Getting at the Inner Man, and, Fifty Years on the Lecture Platform

For my own part, I should say that he is like some of the old-time prophets, the strong ones who found a great deal to attend to in addition to matters of religion. The power, the ruggedness, the physical and mental strength, the positive grandeur of the man--all these are like the general conceptions of the big Old Testament prophets. The suggestion is given only because it has often recurred, and therefore with the feeling that there is something more than fanciful in the comparison; and yet, after all, the comparison fails in one important particular, for none of the prophets seems to have had a sense of humor!

It is perhaps better and more accurate to describe him as the last of the old school of American philosophers, the last of those sturdy-bodied, high-thinking, achieving men who, in the old days, did their best to set American humanity in the right path--such men as Emerson, Alcott, Gough, Wendell Phillips, Garrison, Bayard Taylor, Beecher;[1] men whom Conwell knew and admired in the long ago, and all of whom have long since passed away.

[Footnote 1: The life of Henry Ward Beecher parallels that of Russell H. Conwell in many respects. His Plymouth Church in Brooklyn became the largest in America with a seating capacity of nearly 3,000. But it was not to this audience alone that he preached; for, believing as Dean Conwell did after him, that all things concerning the public welfare are fit subjects for a minister's attention, his opinions on all questions were eagerly followed by the public at large. He was, perhaps, the most popular lecturer in the country of his day, and was an unrivaled after-dinner speaker. He allied himself with the Republican party as soon as it was formed, lent his pen and pulpit to further its aims, and during the canvass of 1856 traveled far and wide to speak at mass meetings.

Beecher visited Europe in 1863 for his health and when in Great Britain he addressed vast audiences on the purpose and issues of the Civil War, speaking in one instance for three hours consecutively, and changing materially the state of public opinion. He was a strong advocate of free trade and of woman suffrage. His last public speech was in favor of high license, at Chickering Hall, New York, Feb. 25, 1887.

It was as a speaker that Beecher was seen at his best. His mastery of the English tongue, his dramatic power, his instinctive art of impersonation which had become a second nature, his vivid imagination, his breadth of intellectual view, the catholicity of his sympathies, and his passionate enthusiasm made him a preacher without a peer in his own time and country. Later, like Beecher, Conwell was without peer in his day and the description which characterizes the former applies with equal force to Conwell himself.]

And Conwell, in his going up and down the country, inspiring his thousands and thousands, is the survivor of that old-time group who used to travel about, dispensing wit and wisdom and philosophy and courage to the crowded benches of country lyceums, and the chairs of school-houses and town halls, or the larger and more pretentious gathering-places of the cities.

Conwell himself is amused to remember that he wanted to talk in public from his boyhood, and that very early he began to yield to the inborn impulse. He laughs as he remembers the variety of country fairs and school commencements and anniversaries and even sewing-circles where he tried his youthful powers, and all for experience alone, in the first few years, except possibly for such a thing as a ham or a jack-knife! The first money that he ever received for speaking was, so he remembers with glee, seventy-five cents; and even that was not for his talk, but for horse hire! But at the same time there is more than amusement in recalling these experiences, for he knows that they were invaluable to him as training. And for over half a century he has affectionately remembered John B. Gough, who, in the height of his own power and success, saw resolution and possibilities in the ardent young hill-man, and actually did him the kindness and the honor of introducing him to an audience in one of the Massachusetts towns; and it was really a great kindness and a great honor, from a man who had won his fame to a young man just beginning an oratorical career.

Conwell's lecturing has been, considering everything, the most important work of his life, for by it he has come into close touch with so many millions--literally millions!--of people.

I asked him once if he had any idea how many he had talked to in the course of his career, and he tried to estimate how many thousands of times he had lectured, and the average attendance for each, but desisted when he saw that it ran into millions of hearers. What a marvel is such a fact as that! Millions of hearers!

I asked the same question of his private secretary, and found that no one had ever kept any sort of record; but as careful an estimate as could be made gave a conservative result of fully eight million hearers for his lectures; and adding the number to whom he has preached, who have been over five million, there is a total of well over thirteen million who have listened to Russell Conwell's voice! And this staggering total is, if anything, an underestimate. The figuring was done cautiously and was based upon such facts as that he now addresses an average of over forty-five hundred at his Sunday services (an average that would be higher were it not that his sermons in vacation time are usually delivered in little churches; when at home, at the Temple, he addresses three meetings every Sunday), and that he lectures throughout the entire course of each year, including six nights a week of lecturing during vacation-time. What a power is wielded by a man who has held over thirteen million people under the spell of his voice! Probably no other man who ever lived had such a total of hearers. And the total is steadily mounting, for he is a man who has never known the meaning of rest.

