Fluency Through Preparation

    Animis opibusque parati--Ready in mind and resources.

    --_Motto of South Carolina_.

    In omnibus negotiis prius quam aggrediare, adhibenda est     praeparatio diligens--In all matters before beginning a diligent     preparation should be made.

    --CICERO, _De Officiis_.

Take your dictionary and look up the words that contain the Latin stem _flu_--the results will be suggestive.

At first blush it would seem that fluency consists in a ready, easy use of words. Not so--the flowing quality of speech is much more, for it is a composite effect, with each of its prior conditions deserving of careful notice.

_The Sources of Fluency_

Speaking broadly, fluency is almost entirely a matter of preparation. Certainly, native gifts figure largely here, as in every art, but even natural facility is dependent on the very same laws of preparation that hold good for the man of supposedly small native endowment. Let this encourage you if, like Moses, you are prone to complain that you are not a ready speaker.

Have you ever stopped to analyze that expression, "a ready speaker?" Readiness, in its prime sense, is preparedness, and they are most ready who are best prepared. Quick firing depends more on the alert finger than on the hair trigger. Your fluency will be in direct ratio to two important conditions: your knowledge of what you are going to say, and your being accustomed to telling what you know to an audience. This gives us the second great element of fluency--to preparation must be added the ease that arises from practise; of which more presently.

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