Oral Review-Exercise.—Correct the following sentences, after naming each fault.
1. Belonging to the modern realistic school of novelists, his address was an able defence of their tenets.
2. It is not probable that the scholars will yet give him a very lofty place, and they will be disinclined to call his books literature, but the division of sentiment as to their exact standing will not detract from the brilliancy of the future they promise.
3. “Here you are, a great, hulking fellow, endowed by providence with magnificent strength, instead of which you go about stealing nuts.”
4. Cæsar and all his legions was encamped around the city, and the barbarians knew well enough it was them they had to fight, them the soldiers of the Roman god-like man.
5. “It wasn’t us! it wasn’t us! We wasn’t there, we warnt.”
6. Neither of the adventurers, Olson and Lefevre, saw their native land again.
7. He sat the cage down; and the bird cried, between each mouthful, “Polly wants a cracker.”
8. Like Lucretius, his pleasure was in watching the sea fight from a secure place.
9. Masquerading under the stage name of Viola Violet, there was a gasp of astonishment when she made her first entrance and was recognized by her many friends in the audience.
10. Lacking practice in what might be called the technique of acting, there was now and then some restraint in pose and gesture, and the essential element of artistic repose was lacking.
11. Passengers are warned not to get off the train while in motion.
12. Without stopping to fully describe the construction of this aural instrument, suffice it to say, that it is small and compact, and can be carried in the pocket, weighing about two ounces, constructed mostly of aluminum.
13. When I go back to Cuba again I should like to go with 10,000 interpreters instead of one, all in United States uniforms, and who would talk fast and to the point and would not expect or wait for an answer.
14. Passing a field where brother David was sowing rye, several merry voices called out, “How are you, Mr. Newton?”
15. Mr. Adams positively declines to hang cards over the edges of the boxes at the grand opera with the names of those present in large type.
16. Eva picked up the letter from the hall table, looked quickly round at the closed hall door, at the closed dining-room door, and at the baize door that led to the kitchen stairs—and kissed it.
17. Talking the other day with a friend (the late Mr. Keats) about Dante, he observed that whenever so great a poet told us anything in addition or continuation of an ancient story, he had a right to be regarded as classical authority.
18. Alcibiades told the Spartan envoys that if they would say to the Athenians that their power was limited and that they could only listen and then tell the Spartans what they heard that he would see that the Athenians did not join the alliance: so when the ambassadors went there they did as Alcibiades said and Alcibiades got up and said, that they could not tell two things alike and the Athenians would not have anything more to do with them and they joined the alliance.
19. Having given this department-store question much careful thought I have decided a more dangerous monopoly could not be found, for reasons as follows: First, they tend to centralize business, which is dangerous, and should not exist if we wish our city to grow and thereby equalize taxation. Second, the continuous advertising of the entire stock of an unfortunate merchant on sale in these stores at 33 cents on the dollar is not encouraging to strangers who visit us.
The Sentence not its own Master.—Everybody learns at an early age some such definition as this: A sentence is the expression of a complete thought in words. But many students who have just left the grammar school are not very clear in their own minds as to what the definition means. When they come to write sentences they find it hard to decide what constitutes a complete thought. They know what the test of grammatical completeness is—the sentence must have a subject and a predicate; but they are hazy as to when the sentence is logically complete. Frankly, the most accomplished writers are sometimes troubled to decide this question. Having two ideas, they are not sure whether these ought to stand in separate sentences, or in semicolon clauses. There is no magic rule; but by the right kind of practice one may become perfectly sure, in nine cases out of ten, of the best course to take.
Perhaps the easiest way to approach the matter is to remember that the sentence is only a part of a larger unit,—the paragraph. A paragraph is either a miniature composition, or a main part of a short composition. In long works, the chapter is the short composition of which the paragraphs are the divisions. The sentence, in turn, is a main part of the paragraph. Whether a sentence should be long or short depends on the part it plays in the paragraph.
To make this statement plain, we need consider only the paragraph that stands alone, a miniature composition. Whatever be the number of its sentences, each forms a main part or step in the development of the paragraph-thought. All are concerned with explaining the same thing; each contributes something to the idea. If there is a topic sentence and this be likened to a root, the other sentences are like the stalks and leaves which grow from the root.
