Show WITH THE HIGH SCHOOL S CLASSICS by MARGARET BOYD 1923 westan newspaper union when could they say ay till now that talked of rome that her wide walls encompassed but one man 0 julius caesar caesar dominated rome borne to the extent that he seemed the only man la in it and cassius Cass lus in this conversation with brutus Is trying to arrive at the secret of caesars caesara Cae sars dominant personality it Is 18 given to few of us to study a personality of the first rank at close hand ns as cassius had done the nearest approach we can make to it Is to study the personality of those who can dominate an audience from a theater or opera stage the secret of personality Is as hidden as the secret of the nature of life volume upon volume has been written on both subjects but they get us nowhere in our study when scientists find out whether life itself Is a matter of chemicals of ferments or of radioactivity radio activity then they will probably be in a position to show why one man has a dominant personality and another Is a cipher if life U proved to be a chemical function as lavoisier thought it then personality will probably be proved to be a matter of excess or lack of certain cl chemicals iem in the system just now the best guess as to the secret of personality involves radioactivity when one goes to the theater and observes such widely different personalities as caruso lauder gaill burcl and mitzi one Is struck with the fact that all these people tire are alike in the impression they convey of tremendous overflowing energy one instinctively thinks of them when looking into a the Is a scientific toy that enables us to see radio actie ity it Is a tube a few inches long containing a tiny particle of a radium compound mounted in front of a special screen and viewed through a magnifying lens when one looks into lt it one sees a continuous display ot of sparks the flashes made as the rays thrown oft off by the radium hit the fluorescent screen radium adlum li of course was discovered only a few years ago consequently no Is very old we are not able therefore to say gay how long one will keep up its sparkling display but theoretically one should last indefinitely hour after hour day after day year after year that uny tiny particle of radium compound in the gives off rays ray and yet never grows less in bulk similarly certain people seem able to give off encouragement and inspiration and mental stimulation forever without losing anything from their own personalities those who have this quality dominate their sur round lags as caesar dominated rome your speech would betray you speech on conciliation with america when a man lg Is hurried or excited he be speaks the language of his youth in this oils way speech betrays ones early life and training it Is much easier to disguise ones appearance than to disguise one ones I 1 a speech one rarely it if ever gets completely away from tho speech of ones youth I 1 once heard a man declare that he could tell the state of the union from which anyone an one came by hearing him talk for a few minutes lie ile insisted that there were peculiarities of speech peculiar to each state and that these peculiarities were never altogether outgrown few of us ever cultivate our powers of observation to the point where we can dasting slight variations of speech but most of us feel able to distinguish by his speech a man from the eastern or western or southern part of our country it Is perhaps easier to learn leam a new language than to correct one that has ha been learned incorrectly I 1 remember an interesting example of the way la in which the mind clings to the form first learned clapham Bla pham it will be remembered was an ardent advocate of music in english I 1 remember one occasion when he be tang sang when I 1 was wa a page and sang it as only he could sing it then to illustrate the superiority of music in a language known to the audience he began to sing it in english everything went well until unfit he be reachel reach cl a certain phrase then his speech betrayed him into the italian chagrined he tried several times to sing the aria through in english but every time his speech betrayed him into the lan gauge in which lie he had so BO long sung the speech of the majority of us ui it I 1 influenced by the speech of our associates whis fit 19 especially true of children and mothers are ofton able to tell with whom their children have hav been playing by the childs ancon clous initiation imitation speech also alao tends to betray ones onea occupation and interests and social status as well as ones childhood environment viron ment and ones associates As ai ellot eliot puts put it speech Is I 1 but broken liblit upon the depth of tha th unspoken |