An essay upon the action of an orator, as to his pronunciation & gesture useful both for divines and lawyers, and necessary for all young gentlemen, that study how to speak well in publick / done out of French.

CHAP. V. The way to be Heard with Delight.

IT is not enough for the Orator to be Heard only without difficulty and pain, but he must endeavour to be Heard also, if possible, with Pleasure and De∣light. And therefore you must make it your main business, in the first place, to render your Voyce as Sweet and Soft, and Agreeable to the Ear as you can: So that if you be naturally inclined to any thing either of a Harsh, Hoarse or Obstreperous Voyce, you must enquire in∣to the cause on't for a cure. And if you find it comes only from an Ill Ha∣bit you have got, or so; you ought to take up a resolution of unpractising it as soon as possible, and of running up a Counter-Custom against it, of better Service and Satisfaction to the Publick. But if you discover that it proceeds

from some Natural Indisposition of your Body and the Organs of your Voyce, you must then try to recover it, as well by sobriety and good Regimen according to the Advice of your Physicians, as by care∣ful and constant exercice. As for T••m∣perance and Government, I leave it to the Doctors; but the Antients have ob∣served the morning for exercice, and advised it for the best time when all the Organs of the Body are least emba∣rassed and obstructed. But that this Art of Softening and Timing of the Pronunciation may be acquired by care, Industry and Exercice, it is plain from the example of Cicero, to a Conviction: For Plutarch says in his Life, that he had at first a very Rude and Obstrepe∣rous Voyce, before he went into Greece, but by staying there a while, he brought it to so much Sweetness and Delicacy, that he charmed the Ear with the Soft∣est Sounds and a most Agreeable Har∣mony. In fine, you must endeavour to give your Voyce such a Smoothness, that the Turns, the Tones and the Soft mea∣sures of it may please the Ear of your Auditor, though he understand nothing at all either of your Language or of the

Subject of your Discourse: As Philo∣stratus tells us of Phavorinus the Sophist and of Adrian the Phoenician, that those very Persons who knew nothing of the Greek Tongue, took great delight yet to hear them declame in Greek, their Pe∣riods were so Smooth and their Cadences so Delicate.

In the next place, you must also shun that reigning Vice among many Peo∣ple, of Coughing and Spitting often, while they are a Speaking, which mightily interrupts the Pronunciation, and is ex∣treamly ungrateful and disagreeable both to the Eyes and the Ears of the Hearers. But that it is not impracti∣cable to avoid this vice, on the one hand, and that it is for the most part an effect rather of an ill Custom than of necessity or Nature, on the other; is as Plain as experience can make it, because most Men refrain from it: And I know a Divine that never Coughs nor Spits in the Pulpit, when he has got the greatest Cold in his Head; 'tis no matter whe∣ther he comes to have this Conduct by long Practice, or whether it be the Heat of his Action which stops the De∣fluxion

of Rheum for that time. How∣ever, I mean yet that you are to do no more than you can to avoid Hawking and Spawling; for some People are so troubled with Phlegm and Tisick at certain Times and Seasons of the year, that it is impossi∣ble for them to abstain wholly from one or t'other in their Preaching: but they ought to do as much as they can at least towards the correcting of so Un∣mannerly a Vice, if they have any va∣lue for a decent way of Speaking, or would make the Pronunciation agreea∣ble to their Hearers. But as to the matter of Coughing, it was in Fashion in former days; and there have been Preachers formerly so extravagant as to affect it for a thing that added Grace and Gravity to their Discourse. As for ex∣ample. Oliver Maillard, in one of his Sermons he made at Bruges in the Year Fifteen Hundred, mark'd the Places and Paragraphs of his Discourse with a Hem, Hem, Hem, where he had a de∣sign to Cough upon't; as it may be seen at this Day in Print.

The only thing, after this, I can recom∣mend to your care and your time, is to put your self upon varying your Voyce ac∣cording to the diversity of the Subjects you are to set forth, of the Passions you would either express your self, or ex∣cite in others, and of the several parts of your Speech; according to the vari∣ety of Words, Stronger or Weaker, Higher or Lower, as will best serve your Turn and answer their quality. For as a Scraping Fiddler that should harp always upon one String, would be Ridiculous; and his Musick Intolerable: So there is nothing can grate the Ear of your Auditors so much, and give them so great a disgust as a Voyce still in the same Key, to the Tune of Hum-Drum, without either Division or Vari∣ety. This Vice is remarkable in most Speakers, and I cannot but take notice on't. There's hardly a good Voyce to be found among Men, that fills the Ear well, which has not something agreea∣ble in't, let them manage it never so much without measure: But it would be infinitely more pleasing, if they knew how to give it the just Turns and a

Variation suitable to Subjects and Passions. Besides that, such Voyces, which are so fine and yet so ill governed, are very rare and uncommon: But for ordinary ones that are common enough in the World, this Vice renders them disa∣greeable to all Intents and Purposes.

To pass on further then. I say that this stiff uniformity of the Voyce is not only unpleasant to the Ear, but pre∣judices the Discourse it self extremely too, and disappoints the effect it should have upon the Hearers, for two reasons. The one is, that an equal way of Speak∣ing, when the Pronunciation is all of a piece and every where upon the same Sound, renders all the Parts of the Speech equal too upon a very unjust le∣vel; for it takes away all power from that which has the greatest strength of Argument in the reasoning part, and all Lustre from that which has the greatest splendor of ornament in the figurative part of a Discourse, through∣out the whole Work: So that, in short, that which ought to strike the Passions most, moves them not at all in effect, because it is spoken all alike so, and slab∣bered

over without any distinction or variety. The other, that there is no∣thing lulls us a Sleep sooner, nothing so dull and heavy as a long Discourse without ever turning the Tone or chang∣ing a Note for't: and there are many Persons, although they should fix never so stedfastly upon such a Speaker and resolve to hear him with the utmost regard and attention, would not be able yet to hold up their Eyes 'till he had half-done, upon this deficiency of his Pronunciation. And yet, for all this, Monotony is not only a common vice, but almost universal too among publick Orators. I was subject to't my self, at first, as well as other Men; and I cannot imagine how any body could endure to give me the hearing upon't; for my Delivery then was so trouble∣some and disagreeable, that I could hardly reconcile it to my own Ears: Up∣on which, I bethought my self ever af∣ter of varying my Voyce several ways to make it less uniform, and ungrateful. In the first place, I began to consider how this vicious way of Speaking came to such a height among Men, and crept up so much into Fashion and

Discipline; some people running care∣lesly into it, without ever giving them∣selves leave to think, and others know∣ing very well it is vicious, but have much a do to reform it: and I could find no other cause of it at last, but bad Education. For they that teach Children to read, learn 'em an ill custom of pro∣nouncing every word a like, in the same Cant and Tone; the fault of most School-mistresses: And when these Chil∣dren again advance into Grammar or Rhetorick, they fall perhaps into no better hands, of Masters that teach them their Rudiments in the same measure and method, without ever taking care to correct the ill habit of Speaking they have got; but rather giving them a bad example themselves by pronouncing every word they read or say off-book, with the same Accent, and quite another tone than what we use in our daily Discourse and Common Con∣versation, then instructing Youth in the variation of the Voyce for publick bu∣siness; how they ought to proportion and adjust their Pronunciation upon e∣very punctillo (when they come to make Speeches) to the Grandeur of their

Audience and the multitude of their Auditors. Upon this, I resolved to be governed by better Masters, and to make Nature and Reason my Guides: and they must be your Masters too, take my word for't, if you would do any good in this Art.

Nature it self tells us that we ought to pronounce our selves otherwise when we speak of Melancholy and Mourn∣full Things, then we should do a Mer∣ry-making upon Joy or Pleasantry; otherwise, when we reprove people for committing some Great Crime or o∣ther, than when we are a comforting them that are in Affliction; otherwise, when we upbraid a Man with his faults, then when we would ask Pardon for our own; otherwise again, when we threaten; otherwise, when we promise, or pray a thing and humbly beg the fa∣vour; otherwise, when we are in a good humour, the Passions calm, and the Mind serene; and otherwise, when we are upon the transports of Choler and ill Nature. This variation is so natu∣tural to us, that if we should hear two persons haranguing both together in a

Language we did not understand at all, the one in Anger, and t'other in fear, one of them speaking with joy, and t'o∣ther, with sorrow: We might easily distinguish the Passions of the one from the other, not only by their countenance and their gesture, but by the different Tone and Cadence of the Voyce. So that the pronunciation ought to be natu∣ral, and we must do as Nature dictates: For the nearer it comes up to Nature, the more perfect it is; and the further off from it, the more vicious. The less affected, still the better; for a na∣tural variation is best. The only way then to get this knack of varying the Voyce, is to make your own reflections upon common Chat, and to take notice of any ordinary Discourse, either in Town or in Table-Talk. You are like∣wise to mind how you Speak your self, when you are in Company; what a Woman says in a Passion for an injury done her, and how she pronounces up∣on the loss of her dear Husband or her Child. And when you have made these private Observations, you must endea∣vour to express your self after the same manner upon the like occasions

in publick; only you would do well to distinguish upon the place, how much more audible your Voyce ought to be for the Court or a Church, than for a private Chamber. Our best Actors change their Voyce thus, according to the different quality of persons and the diversity of Subjects; and they speak as naturally upon the Stage, and in the same Tone too, as they would do in a familiar Club-room; saving that they are oblig∣ed to accent their words louder there, and to proportion the force and vehe∣mence of their Voyce to the vastness of a Theatre.

As for Reason, it teaches us, in the first place, that God Almighty hath-blessed Ʋs with the faculty of Speech above all other Creatures, and given us words for the interpretation of our Thoughts and the Mirrour or reflection of our passions: So that we are under the greatest duty both to him and our selves, to set forth the naked truth of things, and to express the different o∣perations and sentiments of our Souls, ingenuously, by the different Accents and Turns of our Voyce, for the raising of

the like Passions and Opinions in those that hear us. But it shews us also, in the second place, that as God in the Creation of the World, in general, di∣vided it into so many several shapes and forms and figures in the visible Order and Harmony we admire now; with∣out which, it would have been but a confus'd Chaos still and an indigested Lump; and as in the production of our humane body, in particular, he made it up of so many different parts and particles, members of Life and Acti∣on; without which, it would only have been a monstrous dull mass of Flesh: So ought we to make use of variety to enliven the matter of our publick Discourses; not only by Invention, Disposition and Elocution; but as well also by the Powers of pronunciation and speaking.

Now if we would polish and refine our Speech, and set-off our pronuncia∣tion with so much Grace and Agreea∣bleness, that it should oblige the hearers, even under the greatest prejudices and disgusts, to recollect their attention to it with Relish and Delight; we

must vary the Voyce as often as it lays in our power. All the difficulty there∣fore that remains, is to know how to do't; and to do it well to the purpose too: Which I am now going to remark into the best Rules I can.