Lecturer

“ It would do your heart good to see the generous and delighted interest which the G.'s and D.'s, and indeed many more, take in the phenomenon of the lectures. The truth is, that their attention to the matter, and the intelligence of the people, and the merits of the lecturer, must be combined to account for such an unprecedented and beautiful audience,-larger, and much more select, they say, than even Thackeray's. ”

“ You have asked me to give these lectures, and I cannot turn them to better account than by asking you to remember that the lecturer is usually the distributor of intellectual wealth amassed by better men. It is not as lecturers but as discoverers that you ought to employ your highest men. Keep your sympathetic eye upon the originator of knowledge. Give him the freedom necessary for his researches; above all things avoiding that question which ignorance so often addresses to genius—What is the use of your work? ”

“ He allows a lecturer to prepare his discourse in writing, but not to read it before the audience, and points out how necessary it is "to raise their interest at the commencement of the lecture, and by a series of imperceptible gradations, unnoticed by the company, keep it alive as long as the subject demands it." ”

“ In higher teaching it is not so much the quantity of lectures delivered by an indifferent and ill-prepared teacher that counts as the quality, substance and value of the lectures of a competent and able lecturer who has been able to make himself a master of the subject or subjects which he intends to teach. ”

“ The attempt to report a lecture in full may so engross the attention that the impressions naturally received from the voice and manner of an earnest instructor are nearly lost. The learned author, as class lecturer, deprecates a too free use of the pencils in his lecture room, and when as epitomist he conducts us over fields once familiar he does not multiply landmarks beyond what are needed, or burden us with details when a word is sufficient. ”

“ Above all, they make one feel what a fair, wide, wonderful world one lives in; how much there is to be known, and how little one knows; and to the earnest man suggest future subjects of study. I only ask you not to expect from lectures what they can never give; but as to what they can give, I consider, I assure you, the lecturer’s vocation a most honourable one in the present day, even if we look on him as on a mere advertiser of nature’s wonders. As such I appear here to-night; not to teach you natural history ”

“ Then he sat down and fell asleep, before the lecturer had been awakened by the secretary to the committee, and had opened his notes upon the desk. For about ten minutes the lecturer made himself quite as unintelligible as the most erudite of the audience could have desired; but then he suddenly lapsed into intelligibility—he had reached that section of his subject which necessitated the recitation of a poem said to be in a Scotch dialect, every stanza of which terminated with the words, “A man’s a man for a’ that!” ”

“ Thus care is insured on the part of the lecturer that he shall not attempt a subject which he has not well studied; and an opportunity is given to every member to obtain an explanation of anything advanced, which he may not have understood, or to express his opinions on the questions that may arise, and, by these means, correct or confirm his own ideas. ”

“ Lectures are, properly speaking, not exhibitions or exercises of art, but matters of business; they profess to impart something definite to those who attend them, and those who attend them profess on their part to receive what the lecturer has to offer. ”

“ A great lecture must have a great theme. One of the supreme tests of a lecturer’s judgment presents itself when he is called upon to choose his subject. Look over the list of subjects on the syllabus of any speaker and the man stands revealed. ”

“ Directed reading, conferences on knotty points, special lectures followed by the questioning of the lecturer, discussions upon matters of opinion, laboratory work when needful, fairly frequent test examinations, and a final examination for places, are the proper ingredients of a good modern College course, and in the necessity of leaving the Professor’s energies free for the direction of all this really educational work, lies another reason for that complete, explicit, well-arranged text-book upon which I am insisting. ”

“ But I tell you the average intellect of five hundred persons, taken as they come, is not very high. It may be sound and safe, so far as it goes, but it is not very rapid or profound. A lecture ought to be something which all can understand, about something which interests everybody. I think, that, if any experienced lecturer gives you a different account from this, it will probably be one of those eloquent or forcible speakers who hold an audience by the charm of their manner, whatever they talk about,—even when they don’t talk very well. ”

