ENGLISH:
COMPOSITION AND LITERATURE
BY
W. F. WEBSTER
PRINCIPAL OF THE EAST HIGH SCHOOL
MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
Boston: 4 Park Street; New York: 85 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 378-388 Wabash Avenue
The Riverside Press Cambridge
COPYRIGHT, 1900 AND 1902, BY W. F. WEBSTER
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
PREFACE
In July, 1898, I presented at the National Educational
Association, convened in Washington, a Course
of Study in English. At Los Angeles, in 1899, the
Association indorsed the principles of this course, and
made it the basis of the Course in English for High
Schools. At the request of friends, I have prepared
this short text-book, outlining the method of carrying
forward the course, and emphasizing the principles
necessary for the intelligent communication of ideas.
It has not been the purpose to write a rhetoric. The
many fine distinctions and divisions, the rarefied examples
of very beautiful forms of language which a young
pupil cannot possibly reproduce, or even appreciate,
have been omitted. To teach the methods of simple,
direct, and accurate expression has been the purpose;
and this is all that can be expected of a high school
course in English.
The teaching of composition differs from the teaching
of Latin or mathematics in this point: whereas
pupils can be compelled to solve a definite number of
problems or to read a given number of lines, it is not
possible to compel expression of the full thought. The
full thought is made of an intellectual and an emotional
element. Whatever is intellectual may be compelled
iv
by dint of sheer purpose; whatever is emotional must
spring undriven by outside authority, and uncompelled
by inside determination. A boy saws a cord of wood
because he has been commanded by his father; but he
cannot laugh or cry because directed to do so by the
same authority. There must be the conditions which
call forth smiles or tears. So there must be the conditions
which call forth the full expression of thought,
both what is intellectual and what is emotional. This
means that the subject shall be one of which the writer
knows something, and in which he is interested; that
the demands in the composition shall not be made a
discouragement; and that the teacher shall be competent
and enthusiastic, inspiring in each pupil a desire
to say truly and adequately the best he thinks and
feels.
These conditions cannot be realized while working
with dead fragments of language; but they are realized
while constructing living wholes of composition.
It is not two decades ago when the pupil in drawing
was compelled to make straight lines until he made
them all crooked. The pupil in manual training began
by drawing intersecting lines on two sides of a board;
then he drove nails into the intersections on one side,
hoping that they would hit the corresponding points on
the other. Now no single line or exercise is an end in
itself; it contributes to some whole. Under the old
method the pupil did not care or try to draw a straight
line, or to drive a nail straight; but now, in order that
he may realize the idea that lies in his mind, he does
care and he does try: so lines are drawn better and nails
v
are driven straighter than before. In all training that
combines intellect and hand, the principle has been
recognized that the best work is done when the pupil’s
interest has been enlisted by making each exercise contribute
directly to the construction of some whole.
Only in the range of the spiritual are we twenty years
behind time, trying to get the best construction by
compulsion. It is quite time that we recognized that
the best work in composition can be done, not while
the pupil is correcting errors in the use of language
which he never dreamed of, nor while he is writing ten
similes or ten periodic sentences, but when both intellect
and feeling combine and work together to produce
some whole. Then into the construction of this whole
the pupil will throw all his strength, using the most
apt comparisons, choosing the best words, framing adequate
sentences, in order that the outward form may
worthily present to others what to himself has appeared
worthy of expression.
There are some persons who say that other languages
are taught by the word and sentence method; then why
not English? These persons overlook the fact that we
are leaving that method as rapidly as possible, and
adopting a more rational method which at once uses a
language to communicate thought. And they overlook
another fact of even greater importance: the pupil
entering the high school is by no means a beginner in
English. He has been using the language ten or
twelve years, and has a fluency of expression in English
which he cannot attain in German throughout a high
school and college course. The conditions under which
vi
a pupil begins the study of German in a high school
and the study of English composition are entirely dissimilar;
and a conclusion based upon a fancied analogy
is worthless.
It is preferable, then, to practice the construction of
wholes rather than the making of exercises; and it is
best at the beginning to study the different kinds of
wholes, one at a time, rather than all together. No
one would attempt to teach elimination by addition and
subtraction, by comparison and by substitution, all together;
nor would an instructor take up heat, light,
and electricity together. In algebra, or physics, certain
great principles underlie the whole subject; and these
appear and reappear as the study progresses through
its allied parts. Still the best results are obtained by
taking up these several divisions of the whole one after
another. And in English the most certain and definite
results are secured by studying the forms of discourse
separately, learning the method of applying to each the
great principles that underlie all composition.
If the forms of discourse are to be studied one after
another, which shall be taken up first? In general,
all composition may be separated into two divisions:
composition which deals with things, including narration
and description; and composition which deals with
ideas, comprising exposition and argument. It needs
no argument to justify the position that an essay which
deals with things seen and heard is easier for a beginner
to construct than an essay which deals with ideas
invisible and unheard. Whether narration or description
should precede appears yet to be undetermined;
vii
for many text-books treat one first, and perhaps as
many the other. I have thought it wiser to begin with
the short story, because it is easier to gain free, spontaneous
expression with narration than with description.
To write a whole page of description is a task for a master,
and very few attempt it; but for the uninitiated amateur
about three sentences of description mark the limit
of his ability to see and describe. To get started, to
gain confidence in one’s ability to say something, to acquire
freedom and spontaneity of expression,—this is
the first step in the practice of composition. Afterward,
when the pupil has discovered that he really has
something to say,—enough indeed to cover three or
four pages of his tablet paper,—then it may be time
to begin the study of description, and to acquire more
careful and accurate forms of expression. Spontaneity
should be acquired first,—crude and unformed it may
be, but spontaneity first; and this spontaneity is best
gained while studying narration.
There can be but little question about the order of
the other forms. Description, still dealing with the
concrete, offers an admirable opportunity for shaping
and forming the spontaneous expression gained in narration.
Following description, in order of difficulty,
come exposition and argument.
I should be quite misunderstood, did any one gather
from this that during the time in which wholes are being
studied, no attention is to be given to parts; that
is, to paragraphs, sentences, and words. All things
cannot be learned at once and thoroughly; there must
be some order of succession. In the beginning the
viii
primary object to be aimed at is the construction of
wholes; yet during their construction, parts can also
be incidentally studied. During this time many errors
which annoy and exasperate must be passed over with
but a word, in order that the weight of the criticism
may be concentrated on the point then under consideration.
As a pupil advances, he is more and more competent
to appreciate and to form good paragraphs and
well-turned sentences, and to single out from the multitude
of verbal signs the word that exactly presents
his thought. The appreciation and the use of the
stronger as well as the finer and more delicate forms
of language come only with much reading and writing;
and to demand everything at the very beginning is
little less than sheer madness.
Moreover there never comes a time when the construction
of a paragraph, the shaping of a phrase, or
the choice of a word becomes an end in itself. Paragraphs,
sentences, and words are well chosen when they
serve best the whole composition. He who becomes
enamored of one form of paragraph, who always uses
periodic sentences, who chooses only common words,
has not yet recognized that the beauty of a phrase
or a word is determined by its fitness, and that it is
most beautiful because it exactly suits the place it fills.
The graceful sweep of a line by Praxiteles or the glorious
radiancy of a color by Angelico is most beautiful
in the place it took from the master’s hand. So
Lowell’s wealth of figurative language and Stevenson’s
unerring choice of delicate words are most beautiful,
not when torn from their original setting to serve as
ix
examples in rhetorics, but when fulfilling their part in
a well-planned whole. And it is only as the beauties
of literature are born of the thought that they ever
succeed. No one can say to himself, “I will now
make a good simile,” and straightway fulfill his promise.
If, however, the thought of a writer takes fire,
and instead of the cold, unimpassioned phraseology of
the logician, glowing images crowd up, and phrases
tipped with fire, then figurative language best suits the
thought,—indeed, it is the thought. But imagery
upon compulsion,—never. So that at no time should
one attempt to mould fine phrases for the sake of the
phrases themselves, but he should spare no pains with
them when they spring from the whole, when they harmonize
with the whole, and when they give to the
whole added beauty and strength.
It is quite unnecessary at this day to urge the study
of literature. It is in the course of study for every
secondary school. Yet a word may be said of the
value of this study to the practice of composition.
There are two classes of artists: geniuses and men of
talent. Of geniuses in literature, one can count the
names on his fingers; most authors are simply men of
talent. Talent learns to do by doing, and by observing
how others have done. When Brunelleschi left Rome
for Florence, he had closely observed and had drawn
every arch of the stupendous architecture in that ancient
city; and so he was adjudged by his fellow citizens
to be the only man competent to lift the dome of
their Duomo. His observation discovered the secret
of Rome’s architectural grandeur; and the slow accumulation
x
of such secrets marks the development of
every art and science. Milton had his method of writing
prose, Macaulay his, and Arnold his,—all different
and all excellent. And just as the architect stands
before the cathedrals of Cologne, Milan, and Salisbury
to learn the secret of each; as the painter searches
out the secret of Raphael, Murillo, and Rembrandt;
so the author analyzes the masterpieces of literature to
discover the secret of Irving, of Eliot, and of Burke.
Not that an author is to be a servile imitator of any
man’s manner; but that, having knowledge of all the
secrets of composition, he shall so be enabled to set
forth for others his own thought in all the beauty and
perfection in which he himself conceives it.
One thing further. A landscape painter would not
make a primary study of Angelo’s anatomical drawings;
a composer of lyric forms of music would not
study Sousa’s marches; nor would a person writing a
story look for much assistance in the arguments of
Burke. The most direct benefit is derived from studying
the very thing one wishes to know about, not from
studying something else. That the literature may give
the greatest possible assistance to the composition, the
course has been so arranged that narration shall be
taught by Hawthorne and Irving, description by Ruskin
and Stevenson, exposition by Macaulay and Newman,
and argument by Webster and Burke. Literature,
arranged in this manner, is not only a stimulus to renewed
effort, by showing what others have done; it is
also the most skillful instructor in the art of composition,
by showing how others have done.
xi
It would be quite impossible for any one at the present
time to write a text-book in English that would not
repeat what has already been said by many others.
Nor have I tried to. My purpose has been rather to
select from the whole literature of the subject just those
principles which every author of a book on composition
or rhetoric has thought essential, and to omit minor
matters and all those about which there is a difference
of opinion. This limits the contents to topics already
familiar to every teacher. It also makes it necessary
to repeat what has been written before many times.
Certain books, however, have treated special divisions
of the whole subject in a thorough and exhaustive manner.
There is nothing new to say of Unity, Mass, and
Coherence; Mr. Wendell said all concerning these in
his book entitled “English Composition.” So in paragraph
development, Scott and Denney hold the field.
Other books which I have frequently used in the classroom
are “Talks on Writing English,” by Arlo Bates,
and Genung’s “Practical Rhetoric.” These books I
have found very helpful in teaching, and I have drawn
upon them often while writing this text-book.
If the field has been covered, then why write a book
at all? The answer is that the principles which are
here treated have not been put into one book. They
may be found in several. These essentials I have repeated
many times with the hope that they will be
fixed by this frequent repetition. The purpose has
been to focus the attention upon these, to apply them
in the construction of the different forms of discourse,
paragraphs, and sentences, and to repeat them until it
xii
is impossible for a student to forget them. If the book
fulfils this purpose, it was worth writing.
Acknowledgments are due to Messrs. Charles Scribner’s
Sons for their kind permission to use the selections
from the writings of Robert Louis Stevenson
contained in this book; also, to Messrs. D. Appleton
& Co., The Century Co., and Doubleday & McClure
Co. for selections from the writings of Rudyard Kipling.
W. F. WEBSTER.
Minneapolis, 1900.
CONTENTS
A COURSE OF STUDY
IN LITERATURE AND COMPOSITION
The Course of Study which follows is presented, not because
it is better than many others which might be made.
For the purposes of this book it was necessary that some
course be adopted as the basis of the text. The principles
which guided in arranging this course I believe are sound;
but the preferences of teachers and the peculiarities of environment
will often make it wise to use other selections from
literature. Of this a large “supplementary list” is given at
the back of the book.
It is now a generally accepted truth that the study of English
should continue through the four years of a high-school
course. The division of time that seems best is to take Narration
and Description in the first year. In connection with
Description, Figures of Speech should be studied. The next
year, Exposition and Paragraphs form the major part of the
work. This may be pleasantly broken by a study of Poetry,
following the outline in the chapter on Verse Forms. In the
third year, while the work in literature is mainly the Novel and
the Drama, Sentences and Words should be studied in composition,
with a review of the chapters on Narration and Description.
Towards the close of the year, Exposition should be reviewed
and the study of Argument taken up. The fourth year should
be devoted to the study of such College Requirements as have
not been taken in the course, and to the study of the History
of English Literature as given in some good text book.
In some instances, it will be found impossible to give so
much time to the study of English. In such cases, the amount
of literature to be studied should be decreased, and the work
in the text book should be more rapidly done. The sequence
of the parts should remain the same, but the time should be
modified to suit the needs of any special environment.
NARRATION.
Composition.
To give Spontaneity.
- External Form of Composition (p. 296).
- Marks for the Correction of Compositions (p. 300).
- Simple Rules for Punctuation (pp. 301-309).
- Forms of Discourse. Definitions (pp. 1-7).
- Choice of Subject (pp. 8-12).
- Study of Narration (pp. 13-48).
- Definition and General Discussion.
- Narration without Plot.
Interest the Essential Feature.
- Narration with Plot.
- Selection of Main Incident of first Importance.
It gives to the story
Unity,
ridding it of
Long Introductions and Conclusions,
Tedious Enumerations, and
Irrelevant Details.
- Arrangement of Material.
Close of Story contains Main Incident.
Opening of Story contains Characters, Place,
and Time.
Incidents generally follow in Order of Time.
- Movement.
- Use of Description in Narration.
- Some General Considerations.
Literature.
The Great Stone Face, The Gentle Boy, The Gray Champion,
Roger Malvin’s Burial, and other Stories. Hawthorne.
Tales of a Wayside Inn. Longfellow.
The Gold Bug. Poe.
xxi
Marmion, or The Lady of the Lake. Scott.
A Christmas Carol, or The Cricket on the Hearth. Dickens.
The Vision of Sir Launfal, and other Narrative Poems.
Lowell.
An Incident of the French Camp, Hervé Riel, The Pied
Piper, How they brought the Good News from Ghent to
Aix. Browning.
Meaning of the Author, calling for
A Study of Words.
Outline of Story.
Turning Points in the Story.
Central Idea, or Purpose of the Story.
Method of the Author.
Is there a Main Incident?
Do all other Incidents converge to it?
Is the Order a Sequence of Time alone?
Is the Interest centred in Characters or Plot?
Style of the Author.
Compare the Works of the Author.
DESCRIPTION.
Composition.
To secure Accuracy of Expression (pp. 49-88).
- Definition and General Discussion.
Difficulties in Language as a Means of Picturing.
Value of Observation.
- Structure of Whole.
- To secure Unity.
Select a Point of View.
- To secure Coherence.
Arrange Details in Natural Order.
- To secure Emphasis.
Arrange and proportion Treatment to effect
your Purpose.
- xxiiParagraph Structure.
Definition.
Length of Paragraphs.
Development of Paragraphs.
- Words.
Specific rather than General.
Adjectives, Nouns, and Verbs.
- Figures Of Speech (pp. 257-268).
Based on Likeness.
Based on Sentence Structure.
Miscellaneous Figures.
Literature.
The Old Manse, The Old Apple Dealer. Hawthorne.
An Indian-Summer Reverie, The Dandelion, The Birch, The
Oak, and other Descriptive Poems. Lowell.
The Fall of the House of Usher. Poe.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Selections from the Sketch
Book. Irving.
Selections from Childe Harold. Byron.
The Deserted Village. Goldsmith.
Julius Cæsar. Shakespeare.
Poems selected from Palgrave’s Golden Treasury.
Meaning of the Author (as under Narration).
Method of the Author.
Does the Author keep his Point of View?
Are the Details arranged in a Natural Order?
Has any Detail a Supreme Importance?
Are the Details treated in Proper Proportion?
Has the Whole a Unity of Effect? Do you see the
Picture distinctly?
For what Purpose has the Author used Description?
Does the Author employ Figures?
Style of the Author.
EXPOSITION, PARAGRAPHS, VERSE FORMS.
Composition.
To encourage Logical Thinking and Adequate Expression
(pp. 89-127).
Exposition.
- Definition and General Considerations.
- Exposition of Terms. Definition.
- Exposition of Propositions.
- Clear Statement of the Proposition in a “Key
Sentence.”
This will limit
- The Discussion.
- What shall be included?
- What shall be excluded?
- How shall Important Matters be emphasized?
Mass and Proportion.
Expansion and Condensation.
To effect these ends use an
- Outline.
Paragraphs (pp. 151-199).
- Definition.
- Length of Paragraphs.
- Development of Paragraphs.
- Principles of Structure.
Unity.
Mass.
Coherence.
Verse Forms (pp. 269-291).
Poetry Defined.
Kinds of Feet.
Number of Feet in a Verse.
Substitutions and Rests.
Kinds of Poetry.
Literature.
Essay on Milton. Macaulay.
Essay on Addison. Macaulay.
Commemoration Ode. Lowell.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Coleridge.
Intimations of Immortality, and other Poems. Wordsworth.
Selections from Palgrave’s Golden Treasury.
The Bunker Hill Oration, or Adams and Jefferson. Webster.
Sesame and Lilies. Ruskin.
Meaning of the Author.
Outline showing the Main Thesis with the Dependence
of Subordinate Propositions.
Method of the Author.
Does he hold to his Point and so gain Unity
Does he arrange his Material so as to secure Emphasis?
Does one Paragraph grow out of another?
Does each Paragraph treat a Single Topic?
Are the Sentences dovetailed together?
Does the Author use Figures?
Are the Figures Effective?
Are his Words General or Specific?
Style of the Author.
Is it Clear?
Has it Force?
Is the Diction Elegant?
How has he gained these Ends?
SENTENCES, WORDS, ARGUMENT.
Composition.
Sentences (pp. 200-234).
- Definition and Classification.
- Principles of Structure.
- Unity.
- Mass.
- xxv
Prominent Positions in a Sentence.
- Periodic Sentences.
- Loose Sentences.
- Coherence.
- Parallel Constructions.
- Connectives.
Words (pp. 235-256).
Reputable Words.
Latin or Saxon Words.
General or Specific.
Figures of Speech.
The One Rule for the Use of Words.
Narration and Description Reviewed.
Exposition Reviewed.
Literature.
Argument (pp. 128-150).
- Kinds of Argument.
- Order of Arguments.
- Refutation.
Sir Roger de Coverley Papers. Addison.
The Vicar of Wakefield. Goldsmith.
Silas Marner. Eliot.
Ivanhoe. Scott.
Macbeth, The Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night’s
Dream. Shakespeare.
Conciliation with the Colonies. Burke.
COMPOSITION.
In the last year of the course, the compositions should be
such as will test the maturer powers of the pupil. They
should be written under the careful supervision of the teacher.
xxvi
They should be of all forms of discourse, and the subjects
should be drawn from the subjects of study in the high
school, especially from the literature.
LITERATURE.
Difficult Selections.
L’Allegro, Il Penseroso, Comus, and Lycidas. Milton.
Paradise Lost. Two Books. Milton.
Essay on Burns. Carlyle.
In Memoriam, The Princess, and other Poems. Tennyson.
Selections. Browning.
Selections. Emerson.
A History of English Literature
ENGLISH:
COMPOSITION AND LITERATURE
CHAPTER I
FORMS OF DISCOURSE
Composition.
Composition, from the Latin words con, meaning together,
and ponere, meaning to place, signifies
a placing together, a grouping or arrangement
of objects or of ideas. This arrangement is generally
made so that it will produce a desired result.
Speaking accurately, the putting together is the composition.
Much of the desired result is gained by care
in the selection of materials. Placing together a well-worn
book, a lamp, and a pair of heavy bowed spectacles
makes a suggestive picture. The selection and
grouping of these objects is spoken of as the composition
of the picture. So in music, an author composes,
when he groups certain musical tones and phrases so
that they produce a desired effect. In literature, too,
composition is, strictly speaking, the selection and arrangement
of materials, whether the incidents of a story
or the details of a description, to fulfill a definite purpose.
English Composition.
In practice, however, English composition has come
to include more than the selection and arrangement
of the materials,—incidents, objects,
or ideas, as the case may be; the term
has been extended to include the means by which the
2
speaker or writer seeks to convey this impression to
other persons. As a painter must understand drawing,
the value of lights and shades, and the mixing of
colors before he can successfully reproduce for others
the idea he has to express, so the artist in literature
needs a knowledge of elementary grammar and of the
simpler usages of language in order clearly to represent
to others the idea which lies in his own mind. As commonly
understood, then, English composition may be
defined as the art of selecting, arranging, and communicating
ideas by means of the English language.
Composition, Written and Oral.
The term “English composition” is now generally
understood to mean written composition, and
not oral composition. At first thought they
seem to be the same thing. So far as the
selection and arrangement of matter is concerned,
they are the same. Moreover, both use words,
and both employ sentences; but here the likeness ends.
If sentences should be put upon paper exactly as they
were spoken, in most instances they would not convey to
a reader the same thought they conveyed to a listener.
It is much more exacting to express the truth one
wishes to convey, by silent, featureless symbols than
by that wonderful organ of communication, the human
voice. Now, if to the human voice be added eyes, features,
gestures, and pose, we easily understand the great
advantage a speaker has over a writer.
Conventions of Composition.
Moreover, there are imposed upon a writer certain
established rules which he must follow. He
must spell words correctly, and he must use
correctly marks of punctuation. These things
need not annoy a speaker; yet they are conditions
which must be obeyed by a writer. A man
who eats with a knife may succeed in getting his food
to his mouth, yet certain conventions exclude such a
3
person from polite society. So in composition, it is
possible for a person to make himself understood,
though he write “alright” instead of “all right,” and
never use a semicolon; still, such a person could hardly
be considered a highly cultured writer. To express
one’s thoughts correctly and with refinement requires
absolute obedience to the common conventions of good
literature.
The study of composition includes, first, the careful
selection of materials and their effective arrangement;
and second, a knowledge of the established conventions
of literature: of spelling; of the common uses of the
marks of punctuation,—period, question mark, exclamation
point, colon, semicolon, comma; of the common
idioms of our language; and of the elements of
its grammar. From the beginning of the high school
course, the essay, the paragraph, the sentence, the word,
are to be studied with special attention to the effective
use of each in adequately communicating ideas.
Five Forms of Discourse.
All written composition may be arranged in two
classes, or groups. The first group will include
all composition that deals with actual
happenings and real things; the second, all
that deals with abstract thoughts and spiritual ideas.
The first will include narration and description; the
second, exposition, argument, and persuasion. All
literature, then, may be separated into five classes,—narration,
description, exposition, argument, and persuasion.
Narration tells what things do; description tells how
things look. Narration deals with occurrences; description
deals with appearances. Exposition defines
a term, or explains a proposition; argument proves the
truth or falsity of a proposition; persuasion urges to
action upon a proposition. Exposition explains; argument
4
convinces; persuasion arouses. These are the
broad lines of distinction which separate the five forms
of discourse.
Definitions.
Narration is that form of discourse which recounts
events in a sequence. It includes stories,
novels, romances, biographies, some books of
travel, and some histories.
Description is that form of discourse which aims
to present a picture. It seldom occurs alone, but it
is usually found in combination with the other forms
of discourse.
Exposition is that form of discourse which seeks to
explain a term or a proposition. Text-books, books of
information, theses, most histories, many magazine articles,
and newspaper leaders are of this class of literature.
Argument is that form of discourse which has for
its object the proof of the truth or falsity of a proposition.
Persuasion is that form of discourse the purpose of
which is to influence the will.
Difficulty in distinguishing.
Though these definitions seem to set apart the great
classes of literature, and to insure against any
danger of confusion, it is not always easy to
place individual pieces of literature in one of
these divisions. Whittier’s “Barbara Frietchie” and
Stevenson’s “Treasure Island” are narrative beyond
any question; but what about “Snow-Bound” and
“Travels with a Donkey” by the same authors? Are
they narration or description? In them the narrative
and descriptive portions are so nearly equal that one
hesitates to set them down to either class; the reader
is constantly called from beautiful pictures to delightful
stories. The narrative can easily be separated
from the descriptive portions; but when this has been
5
done, has it been decided whether the whole piece is
narration or description?
When a person takes up the other forms of discourse,
the difficulty becomes still greater. Description and
narration are frequently used in exposition. If a boy
should be asked to explain the working of a steam
engine, he would, in all likelihood, begin with a description
of an engine. If his purpose was to explain how
an engine works, and was not to tell how an engine
looks, the whole composition would be exposition. So,
too, it is often the easiest way to explain what one
means by telling a story. The expression of such
thoughts would be exposition, although it might contain
a number of stories and descriptions.
Narration and description may be found in a piece
of exposition; and all three may be employed in argument.
If a person should wish to prove the dangers
of intemperance, he might enforce his proof by a story,
or by a description of the condition of the nervous system
after a drunken revel. And one does not need to
do more than explain the results of intemperance to a
sensible man to prove to him that he should avoid all
excesses. The explanation alone is argument enough
for such a person. Still, is such an explanation exposition
or argument? If the man cared nothing about
convincing another that there are dangers in intemperance,
did not wish to prove that the end of intemperance
is death and dishonor, the composition is as much
exposition as the explanation of a steam engine. If,
on the other hand, he explained these results in order
to convince another that he should avoid intemperance,
then the piece is argument.
Persuasion introduces a new element into composition;
for, while exposition and argument are directed to
a man’s reason, persuasion is addressed to the emotions
6
and the will. Its purpose is to arouse to action. One
can readily imagine that a simple explanation of the
evils of intemperance might be quite enough to convince
a man that its dangers are truly great,—so great
that he would determine to fight these evils with all his
strength. In such a case explanation alone has convinced
him; and it has aroused him to do something.
Is the piece exposition, or argument, or persuasion?
Here, as before, the answer is found in the purpose of
the author. If he intended only to explain, the piece
is exposition; if to convince, it is argument; if to
arouse to action, it belongs to the literature of persuasion.
It must now be plain that few pieces of literature are
purely one form of discourse. The forms are mingled
in most of our literature. Hardly a story can be found
that does not contain some descriptions; and a description
of any considerable length is sure to contain some
narrative portions. So, too, narration and description
are often found in exposition, argument, and persuasion;
and these last three forms are frequently combined.
Purpose of the Author.
It must also be evident that the whole piece of literature
will best be classified by discovering
the purpose of the author. If his purpose is
simply to tell a good story, his work is narration;
if the purpose is merely to place a picture before
the reader’s mind, it is description; if to explain conditions
and nothing more, it is exposition; if to prove
to the reason the truth or falsity of a proposition, it is
argument; while, if the writer addresses himself to the
emotions and the will, no matter whether he tells anecdotes
or paints lurid pictures, explains conditions or
convinces of the dangers of the present course,—if he
does all these to urge the reader to do something, the
7
composition belongs to the literature of persuasion. The
five forms of discourse are most easily distinguished by
discovering the purpose of the author.
One addition should be made. Few novels are written
in which there is nothing more than a story. Nearly
all contain some teaching; and it is a safe conclusion
that the authors have taught “on purpose.” In “Baa,
Baa, Black Sheep,” Kipling has shown the imperative
necessity of a “real, live, lovely mamma;” in “The
Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” Irving has placed before us
a charming picture of rural life in a dreamy Dutch
village on the Hudson; and in his “Christmas Carol,”
Dickens shows plainly that happiness is not bought
and sold even in London, and that the only happy man
is he who shares with another’s need. Yet all of these,
and the hundreds of their kind, whatever the purpose
of the authors when writing them, belong to the
“story” or “novel” class. The purpose in telling
the story is secondary to the purpose to tell a story.
They are to be classified as narration.
English composition, then, is a study of the selection
and arrangement of ideas, and of the methods of using
the English language to communicate them. All composition
is divided into five great classes. These classes
have broad lines of distinction, which are most easily
applied by determining the purpose of the author.
CHAPTER II
CHOICE OF SUBJECT
Form and Material.
From the considerations in the preceding chapter
may be derived several principles regarding
the choice of subject. If the composition is to
be narrative, it should be upon a subject that
readily lends itself to narrative form. One can tell a
story about “A Day’s Hunt” or “What We did Hallowe’en;”
but it would try one’s powers of imagination
to write a story of “A Tree” or “A Chair.” The latter
subjects do not lend themselves to narration, but they
may be described. Josiah P. Cooke has written a brilliant
exposition of “Fire” in “The New Chemistry;”
yet a young person would be foolish to take “Fire” as
a subject for exposition, though he might easily write a
good description of “How the Fire looked from My
Window,” or narrate “How a Fireman rescued My
Sister.” So in all work in composition, select a subject
that readily lends itself to the form of discourse
demanded; or, conversely, select the form of discourse
suitable for presenting most effectively your
material.
Author’s Individuality.
If an author is writing for other purposes than for
conscious practice, he should choose the form
of discourse in which he can best work, and
to which he can best shape his material. Some
men tell stories well; others are debaters; while yet
others are wonderfully gifted with eloquence. Emerson
9
understood life thoroughly. He knew man’s feelings,
his motives, his hopes, his strength, his weakness; yet
one cannot imagine Emerson shaping this material into
a novel. But just a little way down the road lived a
wizard who could transmute the commonest events of
this workaday world to the most beautiful shapes; no
one wishes that Hawthorne had written essays. The
second principle guiding in the choice of a subject is
this: Select a subject which is suited to your peculiar
ability as an author.
Knowledge of Subject.
The form, then, should suit the matter; and it should
be the form in which the author can work.
There is a third principle that should guide
in the choice of a subject. It should be a
subject of which the author knows something. Pupils
often exclaim, “What can I write about!” as if they
were expected to find something new to write. An
exercise in composition has not for its object the proclaiming
of any new and unheard-of thing; it is an
exercise in the expression of things already known.
Even when the subject is known, the treatment offers
difficulties enough. It is not true that what is thoroughly
understood is easily explained. Many excellent
scholars have written very poor text-books because
they had not learned the art of expression. A necessary
antecedent of all good composition is a full and
accurate knowledge of the subject; and even when one
knows all about it, the clear expression of the thought
will be difficult enough.
To demand accurate knowledge of the subject before
an author begins work upon it narrows the field from
which themes may be drawn. Burroughs is an authority
on all the tenants of our groves; “Wake-Robin,”
“Pepacton,” and his other books all show a master’s
certain hand. So Stedman is an authority in matters
10
relating to literature. But Burroughs and Stedman
alike would find difficulty in writing an essay on “Electricity
in the Treatment of Nervous Diseases.” They
do not know about it. A boy in school probably
knows something of fishing; of this he can write. A
girl can tell of “The Last Parlor Concert.” Both could
write very entertainingly of their “First Algebra Recitation;”
neither could write a convincing essay on “The
Advantages of Free Trade.”
Common Subjects.
This will seem to limit the list of subjects to the
commonplace. The fact is that in a composition
exercise the purpose is not to startle
the world with some new thing; it is to learn the art
of expression. And here in the region of common
things, things thoroughly understood, every bit of
effort can be given to the manner of expression. The
truth is, it does not require much art to make a book
containing new and interesting material popular; the
matter in the book carries it in spite of poor composition.
Popular it may be, but popularity is not immortality.
Columns of poorly written articles upon
“Dewey” and “The Philippines” have been eagerly
read by thousands of Americans; it would require a
literary artist of great power to write a one-column
article on “Pigs” so that it would be eagerly read by
thousands. Real art in composition is much more
manifest when an author takes a common subject and
treats it in such a way that it glows with new life.
Richard Le Gallienne has written about a drove of pigs
so beautifully that one forgets all the traditions about
these common animals. Choose common subjects, then,—subjects
that allow every particle of your strength to
go into the manner of saying what you already know.
The requirement that the subject shall be common
11
does not mean that the subject shall be trivial. “Sliding
to First,” “How Billy won the Game,” with all
of this class of subjects, at once put the writer into a
trifling, careless attitude toward his work. The subjects
themselves seem to call forth a cheap, slangy vocabulary
and the vulgar phrases of sporting life. An equally
common subject could be selected which would call
forth serious, earnest effort. If a boy knew nothing
except about ball games, it would be advisable for him
to write upon this subject. Such a condition is hardly
possible in a high school. Choose common subjects,
but subjects that call for earnest thinking and dignified
expression.
Interest.
Interest is another consideration in the choice of a
subject. It applies equally to writer and
reader. Choose subjects that are interesting.
Not only must an author know about the subject;
he must be interested in it. A pupil may have accurate
knowledge of the uses of a semicolon; but he
would not be likely to succeed in a paragraph about
semicolons, largely because he is not much interested
in semicolons. This matter of interest is so important
that it is well to know what things all persons, authors
and readers alike, are interested in. What, then, is
generally interesting?
The Familiar.
First, the familiar is interesting. When reading a
newspaper each one instinctively turns to the
local column, or glances down the general
news columns to see if there is anything from his home
town. To a former resident, Jim Benson’s fence in
Annandale is more interesting than the bronze doors of
the Congressional Library in Washington. For the
same reason a physician lights upon “a new cure for
consumption,” a lawyer devours Supreme Court decisions,
while the dealer in silks is absorbed in the process
12
of making silk without the aid of the silkworm.
Each is interested in that which to him is most familiar.
Human Life.
Second, human life in all its phases is interesting.
The account of a fire or of a railroad accident
takes on a new interest when, in addition to
the loss of property, there has been a loss of life.
War is horribly fascinating, not so much because there
is a wanton destruction of property, as because it involves
the slaughter of men. Stories about trees and
animals are usually failures, unless handled by artists
who breathe into them the life of man. Andersen’s
“Tannenbaum” and Kipling’s “Jungle Books” are
intensely interesting because in them trees and animals
feel and act just as men do.
The Strange.
Third, the romantic, the unique, and the impossible
are interesting. A new discovery, a new invention,
a people of which little is known,—anything
new is interesting. The stories of Rider
Haggard and Jules Verne have been popular because
they deal with things which eye hath not seen. This
peculiar trait of man allows him to relish a good fish
story, or the latest news from the sea-serpent. Just
for the same reason, children love to hear of Little
Red Riding Hood and Cinderella. Children and their
parents are equally interested in those things which are
entirely outside of their own experience.
These, then, are the general conditions which govern
the choice of a subject. It shall easily lend itself to
the form of discourse chosen; it shall be suited to the
peculiar ability of the author; it shall be thoroughly
understood by the author,—common, but not trivial;
it shall be interesting to both reader and author.
CHAPTER III
NARRATION
Material of Narration.
Narration has been defined as the form of discourse
which recounts events in a sequence.
It includes not only letters, journals, memoirs,
biographies, and many histories, but, in addition,
that great body of literature which people generally include
in the comprehensive term of “stories.”
If this body of literature be examined, it will be
found that it deals with things as opposed to ideas;
incidents as opposed to propositions. Sometimes, it is
true, the author of a story is in reality dealing with
ideas. In the fable about “The Hare and the Tortoise,”
the tortoise stands for the idea of slow, steady plodding;
while the hare is the representative of quick wits which
depend on their ability to show a brilliant burst of
speed when called upon. The fable teaches better than
an essay can that the dullness which perseveres will arrive
at success sooner than brilliancy of mind which
wastes its time in doing nothing to the purpose. Andersen’s
“Ugly Duckling,” Ruskin’s “King of the
Golden River,” and Lowell’s “Sir Launfal” stand for
deep spiritual ideas, which we understand better for
this method of presentation. In an allegory like “Pilgrim’s
Progress,” the passions and emotions, the sins
and weaknesses of men are treated as if they were real
persons. Ideas are represented by living, breathing
persons; and we may say that all such narratives deal,
not with ideas, but, for want of a better word, with
things.
In Action.
14
Not only does narration deal with things, but with
things doing something. Things inactive might
be written of, but this would be description.
It is necessary in narration that the things be in an
active mood; that something be doing. “John struck
James,” then, is a narrative sentence; it tells that
John has been doing something. Still, this one sentence
would not ordinarily be accepted as narration.
For narration there must be a series, a sequence of
individual actions. Recounting events in a sequence
is narration.
The Commonest Form of Discourse.
Narration is the most popular form of discourse.
Between one fourth and one third of all
books published are stories; and more than
one half of the books issued by public libraries
belong to the narrative class. Such a
computation does not include the large number of
stories read in our papers and magazines. In addition
to being the most popular form of discourse, it is the
most natural. It is the first form of connected discourse
of the child; it is the form employed by the
uncultured in giving his impressions; it is the form
most used in conversation. Moreover, narration is the
first form found in great literatures: the Iliad and
the Odyssey, the songs of the troubadours in France,
and the minnesingers in Germany, the chronicles and
ballads of England,—all are narrative.
Language as a Means of Expression.
Narration is especially suited to the conditions imposed
by language. Men do not think in single
words, but in groups of words,—phrases,
clauses, and sentences. In hearing, too, men
do not consider the individual words; the mind waits
until a group of words, a phrase, or a simple sentence
perhaps,—which expresses a unit of thought, has been
uttered. In narration these groups of words follow in
15
a sequence exactly as the actions which they represent
do. Take this rather lurid bit from Stevenson:—
“He dropped his cutlass as he jumped, and when he felt
the pistol, whipped straight round and laid hold of me, roaring
out an oath; and at the same time either my courage
came again, or I grew so much afraid as came to the same
thing; for I gave a shriek and shot him in the midst of the
body.” (“Kidnapped.”)
Each phrase or clause here is a unit of thought, and
each follows the others in the same order as the events
they tell of occurred. On the other hand, when one attempts
description, and exposition too in many cases, he
realizes the great difficulties imposed by the language
itself; for in these forms of discourse the author not
infrequently wishes to put the whole picture before the
reader at once, or to set out several propositions at the
same time, as belonging to one general truth. In order
that the reader may get the complete picture or the complete
thought, he must hold in mind often a whole paragraph
before he unites it into the one conception the
author intended. In narration one action is completed;
it can be dropped. Then another follows, which can
also be dropped. They need not be held in mind until
the paragraph is finished. Narration is exactly suited
to the means of its communication. The events which
are recorded, and the sentences which record them, both
follow in a sequence.
Without Plot.
The sequence of events in narration may be a simple
sequence of time, in which case the narrative
is without plot. This is the form of
narration employed in newspapers in giving the events
of the day. It is used in journals, memoirs, biographies,
and many elementary histories. It makes little
demand upon an author further than that he shall
16
say clearly something that is interesting. Interesting
it must be, if the author wishes it to be read; readers
will not stay over dull material. Newspapers and
magazines look out for interesting material, and it is
for the matter in them that they are read. So memoirs
and biographies are read, not to find out what happens
at last,—that is known,—but to pick up information
concerning an interesting subject.
Plot.
Or the sequence may be a more subtle and binding
relation of cause and effect. This is the
sequence employed in stories. One thing
happens because another thing has happened. Generally
the sequence of time and the sequence of cause
and effect correspond; for effects come after causes.
When, however, more than one cause is introduced,
or when some cause is at work which the author hides
until he can most advantageously produce it, or when
an effect is held back for purposes of creating interest,
the events may not be related exactly in the order in
which they occurred. When any sequence is introduced
in addition to the simple sequence of time, or
when the time sequence is disturbed for the purpose of
heightening interest, there is an arrangement of the
parts which is generally termed plot.
Plot is a term difficult to define. We feel, however,
that Grant’s “Memoirs” have no plot, and we feel
just as sure that “King Lear” has a plot. So, too,
we say that “Robinson Crusoe” has little, almost no
plot; that the plot is simple in “Treasure Island,” and
that “Les Misérables” has an intricate plot. A plot
seems to demand more than a mere succession of events.
Any arrangement of the parts of a narrative so that
the reader’s interest is aroused concerning the result
of the series of events detailed is a plot.
It often occurs that a book which, as a whole, is
17
without a plot, contains incidents which have a plot.
In “Travels with a Donkey,” by Stevenson, no one
cares for the plot of the whole book,—in fact there
is none; yet the reader is interested in the purchase
of the “neat and high bred” Modestine up to the
“last interview with Father Adam in a billiard-room
at the witching hour of dawn, when I administered the
brandy.” This incident has a plot. The following is
a paragraph from “An Autumn Effect” by Mr. Stevenson.
The simple events are perfectly ordered, and
there is a delightful surprise at the end. This paragraph
has a plot. Yet the thirty pages of “An Autumn
Effect” could not be said to have a plot.
“Bidding good-morning to my fellow-traveler, I left the
road and struck across country. It was rather a revelation
to pass from between the hedgerows and find quite a bustle
on the other side, a great coming and going of school-children
upon by-paths, and, in every second field, lusty horses
and stout country-folk a-ploughing. The way I followed took
me through many fields thus occupied, and through many
strips of plantation, and then over a little space of smooth
turf, very pleasant to the feet, set with tall fir-trees and
clamorous with rooks, making ready for the winter, and so
back again into the quiet road. I was now not far from the
end of my day’s journey. A few hundred yards farther,
and, passing through a gap in the hedge, I began to go down
hill through a pretty extensive tract of young beeches. I was
soon in shadow myself, but the afternoon sun still colored
the upmost boughs of the wood, and made a fire over my
head in the autumnal foliage. A little faint vapor lay
among the slim tree-stems in the bottom of the hollow; and
from farther up I heard from time to time an outburst of
gross laughter, as though clowns were making merry in the
bush. There was something about the atmosphere that
brought all sights and sounds home to one with a singular
purity, so that I felt as if my senses had been washed with
18
water. After I had crossed the little zone of mist, the path
began to remount the hill; and just as I, mounting along
with it, had got back again from the head downwards, into
the thin golden sunshine, I saw in front of me a donkey tied
to a tree. Now, I have a certain liking for donkeys, principally,
I believe, because of the delightful things that Sterne
has written of them. But this was not after the pattern of
the ass at Lyons. He was of a white color, that seemed to
fit him rather for rare festal occasions than for constant
drudgery. Besides, he was very small, and of the daintiest
proportions you can imagine in a donkey. And so, sure
enough, you had only to look at him to see he had never
worked. There was something too roguish and wanton in
his face, a look too like that of a schoolboy or a street Arab,
to have survived much cudgeling. It was plain that these
feet had kicked off sportive children oftener than they had
plodded with freight through miry lanes. He was altogether
a fine-weather, holiday sort of a donkey; and though
he was just then somewhat solemnized and rueful, he still
gave proof of the levity of his disposition by impudently
wagging his ears at me as I drew near. I say he was somewhat
solemnized just then; for with the admirable instinct
of all men and animals under restraint, he had so wound
and wound the halter about the tree that he could go neither
back nor forwards, nor so much as put his head down to
browse. There he stood, poor rogue, part puzzled, part
angry, part, I believe, amused. He had not given up hope,
and dully revolved the problem in his head, giving ever and
again another jerk at the few inches of free rope that still
remained unwound. A humorous sort of sympathy for the
creature took hold upon me. I went up, and, not without
some trouble on my part, and much distrust and resistance
on the part of Neddy, got him forced backwards until the
whole length of the halter was set loose, and he was once
more as free a donkey as I dared to make him. I was
pleased (as people are) with this friendly action to a fellow-creature
in tribulation, and glanced back over my shoulder
to see how he was profiting by his freedom. The brute was
19
looking after me; and no sooner did he catch my eye than
he put up his long white face into the air, pulled an impudent
mouth at me, and began to bray derisively. If ever
any one person made a grimace at another, that donkey
made a grimace at me. The hardened ingratitude of his
behavior, and the impertinence that inspired his whole face
as he curled up his lip, and showed his teeth and began to
bray, so tickled me and was so much in keeping with what
I had imagined to myself of his character, that I could not
find it in my heart to be angry, and burst into a peal of
hearty laughter. This seemed to strike the ass as a repartee,
so he brayed at me again by way of rejoinder; and we went
on for awhile, braying and laughing, until I began to grow
a-weary of it, and shouting a derisive farewell, turned to
pursue my way. In so doing—it was like going suddenly
into cold water—I found myself face to face with a prim,
little old maid. She was all in a flutter, the poor old dear!
She had concluded beyond question that this must be a lunatic
who stood laughing aloud at a white donkey in the
placid beech-woods. I was sure, by her face, that she had
already recommended her spirit most religiously to Heaven,
and prepared herself for the worst. And so, to reassure her,
I uncovered and besought her, after a very staid fashion, to
put me on my way to Great Missenden. Her voice trembled
a little, to be sure, but I think her mind was set at rest; and
she told me, very explicitly, to follow the path until I came
to the end of the wood, and then I should see the village
below me in the bottom of the valley. And, with mutual
courtesies, the little old maid and I went on our respective
ways.”
Books of travel, memoirs, and biographies, as whole
books, are generally without any arrangement serious
enough to be termed a plot; yet a large part of the
interest in such books would be lost were the incidents
there collected not well told, with a conscious attempt
to set them out in the very best fashion; indeed, if
each incident did not have a plot. In “Vanity Fair”
20
with its six hundred pages, in “Silas Marner” with
its two hundred pages, in the short stories of our best
magazines, in the spicy little anecdotes in the “Youth’s
Companion,”—in the least bit of a good story as well
as the three-volume novel, the authors have used the
means best suited to retain the interest to the end.
They have constructed plots.
Unity, Mass, and Coherence.
In the construction of any piece of composition
there are three principles of primary importance:
they are Unity, which is concerned
with the material itself; and Mass and Coherence,
which are concerned with the arrangement
of the material. A composition has unity when all
the material has been so sifted and selected that each
part contributes its share to the central thought of
the whole. Whether of a sentence, a paragraph, or a
whole composition, all those parts must be excluded
which do not bring something of value to the whole;
and everything must be included which is necessary to
give a clear understanding of the whole. Mass, the
second principle of structure, demands that those parts
of a composition, paragraph, or sentence which are
of most importance shall be so placed that they will
arrest the attention. By coherence is meant that principle
of structure which, in sentences, paragraphs, and
whole compositions, places those parts related in thought
near together, and keeps separate those parts which are
separated in thought.
Main Incident.
For the construction of a story that will retain the
reader’s interest to the end, for the selection
of such material as will contribute to a central
thought, for the arrangement of this material so
that the most important matter shall occupy the most
important position in the theme, one simple rule is of
value. It is this: First choose the main incident
21
towards which all the other incidents converge, and
for the accomplishment of which the preceding incidents
are necessary. A few pages will be given to
the application of this rule, and to the results of its
application.
Its Importance.
There should be in each story, however slight the
plot, some incident that is more important
than the others, and toward which all the
others converge. A reader is disappointed if, after
reading a story through, he finds that there is no worthy
ending, that all the preparation was made for no
purpose. If, in “Wee Willie Winkie,” Kipling had
stopped just before Miss Allardyce started across the
river, it would have been a poor story. It would have
had no ending. It is because a story gets somewhere
that we like it. Yet not just somewhere; it must
arrive at a place worthy of all the preparation that has
preceded. A very common fault with the compositions
of young persons is that they begin big and end
little. It is not infrequent that the first paragraph
promises well; the second is not quite so good; and
the rest gradually fall off until the end is worthless.
The order should be changed. Have the first paragraph
promise well, make the second better, and the
last best of all. The main incident should be more
important than each incident that precedes it. Get
the main incident in mind before beginning; be sure
it is the main incident; then bend all your energies
to make it the most important incident toward which
all the other incidents converge.
Unity.
The choice of a main incident will determine what
incidents to exclude. The world is full of
incidents—enough to make volumes more
than we now have. A phonograph and a camera could
gather enough any day at a busy corner in a city
22
to fill a volume; yet these pictures and these bits of
conversation, interesting as each in itself might be,
would not be a unit,—not one story, but many. Few
persons, indeed, would write anything so disjointed as
the report made by this phonograph; yet good writers
are often led astray by the brilliancy of their own
ideas. They have so many good stories on hand which
they would like to tell, that they force some of them
into their present story, and so spoil two stories. In the
very popular “David Harum,” it would puzzle any one
to know why the author has introduced the ladies from
the city and the musical party at the lake. The episode
is good enough in itself; but in this story it has
not a shadow of excuse. There is a phrase of Kipling’s
that should ring in every story-teller’s ears. Not once
only, but a number of times, this prince of modern
story-tellers catches himself—almost too late sometimes—and
writes, “But that is another story.” One
incident calls up another; paragraph follows paragraph
naturally. It is easy enough to look back and trace the
road by which the writer arrived at his present position;
yet it would be very hard to tell why he came hither,
or to see how the journey up to this point will at all
put him toward his destination. He has digressed;
he has left the road. And he must get back to the
road. By this digression he has wasted just as much
time as it has taken to come from the direct road to
this point added to the time it will take to go back.
Do not digress; tell one story at a time; let no incident
into your story which cannot answer the question,
“Why are you here?” by “I help;” keep your eye
on the main incident; things which do not unquestionably
contribute something to the main incident should
be excluded.
Introductions and Conclusions.
The choice of the main incident towards which all
23
other incidents converge will rid compositions of worthless
introductions and trailing conclusions.
A story should get under way at once; and
any explanations at the beginning, the introduction
of long descriptions or tedious paragraphs of
“fine writing,” will be headed off if the pupil keeps
constantly in mind that it must all lead directly toward
the main incident. Again, if everything converges to
the main incident, when that has been told the story is
finished. After that there must be no explanations,
no moralizing, nothing. When the story has been told
it is a good rule to stop.
An excellent example of a short story well told is
“An Incident of the French Camp,” by Robert Browning.
Only the absolutely necessary has been introduced.
The incidents flash before the reader. Nothing
can be said after the last line. “Hervé Riel” is a
vivid piece of narrative too. Such an exhibition of
manliness appeals to all. Was it necessary to attach
the last stanza? If this poem needed it, why not the
other? If the story has no moral in it, no man can
tie it on; if there is one, the reader should be accounted
intelligent enough to find it without any help.
Tedious Enumerations.
Making all the incidents converge to one main
incident will avoid tiresome enumerations of
inconsequential events, which frequently fill
the compositions of young pupils. Such
essays generally start with “a bright, clear morning,”
and “a party of four of us.” After recounting
a dozen events of no consequence whatever, “we
came home to a late supper, well repaid for our day’s
outing.” These compositions may be quite correct in
the choice of words, sentences, and paragraphs, and with
it all be flat. There is nothing to them; they get the
reader nowhere. Pick out one of the many incidents.
24
Work it up. Turn back to the paragraph from Stevenson
and notice how little there is to it when reduced to
bare outline. He has worked it up so that it is good.
Always remember that a short anecdote well told is
worth pages of aimless enumeration.
What to include.
The selection of the main incident will guide in
determining what to include; for every detail
must be included that is necessary to
make the main incident possible. A young pupil
wrote of a party in the woods. The girls had found
pleasant seats in a car and were chatting about their
friends, when they felt a sudden lurch, and soon one
of the party was besmeared by slippery, sticky whites
of eggs. Now, if eggs were in the habit of clinging
to the roofs of cars and breaking at unfortunate
moments, there would be no need of any explanation;
but as the cook forgot to boil the eggs and the girl
had put them up into the rack herself, some of this
should have been told. Enough at least should be told
to make the main incident a possibility. Stories are
full of surprises, but they can be understood easily
from the preceding incidents; or else the new element
is one that happens frequently, and of itself is nothing
new. In the paragraph from Stevenson, the entrance
of the “prim, little old maid” is a surprise, but it is a
very common thing for ladies to walk upon a public
highway. Any surprise must be natural,—the result
of causes at work in the story, or of circumstances
which are always occurring and by themselves no surprises.
If the story be a tangled web of incidents
culminating in some horror, as the death of the beautiful
young wife in Hawthorne’s “Birthmark,” all the
events must be told that are necessary to carry the
reader from the first time he beholds her beauty until
he sees her again, her life ebbing away as the fairy hand
25
fades from her cheek. In “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” it
would be impossible to pass directly from the sweet
boy of the first chapter to the little liar of the last;
something must be told of those miserable days that
intervene, and their telling effect on the little fellow.
So a reader could not harmonize his idea of old Scrooge
gained in the first chapter with generous Mr. Scrooge
of the last without the intermediate chapters. Keeping
the main incident in mind, include all that is necessary
to make it possible.
Consistency.
This same rule more than any other will make a
story consistent. If incidents are chosen with
relation to the one main incident, they will all
have a common quality; they can scarcely be inconsistent.
It is much more essential that a story be consistent
than that it be a fact. Indeed, facts are not
necessary in stories, and they are dangerous. Ian
Maclaren says that the only part of his stories that has
been severely criticised is a drowning episode, which
was a fact, and the only one he ever used. Yet to
those who have read “The Bonnie Brier Bush,” the
old doctor is as well known as any person who lives
across the street; he is real to us, though he never
lived. “Old Scrooge” and “Brom Bones” are better
known than John Adams is. A good character or
a good story need not be drawn from facts. Indeed,
in literature as in actual life, facts are stubborn things,
and will not accommodate themselves to new surroundings.
Make the story consistent; be not too careful
about the facts.
A story may be good and be entirely contrary to
all known facts. “The Ugly Duckling” is as true as
Fiske’s “History of the United States,” and every
whit as consistent. “Alice in Wonderland” is an excellent
story; yet it contains no facts. The introduction
26
of a single fact would ruin the story; for between the
realm of fact and the region of fancy is a great gulf
fixed, and no man has successfully crossed it. Whatever
conditions of life and action are assumed in one
part of a story must be continued throughout. If walruses
talk and hens are reasonable in one part of the
story, to reduce them to every-day animals would be
ruinous. Consistency, that the parts stand together,
that the story seem probable,—this is more essential
than facts. And to gain this consistency the surest
rule is to test the material by its relation to the main
incident.
The choice of the main incident, then, will determine
to a great degree what to exclude and what to include;
it will assist in ridding compositions of countless enumerations,
aimless wanderings, and flat endings; it will
help the writer to get started, and insure a stop when
the story is told; and it will give to the story the quality
most essential for its success, consistency.
An Actor as the Storyteller.
There is yet another condition that enters into the
selection of materials: it makes a difference
who tells the story. If the story be told in
the first person, that is, if one of the actors
tell the story, he cannot be supposed to know all that
the other persons do when out of sight and hearing,
nor can he know what they think. To take an illustration
from a pupil’s essay. A girl took her baby
sister out upon the lake in a rowboat. A violent
storm arose, lashing the lake into a fury. The oars
were wrenched from her hands. Helpless on the water,
how was she to be saved? Here the essayist recited
an infinite amount of detail about the distress at home,
giving the conversation and the actions. These things
she could not have known in the character she had
assumed at the beginning, that of the chief actor. All
27
of that should have been excluded. When Stevenson
tells of the fight in the round house, though he knew
what those old salts were doing outside, matters of
great interest to the reader, he does not let David say
anything except what he could see or hear, and a very
little of what he “learned afterwards.” Stevenson
knew well who was telling the story; David is too good
a story-teller to tell what he could not know. In the
pupil’s essay and in “Kidnapped,” all such matters
would have a direct bearing on the main incident; they
could be included without destroying the unity of the
story. But they cannot be included when the story is
told by one of the actors.
The Omniscience of an Author.
Many stories, probably most stories, are told in the
third person. In this case the author assumes
the position of an omniscient power who
knows everything that is done, said, or
thought by the characters in his story. Not only what
happens in the next room, but what is thought at the
other side of the world, is comprehended in his omniscience.
This is the position assumed by Irving in
“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” by Kipling in the
series of stories included with “Wee Willie Winkie,”
by Scott in “Marmion,” and by most great novelists.
Omniscience is, however, a dangerous prerogative
for a young person. The power is so great
that the person who has but recently come into possession
of it becomes dizzy with it and uncertain in his
movements. A young person knows what he would do
under certain conditions; but to be able to know what
some other person would do and think under a certain
set of circumstances requires a sure knowledge of character,
and the capability of assuming entirely different
and unaccustomed points of view. It is much safer
for the beginner to take the point of view of one of the
28
actors, and tell the story in the first person. Then
when the grasp has become sure from this standpoint,
he may assume the more difficult role of the omniscient
third person.
To sum up what has been said about the selection of
materials: only those materials should be admitted to
a story which contribute to its main incident, which
are consistent with one another, and which could have
been known by the narrator.
The Climax.
When the materials for a story have been selected,
the next consideration is their arrangement.
If the materials have been selected to contribute
to the main incident and converge toward it,
it will follow that the main incident will come last
in the story; it will be the climax towards which
the several parts of the story are directed. Moreover,
it should be last, in order to retain the interest
of the reader up to that time. This is in accordance
with the demands of the second great principle
of structure, Mass. An essay is well massed if the
parts are so arranged that things of importance will
arrest the attention. In literature to be read, to arrest
the attention is almost equivalent to catching the
eye. The positions that catch the eye, whether in sentence,
paragraph, or essay, are the beginning and the
end. Were it not for another element which enters
into the calculation, these positions would be of nearly
equal importance. Since, however, the mind retains
the most vivid impression of the thing it received
last, the impression of the end of the sentence, paragraph,
or essay is stronger than the impression made
by its beginning. The climax of a story should come
at the end, both because it is the result of preceding
incidents, and because by this position it receives the
additional emphasis due to its position.
Who? Where? When? Why?
29
The beginning is the position of second importance.
