Chapter twenty five, influencing the crowd. Success in business in the last analysis
turns upon touching the imagination of crowds. The reason that preachers in this present
generation are less successful in getting people to want goodness than business men are in
getting them to want motor cars, hats, and pianolas is that business men
as a class are more close and desperate students of human nature, and have
boned down harder to the art of touching the imaginations of the crowds. Gerald
Stanley Lee crowds. In the early part of July nineteen fourteen, a collection
of Frenchmen in Paris or Germans in Berlin was not a crowd in a psychological
sense. Each individual had his own special interests and needs, and there was
no powerful common eye dear to unify them. A group then represented only a
collection of individuals. A month later, any collection of Frenchmen or Germans form
the crowd. Patriotism, hate, a common fear, a pervasive grief had
unified the individuals. The psychology of the crowd is far different from the psychology
of the personal members that compose it. The crowd is a distinct entity.
Individuals restrain and subdue many of their impulses at the dictates of reason. The
crowd never reasons, It only feels as persons. There is a sense of
responsibility attached to our actions, which checks many of our incitements, but the
sense of responsibility is lost in the crowd because of its numbers. The crowd
is exceedingly suggestible and will act upon the wildest and most extreme ideas. The
crowd mind is primitive and will cheer plans and perform actions which its members would
utterly repudiate. A mob is only a highly wrought crowd. Ruskin's description is
fitting. You can talk a mob into anything. Its feelings may be usually
are on the whole, generous and right, but it has no foundation for
them, no hold of them. You may tease or tickle it into anything
at your pleasure. It thinks by infection, for the most part, catching
an opinion like a cold and there is nothing so little that it will not
roar itself wild about when the fit is on, nothing so great, but
it will forget in an hour when the fit is past. History will show
us how the crowd mind works. The medieval mind was not given to reasoning.
The medieval man attached great weight to the utterance of authority. His religion
touched chiefly the emotions. These conditions provided a rich soil for the propagation of
the crowd mind. When in the eleventh century flagellation, a voluntary self scourging
was preached by the monks, substituting flagellation for reciting penitential psalms was advocated by
the reformers. A scale was drawn up, making one thousand strokes equivalent to
ten psalms, or fifteen thousand to the entire psalter. This craze spread by
leaps and crowds. Flagellant fraternities sprang up. Priests carrying banners led through the
streets great processions, reciting prayers and whipping their bloody bodies with leaden thongs fitted
with four iron points. Pope Clement denounced this practice, and several of the
leaders of those processions had to be burned at the stake before the frenzy could
be uprooted. All Western and Central Europe was turned into a crowd by the
preaching of the crusaders, and millions of the followers of the Prince of Peace
rushed to the Holy Land to kill the heathen. Even the children started on
a crusade against the Saracens. The mob spirit was so strong that home affections
and persuasion could not prevail against it, and thousands of mere babes died in
their attempts to reach and redeem the sacred sepulture. In the early part of
the eighteenth century, the south Sea Company was formed in England. Britain became
a speculative crowd. Stock in the south Sea Company rose from one hundred twenty
eight one half points in January to five hundred fifty in May, and scored
one thousand in July. Five million shares were sold At this premium. Speculation
ran riot. Hundreds of companies were organized. One was formed for a wheel
of perpetual motion. Another never troubled to give any reason at all for taking
the cash of its subscribers. It merely announced that it was organized for a
design which will hereafter be promulgated. Owners began to sell The mob called the
suggestion a panic. In suit, the south Sea Company stock fell eight hundred
points in a few days, and more than a billion dollars evaporated. In
this era of frenzied speculation, the burning of the Witches at Salem. The
Klondike gold craze, and the forty eight people who were killed by mobs in
the United States in nineteen thirteen are examples familiar to us. In America,
the crowd must have a leader. The leader of the crowd or mob is
its determining factor. He becomes self hypnotized with the idea that unifies its members.