Note how each of the following miniature compositions[18] has a root, from which the rest of the paragraph springs necessarily.
1. Flowers have an expression of countenance as much as men or animals. Some seem to smile; some have a sad expression; some are pensive and diffident; others again are plain, honest, and upright, like the broad-faced sunflower and the hollyhock.—H. W. Beecher.
2. There are three wicks ... to the lamp of a man’s life; brain, blood, and breath. Press the brain a little, its light goes out, followed by both the others. Stop the heart a minute, and out go all three of the wicks. Choke the air out of the lungs, and presently the fluid ceases to supply the other centres of flame, and all is soon stagnation, cold, and darkness.—Dr. Holmes.
Consider the parts of the paragraphs just given. Mr. Beecher has two sentences, the second grouping together the details which explain the first. But the first sentence is made much shorter than the second, because, word for word, it is to be more emphatic. The second is the longer, because no one of the separate clauses seemed to the writer important enough to stand alone. The clauses of detail taken together form one main division of the paragraph. The short sentence that states the gist of the paragraph is another main division. In Dr. Holmes’s brief parable, there are four sentences. Three of them develop the general idea stated in the first. Dr. Holmes cannot condense these three into one explanatory sentence, as Beecher does; he has too much to say. By giving a sentence to each of the three “wicks,” he shows that he considers them all approximately equal in importance.
Study now another paragraph:—
It is saying less than the truth to affirm that an excellent book (and the remark holds almost equally good of a Raphael as of a Milton) is like a well-chosen and well-tended fruit tree. Its fruits are not of one season only. With the due and natural intervals, we may recur to it year after year, and it will supply the same nourishment and the same gratification, if only we ourselves return to it with the same healthful appetite.—Coleridge.
In this passage from Coleridge the first sentence is the root of the paragraph; ‘a book is like a fruit tree.’ But the second sentence is made shorter than the first, because it is to state the pith of the paragraph more clearly and emphatically than did the first. The meaning of the first sentence is a little vague; how a book is like a fruit tree, it does not say. The second sentence does say how. Note, then, that a short sentence is always emphatic, and that accordingly it should be used to state something that is important in the paragraph.
Study also the following paragraph:—
Our chief want in life, is somebody who shall make us do what we can. This is the service of a friend. With him we are easily great. There is a sublime attraction in him to whatever virtue is in us. How he flings wide the doors of existence! What questions we ask of him! what an understanding we have! how few words are needed! It is the only real society.—Emerson.
In this paragraph of Emerson’s, the main ideas are stated in brief sentences, and the summary of the paragraph comes in a sentence of six short words. But note that in the last sentence except one, the writer groups three clauses, because the three constitute parts of one main idea of the paragraph.
Read the following rather abstruse paragraphs, and decide as to which shows the chief divisions of the whole thought.
There is, first, the literature of knowledge; and, secondly, the literature of power. The function of the first is, to teach; the function of the second is, to move; the first is a rudder, the second an oar or a sail. The first speaks to the mere discursive understanding; the second speaks ultimately, it may happen, to the higher understanding or reason, but always through affections of pleasure and sympathy.—De Quincey.
There is, first, the literature of knowledge. And, secondly, the literature of power. The function of the first is, to teach. The function of the second is, to move. The first is a rudder. The second, an oar or a sail. The first speaks to the mere discursive understanding. The second speaks ultimately, it may happen, to the higher understanding or reason, but always through affections of pleasure and sympathy.
From a study of the foregoing selections, it becomes clear that the sentence is not its own master. It is the servant of the paragraph. The paragraph, having an idea to give, uses sentences to develop this idea. A skilful writer is not in haste to crowd into a sentence all of one large, complex thought. The full expression of that thought is the task of the paragraph. The sentences are the means by which its parts may be made clear. The long sentences are for explanatory details; the short ones are for emphatic summaries or generalizations, and for rapid narrative.