“ A lecturer who has done some amount of research work in a particular subject or subjects and who has been teaching such subject or subjects for several years, can very easily take upon himself additional hours of lecture work, because that does not involve on the part of such a lecturer any extra preparation at home. ”

“ He reads to the end; the admiration grows, rises, bubbles over! where will it end? Thunders of applause follow, and the lecturer is inwardly overjoyed, but his modesty never deserts him. "Enough friends, enough!" he murmurs, "This is too much," Of course the transports are redoubled, and our lecturer returns home, believing himself a Virgil, a Sallust, or a Cicero.
[Footnote 72: Pliny the Younger, Letters, vi. 6.] ”

“ A lecturer of this kind had two great advantages over a lecturer in civil life; first, he was always sure of an audience, and, second, he could [189] hold their attention to the very close. None of them left while the lecture was in progress. Now and then an orderly-sergeant would try his hand in the lecture field, but unless he was protected by the presence of a pair of shoulder-straps he was quite likely to be coughed or groaned down, or in some other way discouraged from repeating the effort.
GOING TO WATER. ”

“ I respect myself too much, and I respect my class too much, to attempt rhetoric. My rôle is to help them to understand. Scientific lecturing ought to be, above all things, clear, instructive, well put together, and convincing. A lecturer has nothing to do with paying court to the scholars, or with showing off the master ”

“ There are, of course, notable exceptions; we had twelve gloriously popular talks on organic evolution, but the lecturer was not yet a professor—merely a university instructor—and his mind was still eager over the marvel of it all. Fortunately there is an increasing number of lecturers whose matter is so real, so definite, and so valuable, that in an attempt to give it an exact equivalence in words, they utilize the most direct forms of expression. ”

“ It is well, perhaps, to indicate exactly what it is which a lecturer proposes to himself to achieve during the brief hour in which you indulge him with your attention; it certainly makes his task the easier if he does so. ”

“ In short, it would be easy to trace out a course of lectures on common things to occupy a whole year, and for which the pupils, whenever they come to have homes of their own, will thank the lecturer to the last day of their life. ”

“ The utterance should not be rapid and hurried, and consequently unintelligible, but slow and deliberate, conveying ideas with ease from the lecturer, and infusing them with clearness and readiness into the minds of the audience. A lecturer should endeavour by all means to obtain a facility of utterance, and the power of clothing his thoughts and ideas in language smooth and harmonious, and at the same time simple and easy. ”

“ We rave over a famous lecturer or writer, but how many of us try to become lecturers or writers? Can you imagine a man—I know him—who never misses a professional billiard game, knows all the professional players, all the niceties of their work, but never takes a billiard cue in hand? ”

“ The teacher before his class, the lecturer in the presence of his audience, has the argument usually to himself; he allows few questionings and admits no reply. An erroneous theory may entrench itself within a folio against arguments which would annihilate its positions if these were condensed in a tract. ”

“ His ready speech, retentive memory, earnest purpose, and bright style made him perhaps the most popular lecturer of his day. His teaching work at University College was marked by equally extraordinary success. ”

“ Such a fatiguing life, however, has its compensations. It brings the lecturer into friendly contact with the brightest minds among his fellow countrymen in many and many places, and enlarges his sphere of influence in a way that is not easy to estimate. ”

“ Several sciences which depend not on one another are all learnt in less time together than successively, the mind being diverted and recreated by the variety, and put more upon the stretch. And therefore divers of these Lecturers may proceed together: suppose the Tutor’s [lectures] after morning chapel, the Greek or Philosophy Lecturer’s two hours after, and the Humanity and Mathematic [Lecturers’] in the afternoon. ”

“ The many-sidedness of the man, and the unconventional character of his prelections, combine to make it exceedingly difficult to define the nature and grounds of his wonderful power as a lecturer. I am certain that if every student who ever attended his class were to place on record his impressions of these, the impressions of each student would be widely{28} different, and yet they would not, taken all together, exhaust the subject, or supply a complete representation either of his matter or his manner.... ”