What, then, shall stand in this place? A story resembles
a puzzle. The solution of the puzzle is given at
the end; the thing of next importance is the conditions
of the puzzle. In “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” the story
culminates in the surprise of a devoted mother
when she discovers that her boy is a
secretive little liar, who now deserves to be
called “Black Sheep.” This is the end; what was the
beginning,—the conditions necessary to bring about
this deplorable result? First, they were the persons;
second, the place; third, the time. In many stories
there is introduced the reason for telling the story.
These conditions, answering the questions Who?
Where? When? and Why? are all, or some of them,
introduced at the beginning of any narrative, and as
soon as it can be done, they ought all to be given. In
a short essay, they are in the first paragraph; in a
novel, in the first chapters. In “Marmion” the time,
the place, and the principal character are introduced
into the first canto. So Irving begins “The Legend
of Sleepy Hollow” with the place and time, then follow
the characters. In all stories the beginning is
occupied in giving the conditions of the story; that is,
the principal characters, the time, and the place.
In what Order?
Having the end and the beginning clearly in mind,
the next question is how best to get from one
to the other. Shall the incidents be arranged
in order of time? or shall other considerations govern?
If it be any narrative of the journal form, whether a
diary or a biography, the chronological arrangement
will direct the sequence of events. Again, if it be a
simple story with a single series of events, the time
order will prevail. If, however, it be a narrative which
contains several series of events, as a history or a novel,
30
it may be wise, even necessary, to deviate from the
time sequence. It would have been unwise for Scott
to hold strictly to the order of time in “Marmion;”
after introducing the principal character, giving the
time and the setting, it was necessary for him to bring
in another element of the plot, Constance, and to go
backward in time to pick up this thread of the story.
The really essential order in any narrative is the order
of cause and effect. As causes precede effects, the
causal order and the time order generally coincide. In
a single series of events, that is, where one cause alone
produces an effect, which in turn becomes the cause of
another effect, the time order is the causal order. In
a novel, or a short story frequently, where there are
more than one series of incidents contributing to and
converging towards the main incident, these causes
must all be introduced before the effect, and may
break the chronological order of the story. In “Roger
Malvin’s Burial,” it would be impossible to tell what
the stricken father was doing and what the joyous
mother was thinking at the same time. Hawthorne
must leave one and go to the other until they meet in
their awful desolation. The only rule that can be
given is, introduce causes before effects. In all stories,
short or long, this will result in an approximation to
the order of time; in a simple story it will invariably
give a time sequence.
There is one exception to this rule which should
be noted. It is necessary at the very beginning to
have some incident that will arrest the attention. This
does not mean that persons, place, and time shall not
come first. They shall come first, but they shall be
so introduced as to make an interesting opening to
the story. The novels of some decades ago did not
sufficiently recognize the principle. One can frequently
31
hear it said of Scott’s stories, “I can’t get started
with them; they are too dry.” The introductory
chapters are often uninteresting. So much history is
introduced, so much scenery is described before the
author sets out his characters; and all this is done before
he begins the story. Novelists of to-day realize
that they must interest the reader at the beginning;
when they have caught him, they are quite certain
that he will bear with them while they bring up the
other divisions of the story, which now have become interesting
because they throw light on what has already
been told. Even more than novelists, dramatists recognize
this principle. When the curtain rises on the
first act, something interesting is going on. The action
frequently begins far along in the time covered by the
story; then by cleverly arranged conversation all circumstances
before the time of the opening that are
necessary to the development of the plot are introduced.
The audience receives these minor yet essential
details with no impatience, since they explain in
part a situation already interesting. The time order
may be broken in order to introduce at the beginning
of the story some interesting situation which will immediately
engage the reader’s attention.
In arranging the materials of a story, the main considerations
are Mass and Coherence. Mass demands
important matters at the beginning and at the end of
a story. Coherence demands that events closely related
shall stand close together: that an effect shall immediately
follow its cause. Beginning with some interesting
situation that will also introduce the principal
characters, the time, and the setting, the story follows
in the main the order of time, and concludes with the
main incident.
An Outline.
One practical suggestion will assist in arranging the
32
parts of a story. Use an outline. It will guard
against the omission of any detail that may
afterward be found necessary, and against the
necessity of offering the apology, inexcusable in prepared
work, of “forgetting to say;” it will help the
writer to see the best arrangement of the parts, to
know that causes have preceded effects. The outline
in narration should not be too much in detail, nor
should it be followed if, as the story progresses, new
light comes and the writer sees a better way to proceed.
The writer should be above the outline, not its
slave; but the outline is a most valuable servant of
the writer.
Movement.
Movement is an essential quality of narrative; a
story must advance. This does not mean
that the story shall always go at the same
rate, though it does mean that it shall always go. If
a story always had the rapidity and intensity of a climax,
it would be intolerable. Music that is all rushing
climaxes is unbearable; a picture must not be a
glare of high lights. The quiet passages in music, the
grays and low tones in the background of the picture,
the slow chapters in a story, are as necessary as their
opposites; indeed, climaxes are dependent on contrasts
in order to be climaxes.
Rapidity.
The question of movement resolves itself into these
two: how is rapidity of movement obtained,
and how can the writer delay the movement.
Rapidity is gained by the omission of all unnecessary
details, and the use of the shortest, tersest sentences to
express the absolutely essential. Dependent clauses
disappear; either the sentences are simple, just one
sharp statement, or they are made of coördinate
clauses with no connectives. Every weight that could
clog the story is thrown away, and it runs with the
33
swiftness of the thought. At such a time it would be
a waste of good material to introduce beautiful descriptions
or profound philosophy. Such things would be
skipped by the reader. Everything must clear the
way for the story.
Slowness.
What has been said of rapidity will indicate the
answer to the second question. Slowness of
movement is obtained by introducing long
descriptions, analyses of characters, and information regarding
the history or customs of the time. Sentences
become long and involved; dependent clauses abound;
connective words and phrases are frequent. Needless
details may be introduced until the story becomes
wearisome; it has almost no movement.
Very closely connected with what has been said
above is another fact concerning movement. Strip
the sentences as you may, there are still the verbs remaining.
Verbs and derivatives from verbs are the
words which denote action. If other classes of words
be taken out, the ratio of verbs to the other words in
the sentence is larger. Shorter sentences and an increased
ratio of verbs mark the passages in which the
movement is more rapid. In “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep”
the sentences average twenty-five words in the slower
parts; in the intenser paragraphs the sentences have an
average of fifteen words. Poe’s “Gold-Bug“ changes
from thirty-eight to twenty-one. Again, Stevenson’s
essays have a verb to eight words, while the fight at the
round house has a verb to about five and a half words.
One of Kipling’s stories starts in with a verb to eight
and a half words, and the climax has a verb in every four
words. These figures mean that as the sentences are
shortened, adjectives, adverbs, phrases, connectives, disappear.
Everything not absolutely necessary is thrown
away when the passage is to express rapid movement.
34
No person should think that, by eliminating all dependent
clauses, cutting away all unnecessary matters,
and putting in a verb to every four words, he can gain
intensity of expression. These are only accompanying
circumstances. Climaxes are in the thought. When
the thought moves rapidly, when things are being done
with a rush, when the climax has been reached, then
the writer will find that he can approach the movement
of the thought most nearly by using these means.
Description and Narration.
A valuable accessory to narration is description; in
truth, description for its own sake is not frequently
found. The story must be somewhere; and it is more
real when we know in what kind of a place
it occurs. Still it is not wise to do as Scott
so often has done,—give chapters of description
at the beginning of the story. Rather the setting
should be scattered through the story so that it is
hardly perceptible. At no time should the reader halt
and realize that he is being treated to a description.
Even in the beautiful descriptions by Stevenson quoted
in the next chapter, the work is so intimately blended
with the story that the reader unfortunately might pass
over it. A large part of the pleasure derived from the
best stories is supplied by good descriptions, giving a
vivid picture of the setting of the story.
Description has another use in narration beside giving
the setting of the story; it is often used to accent
the mood of the action. In “The Fall of the House of
Usher” by Poe, much of the gloomy foreboding is caused
by the weird descriptions. Hawthorne understood well
the harmony between man’s feelings and his surroundings.
The Sylvan Dance in “The Marble Faun” is wonderfully
handled. Irving, in “The Legend of Sleepy
Hollow,” throws about the story a “witching influence,”
and long before the Headless Horseman appears,
35
the reader is quite sure that the region abounds in
“ghosts and goblins,” dwelling in its “haunted fields,
and haunted brooks, and haunted bridges, and haunted
houses.” The danger in the use of description for this
purpose is in overdoing it. The fact is, as Arlo Bates
says, “the villains no longer steal through smiling
gardens whose snowy lilies, all abloom, and sending
up perfume like incense from censers of silver, seem to
rebuke the wicked.” Yet when handled as Stevenson
and Irving handled it, description assists in accenting
the mood of the action.
Characters few, Time short.
The number of characters should be few and the
time of the action short. Pupils are not able
to handle a large number of persons. There
is, however, a stronger reason for it than incapacity.
A young person would have great trouble
in remembering the large number of persons introduced
into “Little Dorrit.” Many of them would
always remain entire strangers. Such a scattering of
attention is unfavorable to a story. To focus the interest
upon a few, to have the action centred in these
few, increases the movement and intensity of the narrative.
The writers of short stories in France (perhaps
the best story-tellers of the present), Kipling, Davis,
Miss Wilkins, and some others of our best authors,
find few characters all that are necessary, and they
gain in intensity by limiting the number of characters.
For the same reason the time should be short. If
all the incidents chosen are crowded into a short period
of time, the action must be more rapid. The reader
does not like to know five years have elapsed between
one event and the next, even if the story-teller does
not try to fill up the interim with matters of no consequence
to the narrative. One exception must be
made to this rule. In stories whose purpose is to portray
36
a change of character, a long time is necessary;
for the transformation is not usually the result of
a day’s experience, but a gradual process of years.
“Silas Marner” and “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” demand
time to make naturally the great changes recounted.
In general, however, the time should be short.
Simple Plot.
Moreover, the plot should be simple. This is not
saying that the plot should be evident. No one is
quite satisfied if he knows just how the story will turn
out. There are, however, so many conditions in a story
that the accentuation of one or the subordination
of another may bring about something
quite unexpected, yet perfectly natural. Complicated
plots have had their day; simple plots are now in
vogue. They are as natural as life, and quite as unfathomable.
In Davis’s “Gallegher” there is nothing
complicated; one thing follows another in a perfectly
natural way; yet there are many questions in the
reader’s mind as to how the little rascal will turn out,
and whether he will accomplish his mission. Much
more cleverness is shown by the sleight-of-hand trickster,
who, unassisted and in the open, with no accessories,
dupes his staring assembly, than by him who, on the
stage, with the aid of mirrors, lights, machines, and a
crowd of assistants, manages to deceive your eyes. A
story that by its frank simplicity takes the reader into
its confidence, and brings him to a conclusion that is
so natural that it should have been foreseen from the
beginning, has a good plot. The conclusion of a story
must be natural,—the result of the causes at work in
the story. It must be an expected surprise. If it
cannot be accounted for by the causes at work in
the story, the construction is faulty. In the world of
fiction there is not the liberty one experiences in
the world of fact. There things unexpected and unexplainable
37
occur. But the story-teller has no such
privilege. Truth is stranger than fiction dare be. A
simple, natural story, with few characters and covering
but a short period of time, has three elements of success.
Paragraph structure, sentence structure, and choice
of words are taken up in subsequent chapters. Of
paragraphs it may be wise to say that there will be as
many as there are divisions in the outline; and sometimes,
by reason of the length of topic, a subdivision
may be necessary. The paragraph most common in
narration is the paragraph of details, the first form
presented in the chapter on paragraphs. What needs
to be said of sentences has already been said when
treating of movement. Of words one thing may be
suggested. Choose live words, specific words, words
that have “go” in them.
It should be remembered that everything cannot be
learned at once. The study of the whole is the principal
occupation just now. Select the main incident;
choose other incidents to be consistent with it; start
out at once giving the conditions of the story; proceed
now fast, now slow, as the thought demands, arriving
at a conclusion that is an expected surprise, the result
of forces at work in the story.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES
The questions are only suggestive. They indicate how
literature can be made to teach composition. Some questions
may seem hard, and will provoke discussion. To have
even a false opinion, backed by only a few facts, is better
than an entire absence of thought. Encourage discussion.
The answers to the questions have not been suggested in the
questions themselves. The object has been to throw the
pupil upon his own thinking.
These questions upon the “Method of the Author” should
not be considered until the far more important work of
deriving the “Meaning of the Author” has been finished.
Only after the whole piece has been carefully studied can
the relation of the parts to the whole be understood. Reserve
the questions for the review.
QUESTIONS.
THE GREAT STONE FACE.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 40.)
In what paragraphs is the main incident?
Can you find one sentence on the second page of the story
that foreshadows the result?
How many incidents or episodes contribute to the story?
Do these help in the development of Ernest’s character?
If not, what is the use of them?
Why are they arranged in this order?
Introduce into its proper place an incident of a scientist.
Write it up.
Do you think one of the incidents could be omitted?
Which one?
39
Are the incidents related in the order in which they
occurred? Is one the cause of another?
Has the story a plot? Why do you think so? What is
a plot?
Where are introduced the time, place, and the principal
character?
What is the use of the description of “the great stone
face”?
Why does the author tell only what “was reported” of
the interior of Mr. Gathergold’s palace? Is it better so?
Are the descriptions to accent the mood of the story? or
are they primarily to make concrete and real the persons
and places?
Is there any place where the movement of the story is
rapid?
Does the author begin at once, and close when the story
is told?
Did you find any use of comparisons in the piece? (See
top of p. 6, top of p. 19, middle of p. 22.)
Of what value are they in composition?
THE GENTLE BOY.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 145.)
What is the main incident?
In relation to the whole story, in what place does it
stand?
Do the other incidents serve to develop the character of
“the gentle boy”? or are they introduced to open up to the
reader that character? (Compare with “Wee Willie
Winkie.”)
Do you consider all the incidents necessary?
Why has the author introduced the fact that Ilbrahim
gently cared for the little boy who fell from the tree?
What is the use of the first two pages of the story?
Where does the story really begin?
40
How could you know the time, if the first page were not
there? Is it a delicate way of telling “when”?
Notice that time, place, and principal characters all are
introduced into the first paragraph of the real story.
Why does the author note the change in Tobias’s circumstances?
Does it add to the interest of the story? Would
you omit it?
Do you think this plot more complicated than that of
“The Great Stone Face”?
What is the use of the description on p. 31?
What do you note as the difference between
(a) second line of p. 19, sixth line of p. 27, sixteenth line
of p. 29, and (b) fourth line of p. 25, the figure in the complete
paragraph on p. 40?
THE GRAY CHAMPION.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 145.)
Note the successive stages by which the time is approached.
(Compare with the beginning of “Silas Marner.”)
Can you feel any difference between the movement of this
story and the movement in “The Gentle Boy”?
Is there any difference in the length of the sentences?
(Remember that the independent clauses of a compound sentence
are very nearly the same as simple sentences.)
Is there any difference in the proportion of verbs and
verbals? What parts of speech have almost disappeared?
ROGER MALVIN’S BURIAL.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 145.)
Why is the first paragraph needed?
Why could the incident in the first paragraph on p. 50 not
be omitted? Do you find it later?
How many chapters could you divide the story into?
What is the basis of division?
Why did not Hawthorne tell the result of the shot at
once?
41
A plot is usually made by introducing more than one
cause, by hiding one of the causes, or by holding back an
effect. Which in this story?
Is there a change of movement between the beginning
and the end of the story? Look at the last two pages carefully.
How has the author expressed the intensity of the
situation?
Does the story end when it is finished?
THE WEDDING KNELL.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 145.)
Of the three common ways of giving uncertainty to a
plot, which has been used?
Do you call this plot more complicated than those of the
other tales studied?
Why does the author say, at the top of p. 72, “necessary
preface”? Could it not be omitted? If not, what principle
of narrative construction would be violated by its omission?
Why has he introduced the last paragraph on p. 74 reaching
over to p. 75?
THE AMBITIOUS GUEST.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 40.)
In what order are the elements of the story introduced?
Pick out phrases which prepare you for the catastrophe.
Can you detect any difference in the movement of the
different parts of the story? What aids its expression?
THE GOLD-BUG.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 120.)
Would you have been satisfied if the story had stopped
when the treasure was discovered? What more do you want
to know?
What, then, is the main incident? Was the main incident
the last to occur in order of time? Why did Poe delay telling
it until the end?
42
Do you see how relating the story in the first person
helped him to throw the main incident last? Why could he
not tell it before?
Does Poe tell any other stories in the first person?
In what person are “Treasure Island” and “Kidnapped”
told? Are they interesting?
If a friend is telling you a story, do you care more for it
if it is about a third party or about himself? Why?
What, then, is the advantage of making an actor the narrator?
What are some of the disadvantages?
Do you think this plot as good as those of Hawthorne’s
stories?
Why was it necessary to have “a day of remarkable chilliness”
(p. 3), and a Newfoundland dog rushing into the
room (p. 6)?
What principle would it violate to omit these little matters?
(Text-book, p. 24.)
What of the rapidity of movement when they are digging?
How has rapidity been gained?
What form of wit does Poe attempt? Does he succeed?
Do you think the conversation is natural? If not, what
is the matter with it?
Are negroes usually profane? Does Jupiter’s general
character lead you to expect profanity from him? Is anything
gained by his oaths? Is anything sacrificed? In this
story is profanity artistic? (To know what is meant by
“artistic,” read the last line of “L’Envoi” on p. 253 of the
text-book.)
THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 30.)
What is the purpose of the first stanza?
What connection in thought is there between the second,
third, and fourth stanzas? What have these stanzas to do
with the story? If they have nothing to do with it, what
principle of structure do they violate? Would Lowell be
likely to do this?
43
What is the use of the description beginning “And what
is so rare as a day in June”?
Would the story be complete without the preludes?
Would the teaching be understood without them?
Are time and place definitely stated in the poem? Why
should they be, or not be?
Why does so much time elapse between Part I. and Part
II. of the story?
In what lines do you find the main incident?
In the first prelude is Lowell describing a landscape of
New England or Old England? Where is the story laid?
What comment have you to make upon these facts?
Pick out the figures. Are they useful?
Can you find passages of exposition and description in
this narrative? Why do you call it narration?
What is Lowell’s criticism upon himself? (See “Fable
for Critics.”)
A CHRISTMAS CAROL.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 57.)
Is the opening such as to catch the attention?
What is the essential idea in the description of Scrooge?
Do all details enforce this idea? Do you know Scrooge?
In what paragraph does Dickens tell where the story
occurs?
Find places on p. 19 and p. 96 where Dickens has used
“in” or “into.”
What advantage to the story is the appearance in Scrooge’s
office of his nephew and the two gentlemen? Do they come
into the story again?
Are the details in the description of the apparition on
p. 41 in the order in which they would be noted? Which
is the most important detail? Where is it in the description?
Is the description of Mrs. Fezziwig on p. 52 successful?
What helps express rapidity of movement in the paragraph
at the bottom of p. 53? (See also paragraph on
p. 85.)
44
Examining the words used by Dickens and Hawthorne,
which are longer? Which are most effectual? Are you
sure? Rewrite one of Hawthorne’s paragraphs with a
Dickens vocabulary. What is the result?
What word is the topic of the last paragraph on p. 73?
Recast the first sentence of the last paragraph on p. 77.
Does Dickens use slang? (Do not consider conversation
in the answer to this question.)
What is the main incident? Is there one of the minor
incidents that could be omitted?
Which one could you most easily spare?
What is the need of the last chapter?
MARMION.
(Rolfe’s Student’s Series, Vol. 2.)
How do you know the time of “Marmion”?
Do you see any reason why stanza vi. of Canto I. would
better precede stanza v.?
Where is the first mention of De Wilton? the first intimation
of Clara de Clare? of Constance?
What form of discourse in stanza vii. of Canto II.?
What part in the development of the narrative does Fitz-Eustace’s
song make?
Does the tale related by the host break the unity of the
whole? Is it “another story”? What value has it?
Why does Scott not tell of Marmion’s encounter with the
Elfin Knight in Canto III.? Where is it told? Why there?
Why is Canto II. put after Canto I.? Did the events
related in II. occur after those related in I.?
How many of the descriptions of persons in “Marmion”
begin with the face? How many times are they of the face
only?
Try to write the incident related in stanzas xix., xx., xxi.,
and xxii. of Canto III. in fewer words than Scott has done
it without sacrificing any detail.
Are you satisfied with the description of King James in
stanza viii. Canto V.? Do you see him?
45
Write an outline of the plot of “Marmion” in two hundred
words.
Why is the story of Lady Clare reserved until Canto V.?
What cantos contain the main incident?
Were all that precedes omitted, would “The Battle” be
as interesting?
Do you think the plot good? Is it complicated?
What of the number of figures used in the last canto
compared with those used in any other canto? Do you find
more in narrative or descriptive passages? Why?
Read stanza viii. Canto III. Can you describe a voice
without using comparison?
Do the introductions to the several cantos form any part
of the story? Would they be just as good anywhere else?
Would the story be better with them, or without them?
What principle of structure do they violate?
EXERCISES.
The subjects for composition given below are not intended
as a course to be followed, but only to suggest a plan for the
work. The individual topics for essays may not be the best
for all cases. Long lists of topics can be found in rhetorics.
Bare subjects, however, are usually unsuggestive. They
should be adapted to the class. Put the subjects in such
shape that there is something to get hold of. Give the
pupils a fair start.
- through 4. In order to place before the pupils good models for
constructing stories, read one like “A Piece of String” in
“An Odd Number,” by Maupassant. Stories for this purpose
should not be long. Talk the story over with the pupils,
bringing out clearly the main incident and the several episodes
which contribute to it. Have them notice how characters,
time, and place are introduced; and how each succeeding
event is possible and natural. Then have it rewritten.
This will fix the idea of plan. For this purpose some of
Miss Wilkins’s stories are excellent; Kenneth Grahame’s
46
“The Golden Age,” and Miss Jewett’s short stories are good
material. Some of the short stories in current magazines
serve well.
- and 6. Read the first of a story and its close,—enough to
indicate the main incident and the setting of the story.
Have the pupils write it complete.
- Read the close of a story. The pupils will then write
the whole.
- Read the opening of a story. Have the pupils complete
it.
- Finish “The Circus-Man’s Story” (Text-book, p. 297.)
- My First Algebra Lesson. Remember that in composition
a good story is worth more than a true one. The
basis may be a fact. Do not hesitate to fix it up.
- A delivery horse runs away. No persons are in the
wagon. Tell about it.
- Write about a runaway in which you and your little
sister are injured. (I have found it very helpful to use the
same subject, but having the relation of the narrator to the
incident very different. It serves to bring out a whole new
vocabulary in order to express the difference in the feelings
of the narrator.)
- Write the story suggested to your mind by these
words: Digging in the sand I found a board much worn
by the waves, on which were cut, in characters scarcely
traceable, these words: “Dec.——18 9, N. J.”
- A humorous incident in a street car, in which the
joke was on the other fellow.
- Another in which the joke was on me. The same
incident may be used with good effect. The choice of new
words to express the difference of feelings makes an excellent
exercise.
- Tell the story that Doreas related to her neighbors
about her husband’s escape and her father’s death.
- To bring out the fact that the language must be varied
to suit the character of the reader or listener, tell a
fairy story to a sleepy five-year old so that he will not go
47
to sleep. Do not hesitate at exaggerations. Only remember
it must be consistent.
- Have “The Gentle Boy” tell one of the incidents in
which he was cruelly treated. This may well be an incident
of your own life adapted to its purpose.
- and 20. Jim was a mean boy. Meanness seemed to be in
his blood. He was all mean. His hair was mean; his
freckles were mean; his big, chapped hands were mean.
And he was always mean. He was mean to his pets; he
was meaner to small boys; and he was as mean as he dared
to be to his equals in size.
Write one incident to show Jim’s meanness.
Write another to show how Jim met his match, and
learned a lesson.
- Work up the following into a story. It all occurs
in one day at the present time. Place, your own city.
Characters, a poor sewing girl, her little sick brother, and
a wealthy society lady. Incidents: a conversation between
brother and sister about some fruit; a conversation between
the sewing girl and the lady about money due for sewing;
stealing apples; arrest; appearance of the lady. Title:
Who was the Criminal?
- A story of a modern Sir Launfal.
- The most thrilling moment of my life.
- Tell the whole story suggested by the stanza of
“A Nightingale in the Study,” by Lowell, which begins,
“Cloaked shapes, a twanging of guitars.”
- Write a story which teaches a lesson. Remember
that the lesson is in the story, not at its end.
In the work at this time but little attention can be given
to the teaching of paragraphs and sentences. The pupil
should learn what a paragraph is, and should have his composition
properly divided into paragraphs. But the form
and massing of paragraphs cannot be taken up at this time.
The same may be said of sentences. He should have no
sentences broken in two by periods; nor should he have two
sentences forced into one. Grammatical errors should be
48
severely criticised. However, the present work is to get the
pupils started; and they cannot get started if there is a
teacher holding them back by discouraging criticisms. Mark
all mistakes of whatever kind; but put the stress upon the
whole composition: its unity, its coherence, its mass, and
its movement. Everything cannot be done at once; many
distressing faults will have to be passed over until later.
CHAPTER IV
DESCRIPTION
Difficulties of Language for making Pictures.
Description has been defined as the form of literature
which presents a picture by means of
language. In the preceding chapter, it has
been pointed out that the sequence of language
is perfectly adapted to detail the sequence
of action in a narrative. For the purpose of
constructing a picture, the means has serious drawbacks.
The picture has to be presented in pieces;
and the difficulties are much as would be experienced
if “dissected maps and animals” used for children’s
amusement were to be put together in the head. It
would not be easy to arrange the map of the United
States from blocks, each containing a small part of it,
taken one at a time from a box. Yet this closely
resembles the method language forces us to adopt in
constructing a picture. Each phrase is like one of the
blocks, and introduces a new element into the picture;
from these phrases the reader must reconstruct the
whole. This means not alone that he shall remember
them all, but there is a more serious trouble: he must
often rearrange them. For example, a description by
Ruskin begins, “Nine years old.” Either a boy or a
girl, the reader thinks, as it may be in his own home.
In the case of this reader it is a boy, rather tall of
his age, with brown hair and dark eyes. But the next
phrase reads, “Neither tall nor short for her age.”
Now the reader knows it is a girl of common stature.
50
Later on he learns that her eyes are “deep blue;” her
lips “perfectly lovely in profile;” and so on through
the details of the whole sketch. Many times in the
course of the description the reader makes up a new
picture; he is continually reconstructing. Any one
who will observe his own mind while reading a new
description can prove that the picture is arranged and
rearranged many times. This is due to the means by
which it is presented. Language presents only a phrase
at a time,—a fragment, not a whole,—and so fails
in the instantaneous presentation of a complete picture.
Painting and Sculpture.
The painter or sculptor who upon canvas or in
stone flashes the whole composition before us
at the same instant of time, has great advantages
over the worker in words. In these
methods there is needed no reconstruction of previous
images, no piecing together of a number of fragments.
Without any danger of mistakes which will have to
be corrected later, the spectator can take in the whole
picture at once,—every relation, every color, every
difference in values.
It is because pictures are the surest and quickest
means of representing objects to the mind that books,
especially text-books, and magazines are so profusely
illustrated. No magazine can claim popularity to-day
that does not use illustrations where possible; no text-book
in science or history sells unless it contains pictures.
And this is because all persons accurately and
quickly get the idea from a picture.
Advantages of Language.
Whatever be the disadvantages of language, there
are some advantages. Who could paint this
from Hawthorne?
“Soon the smoke ascended among the trees, impregnated
with savory incense, not heavy, dull, and surfeiting, like
51
the steam of cookery indoors, but sprightly and piquant.
The smell of our feast was akin to the woodland odors with
which it mingled.” (“Mosses from an Old Manse.”)
Or this from Lowell?—
“Under the yaller-pines I house,
When sunshine makes ’em all sweet-scented,
An’ hear among their furry boughs
The baskin’ west wind purr contented,
While ’way o’erhead, ez sweet an’ low
Ez distant bells thet ring for meetin’,
The wedged wil’ geese their bugles blow,
Further an’ further South retreatin’.”
Or cut this from marble?—
“O mother Ida, many-fountained Ida,
Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.
For now the noonday quiet holds the hill;
The grasshopper is silent in the grass;
The lizard, with his shadow on the stone,
Rests like a shadow, and the winds are dead.
The purple flower droops; the golden bee
Is lily-cradled; I alone awake.
My eyes are full of tears, my heart of love,
My heart is breaking, and my eyes are dim,
And I am all aweary of my life.”
The painter cannot put sounds upon a canvas, nor
can the sculptor carve from marble an odor or a taste.
We use the other senses in determining qualities of
objects; and words which describe effects produced by
other senses beside sight are valuable in description.
As Lowell says, “we may shut our eyes, but we cannot
help knowing” a large number of beautiful things.
Moreover, language suggests hidden ideas that the
representative arts cannot so well do. The following
52
from a “Song” by Lowell has in it suggestions which
the picture could not present.
“Violet! sweet violet!
Thine eyes are full of tears;
Are they wet
Even yet
With the thought of other years?
Or with gladness are they full,
For the night so beautiful,
And longing for those far-off spheres?
“Thy little heart, that hath with love
Grown colored like the sky above,
On which thou lookest ever,—
Can it know
All the woe
Of hope for what returneth never,
All the sorrow and the longing
To these hearts of ours belonging?”
Enumeration and Suggestion
Description, like narration, has two large divisions:
one simply to give information or instruction;
the other to present a vivid picture. One
is representative or enumerative; the other,
suggestive. One may be illustrated by guide-books;
the other by the descriptions of Stevenson or Ruskin.
And in the most artistic fashion the two have been
made to supplement each other in the following picture
of “bright and beautiful Athens” by Cardinal Newman.
From the first, to the sentence beginning “But
what he would not think of,” there is simply an
enumeration of features which a commercial agent
might see; the rest is what the artistic soul of the
lover of beauty saw there. One is enumeration; the
other a gloriously suggestive picture.
“A confined triangle, perhaps fifty miles its greatest length,
53
and thirty its greatest breadth; two elevated rocky barriers,
meeting at an angle; three prominent mountains, commanding
the plain,—Parnes, Pentelicus, and Hymettus; an unsatisfactory
soil; some streams, not always full;—such is
about the report which the agent of a London company
would have made of Attica. He would report that the
climate was mild; the hills were limestone; there was plenty
of good marble; more pasture land than at first survey might
have been expected, sufficient, certainly, for sheep and goats;
fisheries productive; silver mines once, but long since worked
out; figs fair; oil first-rate; olives in profusion. But what
he would not think of noting down was that that olive-tree
was so choice in nature and so noble in shape that it excited
a religious veneration; and that it took so kindly to the
light soil as to expand into woods upon the open plain, and
to climb up and fringe the hills. He would not think of
writing word to his employers, how that clear air, of which
I have spoken, brought out, yet blended and subdued, the
colors on the marble, till they had a softness and harmony,
for all their richness, which in a picture looks exaggerated,
yet is after all within the truth. He would not tell how that
same delicate and brilliant atmosphere freshened up the pale
olive, till the olive forgot its monotony, and its cheek glowed
like the arbutus or beech of the Umbrian hills. He would
say nothing of the thyme and the thousand fragrant herbs
which carpeted Hymettus; he would hear nothing of the hum
of its bees; nor take account of the rare flavor of its honey,
since Gaza and Minorca were sufficient for the English
demand. He would look over the Ægean from the height
he had ascended; he would follow with his eyes the chain of
islands, which, starting from the Sunian headland, seemed
to offer the fabled divinities of Attica, when they would visit
their Ionian cousins, a sort of viaduct thereto across the
sea; but that fancy would not occur to him, nor any admiration
of the dark violet billows with their white edges down
below; nor of those graceful, fan-like jets of silver upon the
rocks, which slowly rise aloft like water spirits from the deep,
then shiver, and break, and spread, and shroud themselves,
54
and disappear in a soft mist of foam; nor of the gentle, incessant
heaving and panting of the whole liquid plain; nor
of the long waves, keeping steady time, like a line of soldiery
as they resound upon the hollow shore,—he would not
deign to notice the restless living element at all except to
bless his stars that he was not upon it. Nor the distinct details,
nor the refined coloring, nor the graceful outline and
roseate golden hue of the jutting crags, nor the bold shadows
cast from Otus or Laurium by the declining sun;—our
agent of a mercantile firm would not value these matters even
at a low figure. Rather, we must turn for the sympathy we
seek to yon pilgrim student, come from a semi-barbarous
land to that small corner of the earth, as to a shrine, where
he might take his fill of gazing on those emblems and coruscations
of invisible unoriginate perfection. It was the stranger
from a remote province, from Britain or from Mauritania,
who in a scene so different from that of his chilly, woody
swamps, or of his fiery, choking sands, learned at once what
a real University must be, by coming to understand the sort
of country which was its suitable home.”
Enumerative Description.
Enumerative description has one point of great difference
from suggestive description. In the
former everything is told; in the latter the
description is as fortunate in what it omits as
in what it includes. Were an architect to give specifications
for the building of a house, every detail would
have to be included; but after all the pages of careful
enumeration the reader would know less of how it
looked than after these few words from Irving. “A
large, rickety wooden building stood in its place, with
great gaping windows, some of them broken and
mended with old hats and petticoats, and over the door
was painted ‘The Union Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.’”
So the manual training student uses five hundred
words to describe in detail a box which would be
thrown off with but a few words in a piece of literature.
55
In enumerative description, one element is of
as much importance as another; no special feature is
made primary by the omission or subdual of other
qualities. It has value in giving exact details of objects,
as if for their construction, and in including an
object in a class.
Suggestive Description.
Suggestive description, description the aim of which
is not information, but the reproduction of a
picture, is the kind most employed in literature.
To present a picture, not all the details
should be given. The mind cannot carry them all,
and, much worse, it cannot arrange them. Nor is there
any need for a detailed enumeration. A room has
walls, floor, and ceiling; a man naturally has ears,
arms, and feet. These things may be taken for granted.
It is not what is common to a class that describes; it
is what is individual, what takes one object out of a
class.
Value of Observation.
This leads to the suggestion that good description
depends largely on accurate observation. A
selection frequently quoted, but none the less
valuable because often seen, is in point here.
It is the last word on the value of observation.
“Talent is long patience. It is a question of regarding
whatever one desires to express long enough and with attention
close enough to discover a side which no one has seen
and which has been expressed by nobody. In everything
there is something of the unexplored, because we are accustomed
to use our eyes only with the thought of what has
already been said concerning the thing we see. The smallest
thing has in it a grain of the unknown. Discover it. In
order to describe a fire that flames or a tree in the plain, we
must remain face to face with that fire or that tree until for
us they no longer resemble any other tree or any other fire.
This is the way to become original.
56
“Having, moreover, impressed upon me the fact that there
are not in the whole world two grains of sand, two insects,
two hands, or two noses absolutely alike, he forced me to
describe a being or an object in such a manner as to individualize
it clearly, to distinguish it from all other objects of
the same kind. ‘When you pass,’ he said to me, ‘a grocer
seated in his doorway, a concierge smoking his pipe, a row
of cabs, show me this grocer and this concierge, their attitude,
all their physical appearance; suggest by the skill of
your image all their moral nature, so that I shall not confound
them with any other grocer or any other concierge;
make me see, by a single word, wherein a cab-horse differs
from the fifty others that follow or precede him.’... Whatever
may be the thing which one wishes to say, there is but
one word for expressing it; only one verb to animate it, but
one adjective to qualify it. It is essential to search for this
verb, for this adjective, until they are discovered, and never
to be satisfied with anything else.”
The Point of View.
With the closest observation, an author gets into
his own mind what he wishes to present to
another; but with this essential step taken,
he is only ready to begin the work of communication.
For the successful communication of a picture there
are some considerations of value. And first is the
point of view. It has much the same relation to description
as the main incident has to narration. In
large measure it determines what to exclude and what
to include. When a writer has assumed his point of
view, he must stay there, and tell not a thing more
than he can see from there. It would hardly be possible
for a man, telling only so much as he saw while
gazing from Eiffel Tower into the streets below, to
say that the people looked like Lilliputians and that
their hands were dirty. To one lying on the bank of a
57
stream, it does not look like “a silver thread running
through the landscape.” Things do not look the same
when they are near as when at a distance. This fact
has been acted upon more by the modern school of
painting than ever before in art. Verboeckhoven
painted sheep in a marvelous way. The drawing is
perfect, giving the animal to the life. Still, no matter
how far away the artist was standing, there are the same
marvelously painted tufts of wool, showing almost the
individual fibres. Tufts of wool were on the sheep,
and made of fibres; but no artist at twenty rods could
see them. The new school gives only what actually
can be seen. Its first law is that each “shall draw the
thing as he sees it for the God of Things as They Are.”
Make no additions to what you can actually see because,
as a result of experience, you know that there are some
things not yet mentioned in your description; the hands
may be dirty, but the man on the tower cannot see
the dirt. Neither make an addition simply because it
sounds well; the “silver thread through the landscape”
is beautiful, but, unfortunately, it is not always true.
Not only does distance cut out details from a picture;
the fact that man sees in a straight line and not
around a corner eliminates some features. In describing
a house, remember that as you stand across the street
from it, the back porch cannot be seen, neither can the
shrubbery in the back yard. A writer would not be
justified in speaking of a man’s necktie, if the man he
was describing were walking in front of him. In enumerative
description the inside of a box may be told of;
a man may be turned around, as it were; but to present
a picture, only one side can be described, just as it would
be shown in a photograph. Any addition to what can
actually be known from the point of view assumed by
the author is a fault and a source of confusion. Choose
58
your point of view; stay there; and tell only what is
seen from that point.
Moving Point of View.
It has been said that the point of view should not be
changed. This requires one modification. It
may be changed, if the reader is kept informed
of the changes. If a person wished
to describe an interior, he would be unable to see the
whole from any one point of view. As he passed from
room to room he should inform his reader of his change
of position. Then the description, though a unit, is a
combination of several descriptions; just as the house
is one, though made of dining-room, sitting-rooms, bedrooms,
and attic. This kind of description is very
common in books of travel, in which the author tells
what he sees in passing. The thing to be remembered
in writing this kind of description is to inform the
reader where the author is when he writes the different
parts of the description,—to give the points of view.
The Point of View should be stated.
The point of view, whether fixed or moving, should
be made clear. Either it should be definitely
stated, or it should be suggested by some
phrase in the description. In the many examples
which are quoted in this chapter, it would be
well to see what it is that gives the point of view. The
picture gains in distinctness when the point of view is
known. The following sentences are from “The Old
Manse;” there is no mistake here. The reader knows
every move the author makes. It opens with:—
“Between two tall gateposts of rough-hewn stone (the
gate itself having fallen from its hinges at some unknown
epoch) we beheld the gray front of the old parsonage terminating
the vista of an avenue of black ash-trees.”
From the street the reader is taken to “the rear of
the house,” where there was “the most delightful little
59
nook of a study that ever offered its snug seclusion to
a scholar.” Through its window the clergyman saw
the opening of the “deadly struggle between two
nations.” He heard the rattle of musketry, and
“there needed but a gentle wind to sweep the battle smoke
around this quiet house. Perhaps the reader, whom I
cannot help considering as my guest in the Old Manse
and entitled to all courtesy in the way of sight-showing,—perhaps
he will choose to take a nearer view of the memorable
spot. We stand now on the river’s brink.”... “Here
we are, at the point where the river was crossed by the old
bridge.”... “The Old Manse! We had almost forgotten
it, but will return thither through the orchard.”... “What
with the river, the battle-field, the orchard, and the garden,
the reader begins to despair of finding his way back into the
Old Manse. But in agreeable weather it is the truest hospitality
to keep him out-of-doors. I never grew quite acquainted
with my habitation till a long spell of sulky rain
had confined me beneath its roof. There could not be a
more sombre aspect of external nature than as then seen
from the windows of my study.”
And so Hawthorne continues through this long and
beautiful description of “The Old Manse;” every
change in the point of view is noted.
Mental Point of View.
Closely connected with the physical point of view is
the mood or purpose of the writer; this might
be called the mental point of view. Not everything
should be told which the author could
know from his position, but only those things which
at the time serve his purpose. In the description already
quoted from Newman, the mercantile gentleman
notes a large number of features which are the commercial
advantages of Attica; of these but three are
worthy of mention by “yon pilgrim student” in giving
his impression of Athens as “a shrine where he might
60
take his fill of gazing on those emblems and coruscations
of invisible unoriginate perfection.” The others—the
soil, the streams, the climate, the limestone, the
fisheries, and the silver mines—do not serve his purpose.
Hawthorne in the long description already mentioned
has retained those features which suggest quiet
and peace. Such a profusion of “quiet,” “half asleep,”
“peaceful,” “unruffled,” “unexcitable” words and
phrases never “loitered” through forty pages of
“dreamy” and “whispering” description.
In the following bit from “Lear,” where Edgar tells
his blinded father how high the cliff is, only those details
are included which measure distance.
“How fearful
And dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low!
The crows and choughs that wing the midway air
Show scarce so gross as beetles; half way down
Hangs one that gathers samphire,—dreadful trade!
Methinks he seems no bigger than his head:
The fishermen, that walk upon the beach,
Appear like mice; and yond tall anchoring bark,
Diminished to her cock; her cock, a buoy
Almost too small for sight: the murmuring surge,
That on th’ unnumbered idle pebbles chafes,
Cannot be heard so high.—I’ll look no more,
Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight
Topple down headlong.”
The following is from Kipling’s “The Light that
Failed:”—
“What do you think of a big, red, dead city built of red
sandstone, with green aloes growing between the stones, lying
out neglected on honey-colored sands? There are forty dead
kings there, Maisie, each in a gorgeous tomb finer than all
the others. You look at the palaces and streets and shops
and tanks, and think that men must live there, till you find
61
a wee gray squirrel rubbing its nose all alone in the marketplace,
and a jeweled peacock struts out of a carved doorway
and spreads its tail against a marble screen as fine pierced
as point-lace. Then a monkey—a little black monkey—walks
through the main square to get a drink from a tank
forty feet deep. He slides down the creepers to the water’s
edge, and a friend holds him by the tail, in case he should
fall in.
“Is all that true?
“I have been there and seen. Then evening comes and
the lights change till it’s just as though you stood in the
heart of a king-opal. A little before sundown, as punctually
as clockwork, a big bristly wild boar, with all his family following,
trots through the city gate, churning the foam on his
tusks. You climb on the shoulder of a big black stone god,
and watch that pig choose himself a palace for the night and
stump in wagging his tail. Then the night-wind gets up, and
the sands move, and you hear the desert outside the city
singing, ‘Now I lay me down to sleep,’ and everything is
dark till the moon rises.”
Note how every detail introduced serves to make the
city dead. Dead kings, a wee gray squirrel, a little
black monkey, a bristly wild boar, the night wind, and
the desert singing,—these could not be seen or heard
in a live city with street cars; but all serve to emphasize
the fact that here is “a big, red, dead city.”
At the risk of over-emphasizing this point that the purpose
of the author, the mental point of view of the writer,
the feeling which the object gives him and which he
wishes to convey to the reader, the central thought in
the description, is primary, and an element that cannot
be overlooked in successful description, I give another
example. This point really cannot be over-emphasized:
a writer cannot be too careful in selecting materials.
Careless grouping of incongruous matters cannot make
a picture. Nor does the artistic author leave the
62
reader in doubt as to the purpose of the description;
its central thought is usually suggested in the first sentence.
In the quotations from Shakespeare and Kipling,
the opening sentences are the germ of what follows.
Each detail seems to grow out of this sentence,
and serves to emphasize it. In the following by Stevenson,
the paragraphs spring from the opening sentence;
they explain it, they elaborate it, and they accent it.
“Night is a dead monotonous period under a roof; but in
the open world it passes lightly, with its stars and dews and
perfumes, and the hours are marked by changes in the face
of Nature. What seems a kind of temporal death to people
choked between walls and curtains is only a light and
living slumber to the man who sleeps afield. All night long
he can hear Nature breathing deeply and freely; even as
she takes her rest she turns and smiles; and there is one
stirring hour unknown to those who dwell in houses, when a
wakeful influence goes abroad over the sleeping hemisphere,
and all the outdoor world are on their feet. It is then that
the first cock crows, not this time to announce the dawn, but
like a cheerful watchman speeding the course of the night.
Cattle awake on the meadows; sheep break their fast on the
dewy hillsides, and change to a new lair among the ferns;
and houseless men, who have lain down with the fowls, open
their dim eyes and behold the beauty of the night.
“At what inaudible summons, at what gentle touch of Nature,
are all these sleepers thus recalled in the same hour to
life? Do the stars rain down an influence, or do we share
some thrill of mother earth below our resting bodies? Even
shepherds and old country-folk, who are the deepest read in
these arcana, have not a guess as to the means or purpose of
this nightly resurrection. Towards two in the morning they
declare the thing takes place; and neither know nor inquire
further. And at least it is a pleasant incident. We are
disturbed in our slumber only, like the luxurious Montaigne,
‘that we may the better and more sensibly enjoy it.’ We
have a moment to look upon the stars. And there is a special
63
pleasure for some minds in the reflection that we share
the impulse with all outdoor creatures in our neighborhood,
that we have escaped out of the Bastille of civilization, and
are become, for the time being, a more kindly animal and
a sheep of Nature’s flock.” (“Travels with a Donkey.”)
Length of Descriptions.
There is one more step in the exclusion of details.
This considers neither the point of view nor
the purpose of the writer, but it is what is
due the reader. Stevenson says in one of his
essays that a description which lasts longer than two
minutes is never attempted in conversation. The listener
cannot hold the details enumerated. The clearest
statement regarding this comes from Jules Lemaître
in a criticism upon some descriptions by Emile Zola
which the critic says are praised by persons who have
never read them. He says:—
“It has been one of the greatest literary blunders of the
time to suppose that an enumeration of parts is a picture, to
think that forever placing details side by side, however picturesque
they may be, is able in the end to make a picture,
to give us any conception of the vast spectacles in the physical
universe. In reality, a written description arranges its
parts in our mind only when the impression of the first features
of which it is formed are remembered sufficiently, so
that we can easily join the first to those which complete and
end it. In short, a piece of description is ineffective if we
cannot hold in mind all its details at one time. It is necessary
that all the details coexist in our memory just as the
parts of a painting coexist under our eye. This becomes
next to impossible if the description of one definite object
last over fifteen minutes of reading. The longer it is, the
more obscure it becomes. The individual features fade
away in proportion to the number which are presented;
and for this reason one might say that we cannot see the
forest for the trees. Every description which is over fifty
lines ceases to be clear to a mind of ordinary vigor. After
64
that there is only a succession of fragmentary pictures which
fatigues and overwhelms the reader.”
These, then, are the principles that guide in the
choice of materials for a description. First, the point
of view, whether fixed or movable, should be made
clear to the reader; it should be retained throughout
the description, or the change should be announced.
By regard for it the writer will be guided to the exclusion
of matters that could not be observed, and to the
inclusion of such details as can be seen and are essential.
Second, the writer will keep out matters that do
not contribute to his purpose, and will select only those
details which assist in producing the desired impression.
Third, the limitations of the reader’s powers advise
a writer to be brief: five hundred words should be
the outside; two hundred are enough for most writers.
These principles will give to the whole that unity of
materials and of structure which is the first requisite
of an effective description.
The next matter for consideration is the arrangement
of the materials. The arrangement depends on the
principles that guided in narration, Mass and Coherence.
Arrangement of Details in Description.
After we have looked at any object long enough to
be able to write about it, one feature comes
to assume an importance that sets it far above
all others. To a writer who has looked long
at a man, he may shrink to a cringing piece
of weakness, or he may grow to a strong, self-centred
power whose presence alone inspires serenest trust.
Hawthorne, standing in St. Peter’s, saw only the gorgeous
coloring; proportions, immensity, and sacredness
were as nothing to the harmonious brilliancy of this
expanded “jewel casket.” Stevenson, thinking of the
65
beast of burden best suited to carry his great sleeping
sack, discarded the horse, for, as he says, “she is a
fine lady among animals.” The description of a horse
which follows this statement emphasizes the fact that
a horse is not intended for carrying burdens. From
the germinal impression of a description, all the details
grow; to this primary impression they all contribute.
In the case of buildings, or other things material, this
impression is generally one of form, sometimes of the
height of the object; if striking, it may be color. The
strongest impression of persons is a quality of character
which shows itself either in the face or in the pose
of a man. An example of each may be found in the
following paragraphs from “David Copperfield:”—
“At length we stopped before a very old house bulging
out over the road; a house with long, low lattice-windows
bulging out still farther, and beams with carved heads on
the ends bulging out too, so that I fancied the whole house
was leaning forward, trying to see who was passing on the
narrow pavement below. It was quite spotless in its cleanliness.
The old-fashioned brass knocker on the low-arched
door, ornamented with carved garlands of fruits and flowers,
twinkled like a star; the two stone steps descending to the
door were as white as if they had been covered with fair
linen; and all the angles and corners, and carvings and
mouldings, and quaint little panes of glass, and quainter little
windows, though as old as the hills, were as pure as any
snow that ever fell upon the hills.
“When the pony-chaise stopped at the door, and my eyes
were intent upon the house, I saw a cadaverous face appear
at a small window on the ground floor (in a little round
tower that formed one side of the house), and quickly disappear.
The low arched door then opened, and the face came
out. It was quite as cadaverous as it had looked in the window,
though in the grain of it there was that tinge of red
66
which is sometimes to be observed in the skins of red-haired
people. It belonged to a red-haired person—a youth of
fifteen, as I take it now, but looking much older whose hair
was cropped as close as the closest stubble; who had hardly
any eyebrows, and no eyelashes, and eyes of a red-brown;
so unsheltered and unshaded that I remember wondering
how he went to sleep. He was high-shouldered and bony;
dressed in decent black, with a white wisp of a neck cloth;
buttoned up to the throat; and had a long, lank, skeleton
hand, which particularly attracted my attention, as he stood
at the pony’s head, rubbing his chin with it, and looking up
at us in the chaise.”
Hawthorne thus begins his description of “The
House of the Seven Gables:”—
“Maule’s Lane, or Pyncheon Street, as it were now more
decorous to call it, was thronged, at the appointed hour, as
with a congregation on its way to church. All, as they approached,
looked upward at the imposing edifice, which was
henceforth to assume its rank among the habitations of mankind.”
And in the same volume his description of “The
Pyncheon of To-day” begins:—
“As the child went down the steps, a gentleman ascended
them, and made his entrance into the shop. It was the
portly, and, had it possessed the advantage of a little more
height, would have been the stately figure of a man, considerably
in the decline of life, dressed in a black suit of some
thin stuff, resembling broadcloth as closely as possible.”
If the description be long, and the object will lend
itself to such a treatment, a definite, tangible, easily
understood shape or form should be suggested at once.
Notice Newman’s first sentence describing Attica: “A
confined triangle, perhaps fifty miles its greatest length,
and thirty its greatest breadth.” Like this is the
67
beginning of the description of the battle of Waterloo
by Victor Hugo.
“Those who would get a clear idea of the battle of
Waterloo have only to lay down upon the ground in their
mind a capital letter A. The left stroke of the A is the road
to Nivelles, the right stroke is the road from Genappe, the
cross of the A is the sunken road from Ohain to Braine
l’Alleud. The top of the A is Mont Saint Jean, Wellington
is there; the left-hand lower point is Hougomont, Reille is
there with Jerome Bonaparte; the right-hand lower point
is La Belle Alliance, Napoleon is there. A little below the
point where the cross of the A meets and cuts the right
stroke, is La Haie Sainte. At the middle of this cross is
the precise point where the final battle word was spoken.
There the lion is placed, the involuntary symbol of the supreme
heroism of the Imperial Guard. The triangle contained
at the top of the A, between the two strokes and the
cross, is the plateau of Mont Saint Jean. The struggle for
this plateau was the whole of the battle.”
In “The Vision of Sir Launfal” Lowell opens his
beautiful description with the words, “And what is so
rare as a day in June?” From this general and comprehensive
sentence follow all the details which make
a June day perfect.
Hawthorne, after telling how he happened to write
of him, begins his long description of “The Old Apple
Dealer” with the following paragraph:—
“He is a small man, with gray hair and gray stubble beard,
and is invariably clad in a shabby surtout of snuff color,
closely buttoned, and half concealing a pair of gray pantaloons;
the whole dress, though clean and entire, being evidently
flimsy with much wear. His face, thin, withered,
furrowed, and with features which even age has failed to
render impressive, has a frost-bitten aspect. It is a moral
frost which no physical warmth or comfortableness could
68
counteract. The summer sunshine may fling its white heat
upon him, or the good fire of the depot room may make him
the focus of its blaze on a winter’s day; but all in vain; for
still the old man looks as if he were in a frosty atmosphere,
with scarcely warmth enough to keep life in the region
about his heart. It is a patient, long-suffering, quiet,
hopeless, shivering aspect. He is not desperate,—that,
though its etymology implies no more, would be too positive
an expression,—but merely devoid of hope. As all his past
life, probably, offers no spots of brightness to his memory,
so he takes his present poverty and discomfort as entirely a
matter of course; he thinks it the definition of existence, so
far as himself is concerned, to be poor, cold, and uncomfortable.
It may be added, that time has not thrown dignity as
a mantle over the old man’s figure: there is nothing venerable
about him: you pity him without a scruple.”
So this old apple dealer shivers all through this
description of nine pages to the last sentences:—
“God be praised, were it only for your sake, that the
present shapes of human existence are not cast in iron nor
hewn in everlasting adamant, but moulded of the vapors that
vanish away while the essence flits upward to the Infinite.
There is a spiritual essence in this gray and lean old shape
that shall flit upward too. Yes; doubtless there is a region
where the lifelong shiver will pass away from his being, and
that quiet sigh, which it has taken him so many years to
breathe, will be brought to a close for good and all.”
The prominent characteristic may be the feeling
aroused by the object. It may be horror, as in a description
of a haunted house or a murderer; it may
be love, as in the picture of an old home or a sainted
mother. The emotion occasioned is often mentioned
or suggested at once, and the details are afterward
given which have called forth the feeling. Poe uses
this in the first paragraph of “The House of Usher.”
69
“During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the
autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low
in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback,
through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length
found myself, as the shades of evening drew on, within view
of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it was—but,
with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable
gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable;
for the feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable,
because poetic, sentiment with which the mind usually receives
even the sternest natural images of the desolate or
terrible. I looked upon the scene before me—upon the
mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain—upon
the bleak walls—upon the vacant, eye-like windows—upon
a few rank sedges—and upon a few white
trunks of decayed trees—with an utter depression of soul
which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly
than to the after-dream of a reveler upon opium—the bitter
lapse into every-day life—the hideous dropping off of the veil.
There was an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart—an
unredeemed dreariness of thought which no goading of the
imagination could torture into aught of the sublime.... It
was, possible, I reflected, that a mere different arrangement of
the particulars of the scene, of the details of the picture, would
be sufficient to modify, or perhaps to annihilate, its capacity
for sorrowful impression; and, acting upon this idea, I
reined my horse to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid
tarn that lay in unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed
down—but with a shudder even more thrilling than before—upon
the remodeled and inverted images of the gray sedge,
and the ghastly tree-stems, and the vacant and eye-like windows.”
And one may see from looking back at the illustrations
given that the dominant impression which gives
the character to the whole description, this leading
quality which is the essence of the whole, usually
stands at the very beginning, and to it all the succeeding
details cling.
The End of a Description.
70
The end of a description is equally as important as
the opening. In most descriptions, whether
short or long, the most important detail, the
detail that emphasizes most the general feeling
of the whole, stands at the end. If the description
be short, the necessity of a comprehensive opening statement
is not imperative,—indeed, it may be made so
formal and ostentatious when compared with the rest
of the description as to be ridiculous; yet even in the
short description some important detail should close it.
In a long description the repetition of the opening
statement in a new form sometimes stands at the end.
If the description be of movement or change, the end
will be the climax of the movement, the result of the
change.
In the examples already given there are illustrations
of the methods of closing. In each case, there is an
important detail or an artistic repetition of the general
impression. Many examples of short characterization
can be found in all narratives. In Irving’s description
of Ichabod Crane, the next to the last sentence gives
the significant detail, and the last gives another general
impression. It reads:—
“The cognomen of Crane was not inapplicable to his person.
He was tall, but exceedingly lank, with narrow shoulders,
long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of
his sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his
whole frame most loosely hung together. His head was
small, and flat at top, with huge ears, large green glassy
eyes, and a long snipe nose, so that it looked like a weather-cock
perched upon his spindle neck to tell which way the
wind blew.” (“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”)
So far this is but an amplification of his likeness to
a crane; certainly “a long snipe nose” “upon his spindle
71
neck” is the most important detail. Next the author
gives another general impression:—
“To see him striding along the profile of a hill on a windy
day, with his clothes bagging and fluttering about him, one
might have mistaken him for the genius of famine descending
upon the earth, or some scarecrow eloped from a cornfield.”
The following is from “The House of Usher:”—
“Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a
dream, I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building.