Sentence Unity.—I. A sentence that possesses Unity of Substance constitutes one main step in the development of the paragraph-idea. A main step, as thus employed, usually means a sentence giving one of the following: (1) the general subject of the paragraph; (2) the general thought or assertion of the paragraph; (3) the repetition of a preceding idea in new words; (4) an illustration; (5) a group of particulars or details; (6) one proof, or term, in a chain of reasoning; (7) a brief contrast; (8) a cause and an effect; (9) an assertion and a very brief illustration. It would be absurd to hold these principles of unity anxiously in mind when one is writing. Having thought them over a little, and taken to heart the general doctrine that the sentence should be one main step, the scholar should trust his own sense of unity. The chief value of any such analysis is that it may help the scholar to give thought to his own sentences.
II. A sentence that possesses Unity of Form keeps one coherent structure throughout, and subordinates unimportant clauses to the important. Unity of form does not concern the division of the paragraph into sentences. It will be considered in Chapter VI., under Well-knit Sentences.
I. Unity of Substance by Excluding Irrelevant Ideas.—Perhaps the first thing that is noticed in reading hasty composition, is that some sentences are too long. Here is one, written by a lad of fourteen. It will seem to most readers to be a sentence of infantine simplicity, such as no high school student is in the slightest danger of perpetrating. My apology for giving it is that it renders every heterogeneous sentence ridiculous.
Oliver Orlando’s brother did not like him and when he heard that Orlando whipped Charles he was very angry and was going to burn Orlando’s house up with him in it, but Adam, Orlando’s faithful servant, ran out and told him, so they got all the money they had and started for the forest of Arden, when they got pretty near there Adam being so old fainted from hunger.
The student who wrote this was not thinking of the parts of his paragraph; he was thinking merely of the story of As You Like It. He plunged ahead after the story, never looking behind him. The result is a long, rambling sentence, with several chief thoughts in it. These chief thoughts are four: (1) Oliver hatefully plots to kill Orlando. (2) Adam foils Oliver. (3) Adam and Orlando flee. (4) Adam at last faints. The paragraph therefore divides into four decent, though childish, sentences:—
Oliver, Orlando’s brother, did not like him; and when he heard that Orlando whipped Charles he was very angry, and was going to burn Orlando’s house up with him in it. But Adam, Orlando’s faithful servant, ran out and told him. So they got together all the money they had, and started for the forest of Arden. When they got pretty near there, Adam, being so old, fainted from hunger.
Periods are now substituted for several of the student’s commas. That writer had confused these two marks, the comma and the full stop. Such an error may be called, for mere convenience, the comma fault. It is readily seen that of all possible mistakes in punctuation, the comma fault is the most serious and elementary. To begin a new sentence after a comma is an infallible sign of illiteracy.
Oral Exercise.—In the following passages, correct the comma fault wherever it appears. Change the sentences in other ways to give a more mature tone to them.
1. I don’t know what to do in such a case, it is too hard to decide. [Change comma to semicolon.]
2. Romeo fell in love at once, he couldn’t help himself, he had never seen any person so lovable.
3. So they also started for the forest of Arden disguised as a countryman and woman, when they got there they bought a house that was to be sold at auction, once while wandering around they met Orlando and Rosalind asked him if it was he that was spoiling the trees by carving love sentences on them, and he said it was, so she said he could pretend that she was Rosalind, so he came there every day until one day he was detained by seeing a lioness just going to spring on Oliver.
Theme.—Write a paragraph of six to ten short sentences. Let the first state the whole event in brief. Let the others give the steps of the action tersely, rapidly, emphatically. Revise for spelling and punctuation. Suggested topics:—
II. Unity of Substance by Including all the Parts of an Idea.—It has already been said that a paragraph may be composed of several very short sentences, each one a main step of the paragraph, each one a unit. For example:—
A great silence made itself felt. Then, on a sudden, a dry sound cracked in the air. The viscount had slapped his adversary’s face. Every one rose to interfere. Cards were exchanged between the two.