His enthusiasts is contagious, and so is theirs. The crowd acts as
he suggests. The great mass of people do not have any very sharply drawn
conclusions on any subject outside of their own little spheres. But when they become
a crowd, they are perfectly willing to accept ready made, hand me down
opinions. They will follow a leader at all costs. In labor troubles,
they often follow a leader in preference to obeying their government. In war,
they will throw self preservation to the bushes and follow a leader in the face
of guns that fire fourteen times a second. The mob becomes shorn of will
power and blindly obedient to its dictator. The Russian government, recognizing the menace
of the crowd, mind to its autocracy formerly prohibited public gatherings. History is
full of similar instances how the crowd is created to day, the crowd is
as real a factor in our socialized life as our magnates and monopolies. It
is too complex a problem merely to them or praise it. It must be
reckoned with and mastered. The present problem is how to get the most and
the best out of the crowd spirit and the public speaker finds this to be
peculiarly his own question. His influence is multiplied if he can only transmute his
audience into a crowd. His affirmations must be their conclusions. This can be
accomplished by unifying the minds and needs of the audience and arousing their emotions.
Their feelings, not their reason, must be played upon. It is up
to him to do this. Nobly argument has its place on the platform,
but even its potencies must observe the speaker's plan of attack to win possession of
his audience. Reread the chapter on feeling and enthusiasm. It is impossible to
make an audience a crowd without appealing to their emotions. Can you imagine the
average group becoming a crowd while hearing a lecture on dry fly fishing or on
Egyptian art? On the other hand, it would not have required world famous
eloquence to have turned any audience in Ulster in nineteen fourteen into a crowd by
discussing the Home Rule Act. The crowd spirit depends largely on the subject used
to fuse their individualities into one glowing whole. Note hour Antony played upon the
feelings of his hearers in the famous funeral oration given by Shakespeare in Julius Caesar.
From murmuring units, the men became a unit a mob. Antony's oration
over Caesar's body, Friends, ro moments, countrymen, lend me your ears.
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that
men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones.
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus hath told you Caesar was
ambitious. If it were so, it was a grievous fault, And grievously
hath Caesar answered it here on the leave of Brutus and the rest. For
Brutus is an honorable man, So are they all all honorable men? Come
I to speak in Caesar's funeral. He was my friend, faithful and just
to me. But Brutus says he was ambitious, and Brutus is an honorable
man. He hath brought many captives home to Rome, whose ransom did the
general Coffus feel? Did this in Caesar seem ambitious? When that the poor
have cried? Caesar hath wept. Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious, and Brutus is an honorable man. You
all did see that on the lupercal I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition? Yet Brutus says he was
ambitious, and sure he is an honorable man. I speak not to disprove
what Brutus spoke, But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause? What cause withholds you
then to mourn for him? Oh judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts,
and men have lost their reason. Bear with me. My heart is
in the coffin there with Caesar, and I must pause till it come back
to me. Weeps. First, Plebeian, methinks there is my much reason
in his sayings. Second, Plebeian, if thou consider rightly of the matter.
Caesar has had great wrong. Third Plebeian, has he masters? I
fear there will the war's come in his place? Fourth Plebeian, mark dye
his words. He would not take the crown. Therefore tis certain he was
not ambitious. First Plebeian. If it be found so, some will dear
abide it. Second Plebeian, poor soul. His eyes are red as fire
with weeping. Third Plebeian. There is not a nobler man in Rome than
Anthony. Fourth Plebeian. Now mark him. He begins again to speak Anthony.
But yesterday the word of Caesar might have stood against the world. Now
lies he there, and none so poor to do him reverence? O,
Masters, if I were disposed to stir your hearts and minds to mutiny and
rage, I should do Brutus wrong and Cassius wrong, who you all know
are honorable men. I will not do them wrong. I rather choose to
wrong the dead, to wrong myself and you, than I will wrong such
honorable men. But here's a parchment with the seal of Caesar. I found
it in his closet. Tis his will. Let but the commons hear this
testament, which pardon me. I do not mean to read, and they
would go and kiss dead Caesar's wounds, and dip their napkins in his sacred
blood. Yea beg a hair of him for memory and dying mention it within
their wills, bequeathing it as a rich legacy unto their issue. Fourth Plebeian,
will hear the will? Read it, Mark Antony, all the will,
the will? We will here Ceesar's will, Antony. Have patience,
gentle friends. I must not read it. It is not meet you know
how Caesar loved you. You are not would you are not stones but men,
and being men. Hearing the will of Caesar, it will inflame you.
It will make you mad. Tis good? You know not that you
are his heirs? For if you should, oh, what would come of
it? Fourth Plebean read the will? Will hear it, Antony? You
shall read us the will Seesar's will? Antony? Will you be patient?
