and discern the royal figure in the meanest dress is one of the great ends
of that education which must always, in some form, precede real success.
For nothing which endures is ever done without some kind of preliminary
training. Men do not happen, by chance, upon greatness; they achieve it.
Noble work of any kind is the fruit of laborious apprenticeship, and from
the higher forms of success the idler and the amateur are for ever shut
out. A man often enters a new field or takes up a new tool with surprising
facility and power; but in these cases the man is only carrying into a
fresh field the skill already acquired elsewhere. It has sometimes
happened that a sudden occasion has called an obscure man to his feet, and
he has sat down famous. In such instances it is the custom to say that the
orator has spoken without preparation; as a matter of fact, the man knows
that he has been all his life preparing for that critical moment. If he
had not risen full of his theme, with the rich material of noble speech
within reach of his memory or imagination, he would have left the hour
empty and unmarked. In such a moment a man rises as high as the reach of
his nature and no higher, and the reach of his nature depends on the
training he has given himself.

The hour for commanding speech comes to the politician, whose study of
public affairs is chiefly a study of the management of his constituents,
and he sits down as empty as he arose; the same hour, arriving
unexpectedly to Burke or Webster, draws upon vast accumulations of
knowledge, thought, and illustration. In the famous debate with Hayne,
Webster had practically but one day in which to prepare his reply to his
persuasive and accomplished adversary; but when he spoke it was to put
into language for all time the deep conviction of the reality of the
national idea. The great orator had scant time to make ready for the
greatest opportunity of his life, but, in reality, he had been preparing
from boyhood to make that immortal speech. Brilliant speeches are often