Here, indeed, it may be that the second and third sentences are halves of one idea, divided to make its parts more emphatic. At all events, while a sentence may be very short and still constitute a principal factor of the paragraph, sentences should not be so brief that each is, so to speak, only half a main thought. A main thought may be composite. Thus, it is often effective (a) to state and to explain an idea very briefly, within the one sentence; (b) to show an extremely close relation of cause and effect, by stating both within the one sentence; (c) to contrast two things very briefly within the one sentence.
Now, a child gives his ideas in mere bits; he cannot express the relations of the bits to each other. For example:—
My aunt was a very large woman. My uncle was a very thin man. He was very delicate. He dwindled. I mean, he got thinner and punier every day. And my aunt thought a great deal of him. She wished him to get well. She gave him a great deal of medicine. She gave him so much that he began to get worse. He finally died.
This paragraph tells the story of how a woman doctored her husband to death. The writer has made eight steps in the story, which perhaps has not really more than four main parts: (1) The contrast between my aunt and uncle. (2) My uncle “dwindled”—explained by saying he got punier daily. (3) My aunt’s love, and its consequence—her wish for my uncle’s recovery. (4) The form the wish took,—giving of medicine. (5) The twofold result,—aggravation of the disease, then death.
The original sentences may be combined into four. In combining them, what pointing shall be used instead of so many full stops? We may use commas, but only if we make one clause dependent or join two clauses or propositions by a conjunction. We may say, for example, “My aunt was a very large woman, and my uncle a very thin, delicate man.” We have inserted an and; this permits the use of a comma. The result is a pretty good sentence, having one complex idea,—the contrast between the ample lady and her slight husband.
But another invaluable means of showing the real factors of the sentence is the semicolon. The semicolon, as was said in Chapter III., is a kind of weak full stop. Nearly always it connects statements that are unrelated and independent grammatically, but intimately related in sense. In a way,[19] the semicolon connects sentences, a period separates sentences. The former sign is priceless to the writer who, when he comes to expand each idea of his paragraph, finds the structure growing too complicated. He has merely to place a semicolon and go ahead with a miniature new sentence, which every reader will understand to be a part of the logical unit in hand.
If we combine the eight sentences by the help of the semicolon, we get four, somewhat like the following:—
My aunt was a very large woman; my uncle, on the contrary, was a very thin delicate man. He dwindled; that is, he got thinner and punier every day. My aunt thought a good deal of him, and naturally she wished him to get well. She gave him, accordingly, a great deal of medicine. She gave him so much indeed that he began to get worse; and, finally, he died.
Most students do not use the semicolon enough. Two or three semicolon clauses, however, are sufficient for a very long sentence. If more are written there is usually danger of encroaching upon the next main thought of the paragraph. It is better to write too many short sentences than too many long ones.
Oral Exercise.—Consider the following paragraph, and decide whether the main thoughts of it are nine, as here indicated, or four. If four, the thoughts are: (1) Contrast between light above and dark below. (2) The growing dark. (3) The faint, weird sights and sounds that come to the narrator. (4) His retreat from the abbey. If, having given the matter careful thought, you think there should be but four sentences, or if you think there is any other fault in the punctuation, explain how you would repoint.
The last beams of day were now faintly streaming through the painted windows in the high vaults above me. The lower parts of the abbey were already wrapped in the obscurity of twilight. The chapels and aisles grew darker and darker. The effigies of the kings faded into shadows. The marble figures of the monuments assumed strange shapes in the uncertain light. The evening breeze crept through the aisles like the cold breath of the grave. And even the distant footfall of a verger, traversing the Poet’s Corner, had something strange and dreary in its sound. I slowly retraced my morning’s walk. And as I passed out at the portal of the cloisters, the door, closing with a jarring noise behind me, filled the whole building with echoes.
Punctuation for Emphasis.—Below are given three ways of punctuating the same words. We may suppose the same words to be used by three different generals.
1. General A. twirled his moustache, and spoke softly, in his calm, unruffled way, as if he were explaining a mathematical problem to a cadet; he said to the soldier, “You are a coward: you shrink, you dodge, you hide, you run away when the danger comes.” He spoke meditatively, and with a little drawl, letting his voice rise at each pause.
