man, it is easier for me to put you to death than to say that I will”; and the youth yielded.  In earlier days, he was taken by pirates.  What then?  He threw himself into their ship; established the most extraordinary intimacies; told them stories; declaimed to them; if they did not applaud his speeches, he threatened them with hanging,—­which he performed afterwards,—­and, in a short time, was master of all on board.  A man this is who cannot be disconcerted, and so can never play his last card, but has a reserve of power when he has hit his mark.  With a serene face, he subverts a kingdom.  What is told of him is miraculous; it affects men so.  The confidence of men in him is lavish, and he changes the face of the world, and histories, poems, and new philosophies arise to account for him.  A supreme commander over all his passions and affections; but the secret of his ruling is higher than that.  It is the power of Nature running without impediment from the brain and will into the hands.  Men and women are his game.  Where they are, he cannot be without resource.  “Whoso can speak well,” said Luther, “is a man.”  It was men of this stamp that the Grecian States used to ask of Sparta for generals.  They did not send to Lacedaemon for troops, but they said, “Send us a commander”; and Pausanias, or Gylippus, or Brasidas, or Agis, was despatched by the Ephors.

It is easy to illustrate this overpowering personality by these examples of soldiers and kings; but there are men of the most peaceful way of life, and peaceful principle, who are felt, wherever they go, as sensibly as a July sun or a December frost,—­men who, if they speak, are heard, though they speak in a whisper,—­who, when they act, act effectually, and what they do is imitated:  and these examples may be found on very humble platforms, as well as on high ones.

In old countries, a high money-value is set on the services of men who have achieved a personal distinction.  He who has points to carry must hire, not a skilful attorney, but a commanding person.  A barrister in England is reputed to have made twenty or thirty thousand pounds per annum in representing the claims of railroad companies before committees of the House of Commons.  His clients pay not so much for legal as for manly accomplishments,—­for courage, conduct, and a commanding social position, which enable him to make their claims heard and respected.

I know very well, that, among our cool and calculating people, where every man mounts guard over himself, where heats and panics and abandonments are quite out of the system, there is a good deal of skepticism as to extraordinary influence.  To talk of an overpowering mind rouses the same jealousy and defiance which one may observe round a table where anybody is recounting the marvellous anecdotes of mesmerism.  Each auditor puts a final stroke to the discourse by exclaiming, “Can he mesmerize me?” So each man inquires if any orator can change his convictions.