Will you stay Awhile I have always shot myself to tell you of it?
I fear I wrong. The honorable men whose daggers have stabbed Caesar, I
do fear it. Fourth Plebeon they were traitors, honorable men, all the
will the testament. Second Plebaean, they were villains, murderers. The will,
read the will, Antony. You will compel me then to read the
will. Then make a ring about the corpse of Caesar, and let me
show you him that made the will. Shall I descend, and will you
give me leave? All come down? Second plebaein descend, He comes down
from the rostrum. Third plebaein you shall have leave, Fourth plebaein a ring.
Stand round. First plebain stand from the hearse, stand from the body.
Second plebaein room for antonye most noble Antonae, Antony, nay, press
not so upon me stand far off all stand bad back room, bare back
Anthony. If you have tears prepared to shed them. Now you all do
know this mantle. I remember the first time ever Caesar put it on twas
on a summer's evening in his tent. That day he overcame the nervy look
in this place, ran Cassius, dagger through. See what a rent the
envious Casca made through this the well beloved Brutus stabbed, And as he plucked
his cursed steel away, mark how the blood of Caesar followed it as rushing
out of doors to be resolved. If brutus so unkindly knocked or no,
for Brutus, as you know, was Caesar's angel judge O U gods,
how Caesar loved him. This was the most unkindest cut of all. For
when the noble Caesar saw him stabb ingratitude more strong than traitor's arms, quite
vanquished him, then burst his mighty heart and in his mantle, muffling up
his face, even at the base of Pompey's statue, which all the while
ran blood. Great Caesar fell. Oh what a fall was there, my
countrymen? Then I and you and all of us fell down, whilst bloody
treason flourished over us. Oh, now you weep, and I perceive you
feel the dint of pity. These are gracious drops, kind souls. What
weep you when you but behold our Caesar's vesture wounded? Look you here,
he is himself marred as you see by traitors. First plebaein O piteous spectacle,
Second plebaein O noble Caesar, Third plebein, oh woeful day, fourth
plebein O traitors villains. First plebaein almost bloody sight, Second plebaein we will
be revenged all revenge about seek burn fire killed day. Let not at freighter
live, Antony stay, countrymen, First, plebein peace. There hear the
noble Antony. Second plebain will hear him. We'll follow him, will die
with him Antony, Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir you
up to such a sudden flood of mutiny. They death have done this deed,
are honorable. What private griefs they have, alas I know not that
made them do it. They are wise and honorable, and will no doubt
with reasons answer you. I come, not friends, to steal away your
hearts. I am no orator, as Brutus is. But as you know
me, all a plain blunt man that love my friend, and that they
know full well that gave me public leave to speak of him. For I
have neither wit, nor worth, action or utterance, nor the power of
speech to stirman's blood. I only speak right on. I tell you that
which you yourselves do know. Show your sweet Caesar's wounds, poor poor dumb
mouths, and bid them speak for me. But were I brutus and brutus
Antony there were an Antony would ruffle up your spirits and put a tongue in
every wound of Caesar, that should move the stones of Rome to rise and
mutiny. All will mutiny. First Plebaein will burn the house of Brutus.
Third Plebaein away, Then come seek the conspirators. Antony. Yet hear me,
countrymen, yet hear me speak all peace? Ho hear Antony, most
noble Antony, Antony, Why friends you go to? Do you know not
what? Wherein hath Caesar thus deserved your loves? Alas you know not?
I must tell you. Then you have forgot the will I told you of
Plebeyan's most true the will. Let stay and hear the will, Antony.
Here is the will, and un the Caesar's seal to every Roman citizen.
He gives to every several men seventy five drachmas. Second Plebean, most noble
Caesar will revenge his death. Third Plebean, Oh Royal Caesar, Antony,
Here me with patience, all peace, Hoe Anthony. Moreover, he hath
left you all his walks, his private arbors, and new planted orchards on
this side Tiber. He hath left them you and to your heirs forever common
pleasures to walk abroad and recreate yourselves. Here was a Caesar when comes such
another. First Plebeian never never come away away, will burn his body in
the holy place, and with the bronze fire the traitor's houses take up the
body. Second Plebeian, go fetch fire. Third Plebeian pluck down benches.