2. General B. looked at the soldier steadily, and said in a sharp, decided tone: “You are a coward: you shrink; you dodge; you hide; you run away when the danger comes.”
3. General C. sprang up from his camp-stool, angry and indignant. He spoke explosively and incoherently. “You are a coward! You shrink. You dodge. You hide. You run away when the danger comes.”
Evidently the punctuation here is largely dependent on the different states of mind. A calm, logical attitude is reflected in the nice distinctions conveyed by the colon and comma. An excited mood over-emphasizes each detail, and makes it a sentence. There is sometimes need of indignant emphasis on each detail. Perhaps therefore the strict unity of the sentence may sometimes be sacrificed for the sake of emphasis. Such a sacrifice however should very rarely be made.
Oral Exercise.—Consider the following paragraph as a whole, and decide whether the sentences represent the main factors of the paragraph-thought. If you agree that “the song of a young girl’s voice” is as important in the paragraph as several of the other songs put together, how can this importance be indicated by punctuation?
The first thing which Tom saw was the black cedars, high and sharp against the rosy dawn. And St. Brandan’s Isle reflected double in the still broad silver sea. The wind sung softly in the cedars, and the water sung among the caves. The sea-birds sung as they streamed out into the ocean, and the land-birds as they built among the boughs. And the air was so full of song that it stirred St. Brandan and his hermits, as they slumbered in the shade. And they moved their good old lips, and sung their good old hymn amid their dreams. But among all the songs one came across the water more sweet and clear than all, for it was the song of a young girl’s voice.
Theme.—Write a paragraph of four sentences on one of the following subjects. Let the first sentence be a general statement. Then let each of three compound sentences group together details, and so explain the first.
Written Exercise.—In the seventeenth century there were many authors whose minds were full of Latin models. These writers tried to build up in English, an uninflected language, sentences as complex as those of Cicero. They tried to make the sentence do the work of the paragraph. How utterly they failed may be seen in the following passages from Defoe and Lord Clarendon. Considering each selection as a paragraph, rewrite with reference to unity of substance in the sentence.
1. There is one thing more remarkable in this parish, and it is this: twenty-six sheets of lead, hanging all together, were blown off from the middle isle of our church, and were carried over the north isle, which is a very large one, without touching it; and into the churchyard ten yards’ distance from the church; and they were took up all joined together as they were on the roof; the plumber told me that the sheets weighed each three hundred and a half, one with another. This is what is most observable in our parish: but I shall give you an account of one thing (which perhaps you may have from other hands) that happened in another, called Kingscote, a little village about three miles from Tedbury, and seven from us: where William Kingscote, Esq., has many woods; among which was one grove of very tall trees, being each near eighty foot high; the which he greatly valued for the tallness and prospect of them, and therefore resolved never to cut them down: but it so happened, that six hundred of them, within the compass of five acres were wholly blown down; (and supposed to be much at the same time) each tree tearing up the ground with its root; so that the roots of most of the trees, with the turf and earth about them, stood up at least fifteen or sixteen foot high; the lying down of which trees is an amazing sight to all beholders.—Defoe.
2. It is true, that as he[20] was of a most incomparable gentleness, application, and even submission to good and worthy and entire men, so he was naturally (which could not be more evident in his place, which objected him to another conversation and intermixture than his own election would have done) adversus malos injucundus; and was so ill a dissembler of his dislike and disinclination to ill men, that it was not possible for such not to discern it. There was once, in the House of Commons, such a declared acceptation of the good service an eminent member had done to them, and, as they said, to the whole kingdom, that it was moved, he being present, “That the speaker might, in the name of the whole house, give him thanks, and then that every member might, as a testimony of his particular acknowledgment, stir or move his hat towards him;” the which (though not ordered) when very many did, the lord Falkland (who believed the service itself not to be of that moment, and that an honourable and generous person could not have stooped to it for any recompence) instead of moving his hat, stretched both his arms out, and clasped his hands together upon the crown of his hat, and held it close down to his head; that all men might see, how odious that flattery was to him, and that very approbation of the person, though at the same time most popular.—Clarendon.
