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GLADSTONE

NCIENT oratory was most carefully prepared for in advance, and was conscious

art; eighteenth century oratory was extemporaneous and impassioned, and this style found its last great exemplar in Macaulay; but the latter half of the nineteenth century brought a wholly different style — a style in which appeal to the passions was reduced to a minimum, and in which art seemed dispensed with also: at least this was the style adopted by the bar and the platform, while various kinds of display came into vogue for special occasions after-dinner oratory, and what I have called "trance trance" oratory, a brilliant extemporaneous display which seemed to excite unbounded admiration, but did little toward producing conviction.

The unimpassioned type of oratory reached its perfection in statesmen like William Ewart Gladstone, who was listened to primarily because people wanted to hear what he had to say, and because his explanation and analysis of the case was highly instructive. Says one who knew him: "His triumphs as a debater were achieved by the aid—not of the passions; not of prejudice and fallacy; not of imagination and high

seductive colouring, as with Macaulay; but-of pure reason. He did not unhorse his opponent in the tourney, but checkmated him on the chessboard." His voice sounded as if it came from afar. He made little or no attempt to be impressive by either tone or gesture, and he commanded attention by his penetrating eye rather than by any commanding attitude or physical presence, in which he was lacking. Of intellectual passion, however, he had plenty, and as he spoke he often rose on his toes, suggesting the effect of a great man rising to a great occasion.

Gladstone was remarkable for a wonderful fund of information. He always had something interesting to say, and the public was always eager to hear it. His style was simple, unembellished, and merely expressive. It had a pleasant musical flow, and was highly instructive. Indeed, Gladstone was the consummate type, not of the pedagogue, but of the true teacher. He was a good, interesting lecturer, not in the conventional sense, but in an ideal way. But like all teachers and lecturers, he was inclined to be more interested in his subject than were his auditors, and to wish to say much more about it than they wished to hear. As an educated man, too, he liked to use the words which expressed his meaning best to himself, even if they were not familiar to his hearers. Hence he was accused of being diffuse, and of using too many words of Latin origin.

The modern speaker addresses a wide audience through the press, as well as his immediate audience. It is therefore important that his speech read well, as well as sound well-indeed its reading qualities are rather the more important. Impassioned bursts of oratory produce but little effect on the reader, who seldom cares to read ornate orations, and is even inclined to laugh at any oratorical display introduced into a serious discussion for it seems to him suspicious. The modern reader has become wary and this has made the modern listener wary. This element of suspiciousness attending oratorical display is undoubtedly the reason for its total elimination from modern serious speaking. It is tolerated only when the people go to witness a display, and take it as they would a theatrical entertainment.

Gladstone is undoubtedly the best model for the teacher or lecturer. He was free from the crabbedness of the pedagogical, he never fell into a rut, and he was never intrinsically dry- that is, he would not have seemed dry to any one as much interested in his subject as he was.

One of his most famous addresses was that delivered at the founding of the Wedgwood Institute. It was a suitable occasion for an instructive discourse, and Gladstone delivered a speech which not only entertained his hearers, but has been read as an essay by thousands since. It reads as well in print as it sounded when deliv

ered, and the subject is one to appeal to all persons of culture. The style is limpid, flowing, and natural, and the words seem to glide into the mind with a sort of idyllic grace. The teacher or lecturer could not find a better example for imitation.

THE COMMERCIAL VALUE OF ARTISTIC EXCELLENCE

(FROM THE ADDRESS DELIVERED AT THE FOUNDING OF WEDGWOOD INSTITUTE IN STAFFORDSHIRE, OCTOBER 26, 1863)

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WE may consider the products of industry with

reference to their utility, or to their cheapness, or with regard to their influence upon the conditions of those who produce them, or, lastly, with reference to their beauty, to the degree in which they associate the presentation of forms and colours agreeable to the cultivated eye, with the attainment of the highest aptitude for those purposes of common life for which they are properly designed. First, as to their utility and convenience, considered alone, we may leave that to the consumer, who will not buy what does not suit him. As to their cheapness, when once security has been taken that an entire society shall not be forced to pay an artificial price to some of its members for their productions, we may safely commit the question to the action of competition among manufactures, and of what we term the laws of supply and demand. As to the condition of work-people, experience has shown,