GESTURES AND MANNERISMS
We are not a demonstrative race. Which means, not only that our speakers are generally little disposed to gesticulation, but also that our audiences are not inclined to watch them, save as an entertainment. Generally, then, if you are not wishful to use your hands in your speaking, do not use them. People will prefer it so, rather than that you should constrain yourself into insincere and irrelevant motions. " Don't use little gestures. Don't jerk the hands continually. You are a speaker, not St. Virus."22 But if we decide to keep our hands still and for most of us this is wise at first, we have to do something else with them. They must not go into our pockets. They must not rattle keys or small change. They had better not fiddle at all; the glass of water will one day fall over as we fondle it; the handkerchief we twist round our fingers will rend noisily; the reading lamp flex will bare and electrocute us; it is not considered polite to tear up the little note which said, " Twenty minutes only please"! If our hands are not wanted for motions or turning papers, they can rest gently on the table or be folded loosely hanging before us. They can be clasped palm downwards and elbows extended upon the desk if we have one. If we have no desk, the necessity of grasping our Bible may solve the problem without further thought.

This is not, however, to discountenance gesture altogether. But acceptable gesture takes its place with the rest of the preacher's acceptable qualities. It comes, if it comes at all, we know not how. This chapter will neither advocate it nor suggest rules for it: the essence of it is spontaneity. The brother whose notes were interrupted at a critical point with the message: " raise bible aloft and thump desk with fist " must have been a consummate actor if his programme produced any more than a sad smile from his audience. If we are preaching from the heart, our whole body will take its rhythm from our theme-not necessarily on the big scale- and we shall have no need of tuition.

Mannerisms are another matter. We all know brethren who have them, and some we find endearing, and others we find offensive. The brother who takes off his spectacles at a significant moment in his address, and leaning over the desk, gently opens and closes them as he confides an intimate secret of great moment to us, does what we expect of him. We know him for it and should be sorry if he stopped. It is part of him. But let any one try to copy him, and we are enraged. The brother who clears his throat twice in a sentence should be asked not to. Kind critics will tell us whether any mannerisms we may have dropped into are offensive or ridiculous. Our own sense must tell us that they cannot, and must not, be contemplated and deliberately adopted.