Oral Exercise.—Examine the paragraphs by Hawthorne (p. 106), Macaulay, Webster, Huxley (pp. 107-8) to see whether the sentences are units in substance. Note also the different effects produced by long and short sentences.
III. A. Unity of Substance by Keeping to the Point.—In a hastily written manuscript will often be found unlike ideas joined together in one sentence. Some persons are worse than others in this matter, but everybody, in composing rapidly, is liable to the fault. It is amusingly easy to fly off at a tangent, if the parts of the paragraph have not been properly thought out. The mind often works erratically; it is pursuing a given idea when some word used suggests a different line of thinking and the train is switched off its track.
Cardinal Newman once wrote a burlesque of this scatter-brained kind of writing. He pretends that the lad is writing a theme on the topic, “Fortune favors the brave.” In the midst of it the boy says:—
Napoleon, too, shows us how little we can rely on fortune; but his faults, great as they were, are being redeemed by his nephew, Louis Napoleon, who has shown himself very different from what was expected, though he has never explained how he came to swear to the constitution, and then mounted the imperial throne.
Here the writer has not committed the comma fault; he has not begun an independent sentence after a comma. But he has set down ideas irrelevant to the sentence, and, in this case, irrelevant even to the theme.
This lack of unity often arises from putting down, as the sentence proceeds, the details that occur parenthetically to the writer; he empties his mind upon the paper. Thus:—
My aunt happened to notice, as she stood looking into the glass and thinking how pretty she was, for she was really pretty for one so old, that the eyes of a portrait or one of the eyes was moving, for my aunt had a large picture of my uncle in her room in her country-house, which was in Derbyshire.
B. Many a sentence which ends in an irrelevant clause can be made to show unity by the insertion of some intermediate link that occurred in the mind but was overlooked in the writing. “Johnson wrote political articles, and took care that the Whigs did not get the best of it,” becomes a unit if we supply a few words: “Johnson wrote political articles, and in those which referred to parliamentary debates took care that the Whigs did not get the best of it.” In other words, a sentence must not merely include the expressed parts of a main thought, as in the second kind of unity of substance; it must express every part of the main thought.
Oral Exercise.—Trim the following sentences into shape, so that each shall be a unit. If necessary, divide the sentence.
1. He was young; but his foolishness stood him in good stead.
2. The cholera in Egypt is assuming a more loathsome form, among the dead being Major Roddy Owen, the famous Uganda explorer.
3. The delegates, wearied by the excitement of the past week, have hurried to their homes, a few remaining for all the business men have been making unusual displays in spite of the hard times.
4. The new light is placed upon a gas-jet, which supplies the gas to a curious film, which is made of some chemically prepared substance that becomes incandescent, not having to be changed oftener than twice a year, if you are careful with it.
5. The electric lights, which are of the Edison pattern, are not burned later than six o’clock. They are more convenient than gas, and they come packed in straw.
Oral Exercise, in Review.—Decide whether the following sentences are units or not. Indicate which form of sentence unity each has or lacks. Suggest improvements.
1. In the midst of life we are in death, and it has been said that the tariff is a tax.
2. Jesu! Jesu! Dead!—he drew a good bow;—and dead!—he shot a fine shoot:—John of Gaunt loved him well, and betted much money on his head.—2 Henry IV., Act III., Sc. 2, l. 48.
3. He had one claw knobbed and the other jagged; and Tom delighted in watching him hold on to the sea-weed with his knobbed claw, while he cut up salads with his jagged one, and then put them into his mouth, after smelling at them, like a monkey, and always the little barnacles threw out their casting nets and swept the water, and came in for their share of whatever there was for dinner.
4. We were now thoroughly broken down, but the intense excitement of the time denied us repose, and after a unique slumber of some three or four hours’ duration, we arose, as if by preconcert, to make examination of our treasure.
5. Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt [partly-gilt] goblet, sitting in my Dolphin-chamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal fire, upon Wednesday in Whitsun week, when the prince broke thy head for likening his father to a singing man of Windsor; thou didst swear to me then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me, and make me my lady thy wife.—2 Henry IV., Act II., Sc. 1, l. 94.