“ With us, if I am not mistaken, lectures are mostly given gratuitously by the lecturer. They are got up here and there with some philanthropical object, and in the hope that an hour at the disposal of young men and women may be rescued from idleness. ”

“ From the period of our last Chapter our friend commences to adopt the attributes of the mature student. His notes are taken as before at each lecture he attends, but the lectures are fewer, and the notes are never fairly transcribed; at the same time they are interspersed with a larger proportion of portraits of the lecturer, and other humorous conceits. He proposes at lunch-time every day that he and his companions should “go the odd man for a pot;” ”

“ A lecturer should appear easy and collected, undaunted and unconcerned, his thoughts about him, and his mind clear and free for the contemplation and description of his subject. His action should not be hasty and violent, but slow, easy, and229 natural, consisting principally in changes of the posture of the body, in order to avoid the air of stiffness or sameness that would otherwise be unavoidable. ”

“ Possibly an anxious tutor may suggest that he should attend at least three lectures a week, but this need not disturb him. There are always the wretched tripos men driven by the spurs of ambition to listen to obvious propositions expounded in stuffy lecture-rooms. These men, being good fellows, will take your card and leave it in the lecturer's hat each morning. ”

“ The lecturer should then sit down and invite and encourage his students to ask pertinent questions or advance sound criticism.
In a class-room it is easier to keep the interest of the pupils alive. Every effort should be made to let the information come from the pupils rather than the teacher. ”

“ Our risible faculties are continually called into action at public lectures of all kinds; and indeed, no lecturer, however learned he may be, has much chance now-a-days of instructing, unless he can also amuse his audience. Nor can the various public and even private buildings, which are daily springing up around us, like so many mushrooms, be contemplated 12 without considerable emotions of mirthfulness. ”

“ The Almighty lecturer, by displaying the principles of science in the structure of the universe, has invited man to study and to imitation. It is as if he had said to the inhabitants of this globe that we call ours, "I have made an earth for man to dwell upon, and I have rendered the starry heavens visible, to teach him science and the arts. He can now provide for his own comfort, AND LEARN FROM MY MUNIFICENCE TO ALL, TO BE KIND TO EACH OTHER." ”

“ The lecturer will read but those parts of his lecture which are best heard. Sometimes, it is true, the faith and spirits of the reader run a little ahead and draw after the good hearing, and at other times the good hearing runs ahead and draws on the good reading. ”

“ C. LAMB. W. H [azlitt] . goes on lecturing against W.W., and making copious use of quotations from said W.W. to give a zest to said lectures. S.T.C. is lecturing with success. I have not heard either him or H.; but I dined with S.T.C. at Oilman's a Sunday or two since; and he was well and in good spirits. I mean to hear some of the course; but lectures are not much to my taste, whatever the lecturer may be. If read, they are dismal flat, and you can't think why you are brought together to hear a man read his works, which you could read so much better at leisure yourself ”

“ There are two sorts of lecturers; those that absolutely teach, and those that stimulate to learn; those that exhaust their subject, and those that indicate its bearings; those that infuse into their hearers their own ideas, and those that set them a-thinking for themselves. ”

“ One student tells of having written fifteen pages of notes from four talks which he heard at a convention, [Pg 27] and that some of these notes were not transferred from his mind to the note-book for at least ten days after the talks were heard.
Form the habit of letting the lecturer make you SEE what he describes. The visual impression which you make will increase your understanding of anything you hear or read, and at the same time very materially assist you in remembering it. ”

“ Lectures from such persons are, no doubt, as full of insight, imagination and power as are their written works; but we cannot have a score of such lecturers in every school, each to elucidate his own subject, nor, if we could, would it be good for the children. The personality of the teacher would influence them to distraction from the delight in knowledge which is itself a sufficient and compelling force to secure perfect attention, and seemly discipline. ”