I think it almost certain that Dr. Conwell has never spoken to any one of what, to me, is the finest point of his lecture-work, and that is that he still goes gladly and for small fees to the small towns that are never visited by other men of great reputation. He knows that it is the little places, the out-of-the-way places, the submerged places, that most need a pleasure and a stimulus, and he still goes out, man of well over seventy that he is, to tiny towns in distant states, heedless of the discomforts of traveling, of the poor little hotels that seldom have visitors, of the oftentimes hopeless cooking and the uncleanliness, of the hardships and the discomforts, of the unventilated and overheated or underheated halls. He does not think of claiming the relaxation earned by a lifetime of labor, or, if he ever does, the thought of the sword of John Ring restores instantly his fervid earnestness.

How he does it, how he can possibly keep it up, is the greatest marvel of all. I have before me a list of his engagements for the summer weeks of this year, 1915, and I shall set it down because it will specifically show, far more clearly than general statements, the kind of work he does. The list is the itinerary of his vacation. Vacation! Lecturing every evening but Sunday, and on Sundays preaching in the town where he happens to be!

June 24 Ackley, Ia. " 25 Waterloo, Ia. " 26 Decorah, Ia. " 27 [2]Waukon, Ia. " 28 Red Wing, Minn. " 29 River Ralls, Wis. " 30 Northfield, Minn. July 1 Faribault, Minn. " 2 Spring Valley, Minn. " 3 Blue Earth, Minn. " 4 [2]Fairmount, Minn. " 5 Lake Crystal, Minn. " 6 Redwood Falls, Minn. " 7 Willmer, Minn. " 8 Dawson, Minn. " 9 Redfield, S. D. " 10 Huron, S. D. " 11 [2]Brookings, S. D. " 12 Pipestone, Minn. " 13 Hawarden, Ia. " 14 Canton, S. D. " 15 Cherokee, Ia. " 16 Pocahontas, Ia. " 17 Glidden, Ia. " 18 [2]Boone, Ia. " 19 Dexter, Ia. " 20 Indianola, Ia. " 21 Corydon, Ia. " 22 Essex, Ia. " 23 Sidney, Ia. " 24 Falls City, Nebr. " 25 [2]Hiawatha, Kan. " 26 Frankfort, Kan. " 27 Greenleaf, Kan. " 28 Osborne, Kan. " 29 Stockton, Kan. " 30 Phillipsburg, Kan. " 31 Mankato, Kan.

En route to next date on circuit.

Aug. 3 Westfield, Pa. " 4 Galston, Pa. " 5 Port Alleghany, Pa. " 6 Wellsville, N. Y. " 7 Bath, N. Y. " 8 [2]Bath, N. Y. " 9 Penn Yan, N. Y. " 10 Athens, N. Y. " 11 Owego, N. Y. " 12 Patchogue, L. I., N. Y. " 13 Port Jervis, N. Y. " 14 Honesdale, Pa. " 15 [2]Honesdale, Pa. " 16 Carbondale, Pa. " 17 Montrose, Pa. " 18 Tunkhannock, Pa. " 19 Nanticoke, Pa. " 20 Stroudsburg, Pa. " 21 Newton, N. J. " 22 [2]Newton, N. J. " 23 Hackettstown, N. J. " 24 New Hope, Pa. " 25 Doylestown, Pa. " 26 Phoenixville, Pa. " 27 Kennett, Pa. " 28 Oxford, Pa. " 29 [2]Oxford, Pa.

[Footnote 2: Preach on Sunday.]

And all these hardships, all this traveling and lecturing, which would test the endurance of the youngest and strongest, this man of over seventy assumes without receiving a particle of personal gain, for every dollar that he makes by it is given away in helping those who need helping.

That Dr. Conwell is intensely modest is one of the curious features of his character. He sincerely believes that to write his life would be, in the main, just to tell what people have done for him. He knows and admits that he works unweariedly, but in profound sincerity he ascribes the success of his plans to those who have seconded and assisted him. It is in just this way that he looks upon every phase of his life. When he is reminded of the devotion of his old soldiers, he remembers it only with a sort of pleased wonder that they gave the devotion to him, and he quite forgets that they loved him because he was always ready to sacrifice ease or risk his own life for them.

He deprecates praise; if any one likes him, the liking need not be shown in words, but in helping along a good work. That his church has succeeded has been because of the devotion of the people; that the university has succeeded is because of the splendid work of the teachers and pupils; that the hospitals have done so much has been because of the noble services of physicians and nurses. To him, as he himself expresses it, realizing that success has come to his plans, it seem as if the realities are but dreams. He is astonished by his own success. He thinks mainly of his own short-comings. "God and man have ever been very patient with me." His depression is at times profound when he compares the actual results with what he would like them to be, for always his hopes have gone soaring far in advance of achievement. It is the "Hitch your chariot to a star" idea.

His modesty goes hand-in-hand with kindliness, and I have seen him let himself be introduced in his own church to his congregation, when he is going to deliver a lecture there, just because a former pupil of the university was present who, Conwell knew, was ambitious to say something inside of the Temple walls, and this seemed to be the only opportunity.

I have noticed, when he travels, that the face of the newsboy brightens as he buys a paper from him, that the porter is all happiness, that conductor and brake-man are devotedly anxious to be of aid. Everywhere the man wins love. He loves humanity and humanity responds to the love.