At the same time this plan has several unfavorable aspects.  When the debater has prepared himself in this way, forgetting is fatal.  He has memorized words.  When the words do not come he has no recourse but to wait for memory to revive, or to look to his colleagues for help.  Again, the man who has learned his argument can give no variety to his attack or defense.  He is like a general with an immovable battery, who, though able to hurl a terrific discharge in the one direction in which his guns point, is powerless if the attack is made ever so slightly on his flank.  Perhaps the greatest disadvantage of this method is that it does not give the student the best kind of training.  What he needs most in life is the ability to arrange and present ideas rapidly, not to speak a part by rote.

It would seem, then, that this plan should be advised only when the students are working for one formal debate, and are not preparing for a series of class or local contests that can all be controlled by the same instructor or critic.  With beginners in oral argumentation this method will usually make the better showing, and may therefore be considered permissible in the case of those teams which, because of unfamiliarity with their opponents’ methods, can take no chances.  This plan of preparation is in no way harmful or dishonest, but lacks some of the more permanent advantages of the second method.

The second method of developing the brief into the forensic is by oral composition.  This method demands that the debater shall speak extemporaneously from his memorized brief.  This in no way means that careful preparation, deliberate thought, and precise organization are omitted.  On the contrary, the formation of a brief from which a winning forensic can be expanded requires the most studious preparation, the keenest thought, and the most careful organization.  Neither does it mean that, as soon as the brief is formed, the forensic can be presented.  Before that step is taken, the debater who will be successful will spend much time, not in written, but in oral composition.

He will study his brief until he sees that it is not merely a succession of formal statements connected with “for’s,” but a series of ideas arranged in that form because they will, if presented in that order, bring conviction to his hearers.  “Learning the brief,” then, becomes not a case of memory, but a matter of seeing—­seeing what comes next because that is the only thing that logically could come next.  When the brief is in mind, the speaker will expand it into a forensic to an imaginary audience until he finds that he is expressing the ideas clearly, smoothly, and readily.  Pay no attention to the fact that in the course of repeated deliveries the words will vary.  Words make little difference if the framework of ideas is the same.

This method of composing the forensic trains the mind of the student to see the logical relationship of ideas, to acquire a command of language, and to vary the order of ideas if necessary.  In doing these things, there are developed those qualities that are essential to all effective speaking.