Macaulay advised a young friend who asked how to keep his brain active to read a couple of solid books, making careful outlines of their material at the same time.  One of these should be—­if possible—­a work in a foreign tongue, so that the strangeness of the language would necessitate slow, careful reading and close thinking.  All good students know that the best way to prepare for an examination is to make outlines of all the required reading and study.

It is just because the making of the outline demands such careful thinking that it is one of the most important steps in the production of a speech.

The Outline in the Finished Speech.  If the outline really shows in the finished speech, let us see if we can pick the entries out from a portion of one.  Edmund Burke in 1775 tried to prevent Great Britain from using coercive measures against the restive American colonies.  Many Englishmen were already clamoring for war when Burke spoke in Parliament upon conciliating the Colonies.

I am sensible, Sir, that all which I have asserted in my detail, is admitted in the gross; but that quite a different conclusion is drawn from it.  America, gentlemen say, is a noble object.  It is an object well worth fighting for.  Certainly it is, if fighting a people be the best way of gaining them.  Gentlemen in this respect will be led to their choice of means by their complexions and their habits.  Those who understand the military art, will of course have some predilection for it.  Those who wield the thunder of the state, may have more confidence in the efficacy of arms.  But I confess, possibly for want of this knowledge, my opinion is much more in favor of prudent management, than of force; considering force not as an odious, but a feeble instrument, for preserving a people so numerous, so active, so growing, so spirited as this, in a profitable and subordinate connexion with us.

First, Sir, permit me to observe, that the use of force alone is but temporary.  It may subdue for a moment; but it does not remove the necessity of subduing again; and a nation is not governed which is perpetually to be conquered.

My next objection is its uncertainty.  Terror is not always the effect of force; and an armament is not a victory.  If you do not succeed, you are without resource; for, conciliation failing, force remains; but, force failing, no further hope of reconciliation is left.  Power and authority are sometimes bought by kindness; but they can never be begged as alms by an impoverished and defeated violence.

A further objection to force is, that you impair the object by your very endeavors to preserve it.  The thing you fought for is not the thing which you recover; but depreciated, sunk, wasted, and consumed in the contest.  Nothing less will content me, than whole America.  I do not choose to consume its strength along