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give me death." His fame would have been different had he lived to-day and argued for the recall of judges.
The Power of Enthusiasm
Political parties hire bands, and pay for applause--they argue that, for vote-getting, to stir up enthusiasm is
more effective than reasoning. How far they are right depends on the hearers, but there can be no doubt about
the contagious nature of enthusiasm. A watch manufacturer in New York tried out two series of watch
advertisements; one argued the superior construction, workmanship, durability, and guarantee offered with the
watch; the other was headed, "A Watch to be Proud of," and dwelt upon the pleasure and pride of ownership.
The latter series sold twice as many as the former. A salesman for a locomotive works informed the writer that
in selling railroad engines emotional appeal was stronger than an argument based on mechanical excellence.
Illustrations without number might be cited to show that in all our actions we are emotional beings. The
speaker who would speak efficiently must develop the power to arouse feeling.
Webster, great debater that he was, knew that the real secret of a speaker's power was an emotional one. He
eloquently says of eloquence:
"Affected passion, intense expression, the pomp of declamation, all may aspire after it; they cannot reach it. It
comes, if it come at all, like the outbreak of a fountain from the earth, or the bursting forth of volcanic fires,
with spontaneous, original, native force.
"The graces taught in the schools, the costly ornaments and studied contrivances of speech, shock and disgust
men, when their own lives, and the fate of their wives, their children, and their country hang on the decision of
the hour. Then words have lost their power, rhetoric is in vain, and all elaborate oratory contemptible. Even
genius itself then feels rebuked and subdued, as in the presence of higher qualities. Then patriotism is
CHAPTER X 56
eloquent, then self-devotion is eloquent. The clear conception outrunning the deductions of logic, the high
purpose, the firm resolve, the dauntless spirit, speaking on the tongue, beaming from the eye, informing every
feature, and urging the whole man onward, right onward to his subject--this, this is eloquence; or rather, it is
something greater and higher than all eloquence; it is action, noble, sublime, godlike action."
When traveling through the Northwest some time ago, one of the present writers strolled up a village street
after dinner and noticed a crowd listening to a "faker" speaking on a corner from a goods-box. Remembering
Emerson's advice about learning something from every man we meet, the observer stopped to listen to this
speaker's appeal. He was selling a hair tonic, which he claimed to have discovered in Arizona. He removed his
hat to show what this remedy had done for him, washed his face in it to demonstrate that it was as harmless as
water, and enlarged on its merits in such an enthusiastic manner that the half-dollars poured in on him in a
silver flood. When he had supplied the audience with hair tonic, he asked why a greater proportion of men
than women were bald. No one knew. He explained that it was because women wore thinner-soled shoes, and
so made a good electrical connection with mother earth, while men wore thick, dry-soled shoes that did not
transmit the earth's electricity to the body. Men's hair, not having a proper amount of electrical food, died and
fell out. Of course he had a remedy--a little copper plate that should be nailed on the bottom of the shoe. He
pictured in enthusiastic and vivid terms the desirability of escaping baldness--and paid tributes to his copper
plates. Strange as it may seem when the story is told in cold print, the speaker's enthusiasm had swept his
audience with him, and they crushed around his stand with outstretched "quarters" in their anxiety to be the
possessors of these magical plates!
Emerson's suggestion had been well taken--the observer had seen again the wonderful, persuasive power of
enthusiasm! [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]