t of story-tellers since AEsop did not deface one of
these great deliverances with story or any form of humor.

The reason for this is found in the whole tendency of human thought
and feeling--in the whole melancholy history of the race--where tears
and grief, the hard seriousness of life and the terrible and speedy
certainty of our common fate of suffering and of death, make somber
the master-cord of existence. And the great orator must reflect the
deeper soul of his hearers.

So all the immortal things are serious, even sad.

It is so with speech--I mean the speech that affects the convictions
and understanding of men. I am excluding now that form of speech which
belongs to the same class, though not of so high an order, as the
theatrical exhibition.

Excepting only Lincoln, the Middle West has produced no greater man
than Oliver P. Morton; and few men in our history have had greater
power upon an audience both in the immediate and permanent effect of
his speeches than did Indiana's great Senator. It is related of him
that while a very young man he made a speech so rich in humor and
scintillant of wit that it attracted the attention of the whole
commonwealth.

Morton, however, was not pleased or flattered. He was alarmed. He
feared that what he knew to be his weighty abilities would be held
lightly by his fellow citizens. From that time on this Cromwell of the
forum never "told a story" or attempted to amuse his hearers in any
way.

Of course, if your mental armory is naturally heavily stocked with the
various forms of fun, you are not to be blamed for employing the
weapons with which Nature has equipped you and which Nature has
peculiarly fitted you to use--although Morton deliberately let them
rust. But, generally speaking, it is a distinct descent from the high
plane of your address to excite the laughter of your audience. When
you do so, you confess that you are not able to hold the attention of
your hearers by the sustained and unbroken strength of your argument.
You admit that you are either so dull in your thought or indifferent
in your convictions that you know you are wearying your auditors and
must rest them by some mental diversion.

Where there is an earnestness of thought (and earnestness is only
another name for seriousness) there will always be the same quality in
manner--an impressiveness in bearing and delivery. This is
inconsistent with merriment of delivery, which robs speech of a
certain