Its principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive
antiquity. The discoloration of ages had been great. Minute
fungi overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine
tangled web-work from the eaves. Yet all this was apart
from any extraordinary dilapidation. No portion of the
masonry had fallen, and there appeared to be a wild inconsistency
between its still perfect adaptation of parts and the
crumbling condition of the individual stones. In this there
was much that reminded me of the specious totality of old
woodwork which has rotted for long years in some neglected
vault with no disturbance from the breath of the external air.
Beyond this indication of extensive decay, however, the fabric
gave little token of instability. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing
observer might have discovered a barely perceptible
fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building in
front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until
it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.”
In this every detail emphasizes the “excessive antiquity”
of the house; and on reading the story there
is no question of the importance of the “barely perceptible
fissure.” Thereby hangs the tale.
The two following are descriptions of dawn, of
change; they have marked climaxes. The first is by
Edward Everett, the second by Stevenson. The similarity
in choice of words and in the feelings of the men
is remarkable.
72
“Such was the glorious spectacle as I entered the train.
As we proceeded, the timid approach of twilight became
more perceptible; the intense blue of the sky began to soften;
the smaller stars, like little children, went first to rest; the
sister-beams of the Pleiades soon melted together; but the
bright constellations of the west and north remained unchanged.
Steadily the wondrous transfiguration went on.
Hands of angels, hidden from mortal eyes, shifted the scenery
of the heavens; the glories of night dissolved into the glories
of dawn. The blue sky now turned more softly gray; the
great watch-stars shut up their holy eyes; the east began to
kindle. Faint streaks of purple soon blushed along the sky;
the whole celestial concave was filled with the inflowing tides
of the morning light, which came pouring down from above
in one great ocean of radiance, till at length, as we reached
the Blue Hills, a flash of purple blazed out from above the
horizon, and turned the dewy teardrops of flower and leaf
into rubies and diamonds. In a few seconds, the everlasting
gates of morning were thrown wide open, and the lord of
day, arrayed in glories too severe for the gaze of man, began
his state.” (“The Uses of Astronomy.”)
“At last she began to be aware of a wonderful revolution,
compared to which the fire of Mittwalden Palace was but a
crack and flash of a percussion cap. The countenance with
which the pines regarded her began insensibly to change;
the grass, too, short as it was, and the whole winding staircase
of the brook’s course, began to wear a solemn freshness
of appearance. And this slow transfiguration reached her
heart, and played upon it, and transpierced it with a serious
thrill. She looked all about; the whole face of nature looked
back, brimful of meaning, finger on lip, leaking its glad
secret. She looked up. Heaven was almost emptied of
stars. Such as still lingered shone with a changed and waning
brightness, and began to faint in their stations. And
the color of the sky itself was most wonderful; for the rich
blue of the night had now melted and softened and brightened;
and there had succeeded a hue that has no name, and
73
that is never seen but as the herald of the morning. ‘Oh!’
she cried, joy catching at her voice, ‘Oh! it is the dawn!’
“In a breath she passed over the brook, and looped up
her skirts and fairly ran in the dim alleys. As she ran, her
ears were aware of many pipings, more beautiful than music;
in the small, dish-shaped houses in the fork of giant arms,
where they had lain all night, lover by lover, warmly pressed,
the bright-eyed, big-hearted singers began to awaken for the
day. Her heart melted and flowed forth to them in kindness.
And they, from their small and high perches in the
clerestories of the wood cathedral, peered down sidelong at
the ragged Princess as she flitted below them on the carpet
of the moss and tassel.
“Soon she had struggled to a certain hilltop, and saw far
before her the silent inflooding of the day. Out of the East
it welled and whitened; the darkness trembled into light;
and the stars were extinguished like the street-lamps of a
human city. The whiteness brightened into silver; the silver
warmed into gold, and the gold kindled into pure and living
fire; and the face of the East was barred with elemental
scarlet. The day drew its first long breath, steady and
chill; and for leagues around the woods sighed and shivered.
And then, at one bound the sun had floated up; and her
startled eyes received day’s first arrow, and quailed under
the buffet. On every side, the shadows leaped from their
ambush and fell prone. The day was come, plain and garish;
and up the steep and solitary eastern heaven, the sun, victorious
over his competitors, continued slowly and royally to
mount.” (“Prince Otto.”)
Proportion.
One thing further should be said regarding Mass.
Not everything can stand first or last; some
important details must be placed in the midst
of a description. These particulars will not be of
equal importance. The more important details may
be given their proportionate emphasis by relatively
increasing the length of their treatment. If one detail
is more important than another, it requires more to be
74
said about it; unimportant matters should be passed
over with a word. Proportion in the length of treatment
is a guide to the relative importance of the matters
introduced into a description.
In the description of “The House of Usher,” position
emphasizes the barely perceptible fissure. Proportion
singles out the crumbling condition of the
individual stones and makes this detail more emphatic
than either the discoloration or the fungi. And in
Newman’s description, the olive-tree, the brilliant atmosphere,
the thyme, the bees, all add to the charms
of bright and beautiful Athens; but most of all the
Ægean, with its chain of islands, its dark violet billows,
its jets of silver, the heaving and panting of its
long waves,—the restless living element fascinates
and enraptures “yon pilgrim student.” Position and
proportion are the means of emphasis in a paragraph
of description.
Arrangement must be natural.
Having settled the massing of the description, the
next matter for consideration is the arrangement.
In order that the parts of a description
may be coherent, hold together, they
should be arranged in the order in which they would
naturally be perceived. What strikes the eye of the
beholder as most important, often the general characteristic
of the whole, should be mentioned first; and the
details should follow as they are seen. In a building,
the usual way of observing and describing is from
foundation to turret stone. A landscape may be described
by beginning with what is near and extending
the view; this is common. Sometimes the very opposite
plan is pursued; or one may begin on either hand
and advance toward the other. Of a person near by,
the face is the first thing observed; for it is there that
his character can be best discovered. Afterward details
75
of clothing follow as they would naturally be noticed.
If a person be at a distance his pose and carriage
would be about all that could be seen; as he approaches,
the other details would be mentioned as they
came into view. To arrange details in the order in
which they are naturally observed will result in an
association in the description of the details that are
contiguous in the objects. Jumping about in a description
is a source of confusion. How entirely it may
ruin a paragraph can be estimated by the effect upon
this single sentence, “He was tall, with feet that
might have served for shovels, narrow shoulders, hands
that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, long arms and
legs, and his whole frame most loosely hung together.”
This rearrangement makes but a disjointed and feeble
impression; and the reason is entirely that an order
in which no person ever observed a man has been substituted
for the commonest order,—from head to foot.
Arrange details so that the parts which are contiguous
shall be associated in the description, and proceed in
the order in which the details are naturally observed.
The following is by Irving; he is describing the
stage-coachman:—
“He has commonly a broad, full face, curiously mottled
with red, as if the blood had been forced by hard feeding
into every vessel of the skin; he is swelled into jolly dimensions
by frequent potations of malt liquors, and his bulk is
still further increased by a multiplicity of coats, in which he
is buried like a cauliflower, the upper one reaching to his
heels. He wears a broad-brimmed, low-crowned hat; a huge
roll of colored handkerchief about his neck, knowingly knotted
and tucked in at the bosom; and has in summer time a
large bouquet of flowers in his buttonhole, the present, most
probably, of some enamored country lass. His waistcoat is
commonly of some bright color, striped, and his small-clothes
76
extend far below the knees, to meet a pair of jockey boots
which reach about half way up his legs.”
Use Familiar Images.
When the materials have been selected and arranged,
the hardest part of the work has been done. It now
remains to express in language the picture. A few
suggestions regarding the kind of language
will be helpful. The writer must always bear
in mind the fact that in constructing a mental picture
each reader does it from the images he already possesses.
“Quaint arabesques” is without meaning to many persons;
and until the word has been looked up in the
dictionary, and the picture seen there, the beautiful
line of “Sir Launfal” suggests no image whatever.
So when Stevenson speaks of the birds in the “clerestories
of the wood cathedral,” the image is not distinct
in the mind of a young American. Supposing a pupil
in California were asked to describe an orange to an
Esquimau. He might say that it is a spheroid about
the size of an apple, and the color of one of Lorraine’s
sunsets. This would be absolutely worthless to a child
of the frigid zone. Had he been told that an orange
was about the size of a snowball, much the color of the
flame of a candle, that the peeling came off like the
skin from a seal, and that the inside was good to eat,
he would have known more of this fruit. The images
which lie in our minds and from which we construct
new pictures are much like the blocks that a child-builder
rearranges in many different forms; but the
blocks do not change. From them he may build a
castle or a mill; yet the only difference is a difference
in arrangement. So it is with the pictures we build
up in imagination: our castle in Spain we have never
seen, but the individual elements which we associate
to lift up this happy dwelling-place are the things we
know and have seen. A reader creates nothing new;
77
all he does is to rearrange in his own mind the images
already familiar. Only so may he pass from the known
to the unknown.
The fact that we construct pictures of what we read
from those images already in our minds warns the
writer against using materials which those for whom
he writes could not understand. It compels him to
select definite images, and it urges him to use the
common and the concrete. It frequently drives him
to use comparisons.
Use of Comparisons.
To represent the extremely bare and unornamented
appearance of a building, one might write,
“It looked like a great barn,” or “It was a
great barn.” In either case the image would
be definite, common, and concrete. In both cases there
is a comparison. In the first, where the comparison is
expressed, there is a simile; in the second, where the
comparison is only implied, there is a metaphor. These
two figures of speech are very common in description,
and it is because they are of great value. One other
is sometimes used,—personification, which ascribes to
inanimate things the attributes of life which are the
property of animate nature. What could be happier
than this by Stevenson: “All night long he can hear
Nature breathing deeply and freely; even as she takes
her rest she turns and smiles”? or this, “A faint sound,
more like a moving coolness than a stream of air”?
And at the end of the chapter which describes his
“night under the pines,” he speaks of the “tapestries”
and “the inimitable ceiling” and “the view which I
command from the windows.” In this one chapter are
personification, simile, metaphor,—all comparisons,
and doing what could hardly be done without them.
Common, distinct, concrete images are surest.
Choice of Words. Adjectives and Nouns.
To body forth these common, distinct, concrete
78
images calls for a discriminating choice of words; for
in the choice of words lies a large part of the
vividness of description. If the thing described
be unknown to the reader, it requires
the right word to place it before him; if it be common,
still must the right word be found to set it apart from
the thousand other objects of the same class. The
words that may justly be called describing words are
adjectives and nouns; and of these the adjective is the
first descriptive word. The rule that a writer should
never use two adjectives where one will do, and that
he should not use one if a noun can be found that completely
expresses the thought, is a good one to follow.
One certain stroke of the crayon is worth a hundred
lines, each approaching the right one. One word, the
only one, will tell the truth more vividly than ten that
approach its expression. For it must be remembered
that a description must be done quickly; every word
that is used and does nothing is not only a waste of
time, but is actually in the way. In a description every
word must count. It may be a comparison, an epithet,
personification, or what not, but whatever method is
adopted, the right word must do it quickly.
How much depends on the nice choice of words may
be seen by a study of the selections already quoted;
and especially by a careful reading of those by Stevenson
and Everett. To show the use of adjectives and
nouns in description, the following from Kipling is a
good illustration. Toomai had just reached the elephants’
“ball-room” when he saw—
“white-tusked wild males, with fallen leaves and nuts and
twigs lying in the wrinkles of their necks and the folds of
their ears; fat, slow-footed she-elephants, with restless pinky-black
calves only three or four feet high, running under
their stomachs; young elephants with their tusks just beginning
79
to show, and very proud of them; lanky, scraggy,
old-maid elephants, with their hollow, anxious faces, and
trunks like rough bark; savage old bull-elephants, scarred
from shoulder to flank with great weals and cuts of by-gone
fights, and the caked dirt of their solitary mud bath
dropping from their shoulders; and there was one with a
broken tusk and the marks of the full-stroke, the terrible
drawing scrape of a tiger’s claw on his side.”
One third of the words in this paragraph are descriptive
nouns and adjectives, none of which the reader
wishes to change.
Use of Verbs.
Verbs also have a great value in description. In
the paragraph picturing the dawn, Stevenson
has not neglected the verbs. “Welled,”
“whitened,” “trembled,” “brightened,” “warmed,”
“kindled,” and so on through the paragraph. Try to
change them, and it is apparent that something is lost
by any substitution. Kaa, the python, “pours himself
along the ground.” If he is angry, “Baloo and Bagheera
could see the big swallowing-muscles on either
side of Kaa’s throat ripple and bulge.“
Yet in the choice of words, one may search for the
bizarre and unusual rather than for the truly picturesque.
Stevenson at times seems to have lapsed.
When he says that Modestine would feel a switch
“more tenderly than my cane;” that he “must instantly
maltreat this uncomplaining animal,” meaning
constantly; and at another place that he “had to labor
so consistently with” his stick that the sweat ran into
his eyes, there is a suspicion of a desire for the sensational
rather than the direct truth. On the other hand,
the beginner finds himself using words that have lost,
their meaning through indiscriminate usage. “Awful
good,” “awful pretty,” and “awful sweet” mean
something less than good, pretty, and sweet. “Lovely,”
80
“dear,” “splendid,” “unique,” and a large number of
good words have been much dulled by the ignorant use
of babblers. Superlatives and all words denoting comparison
should be used with stinginess. One cannot
afford to part with this kind of coin frequently; the
cheaper coins should be used, else he will find an empty
purse when need arises. Thackeray has this: “Her
voice was the sweetest, low song.” How much better
this, Her voice was a sweet, low song. All the world
is shut out from this, while in the former he challenges
the world by the comparison. Shakespeare was wiser
when he made Lear say,—
“Her voice was ever soft,
Gentle, and low,—an excellent thing in woman.”
Avoid words which have lost their meaning by indiscriminate
use; shun the sensational and the bizarre;
use superlatives with economy; but in all you do,
whether in unadorned or figurative language, choose
the word that is quick and sure and vivid—the one
word that exactly suggests the picture.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES
QUESTIONS.
THE OLD MANSE.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 69.)
Are there narrative portions in “The Old Manse”? paragraphs
of exposition?
Do you term the whole narration, description, or exposition?
Why?
Frame a sentence which you think would be an adequate
topic sentence for the whole piece.
What phrase in the first paragraph allows the author to
begin the second with the words, “Nor, in truth, had the
Old Manse,” etc.? Where in the second paragraph is found
the words which are the source of “my design,” mentioned
in the third? How does the author pass from the fourth
paragraph to the fifth? In the same way note the connections
between the succeeding paragraphs. They are most
skillfully dovetailed together. Now make a list of the
phrases in the first fifteen pages which introduce paragraphs,
telling from what in the preceding paragraph each
new paragraph springs. Do you think that such a felicitous
result just happened? or did Hawthorne plan it?
Does Hawthorne generally introduce his descriptions by
giving the feeling aroused by the object described, a method
very common with Poe?
In the paragraph beginning at the bottom of p. 18, what
do you think of the selection of material? What have
guided in the inclusion and exclusion of details?
Write a paragraph upon this topic: There could not be a
more joyous aspect of external nature than as seen from the
windows of my study just after the passing of a cooling
shower. Be careful to select things that have been made
82
happy, and to use adjectives and nouns that are full of
joy.
Make a list of the words used to describe “The Old Apple
Dealer.”
Has this description Unity?
What relation to the whole has the first sentence of paragraph
three? the last?
Do you think there is a grammatical error in the third
sentence of this paragraph?
By contrasts to what has Hawthorne brought out better the
character of the Apple Dealer? When can contrasts help?
AN INDIAN-SUMMER REVERIE, AND OTHER POEMS.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 30.)
In this poem what purpose is served by the first two
stanzas?
Where in the landscape does the author begin? Which
way does he progress?
Quote stanzas in which other senses than sight are called
upon.
Make a list of the figures of speech. How many similes?
metaphors? examples of personification? Which seems
most effective? Which instance of its use do you prefer?
Has Lowell used too many figures?
Read “The Oak,” “The Dandelion,” and “Al Fresco.”
Are they description or exposition? Do they bear out
Lowell’s estimate of himself?
THE SKETCH-BOOK.
(Riverside Literature Series, Nos. 51, 52.)
Why has Irving given four pages to the description of
Sleepy Hollow before he introduces Ichabod Crane?
Why, then, seven pages to Ichabod before the story
begins?
What gives the peculiar interest to this tale?
In the “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” how many paragraphs
of description close with an important detail?
83
In how many with a general characterization?
In all the descriptions of buildings by Irving that you
have read, what are the first things mentioned,—size,
shape, color, or what? Make a list, so as to be sure.
Does Irving use many comparisons? Are the likenesses
to common things? Select the ten you think best. Are
there more in narrative or descriptive passages? What do
you gather from this fact?
In “Christmas Day,” on p. 51 (R. L. S., No. 52), does
Irving proceed from far to near in the landscape? Is this
common? Find another example.
How has Irving emphasized the littleness of the minister
described on p. 56 (R. L. S., No. 52)?
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 119.)
Is the arrangement of the details in the last two lines of
the first paragraph stronger than the arrangement of the
same details on p. 63? Why, or why not?
In the description of the hall, pp. 67 and 68, do the
details produce the effect upon you which they did upon
Poe?
Find a description in this piece which closes with an important
detail.
Is Usher described at all when Poe says, “I gazed upon
him with a feeling half of pity, half of awe”? Do the
details enumerated arouse such feelings in you? Would
the feeling have been called forth if it had not been suggested
by Poe? Is there, then, any advantage in this
method of opening a description?
What good was done by describing Usher as Poe knew
him in youth?
Why is the parenthetical clause on p. 72 necessary?
On p. 80, should Poe write “previously to its final interment”?
What do you think of the length of the sentence quoted
on p. 85?
84
Does Poe use description to accent the mood of the narrative,
or to make concrete the places and persons?
Why is “The Haunted Palace” introduced into the
story?
Is this story as good as “The Gold-Bug”?
SILAS MARNER.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 83.)
Why is not the early history of Silas Marner related
first in the story?
By what steps has the author approached the definite
time?
From the fragments about his appearance, do you get a
clear idea of how Marner looks?
Do you approve this method of scattering the description
along through the story? Write a description of Marner
on the night he was going to the tavern.
Could not the quarrel between Godfrey and Dunsey been
omitted?
Describe the interior of Marner’s cottage.
Why should Sally Oates and her dropsy be admitted to
the story?
Do you know as well how George Eliot’s characters look
as how they think and feel?
What do you think of the last sentence of Chapter IV.?
Why does not Chapter V. go on with Dunsey’s story? Why
is Chapter VI. introduced at all? What of its close?
What figure in the last sentence of Chapter X.?
Would you prefer to know how tall Eppie was, what kind
of clothes she wore, etc., to the knowledge you gain of her
on p. 178?
Suppose that Dunsey came home the night he staked
Wildfire, recite the conversation between him and Godfrey.
Have Dolly Winthrop, Priscilla Lammeter, and Mr. Macey
talk over “The New Minister.”
Write on “What I see in George Eliot’s Face.”
85
THE DESERTED VILLAGE.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 68.)
Is this piece description or exposition?
In the first stanza where is the topic sentence?
The author has made two groups of charms. Would it
be as well to change them about? Give your reasons.
Where has he used the ear instead of the eye to suggest
his picture? Is it clear?
What method is adopted in lines 125-128? See also lines
237-250.
Can you unite the paragraphs on p. 25? Why do you
think so?
Could you suggest a new arrangement of details in lines
341-362 that would be as good as the present? What are
the last four lines for?
EXERCISES.
Enumerative Description may well employ a few lessons.
In it accuracy of detail must be studied, and every detail
must be introduced.
- The Teacher’s Desk.
- Write a letter to a carpenter giving details for the construction
of a small bookcase.
- By telling how you made it, describe a camp, a kite,
a dress, or a cake. Narration may be employed for the
purpose of description. A good example may be found in
“Robinson Crusoe” in the chapter describing his home
after the shipwreck.
- Describe an unfurnished room. Shape, size, position,
and number of windows, the fireplace, etc., should be definite.
Be sure to give the point of view. To say “On my
right hand,” “In front of me,” or any similar phrases means
nothing unless the reader knows where you are.
In these exercises the pupil will doubtless employ the paragraph
of particulars. This is the most common in description.
Other forms are valuable.
- Using a paragraph telling what it was not, finish this:
86
I followed the great singer to her home. Imagine my surprise
in finding that the house in which this lady lived was
not a home of luxury and splendor,—not even a home of
comfort. Go on with the details of a home of luxury which
were not there. Finish with what you did see. This is
really a description of two houses set in artistic contrast to
heighten the effect. Remember you are outside.
- By the use of comparison finish this: The home of my
poor little friend was but little better than a barn. Choose
only such details as emphasize the barn-like appearance of
the home. There is but one room. Remember where you
are standing; and keep in mind the effect you wish to
produce.
- Using a moving point of view, describe an interior.
Do not have too many rooms.
- Furnish the room described in number four to suit your
taste. Tell how it looks. Remember that a few things give
character to a room.
- Describe your childhood’s home as it would look to you
after years of absence.
- Using a paragraph of the obverse, describe the appearance
of the house from which you were driven by the
cruelty of a drunken father.
- Describe a single tree standing alone in a field. It
will be well for the teacher to read to the class some descriptions
of trees,—Lowell’s “Birch” and “Oak,” “Under
the Willows,” and some stanzas from “An Indian Summer
Reverie.” Holmes has some good paragraphs on trees in
“The Autocrat.” Any good tree descriptions will help
pupils to do it better than they can without suggestion.
They should describe their own tree, however.
- Describe some single flower growing wild. Read
Lowell’s “Dandelion,” “Violet, Sweet Violet,” Wordsworth’s
“Daisy,” “The Daffodils,” “The Small Celandine,”
and Burns’s “Daisy.” These do not so much describe as
they arouse a feeling of love for the flowers which will show
itself in the composition.
- Describe a view of a lake. If possible, have your
87
point of view above the lake and use the paragraph of comparison.
- Describe a landscape from a single point of view.
Read Curtis’s “My Castles in Spain” from “Prue and I,”
many descriptions in “An Inland Voyage” by Stevenson,
and “Bay Street” by Bliss Carman in “The Atlantic
Monthly.”
- Describe your first view of a small cluster of houses
or a small town.
- Approach the town, describing its principal features.
Keep the reader informed as to where you are.
- Describe a dog of your own.
- Describe a dog of your neighbor’s. Before the description
is undertaken read “Our Dogs” and “Rab” by Dr.
Brown; “A Dog of Flanders” by Ouida. Scott has some
noble fellows in his novels.
- Describe a flock of chickens. There are good descriptions
of chickens in “The House of the Seven Gables”
and in “Sketches” by Dickens.
- Describe the burning of your own home. Be careful
not to narrate.
- Describe a stranger you met on the street to-day. It
is easier to describe a person if you and the person you describe
move toward each other. Remember that you begin
the description at a distance. Details should be mentioned
as they actually come into view.
- Describe your father in his favorite corner at home.
- Describe a person you do not like, by telling what he
is not.
- Describe a person you admire, but are not acquainted
with, using the paragraph of comparisons.
- Describe a picture.
It would be well to have at the end of this year four or
five stories written, in which description plays a part. Its
principal use is to give the setting to the story, to give concreteness
to the characters, and to accent the mood of the
story.
Most passages of description are short. Rarely will any
88
pupil write over three hundred words. One hundred are
often better. The short composition gives an opportunity for
the study of accuracy of expression. What details to include;
in what order to arrange them that they produce the best
effect, both of vividness and naturalness; and the influence
of the point of view and the purpose of the author on the
unity of description should be kept constantly present in the
exercises. Careful attention should be paid to choice of
words, for on right words depends in a large degree the
vividness of a description. Right words in well-massed
paragraphs of vivid description should be the object this
term.
CHAPTER V
EXPOSITION
So far we have studied discourse which deals with
things,—things active, doing something, considered
under the head of narration; and things at rest, and
pictured, considered in description. Now we come to
exposition, which deals with ideas either separately or
in combinations. Instead of Mr. Smith’s horse, exposition
treats of the general term, horse. “The Great
Stone Face” may have taught a lesson by its story,
but the discussion of the value of lofty ideals is a subject
for exposition.
General Terms Difficult.
That general terms and propositions are harder to
get hold of than concrete facts is readily
apparent in the first reading of an author
like Emerson. To a young person it means
little. Yet when he puts in the place of the general
terms some specific examples, and so verifies the statements,
the general propositions have a mine of meaning,
and “the sense of the author is as broad as the
world.” This stanza from Lowell is but little suggestive
to young readers:—
“Such earnest natures are the fiery pith,
The compact nucleus, round which systems grow!
Mass after mass becomes inspired therewith,
And whirls impregnate with the central glow.”
Yet when Columbus and Luther and Garrison are
mentioned as illustrations of the meaning, it becomes
90
world-wide in its application. Still in order to get at
the thought, there is first the need of the specific and
the concrete; afterward we pass to the general and the
abstract.
As abstract ideas are harder to get hold of than concrete
facts, so exposition has difficulties greater than
those found in narration and description. It is not so
hard to tell what belongs in a story; the events are all
distinct. Nor is it so difficult to know what to include
in a description; one can look and see. In exposition
this is not so. In most minds ideas do not have distinct
limits; the edges rather are indistinct. It is
hard to tell where the idea stops. In writing of “The
Uses of Coal,” it is easy to wander over an indistinct
boundary and to take a survey of “The Origin of
Coal.” Not only may one include what unquestionably
should be excluded, but there is no definite guide
to the arrangement of the materials, such as was found
in narration. There a sequence of time was an almost
infallible rule; here the writer must search carefully
how to arrange hazy ideas in some effective form. As
discourse comes to deal more with general ideas, the
difficulties of writing increase; and the difficulties are
not due to any new principles of structure which must
be introduced. When one says that the material
should be selected according to the familiar law of
Unity, he has given the guiding principle. Yet the
real difficulty is still before an author: it is to decide
what stamp to put upon such elusive matter as ideas.
They cannot be kept long enough in the twilight of
consciousness to analyze them; and often ideas that
have been marked “accepted” have, upon reëxamination,
to be “rejected.” To examine ideas—the material
used in this form of discourse—so thoroughly that
they may be accurately, definitely known in their backward
91
relation and their bearing upon what follows,
this is the seat of the difficulty in exposition.
Exposition may conveniently be classified into exposition
of a term, or definition; and exposition of a
proposition, which is generally suggested by the term
exposition.
Definition.
Definition of a word means giving its limits or
boundaries. Of man it might be said that it
is a living animal, having a strong bony skeleton;
that this skeleton consists of a trunk from which
extend four limbs, called arms and legs, and is surmounted
by a bony cavity, called a skull; that the
skeleton protects the vital organs, and is itself covered
by a muscular tissue which moves the bones and gives
a rounded beauty to their ugliness; that man has a
highly developed nervous system, the centre of which
is the brain placed in the skull. So a person might go
on for pages, enumerating the attributes which, taken
together, make up the general idea of man.
Exposition and Description distinguished.
This sort of exposition is very near description; indeed,
were the purpose different, it would be
description. The purpose, however, is not to
tell how an individual looks, but to place the
object in a class. It is therefore not description,
but exposition. Moreover, the method is different.
In description those characteristics are given that
distinguish the object from the rest of the class; while
in exposition those qualities are selected which are
common to all objects of its class.
Logical Definition.
On account of the length of the definition by an
enumeration of all the attributes, it is not frequently
used except in long treatises. For it there has been
substituted what is called a logical definition.
Instead of naming all the characteristics
of an object, a logical definition groups many attributes
92
under one general term, and then adds a quality
which distinguishes the object from the others of the
general class. Man has been defined as the “reasoning
animal.” In this definition a large number of
attributes have been gathered together in the general
term “animal;” then man is separated from the whole
class “animal” by the word “reasoning.” A logical
definition consists, then, of two parts: the general term
naming the genus, and the limiting term naming the
distinguishing attribute called the differentia.
Genus and Differentia.
Genus and differentia are found in every good definition.
The genus should be a term more
general than the term defined. “Man is a
person who reasons” is a poor definition; because
“person” is no more general than “man.” “A canine
is a dog that is wild” is very bad, because “dog,” the
general term in the definition, is less general than the
word defined. However, to say that “a dog is a canine
that has been domesticated,” is a definition in which the
genus is more general than the term defined.
Next, the genus should be a term well understood.
“Man is a mammal who reasons” is all right, in having
a genus more general than the term defined, but
the definition fails with many because “mammal” is
not well understood. “Botany is that branch of biology
which treats of plant life” has in it the same error.
“Biology” is not so well understood as “botany,”
though it is a more general term. In cases of this
sort, the writer should go farther toward the more general
until he finds a term perfectly clear to all. “Man
is an animal that reasons,” “botany is the branch of
science that treats of plant life,” would both be easily
understood. The genus should be a term better understood
than the term defined; and it should be a term
more general than the term defined.
93
A definition may be faulty in its differentia also.
The differentia is that part of a definition which names
the difference between the term defined and the general
class to which it belongs. “Man is a reasoning
animal.” “Animal” names the general class, and
“reasoning” is the differentia which separates “man”
from other “animals.” On the selection of this limiting
word depends the accuracy of the definition. “Man
is an animal that walks,” or “that has hands,” or
“that talks,” are all faulty; because bears walk, monkeys
have hands, and parrots talk. Supposing the following
definitions were given: “A cat is an animal that
catches rats and mice;” “A rose is a flower that bears
thorns;” “Gold is a metal that is heavy;” all would
be faulty because the differentia in each is faulty.
Notice, too, the definitions of “dog” and “canine”
already given. Even “man is a reasoning animal”
may fail; since many men declare that other animals
reason. The differentia should include all the members
that the term denotes, and it should exclude all
that it does not denote.
Requisites of a good Definition.
The requisites of a good definition are: first, that it
shall include or denote all the members of
the class; second, that it shall exclude everything
which does not belong to its class; third,
that the words used in the definition shall be better
understood than the word defined; fourth, that it shall
be brief.
A definition may perfectly expound a term; and because
of the very qualities that make it a good definition,
accuracy and brevity, it may be almost valueless
to the ordinary reader. For instance, this definition,
“An acid is a substance, usually sour and sharp to
the taste, that changes vegetable blue colors to red,
and, combining with an earth, an alkali, or a metallic
94
oxide, forms a salt,” would not generally be understood.
So it frequently becomes necessary to do more than
give a definition in order to explain the meaning of a
term. This brings us to the study of exposition, as it
is generally understood, in which all the resources of
language are called into service to explain a term or a
proposition.
How do Men explain? First, by Repetition.
What, then, are the methods of explaining a proposition?
First, a proposition may be explained by the
repetition of the thought in some other form. To be
effective, repetition must add something to what has
been said; the words used may be more specific or
they may be more general. For example, “A
strong partisan may not be a good citizen.
The stanchest Republican may by reason of
a blind adherence to party be working an
injury to the country he loves. Indeed, one can easily
conceive a body of men so devoted to a theory, beautiful
though it may be in many respects, that they stand in
the way of the world’s progress.” The second sentence
repeats the thought of the first in more specific terms;
the third repeats it in more general terms. The specific
may be explained by the general; more often the
general is cleared up by the specific. In either case,
the proposition must be brought one step nearer to
the reader by the restatement, or the repetition is not
good.
Speaking of written or printed words, Barrett
Wendell writes:—
“In themselves, these black marks are nothing but black
marks more or less regular in appearance. Modern English
type and script are rather simple to the eye. Old English
and German are less so; less so still, Hebrew and Chinese.
But all alphabets present to the eye pretty obvious traces of
regularity; in a written or printed page the same mark will
95
occur over and over again. This is positively all we see,—a
number of marks grouped together and occasionally repeated.
A glance at a mummy-case, an old-fashioned tea-chest,
a Hebrew Bible, will show us all that any eye can ever
see in a written or printed document. The outward and
visible body of style consists of a limited number of marks
which, for all any reader is apt to know, are purely arbitrary.”
(“English Composition.”)
In this paragraph every sentence is a repetition of
some part of the opening or topic sentence, and serves
to explain it.
Second, by telling the obverse.
Second, a proposition may be explained by telling
what it is not. At times this is as valuable as telling
what it is. Care should be taken that the
thing excluded or denied have some likeness
to the proposition or term being explained;
that the two be really in some danger of being confused.
Unless to a hopelessly ignorant person, it
would not explain anything to say “a horse is not a
man;” but to assert that “a whale is not a fish,
though they have many points in common,” would prepare
the way for an explanation of what a whale is.
The obverse statement is nearly always followed by a
repetition of what the thing is.
The following from Newman illustrates the method:
“Now what is Theology? First, I will tell you what it is
not. And here, in the first place (though of course I speak
on the subject as a Catholic), observe that, strictly speaking,
I am not assuming that Catholicism is true, while I make
myself the champion of Theology. Catholicism has not
formally entered into my argument hitherto, nor shall I just
now assume any principle peculiar to it, for reasons which
will appear in the sequel, though of course I shall use Catholic
language. Neither, secondly, will I fall into the fashion
of the day, of identifying Natural Theology with Physical
96
Theology; which said Physical Theology is a most jejune
study, considered as a science, and really no science at all,
for it is ordinarily no more than a series of pious or polemical
remarks upon the physical world viewed religiously,
whereas the word ‘Natural’ comprehends man and society,
and all that is involved therein, as the great Protestant
writer, Dr. Butler, shows us. Nor, in the third place, do I
mean by Theology polemics of any kind; for instance, what
are called ‘Evidences of Religion,’ or ‘the Christian Evidences.’...
Nor, fourthly, do I mean by Theology that
vague thing called ‘Christianity,’ or ‘our common Christianity,’
or ‘Christianity the law of the land,’ if there is any
man alive who can tell what it is.... Lastly, I do not
understand by Theology, acquaintance with the Scriptures;
for, though no person of religious feeling can read Scripture
but he will find those feelings roused, and gain much knowledge
of history into the bargain, yet historical reading and
religious feeling are not a science. I mean none of these
things by Theology. I simply mean the Science of God, or
the truths we know about God put into a system; just as we
have a science of the stars, and call it astronomy, or of the
crust of the earth, and call it geology.”
Third, by Details.
Third, a common way of explaining a proposition
is to go into particulars about it. Enough
particulars should be given to furnish a reasonable
explanation of the proposition. Macaulay,
writing of the “muster-rolls of names” which Milton
uses, goes into details. He says:—
“They are charmed names. Every one of them is the first
link in a long chain of associated ideas. Like the dwelling
place of our infancy revisited in manhood, like the song of
our country heard in a strange land, they produce upon us
an effect wholly independent of their intrinsic value. One
transports us back to a remote period of history. Another
places us among the novel scenes and manners of a distant
region. A third evokes all the dear classical recollections of
97
childhood,—the schoolroom, the dog-eared Virgil, the holiday,
and the prize. A fourth brings before us the splendid
phantoms of chivalrous romance, the trophied lists, the embroidered
housings, the quaint devices, the haunted forests,
the enchanted gardens, the achievements of enamoured
knights, and the smiles of rescued princesses.”
Fourth, by Illustrations.
Fourth, a proposition may be explained by the use
of a single example or illustration. The
value of this method depends on the choice
of the example. It must in no essential way
differ from the general case it is intended to illustrate.
Supposing this proposition were advanced by some
woman-hater: “All women are, by nature, liars,”
and it should be followed by this sentence, “For example,
take this lady of fashion.” Such an illustration
is worthless. The individual chosen does not
fairly represent the class. If, on the other hand, a
teacher in physics should announce that “all bodies
fall at the same rate in a vacuum,” and should illustrate
by saying, “If I place a bullet and a feather in
a tube from which the air has been exhausted, they
will be found to fall equally fast,” his example would
be a fair one, as the two objects differ in no manner
essential to the experiment from “all bodies.”
Here should be included anecdotes used as illustrations.
They are of value if they are of the same
type as the general class they are intended to explain.
They may be of little value, however. It could safely
be said that half the stories told in campaign speeches
are not instances in point at all, but are told only to
amuse and deceive. Specific instances must be chosen
with care if they are to serve a useful purpose in exposition.
This example is from Newman:—
“To know is one thing, to do is another; the two things
98
are altogether distinct. A man knows that he should get up
in the morning,—he lies abed; he knows that he should
not lose his temper, yet he cannot keep it. A laboring man
knows that he should not go to the ale-house, and his wife
knows that she should not filch when she goes out charing,
but, nevertheless, in these cases, the consciousness of a duty
is not all one with the performance of it. There are, then,
large families of instances, to say the least, in which men
may become wiser, without becoming better.”
Fifth, by Comparisons.
Last, a thing may be explained by telling what it is
like, or what it is not like. This method of comparison
is very frequently employed. To liken a thing to
something already known is a vivid way of explaining.
Moreover in many cases it is easier than the
method of repetition or that of details. By
this method Macaulay explains his proposition
that “it is the character of such revolutions that
we always see the worst of them first.” He says:—
“A newly liberated people may be compared to a northern
army encamped on the Rhine or the Xeres. It is said that
when soldiers in such a situation first find themselves able to
indulge without restraint in such a rare and expensive luxury,
nothing is to be seen but intoxication. Soon, however,
plenty teaches discretion, and, after wine has been for a few
months their daily fare, they become more temperate than
they had ever been in their own country. In the same manner,
the final and permanent fruits of liberty are wisdom,
moderation, and mercy. Its immediate effects are often
atrocious crimes, conflicting errors, skepticism on points the
most clear, dogmatism on points the most mysterious.”
The comparison may be a simile or a metaphor, as
when Huxley writes, explaining “the physical basis of
life:”—
“Protoplasm, simple or nucleated, is the formal basis of
all life. It is the clay of the potter: which, bake it and
99
paint it as he will, remains clay, separated by artifice, and
not by nature, from the commonest brick or sun-dried clod.”
These, then, are the methods commonly adopted for
explaining terms and propositions. First, by the use
of definitions; second, by repeating the proposition
either directly or obversely, adding something to the
thought by each repetition; third, by enumerating
particulars which form the ground for the statement;
fourth, by selecting an instance which fairly illustrates
the proposition; fifth, by the use of comparisons and
analogies.
The Subject.
Some general considerations regarding the choice of
a subject have been given. A subject should
lend itself to the form of discourse employed;
next, it should be a subject interesting to the readers;
and third, it should be interesting to the writer and
suited to his ability. The last condition makes it
advisable to limit the subject to a narrow field. Few
persons have the ability to view a general subject in
all its relations. “Books” everybody knows something
of; yet very few are able to treat this general
subject in all its ramifications. A person writing of
the general topic “books” would not only be compelled
to know what a book is, what may truly be
called a book, and what is the value of books to readers,
and therefore the influence of the different kinds
of literature; he would also be driven to study the
machinery for making books, the history of printing,
illustrating, and binding books, and all the mechanical
processes connected with the manufacture of books.
The subject might take quite another turn, and be the
development of fiction or drama; it might be a discussion
of the influences, political or social, that have
moulded literature; it might be a study of character
as manifested in an author’s works. No one is well
100
fitted to write on the general topic “books.” A subject
should be limited.
The Subject should allow Concrete Treatment.
For young persons the subject should be so selected
and stated that the treatment may be concrete.
As persons advance they make more
generalizations; few, however, go so far as
to think in general terms. Macaulay says,
“Logicians may reason about abstractions, but the
great mass of men must have images.” That author
depended largely for his glittering effects upon the use
of common, concrete things which the masses understand.
The subject should be such that it can be
treated concretely. “Love,” as a general proposition,
is beautiful; but what more can a young writer say
about it? Let him leave the whole horde of abstract
subjects found in old rhetorics alone. They are subjects
for experience; they cannot be handled by youth.
The Theme.
After the subject has been chosen, the writer next
considers how he shall treat it. He selects
the attitude he will assume toward the proposition,
his point of view; and this position he embodies
in a short sentence, called his theme. For instance,
“patriotism” is the subject; as it stands it is abstract
and very general. However, this, “Can a partisan be
a patriot?” would be sufficiently concrete to be treated.
Even yet there is no indication of the author’s point of
view. Should he write, “A real partisan is no patriot,”
his theme is announced, and his point of view known.
A theme, either explicit or implicit, is essential in
exposition. It is not necessary that it shall be stated
to the reader, but it must be clearly stated by the
writer for his own guidance. It is, however, usually
announced at the opening of the essay. Whether
announced or not, it is most essential to the success
of the essay. It is the touchstone by which the author
101
tries all the material which he has collected. Not
everything on the subject of patriotism should be admitted
to an essay that has for its theme, “A real
partisan cannot be a true patriot.” It would save
many a digression if the theme were always written
in bold, black letters, and placed before the author as
he writes. Every word in a theme should be there
for a purpose, expressing some important modification
of the thought. For instance, the statement above
regarding a partisan may be too sweeping; perhaps
the essayist would prefer to discuss the modified statement
that “a blind partisan cannot always be a true
patriot.” The theme should state exactly what will
be treated in the essay. The statement of it should
employ the hardest kind of thinking; and when the
theme is determined definitely and for all, the essay
is safe from the intrusion of foreign ideas which disturb
the harmony of the whole.
Another advantage in the theme is that, when once
chosen, it will go far toward writing the essay. One
great trouble with the young writer is that he is not
willing to rely on his theme to suggest his composition.
Mr. Palmer well says:—
“He examines his pen point, the curtains, his inkstand, to
see if perhaps ideas may not be had from these. He wonders
what the teacher will wish him to say, and he tries to
recall how the passage sounded in the Third Reader. In
every direction but one he turns, and that is the direction
where lies the prime mover of his toil, his subject. Of that
he is afraid. Now, what I want to make evident is that his
subject is not in reality the foe, but the friend. It is his
only helper. His composition is not to be, as he seems to
suppose, a mass of laborious inventions, but it is made up
exclusively of what the subject dictates. He has only to
attend. At present he stands in his own way, making such
102
a din with his private anxieties that he cannot hear the rich
suggestions of his subject. He is bothered with considering
how he feels, or what he or somebody else will like to see on
his paper. This is debilitating business. He must lean on his
subject, if he would have his writing strong, and busy himself
with what it says, rather than with what he would say.”
The Title.
Having selected a subject, and with care stated the
theme, it yet remains to give the essay a
name. There is something in a name, and
those authors who make a living by the pen are the
shrewdest in displaying their wares under the most
attractive titles. The title should be attractive, but
it should not promise what the essay does not give.
Newspaper headlines are usually attractive enough,
but shamefully untruthful. Next, the title should indicate
the scope of the essay. When Mr. Palmer
calls his little book “Self-Cultivation in English,” it
is evident that it is not a text-book, and that it will
not treat English as literature or as a science. Then,
the title should be short. The theme can rarely be
used as a title; it is too long. But the paramount
idea developed in the essay should be embodied in the
title. “Partisanship and Patriotism” would be a
good subject to give the essay we have spoken of.
The title, then, should be attractive; it should be
short; and it should truthfully indicate the contents
of the essay.
Selection of Material.
One of the important factors in the construction of
an essay is the selection of material. Though
theme and title have already been discussed,
it was not because they are the things for a
writer to consider next after he has chosen his subject,
but because they are so intimately bound up in the
subject that their consideration at that time was natural.
Before a writer can decide upon the position he will
103
assume toward a proposition, he should have looked
over the field in a general way; for only with the facts
before him is he competent to choose his point of view
and to state his theme. The title is not in the least
essential to the writing of the essay; it may be deferred
until the essay is finished. It is necessary, however,
that the writer have much knowledge of his subject,
and that from this knowledge he be able to frame an
opinion regarding the subject. When this has been
done he is ready to begin the work of constructing his
essay; and the first question in exposition, as in narration
and description, is the selection of material to develop
the theme he has chosen.
The selection of material is a more difficult matter
in exposition than in narration and description. It
requires the shrewdest scrutiny to keep out matter that
does not help the thought forward. In narration we
decided by the main incident; in description by the
purpose and the point of view; in exposition we test
all material by its relation to the theme. Does it help
to explain the theme? If not, however good material
it may be, it has no business in the essay.
Association of ideas is a law by which, when one of
two related ideas is mentioned, the other is suggested.
To illustrate, when Manila is mentioned, Admiral
Dewey appears; when treason is spoken of, Arnold is
in the mind. This law is of fundamental importance
in arranging an essay; one thing should suggest the
next. But valuable as it is, even indispensable, it
may become the source of much mischief. For instance,
a pupil has this for a topic, “Reading gives
pleasure to many.” He writes as his second sentence,
“By pleasure I mean the opposite of pain,” and goes
on. “All things are understood by their opposites.
If we did not know sickness, we could not enjoy our
104
health. Joy is understood through sorrow. I remember
my first sorrow. My father had just given me a
new knife,—my first knife,” and so on from one thing
to another. And not so unnaturally either; each sentence
has suggested the next, but not one is on the topic.
The most anxious watch must be kept in the selection
of material. Some will be admitted without any question;
some will be excluded with a brusqueness almost
brutal. There is a third class, however, that is allied
with the subject, yet it is not so easy to determine
whether it should be admitted or rejected. This class
requires the closest questioning. It must contribute to
the strength of the essay, not to its pages, or it has no
place there.
Scale of Treatment.
There is another condition which must be considered
in the selection of material, the scale of treatment.
If Macaulay had been asked by a
daily paper to contribute a paragraph of five hundred
words on Milton, he could not have introduced all the
numerous topics which have their place in his essay of
one hundred pages. He might have mentioned Milton’s
poetry and his character, the two main divisions
of the present essay; but Dante and Æschylus, Puritan
and Royalist, would scarcely have received notice.
The second consideration in selecting material
is the purpose and length of the essay, and the consequent
thoroughness with which the subject is to be
treated.
The exhaustiveness with which an author treats any
subject depends, first, on his knowledge. Any person
could write a paragraph on Milton; Macaulay and
Lowell wrote delightful essays on the topic; David
Masson has written volumes about him. These would
have been impossible except to a person who had been
a special student of the subject. Second, the thoroughness
105
of the treatment depends on the knowledge of the
readers. For persons acquainted with the record of
the momentous events of Milton’s time, it would have
been quite unnecessary, it might be considered even
an insult to intelligence, to go into such details of
history. The shortest statement suffices when the
reader is already familiar with the subject and needs
only to know the application in this case. Third, the
scale of treatment depends on the purpose for which
the essay is written. If a newspaper paragraph, it is
one thing; if for a magazine, it is quite another; if it
is to be the final word on the subject, it may reach to
volumes.
An apt illustration of proportion in the scale of
treatment has been given by Scott and Denny in their
“Composition-Rhetoric.” They suggest that three
maps of the United States, one very large, another
half the size of the first, and a third very small, be
hung side by side. If a comparison be made, it will
be found that, whereas a great number of cities are
represented on the largest map, only half as many appear
on the middle-sized map. If the smallest map be
examined, only the largest cities, the longest rivers,
the greatest lakes, and the highest mountains can be
found; all others must be omitted. On all three maps
the same relation of parts is maintained. In proportion
to the whole, New York State will hold the same
position in all of them. The Mississippi River will
flow from Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico, and the
Gulf will sweep in a curve from Texas to Florida.
The scale is different, but the proportion does not
change.
This principle applies in the construction of themes.
In a paragraph only very important topics will receive
any mention. In an essay these important topics retain
106
their proper place and relation, while many other
points of subordinate rank will be introduced. If the
treatment be lengthened to a book, a host of minor
sub-topics will be considered, each adding something
to the development of the theme, and each giving to
its principal topic the relative importance which belongs
to the main divisions of the essay. The scale of
treatment will have much to do with the selection of
material.
Using Macaulay’s “Milton” as an illustration, the
analyses below will show how by increasing the size
of the essay new subjects come into the field for notice.
The first is but a paragraph and has the two
main divisions of the essay. The second is an outline
for an essay of two thousand words. In the third only
one of the sub-topics is analyzed, as Macaulay has discussed
it. It would take too much space to analyze
minutely the whole essay.
MILTON.
- Milton’s poetry has given him his position among great
men.
- His conduct was such as was to be expected from a man
of a spirit so high and of an intellect so powerful.
In the following outline the same main headings are
retained, and the sub-topics which explain them are
introduced. The numbers indicate the paragraphs
in Macaulay’s essay given to each topic.
INTRODUCTION (1-8).
- Milton’s poetry has given him his position among men.
(9-46.)
- No poet has ever triumphed over greater difficulties
than Milton. (10-19.)
- In his lesser works he shows his great power.
(20-31.)
- 107
There is but one modern poem that can be compared
with “Paradise Lost;” Dante’s “Divine Comedy” has
great power, is upon a kindred subject, but in style of
treatment widely different. (32-46.)
Transition. (47-49.)
- His conduct was such as was to be expected from a
man of a spirit so high and of an intellect so powerful.
(50-90.)
- He lived at one of the most memorable eras in the history
of mankind, and his conduct must be judged as
that of the people is judged. (50-78.)
- There were some peculiarities which distinguished
him from his contemporaries. (79-90.)
Conclusion. (91-94.)
Again, taking up but one section, B, II., the analysis
is as follows:—
- There were some peculiarities which distinguished him
from his contemporaries. (79-90.)
- Milton adopted the noblest qualities of every
party—
- Puritans. (80-84.)
- They excited contempt. However
- They were no vulgar fanatics; but
- They derived their peculiarities from their
daily contemplation of superior beings and
eternal interests.
- Thus the Puritan was made up of two men,—the
one all self-abasement, the other all
pride.
- Résumé of character of Puritans.
- Heathens were passionate lovers of freedom. (85.)
- Royalists had individual independence, learning,
and polite manners of the Court.
- But he alone fought the battle for the freedom of
the mind. (88.)
- This led him to discard parties; and (89)
- To dare the boldest literary services. (90.)
108
The fundamental principle guiding in the selection
of material is unity. It decides what may with propriety
be admitted to the essay, and it determines in
part what must be left out. Another principle, secondary
to this, is scale of treatment. If the essay is
to be short, only essentials may be used; if long, many
related sub-topics must take their subordinate positions
in the essay.
Arrangement.
Following the selection of material comes its arrangement.
Here also there is greater difficulty
than was experienced in narration or description.
Though the same principles of Coherence and
Mass guide, they are more difficult to apply. The
seat of the difficulty is in the elusiveness of the material.
It is hard to picture distinctly the value and
relation of the different topics of an essay. Suppose
the subject is “The Evils of War.” The first paragraph
might contain a general statement announcing
the theme. Then these topics are to be discussed:—
- The effect on the morale of a nation.
- The suffering of friends and relatives.
- The destruction of life.
- The backward step in civilization.
- The destruction of property.
The order could not be much worse. How shall a
better be obtained?
Use Cards for Subdivisions.
The most helpful suggestion regarding a method of
making the material in some degree visible,
capable of being grasped, is that each subdivision
be placed on a separate card, and that,
as the material is gathered, it be put upon the card containing
the group to which it belongs. By different
arrangements of these cards the writer can find most
easily the order that is natural and effective. It is
much like anagrams, this ordering of matter in an
109
essay. Take these letters, s-l-y-w-a-r-e, and in your
head try to put them together to make a word; you
will have some trouble, probably. If, however, these
same letters be put upon separate slips of paper, you
may with some arrangement get out the rather common
word, lawyers. It is much the same with topic
cards in exposition; they can be moved and rearranged
in all possible ways, and at last an order distinctly
better than any other will be found.
Speaking of cards, it might be well to say that the
habit of putting down a fact or an idea bearing on a
topic just as soon as it occurs to one is invaluable for
a writer. All men have good memories; some persons
have better ones than others. But there is no one
who does not forget; and each catches himself very
often saying, “I knew that, but I forgot it.” It is a
fact, not perhaps complimentary, that paper tablets
are surer than the tablets of memory.
An Outline.
In exposition, where the whole attention of the
reader should be given to the thought, where
more than ever the mind should be freed from
every hindrance, and its whole energy directed to getting
the meaning, the greatest care should be given
to making a plan. No person who has attained distinction
in prose has worked without a plan. Any
piece of literature, even the most discursive, has in it
something of plan; but in literature of the first rank
the plan is easily discovered. How clear it is in Macaulay’s
essay has been seen. In Burke it is yet more
logical and exact. However beautiful a piece may be,
however naturally one thought grows out of another,
as though it were always so and could be no other way,
be sure it is so because of some man’s thought, on account
of careful planning. And it may be said without
a chance of contradiction that when an essay has
110
been well planned it is half done, and that half by far
the harder. “We can hardly at the present day understand
what Menander meant, when he told a man
who inquired as to the progress of his comedy that he
had finished it, not having yet written a single line,
because he had constructed the action of it in his mind.
A modern critic would have assured him that the merit
of his piece depended on the brilliant things which
arose under his pen as he went along.” The brilliant
things are but the gargoyles and the scrolls, the ornaments
of the structure; and when so brilliant as to attract
especial attention, they divert the mind from the
total effect much as a series of beautiful marbles set
between those perfect columns would have ruined the
Parthenon. It was not in any single feature—not in
pediment, column, or capital, not in frieze, architrave,
or tympanum—that its glorious beauty lay, but in
the simple strength and the harmonious symmetry of
the whole, in the general plan. Webster planned his
orations, Newman planned his essays, Carlyle planned
his Frederick the Great. Their works are not a momentary
inspiration; they are the result of forethought,
long and painstaking. The absolute essential in the
structure of an essay, that without which it will fail to
arrive anywhere, that compared to which all ornament,
all fine writing, is but sounding brass and a tinkling
cymbal, that absolute essential is the total effect secured
by making a plan.
Mass the End.
The principles governing the arrangement of material
are Mass and Coherence. Both are
equally essential, but in practice some questions
regarding Mass are settled first. The important
positions in an essay are the beginning and the
end; of these the more important is the end. In this
place, then, there shall be those sentences or those
111
paragraphs which deserve that distinction. Here frequently
stands the theme, the conclusion of the whole
matter, that for which the composition was constructed.
So that if one wished to know the theme of an essay,
he would be justified in looking at its conclusion to find
it. In the essay on “Milton,” it is evident from the
last paragraph that Macaulay never intended it to be
only a criticism of his poetry, though he has devoted
many pages to this discussion. Here is just the last
sentence: “Nor do we envy the man who can study
either the life or the writings of the great poet and
patriot without aspiring to emulate, not indeed the
sublime works with which his genius has enriched our
literature, but the zeal with which he labored for the
public good, the fortitude with which he endured every
private calamity, the lofty disdain with which he looked
down on temptations and dangers, the deadly hatred
which he bore to bigots and tyrants, and the faith
which he so sternly kept with his country and his
fame.” Notice the last sentence of a delightful essay
by George William Curtis; one could easily guess the
contents and the title. “Fear of yourself, fear of your
own rebuke, fear of betraying your consciousness of
your duty and not doing it—that is the fear that
Lovelace loved better than Lucasta; that is the fear
which Francis, having done his duty, saved, and justly
called it honor.” Examples of the ending in which the
theme of the essay stands in the place of greatest distinction
are so plentiful that there needs no collector to
establish the assertion.
In a single paragraph of exposition not exceeding
two or three hundred words, it is a very safe rule for
a beginner always to have the theme in the last sentence;
or if he has stated the theme in the opening,
to have a restatement of it in different form, fuller and
112
more explicit usually, sometimes a shorter and more
epigrammatic form, in the conclusion.
If the pupil should obey this little rule to have
at the end something worthy of the position, a vast
amount of time would be saved both to teacher and to
pupil. It can be safely said that not more than one
half the essays end when the thought ends. Instead
of quitting when he has finished, the writer dribbles
on, repeating in diluted fashion what he has said with
some force before, and often introducing matters that
are not within hailing distance of his theme. When
one has said what he started out to say, it is time to
stop. If he stops then, he will have something important
in the place of distinction.
The Beginning.
The position of second importance is the beginning.
If but a paragraph be written, the topic is
usually announced at the opening. In short
essays this is the most frequent beginning, and it may
safely be used at all times. Exposition is explanation;
the natural thing is to let the reader know at once
what the writer is attempting to explain. Then the
reader knows what the author is talking about and can
relate every statement to the general proposition. To
delay the topic compels the reader to hold in mind all
that has been said up to the time the real theme is
uncovered; this frequently results in inattention. In
the little book by Mr. Palmer, the first paragraph opens
with these two sentences: “English as a study has four
aims: the mastery of our language as a science, as a
history, as a joy, and as a tool. I am concerned with
but one, the mastery of it as a tool.” So, too, the essay
of which the last sentence has been quoted begins:
“These are very precious words of Lovelace:—
‘I could not love thee, dear, so much,
Loved I not honor more.’
113
And Francis First’s message to his mother after Pavia,
‘All is lost but honor,’ is in the same key.”
Instead of announcing the theme at the very beginning,
in essays of some length there is sometimes an
account of the occasion which led to the composition.
Macaulay has used this opening in the essay on “Milton.”
Second, the opening may be the clearing away
of matters unrelated in reality, but which people have
commonly associated with the topic. And third, the
essay may open with definitions of the terms that will
be used in the discussion. Of these three, only the
first will be much used by young persons. It makes
an easy approach to the subject, and avoids the unpleasant
jar of an abrupt start. It is common with
Macaulay, Lowell, and many essayists that write in an
easy, almost conversational style.
There is one case in which the theme should not be
announced at the opening. If the proposition were
distasteful, if it were generally believed to be false, it
would not be policy to announce it at the beginning.
