will listen to you, listen to yourself--you must always be your own best critic,

and the severest one of all.

 

The technical principles that we lay down in the following chapters are not

arbitrary creations of our own. They are all founded on the practices that good

speakers and actors adopt--either naturally and unconsciously or under

instruction--in getting their effects.

 

It is useless to warn the student that he must be natural. To be natural may be

to be monotonous. The little strawberry up in the arctics with a few tiny seeds

and an acid tang is a natural berry, but it is not to be compared with the

improved variety that we enjoy here. The dwarfed oak on the rocky hillside is

natural, but a poor thing compared with the beautiful tree found in the rich,

moist bottom lands. Be natural--but improve your natural gifts until you have

approached the ideal, for we must strive after idealized nature, in fruit, tree,

and speech.

 

QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES.

 

1. What are the causes of monotony?

 

2. Cite some instances in nature.

 

3. Cite instances in man's daily life.