6. There was something in the tone of this note which gave me great uneasiness. Its whole style differed materially from that of Legrand; what could he be dreaming of? what new crotchet possessed his excitable brain? what “business of the highest importance” could he possibly have to transact? Jupiter’s account of him boded no good; I dreaded lest the continued pressure of misfortune had, at length, fairly unsettled the reason of my friend; without a moment’s hesitation, therefore, I prepared to accompany the negro.
7. And in that country is an old castle, that stands upon a rock, the which is cleped the Castle of the sparrowhawk, that is beyond the city of Layas, beside the town of Parsipee, that belongeth to the lordship of Cruk; that[21] is a rich lord and a good Christian man; where men find a sparrowhawk upon a perch right fair, and right well made; and a fair Lady of Fayryre, that keepeth it.—Mandeville.
8. And thus will the city have more lights on the subject, and what will be a gain in lighting to the city will be a greater loss in cash, and the city’s loss will be the Water Works company’s gain, and we are glad of it so far as the company is concerned, for the company was put off and were refused a renewal of its contract with the city at terms that were most reasonable, and the company will also make up for lost time now in good shape.
A sentence may be said to be well-knit if it stands the following tests. It must have unity of form; freedom from excessive looseness; a due amount of emphasis; and climax, if climax is required. All these technical terms need explanation.
Unity of Form.—To be a unit of form, a sentence must place subordinate thoughts in subordinate clauses, and must keep one coherent structure throughout.
Subordination of Clauses.—In the early years of a language, before it has been used to express philosophy and science, the structure of the sentences is loose and simple; it sounds like the speech of a child. Here is a passage from a book which appeared about 1370, as the Voyage and Travels of Sir John Mandeville. There is some doubt whether or not there was really a Sir John; but these Travels are very interesting and curious reading.
And some men say that in the Isle of Lango is yet the daughter of Hippocrates, in form and likeness of a great dragon, that is a hundred fathom of length, as men say: for I have not seen her. And they of the Isles call her, Lady of the Land. And she lieth in an old castle, in a cave, and sheweth twice or thrice in the year. And she doth no harm to no man, but if men do her harm. And she was thus changed and transformed, from a fair damsel, into likeness of a dragon, by a goddess, that was cleped Diana. And men say, that she shall so endure in that form of a dragon, unto the time that a knight come, that is so hardy, that dare come to her and kiss her on the mouth: and then shall she turn again to her own kind, and be a woman again. But after that she shall not live long.
Though much of the naïve, childlike quality of this passage is due to the archaic phraseology, much also is due to the use of and and but instead of other conjunctions.
In certain kinds of writing it is natural enough that ideas should be strung together with and’s. Thus: “It rained, and hailed, and blew, and snowed, and froze, and they became weary of winter.” But suppose that they did not weary of winter. The sentence then would run, “Though it rained, and hailed, and snowed, and froze, they did not become weary of winter.” Here we have ceased the mere enumeration of things that happened, one after the other, and have stated a process of reasoning. The result is a complex sentence. The ability to construct good complex sentences means ability to do careful thinking.
In every complex sentence there is some one proposition that ought to stand out, with the high light upon it. This is the thing we most wish to say; to change the comparison, it is the heart of the sentence. If the other parts can be made subordinate to it, the strongest kind of sentence unity is secured. In the sentence, “It rained; it snowed; it hailed; they did not weary of winter,” all the assertions are stated as equally important. But, clearly enough, the last one is the kernel of the sentence. Therefore the preceding clauses ought to be reduced to their proper rank by being made dependent.
Oral Exercise.—Examine the following compound sentences, to decide whether or not there is in each some important thought to which the others ought to have been subordinated. Then improve the unity by reducing the subordinate ideas to dependent clauses having a participle, or a relative adverb like when.
1. Love is blind; it is not for want of eyes.
2. The soldiers were perhaps somewhat sleepy with the sultriness of the afternoon; they had now laid by much of their vigilance.
3. I spied an honest fellow coming along a lane, and asked him if he had ever heard of a house called the house of Shaws.