However reasonable men may be, it is still true that
reason is subject to emotions and beliefs to a greater
degree than is praiseworthy. If a man should open an
address upon Abraham Lincoln by saying that he was
a cringing coward, he would have difficulty to get an
audience to hear anything he said after that, no matter
how much truth he spoke. The author of such a statement
would be so disliked that nothing would win for
him favor. When an unwelcome theme is to be discussed,
it must be approached carefully by successive
steps which prepare the reader for the reception of a
truth that before seemed false to him. In this case
the theme will be stated at the end, but not at the beginning
of the essay.
Get started as soon as you can, and stop when you
114
have finished; by so doing you will have important
matters in those places which will emphasize them.
Shun the allurements of high-sounding introductions
and conclusions. Professor Marston used to tell his
pupils to write the best introduction they could, to
fashion their most gorgeous peroration, and to be sure
to have the discussion clear, logical, and well expressed.
Then he said that when he had cut off both ends, he
generally had left a good essay. An essay should be
done much as a business man does business. He does
not want the gentleman who calls on him during business
hours to bow and scatter compliments before he
takes up the matter which brought him there; nor does
he care to see him swaying on the doorknob after the
business is finished. To the business at once, and leave
off when you have done. Introductions, exordiums,
perorations, and conclusions are worthless unless they
be in reality a part of the discussion and necessary to
the understanding of the whole.
Proportion in Treatment.
Everything, however, cannot occupy the first and last
places. How can other matters be emphasized?
To refer to the parallel of the map, in
order to make people see that the Mississippi
River is longer than the Hudson, the designer made it
longer on the map. That is exactly what is done in an
essay. If one matter is of greater importance than
another, it should take up a larger part of the essay.
When Macaulay passes over Milton’s sonnets with a
paragraph, while he devotes sixteen paragraphs to “Paradise
Lost,” he indicates by the greater mass the greater
value he ascribes to the epic. So again, a very good
proof that he did not intend this essay to be a literary
criticism primarily, another evidence beside the closing
paragraph, is found in his division of the whole essay.
To Milton’s poetry he has given forty-one paragraphs,
115
and to his character fifty-two paragraphs. The most
common way of emphasizing important divisions of an
essay is by increasing the length of treatment.
Emphasis of Emotion.
However, there are times when this cannot be done:
a point may be so well known that it needs no
amplification. In such a case there may be
an emphasis of emotion; that is, the statement
may be made with an intensity that counterbalances
the weight of the larger treatment. It might be
said that the one has great velocity and little mass,
while the other has great mass and little velocity. By
hurling forth the smaller mass at a higher velocity, the
momentum may be as great as when the larger mass
moves with little velocity. The dynamic force of burning
words may give an emphasis to a paragraph out
of all proportion to the length of treatment. In one
paragraph Macaulay dashes aside all the defenses of
Charles. He writes:—
“The advocates of Charles, like the advocates of other
malefactors against whom overwhelming evidence is produced,
generally decline all controversy about the facts, and content
themselves with calling testimony to character. He had so
many private virtues! And had James II. no private virtues?
Was Oliver Cromwell, his bitterest enemies themselves being
the judges, destitute of private virtues? And what, after all,
are the virtues ascribed to Charles? A religious zeal, not
more sincere than that of his son, and fully as weak and
narrow-minded, and a few of the ordinary household decencies
which half the tombstones in England claim for those
who lie beneath them. A good father! A good husband!
Ample apologies indeed for fifteen years of persecution,
tyranny, and falsehood.” (“Essay on Milton.”)
Phrases indicating Emphasis.
Moreover, phrases and sentences may be introduced
to show that a writer considers some topics of equal
importance to others, or even of greater importance,
116
though they do not demand the same length of treatment.
Of equal importance, not less weighty,
beyond question the most pertinent, illustrate
what is meant by phrases which indicate
values. These and many of their class which the occasion
will call forth are necessary to give certain topics
the rank they hold in the writer’s conception of the
whole subject. In discussing the temper and character
of the American people, Burke ascribes it to six powerful
causes. The relative value of these is indicated
in the last three by phrases. I quote only the opening
sentences.
“First, the people of the colonies are descendants of Englishmen.”...
“They were further confirmed in this pleasing
error by the form of their provincial legislative assemblies.”...
“If anything were wanting to this necessary operation of
the form of government, religion would have given it a complete
effect.”... “There is a circumstance attending these
[southern] colonies which makes the spirit of liberty still
more high and haughty than in those to the northward.”...
“Permit me, Sir, to add another circumstance which contributes
no mean part towards the growth and effect of this
untractable spirit.”... “The last cause of this disobedient
spirit in the colonies is hardly less powerful than the rest.”
Emphasis is indicated, then, by position; by the
length of treatment; by dynamic statement; and by
phrases denoting values.
Coherence.
Coherence is the second principle which modifies the
internal structure of a composition. That
arrangement should be sought for that places
in proximity one to another those ideas which are
most closely related. More than in composition dealing
with things, in those forms of discourse dealing
with intangible, invisible ideas,—with thoughts, with
117
speculations,—the greatest care is necessary to make
one topic spring of necessity from a preceding topic.
And this is not impossible when the material has been
carefully selected. The principal divisions of the subject
bear a necessary and logical relation to the whole
theme, and the subordinate divisions have a similar relation
to their main topic. In the essay on “Milton,”
Macaulay is seeking to commend his hero to the reader
for two reasons: first, because his writings “are powerful,
not only to delight, but to elevate and purify;”
second, because “the zeal with which he labored for
the public good, the fortitude with which he endured
every private calamity, the lofty disdain with which he
looked down on temptations and dangers, the deadly
hatred which he bore to bigots and tyrants, and the
faith which he so sternly kept with his country and with
his fame” made him a patriot worthy of emulation.
We feel instinctively that this arrangement, poetry
first and character next, and not the reverse, is the
right order. To discuss character first and poetry
last would have been ruinous to Macaulay’s purpose.
Notice next the development of a sub-topic in the same
essay. Only one sentence from a paragraph is given.
The defenders of Charles do not choose to discuss “the
great points of the question,” but “content themselves
with exposing some of the crimes and follies to which
public commotions necessarily give birth.” “Be it so.”
“Many evils were produced by the Civil War.” “It is
the character of such revolutions that we always see the
worst of them first.” Yet “there is only one cure for
the evils which newly acquired freedom produces, and
that cure is freedom.” “Therefore it is that we decidedly
approve of the conduct of Milton and the other
wise and good men who, in spite of much that was
ridiculous and hateful in the conduct of their associates,
118
stood firmly by the cause of public liberty.” No
other arrangement of these paragraphs seems possible.
To shift the sequence would break the chain. Each
paragraph grows naturally from the paragraph preceding.
Closely related topics stand together. There is
Coherence.
Transition Phrases.
The logical connection between topics which have
been well arranged may be made more evident
by the skillful use of words and phrases
that indicate the relation of what has been said to what
is to be said. These phrases are guideposts pointing
the direction the next topic will take. They advise the
reader where he is and whither he is going. Cardinal
Newman, who had the ability to write not only so that
he could be understood, but so that he could not be
misunderstood, made frequent use of these guides. The
question in one of his essays is “whether knowledge,
that is, acquirement, is the real principle of enlargement,
or whether that is not rather something beyond
it.” These fragments of sentences open a series of
paragraphs. 1. “For instance, let a person ... go for
the first time where physical nature puts on her wilder
and more awful forms,” etc. 2. “Again, the view of
the heavens which the telescope opens,” etc. 3. “And
so again, the sight of beasts of prey and other foreign
animals,” etc. 4. “Hence Physical Science generally,”
etc. 5. “Again, the study of history,” etc. 6. “And
in like manner, what is called seeing the world,” etc.
7. “And then again, the first time the mind comes
across the arguments and speculations of unbelievers,”
etc. 8. “On the other hand, Religion has its own
enlargement,” etc. 9. “Now from these instances, ...
it is plain, first, that the communication of knowledge
certainly is either a condition or a means of that sense
of enlargement, or enlightenment of which at this day
119
we hear so much in certain quarters: this cannot be
denied; but next, it is equally plain, that such communication
is not the whole of the process.” How
extremely valuable such phrases are may be realized
from the fact that, though the matter is entirely unknown,
any one can know the relation of the parts of
this essay, whither it tends, and can almost supply
Newman’s thoughts.
Summary and Transition.
To secure coherence between the main divisions of
an essay, instead of words and phrases, there
are employed sentences and paragraphs of
summary and transition. Summaries gather
up what has been said on the topic, much like a conclusion
to a theme; transitions show the relation between
the topic already discussed and the one next
to be treated. Summaries at the conclusion of any
division of the whole subject are like the seats on a
mountain path which are conveniently arranged to give
the climber a needed rest, and to spread out at his feet
the features of the landscape through which he has
made his way. Summaries put the reader in possession
of the situation up to that point, and make him
ready for the next stage of the advance. At the end
of the summary there is frequently a transition, either
a few sentences or sometimes a short paragraph. The
sentence or paragraph of transition is much more frequent
than the paragraph which summarizes.
The examples of these summaries and transitions are
so frequent in Macaulay and Burke that one transition
is sufficient to indicate their use. Macaulay writes:—
“There are several minor poems of Milton on which we
would willingly make a few remarks.... Our limits, however,
prevent us from discussing the point at length. We
hasten on to that extraordinary production which the general
suffrage of critics has placed in the highest class of human
compositions.” (“Essay on Milton.”)
120
To conclude, exposition embraces definition and explanation.
Definition is usually too concise to be clear,
and needs an added explanation. In any piece of
exposition there must be unity, and this principle will
dispense with everything that is not essential to the
theme; there must be judicious massing, that those
parts of the essay deserving emphasis may receive it;
and there must be a coherence between the parts,
large and small, so close and intimate that the progress
from one topic to another shall be steady and without
hindrance. Unity, Mass, and Coherence should be the
main considerations in composition the aim of which is
to explain a term or a proposition.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES.
QUESTIONS.
MACAULAY’S ESSAY ON MILTON.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 103.)
What makes up the introduction of this essay? Does he
use the same method in the Essay on Addison? Take a
volume of his essays and see how many begin in similar
fashion. At what paragraph of this Essay on Milton does
the introduction end? Would it be as well to omit it?
Give reasons for your opinion.
Make an analysis of his argument of the proposition, “No
poet has ever triumphed over greater difficulties than Milton.”
Does Macaulay give a definition of poetry on page 13, or
is it an exposition of the term?
What figure of speech do you find in the last sentence of
the paragraph on page 43?
When Macaulay begins to discuss “the public conduct of
Milton,” what method of introduction does he adopt? What
value is there in it?
Do the trifles mentioned at the end of the paragraph on
page 55 make an anticlimax?
What arrangement of sentences in the paragraph does he
use most, individual or serial?
Does he close his paragraphs with a repetition of the topic
more frequently than with a single detail emphasizing the
topic?
Is his last sentence, in case it is a repetition of the topic,
longer or shorter than the topic sentence?
Does Macaulay frequently use epigrams? antitheses?
Find all transition paragraphs.
122
Find ten full sentence transitions outside of the transition
paragraphs.
Where, in such paragraphs, is the topic sentence?
In this essay find examples of the five methods of expounding
a proposition.
Which method does Macaulay use oftenest?
Is his treatment of the subject concrete?
What advantage is there in such treatment?
OF KINGS’ TREASURIES.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 142.)
Do you think the title good?
Is Ruskin wise in disclosing his subject at once?
In section 3 what purpose does the first paragraph fulfill?
What method of exposition is adopted in the last paragraph?
What method in section 4?
For what purpose is the first paragraph of section 5 introduced?
Is the last paragraph of this section a digression?
Do you think the last sentence of section 9 upon the
topic announced in the first sentence? Where does Ruskin
begin to treat the second topic? Should there be two paragraphs?
Find the genus and differentia in the definition of “a
good book of the hour.”
What is the use of the analogy in section 13?
What figure do you find in section 14?
Do you think a large part of section 30 a digression?
What do you think of the structure of sentences 4 and 8 in
section 32? Could you improve it by a change of punctuation?
What is the effect of the supposed case at the end of
section 33? Is it a fair deduction? Is it at the right place
in the paragraph, and why?
Where would you divide the paragraph in section 37?
Is the example in section 36 a fair one, and does it prove
the case?
What is a very common method with Ruskin of connecting
paragraphs?
123
Could you break up the sixth sentence of section 31 so
that it would be better?
If his audience had been hostile to him would he have
been fortunate in some of his assertions? Make an analysis
of the whole essay. Does he seem to you to have digressed
from his topic? At what point? Should it be two essays?
What led Ruskin into this long criticism of English character?
Could you include all the main topics that Ruskin has
included, and by a change in proportion keep the essay on
the subject?
WEBSTER’S BUNKER HILL ORATION.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 56.)
Number the paragraphs in this oration.
Why is paragraph 3 introduced?
What method of development is used in paragraph 7?
In paragraph 8?
In how many paragraphs is the last sentence short?
In how many is the last sentence a repetition of the topic?
What purpose is served in paragraphs 8, 9, and 10?
In paragraph 12 note the use of contrast.
What kind of development in paragraph 27?
Analyze the oration from paragraph 28.
Does he place the topic sentence near the beginning of
the paragraphs?
Does he frequently use transition sentences?
Do you think the outline of this as distinct as that of
Macaulay’s Essay on Milton? Should it be?
What figure of speech in the word “axe” in paragraph
32, and “bayonet” in paragraph 36?
What figure at the end of paragraph 40?
Does he use figures as frequently as Macaulay?
EXERCISES.
This year, taking up the study of exposition, offers especially
good opportunities for exercises in paragraph and
124
sentence construction. During the first eight or ten weeks
the pupils will write isolated paragraphs. The unity and
arrangement of these should be carefully criticised. Also
the exercises should be arranged so that the pupils will employ
all forms of paragraphs. Before he begins to write a
paragraph, the pupil should know what he is to include in
it, and in what order; otherwise the paragraph will fail in
unity and effective massing. Paragraphs are made by forethought,
not by inspiration.
Following the writing of isolated paragraphs is the composition
of the long essay. The first thing is a study of outlines.
This will take up six or eight weeks. To secure the
view of the whole in different arrangements, use the cards.
When the class has gained some grasp of outlines, the
writing of essays should be begun. At the option of the
pupils, they may write some of the essays already outlined,
or study new themes. Two or three paragraphs are all that
can be well done for a lesson. Good, not much, should be
the ideal. In this way a single essay may occupy a class
from three to six weeks.
It should be remembered that these exercises are written
consciously for practice. They are exercises—no more.
Their purpose is to give skill and judgment in composition.
It is because they are exercises that they may be somewhat
stereotyped and artificial in form, just as exercises in music
may be artificially constructed to meet the difficulties the
young musician will have to confront.
During the writing of these essays special attention should
be given to sentence construction. The inclusion of just the
ideas needed in the sentence and no more; the massing that
makes prominent the thought that deserves prominence; and
the nice adjustment of one sentence to the next: these objects
should be striven for during this semester.
- and 2. Write definitions of such common terms as jingoism,
civil service, gold standard, the submerged tenth, sweat shop,
internal revenue, cyclonic area, foreign policy, imperialism,
free silver, mugwump, political pull, Monroe doctrine, etc.
Five or six terms which are not found in a dictionary will
125
make a hard exercise; and two or three lessons in definitions
will set the pupils in the direction of accurate and adequate
statements.
For isolated paragraphs write upon the following subjects:—
- Novel reading gives one a knowledge of the world not
to be gained in any other way. Particulars.
- Novel reading unfits people for the actualities of life.
Specific instances.
- Among the numerous uses of biography three stand
forth preëminent,—it furnishes the material of history, it
lets us into the secrets of the good and great, and it sets before
us attainable ideals of noble humanity. Repetition.
- It is beyond any possibility of successful contradiction
that the examination system encourages cheating. Proofs.
- Electric cars and automobiles are driving horses out of
the cities. Instances.
- Every great development in the culture of a nation has
followed a great war. Proofs.
- From the following general subjects have the pupils
state definite themes. Write isolated paragraphs on a few
of them.
Political Parties.
War.
Books.
Machines.
Inventions.
Great Men.
Planets.
Civil Service.
Coeducation.
Roads.
Tramps.
Boycotts.
Place another similar list on the board and have the
pupils vote on what three they prefer. Use these in making
outlines. Then select more.
Supposing they had settled upon this theme: The tramp
126
is the logical result of our economic system; have it outlined.
The result might be as follows:—
- What is a tramp?
- Who become tramps?
- Their number.
- Where are they?
- Why is he a tramp?
- Inventions have increased the power of production
more rapidly than the demand for products has
grown.
- On the farm.
- Transportation.
- Factories.
- Piecework.
- Women now do much work formerly done by men.
- As clerks.
- As typewriters, stenographers, and bookkeepers.
- In the professions.
- The result of these causes is that many men willing
to work are out of employment.
- What must be done?
Fill out the following outline.
Subject: The Thermometer.
- Its Invention.
- Its Construction.
- Its Value and Uses.
- Outline six more themes.
- Beginning the writing of long essays, write essays in
sections. Using “Tramps” for an illustration, as it is outlined
it contains about twelve paragraphs. All of section
“A” may be included in one paragraph. “B, 1” may be
a paragraph of repetition; “a,” “b,” “c,” “d,” may each
make a paragraph of particulars. By stating “B, 2” in the
following way, it may be a paragraph of “what not:” It
was once considered unladylike for women to engage in any
occupation outside of the home. Men said that they could
not retain, etc.—Go on with the things woman could not do,
closing with a statement of what she does do.
127
“B, 2, a.” On account of their fidelity, honesty, and courtesy,
women succeed as clerks. Repetition.
- The quickness of their intelligence and the accuracy
of their work have made women more desirable for
routine work in an office than men. Comparison and
Contrast.
- There are certain feminine qualities which especially
fit women for the practice of teaching and medicine.
Details.
“B, 3.” By Combination of Forms.
“C.” By Details.
It would be a pleasure to go on with this list of exercises,
but it is unnecessary and it is unwise. These indicate the
objects to be sought for in the exercises. They are not a
specific course, though they might suit a certain environment.
Each teacher knows her own pupils,—their attainments and
their interests. The subjects should be chosen to suit their
special cases. Only make them interesting; put them into
such form that there is something to get hold of; and adapt
them so that all the topics to be studied will be illustrated in
the work. The pupils should be able to write any form of
paragraph, to arrange it so that any idea is made prominent,
and to make easy transitions. Arrange the exercises to
accomplish definite results.
During the third year, attention should be given to words
and to the refinements of elegant composition. These the
pupils will best learn by careful watch of the literature.
The teacher should be quick to feel the strength and beauty
of any passage and able to point out the means adopted to
obtain the delightful effect. Clearness first is the thing to
be desired; if to this can be added force and a degree of
elegance during the last two years, the work of the instructor
has been well done.
CHAPTER VI
ARGUMENT
Argument has been defined as that form of discourse
the purpose of which is to convince the reader
of the truth or falsity of a proposition. It is closely
allied with exposition. To convince a person, it is first
necessary that the proposition be explained to him.
This is all that is necessary in many cases. Did men
decide all matters without prejudice, and were they
willing to accept the truth at any cost, even to discard
the beliefs that have been to them the source of greatest
happiness, the simple explanation would be sufficient.
However, as men are not all-wise, and as they
are not always “reasonable,” they are found to hold
different opinions regarding the same subject; and one
person often wishes to convince another of the error of
his beliefs. Men continually use the words because
and therefore; indeed, a great deal of writing has in it
an element of argument.
From the fact that argument and exposition are so
nearly alike, it follows that they will be governed by
much the same principles. As argument, in addition
to explaining, seeks to convince, it is necessary, in addition
to knowing how to explain, to know what is considered
convincing,—what are proofs; and secondly,
what is the best order in which to arrange proofs.
Induction and Deduction.
Arguments have been classified as inductive and
deductive. Induction includes arguments that proceed
129
from individual cases to establish a general truth.
Deduction comprises arguments that proceed
from a general truth to establish the proposition
in specific instances, or groups of instances.
Syllogism. Premises.
If one should say “Socrates is mortal because he
is a man,” or “Socrates will die because all
men are mortal,” or “Socrates is a man,
therefore he will die,” by any of these he has expressed
a truth which all men accept. In any of these expressions
are bound up two propositions, called premises,
from which a third proposition, called a conclusion, is
derived. If expanded, the three propositions assume
this form: All men are mortal. Socrates is a man.
Therefore Socrates is mortal. This is termed a syllogism.
A syllogism consists of a major premise, a
predication about all the members of a general class of
objects; a minor premise, a predication that includes
an individual or a group of individuals in the general
class named by the major premise; and a conclusion,
the proposition which is derived from the relation
existing between the other two propositions. The
propositions above would be classified as follows:—
Major premise: All men are mortal, a predication about
all men.
Minor premise: Socrates is a man, including an individual
in the general class.
Conclusion: Socrates is mortal.
Terms.
In every syllogism there are three terms,—major,
minor, and middle. The middle term is
found in both the premises, but not in the
conclusion. It is the link connecting the major and
minor terms. The major term is usually the predicate
of the major premise and the predicate of the conclusion.
The minor term is the subject of the minor premise
130
and the subject of the conclusion. “Men” is
the middle term, “are mortal” the major term, and
“Socrates,” the minor term.
Enthymeme.
It is rarely the case in literature that the syllogism
is fully stated: generally one of the premises
is omitted. Such a form of statement is
termed an enthymeme. “Socrates will die because all
men are mortal” is an enthymeme. The minor premise
has been omitted. “Socrates is mortal because
he is a man” is also an enthymeme, because the major
premise which states that “all men are mortal” has
been omitted.
The conclusions arrived at by means of syllogisms
are irresistible, provided the form be correct and the
premises be true. It is impossible here to discuss the
forms of syllogisms; they are too many. It will be
of value, however, to call attention to a few of the
commonest errors in syllogisms.
Definition of Terms.
The first error arises from a misunderstanding of
terms. It is often said that George Eliot is
a poet; there are some who disagree. Certain
it is that she wrote in verse form; and it is true
that she has embodied noble thoughts in verse; but it
is quite as true that she lacks “the bird-note.” If this
were reduced to a syllogism, it would not be a discussion
of whether George Eliot be a poet, but rather a
discussion of what is a poet. Stated, it reads: All
persons who embody noble thoughts in verse form are
poets. George Eliot is a person who has embodied
noble thoughts in verse form. Therefore George Eliot
is a poet. If the major premise of this syllogism be
granted, the conclusion is unquestionable. The terms
should be defined at the beginning; then this error,
springing from a misunderstanding of terms, perhaps
the most common, would be avoided.
Undistributed Middle.
131
The second error arises from the fact that the middle
term is not “distributed;” that is, the major
premise makes no statement about all the
members of a class. The premises in the
following are true, but the conclusion is nonsense.
A horse is an animal.
Man is an animal.
Therefore, man is a horse.
The middle term, in this case “animal,” must be “distributed;”
some statement must be made of all animals.
The following would be true: All animals have
life; therefore man has life. The major premise predicates
life of all animals.
False Premises.
A third error in a syllogism is in the premises themselves.
If either premise be false, the conclusion
is not necessarily true. A parent
might say to his son, “You are doing wrong, and
you will pay the penalty for it soon.” Generally
he would be right. However, if this were put into a
syllogism, it would read as follows: All persons who
do wrong pay the penalty soon. You are such a person.
Therefore, etc. Admitting the son is breaking
the law, the fact is that the major premise is not
always true, and the conclusion holds the weakness of
the weak premise. Again, supposing everybody accepted
the general truth, “All unrepentant sinners will
be punished.” The minister might then say to a young
man, “You will certainly be punished, because all unrepentant
sinners will be punished.” The young man
might deny the suppressed minor premise, which is,
“You are an unrepentant sinner.” Both premises
must be true if they prove anything. The conclusion
contains the weakness of either premise. In both of
these examples note that the mistake is in the premise
which does not appear. In an enthymeme, great care
132
should be taken with the suppressed premise. Be sure
it is true when you use this form of argument, and be
sure to look for it and state it in full when examining
another’s argument. It is a common way of hiding a
weak point to cover it in the suppressed premise of an
enthymeme.
Method of Induction.
Induction, which proceeds directly opposite to the
method of deduction, is the method by which
all our ultimate knowledge has been obtained.
By observing individual instances man has gathered
a great store of general truths. There was a time
when the first man would not have been justified in
saying, “The sun will rise in the east to-morrow.” The
general law had not been established. To-day it is
practically certain that the sun will rise in the east to-morrow
morning, because it has done so for thousands
of years; the large number of instances establishes the
general truth. Yet there may come a day when it will
rise in the south, or not rise at all. Until every case
has been tried and found to conform to the law, theoretically
man cannot be absolutely certain of any general
truth. There may come an exception to the
general rule that all men must die. So far, however,
there is no experience to justify any man in hoping to
escape death. “As sure as death” means in practice
absolutely sure, though this is not what is called a
perfect induction; that is, an induction in which every
possible case has been included. “All the other States
are smaller than Texas” is a perfect induction, but it
forms no basis for argument. All the cases must be
known for a perfect induction; there is no unknown
to argue to. This, then, is only a short statement of
many individual truths, and has but little of value.
Induction that is imperfect is more valuable; for with
many cases the probability becomes so strong that it is
a practical certainty. It is the method of science.
133
More valuable for literature is another division of
arguments into arguments from cause, arguments from
sign, and arguments from example.
Arguments from Cause.
Arguments from cause include those propositions
which, if they were granted, would account
for the fact or proposition maintained. The
decisive test is to suppose the proposition to
be true; then, if it will account for the condition, it is
an argument from cause. A child holds its finger in
a flame; therefore its finger is burned. If the first
proposition be supposed to be true, it will account for
a burned finger. It is an argument from cause, and it
is conclusive. Again, if a man severs his carotid artery,
he will die. If the first proposition be supposed to be
true, it will account for the man’s subsequent death.
Now, supposing a man takes strychnine, he will die.
This is not quite so sure. If a stomach-pump were
used or an antidote given, he might not die. The
cause has been hindered in its action, or another cause
has intervened to counterbalance the first. If, then, a
cause be adequate to produce the effect, and if it act
unhindered or unmodified, the effect will certainly follow
the active cause. An argument that uses as a
premise such a cause may predicate its effect as a conclusion
with absolute certainty. Such an argument is
conclusive.
The argument from cause is used more frequently
to establish a probability than to prove a fact or proposition.
However strong the proofs of a statement
may be, men hesitate to accept either the statement or
the proofs if the proposition is not plausible, or, as
people say, if “they do not understand it,” or if “it is
not reasonable.” If a murder be done and circumstances
all point to your friend, you do not believe
your friend to be the criminal until some fact is produced
134
sufficient to cause your friend to commit the
crime,—until some motive is established. If it be
shown that the friend hated the murdered man and
would be benefited by his death, a motive is established,—the
proposition is made plausible. A man
could “understand how he came to do it.” The hatred
and the benefit being granted, they would account for
his deed. It is an argument from cause, used not as a
proof, but to establish a probability. It makes the proposition
ready for proof.
Arguments from Sign.
The second class of arguments, arguments from sign,
is most often used for proof. If two facts or
conditions always occur together, the presence
of one is a sign of the presence of the other. Cause
and effect are so related that if either be observed, it
is an indication of the other. No cause acts without
a consequent effect; an effect is a sure sign of a preceding
cause. Supposing one should say, “Because
the flowers are dead, there was a frost,” or “If ice has
formed on the river, it must have been cold,” in both
instances the argument would be an argument from
sign. Both also proceed from the effect to the cause.
Only a low temperature forms ice on the river; the
argument from effect to cause is conclusive. In the
first case, the argument is not conclusive, because flowers
may die from other causes. In a case like this,
it is necessary to find all possible causes, and then by
testing each in succession to determine which could
not have acted and leave the one that is the only
actual cause. A man is found dead; death has resulted
from natural causes, from murder, or from suicide.
Each possible cause would be tested; and by
elimination of the other possible causes the one right
cause would be left. This method of elimination is
frequently employed in arguments from effect to cause.
135
When this method is used the alternatives should be
few, else it gives rise to confusion and to lack of attention
caused by the tediousness of the discussion. And
an enumeration of all possible causes must be made;
for if one be omitted it may be the one that is in fact
the right one.
The relation between cause and effect is so intimate
that the occurrence of one may be regarded as a sure
sign of the presence of the other. If an effect is produced
by only one cause, the presence of the effect is
a certain indication of the cause. If several causes
produce the same effect, some other methods must be
used to determine the cause operating in this special
case.
Sequence and Cause.
In reasoning from effect to cause, one must be sure
that he is dealing with a cause. As effect
follows cause, there is danger that anything
that follows another may be considered as caused by it.
Because a man died just after eating, it would not be
quite reasonable to connect eating and death as cause
and effect. The fact is that death is surer to follow
starvation. The glow at evening is generally followed
by fair weather the next day; but the fair weather is
not an effect of a clear sunset. Common sense must be
used to determine whether the relation is one of cause
and effect; something more than a simple sequence is
necessary.
Another argument from sign associates conditions
that frequently occur together, though one is not the
cause of the other. “James is near, because there is
his blind father,” means that James always accompanies
his father; where the father is, the son is too.
If one had noticed that potatoes planted at the full
of the moon grew well, and potatoes planted at other
times did not thrive, he might say as a result of years
136
of observation that a certain crop would be a failure
because it was not planted at the right time. This
argument might have weight with ignorant people, but
intelligent persons do not consider it a sure sign. All
signs belong to this class of arguments; they are of value
or worthless as they come true more or less frequently.
Every time there is an exception the argument is
weakened; another case of its working strengthens it.
Where there is no sure relation like cause and effect,
the strength of the argument depends on the frequency
of the recurrence of the associated conditions.
A third argument from sign associates two effects
of the same cause. A lad on waking exclaims, “The
window is covered with frost; I can go skating to-day.”
The frost on the window is not the cause of the
ice on the river. Rather, both phenomena are results
of the same cause. This kind of argument is not
necessarily conclusive; yet with others it always
strengthens a case.
Testimony is usually called an argument from sign.
The assertion by some one that a thing occurred is not
sure proof; it is only a sign that it occurred. People
have said that they have seen witches, ghosts, and
sea serpents, and unquestionably believed it; men generally
do not accept their testimony. In a criminal
case, it would be difficult to accept the testimony of
both sides. Though testimony seems a strong argument,
it is or it is not, according to the conditions
under which it is given. One would care little for
the testimony of an ignorant man in a matter that
called for wisdom; he would hesitate to accept the
testimony of a man who claimed he saw, but upon
cross-examination could not report what he saw; and
he would not think it fair to be condemned upon the
testimony of his enemies. Books have been written
137
upon evidence, but three principles are all that are
needed in ordinary arguments. First, the person giving
testimony must be capable of observation; second,
he must be able to report accurately what he has observed;
third, he must have a desire to tell the exact
truth.
Arguments from Example.
The third large division comprises arguments from
example. That is, if a truth be asserted of an
individual, it can therefore be predicated of
the class to which the individual belongs.
For instance, if the first time a person saw a giraffe,
he observed that it was eating grass, he would be justified
in saying that giraffes are herbivorous. All gold
is yellow, heavy, and not corroded by acid, though no
one has tested it all. However, every giraffe does not
have one ear brown and the other gray because the
first one seen happened to be so marked; neither is all
gold in the shape of ten-dollar gold pieces. Only common
sense will serve to pick out essential qualities;
but if essential and invariable qualities be selected, the
argument from the example of an individual to all
members of its class is very powerful.
Analogies resemble examples. In exposition they
are used for illustration; in argument they are employed
as proofs. Though two things belong to different
classes of objects, they may have some qualities that
are similar, and so an argument may be made from
one to another. “Natural Law in the Spiritual
World” is a book written to show how the physical
laws hold true in the region of spirit. It is not because
an enemy sowed tares in a neighbor’s field that
there are wicked men in the world; nor is it because
a lover of jewels will sell everything that he has to
buy the pearl of greatest price that men devote everything
they have to the kingdom of heaven. Analogies
138
prove nothing. They clear up relations and often help
the reader to appreciate other arguments. They are
valuable when the likeness is broad and easily traced.
They should never be used alone.
These, then, are the principal forms of argument:
deduction and induction; arguments from cause, from
sign, and from example. Upon these men depend
when they wish to convince of truth or error.
Selection of Material.
In argument the material is selected with reference
to its value as proof. Every particle of matter
must be carefully tested. While a piece
of material that could be omitted without loss
to the explanation may sometimes find a place in exposition,
such a thing must not occur in argument. As
soon as a reader discovers that the writer is off the
track, either he loses respect for the author’s words, or
he suspects him of trying to hide the weakness of his
position in a cloud of worthless and irrelevant matters.
Every bit of material should advance the argument one
step; it should fill its niche in the well-planned structure;
it should contribute its part to the strength of
the whole.
Plan called The Brief.
When the material has been selected, it must be
arranged. An argument is a demonstration.
Each of its parts is the natural result of what
has preceded, and, up to the last step, each part is the
basis for the next step. As in geometry a demonstration
that omits one step in its development, or, which
comes to the same thing, puts the point out of its logical
order, is worthless as a demonstration, so in argument
not one essential step can be omitted, nor can it
be misplaced. The plan in an argument may be more
evident than in exposition. We are a little offended
if the framework shows too plainly in exposition; but
there is no offense in a well-articulated skeleton in an
139
argument. It is quite the rule that the general plan
and the main divisions of the argument are announced
at the very beginning. Any device that will make the
relation of the parts clearer should be used. Over and
over again the writer should arrange the cards with
the topics until he is certain that no other order is so
good. The writing is a mere trifle compared with the
outline, called in argument the brief.
Though the brief is so essential, it is unfortunately
a thing about which but few suggestions can be given.
The circumstances under which arguments are written—especially
whether written to defend a position or
to attack it—are so various that rules cannot be given.
Still a few general principles may be of value.
Climax.
Proofs should be arranged in a climax. This does
not mean that the weakest argument should
come first, and the next stronger should follow,
and so on until the last and strongest is reached.
It is necessary to begin with something that will catch
the attention; and in argument it is frequently a proof
strong enough to convince the reader that the writer
knows what he is contending for, and that he can strike
a hard blow. Then again, it is evident that in all
arguments there are main points in the discussion that
must be established by points of minor importance.
The main points should be arranged in a logical climax,
and the sub-topics which go to support one of
the main divisions should have their climax. At the
end of the whole should be the strongest and the most
comprehensive argument. It should be a general advance
of the whole line of argument, including all the
propositions that have previously been called into
action, sweeping everything before it.
Inductive precedes Deductive.
To gain this climax what kind of arguments should
precede? Of inductive and deductive, the inductive
140
proofs generally go first. The advance from particular
instances to general truths is the best suited to
catch the attention, for men think with individual examples,
and general truths make little appeal
to them. Moreover, if one is addressing people
of opposing views,—and in most cases
he is, else why is he arguing?—it is unwise to begin
with bald statements of unwelcome truths. They will
be rejected without consideration. They can with
advantage be delayed until they are reached in the regular
development, and the reader has been prepared for
their reception. General truths and their application
by deductive arguments usually stand late in the brief.
Cause precedes Sign.
Of arguments from cause, sign, or example, it is
ordinarily wise to place arguments from cause
first. A person does not listen to any explanation
of an unknown truth until he knows that the explanation
is plausible; that the cause assigned is adequate
to produce the result. After one knows that
the cause is sufficient and may have brought about the
result, he is in a position to learn that it is the very
cause that produced the effect. Arguments from cause
are very rarely conclusive proofs of fact. They only
establish a probability. And it would be unwise to
prove that a thing might be a possibility after one had
attempted to prove that it is a fact. It would be a
long step backward, a retreat. Therefore arguments
from cause, unless absolutely conclusive proof of fact,
should not come last; but by other arguments,—by
testimony, by example, by analogy,—the possibility,
which has been reached by the argument from cause,
may be established as a fact.
Example follows Sign.
Of the two, sign and example, example generally
follows sign. In arguments about human affairs, examples
seldom prove anything; for under similar conditions
141
one person may not act like another. Though
this be true, the argument from example is one
of the most effective—it is not at all conclusive—in
that class of cases where oratory is
combined with argument to convince and persuade.
This is because men learn most readily from examples.
To reason about matters of conduct on abstract principles
of morality convinces but few; to point to a Lincoln
or a Franklin has persuaded thousands. Examples
are of most use in enforcing and illustrating and
strengthening a point already established, and they
generally follow arguments from sign.
Refutation.
One other class of arguments finds a place in debate:
namely, indirect arguments. It is
often as much an advantage to a debater to
dispose of objections as it is to establish his own case.
This is because a question usually has two alternatives.
If one can refute the arguments in favor of the opponent’s
position, he has by that very process established
his own. If the points of the refutation are of minor
importance and are related to any division of his own
direct argument, the refutation of such points should
be taken up in connection with the related parts of the
direct argument. If, however, it is an argument of
some weight and should be considered separate and
apart from the direct argument, it is generally wisest
to proceed to its demolition at the end of the direct
argument and before the conclusion of the whole. For
then the whole weight of the direct argument will be
thrown into the refutation and will render every word
so much the more destructive. Again, if the opposing
argument be very strong and have taken complete
possession of the audience, it must be attacked and
disposed of at the very beginning. Otherwise it is
impossible for the direct argument to make any advance.
142
From these suggestions one derives the general principle
that each case must be considered by itself.
There will be cases of conflict among the rules, and
there must be a careful weighing of methods. Common
sense and patient labor are the most valuable
assistants in arranging a powerful argument.
It hardly needs to be said that the suggestions made
in the chapter on Exposition regarding Mass and Coherence
should be observed here. In argument as in
exposition, topics are emphasized by position, and by
proportion in the scale of treatment. Here as there,
matters that are closely related in thought should be
connected in the discourse, and matters that are not related
in thought should not be associated in the essay.
It will be an advantage now to look through “Conciliation
with the Colonies” and note its general plan
of structure. Only the main divisions of this powerful
oration can be given, as to make a full brief would
deprive this piece of literature of half its value for
study.
Analysis of Burke’s Oration.
Mr. Burke begins by saying that it is “an awful
subject or there is none this side of the
grave.” He states that he has studied the
question for years, and while Parliament has
pursued a vacillating policy and one aggravating to
the colonies, he has a fixed policy and one sure to restore
“the former unsuspecting confidence in the Mother
Country.” His policy is simple peace. This by
way of introduction. He then divides the argument
into two large divisions and proceeds.
- Ought you to concede?
- What are “the true nature and the peculiar circumstances
of the object which we have before us?”
- America has a rapidly growing population.
- 143
It has a rapidly increasing commercial value, shown
by
- Its demand for our goods.
- The value of its agricultural products.
- The value of the products of its fisheries.
- There is in the people a “fierce spirit of liberty.”
This is the result of
- Their descent from Englishmen.
- Their popular form of government.
- Religion in the North.
- The haughty spirit of the South.
- Their education.
- Their remoteness from the governing body.
- “You have before you the object.” “What ... shall
we do with it?” “There are but three ways of
proceeding relative to this stubborn spirit in the
colonies.”
- To change it by removing the causes. This is impracticable.
- To prosecute it as criminal. This is inexpedient.
- To comply with it as necessary. This is the answer
to the first question.
- Of what nature ought the concession to be?
- A concession that grants to any colony the satisfaction
of the grievances it complains of brings about
conciliation and peace. This general proposition
is established by the following examples. It has
done so in
- Ireland,
- Wales,
- Durham, and
- Chester.
- The grievances complained of in America are unjust
taxation and no representation.
- Therefore these resolutions rehearsing facts and calculated
to satisfy their grievances will bring about
conciliation and peace.
- 144
They are unrepresented.
- They are taxed.
- No method has been devised for procuring a representation
in Parliament for the said Colonies.
- Each colony has within itself a body with powers to
raise, levy, and assess taxes.
- These assemblies have at sundry times granted large
subsidies and aids to his Majesty’s service.
- Experience teaches that it is expedient to follow
their method rather than force payment.
- As a result of the adoption of these resolutions,
“everything which has been made to enforce a
contrary system must, I take it for granted, fall
along with it. On that ground, I have drawn the
following resolutions.”
- It is proper to repeal certain legislation regarding
taxes, imports, and administration of justice.
- To secure a fair and unbiased judiciary.
- To provide better for the Courts of Admiralty.
- He next considers objections.
- Conclusion.
Notice first the introduction. It goes straight to the
question. To tell a large opposition that it has vacillated
on a great question is not calculated to win a kind
hearing; yet this point, necessary to Burke’s argument,
is so delicately handled that no one could be seriously
offended, nor could any one charge him with weakness.
The introduction serves its purpose; it gains the attention
of the audience and it exactly states the proposition.
He then divides the whole argument into two parts.
The framework is visible, and with intent. These great
divisions he takes up separately. First, that there
may be a perfect understanding of the question, he explains
“the true nature and the peculiar circumstances
of the object which we have before us.” This illustrates
145
the use of exposition in argument. The descent
and education did not prove that the Americans had
a fiery spirit; that was acknowledged and needed no
proof. It simply sets forth the facts,—facts which
he afterward uses as powerful instruments of conviction.
As long as a man can use exposition, he can
carry his readers with him; it is when he begins to
argue, to force matters, that he raises opposition. So
this use of exposition was fortunate. America was an
English colony. Her strength and riches were England’s
strength and wealth. It would be pleasing to
all Englishmen to hear the recital of America’s prosperity.
Up to the time he asks, “What, in the name
of God, shall we do with it,” the oration is not essentially
argument; it does nothing more than place “before
you the object.”
In the section marked “I. B,” Burke begins the real
argument by the method of elimination. He asserts
that there are only three ways of dealing with this
fierce spirit of liberty. Then he conclusively proves
the first impracticable and the second inexpedient.
There is left but the one course, concession. This
method of proof is absolutely conclusive if every possible
contingency is stated and provided for. Notice
that in this section “B” everything that was mentioned
in the first section “A” is used, and the whole is one
solid mass moving forward irresistibly to the conclusion
of the first and the most important part of this
argument.
The second main division is devoted to the conclusion
of the first. If you must concede,—the conclusion
of the first half,—what will be the nature of your
concession? A concession, to be a concession, must
grant what the colonists wish, not what the ministry
thinks would be good for them. Then by the history
146
of England’s dealings with Ireland, Wales, Chester,
and Durham, he proves that such a concession has been
followed by peace. This makes the major premise of
his syllogism, stated in “II. A.” The minor premise
is a statement of the grievances of the colonies. The
conclusion is in the resolutions for the redress of the
grievances of the colonies. The second part is then
one great syllogism, the premises of which are established
by ample proof, the conclusion of which cannot
well be disputed.
“And here I should close,” says the orator; the
direct argument is finished. There are some objections
which demand dignified consideration. At this point,
however, it is easy to refute any objections, for behind
each word there is now the crushing weight of the whole
argument.
The conclusion recites the advantages of Burke’s plan
over all others, and reasserts its value, now proven at
every point. It is a powerful summary, and a skillful
plea for the adoption of a policy of conciliation with
the colonies of America.
Every kind of argument is used in this oration. One
would look long for a treasury better supplied with
illustrations. The great conclusions are reached by
the certain methods of elimination and deduction. In
establishing the minor points Burke has used arguments
from sign, cause, example, and induction. He
calls in testimony; he quotes authority; he illustrates.
Not any device of sound argument that a man honest
in his search for truth may use has been omitted. It
is worthy of patient study.
In conclusion, the student of argument should learn
well the value of different kinds of argument; he
should exercise the most careful scrutiny in selecting
his material, without any hesitation rejecting irrelevant
147
matter; he should state the proposition so that it cannot
be misunderstood; he must consider his readers,
guiding his course wisely with regard for all the conditions
under which he produces his argument; he
should remember that the law in argument is climax,
and that coherence should be sought with infinite
pains. Above all, the man who takes up a debate
must be fair and honest; only so will he win favor
from his readers, and gain what is worth more than
victory,—the distinction of being a servant of truth.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS
QUESTIONS.
MACAULAY’S ESSAY ON MILTON.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 103.)
Put into a syllogism, Macaulay’s opponents said, “An
educated man living in an enlightened age has better facilities
for writing poetry than an uneducated man at the dawn
of civilization. Milton was an educated man, living in an enlightened
age; therefore Macaulay had better facilities,” etc.
Which premise does Macaulay attack? Does he demolish
it?
What value is there in an analogy between experimental
sciences and imitative arts? Between poetry and a magic-lantern?
Is either an argument that is convincing? Are
both effective in the essay?
What do you think of Macaulay’s estimate of Wordsworth?
Granting that this estimate is true, what kind of
a proof is it of the proposition that “his very talents will be
a hindrance to him”?
Is it a uniform phenomenon that as civilization advances,
poetry declines? Name some instances that prove it.
Name some instances that disprove it. What method of
proof have you used in both?
Is an uncivilized state of society the cause of good poetry,
or only an attendant circumstance?
What method of proof is adopted on pages 34 and 35?
Granting that you cannot conceive “a good man and an
unnatural father,” does that prove anything about the first
sentence at the bottom of page 55?
Does the example of the prisoner on page 60 prove anything?
149
BURKE’S SPEECH ON CONCILIATION WITH THE COLONIES.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 100.)
What argument does Burke use to prove that hedging in
the population is not practicable?
When he says that they will occupy territory because they
have done so, is that an inductive or deductive argument, or
is it an argument from sign?
If it is deductive, what is the suppressed premise?
Are the arguments from 48 to 64 more in the nature of
direct or indirect proofs?
What value is there in an indirect argument?
“Americans speak the English language, therefore they
are English.” Is the argument good? Where is the fault?
Look for the suppressed premise.
Is paragraph 55 direct or indirect argument?
Does he prove that criminal procedure against the colonies
would fail, by sign or by deduction?
Do the four precedents which he cites of Ireland, Wales,
Durham, and Chester prove that his plan will work in
America?
Upon what general principle do all arguments from example
depend?
Is paragraph 79 in itself exposition or argument?
What method is adopted in paragraph 88 to prove that
the principle of concession is applicable to America?
How does he prove that Americans were grieved by
taxes?
How does he establish the competence of the colony assemblies?
How could the arguments have made “the conclusion irresistible”?
(Paragraph 112.)
What principle of argument is stated in paragraph 114?
In paragraph 127 is the one example cited enough to
prove the rule?
Find an example of argument from sign. Is it a relation
of cause and effect? Is it conclusive?
150
In paragraph 129 what does Burke mention as arguments
of value?
What kind of arguments in paragraphs 128 to 136? What
is the conclusion?
Whenever Burke states a general truth it forms a part of
what? Supply the other premise in five cases, and derive
a conclusion.
Does he ever use an argument from cause to establish a
probability? To establish a fact?
Does he use deduction more frequently than sign?
Does he seek for a climax in the arrangement of the parts
of his brief?
CHAPTER VII
PARAGRAPHS
Definition.
So far we have been dealing with whole compositions;
we now take up the study of paragraphs,
sentences, and words. A paragraph
in many respects resembles a whole composition. It
may be narrative, descriptive, expositive, or argumentative.
It must have a beginning, a middle, and an
end. It is constructed with regard to Unity, Mass, and
Coherence. And as a whole composition treats a single
theme, so a paragraph treats one division of a theme.
It has been defined as a composition in miniature. A
paragraph is a sentence or a group of sentences serving
a single purpose in the development of a theme. The
purpose may be simply to announce the theme-subject,
to make a conclusion, to indicate a transition; but in
the great majority of cases its purpose is to treat a
single topic. So true is this that many authors, with
good reason, define a paragraph as a group of sentences
treating a single topic.
Long and Short Paragraphs.
Nobody would have trouble in telling where on a
page a paragraph began and where it ended.
The indention at the beginning, and usually
the incomplete line at the end, mark its visible
limits. Unfortunately there is no specified length
after which the writer is to make a break in the lines
and begin a new paragraph. The length of a paragraph
depends on something deeper than appearances; as the
topic requires a lengthy or but a short treatment, as
152
the paragraph may be a long summary or a short transition,
the length of a paragraph varies. Yet there is
one circumstance which should counsel an author to
keep his paragraphs within certain bounds: he should
always have regard for his readers. Readers shirk
heavy labor. If a book or an article looks hard, it is
passed by; if it looks easy, it is read. If the paragraphs
be long and the page solid, the composition
looks difficult; if the paragraphs be short and the page
broken, the piece looks easy. This fact should advise a
writer to make the page attractive by using short paragraphs;
provided, and the provision is important, he
can so make real paragraphs, divisions of composition
that fully treat one topic. These divisions may in
reality be but one sentence, and they may just as unquestionably
be two pages of hard reading.
Successive paragraphs, each more than a page of
ordinary print in length, repel as too hard; and a
series of paragraphs of less than a quarter of a page
impresses a reader as scrappy, and the work seems to
lack the authority of complete treatment. An author
will serve his readers and himself best by so subdividing
his subject that the paragraphs are within these limits.
The following paragraph is much too long and can
with no difficulty be subdivided. The paragraphs in
the next group are too short, and they are incomplete.
“Keating rode up now, and the transaction became more
complicated. It ended in the purchase of the horse by Bryce
for a hundred and twenty, to be paid on the delivery of
Wildfire, safe and sound, at the Batherley stables. It did
occur to Dunsey that it might be wise for him to give up the
day’s hunting, proceed at once to Batherley, and, having
waited for Bryce’s return, hire a horse to carry him home
with the money in his pocket. But the inclination for a run,
153
encouraged by confidence in his luck, and by a draught of
brandy from his pocket-pistol at the conclusion of the bargain,
was not easy to overcome, especially with a horse under
him that would take the fences to the admiration of the field.
Dunstan, however, took one fence too many, and got his
horse pierced with a hedge-stake. His own ill-favored person,
which was quite unmarketable, escaped without injury;
but poor Wildfire, unconscious of his price, turned on his
flank, and painfully panted his last. It happened that Dunstan,
a short time before, having had to get down to arrange
his stirrup, had muttered a good many curses at this interruption,
which had thrown him in the rear of the hunt near
the moment of glory, and under this exasperation had taken
the fences more blindly. He would soon have been up with
the hounds again, when the fatal accident happened; and
hence he was between eager riders in advance, not troubling
themselves about what happened behind them, and far-off
stragglers, who were as likely as not to pass quite aloof from
the line of road in which Wildfire had fallen. Dunstan,
whose nature it was to care more for immediate annoyances
than for remote consequences, no sooner recovered his legs,
and saw that it was all over with Wildfire, than he felt a
satisfaction at the absence of witnesses to a position which
no swaggering could make enviable. Reinforcing himself,
after his shake, with a little brandy and much swearing, he
walked as fast as he could to a coppice on his right hand,
through which it occurred to him that he could make his
way to Batherley without danger of encountering any member
of the hunt. His first intention was to hire a horse there
and ride home forthwith, for to walk many miles without a
gun in his hand, and along an ordinary road, was as much
out of the question to him as to other spirited young men of
his kind. He did not much mind about taking the bad news
to Godfrey, for he had to offer him at the same time the
resource of Marner’s money; and if Godfrey kicked, as he
always did, at the notion of making a fresh debt, from which
he himself got the smallest share of advantage, why, he
154
wouldn’t kick long: Dunstan felt sure he could worry Godfrey
into anything. The idea of Marner’s money kept
growing in vividness, now the want of it had become immediate;
the prospect of having to make his appearance with
the muddy boots of a pedestrian at Batherley, and to encounter
the grinning queries of stablemen, stood unpleasantly in
the way of his impatience to be back at Raveloe and carry
out his felicitous plan; and a casual visitation of his waistcoat-pocket,
as he was ruminating, awakened his memory to
the fact that the two or three small coins his fore-finger encountered
there were of too pale a color to cover that small
debt, without payment of which the stable-keeper had declared
he would never do any more business with Dunsey Cass.
After all, according to the direction in which the run had
brought him, he was not so very much farther from home
than he was from Batherley; but Dunsey, not being remarkable
for clearness of head, was only led to this conclusion by
the gradual perception that there were other reasons for
choosing the unprecedented course of walking home. It was
now nearly four o’clock, and a mist was gathering: the sooner
he got into the road the better. He remembered having
crossed the road and seen the finger-post only a little while
before Wildfire broke down; so, buttoning his coat, twisting
the lash of his hunting-whip compactly round the handle, and
rapping the tops of his boots with a self-possessed air, as if to
assure himself that he was not at all taken by surprise, he
set off with the sense that he was undertaking a remarkable
feat of bodily exertion, which somehow, and at some time,
he should be able to dress up and magnify to the admiration
of a select circle at the Rainbow. When a young gentleman
like Dunsey is reduced to so exceptional a mode of locomotion
as walking, a whip in his hand is a desirable corrective
to a too bewildering dreamy sense of unwontedness in his
position; and Dunstan, as he went along through the gathering
mist, was always rapping his whip somewhere. It was
Godfrey’s whip, which he had chosen to take without leave
because it had a gold handle; of course no one could see,
155
when Dunstan held it, that the name Godfrey Cass was cut
in deep letters on that gold handle—they could only see
that it was a very handsome whip. Dunsey was not without
fear that he might meet some acquaintance in whose eyes he
would cut a pitiable figure, for mist is no screen when people
get close to each other; but when he at last found himself in
the well-known Raveloe lanes without having met a soul, he
silently remarked that that was part of his usual good luck.
But now the mist, helped by the evening darkness, was more
of a screen than he desired, for it hid the ruts into which his
feet were liable to slip—hid everything, so that he had to
guide his steps by dragging his whip along the low bushes in
advance of the hedgerow. He must soon, he thought, be
getting near the opening at the Stone-pits: he should find it
out by the break in the hedgerow. He found it out, however,
by another circumstance which he had not expected—namely,
by certain gleams of light, which he presently guessed
to proceed from Silas Marner’s cottage. That cottage and
the money hidden within it had been in his mind continually
during his walk, and he had been imagining ways of cajoling
and tempting the weaver to part with the immediate possession
of his money for the sake of receiving interest. Dunstan
felt as if there must be a little frightening added to the
cajolery, for his own arithmetical convictions were not clear
enough to afford him any forcible demonstration as to the
advantages of interest; and as for security, he regarded it
vaguely as a means of cheating a man by making him believe
that he would be paid. Altogether, the operation on the
miser’s mind was a task that Godfrey would be sure to hand
over to his more daring and cunning brother: Dunstan had
made up his mind to that; and by the time he saw the light
gleaming through the chinks of Marner’s shutters, the idea
of a dialogue with the weaver had become so familiar to him,
that it occurred to him as quite a natural thing to make the
acquaintance forthwith. There might be several conveniences
attending this course: the weaver had possibly got
a lantern, and Dunstan was tired of feeling his way. He
156
was still nearly three quarters of a mile from home, and
the lane was becoming unpleasantly slippery, for the mist
was passing into rain. He turned up the bank, not without
some fear lest he might miss the right way, since he was not
certain whether the light were in front or on the side of the
cottage. But he felt the ground before him cautiously with
his whip-handle, and at last arrived safely at the door. He
knocked loudly, rather enjoying the idea that the old fellow
would be frightened at the sudden noise. He heard no
movement in reply: all was silence in the cottage. Was the
weaver gone to bed, then? If so, why had he left a light?
That was a strange forgetfulness in a miser. Dunstan
knocked still more loudly, and, without pausing for a reply,
pushed his fingers through the latch-hole, intending to shake
the door and pull the latch-string up and down, not doubting
that the door was fastened. But, to his surprise, at this
double motion the door opened, and he found himself in
front of a bright fire, which lit up every corner of the cottage—the
bed, the loom, the three chairs, and the table—and
showed him that Marner was not there.”
“The country, all white, lit up by the fire, shone like a
cloth of silver tinted with red.
“A bell, far off, began to toll.
“The old ‘Sauvage’ remained standing before her ruined
dwelling, armed with her gun, her son’s gun, for fear lest
one of those men might escape.
“When she saw that it was ended, she threw her weapon
into the brasier. A loud report rang back.
“People were coming, the peasants, the Prussians.
“They found the woman seated on the trunk of a tree,
calm and satisfied.
“A German officer, who spoke French like a son of
France, demanded of her:—
“‘Where are your soldiers?’
“She extended her thin arm towards the red heap of fire
which was gradually going out, and she answered with a
strong voice:—
157
“‘There!’
“They crowded round her. The Prussian asked:—
“‘How did it take fire?’
“She said:—
“‘It was I who set it on fire.’”
Topic Sentence.
Paragraphs are developments of a definite topic;
and this topic is generally announced at the
beginning of the paragraph. In isolated
paragraphs, paragraphs that are indeed compositions
in miniature, the topic-sentence is the first sentence.
The reader is then advised of the subject of the discussion;
and as sentence after sentence passes him, he
can relate it to the topic, and the thought is a cumulative
whole. If the subject be not announced, the
individual sentences must be held in mind until the
reader catches the drift of the discussion, or the author
at last presents the topic.
Below are four paragraphs, from different forms of
discourse, all having the topic-sentence at the beginning.
“But success or defeat was a minor matter to them, who
had only thought for the safety of those they loved. Amelia,
at the news of the victory, became still more agitated even
than before. She was for going that moment to the army.
She besought her brother with tears to conduct her thither.
Her doubts and terrors reached their paroxysm; and the
poor girl, who for many hours had been plunged into stupor,
raved and ran hither and thither in hysteric insanity,—a
piteous sight. No man writhing in pain in the hard-fought
field fifteen miles off, where lay, after their struggles, so
many of the brave—no man suffered more keenly than this
poor harmless victim of the war. Jos could not bear the
sight of her pain. He left his sister in the charge of her
stouter female companion and descended once more to the
threshold of the hotel, where everybody still lingered, and
talked, and waited for more news.”
158
”Yet the fact remains that the honey-bee is essentially a
wild creature, and never has been and cannot be thoroughly
domesticated. Its proper home is the woods, and thither
every new swarm counts on going; and thither many do go
in spite of the care and watchfulness of the bee-keeper. If
the woods in any given locality are deficient in trees with
suitable cavities, the bees resort to all kinds of makeshifts;
they go into chimneys, into barns and outhouses, under stones,
into rocks, and so forth. Several chimneys in my locality
with disused flues are taken possession of by colonies of
bees nearly every season. One day, while bee-hunting, I developed
a line that went toward a farmhouse where I had
reason to believe no bees were kept. I followed it up and
questioned the farmer about his bees. He said he kept no
bees, but that a swarm had taken possession of his chimney,
and another had gone under the clapboards in the gable
end of his house. He had taken a large lot of honey out of
both places the year before. Another farmer told me that one
day his family had seen a number of bees examining a knot-hole
in the side of his house; the next day as they were sitting
down to dinner their attention was attracted by a loud
humming noise, when they discovered a swarm of bees settling
upon the side of the house and pouring into the knot-hole.
In subsequent years other swarms came to the same
place.”
“It is important, therefore, to hold fast to this: that poetry
is at bottom a criticism of life; that the greatness of a
poet lies in his powerful and beautiful application of ideas
to life,—to the question: How to live. Morals are often
treated in a narrow and false fashion; they are bound up
with systems of thought and belief which have had their day;
they have fallen into the hands of pedants and professional
dealers; they grow tiresome to some of us. We find attraction,
at times, even in a poetry of revolt against them; in a
poetry which might take for its motto Omar Khayyam’s
words: ‘Let us make up in the tavern for the time which
159
we have wasted in the mosque.’ Or we find attractions in a
poetry indifferent to them; in a poetry where the contents
may be what they will, but where the form is studied and
exquisite. We delude ourselves in either case; and the best
cure for our delusion is to let our minds rest upon that great
and inexhaustible word life, until we learn to enter into its
meaning. A poetry of revolt against moral ideas is a poetry
of revolt against life; a poetry of indifference toward moral
ideas is a poetry of indifference toward life.“
“The advantages arising from a system of copyright are
obvious. It is desirable that we should have a supply of
good books: we cannot have such a supply unless men of
letters are liberally remunerated; and the least objectionable
way of remunerating them is by means of copyright.
You cannot depend for literary instruction and amusement
on the leisure of men occupied in the pursuits of active life.
Such men may occasionally produce compositions of great
merit. But you must not look to such men for works which
require deep meditation and long research. Works of that
kind you can expect only from persons who make literature
the business of their lives. Of these persons few will be
found among the rich and the noble. The rich and the noble
are not impelled to intellectual exertion by necessity. They
may be impelled to intellectual exertion by the desire of distinguishing
themselves, or by the desire of benefiting the community.
But it is generally within these walls that they seek
to signalize themselves and to serve their fellow-creatures.
Both their ambition and their public spirit, in a country like
this, naturally take a political turn. It is then on men whose
profession is literature, and whose private means are not
ample, that you must rely for a supply of valuable books.
Such men must be remunerated for their literary labor. And
there are only two ways in which they can be remunerated.
One of those ways is patronage; the other is copyright.”
160
Frequently the topic-sentence is delayed until after
the connection between what was said in the preceding
paragraph and what will be said has been made. To
establish this relation requires sometimes but a word
or a short phrase, and sometimes sentences. In these
cases the topic-sentence follows the transition, and it
may come as late as the middle of the paragraph.
“The crows we have always with us, but it is not every
day or every season that one sees an eagle. Hence I must
preserve the memory of one I saw the last day I went bee-hunting.
As I was laboring up the side of a mountain at
the head of a valley, the noble bird sprang from the top of a
dry tree above me and came sailing directly over my head.
I saw him bend his eye down upon me, and I could hear the
low hum of his plumage, as if the web of every quill in his
great wings vibrated in his strong, level flight. I watched
him as long as my eye could hold him. When he was fairly
clear of the mountain he began that sweeping spiral movement
in which he climbs the sky. Up and up he went without
once breaking his majestic poise till he appeared to sight
some far-off alien geography, when he bent his course thitherward,
and gradually vanished in the blue depths. The eagle
is a bird of large ideas, he embraces long distances; the continent
is his home. I never look upon one without emotion; I
follow him with my eye as long as I can. I think of Canada,
of the Great Lakes, of the Rocky Mountains, of the wild and
sounding sea-coast. The waters are his, and the woods and
the inaccessible cliffs. He pierces behind the veil of the
storm, and his joy is height and depth and vast spaces.”
“Now these insinuations and questions shall be answered
in their proper places; here I will but say that I scorn and
detest lying, and quibbling, and double-tongued practice, and
slyness, and cunning, and smoothness, and cant, and pretence,
quite as much as any Protestants hate them; and I pray to
161
be kept from the snare of them. But all this is just now by
the bye; my present subject is my Accuser; what I insist
upon here is this unmanly attempt of his, in his concluding
pages, to cut the ground from under my feet;—to poison by
anticipation the public mind against me, John Henry Newman,
and to infuse into the imaginations of my readers suspicion
and mistrust of everything that I may say in reply to
him. This I call poisoning the wells.” (“Apologia.”)
In exposition and argument, and sometimes in the
other forms of discourse, the topic-sentence may be at
the end of the paragraph. This is for emphasis in narration
and description. In exposition and argument
it is better to lead up to an unwelcome truth than to
announce it at once.
“Thus the matter of life, so far as we know it (and we
have no right to speculate on any other), breaks up, in consequence
of that continual death which is the condition of its
manifesting vitality, into carbonic acid, water, and nitrogenous
compounds which certainly possess no properties but
those of ordinary matter. And out of these same forms of
ordinary matter, and from none which are simpler, the vegetable
world builds up all the protoplasm which keeps the
animal world a-going. Plants are the accumulators of the
power which animals distribute and disperse.“
No Topic-Sentence.
Sometimes no topic-sentence appears in the paragraph.
In such a case it is easily discovered;
or at times it is too fragile to be compressed
into any definite shape—a feeling, or a sentiment too
delicate, too volatile for expression. A paragraph with
no topic-sentence is most common in narration and description.
“The tide of color has ebbed from the upper sky. In
the west the sea of sunken fire draws back; and the stars
leap forth, and tremble, and retire before the advancing
162
moon, who slips the silver train of cloud from her shoulders,
and, with her foot upon the pine-tops, surveys heaven.”
(“Richard Feverel,” by George Meredith.)
The Plan.
Whether the topic form a part of the paragraph or
not, it should be distinctly before the writer,
and he should write upon the topic. Nothing
contributes so much to the success of paragraphs as a
definite treatment of one single topic. The paragraph
is the development, the growth of this topic, as the
plant is the development of its seed. Moreover, the
development is according to a definite plan. The different
steps are not usually laid out, as was done in the
outline of a theme. Genung, in the “Practical Elements
of Rhetoric,” presents what he calls a typical
form for a paragraph. It shows that a paragraph which
is fully developed is in reality a miniature theme. It
is as follows:—
The Subject proposed.
- Whatever is needed to explain the subject.
Repetition.
Obverse.
Definition.
- Whatever is needed to establish the subject.
Exemplification or detail.
Illustration.
Proof.
- Whatever is needed to apply the subject.
Result or consequence.
Enforcement.
Summary or recapitulation.
Kinds of Paragraphs.
This typical form of a paragraph embodies all that
paragraphs may do, and it is the logical arrangement.
However, it is rare, perhaps it never occurs, that a
paragraph is found having all these elements developed.
163
The purpose determines which part of a paragraph
should receive the amplification. If it
be narrative or descriptive, there is no definition
or proof; but the development by details
will predominate. In an argument, definition and proof
will form the large part of the paragraphs. Again, the
position in the theme determines what kind of a paragraph
should be used. In exposition the first paragraphs
would be devoted to stating the proposition,
and would therefore be largely given up to definition
and repetition; the body would be especially paragraphs
of detail and illustration; while the closing
paragraph would be taken up with results and a summary.
As one of the elements of a paragraph has
been especially developed, paragraphs have been named
paragraphs of repetition, of the obverse, of details, of
instances or examples, and of comparisons. Such a
division is somewhat mechanical; but for purposes of
study and for conscious practice in construction it has
value.
Details.
The paragraph of details is by far the most common.
It is found in all kinds of discourse. It originates
from the fact that persons generally
give the general truth first and follow this statement
with the details or particulars. Whether the storyteller
begins by saying, “Now I’ll tell you just how
they happened to be there;” or the traveler writes,
“From the Place de la Concorde one has about him
magnificent views,” or “There were many unfortunate
circumstances about the Dreyfus affair;” in each
case he will follow the general statement of the opening
sentence with sentences going into particulars or
details.
“All was now bustle and hubbub in the late quiet schoolroom.
164
The scholars were hurried through their lessons without
stopping at trifles; those who were nimble skipped over
half with impunity, and those who were tardy had a smart
application now and then in the rear, to quicken their speed
or help them over a tall word. Books were flung aside
without being put away on the shelves, inkstands were overturned,
benches thrown down, and the whole school was
turned loose an hour before the usual time, bursting forth
like a legion of young imps, yelping and racketing about the
green in joy at their early emancipation.”
“It was toward evening that Ichabod arrived at the castle
of the Heer Van Tassel, which he found thronged with the
pride and flower of the adjacent country. Old farmers, a
spare leathern-faced race, in homespun coats and breeches,
blue stocking, huge shoes, and magnificent pewter buckles.
Their brisk, withered little dames, in close crimped caps,
long-waisted short-gowns, homespun petticoats, with scissors
and pincushions, and gay calico pockets hanging on the outside.
Buxom lasses, almost as antiquated as their mothers,
excepting where a straw hat, a fine ribbon, or perhaps a
white frock gave symptoms of city innovation. The sons,
in short square-skirted coats, with rows of stupendous brass
buttons, and their hair generally queued in the fashion of the
times, especially if they could procure an eelskin for the
purpose, it being esteemed throughout the country as a
potent nourisher and strengthener of the hair.”32
“The enemies of the Parliament, indeed, rarely choose
to take issue in the great points of the question. They content
themselves with exposing some of the crimes and follies
to which public commotions necessarily give birth. They
bewail the unmerited fate of Strafford. They execrate the
lawless violence of the army. They laugh at the scriptural
names of the preachers. Major-generals fleecing their districts;
soldiers reveling on the spoils of a ruined peasantry;
upstarts, enriched by the public plunder, taking possession
of the hospitable firesides and hereditary trees of the old
165
gentry; boys smashing the beautiful windows of cathedrals;
Quakers riding naked through the market-place; Fifth-monarchy
men shouting for King Jesus; agitators lecturing from
the tops of tubs on the fate of Agag,—all these, they tell us,
were the offspring of the great Rebellion.”
In narration and in a short paragraph of description
this paragraph of details is frequently without a topic-sentence.
The circumstances that make up a transaction
are grouped, but there is no need of writing,
“I will now detail this.” In the following, since the
paragraph is plainly about the preparation for the
fight, it is unnecessary to say so. Such a patent statement
would hinder the movement of the story.
“Alan drew a dirk, which he held in his left hand in
case they should run in under his sword. I, on my part,
clambered up into the berth with an armful of pistols and
something of a heavy heart, and set open the window where
I was to watch. It was a small part of the deck that I
could overlook, but enough for our purpose. The sea had
gone down, and the wind was steady and kept the sails
quiet; so that there was a great stillness on the ship, in
which I made sure I heard the sound of muttering voices.
A little after, and there came a clash of steel upon the deck,
by which I knew they were dealing out the cutlasses, and
one had been let fall; and after that silence again.”
Comparisons.
The paragraph of comparisons tells what a thing is
like and what a thing is not like. It is much
used in description and exposition. It is often
the clearest way to describe an object or to explain a
proposition. One thing may be likened to a number
of things, drawing from each a quality that more definitely
pictures it; or it may be compared with but one,
and the likeness may be followed out to the limit of
its value. In the same manner it is often of value
166
to tell what a thing or a proposition does not resemble,
to contrast it with one or more ideas, and by this
means exclude what might otherwise be confusing.
Note that after the negative comparison the paragraph
closes with what it is like, or what it is.
From Macaulay’s long comparison of the writings of
Milton and Dante, one paragraph is enough to illustrate
the use of contrast.
“Now let us compare with the exact details of Dante the
dim intimations of Milton. We will cite a few examples.
The English poet has never thought of taking the measure
of Satan. He gives us merely a vague idea of vast bulk.
In one passage the fiend lies stretched out, huge in length,
floating many a rood, equal in size to the earth-born enemies
of Jove, or to the sea monster which the mariner mistakes
for an island. When he addresses himself to battle
against the guardian angels, he stands like Teneriffe or
Atlas; his stature reaches the sky. Contrast with these
descriptions the lines in which Dante has described the gigantic
spectre of Nimrod: ‘His face seemed to me as long
and as broad as the ball of St. Peter’s at Rome, and his
other limbs were in proportion; so that the bank, which concealed
him from the waist downwards, nevertheless showed
so much of him that three tall Germans would in vain have
attempted to reach to his hair.’” (“Essay on Milton.”)
The following indicates the use of similarity.
“It is the character of such revolutions that we always
see the worst of them at first. Till men have been some
time free, they know not how to use their freedom. The
natives of wine countries are generally sober. In climates
where wine is a rarity intemperance abounds. A newly
liberated people may be compared to a northern army
encamped on the Rhine or the Xeres. It is said that, when
soldiers in such a situation first find themselves able to indulge
without restraint in such a rare and expensive luxury,
nothing is to be seen but intoxication. Soon, however, plenty
167
teaches discretion, and, after wine has been for a few months
their daily fare, they become more temperate than they had
ever been in their own country. In the same manner, the
final and permanent fruits of liberty are wisdom, moderation,
and mercy. Its immediate effects are often atrocious
crimes, conflicting errors, skepticism on points the most clear,
dogmatism on points the most mysterious. It is just at this
crisis that its enemies love to exhibit it. They pull down the
scaffolding from the half-finished edifice; they point to the
flying dust, the falling bricks, the comfortless rooms, the
frightful irregularity of the whole appearance, and then ask
in scorn where the promised splendor and comfort is to be
found. If such miserable sophisms were to prevail, there
would never be a good house or a good government in the
world.” (“Essay on Milton,” by Lord Macaulay.)
Repetition.
A third method of developing a paragraph from
a topic-sentence is by repetition. Simply to
repeat in other words would be useless redundancy;
but so to repeat that with each repetition the
thought broadens or deepens is valuable in proposing
a subject or explaining it. No person has attained
greater skill in repetition than Matthew Arnold, and
much of his clearness comes from his repetition, often
of the very same phrases.
“Wordsworth has been in his grave for some thirty years,
and certainly his lovers and admirers cannot flatter themselves
that this great and steady light of glory as yet shines
over him. He is not fully recognized at home; he is not
recognized at all abroad. Yet I firmly believe that the
poetical performance of Wordsworth is, after that of Shakespeare
and Milton, of which all the world now recognizes the
worth, undoubtedly the most considerable in our language
from the Elizabethan age to the present time. Chaucer is
anterior; and on other grounds, too, he cannot well be
brought into the comparison. But taking the roll of our
chief poetical names, besides Shakespeare and Milton, from
168
the age of Elizabeth downwards, and going through it,—Spenser,
Dryden, Pope, Gray, Goldsmith, Cowper, Burns,
Coleridge, Scott, Campbell, Moore, Byron, Shelley, Keats
(I mention those only who are dead),—I think it certain
that Wordsworth’s name deserves to stand, and will finally
stand, above them all. Several of the poets named have
gifts and excellencies which Wordsworth has not. But taking
the performance of each as a whole, I say that Wordsworth
seems to me to have left a body of poetical work
superior in power, in interest, in the qualities which give
enduring freshness, to that which any one of the others has
left.” (“Essay on Wordsworth,” by Matthew Arnold.)
“Perhaps no person can be a poet, or can even enjoy
poetry, without a certain unsoundness of mind, if anything
which gives so much pleasure ought to be called unsoundness.
By poetry we mean not all writing in verse, nor even all
good writing in verse. Our definition excludes many metrical
compositions which, on other grounds, deserve the highest
praise. By poetry, we mean the art of employing words
in such a manner as to produce an illusion on the imagination,
the art of doing by means of words what the painter
does by means of colors. Thus the greatest of the poets has
described it, in lines universally admired for the vigor and
felicity of their diction, and still more valuable on account
of the just notion which they convey of the art in which he
excelled:—
‘As imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.’
These are the fruits of the ‘fine frenzy’ which he ascribes to
the poet,—a fine frenzy, doubtless, but still a frenzy. Truth,
indeed, is essential to poetry, but it is the truth of madness.
The reasonings are just, but the premises are false. After
the first suppositions have been made, everything ought to
be consistent; but those first suppositions require a degree
of credulity which almost amounts to a partial and temporary
derangement of the intellect. Hence, of all people,
169
children are the most imaginative. They abandon themselves
without reserve to every illusion. Every image which
is strongly presented to their mental eye produces in them
the effect of reality. No man, whatever his sensibility may
be, is ever affected by Hamlet or Lear as a little girl is
affected by the story of poor Red Riding Hood. She knows
it is all false, that wolves cannot speak, that there are no
wolves in England. Yet in spite of her knowledge she believes;
she weeps; she trembles; she dares not go into a
dark room lest she should feel the teeth of the monster at
her throat. Such is the despotism of the imagination over
uncultivated minds.” (“Essay on Milton,” by Macaulay.)
Obverse.
A fourth method of building up a paragraph from a
topic-sentence consists in telling what it is
not; that is, giving the obverse. This is very
effective in argument, and is employed in exposition
and description. The obverse usually follows a positive
statement, and again is followed by the affirmative;
that is, first what it is, then what it is not, and last,
what it is again. In the following description by
Ruskin, the method appears and reappears. Notice
the “nots” and “buts,” indicating the change from
the negative to the positive statement. It would be a
sacrilege to omit the last paragraph, though it does not
illustrate this manner of development.
“For all other rivers there is a surface, and an underneath,
and a vaguely displeasing idea of the bottom. But
the Rhone flows like one lambent jewel; its surface is nowhere,
its ethereal self is everywhere, the iridescent rush
and translucent strength of it blue to the shore, and radiant
to the depth.
“Fifteen feet thick, not of flowing, but flying water; not
water, neither—melted glacier, rather, one should call it;
the force of the ice is with it, and the wreathing of the
clouds, the gladness of the sky, and the continuance of
Time.
170
“Waves of clear sea are, indeed, lovely to watch, but they
are always coming or gone, never in any taken shape to be
seen for a second. But here was one mighty wave that was
always itself, and every fluted swirl of it, constant as the
wreathing of a shell. No wasting away of the fallen foam,
no pause for gathering of power, no helpless ebb of discouraged
recoil; but alike through bright day and lulling night,
the never-pausing plunge, and never-fading flash, and never-hushing
whisper, and, while the sun was up, the ever-answering
glow of unearthly aquamarine, ultramarine, violet-blue,
gentian-blue, peacock-blue, river-of-paradise blue, glass
of a painted window melted in the sun, and the witch of
the Alps flinging the spun tresses of it forever from her
snow.
“The innocent way, too, in which the river used to stop
to look into every little corner. Great torrents always seem
angry, and great rivers are often too sullen; but there is no
anger, no disdain in the Rhone. It seemed as if the mountain
stream was in mere bliss at recovering itself again out of
the lake-sleep, and raced because it rejoiced in racing, fain
yet to return and stay. There were pieces of wave that
danced all day, as if Perdita were looking on to learn; there
were little streams that skipped like lambs and leaped like
chamois; there were pools that shook the sunshine all through
them, and were rippled in layers of overlaid ripples, like
crystal sand; there were currents that twisted the light into
golden braids, and inlaid the threads with turquoise enamel;
there were strips of stream that had certainly above the lake
been mill-stream, and were looking busily for mills to turn
again; and there were shoots of stream that had once shot
fearfully into the air, and now sprang up again, laughing,
that they had only fallen a foot or two;—and in the midst
of all the gay glittering and eddied lingering, the noble bearing
by of the midmost depth, so mighty, yet so terrorless and
harmless, with its swallows skimming in spite of petrels, and
the dear old decrepit town as safe in the embracing sweep
of it as if it were set in a brooch of sapphires.”
171
This extract from Burke’s speech is a good example
of the same method.
“I put this consideration of the present and the growing
numbers in the front of our deliberation, because, Sir, this
consideration will make it evident to a blunter discernment
than yours, that no partial, narrow, contracted, pinched,
occasional system will be at all suitable to such an object.
It will show you that it is not to be considered as one of
those minima which are out of the eye and consideration of
the law; not a paltry excrescence of the state; not a mean
dependent, who may be neglected with little damage and
provoked with little danger. It will prove that some degree
of care and caution is required in the handling such an object;
it will show that you ought not, in reason, to trifle with
so large a mass of the interests and feelings of the human
race. You could at no time do so without guilt; and be
assured you will not be able to do it long with impunity.”
Examples.
A fifth method of expanding a topic is by means of
illustrations and examples. It is used largely
in establishing or enforcing a proposition.
The author selects one example, or perhaps more than
one, to illustrate his proposition. Note the words that
may introduce specific instances: for example, for instance,
to illustrate, a case in point, and so forth.
In the first of the following quotations, Cardinal
Newman is showing that simply to acquire is not true
mental enlargement. The paragraph is made up of
a series of instances. The second paragraph is by
Macaulay.
“The case is the same still more strikingly when the
persons in question are beyond dispute men of inferior powers
and deficient education. Perhaps they have been much
in foreign countries, and they receive, in a passive, otiose,
unfruitful way, the various facts which are forced upon
them there. Seafaring men, for example, range from one
172
end of the earth to the other; but the multiplicity of external
objects which they have encountered forms no symmetrical
and consistent picture upon their imagination; they see
the tapestry of human life, as it were, on the wrong side, and
it tells no story. They sleep, and they rise up, and they find
themselves, now in Europe, now in Asia; they see visions
of great cities and wild regions; they are in the marts of
commerce, or amid the islands of the South; they gaze on
Pompey’s Pillar, or on the Andes; and nothing which meets
them carries them forward or backward, to any idea beyond
itself. Nothing has a drift or relation; nothing has a history
or a promise. Everything stands by itself and comes
and goes in its turn, like the shifting scenes of a show, which
leave the spectator where he was. Perhaps you are near
such a man on a particular occasion, and expect him to be
shocked or perplexed at something which occurs; but one
thing is much the same to him as another; or, if he is perplexed,
it is as not knowing what to say, whether it is right
to admire, or to ridicule, or to disapprove, while conscious
that some expression of opinion is expected from him; for
in fact he has no standard of judgment at all, and no landmarks
to guide him to a conclusion. Such is mere acquisition,
and, I repeat, no one would dream of calling it philosophy.”
(“Idea of a University,” by Cardinal Newman.)
“I will give another instance. One of the most instructive,
interesting, and delightful books in our language is
Boswell’s ‘Life of Johnson.’ Now it is well known that
Boswell’s eldest son considered this book, considered the
whole relation of Boswell to Johnson, as a blot in the escutcheon
of the family. He thought, not perhaps altogether
without reason, that his father had exhibited himself in a
ludicrous and degrading light. And thus he became so sore
and irritable that at last he could not bear to hear the ‘Life
of Johnson’ mentioned. Suppose that the law had been
what my honorable and learned friend wishes to make it.
Suppose that the copyright of Boswell’s ‘Life of Johnson’
had belonged, as it well might, during sixty years, to Boswell’s
eldest son. What would have been the consequence?
173
An unadulterated copy of the finest biographical work in the
world would have been as scarce as the first edition of Camden’s
‘Britannia.’“ (Speech, “Copyright,” by Macaulay.)
Combines Two or More Forms.
As was said at the beginning, a paragraph is seldom
made exclusively of one form. One part of
the typical paragraph is usually developed
more than any other and gives to the paragraph
its character and its name. By far the most
common variety of paragraph is that which combines
two or more of the other forms. It is not necessary to
cite examples; they are everywhere. Though combination
is the commonest method of development, it
should be guarded. It is a poor paragraph that combines
the forms indiscriminately. It should follow some
plan; and the best plan is the one already given in
the typical paragraph.
All paragraphs, whatever be the special method of development,
are governed by the three principles which
have guided in the structure of whole compositions.
Whether the purpose be to prove or to narrate, to
enforce a conclusion or to illustrate, if a paragraph is
to produce its greatest effect, it should have unity,
it should be well massed, and it should be coherent.
It is not necessary now to define unity in a paragraph;
the need is rather to notice the offenses
against it that frequently occur. They are manifestly
two: too much may be included, and not all
may be included. The accompanying circumstance
of the one, not necessarily the cause, however, is often
a very long paragraph, and of the other a short paragraph.
Unity.
Violations of the unity of a paragraph most frequently
result from including more than belongs
there. The theme has been selected; it
is narrow and concise. When one begins to write, many
174
things crowd in pell-mell. Impressions, which come
and go, we hardly know how or why, are the only products
of most minds. Impressions, not shaped and
logical thoughts, make up the mixed confusion frequently
called a theme. The writer puts down enough
of these impressions to make a paragraph, and then
goes on to do it again, fancying that so he is really
paragraphing. Even should he keep within the limits
of his theme, he cannot in this way paragraph. As
everything upon a subject does not belong in a theme,
so everything in a theme may not be introduced indiscriminately
into any paragraph.
The other danger lies in the short paragraph. It
does not allow a writer room to say all he has to say
upon the topic, so it runs over into the next paragraph.
All of the thought-paragraph should appear in one
division on the page. This error is not so common as
the former. Examples of each are to be found on
pages 152-157.
Need of Outline.
The remedy for this confusion clearly is hard thinking;
and a great assistance is the outline.
Before a word is written, think through the
theme; get clearly the purpose of each paragraph in
the development of the whole. Then write just what
the paragraph was intended to include, and no more.
More will be suggested because the parts of a whole
theme are all closely related, but that more belongs
somewhere else. Make a sharp outline, and follow it.
Mass.
A paragraph should be so arranged that the parts
which arrest the eye will be important. When a
person glances down a page, his eye rests upon the
beginning and the end of each paragraph.
A reader going rapidly through an article to
get what he wants of it does not read religiously every
175
word; he knows that he will be directed to the contents
of each paragraph by the first and last sentences. If a
writer considers his readers, if he desires to arrange his
paragraph so that it will be most effective, he will have
at these points such sentences as will accurately indicate
its contents and the trend of the discussion; and
he will form these sentences so well that they will deserve
the attention which is given them by reason of
their position in the paragraph.
What begins and what ends a Paragraph?
What are the words that deserve the distinction of
opening and closing a paragraph? As in the
theme, so in a paragraph, the first thing is to
announce the subject of discussion. When
the subject is simply announced without giving
any indication as to the drift of the discussion, the
conclusion of the discussion is generally stated in the
last sentence. Burke says, “The first thing we have
to consider with regard to the nature of the object is
the number of people in the colonies.” He concludes
the paragraph with, “Whilst we are discussing any
given magnitude, they are grown to it. Whilst we
spend our time in deliberating on the mode of governing
two millions, we shall find we have millions more
to manage. Your children do not grow faster from
infancy to manhood than they spread from families to
communities, and from villages to nations.” In other
cases the opening sentence states the conclusion at
which the paragraph will arrive. Then the closing
sentence may be a repetition of the opening or topic
sentence; or it may be one of the points used to exemplify
or establish the proposition which opens the paragraph.
Again, in a short paragraph the topic need not
be announced at the beginning; in this case it should be
given in the concluding sentence. Or, should the topic
be given in the opening sentence of a short paragraph,
176
it is unnecessary to repeat it at the end. In any case,
whether the paragraph opens with a simple announcement
of the topic to be discussed, or with the conclusion
which the paragraph aims to explain, establish, or
illustrate, or whether it closes with the conclusion of
the whole matter, or with one of the main points in
the development, the sentences at the beginning and
the end of a paragraph should be strong sentences
worthy of their distinguished position.
In the first paragraph below, there is a proposition
in the first sentence and its repetition in the last.
In the two following, though they close with no general
statement, the specific assertions used to substantiate
and illustrate the first sentences are strong and
carry in themselves the truth of the topic-sentence.
“The eloquence of Mr. Adams resembled his general
character, and formed, indeed, a part of it. It was bold,
manly, and energetic; and such the crisis required. When
public bodies are to be addressed on momentous occasions,
when great interests are at stake, and strong passions excited,
nothing is valuable in speech farther than as it
is connected with high intellectual and moral endowments.
Clearness, force, and earnestness are the qualities which produce
conviction. True eloquence, indeed, does not consist
in speech. It cannot be brought from far. Labor and
learning may toil for it, but they will toil in vain. Words
and phrases may be marshaled in every way, but they cannot
compass it. It must exist in the man, in the subject,
and in the occasion. Affected passion, intense expression,
the pomp of declamation, all may aspire to it; they cannot
reach it. It comes, if it come at all, like the outbreaking
of a fountain from the earth, or the bursting forth of volcanic
fires, with spontaneous, original, native force. The
graces taught in the schools, the costly ornaments and studied
contrivances of speech, shock and disgust men when their
own lives and the fate of their wives, their children, and
177
their country hang on the decision of the hour. Then words
have lost their power, rhetoric is vain, and all elaborate oratory
contemptible. Even genius itself then feels rebuked
and subdued, as in the presence of higher qualities. Then
patriotism is eloquent; then self-devotion is eloquent. The
clear conception, outrunning the deductions of logic, the
high purpose, the firm resolve, the dauntless spirit, speaking
on the tongue, beaming from the eye, informing every feature,
and urging the whole man onward, right onward to his
object—this, this is eloquence: or rather it is something
greater and higher than all eloquence; it is action, noble,
sublime, godlike action.”
“The prejudiced man travels, and then everything he sees
in Catholic countries only serves to make him more thankful
that his notions are so true; and the more he sees of Popery,
the more abominable he feels it to be. If there is any sin,
any evil in a foreign population, though it be found among
Protestants also, still Popery is clearly the cause of it. If
great cities are the schools of vice, it is owing to Popery.
If Sunday is profaned, if there is a carnival, it is the fault
of the Catholic Church. Then, there are no private houses,
as in England; families live in staircases; see what it is to
belong to a Popish country. Why do the Roman laborers
wheel their barrows so slow in the Forum? why do the Lazzaroni
of Naples lie so listlessly on the beach? why, but
because they are under the malaria of a false religion.
Rage, as is well known, is in the Roman like a falling sickness,
almost as if his will had no part in it and he had no
responsibility; see what it is to be a Papist. Bloodletting
is as frequent and as much a matter of course in the South
as hair-cutting in England; it is a trick borrowed from the
convents, when they wish to tame down refractory spirits.”
“Excuse me, Sir, if turning from such thoughts I resume
this comparative view once more. You have seen it on a
large scale; look at it on a small one. I will point out to
your attention a particular instance of it in the single province
178
of Pennsylvania. In the year 1704 that province
called for £11,459 in value of your commodities, native and
foreign. This was the whole. What did it demand in 1772?
Why, nearly fifty times as much; for in that year the export
to Pennsylvania was £507,909, nearly equal to the export to
all the colonies together in the first period.”
The following illustrates the weakness of closing with
a specific instance when it does not rise to the level of
the remainder of a paragraph. The last sentence would
better be omitted.
“We often hear of the magical influence of poetry. The
expression in general means nothing; but, applied to the
writings of Milton, it is most appropriate. His poetry acts
like an incantation. Its merit lies less in its obvious meaning
than in its occult power. There would seem, at first
sight, to be no more in his words than in other words. But
they are words of enchantment. No sooner are they pronounced
than the past is present and the distant near. New
forms of beauty start at once into existence, and all the burial-places
of memory give up their dead. Change the structure
of the sentence, substitute one synonym for another, and the
whole effect is destroyed. The spell loses its power; and he
who should then hope to conjure with it would find himself
as much mistaken as Cassim in the Arabian tale, when he
stood crying, ‘Open Wheat,’ ‘Open Barley,’ to the door
which obeyed no sound but ‘Open Sesame.’ In the miserable
failure of Dryden in his attempt to translate into his own
diction some parts of the ‘Paradise Lost’ is a remarkable
instance of this.” (“Essay on Milton,” by Macaulay.)
Length of opening and closing Sentences.
By examination, one finds that the first sentence of
a paragraph of exposition and of argument is
usually a terse statement of the proposition;
and that after the proposition has been established
there follows a longer sentence gathering up all
the points of the discussion into a full, rounded period
which forms a suitable climax and conclusion of the
179
paragraph. Of Macaulay’s “Milton” one is quite
inside the truth when he says that of those paragraphs
containing an opening topic-sentence and its restatement
as a conclusion, the closing sentence is the longer
in the ratio of two to one. In Burke’s “Conciliation,”
the ratio rises as high as four to one. There are,
however, exceptions to the rule. Paragraphs sometimes
close with a shorter statement of the proposition, a
sort of aphorism or epigram. As this kind of sentence
is fascinating, some books have said that paragraphs
should close so; that it is like cracking a whip, and
gives a snap to the paragraph not gained in any other
way. Even if readers enjoyed having paragraphs close
in this cracking manner, it must be borne in mind that
not all conclusions are capable of such a statement,
and, what is worse, that the tendency to seek for epigrams
leads to untruth and a degenerated form of
witticism. Such forced sentences are only half truths,
or they are a bit of cheap repartee. Such a close is
effective, if the whole truth can be so expressed; but
to seek for such sentences is dangerous. The best rule
is the one already stated; it applies to the long sentence
and the short sentence alike. It is that a paragraph
should close with words that deserve distinction.
Proportion.
The body of a paragraph should have the matter so
proportioned that the more important points
shall receive the longer treatment. In a paragraph
of proof, details, or comparison, that point in
the proof, that particular, that part of the comparison,
which for the specific purpose has most significance,
should have proportionately fuller treatment. It is the
same principle already noticed in exposition. Indicate
the relative importance of topics in a paragraph by the
relative number of words used in their treatment.
For mass in a paragraph, then, keep in mind that
180
the last sentence should contain matter and form
worthy of the position it occupies; that the position
of next importance is at the beginning; and that the
relative importance of the matters in the body of a
paragraph is pretty correctly indicated by the relative
length of treatment.
Coherence and Clearness.
Coherence, the third principle of structure, is the
most important; and it is the most difficult
to apply. For one can make a beginning and
an end, he can select his materials so that
there is unity, but to make all the parts stick together,
to arrange the sentences so that one grows naturally
from the preceding and leads into the next, requires
nice adjustment of parts, and rewriting many times.
How essential coherence in a paragraph is, simply to
make the thought easy to grasp, may be seen by taking
a paragraph to pieces and mixing up its sentences, and
at the same time removing all words that bind its
parts together. The following can hardly be understood
at all, but in its original condition it is so clear
that it cannot be misunderstood. If the sentences be
arranged in the following order, the original paragraph
will appear: 1, 5, 3, 9, 8, 6, 2, 4, 7, 10.
1. “The first question which obviously suggests itself is
how these wonderful moral effects are to be wrought under
the instrumentality of the physical sciences. 2. To know is
one thing, to do is another; the two things are altogether distinct.
3. Does Sir Robert Peel mean to say, that whatever
be the occult reasons for the result, so it is; you have but to
drench the popular mind with physics, and moral and religious
advancement follows on the whole, in spite of individual
failures? 4. A man knows he should get up in the morning,—he
lies abed; he knows he should not lose his temper,
yet he cannot keep it. 5. Can the process be analyzed and
drawn out, or does it act like a dose or a charm which comes
181
into general use empirically? 6. It is natural and becoming
to seek for some clear idea of the meaning of so dark an
oracle. 7. A laboring man knows he should not go to the
ale-house, and his wife knows she should not filch when she
goes out charing, but, nevertheless, in these cases, the consciousness
of a duty is not all one with the performance of
it. 8. Or rather, does he mean, that, from the nature of
the case, he who is imbued with science and literature, unless
adverse influences interfere, cannot but be a better man?
9. Yet when has the experiment been tried on so large a
scale as to justify such anticipations? 10. There are, then,
large families of instances, to say the least, in which men
may become wiser, without becoming better; what, then, is
the meaning of this great maxim in the mouth of its promulgators?”
Coherence, so necessary to the easy understanding
of a paragraph, is gained in three ways: by the order
in which the sentences are arranged; by the use of
parallel constructions for parallel ideas; and by the
use of connectives.
Two Arrangements of Sentences in a Paragraph.
Material which has been selected with regard to the
principle of unity is all informed with one idea. Yet
though one thought runs through it all and unites it,
the parts do not stand in an equally close relation to
the conclusion, nor is each part equally related
to every other part. Had they been,
the last paragraph quoted would have been as
well in one order as another. Rather the sentences
seem to fall into groups of more closely related
matters; or at times one sentence seems to follow as
the direct consequence of the preceding sentence.
With respect to the way in which the sentences contribute
to the topic of the paragraph, whether the topic
be announced first or last, sentences may be said to
contribute directly to the proposition or indirectly. If
182
directly, the paragraph is a collection of sentences, each
having a common purpose, each having a similar relation
to the topic, arranged, as it were, side by side,
and advancing as one body to the conclusion. This
may be termed an individual arrangement of sentences,
since as individuals they each contribute to the topic.
The conclusion derives its force from the combined
mass of all. If indirectly, the paragraph is a series of
sentences, each growing out of the one preceding it,
each receiving a push from the sentence before, and the
last having the combined force of all. This may be
styled a serial arrangement of sentences, since in such
a case each contributes to the topic only as one in a
chain. The former overcomes by its mass; the latter
strikes by reason of its velocity. The one advances in
rank; the other advances in single file.
An illustration of each will help to an understanding
of this. In the following paragraph from Macaulay’s
essay on Milton, each of the details mentioned
points directly to “those days” when the race became
a “byword and a shaking of the head to the nations.”
Their aggregate mass enforces the topic of the paragraph.
They are all one body equally informed with
the common principle which is the topic. Notice that
one sentence is not the source of the next, but that all
the sentences stand in a similar relation to the conclusion.
This arrangement is common in description.
In the second paragraph, from Irving’s “Legend of
Sleepy Hollow,” each detail contributes to the appearance
of Ichabod, not through some other sentence, but
directly.
“Then came those days, never to be recalled without a
blush, the days of servitude without loyalty and sensuality
without love; of dwarfish talents and gigantic vices; the
183
paradise of cold hearts and narrow minds; the golden age
of the coward, the bigot, and the slave. The king cringed
to his rival that he might trample on his people; sank into
a viceroy of France, and pocketed with complacent infamy
her degrading insults and her more degrading gold. The
caresses of harlots and the jests of buffoons regulated the
policy of the state. The government had just ability enough
to deceive, and just religion enough to persecute. The principles
of liberty were the scoff of every grinning courtier,
and the Anathema Maranatha of every fawning dean. In
every high place, worship was paid to Charles and James,
Belial and Moloch; and England propitiated those obscene
and cruel idols with the blood of her best and bravest children.
Crime succeeded to crime, and disgrace to disgrace,
till the race, accursed of God and man, was a second time
driven forth to wander on the face of the earth, and to be
a byword and a shaking of the head to the nations.”
“Ichabod was a suitable figure for such a steed. He rode
with short stirrups, which brought his knees nearly up to the
pommel of the saddle; his sharp elbows stuck out like grasshoppers’;
he carried his whip perpendicularly in his hand,
like a sceptre, and as his horse jogged on, the motion of his
arms was not unlike the flapping of a pair of wings. A
small wool hat rested on the top of his nose, for so his scanty
strip of forehead might be called, and the skirts of his black
coat fluttered out almost to the horse’s tail. Such was the
appearance of Ichabod and his steed as they shambled out of
the gate of Hans Van Ripper, and it was altogether such an
apparition as is seldom to be met with in broad daylight.”
The following paragraph in the essay on Milton contains
an example of the second method of arrangement.
Each sentence is the result of the one before it. The
sentences advance in single file. Notice that each sentence
does not contribute directly to the conclusion, but
that it acts through the succeeding sentence. The
phrases from which a succeeding sentence springs are
184
in small capitals; and the phrases which refer back
are in italics.
“Most of the remarks which we have hitherto made on the
public character of Milton apply to him only as one of a
large body. We shall proceed to notice some of the
peculiarities which distinguished him from his contemporaries.
And for that purpose it is necessary to take a short
survey of the parties into which the political world was at
that time divided. We must premise that our observations
are intended to apply only to those who adhered, from
a sincere preference, to one or to the other side. In days of
public commotion, every faction, like an Oriental army, is
attended by a crowd of camp-followers, a useless and heartless
rabble, who prowl round its line of march in the hope
of picking up something under its protection, but desert it in
the day of battle, and often join to exterminate it after defeat.
England, at the time of which we are treating, abounded
with fickle and selfish politicians, who transferred their support
to every government as it rose; who kissed the hand of
the king in 1640, and spat in his face in 1649; who shouted
with equal glee when Cromwell was inaugurated in Westminster
Hall, and when he was dug up to be hanged at
Tyburn; who dined on calves’ heads or broiled rumps, and
cut down oak branches or stuck them up, as circumstances
altered, without the slightest shame or repugnance. These
we leave out of account. We take our estimate of parties
from those who really deserve to be called partisans.”
(For other examples of the same arrangement see
the next quotation, and also a paragraph quoted on
page 222.)
Paragraphs are most frequently found to combine
the two methods. In the following, notice that the
second sentence grows out of the first, the third from
the second, and so the serial arrangement is maintained
until the eighth is reached. Sentences nine,
ten, eleven, and twelve give body to sentence eight.
185
Then begins again the regular succession. Sentences
sixteen to twenty are the outgrowth of the phrase
“on his account.”
“1. The Puritans were men whose minds had derived a
peculiar character from the daily contemplation of superior
beings and eternal interests. 2. Not content with acknowledging
in general terms an overruling Providence, they
habitually ascribed every event to the will of the Great Being,
for whose power nothing was too vast, for whose inspection
nothing was too minute. 3. To know Him, to serve
Him, to enjoy Him, was with them the great end of existence.
4. They rejected with contempt the ceremonious
homage which other sects substituted for the pure worship of
the soul. 5. Instead of catching occasional glimpses of the
Deity through an obscuring veil, they aspired to gaze full on
the intolerable brightness, and to commune with Him face to
face. 6. Hence originated their contempt for terrestrial distinctions.
7. The difference between the greatest and the
meanest of mankind seemed to vanish when compared with
the boundless interval which separated the whole race from
Him on whom their own eyes were constantly fixed. 8. They
recognized no title to superiority but His favor; and, confident
of that favor, they despised all the accomplishments and
all the dignities of the world. 9. If they were unacquainted
with the works of philosophers and poets, they were deeply
read in the oracles of God. 10. If their names were not
found in the registers of heralds, they were recorded in the
Book of Life. 11. If their steps were not accompanied by
a splendid train of menials, legions of ministering angels had
charge over them. 12. Their palaces were houses not made
with hands; their diadems, crowns of glory which should
never fade away. 13. On the rich and the eloquent, on
nobles and priests, they looked down with contempt; for
they esteemed themselves rich in a more precious treasure,
and eloquent in a more sublime language, nobles by the right
of an earlier creation, and priests by the imposition of a
mightier hand. 14. The very meanest of them was a being
186
to whose fate a mysterious and terrible importance belonged,
on whose slightest action the spirits of light and darkness
looked with anxious interest; who had been destined, before
heaven and earth were created, to enjoy a felicity which
should continue when heaven and earth should have passed
away. 15. Events which short-sighted politicians ascribed
to earthly causes had been ordained on his account. 16. For
his sake empires had risen, and flourished, and decayed.
17. For his sake the Almighty had proclaimed His will by
the pen of the Evangelist and the harp of the prophet.
18. He had been wrested by no common deliverer from the
grasp of no common foe. 19. He had been ransomed by the
sweat of no vulgar agony, by the blood of no earthly sacrifice.
20. It was for him that the sun had been darkened,
that the rocks had been rent, that the dead had risen, that
all nature had shuddered at the sufferings of her expiring
God.”
This division has been made because by its aid an
approach can be made toward rules for arrangement.
In the paragraph quoted on page 183, the different sentences
are equally related to the topic. Is there, then,
no reason why one should be first rather than another?
Notice the topics of the sentences and the order becomes
a necessity. King, state policy, government,
liberty, religion,—it is an ascending scale. On page
96 is a paragraph on the charmed names used by
Milton. “One,” “another,” “a third,” “a fourth,”—for
all one can see as to the relation of each to the
topic, “a fourth” might as well have been “one” as
fourth. But upon reading the paragraph it is evident
that Macaulay thought the last more important than
the first. So in the paragraph just quoted about the
Puritans, when the arrangement of the first eight sentences
changes in sentences nine through eleven, and
again in sentences sixteen to twenty, the order is a
climax. Moreover, those topics are associated which
187
are more closely related in thought. King is more
closely related to government than to religion, and
religion is more intimately associated with the idea of
liberty than with king. The order, then, is the natural
order of association. From these examples we derive
the first principle of arrangement. In a paragraph
where several sentences contribute individually to the
topic, they must be arranged in the order in which the
thoughts are associated and follow each other; and,
when possible, they should take the order of a climax.
Definite References.
In the paragraph made up of sentences in a series,
each linked to the sentence before and after,
the difficulty is in transmitting the force of
one sentence to the next one undiminished.
This is done by binding the sentences so closely together
that one cannot slip on the other. In the
paragraph about the Puritans, of the second sentence
the “Great Being” goes back to “superior
beings” of the first; and “Him” in the next springs
from “Great Being.” “To know Him, to serve Him,
to enjoy Him,”—what is it but the “pure worship”
of the fourth? while “ceremonious homage” of the
fourth is the “occasional glimpses of the Deity through
an obscuring veil” of the fifth. One sentence grows
out of some phrase of the preceding sentence; the sentences
are firmly locked together by the repetition, a
little modified, of the thought of a preceding phrase.
There is no slipping. To get this result there must be
no question of the thought-sequence in the sentences.
Each sentence must be a consequence of a preceding
sentence. And there must be attention to the choice
and position of the words from which the following
sentence is to spring. Such words cannot be indefinite,
mushy words; they must be definite, firm words.
Moreover, they must not be buried out of sight by a
188
mass of unimportant matters; they must be so placed
that they are unhindered, free to push forward the
thought toward its ultimate conclusion. This often requires
inversion in the sentence. That phrase which is
the source of the next sentence must be thrown up into
a prominent position; and it is usually pressed toward
the end of the sentence, nearer to the sentence which
is its consequence. In a paragraph quoted on page 222,
where this same subject is taken up in connection with
sentences, there is an excellent illustration of this.
“Slow and obscure,” “inadequate ideas,” “small circle,”
and the numerous phrases which repeat the
thought, though not the words, are firm words binding
the sentences together indissolubly.
Use of Pronouns.
Not all sentences permit such clear reference as
this. Still it must be said that where the
thought is logical and clear, the reference is
never missed: the binding words are important words
and they occupy prominent positions. There is, however,
a whole group of words whose function is to
make the references sure. They are pronouns. Pronouns
refer back, and they point forward. Their careful
use is the commonest method of making sure of
references, and so of binding sentences together. The
ones in common use are this, that, the former, the
latter; the relatives who, which, and that; and the
personal pronouns he, she, it. To these may be added
some adverbs: here, there, hence, whence, now, then,
when, and while. The binding force of these words is
manifest in every paragraph of composition.
The following paragraph, from Burke’s speech on
“Conciliation with the Colonies,” illustrates the use of
pronouns as words referring back, and binding the
whole into one inseparable unit.
“As to the wealth which the colonies have drawn from the
189
sea by their fisheries, you had all that matter fully opened
at your bar. You surely thought those acquisitions of value,
for they seemed even to excite your envy; and yet the spirit
by which that enterprising employment has been exercised
ought rather, in my opinion, to have raised your esteem and
admiration. And pray, Sir, what in the world is equal to
it? Pass by the other parts, and look at the manner in
which the people of New England have of late carried on the
whale fishery. Whilst we follow them among the tumbling
mountains of ice, and behold them penetrating into the deepest
frozen recesses of Hudson’s Bay and Davis’s Straits,
whilst we are looking for them beneath the arctic circle, we
hear that they have pierced into the opposite region of polar
cold, that they are at the antipodes, and engaged under the
frozen Serpent of the south. Falkland Island, which seemed
too remote and romantic an object for the grasp of national
ambition, is but a stage and resting-place in the progress of
their victorious industry. Nor is the equinoctial heat more
discouraging to them than the accumulated winter of both the
poles. We know that whilst some of them draw the line and
strike the harpoon on the coast of Africa, others run the longitude
and pursue their gigantic game along the coast of Brazil.
No sea but what is vexed by their fisheries; no climate
that is not witness to their toils. Neither the perseverance
of Holland, nor the activity of France, nor the dexterous and
firm sagacity of English enterprise ever carried this most
perilous mode of hardy industry to the extent to which it has
been pushed by this recent people; a people who are still,
as it were, but in the gristle, and not yet hardened into the
bone of manhood. When I contemplate these things; when
I know that the colonies in general owe little or nothing to
any care of ours, and that they are not squeezed into this
happy form by the constraints of watchful and suspicious
government, but that, through a wise and salutary neglect, a
generous nature has been suffered to take her own way to
perfection; when I reflect upon these effects, when I see
how profitable they have been to us, I feel all the pride of
190
power sink, and all presumption in the wisdom of human
contrivances melt and die away within me. My rigor relents.
I pardon something to the spirit of liberty.”
Of Conjunctions.
Another group of words which give coherence to a
paragraph is conjunctions. They indicate
the relations between sentences, and they
point the direction of the new sentence. The common
relations between sentences indicated by conjunctions
are coördinative, subordinative, adversative, concessive,
and illative. Each young writer has usually but one
word, at the most two words, in his vocabulary to express
each of these relations. He knows and, but, if,
although, and therefore. Each person should learn
from a grammar the whole list, for no class of words
indicates clear thinking so unmistakably as conjunctions.
Two words of advice should be given regarding the
use of conjunctions. If the thought all bends one way,
if this direction is perfectly clear, there is no need of
conjunctions. It is when the course of the discussion
is tortuous, when the road is not direct, when the reader
may lose the way without these guides, that conjunctions
should be used. On the other hand, conjunctions
are an annoyance when not needed. Just as guideposts
along a road where there is no chance to leave
the direct path are useless, and their recurrence is a
cause of aggravation, so it is with unnecessary conjunctions.
They attract attention to themselves, and
so draw it from the thought. The first caution is, Do
not use conjunctions unless needed.
In the following, the repetition of and is unnecessary
and annoying.
“Six shillings a week does not keep body and soul together
very unitedly. They want to get away from each other
191
when there is only such a very slight bond as that between
them; and one day, I suppose, the pain and the dull monotony
of it all had stood before her eyes plainer than usual,
and the mocking spectre had frightened her. She had made
one last appeal to friends, but, against the chill wall of their
respectability, the voice of the erring outcast fell unheeded;
and then she had gone to see her child—had held it in her
arms and kissed it, in a weary, dull sort of way, and without
betraying any particular emotion of any kind, and had
left it, after putting into its hand a penny box of chocolate
she had bought it, and afterwards, with her last few shillings,
had taken a ticket and come down to Goring.
“It seemed that the bitterest thoughts of her life must
have centred about the wooded reaches and the bright
green meadows around Goring; but women strangely hug
the knife that stabs them, and, perhaps, amidst the gall,
there may have mingled also sunny memories of sweetest
hours, spent upon those shadowed deeps over which the great
trees bend their branches down so low.
“She had wandered about the woods by the river’s brink
all day, and then, when evening fell and the gray twilight
spread its dusky robe upon the waters, she stretched out her
arms to the silent river that had known her sorrow and her
joy. And the old river had taken her into its gentle arms,
and had laid her weary head upon its bosom, and had
hushed away the pain.”
The other word is: When possible put the conjunction
that connects two sentences into the body of the
sentence, rather than at its beginning. In this way its
binding power is increased. This principle should limit
the use of and and but at the beginning of a sentence.
Rarely is and needed in such a place. If the thought
goes straight forward—and it must do so if and
correctly expresses the relation—there is usually no
gain in its use. At times when the reader might be
led to expect some change of direction from some
192
phrase in the preceding sentence, then it would be
wise to set him right by the use of and. Moreover,
there are times when coördinate thoughts are so important,
and the expression of the coördination is so
important, that a sentence beginning with and is the
only adequate means of expressing it. However, be
very sure that there is need for every and that you
use. The same caution may be given about but. But
indicates an abrupt turn in the thought. Is such a
contrast in the thought? If so, is there no other word
to express the thought? Some persons go so far as to
say that these words should never begin a sentence.
This is too pedantic and not true. When coördinative
and adversative relations are to be expressed,
however, it is certainly more elegant if some variety
can be obtained, and the union is closer if the conjunction
be placed in the body of the sentence. This
requires the use of other words besides and and but.
Also, in like manner, besides, too, nevertheless, however,
after all, for all that, should be as familiar as
the two overworked words and and but. Look for
ways to bind sentences in the middle rather than at
the end. It is more elegant and it is much safer.
Parallel Constructions.
A third principle of arrangement is the use of parallel
constructions for parallel thoughts. By
parallel structure is meant that the principal
elements of the sentences shall be arranged in
the same order. If subordinate clauses precede principal
clauses in one sentence, they shall in the other; if
they follow in one, they shall follow in the other. If
an active voice be used in one, it shall be used in the
other; if the predicate go before the subject in one,
it shall in the other. The use of parallel structure frequently
demands repetition of forms and even of identical
words and phrases. It is very effective in giving
193
clearness to a paragraph and in securing coherence of
its parts.
In the first of the two illustrations below, read one
sentence this way and observe the ruin that is wrought.
“The North American colonies made such a struggle
against the mother country.” In the second paragraph,
change two of the sentences to the passive
voice. The effect is evident loss in clearness and
strength.
“All history is full of revolutions, produced by causes
similar to those which are now operating in England. A
portion of the community which had been of no account, expands
and becomes strong. It demands a place in the system,
suited, not to its former weakness, but to its present
power. If this is granted, all is well. If this is refused,
then comes the struggle between the young energy of one
class and the ancient privileges of another. Such was the
struggle between the Plebeians and Patricians of Rome.
Such was the struggle of the Italian allies for admission to
the full rights of Roman citizens. Such was the struggle of
our North American colonies against the mother country.
Such was the struggle which the Third Estate of France
maintained against the aristocracy of birth. Such was the
struggle which the Roman Catholics of Ireland maintained
against the aristocracy of creed. Such is the struggle which
the free people of color in Jamaica are now maintaining
against the aristocracy of skin. Such, finally, is the struggle
which the middle classes in England are maintaining
against an aristocracy of mere locality, against an aristocracy,
the principle of which is to invest a hundred drunken
pot-wallopers in one place, or the owner of a ruined hovel
in another, with powers which are withheld from cities renowned
to the furthest ends of the earth for the marvels of
their wealth and of their industry.”
“Man is a being of genius, passion, intellect, conscience,
power. He exercises these various gifts in various ways, in
194
great deeds, in great thoughts, in heroic acts, in hateful
crimes. He founds states, he fights battles, he builds cities,
he ploughs the forest, he subdues the elements, he rules his
kind. He creates vast ideas, and influences many generations.
He takes a thousand shapes, and undergoes a thousand
fortunes. Literature records them all to the life....
He pours out his fervid soul in poetry; he sways to and fro,
he soars, he dives, in his restless speculations; his lips drop
eloquence; he touches the canvas, and it glows with beauty;
he sweeps the strings, and they thrill with an ecstatic meaning.
He looks back into himself, and he reads his own
thoughts, and notes them down; he looks out into the universe,
and tells over and celebrates the elements and principles
of which it is the product.”
(The principles of Mass and Coherence in paragraphs
are closely allied with these same principles regarding
sentences. Some further discussion of these important
matters, as well as more illustrations, will be found
in the next chapter.)
Good sense must be exercised in the use of parallel
constructions. Although a short series of sentences
containing parallel thoughts is common and demands
this treatment, it is not at all frequent that one has
such a long series as these paragraphs contain. In
these paragraphs the parallel is in the thought; it has
not been searched out. Because one is pleased with
these effects of parallel construction, he should not be
led to seek for opportunities where he can force sentences
into similar shapes. The thoughts must be
parallel. If the thought is actually parallel, a parallel
treatment may be adopted with great advantage to
clearness and force; if it is not parallel, any attempt
to treat it as such is detected as a shallow trick. To
search for thoughts to trail along in a series results in
thinnest bombast. As everywhere else in composition,
195
so here a writer must rely on his good taste and good
sense.
Summary.
Whatever may be the special mode of development,
of whatever form of discourse it is to be a
part, the three fundamental principles which
guide in making a paragraph are Unity, Mass, and
Coherence. The unity of the paragraph is secured by
referring all of the material to the topic, including
what contributes to the main thought and excluding
what has no value. Paragraphs excessively long or
very short may lead to offenses against unity. Mass
in a paragraph is gained by placing worthy words in
the positions of distinction; by treating the more important
matters at greater length; and, when possible
without disturbing coherence, by arranging the material
in a climax. Coherence is secured by keeping together
matters related in thought; by a wise choice
and placing of all words which bind sentences together;
and by the use of parallel constructions for parallel
ideas. Carefully chosen material, arranged so that
worthy words occupy the positions of distinction, and
all so skillfully knit together that every sentence, every
phrase, every word, takes the reader one step toward
the conclusion,—this constitutes a good paragraph.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS
THE OLD MANSE.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 69.)
In the paragraph beginning at the bottom of page 19,
what do you think of the selection of material? Does the
last detail give the finishing touch to the paragraph? Is it
a real climax?
On page 25 a paragraph begins, “Lightly as,” etc. In
the second sentence “bound volume” goes back to what
words in the first sentence? “he,” of the third, to what of
the second? “thus it was” to what before?
Now take the paragraph on pages 34 and 35 and trace
the connection of the sentences, drawing two lines under the
phrase from which a succeeding sentence springs, and one
line under words that refer back to a preceding phrase; also
trace out the dovetailing in the sentences on pages 6 and 7.
In the paragraph on pages 18 and 19 the development is
not so. Each sentence emphasizes “the sombre aspect of
external nature.” What is the law of their arrangement?
(See text-book, pages 181-187.)
Find other paragraphs arranged in this way. (See pages
35, 36.)
What is the topic of the second paragraph?
Can you divide the paragraph filling the middle of page 8?
Where?
What is the relation between the first sentence and the last
in the paragraph at the bottom of page 11? Give the words
that join the sentences of the paragraph together.
In the paragraph beginning on page 13, what is the purpose
of the first two sentences?
On page 14, does it seem to you that Hawthorne had forgotten
the Old Manse enough so that it could be called a
197
digression? or do you think that the delightful, rambling
character of the essay permits it? Can you divide this
paragraph on pages 14 and 15? Where?
What figure at the bottom of page 15? Is it the custom
to use a capital letter in such a case? Has the paragraph in
which the figure occurs unity? Where could you divide it?
Give the topic of both new paragraphs.
Of the paragraph on pages 16 and 17, what is the relation
of the last three sentences to the topic?
What comment would you make upon the last sentence of
the paragraph ending at the top of page 25?
At the opening of the paragraph beginning on page 29, do
you like the figure? Trace the relation between the first
and second sentences; between the second and the third.
Could this paragraph be divided?
RIP VAN WINKLE AND THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 51.)
In the paragraph on page 11, what is the relation between
the first and last sentences? Why is the middle of the paragraph
introduced? Is it effective?
What method of development is adopted in the next paragraph?
Trace out the connection of the paragraphs in the first five
pages of this essay. What words at the beginning of each
paragraph are especially helpful in joining the parts?
On page 13 Irving writes, “Times grew worse and worse
for Rip Van Winkle,” etc. How many paragraphs are given
to this topic? Could all of them be put into one? Should
they? What is the last part of the first sentence of this
paragraph?
Why are there so few topic sentences in this essay? How
did Irving know where to paragraph? Give topics of the
paragraphs on pages 16, 17, 18. In the paragraph beginning
at the bottom of p. 17, why are the clothes of the man
mentioned first?
What method of paragraph development is adopted in the
198
paragraph beginning in the middle of page 23? Is the last
detail important?
From the use on pages 24 and 25, what do you gather as
to the rule for paragraphing where dialogue is reported?
In the paragraph on page 40, what reason has Irving for
saying “therefore”? From what sentence does the last of
this paragraph arise? Do you think the specific closing of
the paragraph worthy of the position?
When Irving says on page 41 that he was “an odd mixture
of small shrewdness and simple credulity,” did he mean that
he was shrewd, or that he was not shrewd? Can you find
anything in the paragraphs to develop the thought that he was
shrewd? How many paragraphs are given to his simple
credulity? Why so many?
In the paragraph beginning at the bottom of page 42, what
advantage is there in the exclamatory sentences?
Would it be as well to divide the next paragraph into three
sentences? Give your reasons. As the paragraph stands,
is the sentence loose or periodic?
In the paragraph beginning at the bottom of page 45, what
is the method of development? Why is the chanticleer
mentioned last?
Are Irving’s sentences long? Do they seem long? Why,
or why not?
What is the relation of the first sentence of the first paragraph
on page 55 to the last?
What is the topic of the next paragraph? Do you think
it would be just as well to put the second sentence of this
paragraph last?
In the paragraph beginning at the bottom of page 55, what
method of development has been used? Why is the “blue
jay” mentioned last?
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 119.)
Do you think the first paragraph too long? Where can
you divide it? What is the test of the length of a paragraph?
199
At the bottom of page 67, do you think the first sentence
of the paragraph the topic? or is it the last sentence? Give
reasons.
Is the detail at the end of the paragraph beginning on the
middle of page 71 upon the topic of the paragraph? Is it good
there? How do you know that Usher did not say “him”?
Of the paragraph on page 73, what sentence is the topic?
What proportion of the paragraphs have topic sentences?
Have the others topics? Give them for the paragraphs on
the first five pages.
What method of paragraph development has Poe adopted
in the paragraph beginning in the middle of page 81? What
is the relation between the opening and the close of the paragraph?
Why is the middle needed?
Do you like the second sentence of the next paragraph?
What is there disagreeable in it?
As you read along do the paragraphs run into one another?
Is such a condition good?
SILAS MARNER.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 83.)
Divide paragraphs on pages 10 and 11. What is the
topic of each of the new paragraphs?
In the first paragraph of chapter two each sentence grows
out of the one preceding. Put two lines under the words in
each sentence which are the source of the next sentence.
Draw one line under the words in each sentence which refer
back to the preceding sentence.
In the paragraph beginning at the bottom of page 94,
what is the topic sentence? What relation has the last sentence
to the first? What method of development in the
paragraph?
Can the paragraphs of exposition usually be divided? Do
they violate unity? If not, upon what principle can you
divide them?
What is the tendency in regard to the length of paragraphs
in recent literature?
CHAPTER VIII
SENTENCES
Definition and Classification. Simple Sentences.
A sentence is a group of words expressing a complete
thought. Sentences have been classified
as simple, complex, and compound. In reality
there are but two classes of sentences,—simple
and compound. It is not material to the
construction of a sentence whether a modifier be a
word, a phrase, or a clause; it still remains an adjective,
adverb, or noun modifier, and the method in which the
subject and predicate are developed is the same. By
means of modifiers, a subject and predicate of but two
words may grow to the size of a paragraph, and yet
be a group of words expressing one complete thought.
In the sentence below, the subject and predicate are
“we are free.” This does not, however, express
Burke’s complete thought. It is not what he meant.
Free to do what? How free? When may it be done?
Why now? What bill? All these introduce modifications
to the simple assertion, “we are free,” modifications
which are essential to the completeness of the
thought.
“By the return of this bill, which seemed to have taken
its flight forever, we are at this very instant nearly as free
to choose a plan for our American government as we were
on the first day of the session.”
Compound Sentences.
On the other hand, the compound sentence is usually
said to consist of at least two independent
clauses; and the very fact of their independence,
which is only a grammatical independence, to be
201
sure, makes the clauses very nearly independent sentences.
So near to sentences may the clauses be in
their independence that some writers would make them
so. The following group of sentences Kipling certainly
could have handled in another way. “The reason
for her wandering was simple enough. Coppy, in
a tone of too hastily assumed authority, had told her
over night that she must not ride out by the river.
And she had gone to prove her own spirit and teach
Coppy a lesson.” Certainly the last two sentences could
be united into a compound sentence, nor would it be
straining the structure to put all three sentences into
one. This example is not exceptional. Many similar
cases may be found in all prose writers; and in Macaulay’s
writings there are certainly occasions when it
would be better to unite independent sentences. If
the fundamental ideas of the two clauses bear certain
definite and evident relations to each other, they should
stand in one compound sentence. These evident relations
are: first, an assertion and its repetition in some
other form; second, an assertion and its contrast; third,
an assertion and its consequence; and fourth, an assertion
and an example. If the clauses do not bear one of
these evident relations to each other, they should receive
special attention; for they may be two separate,
independent thoughts requiring for their expression
two sentences. The following sentences illustrate the
common relations that may exist between the clauses
of a compound sentence.
Repetition. “Nothing has a drift or relation; nothing
has a promise or history.”
“But the religion most prevalent in our northern colonies
is a refinement on the principle of resistance; it is the dissidence
of dissent, and the protestantism of the Protestant
religion.”
202
Contrast. “If the people approve the way in which these
authorities are interpreting and using the Constitution, they
go on; if the people disapprove, they pause, or at least
slacken their pace.”
“Every court is equally bound to pronounce, and competent
to pronounce, on such questions, a State court no less than a
Federal court; but as all the more important questions are
carried by appeal to the supreme Federal court, it is practically
that court whose opinion determines them.”
Consequence. “The British and American line had run
near it during the war; it had, therefore, been the scene of
marauding, and infested with refugees, cow-boys, and all
kinds of border chivalry.”
Example. “He found favor in the eyes of the mothers
by petting the children, particularly the youngest; and like
the lion bold, which whilom so magnanimously the lamb did
hold, he would sit with a child on one knee, and rock a cradle
with his foot for whole hours together.”
There is another condition which masses many details
into one compound sentence. If in narration a
writer wishes to give the impression that many things
are done in a moment of time, and together form one
incident, he may group many circumstances, nearly
independent except for the matter of time, into one
compound sentence. In description he may present
groups of details hastily in one sentence, and so give
the impression of unity. The same thing may be done
in exposition. Many independent ideas may bear a
common relation to another idea, either expressed or
understood; and in order to get them before the reader
as one whole, the author may group them in a single
sentence. The examples below illustrate this method
of sentence development.
Narration. “For a moment the terror of Hans Van
Ripper’s wrath passed across his mind, for it was his Sunday
saddle; but this was no time for petty fears; the goblin
203
was hard on his haunches; and (unskillful rider that he was!)
he had much ado to maintain his seat; sometimes slipping on
one side, sometimes on another, and sometimes jolted on the
high ridge of his horse’s backbone, with a violence that he
verily feared would cleave him asunder.”
Description. “In one corner stood a huge bag of wool,
ready to be spun; in another, a quantity of linsey-woolsey
just from the loom; ears of Indian corn, and strings of dried
apples and peaches, hung in gay festoons along the walls,
mingled with the gaud of red peppers; and a door left ajar
gave him a peep into the best parlor, where the claw-footed
chairs and dark mahogany tables shone like mirrors; andirons,
with their accompanying shovel and tongs, glistened
from their covert of asparagus tops; mock oranges and conch
shells decorated the mantelpiece; strings of various-colored
birds’ eggs were suspended above it; a great ostrich egg was
hung from the centre of the room, and a corner cupboard,
knowingly left open, displayed immense treasures of old silver
and well-mended china.”43
Exposition. “That perfection of the Intellect, which is
the result of Education, and its beau idéal, to be imparted to
individuals in their respective measures, is the clear, calm,
accurate vision and comprehension of all things, as far as the
finite mind can embrace them, each in its place, and with its
own characteristics upon it. It is almost prophetic from its
knowledge of history; it is almost heart-searching from its
knowledge of human nature; it has almost supernatural
charity from its freedom from littleness and prejudice; it
has almost the repose of faith, because nothing can startle it;
it has almost the beauty and harmony of heavenly contemplation,
so intimate is it with the eternal order of things and the
music of the spheres.”
(Notice the use of the semicolon in the last two
groups of sentences. The parts of compound sentences
such as these should be separated by semicolons.)
Short Sentences.
Having determined approximately what relations
204
may be grouped in a single sentence, the first question
for consideration is whether sentences should
be long or short. This cannot be definitely
answered. Since they should be concise, the
short sentence is well suited for definitions. Since
a proposition should be announced in as few words
as can be used, without sacrificing brevity to clearness,
short sentences serve best for this purpose. As
changes in the direction of the development of a thought
should be quickly indicated, a short sentence is generally
used for transition. And as at times when the
mind is under a stress of strong feeling, or the action
of a story is rapid, all explanatory matters are cut
away, the barest statements in shortest sentences serve
best to express strong emotion and rapid action.
Long Sentences.
Long sentences have the very opposite uses. To
amplify a topic, to develop a proposition by
repetition, by details, by proofs, or by example,
long sentences are serviceable; by them the finer
modifications of a thought can be expressed. So, too,
a summary of a paragraph or a chapter frequently
employs long sentences to express the whole thought
with precision and with proper subordination of parts.
Again, as short sentences best express haste and intensity,
so long sentences give the feeling of quiet deliberation
and dignified calm.
Illustrations of definitions, propositions, transitions,
and exemplifications are to be found everywhere. Slow
movement expressed by long sentences is well illustrated
in Irving and Hawthorne. One selection from George
Meredith, to show the peculiar adaptation of the short
sentence to express intensity of feeling, is given. Richard
Feverel has just learned that the wife whom he
had deserted has borne him a son. Description and
narration are mingled. The short, nervous sentences
205
express both the vividness of his impressions and the
intensity of his emotions.
“A pale gray light on the skirts of the flying tempest displayed
the dawn. Richard was walking hurriedly. The
green drenched woods lay all about his path, bent thick, and
the forest drooped glimmeringly. Impelled as a man who
feels a revelation mounting obscurely to his brain, Richard
was passing one of those little forest-chapels, hung with votive
wreaths, where the peasants halt to kneel and pray. Cold,
still, in the twilight it stood, rain-drops pattering round it.
He looked within, and saw the Virgin holding her Child.
He moved not by. But not many steps had he gone before
the strength went out of him, and he shuddered. What was
it? He asked not. He was in other hands. Vivid as lightning
the Spirit of Life illumined him. He felt in his heart
the cry of his child, his darling’s touch. With shut eyes he
saw them both. They drew him from the depths; they led
him a blind and tottering man. And as they led him he
had a sense of purification so sweet he shuddered again and
again.”
Unity.
In a sentence, as in a theme or a paragraph, the first
question regarding its structure is what to put
into it. The germ of a paragraph is usually
a sentence; of the sentence it is one word or but very
few words. This kernel of a sentence may be developed
through the many modifications of the thought; but
always the additions must be distinctly related to the
germ words. If this relation of parts to the kernel of
the sentence be unmistakable, the sentence has unity;
if there are parts whose connection with the germ of
the sentence cannot be easily traced, they should be rejected
as belonging to another sentence. The pith of
the whole sentence can be stated in a few words, if the
sentence has unity.
Long sentences should be watched. One thing easily
suggests another, interesting too, it may be; and when
206
an essay is to be written, anything,—especially if it
have so worthy a quality as interest to recommend it,—anything
is allowed to go in. Such a sentence as
the following can be explained on no other principle:
“Just then James came rushing downstairs like mad
to find the fellow who had punched a hole in the tire of
his bicycle, which was a Columbia which he got two
years before at a second-hand store, paying for it in
work at fifteen cents an hour.” Plainly everything
after “bicycle” is nothing to the present purpose and
should be excluded. The following from a description
of Cologne Cathedral is as bad, in some respects,
worse; for there is one point where the break is so
abrupt that a child would detect it. “The superintendence
was intrusted to Mr. Ahlert, whose ideas
were not well adapted to inspire him for his grand
task, under his direction much of the former beauty
and artistical skill was lost sight of, but at all events it
was a great satisfaction to see the work go on and to
have the expenses defrayed by the State.” In this case
the writer, beyond doubt, thinks long sentences the
correct thing. Long sentences are necessary at times;
but the desire simply to write long sentences or to fill
up space should never lead one to forget that a sentence
is the expression of one—not more—of one
complete thought.
On the other hand, sentences should contain the
whole of one thought; none of it should run over into
another sentence. Strange as it may seem, sentences
are sometimes found like the following: “James was
on the whole a bad boy. But he had some redeeming
qualities.” “The first day at school was all new to
me. While it was interesting as well.” “He said
that he was going. And that I might go with him.”
There is no ground for an explanation of such errors
207
as these except laziness and grossest illiteracy. It is
by no device so simple as the insertion of a period that
man can separate what has been joined in thought.
And and but rarely begin sentences; in nearly all
cases it will be found that the sentences they purport
to connect are but the independent clauses of one compound
sentence. While or any other subordinating
conjunction introduces a dependent clause; a dependent
clause is not a sentence; it can never stand alone.
The offenses against the unity of a sentence are
including too much and including too little. Both are
the result of carelessness or inability to think. The
purpose, the kernel, the germ of the sentence, should
be so clearly in mind that every necessary modification
of the thought shall be included and every unnecessary
phrase be excluded. Some further suggestions concerning
unity are found in the paragraphs treating primarily
of mass and coherence.
Mass.
As advance is made in the ability to grasp quickly
the thought of a book, it becomes more and
more evident that the eye must be taken into
account when arranging the parts of a composition.
The eye sees the headings of the chapters; it catches
the last words of one paragraph and the first words of
the next; it lights upon the words near the periods;
so the parts of a composition should be arranged so
that these points shall contain worthy words. Moreover,
within the sentence the colon marks the greatest
independence of the parts; the semicolon comes next;
and the comma marks the smallest division of thought.
Following the guidance of the eye, then, the words
before a period should be the most important; those
near a colon, a semicolon, and a comma will have a
descending scale of value. A speaker has no difficulty
with punctuation; unconsciously he pauses with the
208
thought. So true is this, that one is inclined to say
that if the writer will read aloud his own composition,
and punctuate where he pauses in the reading, always
remembering the rank of the marks of punctuation, he
will not be far from right. It will be noticed that he
has paused in the reading after important words, as if
the thought stayed a moment there for the help of the
reader. Naturally we pause after important words;
and conversely, the places of importance in a sentence
are near the marks of punctuation, increasing from the
comma to the period.
End of a Sentence.
The end of a sentence is more important than the
beginning; and the difference in value is
greater than in a paragraph. In a paragraph
the opening is very important, generally containing
the topic. In a sentence, however, the beginning
more often has some phrase of transition, or some
modifier; while it is the end that contains the gist of
the sentence. This fact makes it imperative that no
unworthy matter stand at the end. How important a
position it is, and how much is expected of the final
words of a sentence, is evident from the effect of failure
produced by a sentence that closes with weak words.
In the following sentences, phrases have been moved
from their places; the weakness is apparent.
Abstract liberty is not to be found; and this is true of
other mere abstractions.
This is a persuasion built upon liberty, and not only favorable
to it.
I pass, therefore, to their agriculture, another point of
view.
Of course Burke never wrote such sentences as these.
However, sentences like them can be found in school
compositions.
209
“Lincoln’s character is worthy to be any young man’s
ideal; having in it much to admire.”
“Euclid Avenue, with its broad lawns, and with Wade
Park as the fitting climax of its spacious beauty, is the most
attractive driveway in the United States, which is saying a
good deal.”
“Minnesota has many beautiful lakes; Mille Lacs, fringed
with dark pines; Osakis, with its beach of glistening sand;
Minnetonka, skirted by a lovely boulevard bordered by cool
lawns and cosy cottages; and many others not so big.”
Such sentences as these are not uncommon. Their
ruin is wrought by the closing words. Watch for
trailing relatives, dangling participles, and straggling
generalities at the end of sentences. The end of a
sentence is a position of distinction; it should be held
by words of distinction.
So influential is position in a sentence that by virtue
of it a word or a clause of equal rank with others can
be made to take on a certain added authority. By
observing the end of a sentence, a reader can determine
what was uppermost in the mind of an author
careful of these things. In the following sentence as
it was written by Burke the emphasis is on the duration
of the time; but by a change of position it is
put upon the fact. “Refined policy ever has been the
parent of confusion; and ever will be so, as long as the
world endures.” Changing the last clause it reads,
“and, as long as the world endures, ever will be so.”
This is not weak; but the stress is not where Burke
placed it. The position of the words gives them an importance
that does not inhere in the words themselves.
Effect of Anti-climax.
Still, as the tenure of a place of distinction cannot
save a fool from the reputation of folly, position in a
sentence cannot redeem empty words from their truly
insipid character. Indeed, as the imbecility of a shallow
210
pate is made all the more apparent by a position of
distinction, so is the utter unfitness of certain words for
their position painfully manifest. This is the secret of
anti-climax. By reason of its very position
in a sentence, the last phrase should be distinguished;
instead the position is held by a
silly nothing. Disappointing anti-climaxes, like those
already cited, are frequently made by young writers;
and they are sometimes met with in the works of the
best authors. The following sentence is from Newman:
from the point of view of an ardent churchman,
it may be a climax; but from the point of view of the
general reader who considers the whole greater than
any of its parts, in spite of all the sense preceding the
final phrase, that is absurd and disappointing nonsense.
“I protest to you, gentlemen, that if I had to choose
between a so-called university, which dispensed with residence
and tutorial superintendence, and gave its degrees to
any person who passed an examination in a wide range of
subjects, and a university which had no professors and examinations
at all, but merely brought a number of young men
together for three or four years, and then sent them away as
the University of Oxford is said to have done some sixty
years since, if I were asked which of these methods was the
better discipline of the intellect,—mind, I do not say which
is morally the better, for it is plain that compulsory study
must be a good and idleness an intolerable mischief,—but
if I must determine which of the two courses was the more
successful in training, moulding, and enlarging the mind,
which sent out men the more fitted for their secular duties,
which produced better public men, men of the world, men
whose names would descend to posterity, I have no hesitation
in giving the preference to that university which did
nothing, over that which exacted an acquaintance with every
science under the sun. And, paradox as this may seem, still
if results be the test of systems, the influence of the public
211
schools and colleges of England, in the course of the last century,
at least will bear out one side of the contrast as I have
drawn it. What could come, on the other hand, of the ideal
systems of education which have fascinated the imagination
of this age, could they ever take effect, and whether they
would not produce a generation frivolous, narrow-minded,
and resourceless, intellectually considered, is a fair subject
for debate; but so far is certain, that the universities and
scholastic establishments, to which I refer, and which did
little more than bring together first boys and then youths in
large numbers, these institutions, with miserable deformities
on the side of morals, with a hollow profession of Christianity,
and a heathen code of ethics,—I say, at least, they can
boast of a succession of heroes and statesmen, of literary men
and philosophers, of men conspicuous for great natural virtues,
for habits of business, for knowledge of life, for practical
judgment, for cultivated tastes, for accomplishments, who
have made England what it is,—able to subdue the earth,
able to domineer over Catholics.“
Use of Climax.
From what has been said, it is evident that the parts
of a sentence, as far as may be, should be arranged
in a climax. The climax should be
in the thought, with a corresponding increase in the
weight of the phrases. If the thoughts increase in importance,
the words that express them should increase
in number. The number of words in the treatment
bears a pretty constant ratio to the importance of the
subject treated. The paragraph quoted from Newman
is an excellent illustration of the use of climax,—until
it comes to that last phrase. Note in the first sentence
the repetition of the condition, three times repeated.
Change the second to the third and see how
different it is. Then he has “public men, men of the
world, men whose names would descend to posterity,”—a
steady increase in the thought, and a corresponding
increase in the length of phrases. The last sentence
212
contains a fine example of climax. “Of heroes and
statesmen, of literary men and philosophers, of men
conspicuous for great natural virtues, for habits of
business, for knowledge of life, for practical judgment,
for cultivated tastes, for accomplishments, who
have made England what it is,—able to subdue the
earth.” Climax is the arrangement that produces the
effect of vigorous strength. In arranging a succession
of modifiers, so far as possible without breaking some
other more important principle, a writer will gain in
force if he seeks for climax.
Loose and Periodic.
Sentences are divided into two classes: loose and
periodic. A loose sentence may be broken at
some point before the end, and up to that
point be grammatically a complete sentence. An arrangement
of the parts of a sentence that suspends the
meaning until the close is called periodic. The periodic
sentence is generally so massed that the end contains
words of distinction, and the sentence forms a
climax. Not all climaxes are periods; but nearly all
periods are climaxes.
The Period.
The philosophy of the periodic sentence has been best
stated by Herbert Spencer. He starts with
the axiom that the whole amount of attention
a reader can give at any moment is limited and fixed.
A reader must give a part of it to merely acquiring the
meaning; the remainder of his attention he can give
to the thought itself. In reading Cicero the pupil has
to put a large part of his attention upon the vocabulary,
upon the order and construction of the words; the
barest fragment of attention he can bestow upon the
thought of the great orator. So when the reader attacks
one of Browning’s most involved and obscure
passages, he is kept from the thought by the difficulties
in the language. As it is the purpose of language
213
to convey thought, and as it is usually the wish of an
author to be understood, he should use up as little as
possible of the reader’s limited attention for the mere
acquisition of the thought, and leave the reader as
much as he can to put upon the meaning. In applying
this to sentences, the question is, which form of
sentence demands least effort to get at its meaning:
the periodic sentence, which suspends the meaning to
the end; or the loose sentence, which may be broken
at several points and gives its meaning in installments?
The old example is as good as any: shall we say as the
French do, a horse black; or shall we say as the English
do, a black horse? for in the arrangement of these
three words there lies the difference between a loose
and a periodic sentence. Consider the French order
first. When a person hears the words “a horse,” he
at once thinks of the horse he knows best; that is, generally,
a bay horse. When the word “black” follows,
the whole image has to be changed from the bay horse
he knows to the black horse he has occasionally seen.
There has been a waste of attention. On the other
hand, when the words “a black” are heard, the mind
constructs no image; it waits until the noun modified
is spoken. Then the whole image springs up at once;
it is correct and it needs no remodeling. The following
sentence illustrates the point. “I am wasting time”
is the beginning. It would be difficult to enumerate
the many thoughts suggested by these words; each
person has his own idea of wasting time. When the
rest of the sentence is added, “trying to learn my
geometry lesson,” the whole has to be reconstructed.
On the other hand the periodic statement suspends the
meaning to the end. There is no place where, without
additions to the words used, the mind can rest. “Trying
to learn a geometry lesson is for me a waste of
214
time.” Theoretically the periodic sentence is better
than the loose sentence; for it economizes attention.
There is another side to the question, however. If
the details be many, and if each be long, they would be
more than the mind could carry without great effort;
and instead of economy of attention, there is improvident
waste. The mind will carry a long, carefully
arranged period at intervals; but a succession of periods
is sure to result in its absolute refusal to do so any
longer. There is a limit to the length of a period that
economizes attention; and there is a limit to the number
of successive periods which a reader can endure.
Periodic and Loose combined.
There is another form of sentence, which combines
the loose and the periodic. It generally
begins with the periodic form and sustains
this until it is better to relieve the mind of
the stress, when the period ends or the loose structure
begins; and the sentence may as a whole be
periodic while containing parts that are loose. This
kind of sentence is a common form for long sentences.
It gives to prose much of the dignity of the period,
together with the familiarity of the loose sentence.
The sentence below may be changed, by putting the
last clause first, to a loose sentence; and by placing it
after the word “subject” it becomes mixed.
“By all persons who have written of the subject, for the
grandeur of its mountains and the deep quiet of its green
valleys for the leaping torrents of its foaming rivers and
blue calm of its crag-walled lakes, Switzerland has been
named ‘the Paradise of Europe.’”
The following paragraph from Burke contains examples
of loose, periodic, and mixed sentences:—
“To restore order and repose to an empire so great and
so distracted as, ours, is, merely in the attempt, an undertaking
215
that would ennoble the flights of the highest genius, and
obtain pardon for the efforts of the meanest understanding.
Struggling a good while with these thoughts, by degrees I
felt myself more firm. I derived, at length, some confidence
from what in other circumstances usually produces
timidity. I grew less anxious, even from the idea of my
own insignificance. For, judging of what you are by what
you ought to be, I persuaded myself that you would not reject
a reasonable proposition because it had nothing but its
reason to recommend it. On the other hand, being totally
destitute of all shadow of influence, natural or adventitious,
I was very sure that, if my proposition were futile or dangerous—if
it were weakly conceived, or improperly timed,—there
was nothing exterior to it of power to awe, dazzle,
or delude you. You will see it just as it is; and you will
treat it just as it deserves.”
Which shall be used?
Which shall be used, loose sentences or periodic?
In literature the loose more frequently occur.
They are informal and conversational, and
are especially suited to letter-writing, story-telling,
and the light essay. The period is formal; it
has the air of preparation. The oration, the formal
essay, well-wrought argument,—forms of literature
where preparation is expected,—may use the period
with good effect. It has a finish, a scholarly refinement,
not found in the loose sentence; and yet a series
of periods would be as much out of place in a letter as
a court regalia at a downtown restaurant. The loose
sentence is easy, informal, and familiar; the periodic
is stiff, artificial, and aristocratic. To use none but
loose sentences gives a composition an air of familiarity
even to the verge of vulgarity; to employ only periodic
sentences induces a feeling of stiff artificiality
bordering on bombast. The fitness of each for its purpose
is the guide for its use.
216
There is, however, a reason why young persons
should be encouraged to use periodic sentences. Usually
they compose short sentences, so there is little
danger of overburdening the reader’s attention. With
this danger removed, the result of the generous use of
periodic sentences will be nothing worse than a too
obvious preparation. The sentences will all be finished
to a degree, and unquestionably will give a feeling of
artificiality. However, the attention to sentence-structure
necessary in order to make it periodic is a thing
devoutly to be wished at this stage of growth. No
other fault is so common in sentence-construction as
carelessness. A theme will be logically outlined, a
paragraph carefully planned, but a sentence,—anybody
standing on one foot can make a sentence. A
well-turned sentence is a work of art, and it is never
made in moments when the writer “didn’t think.”
The end must be seen at the beginning: else it does
not end; it plays out. There is no other remedy for
careless, slipshod sentence-making so effective as the
construction of many periodic sentences.
Not only will there be care in the arrangement of
the material, but when all details must be introduced
before the principal thought, there will be little chance
of any phrase slipping into the sentence that does not
in truth belong there. Dangling participles, trailing
relatives, and straggling generalities can find no chance
to hang on to a periodic sentence. Every detail must
be a real and necessary modification of the germ
thought of the sentence, else it can hardly be forced in.
Periodic sentences, then, besides insuring a careful
finish to the work, are also a safeguard against the
introduction of irrelevant material,—the commonest
offense against sentence-unity.
Emphasis by Change of Order.
Closely connected with the emphasis gained by the
217
periodic arrangement of the parts of a sentence is
the emphasis gained by forcing words out
of their natural order. In a sentence the
points which arrest the eye and the attention
are the beginning and the end. However, if the subject
stands first and the words of the predicate in their
natural order, there is no more emphasis upon them
than these important elements of a sentence ordinarily
deserve. To emphasize either it is necessary to force
it out of its natural position. “George next went to
Boston,” is the natural order of this sentence. Supposing,
however, that a writer wished to emphasize the
fact that it was George who went next, not James or
Fred, he could do it by forcing the word “George”
from its present natural position to a position unnatural.
He could write, “It was George who next went
to Boston,” or, “The next to go to Boston was George.”
Forcing the subject toward the position usually occupied
by the predicate emphasizes the subject. This is
similar to the emphasis given by the period. “It was
George” is so far periodic, followed by the loose
structure; and the last arrangement is quite periodic.
Every device for throwing the subject back into the
sentence makes the sentence up to the point where
the subject is introduced periodic; this arrangement
throws the emphasis forward to the word that closes
the period.
Other parts of a sentence may be emphasized by
being placed out of their natural order. In the natural
order, adjectives and adverbs precede the words they
modify; conditional and concessive clauses precede
the clauses they modify; an object follows a verb;
and prepositional phrases and adjective clauses follow
the words they modify. These rules are general.
Moving a part of a sentence from this general order
218
usually emphasizes it. “George went to Boston next”
emphasizes a little the time; but “Next George went
to Boston” places great emphasis on the time. So
“It was to Boston that George went next” emphasizes
the place. “Went” cannot be so dealt with. It
seems irrevocably fixed that in a prose declarative sentence
the verb shall never stand first. It is not allowed
by good use.
The rearrangement of the following sentence illustrates
the emphasis given by putting words out of their
natural order:—
The strong and swarthy sailors of the Patria slowly
rowed the party to the shore.
The sailors of the Patria, strong and swarthy, slowly
rowed the party to the shore.
Slowly the strong and swarthy sailors of the Patria rowed
the party to the shore.
Of the steamer Patria, the sailors, strong and swarthy,
rowed the party to the shore.
To show the arrangement of clauses the following
will be sufficient:—
He cannot make advancement, even if he studies hard.
Even if he studies hard, he cannot make advancement.
“Your Irish pensioners would starve, if they had no other
fund to live on than the taxes granted by English authority.”
If they had no other fund to live on than the taxes granted
by English authority, your Irish pensioners would starve.
The latter arrangement emphasizes the conclusion
much more than the former; at the same time it subordinates
the condition. Burke wished the emphasis
to be upon the condition; he placed it after the conclusion.
Subdue Unimportant Elements.
Emphasis is gained by placing words in important
positions in a sentence by arranging the parts to
219
form a climax; by the use of the period; by forcing
words out of their natural order. It is also
gained by the subdual of parts not important.
This emphasis is a matter of relative intensity.
The beauty and strength of any artistic product
depend as much upon the subdual of the accessories
as upon the intensifying of the necessaries. In
order to get the emphasis upon certain phrases, it is
necessary to subordinate other phrases. In the talk
of a child every thought phrases itself as a simple sentence.
Not until it grows to youth does the child
recognize that there is a difference in values, and adopt
means for expressing it. To grasp firmly the principal
idea and then subdue all other ideas is an elegant way
of emphasizing.
The subdual of parts is accomplished by reducing
to subordinate clauses, to phrases, to words, some of
the ideas which in a child’s talk would be expressed in
sentences. A thought of barely enough importance to
be mentioned should be squeezed into a word. If it
deserves more notice, perhaps a prepositional phrase
will express it. A participial phrase will often serve
for a clause or a sentence. A subordinate clause may
be needed if the thought is of great importance. And
last, if it deserves such a distinction, the thought may
demand an independent clause or a sentence for itself.
If the following sentence be broken into bits as a child
would tell it, the nice effects of emphasis which Irving
has given it are ruined:—
“When the dance was at an end, Ichabod was attracted
to a knot of the sager folks, who, with old Van Tassel, sat
smoking at one end of the piazza, gossiping over former
times, and drawing out long stories about the war.”
Put into simple sentences, it would be like this: The
220
dance was at an end. Ichabod was attracted to a knot
of folks. The folks were older. They sat at the end
of the piazza. Old Van Tassel was with them. They
were smoking, etc.
In such sentences, nothing is emphatic; it is all
alike. In Irving’s sentences, where ideas are reduced
to clause, phrase, even a word, there is no question
about what is important and what is unimportant. He
has secured an exquisite emphasis by a discriminating
subdual of subordinate ideas.
This brings up the sentences by Kipling already
quoted on page 201. The author has used three independent
sentences. They can be written as one, thus:
The reason of her wandering was simple enough; for
Coppy, in a tone of too-hastily-assumed authority, had
told her over night that she must not ride out by the
river, and she had gone to prove her own spirit and
teach Coppy a lesson.
There is a reason, however, why Kipling wished that
last sentence to stand alone. Subordinated as it is
here rewritten, it does not half express the spiteful
independence she assumed to teach Coppy a lesson.
It needs the independent construction. Just as surely
as Kipling is right in putting the reasons into two
sharp, independent sentences, is Irving right when he
puts the reason in the following sentence into a subordinate
clause. It is not important enough to deserve
a sentence all by itself.
“He was, moreover, esteemed by the women as a man of
great erudition, for he had read several books quite through,
and was a perfect master of Cotton Mather’s ‘History of
New England Witchcraft,’ in which, by the way, he most
firmly and potently believed.”
In the following sentence the effect of subordination
is unmistakable:—
221
“He had a name in the village for brutally misusing the
ass; yet it is certain that he shed a tear which made a clean
mark down one cheek.”
Now read it again:—
“He had a name in the village for brutally misusing the
ass; yet it is certain that he shed a tear, and the tear made
a clean mark down one cheek.”
The last clause has burst away from its former submission,
and in its independence has made the most
important announcement of the sentence,—the witty
climax. Emphasis is, to a large degree, a matter of
position, but position cannot emancipate any clause
from the thralldom of subordination. To emphasize
one idea, subordinate ancillary ideas; make them take
their proper rank in the sentence. Reduce them to a
clause or to a phrase; and if a word justly expresses
the relative importance of the thought, reduce its expression
to a single word.
The Dynamic Point of a Sentence.
In the chapter on paragraphs it was said that one
sentence is often the source of the succeeding
sentence; that such a sentence seemed to be
charged like a Leyden jar, and to discharge
its whole power through a single word or phrase; and
further, that this word or phrase should be left free to
act,—it should be uncovered. How a sentence can
be arranged so that this word or phrase shall have the
prominence it deserves, and can unhindered transmit
the undiminished force of one sentence to the next, has
now been explained. First, such words can be made
dynamic by placing them at the beginning or the end
of a sentence; second, by placing them near the major
marks of punctuation; third, by forcing them from
their natural order; and fourth, by the subdual of the
other parts of the sentence. The greatest care in
222
massing sentences so that none of their power be lost
in transmission is one of the secrets of the literature
that carries the reader irresistibly forward. Sometimes
he may be annoyed by the repetition of phrases;
but he cannot get away; he must go forward. In the
paragraph below, quoted from Matthew Arnold, every
phrase that is the point from which the next sentence
springs is in a position where it can act untrammeled.
Through it the whole force of the sentence passes:—
“It will be said that it is a very subtle and indirect action
which I am thus prescribing for criticism, and that, by embracing
in this manner the Indian virtue of detachment and
abandoning the sphere of practical life, it condemns itself as
a slow and obscure work. Slow and obscure it may be, but
it is the only proper work of criticism. The mass of mankind
will never have any ardent zeal for seeing things as
they are; very inadequate ideas will satisfy them. On these
inadequate ideas reposes, and must repose, the general practice
of the world. That is as much as saying that whoever
sets himself to see things as they are will find himself one of
a very small circle; but it is only by this small circle resolutely
doing its own work that adequate ideas will ever get
current at all. The rush and uproar of practical life will
always have a dizzying and attracting effect upon the most
collected spectator, and tend to draw him into its vortex;
most of all will this be the case where that life is so powerful
as it is in England. But it is only by remaining collected,
and refusing to lend himself to the point of view of
the practical man, that the critic can do the practical man
any service; and it is only by the greatest sincerity in pursuing
his own course, and by at last convincing even the
practical man of his sincerity, that he can escape misunderstandings
which perpetually threaten him.”
Good Use.
Good use has been mentioned. In massing the parts
of a sentence for the purpose of emphasizing some idea,
a writer has not entire freedom. Good use, which is the
223
use of acknowledged masters, decides what may be
done. There are certain arrangements of
words to which we are accustomed; and the
disregard of them leads to obscurity or downright contrariety
in the thought. “Brutus stabbed Cæsar” is
the common order; “Brutus Cæsar stabbed,” or
“Stabbed Brutus Cæsar,” is obscure; while “Cæsar
stabbed Brutus” is the very opposite of the truth.
Those who have studied Latin know that as far as understanding
the sentence is concerned, it would make
no difference in which order the three Latin words
should be arranged; though it would make a mighty
difference in the emphasis. In Latin the case endings
determine the construction of the words. In an inflected
language the words may be massed almost to
suit the writer; in an uninflected language, within
certain limits the order determines the relation between
groups of words. Though for emphasis it might be
advisable to have the object first, for the sake of clearness
in a short sentence the object cannot stand first.
The primary consideration in making any piece of
literature is that it may be understood. To be understood,
the sentence must be arranged in the order to
which we are accustomed. The order to which we are
accustomed has been determined by good use.
The variety in the arrangement of the parts of a
sentence that has been sanctioned by good usage is
great, yet there are limits. Grammar is based upon
the usage of the best writers. Any offense against the
grammar of our language is a sin against good use.
Browning may use constructions so erratic that the
ordinary reader does not know what he is reading
about; Carlyle may forge a new word rather than take
the trouble to find one that other people have used.
But the young writer, at least, is far safer while keeping
within the limits of good use.
Clearness gained by Coherence.
224
Coherence in a sentence is that principle of structure
by which its parts are best arranged to
stick together. The parts of a sentence containing
related ideas should be so associated
that there can be no mistake regarding the reference
or the modification. Such a sentence as the following
cannot be understood; the reference is obscure.
“James told him that he did not see what he was to
do in the matter.” If the reader were sure of the first
“he,” he could not come nearer than a guess at the
reference of the second “he.” The third personal
pronoun—he, she, it—in all its cases is especially
uncertain in its references.
The first sentence below is from an English grammar.
The second is from a recently published biography.
Both are obscure in the reference of the pronouns.
“When ‘self’ is added to a pronoun of the First and
Second person, it is preceded by the Possessive case. But
when it is added to a pronoun of the Third person, it is preceded
by a pronoun in the Objective case.”
“I am reminded of Swinburne’s view of Providence when
he said that he never saw an old gentleman give a sixpence
to a beggar, but he was straightway run over by a ’bus.”
The relative pronoun is also uncertain in its references.
Some Southerners were among the ship’s passengers, of
whom a few had served in the Rebellion. (Obscure reference.)
Red lights were displayed in a peculiar succession, which
warned of impending storm. (No antecedent.)
To make the reference of pronouns, personal and
relative, distinct, the antecedent must be made prominent;
sometimes the only way out of the difficulty is a
repetition of the antecedent. And the pronoun should
stand near the word to which it refers. Keep associated
ideas together.
225
Like pronouns in the uncertainty of their reference
are participles. Either the subject is not expressed, or
it is uncertain.
Hastening up the steps, the door opened. (None.)
Coming from the spring, with a pail of water in either
hand, he saw her for the first time. (Uncertain.)
Adverbs are sometimes placed so that they make a
sentence ridiculous; and frequently their meaning is
lost by being separated from the words they modify.
“Only” is a word to be watched. Like adverbs are
correlative conjunctions. They are frequently so
placed that they do not join the elements they were
intended to unite.
He seized the young girl as she rose from the water
almost roughly.
I think I hardly shall.
I only went as far as the gate.
“Who shall say, of us who know only of rest and peace
by toil and strife?”
He not only learned algebra readily but also Latin.
Phrases and clauses may lose their reference by
being removed from the words they modify.
Toiling up the hill, he arrived at Hotel Bellevue through
a drizzling rain.
Addison rose to a post which dukes, the heads of the
great houses of Talbot, Russell, and Bentinck, have thought
it an honor to fill without high birth, and with little property.
“Fred was liked well; but he had the habit of that class
that cannot get the English Language in the right order
when a little excited.”
All the classes of errors which have been exemplified
here are due to the infringement of one rule:
things that belong together in thought should stand
226
together in composition. Nothing should be allowed
to come between a pronoun, an adjective, an adverb, a
correlative, a phrase, or a clause, and the word it modifies.
Sometimes other modifiers have to be taken into
account: where more than one word or phrase modifies
the same word, a trial will have to be made to
arrange them so that there shall be no obscurity or
absurdity. Keep related ideas together; keep unrelated
ideas apart.
Parallel Construction.
The second principle which helps to make the relation
of parts clear is parallel construction.
It has already been explained in paragraphs.
In sentences the commonest errors are in linking
an infinitive with a gerund, a participle with a verb,
an active with a passive voice, a phrase with a clause.
The result is sentences like the following:—
You cannot persuade him to go and into buying what he
does not want.
Thus he spoke, and turning to the door.
The king began to force the collection of duties, and an
army was sent by him to execute his wishes.
He was resolved to use patience and that he would often
exercise charity.
Such sentences are offensive to the ear; and were
they as long as the ones below, they would not be
clear.
“You cannot persuade them to burn their books of curious
science; to banish their lawyers from their courts of laws; or
to quench the lights of their assemblies by refusing to choose
those persons who are best read in their privileges.”
“For though rebellion is declared, it is not proceeded
against as such, nor have any steps been taken towards the
apprehension or conviction of any individual offender, either
on our late or our former Address; but modes of public
coercion have been adopted, and such as have much more
227
resemblance to a sort of qualified hostility towards an independent
power than the punishment of rebellious subjects.”
“My Resolutions therefore mean to establish the equity
and justice of a taxation of America by grant and not by
imposition; to mark the legal competency of the colony
Assemblies for the support of their government in peace,
and for public aids in time of war; to acknowledge that
this legal competency has had a dutiful and beneficial exercise;
and that experience has shown the benefit of their
grants, and the futility of Parliamentary taxation as a
method of supply.”
In the second sentence Burke has used a passive
voice when it would certainly be more elegant to
change to the active. “Is proceeded against” is
surely awkward, but for uniformity and resulting
clearness he has retained the passive. In the last sentence
the infinitives “to establish,” “to mark,” and
“to acknowledge” are in the same construction; they
are objects of “mean.” Then comes a change of form
to show that the clauses “that this legal competency
has had,” etc., and “that experience has shown,” etc.,
are in a like relation to the infinitive “to acknowledge.”
Though the last clause by reason of the punctuation
looks correlative with the others, it is not related
as object to the verb “mean,” as the others are,
but it is the object of “to acknowledge.” There could
hardly be a better example of the value of parallel
constructions for the purpose of avoiding confusion,
and linking together parts that are related.
Balanced Sentences.
Parallel constructions are used in balanced sentences.
In balanced sentences one part is
balanced against another,—a noun and a
noun, an adjective and an adjective, phrase and phrase.
Balanced sentences are especially suited to express antithesis,
the figure of speech where two ideas are sharply
228
opposed to each other. In the following from Newman,
the balancing is admirable: “Inebriated with
the cup of insanity, and flung upon the stream of
recklessness, she dashes down the cataract of nonsense
and whirls amid the pools of confusion.” This
is not antithesis, however; but the following from
Macaulay is: “She seems to have written about the
Elizabethan age, because she had read much about it;
she seems, on the other hand, to have read a little
about the age of Addison, because she had determined
to write about it.”
The danger in the use of balanced sentences is
excess. Macaulay is very fond of brilliant contrasts.
But is a very common word with him. In some cases
the reader feels that for the sake of the figure he has
forced the truth. Balanced sentences are palpably
artificial, and should be used but sparingly.
There is, however, but little danger of overdoing the
parallel construction where there is no antithesis. The
parts of succeeding sentences do not resemble each
other so much in thought that there is great danger
of resulting monotony in its expression. However,
should the difficulty arise, the monotony may be
broken up by a trifling variation. Macaulay has done
this well in the sentences quoted on page 186, beginning
with the words, “For his sake empires had risen, and
flourished, and decayed,” and continuing to the end of
the paragraph.
Use of Connectives.
The third method of securing coherence in a sentence
is by the use of connectives. The
skillful use of prepositions and conjunctions
indicates a master of words. The use of
connectives has been discussed when treating of emphasis
secured by subdual of unimportant details. Such
parts are connected, and in a very definite way. The
229
relations are evident. Two examples will illustrate.
The first group of sentences are the fragments of but
one of Irving’s.
He did not look to the right or left. He did not notice
the scene. The scene was of rural wealth. He had often
gloated on this scene. He went straight to the stable. He
kicked and cuffed his steed several times, and so forth.
Now note the value of prepositions in giving these
separate sentences coherence.
“Without looking to the right or left to notice the scene
of rural wealth, on which he had so often gloated, he went
straight to the stable, and with several hearty cuffs and
kicks roused his steed most unceremoniously from the comfortable
quarters in which he was soundly sleeping, dreaming
of mountains of corn and oats, and whole valleys of
timothy and clover.”
The next also is from Irving, and shows the skillful
use of conjunctions to point out unerringly the relation
of the clauses in a sentence.
“What seemed particularly odd to Rip was that, though
these folks were evidently amusing themselves, yet they
maintained the gravest faces, the most mysterious silence,
and were, withal, the most melancholy party of pleasure he
had ever witnessed.”
Coherence, the principle of structure that surely
holds the parts of a sentence together, is of greater
importance than Mass. Upon Coherence depends the
meaning of a sentence; upon Mass the force with which
the meaning is expressed. That the meaning may be
clear, it is necessary that the relation of the parts shall
be perfectly evident. This lucidity is gained by placing
related parts near together, and conversely, by
separating unrelated ideas; by using parallel constructions
230
for parallel thoughts; and by indicating
relations by the correct use of prepositions and conjunctions.
To summarize, sentences are the elements of discourse.
The ability of a sentence to effect with certainty
its purpose depends upon Unity, Mass, and
Coherence. A sentence must contain all that is
needed to express the whole thought, but it must contain
no more. A sentence must be arranged so that
its important parts shall be prominent. Position and
proportion are the means of emphasis in a sentence.
By placing the important words near the major marks
of punctuation, by arranging the parts in a climax or
a period, by forcing words out of the natural order,
and by subduing unimportant details, a sentence is
massed to give the important elements their relative
emphasis. Last, the parts of a sentence should be
arranged so that their relations shall be clear and
unmistakable. Proximity of related parts, parallel
construction for parallel ideas, and connectives are
the surest means of securing Coherence in a sentence.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS
SILAS MARNER.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 83.)
On page 18 put together the sentence beginning “Every
man’s work,” etc., with the next. What connective and
what punctuation will you use? What is the difference in
effect? What one of the relations of a compound sentence
does the second part bear to the first?
On page 26 could you make two sentences of the sentence
beginning, “Raveloe lay low among the bushy trees”?
Would it be as well? Would it be better?
On page 35 do the three parts of the compound sentence
beginning, “He would have liked,” etc., belong to one sentence?
Which one?
Is it right to say, “He would have liked to spring,” or
would it be better to say, “He would have liked to have
sprung”?
Do you think colons are used too frequently in Silas
Marner? Compare their use with their use in Hawthorne’s
Stories and Irving’s Sketches.
In the sentence beginning, “Let him live,” etc., at the
bottom of page 94, is “a possible state of mind in some possible
person not yet forthcoming,” a climax or an anti-climax?
Why?
At the bottom of page 183 why was it necessary to crowd
so much into one sentence?
MACAULAY’S ESSAY ON MILTON.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 103.)
Re-write the sentence on page 33 beginning, “Of all
poets,” etc., making it loose. Is it better or worse?
232
Why does “here” stand first in the next sentence?
What poets with whom you are familiar have philosophized
too much?
Is the first sentence of the paragraph beginning in the
middle of page 36 periodic or loose?
How many periodic sentences in this paragraph?
In the paragraph on pages 37 and 38 trace the relation
of the succeeding sentences.
At the bottom of page 45 what is the reason for putting
first in the sentence, “of those principles”? What do you
think of the massing of the whole sentence? What has
been made emphatic?
Note the last two sentences at the end of the paragraph
on page 58. Is their arrangement effective? Change one.
What is the effect? (See also the middle of page 64.)
On page 60 why did he not say, “She grovels like a
beast, she hisses like a serpent, she stings like a scorpion”?
What arrangement of clauses in the first sentence in the
paragraph beginning at the bottom of page 66? Does it
add clearness?
In the same paragraph find a balanced sentence.
What advantage is there in the short sentences on page
68?
In the first sentence of the paragraph, beginning on page
71, read one of the clauses, “by whom king, church, and
aristocracy were trampled down.” What is the effect of the
change?
Is the parallel construction in the last sentence beginning
on page 77 good? Is it good in the last sentence of this
paragraph?
In the next paragraph, why is Macaulay’s way better
than this: “He was neither Puritan, free thinker, nor royalist”?
When a sentence is introduced by a participial phrase or
a dependent clause it is in part or wholly periodic. Does
Macaulay frequently use this introduction? What is the
effect upon his style?
233
Can you find examples of sentences beginning with a loose
structure, and having within them examples of the periodic
structure?
In the paragraph filling pages 79 and 80 there are many
examples of periodic and parallel structure. Contrast this
paragraph with some of Lamb’s paragraphs.
What is the effect of position upon the phrase, “Even in
his hands,” on page 67?
When Macaulay inverts the order of a sentence does he
usually do it for emphasis or to secure coherence?
Does he use many pronouns and conjunctions?
Does he repeat words?
BURKE’S SPEECH ON CONCILIATION WITH THE COLONIES.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 100.)
How many sentences in the first paragraph are periodic?
What kind of sentences in paragraph 10?
What is the effect of this paragraph?
Notice the arrangement of loose and periodic clauses in
the last sentence in paragraph 12. Make this sentence entirely
loose.
In the long sentence in paragraph 25 do the he’s and
him’s all refer to the same person?
What would you say of Burke’s use of pronouns?
Find examples of balanced sentences in this oration.
Are you ever astray regarding Burke’s meaning?
What has he done to gain clearness?
For what purpose does he frequently use questions?
WEBSTER’S BUNKER HILL ORATION.
(Riverside Literature Series, No. 56.)
What relation has the second sentence of paragraph 1 to
the first?
Is the last sentence in paragraph 3 clear? How has he
made it so?
Compare this sentence with the one beginning at the bottom
of page 12.
234
In the last sentence of paragraph 6 where does loose structure
change to the periodic?
In paragraph 7 why would it be a blemish to write, “That
we may keep alive similar sentiments”?
Why does he repeat “We wish” so many times? Why
did he not substitute synonyms?
In paragraph 18 why has he used the word “interest”
more than once? If the thought is to be repeated, why not
some other word?
In the eighth sentence of paragraph 21 is the structure
periodic or loose?
Reverse the order of clauses in the last sentence of paragraph
28. What is the effect?
CHAPTER IX
WORDS
A word is the sign of an idea. Whether the idea
be an object, a quality, an action, simple existence, or
a relation, if it be communicated to another, it must
have some sign; in language these signs are words.
Infinitely varied are the ideas man has to express.
Each day, each moment, has its new combination of
circumstances; yet by the common person the effect of
the novel situation is described as “horrid” or “awful”
or “perfectly lovely.” Three adjectives to describe all
creation! No wonder that people are constantly misunderstood;
that others do not get their ideas. How
can they? Do the best the master can, the thought will
not pass from him to his reader without considerable
deflection. He cannot say exactly what he would. His
words do not hold the same meaning for him as for
others. “Mother” to him is a dear woman with a gentle
voice, always dressed in black, sitting by the window
of home; to another she is a shrieking termagant, whose
phrases are punctuated by blows. There is not a word
that means exactly the same to two persons; yet with
words men must express their thoughts, their feelings,
their hopes, their purposes,—always changing, ever
new,—and for all this shall they use but a few score of
words? Words are the last, least elements of language;
without these least elements, these atoms of language,
no sentence, however simple, can be made; by means of
them, the master drives mobs to frenzy or soothes the
236
pain of eternal loss. The calm and peace which Emerson
knew, we know; the perpetual benediction of past
years which Wordsworth felt, all may feel. These
thoughts masters have expressed in words, but not in
three words. Thousands are not enough accurately to
transfer their visions of this changing universe from
them to us. Ideas infinite in their variety demand for
their expression all the means which our language has
placed at the disposal of the master. For this true
expression the whole dictionary with its thousands of
words is all too small.
Need of a Large Vocabulary.
Whoever hopes to be understood must acquire a full,
rich vocabulary. However clearly he may
think, however much he may feel, until he
has words, the thought, the emotion, must remain
his alone. To get a vocabulary, then, is a person’s
business. He who has it can command him
who has it not. Not in literature alone, but in business,—in
medicine, in law, behind the accountant’s
desk or the salesman’s counter,—he is master who
can say what he means so that the person to whom he
speaks must know just what he means. Now it is a
singular truth that when we read any great author, the
words which we do not understand are remarkably few.
Even in Shakespeare there are not many; and the
few are unknown by reason of a constantly changing
vocabulary. It was probably true then, as it would
certainly be to-day, that the large majority of audiences
lost not a word of his fifteen thousand, while they themselves
used less than eight hundred. We know what
others say; yet we say nothing ourselves. What a
vocabulary one could accumulate, if from six to eighteen
he added only two words a day! Twelve years,
and each year more than seven hundred words! It
does not look a difficult task. Children do more, and
237
never realize the superiority of their achievement. Nine
thousand words at eighteen! Shakespeare alone used
more. Macaulay needed scarcely six thousand.
Dictionary.
How shall a vocabulary be accumulated? One
method is by the use of a dictionary; and
many persons find it a source of great pleasure.
The genealogy and biography of words are as
fascinating to a devoted philologist as stamps to a philatelist
or cathedrals to an architect. “Canteen” is
quite an unassuming little word. Yet imperious Cæsar
knew it in its childhood. The Roman camp was laid
out like a small city, with regular streets and avenues.
On one of these streets called the “Via Quintana” all
the supplies were kept. When the word passed into
the Italian, it became “cantina;” and cantinas may be
found among all nations who have drawn their language
from the Latin. There is this difference, however:
that whereas eatables were to be had in the Roman
quintana, only drinkables can be found in the Italian
cantina. When the English adopted the word, the
middle meaning, a place where wines are stored, a
wine-cellar, came to be a small flask especially fitted
for the rough usage of a soldier’s life, in which a necessary
supply of some sort of liquid may be carried. So
the name of a street has become the much-berated canteen
of the sutler and the much needed canteen of the
soldier. The dictionary is full of such fascinating biographies.
Still its fascination is not the reason why
most people study the dictionary: it is because such a
study is necessary for the person who hopes for an accurate
knowledge of the words he reads. It is not impossible
to know “pretty nearly what it means” from
the context; but no master uses words without knowing
exactly what they mean. Certainty of meaning
precedes frequency of use; and this necessary confidence
238
is gained from a study of the dictionary. In a
general way we know all the words of Macaulay’s vocabulary;
but the average man uses only eight hundred
of them. His knowledge of words is no more than an
indistinct, mumbling knowledge. To lift each word
out of its context, to make it a distinct, living entity,
capable of serving, the definition must be studied.
Then the student knows just what service the word is
fitted for, and finds a pleasure in being competent to
command that service. The dictionary is a necessity
to the person who hopes to use words.
Study of Literature.
Yet the knowledge of words that the student derives
from the dictionary is not sufficient.
When one hears an educated foreigner speak,
he detects little errors in his use of words,—errors
which are not the fault of definition, but errors in the
idiomatic use of words. This use cannot be learned
from a dictionary, where words are studied individually,
but only by studying them in combination with other
words where the influence of one word upon another
may be noted. There is little difference in the size of
a pile of stones, whether we say a great pile of stones
or a large pile of stones; but a great man is of much
more consequence than a large man. A dictionary
could hardly have told a foreigner this. A man may
pursue or chase a robber, as the author wishes; but he
may not chase a course. Prepositions are especially
liable to be misused, and their correct use comes from
a study of literature, not of the dictionary. The nice
and discriminating refinements in the use of words
are learned by careful reading. When a phrase is met,
such as “the steep and solitary eastern heaven,” where
each word has been born to a new beauty; or this,
“And the sweet city with her dreaming spires,” where
the adjectives “sweet” and “dreaming” have a richer
239
content, they should be regarded with great care and
greeted with even more delight than words entirely
new. How to read that we may gain this complete
mastery of words, Mr. Ruskin has best told us in
“Sesame and Lilies.” Every person should know “Of
Kings’ Treasuries” by reading and re-reading. Literature,
the way masters have used words, will furnish
a knowledge of the nicer discriminations in their use.
The dictionary and literature are the sources of
a full and refined vocabulary. But the vocabulary
which may be perfectly understood is not entirely
in one’s possession until it is used. Seek the first
opportunity to use the newly acquired word. It will
be hard to utter it; you will feel an effort in getting it
out. Only once, however; after that it rises as easily
as any old familiar word. Because the companion with
whom you speak is always “just as mad as” she can
be, is no reason why you may not at times be vexed,
annoyed, aggravated, exasperated, or angry. Men are
not always either “perfectly lovely” or “awful;”
neither are all ladies “jewels.” There are degrees of
villainy and nobility; and all jewels have not the same
lustre. Know what you want to say, and find the one
word that will exactly say it. This costs work, it is
true; but what is there worth having which has not
cost some one work? Do the work; search for the
word; then use it. In this way a vocabulary becomes
a real possession.
The words which a person may use are generally
described as reputable, national, and present. Words
must be reputable; that is, sanctioned by the authority
of the creators of English literature. They must be
national; words that are the property of the mass of
the people, not of a clique or a district. And they
must be of the present; Chaucer’s vocabulary, though
240
it be the source of English, will not satisfy the conditions
of to-day.
Vulgarisms are not reputable.
First, words must be of reputable use. No person
would consider vulgarisms reputable. When
a person says “I hain’t got none,” he has
reached about the acme of vulgarisms, the
language of the illiterate. Grammar has been disregarded;
a word has been used which is not a word;
and another word has no reason for its appearance in
the sentence. Yet sometimes this expression is heard;
seldom seen written. It is always set down to the
account of an illiterate home; for no one can reach a
high school without knowing its grammatical errors.
The unerring use of don’t, me, I, lie, lay, set, and sit,
is not so assured that the list can be omitted. Adjectives
are used for adverbs; “real good” is not yet forgotten.
Nouns are called upon to do the work of
verbs. This is the language of the illiterate, and it
should be avoided; for vulgarisms are not reputable.
Slang is not reputable.
Neither is slang reputable. He would be a prude
who would not recognize that slang is sometimes
right to the point; and that many of
our strongest idioms were originally slang.
Still, although many phrases which to-day are called
slang were at one time reputable, the fact of their
respectable birth cannot save them from the slight
imputation that now they are slang. Notwithstanding
the fact that we owe some of our strongest idioms
to slang, the free use of slang always vulgarizes. It
generally is called upon to supply a deficiency either
in thought or in the power of expression. People too
lazy to think, too indolent to read, with little to say,
and but a few slang phrases to say it with, may be
allowed to practice this vulgarity; but cultured persons
in cultured conversation will eschew all acquaintance
241
with it. To find it in the serious composition of
educated persons always raises a question of their refinement.
It is the stock in trade of the lazy and the
uncultured. It is used to divert attention from poverty
of thought and a threadbare vocabulary. It is
unnecessary for the complete expression of thought by
the scholar and man of refinement.
It is a real misfortune that many good words have
been tarnished by the handling of the illiterate. “Awful,”
“horrid,” and “lovely” are good words; but they
have been sullied by common use. So common have
they become that they approach slang. They may be
rescued from that charge in each person’s writing, if
he shows by accurate use of them that he is master of
their secret strength.
Milton wrote in “Paradise Lost:”—
“No! let us rather choose,
Armed with Hell-flames and fury, all at once
O’er Heav’n’s high towers to force resistless way,
Turning our tortures into horrid arms
Against the Torturer.”
Lord Lytton makes Richelieu exclaim:—
“Look where she stands! Around her form I draw
The awful circle of our solemn church.”
And in the New Testament we read:—
“Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever
things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever
things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever
things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if
there be any praise, think on these things.”
There is no question here of the words; they have
all the freshness and vigor of their youth. Do not
hesitate to use such words exactly. When the thought
calls for them, they say with certainty what can be
expressed only doubtfully by other words.
Words must be national. Provincialisms.
242
Second, words must be of national use. They cannot
be words confined to a locality. When
Morris talks of a house that has been “gammoned,”
he deprives a large number of readers
of his meaning. “Gums” and “brasses”
may be good in certain districts of England, but in
literature they should not be used, for they would not
generally be understood. For the same reason much
of the common conversation of the South is foreign to
a native of New York. Whoever employs the language
of a locality limits his circle of readers to that
locality. To write for all he must use the language of
all; he must avoid provincialisms.
Technical and Bookish Words.
Like words that are used by a small region are words
which are understood by a clique of persons.
Scholars are inclined to use a scholarly vocabulary.
The biologist has one; the chemist
another; the philosopher a third. This technical vocabulary
may be a necessity at times; but when a specialist
addresses the public, his words must be the
words which an average cultured man can understand.
Such words can be found if the writer will look for
them; if he does not, his work can scarcely be called
literature. Technical words and bookish terms are not
words of national use.
The following by Josiah Royce illustrates how clearly
a most abstruse topic can be handled by a man willing
to take the trouble:—
“If you ask what sort of thing this substance is, the first
answer is, that it is something eternal; and that means, not
that it lasts a good while, but that no possible temporal view
of it could exhaust its nature. All things that happen result
from the one substance. This surely means that what happens
now and what happened millions of years ago are, for
the substance, equally present and necessary results. To illustrate
243
once more in my own way: A spider creeping back and
forth across a circle could, if she were geometrically disposed,
measure out in temporal succession first this diameter,
and then that. Crawling first over one diameter, she would
say, ‘I now find this so long.’ Afterwards examining another
diameter, she would say, ‘It has now happened that
what I have just measured proves to be precisely as long as
what I measured some time since, and no longer.’ The toil
of such a spider might last many hours, and be full of such
successive measurements, each marked by a spun thread of
web. But the true circle itself within which the web was
spun, the circle in actual space as the geometer knows it,
would its nature be thus a series of events, a mere succession
of spun threads? No, the true circle would be timeless, a
truth founded in the nature of space, outlasting, preceding,
determining all the weary web-spinning of this time-worn
spider. Even so we, spinning our web of experience in all
its dreary complications in the midst of the eternal nature
of the world-embracing substance, imagine that our lives
somehow contain true novelty, discover for the substance
what it never knew before, invent new forms of being.
We fancy our past wholly past, and our future wholly unmade.
We think that where we have yet spun no web, there
is nothing, and that what we long ago spun has vanished,
broken by the winds of time into nothingness. It is not so.
For the eternal substance there is no before and after; all
truth is truth. ‘Far and forgot to me is near,’ it says. In
the unvarying precision of its mathematical universe, all is
eternally written.
‘Not all your piety nor wit
Can lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all your tears wash out one word of it.’”
Foreign Words.
Words and phrases from a foreign language should
be used only as a last resort. Bon mot, sine
qua non, and dolce far niente are all very apt,
and to a person like Mr. Lowell, who was intimately
244
acquainted with many languages, they may come as
soon as their English equivalents. In the case of such
a person, the reason why they should not be used is
that the reader cannot understand them. But when a
young smatterer uses them to advertise his calling acquaintance
with a language, he is but proclaiming his
own lack of good taste. In his composition they are
as ineffective to make it respectable as a large diamond
on a gamester’s finger to make him an honored
gentleman. Use the English language when writing
for English-speaking people. It has the fullest, richest
vocabulary in the world. It will not be found
unequal to the task of expressing your thoughts.
Words in Present Use.
Third, words should be in present use. Words may
be so new that people do not know them;
they may have passed out of use after years
of good service. Of new words, but little can
be said. The language constantly changes. New discoveries
and inventions demand new words. What ones
will be more than temporary cannot be prophesied.
“Blizzard” and “mugwump” were new but a short
time ago: the latter is dying from disuse, the former
has come to stay. In this uncertainty one thing can
be said, however. No word which has not secured
recognition should be used by a young person, if by
reputable words already in the language he can express
his meaning. And just as he should not be the first to
take up an untried word, so the young writer should
not be the last to drop a dead one. There is at present
a sort of fad for old English. A large number of
words that have been resting quietly in their graves
for centuries have been called forth. Some may
enjoy a second life; most of them will feel only the
weakness of a second obsolescence. “Foreword” and
“inwit” were good once; but “preface” and “conscience”
245
mean as much and have the advantage of
being alive. To be understood use the words of the
present.
Words in their Present Meaning.
Use words in their present signification. Not only
has language cast out many words; it has
changed many others so that they are hardly
recognized. When Chaucer wrote,
“Ther may no man Mercury mortify
But hit be with his brother knowleching,”
“mortify” meant to make dead, to kill. To-day a
lady may say she was mortified to death; but that is
hyperbole. In “Paradise Lost” Satan may
“Through the palpable obscure find out
His uncouth way.”
But a person to-day is not justified in using “uncouth”
for “unknown.” The works of Shakespeare
and Milton abound in words whose life has been prolonged
to the present, but whose signification has been
changed. The writer who seeks to use words with
these old meanings is standing in his own light. Such
use always attracts attention to the words themselves,
and by so much subtracts attention from the thought.
Words of Latin and Saxon Origin.
Words that are in good use have been divided into
two classes, as they have been drawn from
two sources. Some differences between Anglo-Saxon
and Latin words are marked.
Saxon words are generally short; Latin words long.
The first are the words of home and are concerned
with the necessities of life; the second are the words
of the court and the adornments of polite society. The
former made the foundation of our language and gave
to it its idiomatic strength; the latter came later, and
added to the strength of the language its grace and
refinement.
246
In our speech there can be no doubt that short words
are used when the purpose is to be understood quickly,
even harshly, while the longer words are frequently employed
for saying unpleasant things pleasantly. Euphemism,
the choice of words not harsh for harsh ideas,
has its uses. It is not always wrong to say, “He was
taken away” for “He was killed.” But when the plain
truth is to be spoken, when, as in most composition,
the object is to be understood, the words should be
chosen which exactly express the thought, be those
words Latin or Saxon. For any one to say, “Was
launched into eternity” for “Was hanged,” or “When
the fatal noose was adjusted about the neck of the unfortunate
victim of his own unbridled passions” for
“When the halter was put around his neck,” is a useless
parade of vocabulary. One knows that such
phrases are made by a writer who is ignorant of the
value of words, or by a penny-a-liner, willing to sacrifice
every effect of language to the immediate needs of
his purse. Such writing has no power. The words
are dictated by too low a motive to have any force in
them. Let a writer go straight to the point as
directly as the hindrances of language will allow. Even
then his expression will lag behind his thought.
This does not mean that one is to use Saxon words
always. It means that one shall use the words that
say exactly what is to be said, so that the reader can
get the exact thought with the least outlay of attention
to the words. Latin words are as common as Saxon
words. To search out a Saxon word because it is
Saxon and short is as reprehensible as to use the indirection
of Latin words where directness is wanted.
Latin words have a place; they express the finer distinctions
and gradations of thought. In the discussion
247
of any question requiring nice precision of statement
Latin words are necessary. In the following from
Newman, it would be difficult, perhaps impossible, to
substitute words of Anglo-Saxon origin for the words
of Latin origin, and could it be done, the passage would
not then have the clearness it now has from his use of
common words, though they be Latin:—
“I mean then by the Supreme Being, one who is simply
self-dependent, and the only Being who is such; moreover,
that He is without beginning or Eternal, and the only Eternal;
that in consequence He has lived a whole eternity by
Himself; and hence that He is all-sufficient, sufficient for his
own blessedness, and all-blessed, and ever-blessed. Further,
I mean a Being who, having these prerogatives, has the
Supreme Good, or rather is the Supreme Good, or has all the
attributes of good in infinite intenseness; all wisdom, all
truth, all justice, all love, all holiness, all beautifulness; who
is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent; ineffably one, absolutely
perfect; and such that what we do not know of Him
is far more wonderful than what we do and can.”
Latin words, moreover, have a fullness of sound
which gives them an added weight and dignity. One
would hesitate long before changing one of Milton’s
big-sounding phrases, even if he were not compelled to
sacrifice the metre. In Webster’s orations there is a
dignity, a sublimity, gained by the use of full-mouthed
polysyllables. Supposing he had said at the beginning
of his eulogy of Adams and Jefferson, “This is a new
sight” instead of “This is an unaccustomed spectacle,”
the whole effect of dignified utterance commensurate
with the occasion would have been lost. The oration
abounds in examples of reverberating cadences. Milton’s
sentences are a stately procession of gorgeous
words: the dignified pomp of the advance is occasioned
248
by the wealth of essential beauty and historical
association in the individual words:—
“That proud honor claimed
Azazel as his right, a Cherube tall:
Who forthwith from the glittering staff unfurl’d
Th’ imperial ensign, which, full high advanc’t
Shon like a meteor streaming to the wind,
With gemms and golden lustre rich emblaz’d
Seraphic arms and trophies; all the while
Sonorous metall blowing martial sounds:
At which the universal host up-sent
A shout that tore Hell’s concave, and beyond
Frighted the reign of Chaos and old Night.
All in a moment through the gloom were seen
Ten thousand banners rise into the air,
With orient colours waving; with them rose
A forrest huge of spears; and thronging helms
Appear’d, and serried shields in thick array
Of depth immeasurable.” (“Paradise Lost.”)
The choice of words does not depend on whether
they are of Latin or of Saxon origin. In use it will
be found that short words, like short sentences, give
more directness and force to the composition; while
long words have a dignified elegance and refinement
of discrimination not the property of monosyllables.
No one should think, however, that short words cause
the force or long words cause the dignity. These
qualities belong to the thought; the completeness of
its expression is approached by a choice in words.
Choose words for their fitness to say what you think,
or feel, or purpose, having no regard for their origin.
General and specific.
Words are also classified as general and specific.
By a general word is meant a word common
to or denoting a large number of ideas. By
specific is meant a word that denotes or specifies a
249
single idea. “Man,” “move,” “bad,” are general
and denote a large number of ideas; while “Whittier,”
“glide,” “thieving,” are specific, denoting but
one man, one movement, one kind of badness. “Man”
denotes the whole human race, while it implies a feeling,
thinking, speaking, willing animal. “Whittier”
denotes but a single person, but beside all the common
qualities implied by the, word “man,” “Whittier”
suggests, among other things, a homely face, serious
and kind, a poet, and an anti-slavery worker.
Use Words that suggest most.
As a principle in composition, it may be said that
the more a word or phrase can be made to
imply or suggest, while at the same time
expressing all that the writer wishes to say,
the more valuable does that word or phrase become.
Yet it should be remembered that words may be so
specific that they do not include all that the author
wishes to include. For instance, if instead of “Blessed
are the peacemakers,” the beatitude should be made
to read “Blessed are the Quakers,” though this organized
body of persons labor for the blessings of peace,
yet the meaning would be restricted by the limited denotation
of the term. It does not include enough. So
in almost all of Emerson’s writing, it would not be
possible to express his entire thought with more specific
words. Therefore regard must always be had for
the thought,—that it may be expressed in its perfect
fullness and entirety. Keeping this full expression in
view, those words are strongest, truest, richest, which
suggest most. To say of a person that he is a bad
man is one thing; that he is a traitor is quite another;
but when one writes that he is a veritable Judas, words
fail to keep pace with suggestions, and reason yields
to emotion. Specific words, if they denote the whole
idea, are as much better than general terms as their
suggestion exceeds the suggestion of general terms.
Synecdoche, Metonymy.
250
Much of the force of figures of speech is derived
from the suggestive quality of the specific
words employed. When a man calls another
a dog, he has used a metaphor. He has availed himself
of a term that gathers up all the snarling qualities
of the worst of the dog species. The figure has high
suggestive power. Synecdoche, too, that figure of
speech in which a part is used for the whole or the
whole for a part, employs a term of higher suggestive
power for one of lower connoting force. “All
hands took hold” is better than “All persons went to
work.” Metonymy is the substitution of the name of
one thing for that of another to which the former bears
a known and close relation. The most common of
these known and close relations are those of cause and
its effects, of container and the thing contained, and of
sign and the thing signified. “He has read Shakespeare,”
“He was addicted to the use of the bottle,”
“All patriots fight for the flag,” are examples of metonymy.
All these figures depend in large degree for
their power upon the greater suggestiveness of specific
words; and their use gives to composition an efficiency
and directness commensurate with the greater connoting
value of the specific words.
Care in Choice of Specific Words.
A writer should keep in mind the fact that the
same word may mean widely different things
to two persons. For this reason the specific
word that appeals to him most may be of no
value in addressing others. “Free silver” means to
one set of men the withdrawal of money from investment,
consequent stagnation in business, followed by
the closing of factories and penury among laborers.
To others it means three dollars a day for unskilled
labor, fire, clothes, and something to eat. Again, if
one wished to present the horrors of devastating disease,
251
in the South he would mention yellow fever, in
the North smallpox; but to a lady who saw six little
brothers and sisters dead from it in one week, three
carried to the graveyard on the hillside one chill November
morning, all the terrors of contagious disease
are suggested by the word “diphtheria.” Words are
weighted with our experiences. They are laden with
what we have lived into them. As persons have different
experiences, each word carries to each person a
different meaning. The wise writer chooses those
specific words which suggest most to the men he addresses,—in
general, to the average man.
There are many words that carry some of the same
suggestions to all. These words are connected with
the common things of life: such words as “home,”
“death,” “mother,” and the many more that have
been with all people from childhood. They are simple
little words crowded with experiences. Such words
carry a weight of suggestion not found in strange new
words. It is for this reason that simple language goes
straight to the heart; it is so loaded with life. Of two
expressions that convey the thought with equal accuracy,
always choose the simpler.
The following poems—one by Tennyson, steeped
in pain, perfect in its phrasing; the other by Kipling,
rising to a conception of a true artist’s work, never
before so simply expressed—are both written in
home words, little words, but words all know, words
that carry to all a common meaning:—
“Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean:
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy autumn fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more.
252
“Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail
That brings our friends up from the underworld;
Sad as the last which reddens over one
That sinks with all we love below the verge;
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.
“Ah! sad and strange as in dark summer dawns
The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square;
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.
“Dear as remembered kisses after death,
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned
On lips that are for others; deep as love,
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret;
O Death in Life, the days that are no more!”
L’ENVOI.
“When Earth’s last picture is painted and the tubes are twisted and dried,
When the oldest colors have faded, and the youngest critic has died,
We shall rest, and, faith, we shall need it—lie down for an æon or two,
Till the Master of All Good Workmen shall put us to work anew!
“And those that were good shall be happy: they shall sit in a golden chair;
They shall splash at a ten-league canvas with brushes of comets’ hair;
They shall find real saints to draw from—Magdalene, Peter, and Paul;
They shall work for an age at a sitting and never be tired at all!
253
“And only the Master shall praise us, and only the Master shall blame;
And no one shall work for money, and no one shall work for fame;
But each for the joy of the working, and each, in his separate star,
Shall draw the Thing as he sees It for the God of Things as They Are!”
Avoid Hackneyed Phrases.
Much like general terms, which mean something or
nothing, are expressions that have become
trite and hackneyed. At some time they
were accurate phrases, saying just what was
needed. By being used for all sorts of purposes, they
have lost the original thought of which they were the
accurate expression. They have no freshness. The
sounding phrases repeated in the pulpit, or the equally
empty phrases of the scientist, however good they were
at their inception, are, in the writing of many persons,
but theological and scientific cant relied upon by ignorant
people to cover up the vacuity of their thought.
One’s own expression, even though it be not so elegant
and graceful, is better than any worn-out, hackneyed
phrase. Think for yourself; then say what you have
thought in the best language you can find yourself.
“Fine Writing.”
“Fine writing,” the subjection of noble words to
ignoble service, is to be avoided. Mr. Micawber
was addicted to this pomposity of
language; and Dickens, by the creation of this character,
has done literature a real service, by showing
how absurd it is, how valueless for anything more than
humor. “‘Under the impression,’ said Mr. Micawber,
‘that your peregrinations in this metropolis have not
as yet been extensive, and that you might have some
difficulty in penetrating the arcana of the Modern
Babylon in the direction of the City Road—in short,’
254
said Mr. Micawber, in another burst of confidence,
‘that you might lose yourself—I shall be happy to
call this evening, and install you in the knowledge of
the nearest way.’” Here are great words in profusion
to dress out a little thought. “Fine writing”
is as much out of taste as over-dressing. When the
thought calls for noble expression, then all one’s energies
should be bent to finding noble phrases; but for
common things common expressions are the only ones
in good taste.
In Prose avoid Poetical Words.
Much like “fine writing” is the use of poetical
words in prose. Enow, erstwhile, besprent,
methinks, agone, and thine are examples of
a large class of words which, though in
perfectly good taste in poetry, are in extremely poor
taste in prose. They are out of place; and so attract
attention to themselves, not to the thought they express.
When writing prose, avoid poetical words.
All of this comes at last to one rule: be exact, be
accurate in the choice of words. Not a word that half
expresses the thought, not even one that is pretty near,
but the only word that exactly expresses the meaning,
that word must be used. It is not a question of long
or short, of Latin or Saxon, of general or specific; it
is a question of accuracy or inaccuracy, the whole or a
part, the whole or too much, of just right or about
right. No one would entirely misunderstand the following
sentence; and just as certainly no one would
derive from these words the impression the author had
when he wrote it. He has phrased it as follows:
“Another direction in which free education is most
valuable to society, is the way in which it removes the
gulf affixed between the rich and poor.” The boy
wanted the opening sentence to sound big, and forgot
that the first use of words is accurately to express the
255
thought. In this sentence are the commonest errors
in the choice of words. “Most valuable” says more
than truth; “direction” says less than truth; and
“affixed” does not say anything. Had the boy studied
the dictionary, had he been familiar with the Bible, had
he carefully considered the figure he introduced with
the word “gulf,” he would not have written this incongruous
sentence; he would not have been inaccurate.
Spare no pains in your effort to be exact. Search
through the words of your own vocabulary; if these
fall short, find others in the dictionary. Get the word
that exactly expresses the thought. Let no fine-sounding
or high-born word trick you into saying what
you do not mean. Be master of your words; never let
fine expressions enslave you. In a word, be accurate.
Such painstaking labor has its reward not alone in
the increased power of expression; there is also a corresponding
growth in the ability to observe accurately
and to think clearly. No man can write such descriptions
as Ruskin and Stevenson have written without
seeing accurately; nor can a man speak with the definite
certainty of Burke without thinking clearly. The
desire to be accurate in expression drives a writer to be
accurate in thinking. To think is the highest that
man can hope from education. Anything that contributes
to this highest attainment should be undertaken
with joy. Whether planning a story or constructing
an argument; whether excluding irrelevant matter or
including what contributes to the perfection of the
whole; whether massing the material so that all the
parts shall receive their due emphasis; whether relating
the parts so that the thought advances steadily and
there can be no misunderstanding,—in all this the student
will find arduous labor. Yet after all this is done,—when
the theme, the paragraphs, and the sentences
256
contain exactly what is needed, are properly massed, and
are set in perfect order,—then comes the long labor
of revision, which does not stop until the exact word
is hunted out. For upon words, at last, we are dependent
for the expression of our observation and thought.
He is most entirely master of his thoughts who can
accurately express them: clearly, that he cannot be
misunderstood; forcefully, that he will not be unread;
and elegantly, that he give the reader joy. And this
mastery he evinces in a finely discriminating choice of
words.
CHAPTER X
FIGURES OF SPEECH
Figurative Language.
There is a generally accepted division of language
into literal and figurative. Language that
is literal uses words in their accepted and
accurate meaning. Figurative language employs words
with meanings not strictly literal, but varying from
their ordinary definitions.
Much of our language is figurative. When a person
says, “He is a bright boy,” he has used the word
“bright” in a sense that is not literal; the use is figurative.
In the following there is hardly a sentence that
has not some variation from literal language.
“Down by the river there is, as yet, little sign of spring.
Its bed is all choked with last year’s reeds, trampled about
like a manger. Yet its running seems to have caught a happier
note, and here and there along its banks flash silvery
wands of palm. Right down among the shabby burnt-out
underwood moves the sordid figure of a man. His hat is
battered, and he wears no collar. I don’t like staring at his
face, for he has been unfortunate. Yet a glimpse tells me
that he is far down the hill of life, old and drink-corroded at
fifty.” (Le Gallienne.)
In the second sentence there are at least three figurative
expressions. “Bed,” “choked,” and “trampled
like a manger” are not literal. So, too, in the next
sentence there are two beautiful variations from literal
expression. Going on through the selection the reader
will find frequently some happy change from literalness,—sometimes
just a word, sometimes a phrase.
258
Figurative language is of great value. It adds
clearness to our speech; it gives it more force; or it
imparts to literature beauty. The last use is the most
common; indeed, it is so common that sometimes the
other uses are overlooked. However, when such a
sentence as the following is read, the comparison is of
value in giving clearness to the thought, although it
does not state the literal truth.
“In the early history of our planet, the moon was flung
off into space, as mud is thrown from a turning wagon
wheel.”
Force is often gained by the use of figurative language.
The following is a good illustration:—
“Neither the perseverance of Holland, nor the activity
of France, nor the dextrous and firm sagacity of English enterprise,
ever carried this most perilous mode of hardy industry
to the extent to which it has been pushed by these
people [Americans]; a people who are still, as it were, but
in the gristle, and not yet hardened into the bone of manhood.”
The next is an illustration of a figure used for
beauty:—
“Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.”
A figure of speech is any use of words with a sense
varying from their literal definition, to secure clearness,
force, or beauty of expression.
Figures add so much to the attractiveness of literature,
that every one would like to use them. Yet figures
should never be sought for. When they come of
themselves, when they insist on being used, and are a
part of the thought itself, and seem to be its only adequate
259
expression, then they should be used. In most
cases figures are ornaments of literature; it must be
remembered that ornament is always secondary, and
that no ornament is good unless it is in entire harmony
with the thing it is to beautify. (See Preface, p. viii.)
When a figure suggests itself, it must be so clearly
seen that there can be no mixing of images. Some
people are determined to use figures, and they force
them into every possible place. The result is that
there is often a confusion of comparisons. The following
is bad: “His name went resounding in golden letters
through the corridors of time.” Just how a name
could resound “in golden letters” is a difficult question.
Longfellow used the last phrase beautifully:—
“Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of time.”
Of the two hundred or more figures of speech which
have been named and defined, only a few need be mentioned
here. And the purpose is not that you shall
use them more, but that you may recognize them when
you meet them in literature.
Figures based upon Likeness.
There is a large group of figures of speech based
upon likeness. One thing is so much like
another that it is spoken of as like it, or, more
frequently, one is said to be the other. Yet
if the things compared are very much alike, there is
no figure. To say that a cat is like a panther is not
considered figurative. It is when in objects essentially
different we detect and name some likeness that we
say there is a figure of speech. There is at first thought
no likeness between hope and a nurse; yet were it not
for hope most persons would die. Thackeray was right
when he said that “Hope is the nurse of life.”
260
The principal figures based upon likeness are metaphor,
epithet, personification, apostrophe, allegory, and
simile.
A metaphor is an implied comparison between
things essentially different, but having some common
quality. Metaphor is by far the most common figure of
speech; indeed, so common is it that figurative language
is often called metaphorical.
“Tombs are the clothes of the dead; a grave is but a
plain suit, and a rich monument is one embroidered.”
“Let me choose;
For as I am, I live upon the rack.”
“The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep.”
Only a little removed from metaphor is epithet.
An epithet is a word, generally a descriptive adjective
or a noun, used, not to give information, but to impart
strength or ornament to diction. It is like a shortened
metaphor. It is very often found in impassioned prose
or verse. Notice that in each epithet there is a comparison;
that the figure is based on likeness.
“Here are sever’d lips
Parted with sugar breath.”
“Base dog! why shouldst thou stand here?”
Personification is a figure that ascribes to inanimate
things, abstract ideas, and the lower animals the
attributes of human beings. It is plain that there
must be some resemblance of the lower to the higher,
else this figure could not be used. Personification, like
the epithet, is a modification of the metaphor. Indeed,
in every personification there is also a metaphor.
“When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees
And they did make no noise.”
“But ever heaves and moans the restless Deep.”
261
Apostrophe is an address to the dead as if living;
to abstract ideas or inanimate objects as if they were
persons. It is a variety of personification.
“O Caledonia! stern and wild,
Meet nurse for a poetic child!”
“Wee, modest, crimson-tippèd flower,
Thou’s met me in an evil hour;
For I maun crush amang the stoure
Thy slender stem.”
“Milton! thou shouldst be living at this hour.”
Allegory is a narrative in which material things
and circumstances are used to illustrate and enforce
high spiritual truths. It is a continued personification.
Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress” and Spenser’s
“Faerie Queene” are good examples of allegory.
All these figures are varieties of metaphor. In them
there is always an implied, not an expressed, comparison.
A simile is an expressed comparison between unlike
things that have some common quality. This comparison
is usually indicated by like or as.
“Ilbrahim was like a domesticated sunbeam, brightening
moody countenances, and chasing away the gloom from the
dark corners of the cottage.”
(Does this figure change to another in its course?)
“How far that little candle throws its beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.”
Of retired Dutch valleys, Irving wrote:—
“They are like those little nooks of still water which border
a rapid stream; where we may see the straw and bubble
riding quietly at anchor, or slowly revolving in their mimic
harbor, undisturbed by the rush of the passing current.”
Figures based upon Sentence Structure.
There are a number of figures that express emotion
262
by simply changing the normal order of the sentence.
Among these are inversion, exclamation, interrogation,
climax, and irony.
Inversion is a figure intended to give
emphasis to the thought by a change from the natural
order of the words in a sentence.
“Thine be the glory!”
“Few were the words they said.”
“He saved others; himself he cannot save.”
Exclamation is an expression of strong emotion in
abrupt, inverted, or elliptical phrases. It is among
sentences what the interjection is among words.
“How far that little candle throws its beams!”
“Oh, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!”
Interrogation is a figure in which a question is
asked, not to get an answer, but for the sake of
emphasis.
“Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?”
“Fear ye foes who kill for hire?
Will ye to your homes retire?”
“Am I a coward?”
Climax is a figure in which the intensity of the
thought and emotion gradually increases with the
successive groups of words or phrases. (See p. 211.)
“Your children do not grow faster from infancy to manhood
than they [the American colonists] spread from families
to communities, from villages to nations.”
Irony is a figure in which one thing is said and
the opposite is meant.
“And Job answered and said, No doubt but ye are the
people, and wisdom shall die with you.”
“O Jew, an upright judge, a learned judge!”
263
Four other figures should be mentioned: metonymy,
synecdoche, allusion, and hyperbole.
Metonymy calls one thing by the name of another
which is closely related to the first. The most common
relations are cause and effect, container and thing contained,
and sign and the thing signified.
“From the cradle to the grave is but a day.”
“I did dream of money-bags to-night.”
Synecdoche is that figure of speech in which a part
is put for the whole, or the whole for a part.
“Fifty sail came into harbor.”
“The redcoats are marching.”
Allusion is a reference to something in history or
literature with which every one is supposed to be acquainted.
“A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel!”
Men still sigh for the flesh pots of Egypt; still worship
the golden calf.
There is no “Open Sesame” to the treasures of learning;
they must be acquired by hard study.
Milton and Shakespeare are full of allusions to the
classic literature of Greece and Rome.
Hyperbole is an exaggerated statement made for
effect.
“He was tall, but exceedingly lank, with narrow shoulders,
long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of his
sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his
whole frame most loosely hung together.”
“And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw
Millions of acres on us, till our ground,
Singeing his pate against the burning zone,
Make Ossa like a wart!”
Exercises in Figures.
264
Name the following figures. Of those that are based
upon likeness, tell in what the similarity consists.
In many of the selections more than
one figure will be found.
- “The long, hard winter of his youth had ended; the
spring-time of his manhood was turning green like the woods.”
- A pig came up to a horse and said, “Your feet are
crooked, and your hair is worth nothing.”
- “The words of his mouth were smoother than butter,
but war was in his heart; his words were softer than oil, but
they were drawn swords.”
- “The lily maid of Astolat.”
“O Truth! O Freedom! how are ye still born
In the rude stable, in the manger nursed!”
“The birch, most shy and ladylike of trees,
Her poverty, as best she may, retrieves,
And hints at her foregone gentilities
With some saved relics of her wealth of leaves.”
- “O friend, never strike sail to a fear! Come into port
grandly, or sail with God the seas!”
- “Primroses smile and daisies cannot frown.”
- “How deeply and warmly and spotlessly Earth’s nakedness
is clothed!—the ‘wool’ of the Psalmist nearly two
feet deep. And as far as warmth and protection are concerned,
there is a good deal of the virtue of wool in such a
snow-fall. It is a veritable fleece, beneath which the shivering
earth (‘the frozen hills ached with pain,’ says one of our
young poets) is restored to warmth.”
- “We can win no laurels in a war for independence.
Earlier and worthier hands have gathered them all. Nor
are there places for us by the side of Solon and Alfred and
other founders of States. Our fathers have filled them.”
265
“I put on righteousness, and it clothed me; my judgment
was as a robe and diadem.
“I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame.
“I was father to the poor; and the cause which I knew
not I searched out.
“And I brake the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the
spoil out of his teeth.”
- “His head and his heart were so well combined that
he could not avoid becoming a power in his community.”
Spenser, writing of honor, says:—
“In woods, in waves, in wars, she wonts to dwell,
And will be found with peril and with pain;
Nor can the man that moulds an idle cell
Unto her happy mansion attain:
Before her gate high God did Sweat ordain,
And wakeful watches ever to abide;
But easy is the way and passage plain
To pleasure’s palace: it may soon be spied,
And day and night her doors to all stand open wide.”
- “Over the vast green sea of the wilderness, the moon
swung her silvery lamp.”
- “The peace of the golden sunshine was supreme. Even
a tiny cloudlet anchored in the limitless sky would not sail
to-day.”
- “A short way further along, I come across a boy gathering
palm. He is a town boy, and has come all the way from
Whitechapel thus early. He has already gathered a great
bundle—worth five shillings to him, he says. This same
palm will to-morrow be distributed over London, and those
who buy sprigs of it by the Bank will know nothing of the
blue-eyed boy who gathered it, and the murmuring river by
which it grew. And the lad, once more lost in some squalid
court, will be a sort of Sir John Mandeville to his companions—a
Sir John Mandeville of the fields, with their water-rats,
their birds’ eggs, and many other wonders. And one
can imagine him saying, ‘And the sparrows there fly right
266
up into the sun, and sing like angels.’ But he won’t get his
comrades to believe that.“
-
“We wandered to the Pine Forest
That skirts the Ocean’s foam;
The lightest wind was in its nest,
The tempest in its home.
The whispering waves were half asleep,
The clouds were gone to play,
And on the bosom of the deep
The smile of heaven lay;
It seemed as if the hour were one
Sent from beyond the skies
Which scattered from above the sun
The light of Paradise.
“We paused amid the pines that stood
The giants of the waste,
Tortured by storms to shapes as rude
As serpents interlaced,—
And soothed by every azure breath
That under heaven is blown,
To harmonies and hues beneath,
As tender as its own:
Now all the tree-tops lay asleep
Like green waves on the sea,
As still as in the silent deep
The ocean woods may be.”
- “When a bee brings pollen into the hive, he advances
to the cell in which it is to be deposited and kicks it off as one
might his overalls or rubber boots, making one foot help the
other; then he walks off without ever looking behind him;
another bee, one of the indoor hands, comes along and rams
it down with his head and packs it in the cell as the dairy-maid
packs butter into a firkin.”
“For thy desires
Are wolfish, bloody, starved, and ravenous.”
- “What a piece of work is man! how noble in reason!
267
how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express
and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension
how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon
of animals!”
“And in her cheeks the vermeil red did shew
Like roses in a bed of lilies shed.”
- He betrayed his friend with a Judas kiss.
- “A true poet is not one whom they can hire by money
and flattery to be a minister of their pleasures, their writer
of occasional verses, their purveyor of table wit; he cannot
be their menial, he cannot even be their partisan. At the
peril of both parties let no such union be attempted. Will a
Courser of the Sun work softly in the harness of a Dray-horse?
His hoofs are of fire, and his path is through the
heavens, bringing light to all lands; will he lumber on mud
highways, dragging ale for earthly appetites from door to
door?”
“Hath a dog money? is it possible
A cur can lend three thousand ducats?”
“Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman blood.”
- They sleep together,—the gray and the blue.
- “Have not the Indians been kindly and justly treated?
Have not the temporal things—the vain baubles and filthy
lucre of this world—which were apt to engage their worldly
and selfish thoughts, been benevolently taken from them?
And have they not, instead thereof, been taught to set their
affections on things above?” (Quoted from Meiklejohn’s
“The Art of Writing English.”)
- “Poetry is truth in its Sunday clothes.”
“His words were shed softer than leaves from the pine,
And they fell on Sir Launfal as snows on the brine,
That mingle their softness and quiet in one
With the shaggy unrest they float down upon.”
- Too much red tape caused a great amount of suffering
in the beginning of the war.
268
“Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean, roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain.”
- “The old Mountain has thrown a stone at us for fear
we should forget him. He sometimes nods his head, and
threatens to come down.”
“But pleasures are like poppies spread:
You seize the flow’r, its bloom is shed;
Or like the snow falls in the river,
A moment white—then melts for ever;
Or like the borealis race,
That flit ere you can point their place;
Or like the rainbow’s lovely form
Evanishing amid the storm.”
CHAPTER XI
VERSE FORMS
No pupil has passed through the graded schools
without being told that he should not sing verses,
though no one is inclined to sing prose. One can
scarcely help singing verse, and one cannot well sing
prose.
What is there about the form that leads a person to
sing verses of poetry? For example, when a person
reads the first lines of “The Lady of the Lake,” he
falls naturally into a sing-song which can be represented
by musical notation as follows:—
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “The | stag |
at | eve |
had | drunk |
his | fill, |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Where | danced |
the | moon |
on | Mon |
an’s | rill, |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| And | deep |
his | mid |
night | lair |
had | made |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| In | lone |
Glen | art |
ney’s | ha |
zel | shade.” |
The second, fourth, sixth, and eighth syllables in
each of these lines are naturally accented in reading,
while the other syllables are read without stress. The
eight syllables of each line fall naturally into groups
270
of two, an unaccented syllable followed by an accented
syllable, just as in the musical notation given, an
unaccented eighth note is followed by an accented
quarter.
In “Hiawatha” the accented syllable comes first,
and the unaccented follows it.
| ^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “By | the |
shores | of |
Git | chee |
Gu | mee, |
| ^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| By | the |
shin | ing |
Big- | Sea- |
Wa | ter, |
| ^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Stood | the |
wig | wam |
of | No |
ko | mis, |
| ^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Daugh | ter |
of | the |
Moon, | No |
ko | mis.” |
So, too, there are groups in which there are three
syllables. The accent may fall on any one of the three.
In the following stanza from “The Bridge of Sighs,”
the accent falls on the first syllable of each group.
| ^ | | |
^ | | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Touch | her | not |
scorn | ful | ly; |
| ^ | | |
^ | | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Think | of | her |
mourn | ful | ly, |
| ^ | | |
^ | | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Not | of | the |
stains | of | her; |
| ^ | | |
^ | | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| All | that | re |
mains | of | her |
| 271^ | | |
^ | | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Now | is | pure |
wo | man | ly.” |
The accent may be upon the second syllable of the
group. This is not common. The following is from
“The Three Fishers.”
| | ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Three | fish | ers |
went | sail | ing |
out | in | to |
the | West, |
| | ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Out | in | to |
the | West | as |
the | sun |
went | down; |
| | ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Each | thought | on |
the | wo | man |
that | loved | him |
the | best; |
| | | ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| [] |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| [And] | the | child | ren |
stood | watch | ing |
them | out | of |
the | town.” |
Or the accent may be upon the last syllable of the
group. This form is very common. It is found in the
poem entitled “Annabel Lee.”
| | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “It | was | man |
y | and | man |
y | a | year |
a | go, |
| | | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| In | a | king |
dom | by |
the | sea, |
| | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| That | a | maid |
en | there | lived |
whom | you |
may | know |
| | | ^ |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| By | the | name |
of | An |
na | bel | Lee; |
| | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| And | this | maid |
en | she | lived |
with | no |
oth | er | thought |
| 272 | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Than | to | love |
and | be | loved |
by | me.” |
Poetic Feet.
If all these verses be observed carefully, it will be
seen that in each group of syllables there is one accented
syllable combined with one or two unaccented.
Such a group of syllables is called a foot.
The foot is the basis of the verse; and from
the prevailing kind of foot that is found in any verse,
the verse derives its name.
A foot is a group of syllables composed of one accented
syllable combined with one or more unaccented.
It will be noticed further that if musical notation be
used, all of these forms are but variations of the one
form, represented by the standard measure 3/8. They
are:—
Accordingly there are five forms of poetic feet made of
this musical rhythm. Of these, four are in common use.
An Iambus is a two-syllable foot accented on the
last syllable. Verse made of this kind of feet is called
iambic. It is the most common form found in English
poetry. Example:—
“The stag at eve had drunk his fill.”
A Trochee is a two-syllable foot accented on the first
syllable. Verse made of this kind of feet is called
trochaic. Example:—
“Stood the wigwam of Nokomis.”
A Dactyl is a three-syllable foot accented on the
first syllable. Such verse is called dactylic. Example:—
“Touch her not scornfully.”
273
An Amphibrach is a three-syllable foot accented on
the middle syllable. It is uncommon. Example:—
“Three fishers went sailing out into the West.”
An Anapest is a three-syllable foot accented on the
last syllable. Example:—
“It was many and many a year ago.”
A Spondee is a very uncommon foot in English. It
consists of two long syllables accented about equally.
It occurs as an occasional foot in a four-syllable rhythm.
No English poem is entirely spondaic. The four-syllable
foot and the spondee are so uncommon that
there is little use in the pupil’s knowing more than that
there are such things. The example below is quoted
from Lanier’s “The Science of English Verse.”
| |
^ | | | |
^ | | |
^ | ^ |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Ah, the |
au | tumn | days | fade |
out, | and | the |
nights | grow |
chill |
| |
^ | | | |
^ | | | |
^ | ^ |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| And we |
walk | no | more | to |
ge | ther | as | we |
used | of |
yore |
When the rose was new in blossom and the sun was on the hill,
And the eves were sweetly vocal with the happy whippoorwill,
And the land-breeze piped its sweetest by the ocean shore.”
Kinds of Metre.A verse is a single line of poetry. It
may contain from one foot to eight feet.
A line made of one foot is called monometer. It is
never used throughout a poem, except as a joke, but
it sometimes occurs as an occasional verse in a poem
that is made of longer lines. The two lines which follow
are from the song of “Winter” in Shakespeare’s
“Love’s Labour’s Lost.” The last is monometer.
274
“Then nightly sings the staring owl
Tu-whit.”
A line containing two feet is called dimeter. It
also is uncommon; but it does sometimes make up a
whole poem; as, “The Bridge of Sighs,” already mentioned.
Another example is:—
| | ^ |
| ^ |
|
| “I’m | wear |
ing | awa’, |
Jean, |
| | ^ | |
| ^ | |
| Like | snaw | when |
it’s | thaw, | Jean, |
| | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| To | the | land |
o’ | the | leal.” |
It is frequently met as an occasional line in a poem.
Wordsworth’s “Daisy” shows it.
“Bright Flower! for by that name at last,
When all my reveries are past,
I call thee, and to that cleave fast,
Sweet, silent creature!
That breath’st with me in sun and air,
Do thou, as thou art wont, repair
My heart with gladness, and a share
Of thy meek nature!”
A line containing three feet is called trimeter. Example:—
| | ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ | |
| “The | snow | had |
be | gun | in |
the | gloam | ing, |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| And | bus |
ily | all |
the | night |
| | | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ | |
| Had | been | heap |
ing | field |
and | high | way |
| | | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| With | a | si |
lence | deep |
and | white.” |
A line containing four feet is called tetrameter.
“Marmion” is written in tetrameters. See the extract
on p. 276.
A line containing five feet is called pentameter.
This line is very common in English poetry. It gives
275
room enough for the poet to say something, and is not
so long that it breaks down with its own weight.
Shakespeare’s Plays, Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” Tennyson’s
“Idylls of the King,”—indeed, most of the
great, serious work of the master-poets has been done
in this verse.
A line containing six feet is called hexameter.
This is the form adopted in the Iliad and the Odyssey
of the Greeks, and the Æneid of the Romans; it has
been used sometimes by English writers in treating
dignified subjects. “The Courtship of Miles Standish”
and “Evangeline” are written in hexameter.
Verses of seven and eight feet are rare; they are
called heptameter and octameter, respectively. The
heptameter is usually divided into a tetrameter and a
trimeter; the octameter, into two tetrameters. Poe’s
“Raven” and Tennyson’s “Locksley Hall” are in
octameters, and Bryant’s “The Death of the Flowers”
is in heptameters.
A verse is named from its prevailing kind of foot
and the number of feet. For example, “The Merchant
of Venice” is in iambic pentameter, and “The
Courtship of Miles Standish” is in dactylic hexameter.
Stanzas.
A stanza is a group of verses, but these verses are
not necessarily of the same length. Monometer, dimeter,
and trimeter are not often used for a
whole stanza; but they are frequently found
in a stanza, introducing variety into it. A stanza
made up of tetrameter alternating with trimeter is
very common. The stanzas from “Annabel Lee”
and “The Village Blacksmith,” found on pages 278
and 279, are excellent examples.
Scansion.
Scansion is the separation of a verse of poetry into
its component feet. Poetry was originally sung or
276
chanted by bards and troubadours. The accompaniment
was a simple strumming on a harp of
very few strings, and was hardly more than
the beating of time. The chanting must have been
much like the sing-song that some people fall into
when reading verses now. The first thing in scanning
a line of poetry is to drop into its rhythm,—to let it
sing itself. When the regular accent is felt, the lines
can easily be separated into their metrical feet. Read
these lines from “Marmion,” and mark only the accented
syllables.
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| “And | there |
she | stood |
so | calm |
and | pale, |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| That | but |
her | breath |
ing | did |
not | fail, |
And motion slight of eyes and head,
And of her bosom, warranted
That neither sense nor pulse she lacks,
You might have thought a form of wax
Wrought to the very life was there;
So still she was, so pale, so fair.”
The marked verses have an accented syllable preceded
by an unaccented syllable. Such a foot is iambic.
There are four feet in each verse; so the poem
is written in iambic tetrameter. In the same way, one
decides that “The Song of Hiawatha” is written in
trochaic tetrameter.
Variations in Metres.
In music the bar or measure is not always filled
with exactly the same kind of notes arranged in the
same order. If the signature reads 3/8, the
measure may be filled by any notes that added
together equal three eighth notes. It may be a quarter
and an eighth, an eighth and a quarter, a dotted
quarter, or three eighth notes. So, in poetry the
verses are not always as regular as in “Marmion”
and “Hiawatha,” although poetry is more regular than
277
music and there are usually few variations of metre
in any one poem. A knowledge of the most common
forms of variation is necessary to correct scansion.
The commonest variation in verse is the substitution
of three eighths for the quarter and the eighth, or the
eighth and the quarter. And the very opposite of this
often occurs; that is, the substitution of the two-syllable
foot for the three-syllable foot. The following, from
“The Burial of Sir John Moore,” illustrates what is
done. Notice, however, that the beat is quite regular,
and the lines lilt along as if there were no change.
| | | ^ |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
| | ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Not | a | drum |
was | heard, |
not | a | fun |
er | al | note, |
| | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| | ^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
[] |
| As | his | corse |
to | the | ram |
part | we | hur | [ried]; |
| | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Not | a | sol |
dier | dis | charged |
his | fare |
well | shot |
| | | ^ |
| | ^ |
| | ^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
[] |
| O’er | the | grave |
where | our | he |
ro | we | bur | [ied].” |
In reading this the first time, a person is not likely to
notice that there are three feet in it containing but two
syllables. The rhythm is perfectly smooth, and cannot
be called irregular. The accent remains on the last
syllable of the foot.
In the following selection from “Evangeline,”
trochees are substituted for dactyls, yet there is no
break in the rhythm. It does not seem in the least
irregular.
| |
^ | |
^ | | |
^ | |
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Be |
hind | them |
fol | lowed | the |
watch- | dog, |
| 278^ | |
^ | | |
^ | | |
^ | | |
^ | | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Pa | tient, |
full | of | im |
port | ance, | and |
grand | in | the |
pride | of | his |
in | stinct, |
Walking from side to side with a lordly air, and superbly
Waving his bushy tail, and urging forward the stragglers.”
These examples are enough to illustrate the fact that
one kind of foot may be substituted for another and
not make the rhythm feel irregular. So long as the
accent is not changed from the first syllable to the
last, or from the last to the first, there is no jar in
the flow of the lines. The trochee and the dactyl are
interchangeable; and the iambus and the anapest
are interchangeable.
We may take a step further. There are many times
when some sudden change of thought, some strong
emotion forces a poet to break the smooth rhythm,
that the verses may harmonize with his feeling. Such
a variation is like an exclamation or a dash thrown
into prose. The following is taken from “Annabel
Lee.” The regular foot has the accent on the last
syllable. It is anapestic, in tetrameters and trimeters.
But note the shudder in the third line when the accent
is changed on the word “chilling.” The music and the
thought are in perfect harmony.
“And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| A | wind |
blew | out | of |
a | cloud, |
chil | ling |
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me
279
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.”
Another beautiful example is found in the last stanza
of the same poem. It is in the first two feet of the
fifth line. Here the regular accent has yielded to an
accent on the middle syllable and there are two amphibrachs.
Notice, too, how it is almost impossible to
tell in the next foot whether the accent goes upon the
second or upon the third syllable. It is hovering between
the form of the first two feet and the anapest of
the last foot.
“For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
| | ^ | |
| ^ | |
| ^ | ^ |
| | ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| And | so, | all |
the | night- | tide, |
I | lie | down |
by | the | side |
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea
In her tomb by the sounding sea.”
As has already been said, the iambus is the common
foot of English verse. It is made of a short and a
long syllable. At the beginning of a poem an unaccented
syllable seems weak; and so very frequently
the first foot of a poem is trochaic; often the first
two or three feet are of this kind. At such a place
the irregularity does not strike one. The following is
an illustration:—
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Un | der |
a | spread |
ing | chest |
nut | tree |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| The | vil |
lage | smith |
y | stands; |
280
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.”
In this stanza the prevailing foot is iambic, but the
first foot is trochaic. In the following beautiful lines
by Ben Jonson, there is the same thing:—
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Drink | to |
me | on |
ly | with |
thine | eyes |
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup
And I’ll not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine;
But might I of Jove’s nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.”
A similar substitution may occur in any other verse
of the stanza; but we feel the change more than when
it is found in the first verse. The second stanza of
Jonson’s song furnishes an example of the substitution
of a trochee for an iambus:—
“I sent thee late a rosy wreath,
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Not | so |
much | hon |
or | ing | thee |
As giving it a hope that there
It could not withered be,
But thou thereon didst only breathe
And sent’st it back to me;
Since when it grows and smells, I swear,
Not of itself, but thee.”
Of all the great poets, but few have been such masters
281
of the art of making musical verse as Spenser.
The following stanza is from “The Faerie Queene;”
and the delicate changes from one foot to another are
so skillfully made that one has to look twice before he
finds them.
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| “A | lit |
tle | low |
ly | her |
mit | age |
it | was, |
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| Down | in |
a | dale, |
hard | by |
a | for |
est’s | side, |
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| Far | from |
res | ort |
of | peo |
ple | that |
did | pass |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| In | trav |
el | to |
and | fro; |
a | lit |
tle | wide |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| There | was |
a | ho |
ly | chap |
el | ed |
i | fied, |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| Where | in |
a | her |
mit | du |
ly | wont |
to | say |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| His | ho |
ly | things |
each | morn |
and | ev |
en | tide; |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| There | by |
a | crys |
tal | stream |
did | gent |
ly | play, |
| ^ | |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| Which | from |
a | sac |
red | foun |
tain | wel |
léd | forth |
al | way.” |
First and Last Foot.
From the lines on “The Burial of Sir John Moore,”
another fact about metres may be derived. The second
and fourth lines apparently have one too
many syllables. This may occur when the
accent is upon the last syllable of the foot; that is,
when the foot is an iambus or an anapest.
Again, the last foot of each line may be one syllable
short. This may occur when the accent is on the first
syllable of a foot; that is, when the foot is trochaic
or dactylic. The scheme is like this:
| ^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Tell | me |
not | in |
mourn | ful |
num | bers |
| ^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
| Life | is |
but | an |
emp | ty |
dream.” | |
282
The last foot of a verse of poetry, then, may have more
or fewer syllables than the regular number; still the
foot takes up the regular time and cannot be deemed
unrhythmical.
The first foot of a line, too, may contain an extra
syllable; a good example has been given in the lines
on page 273, beginning,—
“Ah, the autumn days fade out, and the nights grow chill.”
And the first foot of a line may lack a syllable, as in
the first line of “Break, Break, Break,” by Tennyson.
In a line like the following, it is sometimes difficult
to tell whether the syllable is omitted from the first or
the last foot. If from the first, the verse is iambic,
and is scanned like this:—
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| | “Proud |
and | low |
ly, | beg |
gar | and | lord.” |
If the last foot is not full, the line is trochaic.
| ^ | |
^ | |
^ | | |
^ | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| “Proud | and |
low | ly, |
beg | gar | and |
lord.” | |
Now if the whole of “London Bridge,” from which this
line is quoted, be read, there will be found several lines
that are trochaic beyond question; and the last line of
the chorus is iambic. The majority of trochaic lines
leads us to decide that the verse is trochaic. From
this example one learns to appreciate how nearly alike
are trochaic and iambic verses. Both are composed of
alternating accented and unaccented syllables; and the
kind of metre depends upon which comes first in the
foot. In Blake’s “Tiger, Tiger,” there is not a line
that clearly shows what kind of verse the poet used.
If the unaccented syllable is supplied at the beginning
the poem is iambic; if at the end, it is trochaic.
283
“Tiger, Tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Framed thy fearful symmetry?”
Silences may occur in the middle of a verse of
poetry as well as at the beginning or the end. In the
following nursery rhyme it is clear that the prevailing
foot is anapestic, though several feet are iambic, and
in the first two lines and the last line a single syllable
makes a foot. Silences are introduced here as rests
are in music.
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| Hur | rah, |
hur | rah |
for | the | farm |
er’s | wife! |
| | ^ |
| | ^ |
| | ^ |
| ^ |
| She | cut |
off | their | tails |
with | a | carv |
ing | knife! |
| | | ^ |
| ^ |
| | ^ |
| | ^ |
| Did | you | ev |
er | see |
such | a | sight |
in | your | life |
Like this is the scansion of Tennyson’s “Break, Break,
Break.”
On thy cold gray stones, O sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.”
In scanning, then, it is necessary—
284
First. To determine by reading a number of verses
the kind of foot that predominates, and to make this
the basis of the metrical scheme.
Second. To remember that one kind of foot may be
substituted for another, at the will of the poet, introducing
into the poem a delicate variety of rhythm.
Third. To keep in mind that the first foot of a
verse and the last foot may have more or fewer syllables
than the regular foot of the poem.
Fourth. That silences, like rests in music, may be
introduced into a verse and give to it a perfect smoothness
of rhythm.
Kinds of Poetry.
It is a difficult thing to give a definition of poetry.
Many have done so, yet no one has been fortunate
enough to have his definition go without criticism.
In general, it may be said that poetry
deals with serious subjects, that it appeals to the feelings
rather than to the reason, that it employs beautiful
language, and that it is written in some metrical
form.
