The Introduction and the Audience.  When we turn from the material of the introduction or the speech we naturally consider the audience.  Just as the salutations already listed in this chapter indicate how careful speakers are in adapting their very first words to the special demands of recognition for a single audience, so a study of introductions to speeches which have been delivered will support the same principle.  A speech is made to affect a single audience, therefore it must be fitted as closely as possible to that audience in order to be effective.  A city official invited to a neighborhood gathering to instruct citizens in the method of securing a children’s playground in that district is not only wasting time but insulting the brains and dispositions of his listeners if he drawls off a long introduction showing the value of public playgrounds in a crowded city.  His presence before that group of people proves that they accept all he can tell them on that topic.  He is guilty of making a bad introduction which seriously impairs the value of anything he may say later concerning how this part of the city can induce the municipal government to set aside enough money to provide the open space and the apparatus.  Yet this speech was made in a large American city by an expert on playgrounds.

People remembered more vividly his wrong kind of opening remarks than they did his advice concerning a method of procedure.

Effect of the Introduction upon the Audience.  Many centuries ago a famous and successful Roman orator stipulated the purpose of an introduction with respect to the audience.  Cicero stated that an introduction should render its hearers “benevolos, attentos, dociles”; that is, kindly disposed towards the speaker himself, attentive to his remarks, and willing to be instructed by his explanations or arguments.  Not everyone has a pleasing personality but he can strive to acquire one.  He can, perhaps, not add many attributes to offset those nature has given him, but he can always reduce, eradicate, or change those which interfere with his reception by others.  Education and training will work wonders for people who are not blessed with that elusive quality, charm, or that winner of consideration, impressiveness.  Self-examination, self-restraint, self-development, are prime elements in such a process.  Great men have not been beyond criticism for such qualities.  Great men have recognized their value and striven to rid themselves of hindrances and replace them by helps.

Every reader is familiar with Benjamin Franklin’s account of his own method as related in his Autobiography, yet it will bear quotation here to illustrate this point: