Secret meeting

“ And any members are at liberty to have small meetings among themselves, especially to tea, whereat they may enjoy the ever fresh and pleasant luxury of scandal and mischief-making, and prepare their accusations and taunts for the next general meeting ”

“ Why, you know two men can't meet on a street corner without immediately forming a secret society, electing president, vice-president, secretary, and treasurer, and appointing a committee of five to get up a banquet. ”

“ And that, perhaps, they will by and by succeed in rousing the "stubborn enthusiasm of the people" against themselves? Where has there been called one single spontaneous public meeting of any importance, and where exhibited a spark of enthusiasm, for the total repeal of the Corn-laws? Surely the topic is capable of being handled in a sufficiently exciting manner! But no; wherever a "meeting," or "demonstration," [pg 123] is heard of—there, also, are the eternal Cobden, Bright and Wilson, and their miserable fellow-agitators, who alone have got up—who alone harangue the meetings. ”

“ When I had got the pledge from him I told the people that Thursday’s meeting would only be a prayer meeting. But after this some of the people went to him and he turned round again, and said it was a business meeting. I know that he said no business should be done at that meeting, and afterwards said it should be a business meeting. I then saw that this was a deep and cunning plan laid to divide the best people that ever lived. ”

“ He went to justify the right of public meeting by his presence, and to share the responsibility of those who convened it. What man eminent as a thinker, save he, or Mr. John Morley, would incur the odium, peril, and discomfort of attending, for such a purpose, a workman's meeting such as that? ”

“ In meetings consisting of a half dozen or more people, it has been found advisable to have, in addition to a chairman and a secretary, more rules and more formality than in a meeting of three or four persons. ”

“ We alone are the unreported. We speak as we feel, and we don't tremble for to-morrow. Throughout the year we set down the words and deeds of the public, but on this day of our own meeting we shut out the public. ”

“ I said, "I suppose your engagement of to-day was a meeting of this society?"
"Yes," he answered, "a meeting of the Chamber to which I and the elder members of my household, including my son and his wife, belong." "But," I said, "if you are more powerful than the rulers of your people, what need of such careful secrecy?"
"You will understand the reason," he answered, "when you learn the nature of our powers. Hundreds among millions, we are no match for the fighting force of our unbelieving countrymen. ”

“ Ages of dumb suffering have given these people the interminable patience of mountains, and a public meeting is so new to them that they find a fearful pleasure in speeches which our free-born electors would howl down in three minutes. Any meeting of British trade-unionists would have polished off the Strike Committee’s business in an hour, but when I came away, though it was past two in the morning and the meeting had begun at six in the afternoon, the discussion was still proceeding with healthy vigour, and there were plenty of other subjects of equal importance still to be settled. ”

“ But, as we have the unfortunate example in our own times—not so very long ago, in Trafalgar Square—the calling together of a Mass meeting does not always guarantee that the gathering shall consist entirely of persons interested in the object of the meeting—the thing is impossible. ”

“ Even if the general public has not comprehended the marvellous significance of the meeting of the Conference, perhaps it will be capable of perceiving the significance of positive results. Facts and successes are always more powerful than the most glorious theories, however irrefutable. ”

“ A refusal to meet in conference until the figure proposed is acceptable rules out discussion between parties as a means of coming to terms on the main question in a dispute.
I have taken part in the settlement of probably more industrial differences than most politicians. In every case I have started with an impasse. The [Pg 197] first meeting of the parties always revealed an apparently unbridgeable chasm between their respective positions; but perseverance and an honest endeavour on both sides to find a solution usually ends in agreement. Goodwill can bridge any abyss. ”

“ It is amusing for the visitor from a free country to attend a political meeting where the chairman, speaker and policeman file up on the stage to occupy the three chairs reserved for them. The policeman may be heard by those in the front rows continually cautioning the speaker. ”

“ For myself, to this hour, I never enter board meeting, committee meeting, or synod, without the queer question, what would happen should any one discover that this bearded man was only a big boy disguised? that the frockcoat and the round hat are none of mine, and that, if I should be spurned from the assembly, as an interloper, a judicious public, learning all the facts, would give a verdict, “Served him right.” This consideration helps me through many bored meetings which would be else so dismal. What did my old copy say?—
“Boards are made of wood, they are long and narrow.” ”

“ The undersigned, representatives of English and Canadian newspapers, find that it would be impossible for them satisfactorily to discharge their duties if an injunction of secrecy be imposed on the conference and stringently carried into effect. They, therefore, beg leave to suggest whether, while the remarks of individual members of your body are kept secret, the propositions made and the treatment they meet with, might not advantageously be made public, and whether such a course would not best accord with the real interests committed to the conference. ”

“ Where the human flies are proudest in their function of pestiferousness, however, is in a meeting. Wherever you have a conference, a committee meeting, or a convention, there they buzz, tickle, and deblatterate. They keep the majority waiting while they air their incoherence. They suggest, amend, and raise objections. They never do anything; it is their business to annoy people who do things. ”

“ Our friend spends the first half an hour at his correspondence, fixes a day for a special audit of the accounts of the suspected branch, drops a hasty line to the General Secretary informing him of his whereabouts for the next few days, and writes to the Branch Secretary strongly objecting to the proposed mass meeting to vote on a strike on the ground that " an aggregate meeting is an aggravated meeting," and appointing, instead, a day for a small conference of representatives from the different branches. ”

“ Had the occasion been a ministerial conference—had the event been one in which a bold front was called for, to cover a weak position, or affront a coming peril—the old envoy would have borne himself well and bravely; no one could have worn an easier look in a trying emergency, or better baffled the searching that would try to detect a secret misgiving. ”