Poetry has been divided into three great classes:
narrative, lyric, and dramatic.
Narrative poetry deals with events, real or imaginary.
It includes, among other varieties, the epic, the metrical
romance, the tale, and the ballad.
The epic is a narrative poem of elevated character
telling generally of the exploits of heroes. The
“Iliad” of the Greeks, the “Æneid” of the Romans,
the “Nibelungen Lied” of the Germans, “Beowulf”
of the Anglo-Saxons, and “Paradise Lost” are good
examples of the epic.
The metrical romance is any fictitious narrative of
heroic, marvelous, or supernatural incidents derived
from history or legend, and told at considerable length.
“The Idylls of the King” are romances.
285
The tale is but little different from the romance. It
leaves the field of legend and occupies the place in
poetry that a story or a novel does in prose. “Marmion”
and “Enoch Arden” are tales.
A ballad is a short narrative poem, generally rehearsing
but one incident. It is usually vigorous in
style, and gives but little thought to elegance. “Sir
Patrick Spens,” “The Battle of Otterburne,” and
“Chevy Chase” are examples.
Lyric poetry finds its source in the author’s feelings
and emotions. In this it differs from narrative poems,
which find their material in external events and circumstances.
Epic poetry is written in a grand style,
generally in pentameter, or hexameter; while the lyric
adopts any verse that suits the emotion. The principal
classes of lyric poetry are the song, the ode, the
elegy, and the sonnet.
The song is a short poem intended to be sung. It
has great variety of metres and is generally divided
into stanzas. “Sweet and Low,” “Ye Banks and
Braes o’ Bonnie Doon,” “John Anderson, My Jo,
John,” are songs.
An ode is a lyric expressing exalted emotion; it
usually has a complex and irregular metrical form.
Collins’s “The Passions,” Wordsworth’s “Intimations
of Immortality,” and Lowell’s “Commemoration Ode,”
are well known.
An elegy is a serious poem pervaded by a feeling of
melancholy. It is generally written to commemorate
the death of some friend. Milton’s “Lycidas” and
Gray’s “Elegy in a Country Churchyard” are examples
of this form of lyric.
A sonnet is a lyric that deals with a single
thought, idea, or sentiment in a fixed metrical form.
The sonnet always contains fourteen lines. It has,
286
too, a very definite rhyme scheme. Some of the best
English sonnets have been written by Shakespeare,
Wordsworth, and Mrs. Browning.
Dramatic poetry presents a course of human events,
and is generally designed to be spoken on the stage.
Because such poetry presents human character in
action, the term “dramatic” has come to be applied to
any poetry having this quality. Many of Browning’s
poems are dramatic in this sense. In the first sense of
the word, dramatic poetry includes tragedy and comedy.
Tragedy is a drama in which the diction is dignified,
the movement impressive, and the ending unhappy.
Comedy is a drama of a light and amusing character,
with a happy conclusion to its plot.
Exercises in Metres.
Enough of each poem is given below so that the
kind of metre can be determined. Always name the
verse form and write the verse scheme.
Some hard work will be necessary to work out
the irregular lines, but it is only by work on these that
any ability in scanning can be gained. Always read
a stanza two or three times to get the swing of the
rhythm. Remember the silences, and the substitutions
that may be made.
-
“I stood on the bridge at midnight
As the clocks were striking the hour,
And the moon rose over the city,
Behind the dark church tower.
“Among the long black rafters
The wavering shadows lay,
And the current that came from the ocean
Seemed to lift and bear them away.”
“All things are new;—the buds, the leaves,
That gild the elm-tree’s nodding crest,
287
And even the nest beneath the eaves;—
There are no birds in last year’s nest!”
“Meanwhile we did our nightly chores,—
Brought in the wood from out of doors,
Littered the stalls, and from the mows
Raked down the herd’s-grass for the cows;
Heard the horse whinnying for his corn;
And, sharply clashing horn on horn,
Impatient down the stanchion rows
The cattle shake their walnut bows;
While, peering from his early perch
Upon the scaffold’s pole of birch,
The cock his crested helmet bent
And down his querulous challenge sent.”
“You know, we French stormed Ratisbon:
A mile or so away,
On a little mound, Napoleon
Stood on our storming day;
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how,
Legs wide, arms locked behind,
As if to balance the prone brow
Oppressive with its mind.”
-
“Come, read to me some poem,
Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling,
And banish the thoughts of day.
“Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of Time.
“For, like strains of martial music,
Their mighty thoughts suggest
288
Life’s endless toil and endeavor;
And to-night I long for rest.
“Read from some humbler poet
Whose songs gushed from his heart,
As showers from the clouds of summer,
Or tears from the eyelids start;
“Who through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
Of the wonderful melodies.”
“Hickory, dickery, dock,
The mouse ran up the clock;
The clock struck one,
And the mouse ran down;
Hickory, dickery, dock.”
“Two brothers had the maiden, and she thought,
Within herself: ‘I would I were like them;
For then I might go forth alone, to trace
The mighty rivers downward to the sea,
And upward to the brooks that, through the year,
Prattle to the cool valleys. I would know
What races drink their waters; how their chiefs
Bear rule, and how men worship there, and how
They build, and to what quaint device they frame,
Where sea and river meet, their stately ships;
What flowers are in their gardens, and what trees
Bear fruit within their orchards; in what garb
Their bowmen meet on holidays, and how
Their maidens bind the waist and braid the hair.’”
(In this quotation we have blank verse; that is, verse
that does not rhyme. It is iambic pentameter,—the most
common verse in great English poetry. What poems are
you familiar with that use this verse-form?)
-
289
“A wet sheet and a flowing sea,
A wind that follows fast
And fills the rustling sails
And bends the gallant mast;
And bends the gallant mast, my boys,
While like the eagle free
Away the good ship flies, and leaves
Old England on the lee.
“O for a soft and gentle wind;
I heard a fair one cry;
But give to me the snoring breeze
And white waves heaving high;
And white waves heaving high, my lads,
The good ship tight and free—
The world of waters is our home,
And merry men are we.
“There’s tempest in yon horned moon,
And lightning in yon cloud;
But hark the music, mariners!
The wind is piping loud;
The wind is piping loud, my boys,
The lightning flashes free—
While the hollow oak our palace is,
Our heritage the sea.”
“Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door—
‘’T is some visitor,’ I muttered, ‘tapping at my chamber door—
Only this, and nothing more.’”
290
“Somewhat back from the village street
Stands the old-fashioned country-seat,
Across its antique portico
Tall poplar trees their shadows throw;
And from its station in the hall
An ancient timepiece says to all,—
‘Forever—never!
Never—forever!’”
“Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in seventy-five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.”
-
“Sweet and low, sweet and low,
Wind of the western sea,
Low, low, breathe and blow,
Wind of the western sea!
Over the rolling waters go,
Come from the dying moon, and blow,
Blow him again to me;
While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps.
“Sleep and rest, sleep and rest,
Father will come to thee soon;
Rest, rest, on mother’s breast,
Father will come to thee soon;
Father will come to his babe in the nest—
Silver sails all out of the west
Under the silver moon:
Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep.”
“See what a lovely shell,
Small and pure as a pearl,
Lying close to my foot,
Frail, but a work divine,
291
Made so fairily well
With delicate spire and whorl,
How exquisitely minute,
A miracle of design!”
(If the pupils have Palgrave’s “Golden Treasury of Songs
and Lyrics,” they have a great fund of excellent material
illustrating all varieties of metrical variation. There are
very few pieces of literature that illustrate so many varieties
of metre as Wordsworth’s “Ode on the Intimations of Immortality.”)
APPENDIX
A. SUGGESTIONS TO TEACHERS.
The Course of Study on pages xx-xxvi contemplates five
days a week for the study of English. The text which is to
be the subject of the term’s work should first be studied
for a few weeks. After it has been mastered, three days of
each week should be given to literature and two to composition.
In practice I have found it best to have the study of
literature occupy three consecutive days,—for example,
Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. This arrangement
leaves Monday and Friday for composition. Friday is used
for the study of the text-book and for general criticism and
suggestion. On Monday the compositions should be written
in the classroom. To have them so written is, at least during
the first year, distinctly better. The first draft of the composition
should be brought to class ready for amendment
and copying. During the writing the teacher should be
among the pupils offering assistance, and insisting upon good
penmanship. Care at the beginning will form a habit of
neatness, and keep the penmanship up to a high standard.
The arrangement suggested is only one plan. This
works well. Many others may be adopted. But no plan
should be accepted which makes the number of essays fewer
than one a week; nor should the number of days given to
literature be smaller than three a week.
During the second year, if the instructor thinks it can be
done without loss, the compositions may be written outside
of school hours and brought to class on a definite day. A
pupil should not be allowed to put off the writing of a composition
any more than a lesson in geometry. On Monday
of each week a composition should be handed in; irregularity
only makes the work displeasing and leads to shirking.
Writing out of school gives more time for criticism and
294
study of composition, and during the second year this extra
time is much needed.
By the third year the pupils certainly can do the work
out of school. As the compositions increase in length, more
time will be necessary for their preparation. The teacher
should, however, know exactly what progress has been made
each week; and by individual criticisms and by wise suggestions
she should help the pupil to meet the difficulties of
his special case.
In order that the instructor may have time for individual
criticism, she should have two periods each day vacant in
which to meet pupils for consultation. To make this clear,
suppose that a teacher of English has one hundred pupils in
her classes. She should have no more, for one hundred
essays a week are enough for any person to correct. If
there be six recitation periods daily, place twenty-five pupils
in each of four sections for the study of literature, composition,
and general criticism. This leaves two periods each
day to meet individuals, giving ten pupils for each period.
These should come on scheduled days, with the same regularity
as for class recitation. The pupil’s work should have
been handed in on the second day before he comes up for
consultation, in order that the teacher may be competent to
give criticisms of any value. The inspiration of the first
reading cannot be depended upon to suggest any help, nor is
there time for such a reading during the recitation.
There will be need of class recitation in argument. Ten
days or two weeks are all that is necessary for text-book
work. This should be done before pupils read the “Conciliation.”
In the reading constantly keep before the pupils
the methods of the author.
Every teacher should be able to do what she asks of the
pupils. No person would dare to offer herself as a teacher
of Latin or algebra until she could write all the translations
of the one and solve all the problems of the other. Yet there
are persons who have the audacity to offer their services as
teachers of English, when they cannot write a letter correctly,
to say nothing of a more formal piece of composition.
295
If an instructor in physics, who had asked his pupils to solve
a problem in electricity, should say to each unfortunate person
as he handed in his solution, “No, that isn’t right;
you’ll have to try again,” without offering any help or suggestion,
and should continue this discouraging process until
some bright pupil worked it out, or perhaps some one guessed
it, we should say that such a person was no instructor at all.
We might go so far as to question his intellectual competency.
We certainly should think him quite deserving of
dismissal. Still many teachers of English do nothing more
than say, “It isn’t right. Make it so.” If the teacher
does not know how to do the thing she asks the pupils to do,
she should not be teaching. And even when she can do it,
she will often benefit herself and the pupils by actually writing
the composition. In this way not only does she gain
command of her own powers of expression, but she finds out
the difficulties with which the pupils have to contend. Every
teacher of English composition should be able to do some
creditable work in English; and every teacher of English
should put this talent into actual use.
Numerous examples of correct paragraphs, well-made sentences,
and apt words have not been included in the text.
They have been omitted because they can be found in the
literature study. It is better for pupils to find these for
themselves. It will put them in the way of reading with the
senses always alert for something good; and all good paragraphs
and sentences lose something of their beautiful adaptation
when torn from the place of their birth and growth.
So, too, there are no long lists of errors. One hundred
pupils in a term make enough to fill a volume. When a
teacher knows that Sentences is to be her next subject she
should begin three months in advance to get a good collection
of specimens. These should be classified so that they
may be most usable. By the time the class comes to the
study of Sentences some new, live material will be on hand
for illustration.
In the pupils’ exercises each week those errors should be
singled out and dwelt upon which are the special subject of
296
text-book work. If the pupils are studying Coherence in
sentence structure, select all violations of this principle in
the week’s exercises, and by means of them nail that one
principle down instead of trying to lay down the whole set
of principles given in the chapter on Sentences. Alongside
of this collection of mistakes in Coherence of sentences show
the pupils the best examples of tight-jointed sentences to be
found in the literature they are studying. Point out how
these sentences have been made to hold together, and how
their own shambling creations can be corrected.
Some teachers will fear the amount of literature required.
It may seem large, especially in the first two years. It certainly
would be quite impossible to read aloud in class all of
this. However, that is not intended. There would be but
sorry progress either in the course of study or in the power
to analyze literature if the class time were taken up with
oral reading of narration and description. The whole of a
short story or one or two chapters of a novel are not too
much for a lesson. The discussion of the meaning and the
method of the author should take up the largest part of the
time. Then such portions should be read aloud as are
especially suited to an exercise in oral reading. In this way
the apparently large list will be easily covered within the time.
Moreover, there is distinct gain in reading much. If only
three or four pages be given for a lesson, the study of literature
degenerates into a study of words. A study of words
is necessary, but it is only a part of the study of literature.
Such a method of study gives the pupil no sense of values.
He does not get out into the wide spaces of the author’s
thought, but is eternally hedged about by the dwarfing barriers
of etymology and grammar.
B. THE FORM OF A COMPOSITION.
The Margin. It is the custom to leave a margin of
about an inch at the left side of the page. In this margin
the corrections should be written, not in the composition.
There should be no margin at the right. The device of
297
writing incomplete lines, or of making each sentence a paragraph,
is sometimes adopted by young persons in the hope
of deceiving the teacher as to the length of the composition.
Remember that pages do not count for literature any more
than yards of hideous advertising boards count as art. Write
a full page with a straight-lined margin at the left.
Indention. To designate the beginning of a new
paragraph, it is customary to have the first line begin an
inch farther in than the other lines. This indention of the
margin and the incomplete line at the end mark the visible
limits of the paragraph.
The Heading. The heading or title of the composition
should be written about an inch and a half from the top of
the page, and well placed in the middle from left to right.
There should be a blank line between the title and the beginning
of the composition. Some persons prefer, in addition
to the title, the name of the writer and the date of writing,—an
unnecessary addition, it seems to me. If they are
to appear, the name should be at the left and the date at the
right, both on one line. The title will be on the next line
below.
Jay Phillips. |
Jan. 27, 1900. |
The Circus-Man’s Story.
“There was once an old man whom
they called a wizard, and who lived in a
great cave by the sea and raised dragons.
Now when I was a very little boy, I had
read a great deal about this old man and
felt as if he were quite a friend of mine.
I had planned for a long time to pay
him a visit, although I had not decided
298
just when I should start. But the day
Jim White’s father brought him that
camel, I was crazy to be after my
dragon at once.
“When bedtime came, I had made all
my plans; and scarcely had Nurse turned
her back when I was on my way. It
was really very far, but I traveled so
swiftly that I arrived in a remarkably
short time at the wizard’s house. When
I rapped, he opened the door and asked
me in.
“‘I came to see if you had any dragons
left,’ I told him. ‘I should like a very
good, gentle dragon,’ I added, ‘that would
not scare Nurse; and if it is isn’t too much
trouble, I should want one that I could
ride.’”
The Indorsement. When the composition is finished,
it should be folded but once up and down the middle of the
page. The indorsement upon the back is generally written
toward the edges of the leaves, not toward the folded edge.
I prefer the other way, however; and for this reason. If
in a bunch of essays a teacher is searching for a particular
one, she generally holds them in the left hand and with the
299
fingers of the right lifts one essay after another. Indorsing
toward the folded edge insures lifting a whole essay every
time; while if the edges of the leaves be toward the right
hand, too many or too few may be lifted.
The indorsement should contain: first, the name of the
writer; second, the term and period of his recitation; third,
the title of the essay; and fourth, the date. In describing
the class and period, it is well to use a Roman numeral for
the term, counting two terms in each year, and an Arabic
numeral to denote the period of his recitation.
300
Penmanship. The penmanship should be neat and legible.
Not all persons can write elegantly; but all can write
so that their work can be easily read, and all can make
a clean page. Scribbling is due to carelessness. A scribbled
page points to a scribbling mind; clean-cut handwriting,
perhaps not Spencerian, but a clear, legible handwriting
is not only an indication of clear-cut thinking but a
means and promoter of accurate thought. Moreover, as a
business proposition, one cannot afford to become a slovenly
penman. Every composition should be a lesson in penmanship,
and by so much improve one’s chances in the business
world. And last, the teacher who has to read and correct
the compositions of from one hundred to two hundred persons
each week demands some consideration. No one but
a teacher knows the drudgery of this work; it can be much
lightened if each pupil writes so that the composition can be
read without difficulty. By doing this, the pupil is sure of
better criticism; for the teacher can give all her attention
to the composition, none being demanded for the penmanship.
C. MARKS FOR CORRECTION OF COMPOSITIONS.
In correcting compositions certain abbreviations will save
a teacher much time. Some of the common ones are given
below. Underscore the element that needs correcting, and
put the abbreviation in the margin. In case the whole paragraph
needs remodeling, draw a line at its side and note the
correction in the margin.
| Cap. | Use a capital letter. |
| l. c. | Use a small letter. |
| D. | See the dictionary for the correct use of the word. |
| Sp. | Spelling. |
| Gr. | A mistake in grammatical use of language. |
| Cnst. | The construction of the sentence is awkward or unidiomatic. |
| 301
Cl. | Not clear. The remedy may be suggested by reference to certain pages of the text. |
| W. | Weak. As above, point out the trouble by a page reference. |
| Rep. | Repetition is monotonous; or it may be necessary for clearness. |
| p. | Punctuation. |
| Cond. | Condense. |
| Exp. | Expand. |
| Tr. | Transpose. |
| ? | Some fault not designated. It is well to use page reference. |
| ¶ | Make a new paragraph. |
| No ¶ | Unite into one paragraph. |
| δ | Cut out. |
| ^ | There is something omitted. |
In addition to the above very common corrections, many
others should be made. Instead of abbreviations, it will be
better to refer the pupil to the page of the book which treats
of the special fault. For instance, if there be an unexpected
change of construction, underscore it, and write in the margin
“226;” on this page is found “parallel construction”
of sentences. It may be well to use the letters U., C., and
M., in connection with the page numbers to indicate that the
fault is in the unity, coherence, or mass of the element to be
corrected. The constant reference to the fuller statement of
the principles violated will serve to fix them in the mind.
D. PUNCTUATION.
Punctuation seeks to do for written composition what
inflections and pauses accomplish in vocal expression. It
makes clear what kind of an expression the whole sentence
is: whether declarative, exclamatory, or interrogative. And
it assists in indicating the relations of the different parts
within a sentence. While there is practically uniformity in
the method of punctuation at the end of a sentence, within a
302
sentence punctuation shows much variety of method. Where
one person uses a comma, another inserts a semicolon; and
where one finds a semicolon sufficient, another requires a
colon. It should be remembered that the parts of a sentence
have not equal rank; and that the difference in rank should,
as far as possible, be indicated by the marks of punctuation.
Keeping in mind, also, the fact that the internal marks of
punctuation,—the colon, the semicolon, and the comma,—have
a rank in the order mentioned, from the greatest to the
least, a writer will use the stronger marks when the rank of
the parts of a sentence demands them, and the weaker marks
to separate the lesser elements of the sentence. The sentences
below illustrate the variety which may be practiced,
and the use of punctuation to show the relation and rank of
the elements of a sentence.
- Internal punctuation is largely a matter of taste but
there are definite rules for final punctuation.
- Internal punctuation is largely a matter of taste; there
are, however, definite rules for final punctuation.
- Internal punctuation, the purpose of which is to group
phrases and clauses which belong together and to separate
those which do not belong together, and to indicate the relative
rank of the parts separated, is, to a great extent, a matter
of taste: on the other hand, there are definite rules for
final punctuation, the object of which is to separate sentences,
and also to assist in telling what kind of a sentence precedes
it; that is, whether it be declarative, interrogative, or exclamatory.
Looking at the first sentence, we find two elements of
equal rank separated by a comma. Some authors would
prefer no punctuation at all in a sentence as short as this.
Again, if one wished to make the two elements very independent,
he would use a semicolon. There would be but
little difference in meaning between no punctuation and a
comma; but there is a wide difference in meaning between
no punctuation and a semicolon. The independence caused
by the use of the semicolon is felt in the second sentence,
where the words are the same except one. In this sentence
303
a colon might be used; and one might go so far as to make
two sentences of it. Notice that in these two sentences the
question is how independent you wish the elements to be, and
it is also a question of taste. In the third sentence, there
are elements of different rank. To indicate the rank, punctuation
of different value must be introduced. The two independent
elements are separated by a colon. A semicolon
might be used, if a semicolon were not used within the second
independent element. This renders the greater mark necessary.
Look at the commas in the first independent element.
The assertion is that “internal punctuation is a matter of
taste.” This is too sweeping. It is modified by an explanatory
phrase, “to a large extent;” and this phrase is inclosed
by commas. Moreover, the long clause indicating the purpose
of internal punctuation is inclosed by commas. The
use of a semicolon in the second part falls under the third
rule for the semicolon. If one should substitute for this
semicolon a comma and a dash, he could use a semicolon instead
of a colon for separating the two main divisions of the
sentence. However, the method in which they are first
punctuated is in accord with the rules generally accepted.
The simplest of these rules are given below but one must
never be surprised to find a piece of literature in which the
internal punctuation is at variance with these rules.
CAPITAL LETTERS.
- A capital letter begins every new sentence.
- A capital letter begins every line of poetry.
- All names of Deity begin with a capital letter.
- All proper names begin with capital letters.
- All adjectives derived from proper nouns begin with
capital letters.
- The first word of every direct quotation begins with a
capital letter.
- Most abbreviations use capital letters.
COMMAS.
A series of words or a series of phrases, performing
304
similar functions in a sentence, are separated from each
other by commas, unless all the connectives are expressed.
“Her voice was ever soft,
Gentle, and low,—an excellent thing in woman.”
“Good my lord,
You have begot me, bred me, loved me: I
Return those duties back as are right fit,
Obey you, love you, and most honor you.”
But, “shining and tall and fair and straight,” because all the connectives
are expressed.
Words out of their natural order are separated from
the rest of the sentence by commas.
“To the unlearned, punctuation is a matter of chance.”
Words and phrases, either explanatory or slightly
parenthetical, are separated from the rest of the sentence
by commas.
“Then poor Cordelia!
And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love ’s
More richer than my tongue.”
However when phrases and clauses are quite parenthetic,
they are separated from the remainder of the sentence by
parentheses, or by commas and dashes. The comma and
dash is more common, and generally indicates a lesser independence
of the inclosed element.
“Then Miss Gunns smiled stiffly, and thought what a pity it was that
these rich country people, who could afford to buy such good clothes
(really Miss Nancy’s lace and silk were very costly), should be brought
up in utter ignorance and vulgarity.”
The nominative of direct address, and phrases in the
nominative absolute construction are cut off by commas.
“Goneril,
Our eldest born, speak first.”
“The ridges being taken, the troops advanced a thousand yards.”
Appositive words and phrases are separated from the
remainder of the sentence by commas.
“In the early years of this century, such a linen weaver, named Silas
Marner, worked at his vocation, in a stone cottage that stood among the
nutty hedgerows near the village of Raveloe, and not far from the edge
of a deserted stone-pit.”
305
When words are omitted, the omission is indicated by
the use of a comma.
“Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich, being poor;
Most choice, forsaken; and most loved, despis’d!”
A comma is used before a short and informal quotation.
“In the bitterness of his wounded spirit, he said to himself, ‘She
will cast me off too.’”
A comma is used to separate the independent clauses
of a compound sentence sufficiently involved to necessitate
some mark of punctuation, and yet not involved enough to
require marks of different ranks.
“But about the Christmas of the fifteenth year a second great change
came over Marner’s life, and his history became blent in a singular
manner with the life of his neighbors.”
Small groups of more closely related words are inclosed
by commas to indicate their near relation and to
separate them from words they might otherwise be thought
to modify.
“In this strange world, made a hopeless riddle to him, he might, if
he had had a less intense nature, have sat weaving, weaving—looking
towards the end of his pattern, or towards the end of his web, till he forgot
the riddle, and everything else but his immediate sensations; but
the money had come to mark off his weaving into periods, and the
money not only grew, but it remained with him.”
SEMICOLONS.
A semicolon is used to separate the parts of a compound
sentence if they are involved, or contain commas. It
is also used to give independence to the members of a compound
sentence when not very complex.
“The meadow was searched in vain; and he got over the stile into
the next field, looking with dying hope towards a small pond which
was now reduced to its summer shallowness, so as to leave a wide margin
of good adhesive mud.”
“As for the child, he would see that it was cared for; he would never
forsake it; he would do everything but own it.”
Semicolons are used to separate a series of clauses in
306
much the same way as commas are used to separate a series
of words.
“I love you more than words can wield the matter;
Dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty;
Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare;
No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honor;
As much as child e’er loved, or father found;
A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable;
Beyond all manner of so much I love thee.”
- A semicolon is generally used to introduce a clause of
repetition, a clause stating the obverse, and a clause stating an
inference.
(Many examples of the last two rules will be found in the
discussion of compound sentences on pages 202, 203.)
COLONS.
A colon is used to introduce a formal quotation. It
is frequently followed by a dash.
“Under date of November 28, 1860, she wrote to a friend:—
“‘I am engaged now in writing a story—the idea of which came to
me after our arrival in this house, and which has thrust itself between
me and the other book I was meditating. It is Silas Manner, the
Weaver of Raveloe.’”
“On the last day of the same year she wrote: ‘I am writing a story
which came across my other plans by a sudden inspiration, etc.’”
A colon is used to introduce a series of particulars,
either appositional or explanatory, which the reader has been
led to expect by the first clause of the sentence. These particulars
are separated from each other by semicolons.
“The study of the principles of composition should include the following
subjects: a study of words as to their origin and meaning; a
study of the structure of the sentence and of the larger elements of
discourse—in other words, of concrete logic; a study of the principles
of effective literary composition, as illustrated in the various divisions
of literature; and also a study of the æsthetics of literature.”
“What John Morley once said of literature as a whole is even more
accurate when applied to fiction alone: its purpose is ‘to bring sunshine
into our hearts and to drive moonshine out of our heads.’”
A colon is used to separate the major parts of a very
307
complex and involved sentence, if the major parts, or either
of them, contain within themselves semicolons.
“For four years he had thought of Nancy Lammeter, and wooed her
with a tacit patient worship, as the woman who made him think of the
future with joy: she would be his wife, and would make home lovely
to him, as his father’s home had never been; and it would be easy,
when she was always near, to shake off those foolish habits that were
no pleasures, but only a feverish way of annulling vacancy.”
A colon is sometimes used to mark a strong independence
in the parts of a compound sentence.
“He didn’t want to give Godfrey that pleasure: he preferred that
Master Godfrey should be vexed.”
THE DASH.
A dash is frequently used with a colon to introduce a
formal quotation. The quotation then begins a new paragraph.
(Example under colon.)
A dash is used alone or with a comma to inclose a
phrase or clause which is parenthetic or explanatory.
“‘But as for being ugly, look at me, child, in this silver-colored silk—I
told you how it ’ud be—I look as yallow as a daffadil.’”
(Example under comma.)
A dash is used to denote a sudden turn of the thought.
“I’ve no opinion of the men, Miss Gunn—I don’t know what you
have.”
“‘It does make her look funny, though—partly like a short-necked
bottle wi’ a long quill in it.’”
A dash is frequently used when the composition should
be interrupted to indicate the intensity of the emotion.
“‘No—no—I can’t part with it, I can’t let it go,’ said Silas
abruptly. ‘It’s come to me—I’ve a right to keep it.’”
“And my poor fool is hang’d! No, no, no life!
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life,
And thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never!—
Pray you, undo this button:—thank you, sir.—
Do you see this? Look on her,—look,—her lips,—
Look there, look there!”—
308
A dash is sometimes used alone before an appositive
phrase or clause.
“For the first time he determined to try the coal-hole—a small
closet near the hearth.”
PERIOD, EXCLAMATION POINT, INTERROGATION MARK.
- A period closes every declarative sentence.
- A period is used after abbreviations.
- An exclamation point follows an expression of strong
emotion.
- An interrogation mark follows a direct question.
An interrogation mark is sometimes used in the body
of a sentence, when the writer wishes to make the assertion
forceful and uses a rhetorical question for the purpose.
“The shepherd’s dog barked fiercely when one of these alien-looking
men appeared on the upland, dark against the early winter sunset;
for what dog likes a figure bent under a heavy bag?—and these pale
men rarely stirred abroad without that mysterious burden.”
- Quotation marks inclose every quotation of the exact
words of another. When one quotation is made within
another, the inner or secondary quotation is inclosed with
single marks, the main or outer quotation is included within
the double marks.
(Examples of both may be found above.)
SUGGESTIONS FOR TEACHING PUNCTUATION.
At the time the pupils are studying the rules for punctuation
they are reading Hawthorne or some other author equally
careful of his punctuation. In his writing they will find
numerous examples of the rules for punctuation. Let them
take five rules for the comma, finding all the examples in
five pages of text. In the same way furnish semicolons,
colons, and dashes. When the rules have all been learned,
they should be able to give the reason for every mark they
find in literature. Next place upon the board paragraphs
not punctuated, and have the pupils punctuate them. Remember
that there is not absolute uniformity in the use of
309
the comma, semicolon, and colon; though in each author
there is a general adherence to the principles he adopts.
Punctuation should be consistent. Insist that the pupil
punctuate his written work consistently.
E. SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF LITERATURE.
| Hawthorne | A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys. |
| Tennyson | Enoch Arden. |
| Longfellow | Tales of a Wayside Inn. |
| Whittier | The Tent on the Beach. |
| Macaulay | Lays of Ancient Rome. |
| Dickens | A Christmas Carol. |
| Kipling | Wee Willie Winkie, and Other Stories. |
| Kipling | The Jungle Books. |
| Hawthorne | Twice-Told Tales. |
| Hawthorne | Mosses from an Old Manse. |
| Dickens | The Cricket on the Hearth. |
| Brown | Rab and his Friends. |
| Ouida | A Dog of Flanders. |
| Hale | The Man without a Country. |
| Defoe | Robinson Crusoe. |
| Poe | The Gold-Bug. |
| Scott | Marmion. |
| Scott | The Lady of the Lake. |
| Browning | Hervé Riel, an Incident of the French Camp, and other Narrative Poems. |
| Franklin | Autobiography. |
| Cooper | The Last of the Mohicans. |
| Longfellow | Evangeline. |
| Longfellow | Miles Standish. |
| Davis | Gallegher, and Other Stories. |
| Maupassant | Number Thirteen. |
| Miss Wilkins | Short Stories. |
| Miss Jewett | Short Stories. |
| Pope | The Iliad. |
| Aldrich | Marjorie Daw. |
| Lowell | The Vision of Sir Launfal, and Other Poems. |
| 310
Irving | Tales of a Traveller. |
| Irving | The Sketch Book. |
| Poe | The Fall of the House of Usher. |
| Whittier | Snow-Bound. |
| Burroughs | Sharp Eyes; Birds and Bees; Pepacton. |
| Goldsmith | The Deserted Village. |
| Scott | Ivanhoe. |
| Dickens | David Copperfield. |
| Shakespeare | Julius Cæsar. |
| Shakespeare | The Merchant of Venice. |
| Irving | Rip Van Winkle. |
| Irving | The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. |
| Bryant | Selected Poems. |
| Gray | An Elegy in a Country Churchyard. |
| Tennyson | The Princess; Idylls of the King. |
| Dickens | The Pickwick Papers. |
| Burns | Selected Poems. |
| Dryden | Alexander’s Feast. |
| Byron | Childe Harold. |
| George Eliot | Silas Marner. |
| Coleridge | The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. |
| Macaulay | Essay on Milton. |
| Ruskin | Sesame and Lilies. |
| Emerson | Friendship; Self-Reliance; Fortune of the Republic; The American Scholar. |
| Arnold | On the Study of Poetry; Wordsworth and Keats. |
| Lowell | Emerson, the Lecturer; Milton; Books and Libraries. |
| Holmes | The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table. |
| Addison | The Sir Roger de Coverley Papers. |
| Wordsworth | Intimations of Immortality, and Other Poems. |
| Keats | Selected Poems. |
| Shelley | Selected Poems. |
| Shakespeare | Macbeth. |
| Shakespeare | A Midsummer Night’s Dream. |
| Shakespeare | As You Like It. |
| Webster | Bunker Hill Monument Oration; Adams and Jefferson. |
| 311
Goldsmith | The Vicar of Wakefield. |
| Milton | L’Allegro; Il Penseroso; Comus; Lycidas. |
| De Quincey | Confessions of an English Opium Eater, and Other Papers. |
| John Henry Newman | Selected Essays. |
| Thackeray | Henry Esmond. |
| Stevenson | Virginibus Puerisque. |
| Stevenson | Memories and Portraits. |
| Schurz | Abraham Lincoln. |
| George William Curtis | Selected Addresses. |
| Charles Lamb | Essays of Elia. |
| Stevenson | Travels with a Donkey. |
| Stevenson | An Inland Voyage. |
| Burke | Conciliation with the Colonies. |
| Lincoln | Cooper Union Address; Gettysburg Speech. |
| Chaucer | Prologue, and Two Canterbury Tales. |
| Milton | Paradise Lost, and Sonnets. |
| Carlyle | Essay on Burns. |
| Tennyson | In Memoriam, and Lyrics. |
| Browning | Rabbi Ben Ezra; Saul; A Grammarian’s Funeral. |
| Thoreau | Walden. |
| Austen | Pride and Prejudice. |
| George Eliot | Romola. |
| Shakespeare | King Lear. |
| Shakespeare | Hamlet. |
| Macaulay | Essay on Johnson. |
| Thackeray | Vanity Fair. |
| Lowell | Democracy; Lincoln. |
| Stevenson | Lantern Bearers; A Humble Remonstrance; Gossip about Romance. |
INDEX
- Abstract vs. concrete, 89, 90.
- “Adams and Jefferson,” Webster’s, quotation from, 176.
- Adjectives, 78.
- “Alice in Wonderland,” a story without facts, 25.
- Allegory, 261.
- Allusion, 263.
- Amphibrach, 273.
- Analogy, use of, 137.
- Anapest, defined, 273;
- interchangeable with iambus, 278.
- “And,” use of, 192.
- Andersen, Hans Christian, his “Tannenbaum,” 12.
- Anecdotes in exposition, 97.
- “Annabel Lee,” quotations from, 271, 278, 279.
- Anti-climax, 210.
- Antithesis, 227.
- “Apologia,” Newman’s, quotation from, 160.
- Apostrophe, 261.
- Argument, 4, 128-137;
- Arnold, Matthew, quotation from, 159;
- quotation to illustrate repetition, 167;
- to illustrate sentence structure, 222.
- Arrangement, in narration, 29-32;
- Association of ideas, 103.
- “Autumn Effect, An,” quotation from, 17.
- “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep,” its purpose, 7;
- beginning, 29;
- length of sentences in, 33;
- time for the action, 36.
- Balanced sentences, 227, 228.
- Ballad, defined, 285.
- “Barbara Frietchie,” a narrative poem, 4.
- Bates, Arlo, quoted, 35.
- Beauty, gained by use of figurative language, 258.
- Beginning of a story, 29.
- Bellamy, Edward, his “Looking Backward,” 7.
- “Biglow Papers,” quotation from, 51.
- “Birthmark,” Hawthorne’s, 24.
- Blake, William, “Tiger, Tiger,” quoted, 282, 283.
- “Bonnie Brier Bush, Beside the,” 25.
- Bookish words, 242.
- “Break, Break, Break,” quotation from, 283.
- “Bridge of Sighs, The,” quotation from, 270.
- Brief in argument, 138, 139.
- Browning, Robert, vivid narration of, 23.
- “Burial of Sir John Moore, The,” quotation from, 277.
- Burke, Edmund, quotation from his speech on “Conciliation with the Colonies,” 116;
- that speech analyzed, 142-147;
- quotations to illustrate paragraph structure, 171, 175, 177, 188;
- quotations to show sentence structure, 200, 209, 214, 226.
- Burroughs, John, his knowledge of his field, 9;
- “But,” use of, 192.
- Capital letters, 303.
- Cause and effect, 133-136.
- Characters, number of, 35.
- Chaucer, Geoffrey, quotation from, 245.
- Choice of subject, 8-12.
- Choice of words, 78-80, 239-255.
- “Cinderella,” 12.
- Clearness and coherence, 180-193, 224, 225.
- Clearness gained by use of figurative language, 258.
- Climax, 139-141, 211, 218;
- Coherence, 20;
- Colons, 306, 307.
- Comedy, 286.
- Commas, 303, 304.
- Comparisons, use of, 77, 98;
- paragraph of, 165;
- confusion of, 259.
- Composition, 1;
- oral and written, 2;
- conventions of, 2.
- “Conciliation with the Colonies,” Burke’s speech on, quoted, 116, 171, 175, 177, 188, 214, 226;
- 314
Conclusion of a story, 23.
- Concrete facts, use of, 89, 90.
- Conjunctions, use of, 190, 191.
- Connectives in sentences, 228, 229.
- Consistency, 25.
- Cooke, Josiah P., his essay on “Fire,” 8.
- “Copyright,” quotations from Macaulay’s speech on, 159, 172.
- Correction, marks for, 300.
- Curtis, George William, quoted, 111.
- Dactyl, defined, 272;
- interchangeable with trochee, 278.
- “Daisy, The,” Wordsworth’s quotation from, 274.
- “Darkness and Dawn,” 8.
- Dash, 307, 308.
- “David Copperfield,” description quoted from, 65.
- “David Harum,” its construction criticised, 22.
- Davis, Richard Harding, small number of characters in his books, 35;
- simple plot in his “Gallegher,” 36.
- Deduction, 129.
- Definition, a, 91-94.
- Description, 4, 49-80;
- an aid to narration, 34;
- and exposition, 91.
- Description and painting, 50.
- Details, in narration, 22-25;
- Dickens, Charles, his “Nicholas Nickleby” as an exposition, 5;
- description from his “David Copperfield” quoted, 65;
- quotations from Mr. Micawber’s conversation, 253.
- Dictionary, use of, 237.
- Differentia, 92, 93.
- Digression, 22.
- Dimeter, 274.
- Discourse, forms of, 3-7.
- “Discussions and Arguments,” Newman’s, quotation from, 97.
- Dramatic poetry, 286.
- Dynamic point of sentence, 221.
- Elegy, the, 285.
- Eliot, George, her “Silas Marner,” 13;
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo, primarily an essayist, 9.
- Emotional statement, 115.
- Emphasis, how secured, 110-112, 115, 116, 217-219.
- End of a paragraph, 175-179;
- “English Composition,” Wendell’s, quotation from, 94.
- Enthymeme, 130.
- Enumeration vs. suggestion, 52.
- Enumerative description, 54.
- Epic, the, 284.
- Epithet, 260.
- “Evangeline,” quotation from, 277, 278.
- Events, order of, 29, 30.
- Everett, Edward, description from, quoted, 71.
- Examples, paragraph of, 171.
- Exclamation, 262.
- Exclamation point, 308.
- Exclusion of details, 22, 23, 26.
- Exposition, 4, 89-120;
- Facts in stories, 25.
- “Faerie Queene, The,” quotation from, 281.
- “Fall of the House of Usher, The,” descriptions in, 34;
- Familiar images, 76.
- Farrar, Canon, as a writer of sermons, 8.
- “Feathertop,” 13.
- Figurative language, 257;
- Figures of speech, 77, 250, 257-268.
- Fine writing, 253.
- “First Snow-Fall, The,” quotation from, 274.
- Fiske, John, his “History of the United States,” 25.
- Foot, a, in poetry, 272;
- one kind may be substituted for another, 277-281;
- first and last foot of a verse may be irregular, 281, 282.
- Force, gained by use of figurative language, 258.
- Foreign words, 243.
- Francis I. quoted, 113.
- “Function of Criticism at the Present Time,” Arnold’s, quotation from, 222.
- “Gallegher,” simple plot of, 36.
- General terms, 89, 248-252.
- Genung, J. F., on paragraph structure, 162.
- Genus and differentia, 92, 93.
- “Gold Bug,” length of sentences in, 33.
- Good usage, 222, 223, 239-245.
- Grant, U. S., his “Memoirs” have no plot, 16.
- Hackneyed phrases, 253.
- Haggard, Rider, 12.
- Hawthorne, Nathaniel, a story writer, 9;
- his “Feathertop,” 13;
- his descriptions in “The Marble Faun,” 34;
- quoted, 50;
- quotations from, about “The Old Manse,” 58, 59;
- descriptions from his “House of the Seven Gables” quoted, 66;
- from “The Old Apple Dealer,” 67.
- Heading of essay, 297.
- Heptameter, 275.
- “Hervé Riel” as a piece of narrative, 23.
- Hexameter, 275.
- “Hiawatha,” quotation from, 270.
- “Historical Sketches,” Newman’s, quotation from, 52-54.
- Hood, Thomas, “The Bridge of Sighs” quoted, 270.
- “House of the Seven Gables,” descriptions quoted from, 66.
- 315
Hugo, Victor, his description of Waterloo quoted, 67.
- Huxley, Thomas, example of his use of comparison, 98;
- quotation from, to illustrate paragraph structure, 161.
- Hyperbole, 263.
- Iambus, defined, 272;
- the common foot of English verse, 272, 279;
- interchangeable with anapest, 278.
- “Idea of a University,” quotations from, 95, 171, 193, 203, 210, 247.
- Illustrations, their value, 97.
- “Impressions de Théâtre,” quotation from, 63.
- “Incident of a French Camp, An,” as an example of a short story, 23.
- Incident, the main, 20, 21.
- Incidents, order of, 29, 30.
- Inclusion of material, 24.
- Indention of paragraph, 297.
- Individual arrangement of paragraph, 181-188.
- Individuality of author, 8.
- Indorsement of essay, 298.
- Induction, 128, 132.
- Interest, 11, 12.
- Interrogation, 262.
- Interrogation point, 308.
- Introduction of story, 23.
- Inversion, 262.
- Irony, 262.
- Irrelevant matter, 22, 23.
- Irving, Washington, as a story writer in the third person, 27;
- description from, quoted, 54;
- short characterization quoted, 70;
- description of a coachman quoted, 75;
- quotations to illustrate paragraph structure, 164, 183;
- to illustrate sentence construction, 202, 203, 219, 220, 229.
- Jonson, Ben, quotation from, 280.
- “Jungle Books,” 12;
- “Kidnapped,” quotations from, 15, 165;
- “King Lear,” its plot, 16;
- Kingsley, Charles, “The Three Fishers” quoted, 271.
- Kipling, Rudyard, his “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep,” 7;
- his “Jungle Books,” 12;
- his use of climax, 21;
- as a story-teller, 22, 27;
- small number of characters in his stories, 35;
- quotation from his “Light that Failed,” 60;
- description quoted from his “Jungle Books,” 78;
- quotation to illustrate sentence construction, 201;
- his “L’Envoi” quoted, 252.
- “Lady of the Lake, The,” quotation from, 269.
- Language vs. painting, 49-52.
- Lanier, Sidney, “The Science of English Verse,” cited, 269;
- Latin words, 245-248.
- Le Gallienne, Richard, his essay on pigs, 10;
- “Legend of Sleepy Hollow, The,” 27, 29;
- description in, 34;
- quotation from to show paragraph structure, 163, 183;
- to show sentence structure, 202, 219.
- Lemaître, Jules, criticism of Zola quoted, 63.
- Length, of a description, 63, 64;
- “L’Envoi” to “The Seven Seas,” quoted, 252.
- “Les Misérables,” its intricate plot, 16;
- “Light that Failed, The,” quotation from, 60.
- “Little Dorrit,” large number of characters in, 35.
- “Little Red Riding Hood,” 12.
- Logical definition, 91.
- “London Bridge,” quotation from, 282.
- Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, “Hiawatha” quoted, 270;
- “Evangeline” quoted, 277, 278;
- “The Village Blacksmith” quoted, 279, 280.
- “Looking Backward,” as a novel with a purpose, 7.
- Loose sentences, 212, 214, 215.
- Lovelace, Richard, quoted, 112.
- Lowell, James Russell, his “Sir Launfal,” 13;
- quotation from “Biglow Papers,” 51;
- from a “Song,” 52;
- from “To W. L. Garrison,” 89;
- from “The First Snow-Fall,” 274.
- Lyric poetry, 285.
- Lytton, Lord, quotation from, 241.
- Macaulay, Lord, quotation on Milton from, 96;
- quotation to illustrate comparison, 98;
- his essay on “Milton” analyzed, 106;
- last sentence of that essay quoted, 111;
- that essay as an example of proportion in treatment, 114;
- his denunciation of Charles I. quoted, 115;
- further quotations from his “Milton,” 117;
- his speeches on “Copyright” and the “Reform Bill” quoted, 159, 172, 193;
- quotations from the “Milton” to illustrate paragraph structure, 164, 166, 168, 178, 182, 184.
- “Macbeth,” 13.
- Maclaren, Ian, 25.
- Main incident, 20-26.
- Major term, 129.
- “Marble Faun, The,” description in, 34.
- Margin of composition, 296.
- “Marmion,” 27, 29;
- Mass, 20;
- Masson, David, 104.
- Maupassant, Guy de, quotation from his
316
“Pierre et Jean,” 56;
- from his “Odd Number,” 156.
- Meredith, George, quotation from, to illustrate paragraph structure, 161;
- Metaphor, 77, 260.
- Metonymy, 250, 263.
- Metre, kinds of, 273-275;
- Metrical romance, the, 284.
- Middle term, 130.
- “Milton,” Macaulay’s essay on, quotations from, 96, 98, 111, 115, 117, 119, 164, 166-168, 178, 184;
- Milton, John, quotations from, 241, 245, 248.
- Minor term, 129.
- Monometer, 273.
- Mood in description, 59-62, 67-69.
- “Mosses from an Old Manse,” quotation from, 50.
- Movement of story, 32, 33.
- Narration, 4, 13-37.
- Narrative poetry, 284.
- National usage, 242.
- “New Testament,” quotation from, 241.
- Newman, Cardinal, quotation from, about Athens, 52;
- quotation on theology, 95;
- quotation to illustrate the use of specific instances in exposition, 97;
- to illustrate paragraph structure, 160, 171, 177, 193;
- to show sentence construction, 203, 210;
- to show use of words, 247.
- “Nicholas Nickleby,” as an exposition of school abuses, 5.
- Nouns, 78.
- Number of characters, 35.
- Observation, its value, 55.
- Obverse statement, 95, 96;
- Octameter, 275.
- “Odd Number, The,” quotation from, 156.
- Ode, defined, 285.
- “Œnone,” quotation from, 51.
- “Old Apple Dealer, The,” quotation from, 67.
- Omniscience of an author, 27.
- Order of events in stories, 29;
- of words in sentences, 217-219.
- Outline, use of, 32, 109, 110, 138, 139, 174.
- Palmer, Professor G. H., quotations from, on composition writing, 101, 112.
- “Paradise Lost,” quotations from, 241, 245, 248.
- Paragraphs, 151-195.
- Parallel construction, 192-194, 226, 227.
- Particulars in exposition, 96;
- Penmanship, 300.
- Pentameter, 274.
- “Pepacton,” 9;
- Period, 308.
- Periodic sentences, 212-216.
- Personification, 77, 260.
- Persuasion, 4.
- Philippians iv. 8, 241.
- “Physical Basis of Life,” Huxley’s, quotations from, 98, 161.
- “Pierre et Jean,” quotation from, 55.
- “Pilgrim’s Progress,” 13.
- Place of a story, 29.
- Plot, 15-20, 36.
- Poe, Edgar Allan, his sentences, 33;
- his use of description in “The Fall of the House of Usher,” 34;
- quotations from that work, 68, 71;
- “Annabel Lee” quoted, 271, 278, 279.
- Poetic feet, 272.
- Poetical words, 254.
- Poetry, kinds of, 284-286.
- Point of view, 56-59;
- change of, 58;
- mental, 59.
- Position of words in sentences, 217.
- “Præterita,” Ruskin’s, quotations from, 169.
- Premises, 129;
- “Present Position of Catholics in England,” Newman’s, quotation from, 177.
- Present usage of words, 244, 245.
- “Prince Otto,” quotations from, 72, 73.
- “Princess, The,” quotation from, 251.
- Pronouns, use of, 188, 189.
- Proportion in description, 73;
- “Prose Fancies,” 10.
- Provincialisms, 242.
- Purpose, of an author, 6, 7;
- Quotation marks, 308.
- “Quo Vadis,” 7.
- Rapidity of movement, 32.
- “Reform Bill,” quotation from Macaulay’s speech on, 193.
- Refutation in argument, 141.
- Repetition, its value, 94;
- Reputable words, 239-241.
- “Richard Feverel,” quotations from, 161, 205.
- “Richelieu,” quotation from, 241.
- “Robinson Crusoe,” has little plot, 16.
- Royce, Josiah, quotation from, 242.
- Ruskin, John, 49;
- quotation to illustrate building up a paragraph, 169;
- his “Sesame and Lilies,” 239.
- Saxon words, 245-248.
- Scale of treatment, 104-108.
- Scansion, 275-284;
- requisites for scanning, 283, 284.
- “Science of English Verse, The,” quotation from, 273.
- Scott, Sir Walter, as a story-teller in the
317
third person, 27;
- his dull introductory chapters, 31;
- “The Lady of the Lake” quoted, 269;
- “Marmion” quoted, 276.
- Selection of material in narration, 21-28;
- “Self-Cultivation in English,” quotation from, 101, 112.
- Semicolons, 202, 203, 305, 306.
- Sentences, 200-230;
- Sequence of events, 29, 30.
- Serial arrangement of paragraph, 181-188.
- “Sesame and Lilies,” 239.
- Sienkiewicz, Henry, his “Quo Vadis,” 7.
- “Silas Marner,” written for a purpose, 13;
- example of a plot, 20;
- time consumed in the story, 36;
- quotation to show paragraph length, 152-156.
- Simile, 77, 261.
- Sing-song, natural tendency toward, 269, 276.
- Slang, 240.
- Slowness of movement, 33.
- “Snow-Bound,” narrative or descriptive?, 4.
- Song defined, 285.
- Sonnet defined, 285.
- Specific words, 248-252.
- Spencer, Herbert, on the philosophy of the periodic sentence, 212.
- Spenser, Edmund, “The Faerie Queene” quoted, 281.
- “Spirit of Modern Philosophy,” Royce’s, quotation from, 242.
- Spondee, 273.
- Stanza, 275.
- Stedman, E. C., an authority on literature, 9.
- Stevenson, Robert Louis, his “Treasure Island” and “Travels with a Donkey” as narratives, 4;
- quotation from “Kidnapped,” 15;
- his “An Autumn Effect” quoted, 17;
- unity in his stories, 27;
- descriptions from, quoted, 62, 72;
- examples of personification from, 77;
- his unusual use of words, 79;
- quotation to show paragraph structure, 165.
- Subdual of subordinate parts, 219.
- Subject, 8-12;
- common, 11;
- interesting, 11;
- in exposition, 99, 100.
- Suggestion vs. enumeration, 52.
- Suggestions to teachers, 257-260.
- Suggestive description, 55.
- Summary, a, 119.
- Superlatives, 80.
- Syllogism, 129-132.
- Synecdoche, 250, 263.
- “Tannenbaum,” 12.
- Technical words, 242.
- Tennyson, Lord, quotations from, 51, 251, 283.
- Terms of syllogism, 129, 130.
- Testimony, 136.
- Tetrameter, 274.
- Thackeray, W. M., quotation from, 157.
- Theme in exposition, 100, 101.
- “Three Fishers, The,” quotation from, 271.
- “Tiger, Tiger,” quotation from, 283.
- Time of story, 35.
- Title in exposition, 102.
- “To W. L. Garrison,” quotation from, 89.
- Topic-sentence, 157;
- Tragedy, 286.
- Transitions, 118, 119.
- “Travels with a Donkey,” narrative or descriptive? 4;
- absence of plot, 17;
- quotations from, 62, 65, 157.
- “Treasure Island,” a narrative, 4;
- Trimeter, 274.
- Trochee, defined, 272;
- interchangeable with dactyl, 278.
- Type-form of paragraph, 162.
- “Ugly Duckling, The,” 25.
- Undistributed middle, 131.
- Unity, 20;
- in narration, 21, 22;
- in description, 56-64;
- in exposition, 102, 103;
- in argument, 138;
- in paragraphs, 173;
- in sentences, 205.
- “Uses of Astronomy, The,” quotation from, 72.
- Value of observation, 55.
- “Vanity Fair,” example of a plot, 19;
- Variations in metre, 276-284.
- Verbs in description, 79.
- Verne, Jules, 12.
- Verse, a, definition of, 273;
- Verse forms, 269-291.
- “Village Blacksmith, The,” quotation from, 279, 280.
- “Vision of Sir Launfal, The,” 13;
- Vocabulary, need of, 236.
- Vulgarisms, 240.
- “Wake Robin,” 9.
- Webster, Daniel, quotation from, to illustrate paragraph structure, 176;
- “Wee Willie Winkie,” its climax, 21.
- Wendell, Barrett, quotation on printed words from, 94.
- Whittier, John G., his “Barbara Frietchie” and “Snow-Bound” as narratives, 4.
- Wilkins, Miss, small number of characters in her books, 35.
- 318
Wolfe, Charles, “The Burial of Sir John Moore” quoted, 277.
- Words, 235-256;
- choice of, 78, 79, 80, 254-260;
- reputable, 240, 241;
- national, 242;
- in present use, 244, 245;
- Latin and Saxon, 245-248;
- general and specific, 248-252.
- “Wordsworth,” Arnold’s essay on, quotations from, 158, 167;
Footnotes:
See pp. 13, 14, of the Report of Committee on College Entrance
Requirements. (Back)
See the first essay in Prose Fancies. (Back)
Unless otherwise stated, all page references are to the Riverside
Literature Series. (Back)
Biglow Papers, No. X. (Back)
Tennyson’s Œnone. (Back)
Historical Sketches, by Cardinal Newman. (Back)
Pierre et Jean, by Maupassant. Quoted from Bates’s Talks on
Writing English. (Back)
Impressions de Théâtre, by Jules Lemaître. (Back)
The Marble Faun, by Nathaniel Hawthorne. (Back)
Travels with a Donkey, by R. L. Stevenson. (Back)
Les Misérables, by Victor Hugo. (Back)
The Stage Coach, in Irving’s Sketch Book. (Back)
The Jungle Book, by Rudyard Kipling. (Back)
To W. L. Garrison, by J. R. Lowell. (Back)
Idea of a University, by Cardinal Newman. (Back)
Essay on Milton, by Lord Macaulay. (Back)
Discussions and Arguments. (Back)
Essay on Milton. (Back)
The Physical Basis of Life, by T. H. Huxley. (Back)
Self-Cultivation in English, by Professor G. H. Palmer. (Back)
Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies, by Burke. (Back)
A text-book on Logic, such as Jevons’s, should be used to illustrate
the kinds of argument more fully. (Back)
Silas Marner, by George Eliot. (Back)
The Odd Number, by Guy de Maupassant. (Back)
Vanity Fair, by W. M. Thackeray. (Back)
Idyl of the Honey-Bee, from Burroughs’s Pepacton. (Back)
Essay on Wordsworth, by Matthew Arnold. (Back)
Speech on Copyright, by Lord Macaulay. (Back)
Idyl of the Honey-Bee, from Burroughs’s Pepacton. (Back)
The Physical Basis of Life, by T. H. Huxley. (Back)
See Scott and Denney’s Composition-Rhetoric. (Back)
Legend of Sleepy Hollow, by W. Irving. (Back)
Essay on Milton, by Lord Macaulay. (Back)
Kidnapped, by R. L. Stevenson. (Back)
Præterita, by John Ruskin. (Back)
Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies, by Burke. (Back)
Barrett Wendell’s English Composition. (Back)
Oration on Adams and Jefferson, by Daniel Webster. (Back)
Present Position of Catholics in England, by Cardinal Newman. (Back)
Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies, by Burke. (Back)
Speech on the Reform Bill of 1832, by Lord Macaulay. (Back)
Idea of a University, by Cardinal Newman. (Back)
Legend of Sleepy Hollow, by W. Irving. (Back)
Idea of a University, by Cardinal Newman. (Back)
Idea of a University, by Cardinal Newman. (Back)
Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies, by Burke. (Back)
Legend of Sleepy Hollow, by W. Irving. (Back)
Function of Criticism at the Present Time, by Matthew Arnold. (Back)
Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies, by Burke. (Back)
The Spirit of Modern Philosophy, by Josiah Royce. (Back)
See Lowell’s Biglow Papers, Introduction to Second Series. (Back)
Idea of a University, by Cardinal Newman. (Back)
From The Princess: a Medley, Part IV. (Back)
From The Seven Seas, published by D. Appleton & Co., New
York. Copyright, 1896, by Rudyard Kipling. (Back)
In any piece of literature there are many figures. The following
should be used only to make pupils familiar with varieties of figures.
They will find many more in the literature they read. (Back)
The treatment of this subject is based upon Lanier’s The Science
of English Verse. (Back)
See p. xix. (Back)
