Reading aloud is one of those exercises which combine mental and muscular effort, and hence has a double advantage.
To read aloud well, a person should not only understand the subject, but should hear his own voice, and feel within him that every syllable was distinctly enunciated, while there is an instinct presiding which modulates the voice to the number and distance of the hearers. Every public speaker ought to be able to tell whether he is distinctly heard by the farthest auditor in the room; if he is not, it is from a want of proper judgment and observation.
Reading aloud helps to develop the lungs just as singing does, if properly performed. The effect is to induce the drawing of a long breath every once in a while, oftener and deeper than of reading without enunciating. These deep inhalations never fail to develop the capacity of the lungs in direct proportion to their practice.
This loud reading, when properly done, has a great agency in inducing vocal power, on the same principle that muscles are strengthened by exercise; those of voice-making organs being no exception to the general rule. Hence, in many cases, absolute silence diminishes the vocal power, just as the protracted non-use of the arm of the Hindoo devotee at length paralyzes it forever. The general plan, in appropriate cases, is to read aloud in a conversational tone, thrice a day, for a minute, or two, or three at a time, increasing a minute every other day, until half an hour is thus spent at a time, thrice a day, which is to be continued until the desired object is accomplished. Managed thus, there is safety and efficiency as a uniform result.
As a means, then, of health, of averting consumption, of being social and entertaining in any company, as a means of showing the quality of the mind, let reading aloud be considered an accomplishment far more indispensable than that of smattering French, or lisping Italian, or dancing cotillions, gallopades, polkas, and quadrilles.- Hall’sJournal of health.
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