“ When the question is somewhat of a burning one, and the meeting begins to grow warm, all speak at once, and none listen. On these occasions the assembly breaks up into groups, each of which discusses the subject on its own account. ”

“ The mere announcement of the meeting drew a vast and excited throng to prevent it. Men of standing in the community made themselves leaders of the mob, and occupied in advance the entrance to the hall where it was to take place. The proprietors of the hall, appalled by the evidences of furious hostility to the meeting and its purposes, refused to open it to those who had engaged it, and they went elsewhere. ”

“ In the country, we are obliged to steer by the meeting-houses alone. Yet the meeting-house is a kind of wind-mill, which runs one day in seven, turned either by the winds of doctrine or public opinion, or more rarely by the winds of Heaven, where another sort of grist is ground, of which, if it be not all bran or musty, if it be not plaster, we trust to make bread of life. ”

“ The main object of all their endeavours, is, very clearly, to render you odious and to put you down; and, if they had been created for the express purpose of exalting you, it would have been impossible for them to labour to that end with more zeal or more effect. Your manner of conducting the second meeting, the way in which you carried on your communications with the government, the punctuality and decorum of your proceedings, the language and matter of your Resolutions and Petition, and the effect of these, very justly entitled you to a large share of public applause ”

“ Light drives away phantoms. The King desires you to receive the man. Make it a condition that he bring the documents. Arrange that the conference be secret, for 'tis necessary to proceed with the greatest caution. Our enemies are vigilant. ”

“ But if the meeting come to pass, then whosoever betrays the abiding place, which is the meeting-ground, which is that which lives like a star between day and night, between the dark of woman and the dawn of man, between man’s night and woman’s morning, shall never be forgiven, neither here nor in the hereafter. For man is frail and woman is frail, and none can draw the line down which another shall walk. But the star that is between two people and is their meeting-ground shall not be betrayed. ”

“ When feudal princes see one another at a place and time not agreed on beforehand, the interview is called "a meeting." When they do so in some open place agreed on beforehand, it is called "an assembly." When one prince sends a great officer to ask about another, it is called "a message of friendly inquiry." ”

“ We confess ourselves to be much surprised at the prevailing good sense, propriety, and moral elevation of the meeting. No candid reader can deny the existence of singular ability, honest and pure aims, eloquent and forcible advocacy, and a startling power in the reports and speeches of this Convention. For good, or for evil, it seems to us to be the most important meeting since that held in the cabin of the Mayflower. ”

“ When a meeting for any lawful purpose is actually called and held, one who goes there with the purpose to disturb and break it up, and commits disorder to that end, is a trespasser upon the rights of those who, for a time, have control of the place of meeting. ”

“ Every man that belongs to these quorums should be on hand at the time appointed, and not say, "I will work to the last minute, before I start for the meeting." Take time, prepare yourselves, be at the place of gathering promptly, to the minute, that you may hear the first word, then you will hear every word that is spoken and every counsel that is given. ”

“ Even at the start he must stick in his chapter heading about a conclave.
Hanged if I know what a conclave is. It’s some kind of a meeting I guess. He said it was something like a peace conference, but believe me, the meeting I’m going to tell you about wasn’t much like a peace conference. I told him I’d use my own heading and his too, just to keep him quiet. I think he’s got his pockets stuffed full of chapter headings and that he’ll be shooting them at me all the way through—like a machine-gun. ”

“ You will see this class of men at meetings, and conventions, both political and religious, without the most distant idea of promoting the objects of the meeting, convention, etc., as the case may be, but with no higher aim than introducing their idea to notice, making the meeting an engine, and men, met under other obligations, and with the ostensible object of the meeting before them, instruments to carry the pet idea on the high road to fame. ”

“ For months before the great day there is bustle and stir. Secret committees meet, rules are formulated, and insidious agents prowl about with an eye to the political training of those who have not yet nailed their colours to any particular mast. ”

“ The Chairman briefly explained the object of the meeting, and reminded those before him that they were men of business come to discuss a question of business, and he expressed a hope that nothing but business would be talked, as the riotous displays which had now become common on such occasions were not only degrading in themselves, but tended to shake the public confidence in a body which could so conduct itself. ”

“ The day seemed to grow worse as it progressed, as days ill begun have a way of doing, and when the premier in the afternoon appeared at the meeting he was to address, his spirits had not improved, and even if they had, the meeting was one to depress the spirits of any man. ”

“ A protracted meeting, conducted by enthusiastic, proud, extravagant, and ranting leaders, is a curse to any well-organized congregation. [Pg 377] Some men think it is no matter what means are employed if an effect is produced; the end will justify the means. But this is a dangerous sentiment. Let a meeting be conducted for days or weeks, with prudence, candor and solemnity, let an appeal be made to the understanding of rational men, let their judgment be informed; then the experience will be sound, the effect lasting, and the revival will be a blessing and an honor to any congregation. ”

“ At the meetings of the oldest companies, the Brothers always appear with their faces partially covered. If the meeting is in a building [23] of any kind, there is never a light to show the faces of those assembled; and if there be a fire, the Brothers keep away from its light as much as possible. Always, when practicable, the meetings are held in some wilderness, and no meeting is ventured upon for any general business, that requires the presence of more men than might accidentally meet, without the utmost precaution in the way of sentinels, etc. ”

“ I happen to think that any time you can begin three days into your term and have a meeting with somebody who advocates something that's important and something that many people think you're far apart, and it becomes clearer and clearer you're not so far apart, and both parties say it's a good meeting, then the process is beginning on the right note. ”

“ Many facts are not clear that will be clear in a short time. We are to have a secret session on Thursday, and I should think that would be a better opportunity for the many earnest expressions of opinion which members will desire to make and for the House to discuss vital matters without having everything read the next morning by our dangerous foes. ”