Third Plebeian pluck down benches. Fourth Plebeian pluck down forms windows, anything excellant
citizens with the body. Antony, now let it work mischief. Thou art
a foot, Take thou what curse thou wilt? To unify single auditors into
a crowd. Express their common needs, aspirations, dangers, and emotions.
Deliver your message so that the interests of one shall appear to be the interests
of all. The conviction of one man is intensified in proportion as he finds
others sharing his belief and feeling. Antony does not stop with telling the Roman
populace that Caesar fell. He makes the tragedy universal. Then I, and
you and all of us fell down, whilst bloody treason flourished over us.
Applause Generally, a sign of feeling helps to unify an audience. The nature
of the crowd is illustrated by the contagion of applause. Recently, a throng
in a New York moving picture and board Willehouse had been applauding several songs,
and when an advertisement for tailored skirts was thrown on the screen, some one
started the applause, and the crowd, like sheep, blindly imitated until some
one saw the joke and laughed. Then the crowd again followed a leader and
laughed at and applauded its own stupidity. Actors sometimes start applause for their lines
by snapping their fingers. Some one the first few rows will mistake it for
faint applause, and the whole theater will chime in. An observant auditor will
be interested in noticing the various devices a monologist will use to get the first
round of laughter and applause. He worked so hard because he knows an audience
of units is an audience of indifferent critics. But once get them to laughing
together, and each single laughing to sweeps a number of others with them,
until the whole theater is a roar and the entertainer has scored. These are
meretricious schemes. To be sure, and do not savior in the least of
inspiration. But crowds have not changed in their nature in a thousand years.
And the one law holds for the greatest preacher and the pettiest stump speaker.
You must fuse your audience or they will not warm to your message. The
devices of the great orator may not be so obvious as those of the vote
wilmonologist, but the principle is the same. He tries to strike some universal
note that will have all his hearers feeling alike at the same time. The
evangelist knows this when he has the soloist sing some touching song just before the
address, or he will have the entire congregation sing. And that is the
psychology of now everybody sing, for he knows that they who will not join
in the song are as yet outside the crowd. Many a time has the
popular evangelist stopped in the middle of his talk when he felt that his hearers
were units instead of a molten mass. And a sensitive speaker can feel that
condition most depressingly and suddenly demanded that everyone arise and sing or repeat aloud a
familiar passage, or read in unison. Or perhaps he has subtly left the
thread of his discourse to tell a story that from long experience he knew would
not fail to bring his hearers to a common feeling. These things are important
resources for the speaker, and happy is he who uses them worthily, and
not as a despicable charlatan. The difference between a demagogue and a leader is
not so much a matter of method as of principle. Even the most dignified
speaker must recognize the eternal laws of human nature. You are by no means
urged to become a trickster on the platform. Far from it. But don't
kill your speech with dignity. To be icily correct is as silly as to
rant. Do neither, but appeal to those world old elements in your audience
that have been recognized by all great speakers, from Demosthenes to sam Small,
and see to it that you never debase your powers by arousing your hearers unworthily.
It is as hard to kindle enthusiasm in a scattered audience as to build
a fire with scattered sticks. An audience to be converted into a crowd must
be made to appear as a crowd. This cannot be done when they are
widely scattered over a large seating space, or when many empty benches separate the
speaker from his hearers. Have your audience seated compactly how many a preacher has
bemoaned the enormous edifice over which what would normally be a large congregation has scattered
in chilled and chilling solitudes Sunday after Sunday. Bishop Brooks himself could not have
inspired a congregation of one thousand souls seated in the vastness of Saint Peter's at
Rome, in that colossal sanctuary. It is only on great occasions which bring
out the multitudes, that the service is before the high altar. At other
times, the smaller side chapels are used. Universal ideas so charged with feeling,
helped to create the crowd atmosphere. Examples liberty, character, righteousness,
courage, fraternity, altruism, country and national heroes. George Cohen was making
psychology practical and profitable when he introduced the flag and flag songs into his musical
comedies. Cromwell's regiments prayed before the battle and went into the fight singing hymns.
The French corpse singing the Marseilles in nineteen fourteen charged the Germans as one
man such unifying devices aroused the feelings, make soldiers fanatical mobs and alas more
efficient murderers. End of Section twenty five