4. The next person I came across was a dapper little man in a beautiful white wig; I knew well that barbers were great gossips, and I asked him plainly what kind of a man was Mr. Balfour of the Shaws.
5. In these days folk still believed in witches and trembled at a curse; and this curse fell pat, like a wayside omen, to arrest me; it took the pith out of my legs.
6. I was called in at last; my uncle counted out into my hand seven and thirty golden guinea pieces.
7. I had come close to one of the turns in the stair; I felt my way as usual; my hand slipped upon an edge and found nothing but emptiness beyond it.
8. I returned to the kitchen; I made up such a blaze as had not shone there for many a long year; I wrapped myself in my plaid; I lay down upon the chests and fell asleep.
The So Construction.—The conjunction so is a useful word, and the learner prefers it to its synonyms, therefore and consequently, because it is simpler, less formal than either. But in a narrative which is liberally besprinkled with so’s the reader feels that the simplicity is overdone. Here is an extreme example.
A short time afterward my uncle died; so my aunt went to her country-house in Derbyshire. She did not wish to be alone in the country; so she took her servants. When they got there they found the house very lonely; so the maids did not want to stay, but they did.
Examine the sentences just quoted, and show the relations between the clauses by other devices than the use of so.
So, as a conjunction, should be employed very sparingly. When it is employed, it should usually be preceded by a semicolon rather than a comma.
Oral Exercise.—A careful writer is known by his use of conjunctions: he does not use and unless the clauses joined are co-ordinate; nor but unless there is a real opposition; nor a given subordinate conjunction unless it is actually required by logic. In the subjoined selections from Ruskin the original conjunctions have been changed to those in italics. Find better expressions for those italicized.
1. In employing all the muscular power at our disposal we are to make the employments we choose as educational as possible. Consequently a wholesome human employment is the first and best method of education, mental as well as bodily. A man taught to plough, row, or steer well, moreover a woman taught to cook properly, and make a dress neatly, are already educated in many essential moral habits. Labour considered as a discipline has hitherto been thought of only for criminals, therefore the real and noblest function of labour is to prevent crime, but not to be Reformatory, but Formatory.—Ruskin.
2. We must spend our money in some way, at some time, accordingly it cannot at any time be spent without employing somebody. While we gamble it away, the person who wins it must spend it; while we lose it in a railroad speculation, it has gone into some one else’s pockets, or merely gone to pay navvies for making a useless embankment, but not to pay riband or button makers for making useless ribands or buttons; we cannot lose it (unless by actually destroying it) and not give employment of some kind; nevertheless whatever quantity of money exists, the relative quantity of employment must some day come out of it; and the distress of the nation signifies that the employments given have produced nothing that will support its existence. Men cannot live on ribands, or buttons, or velvet, or by going quickly from place to place; but every coin spent in useless ornament, or useless motion, is so much withdrawn from the national means of life.—Ruskin.
One Coherent Structure.—We have seen that to be well-knit a sentence must have that unity of form which gives every thought its proper clause-rank. It must also be uniform in structure. There should be no sudden, unnecessary change in subject, or in the form of the verb. Sometimes a sentence is pulled about by the mind as a child by a cross nurse. It begins in the active voice, it is twitched aside into the passive. It begins as the act of one person, it ends as that of another. Even so admirable a writer as John Fiske has this sentence: “But Howe could not bear to acknowledge the defeat of his attempts to storm, and accordingly, at five o’clock, with genuine British persistency, a third attack was ordered.” This “British persistency” is evidently Howe’s. Why not give him full credit for it, thus?—“But Howe could not bear to acknowledge the defeat of his attempts to storm, and accordingly, at five o’clock, with genuine British persistency he ordered a third attack.”
Oral Exercise.—Change the following sentences so that each shall have unity of form.
1. A blue pencil? there is nothing so easy for an editor to manage, so unmistakable in reading, so wholly impressive to a contributor when he sees it.
2. Tom and East became good friends, and the tyranny of a certain insolent fellow was sturdily resisted by them together.
3. You will see no sudden jerks of the St. Ambrose rudder, nor will any clumsy rounding of a point be seen.
4. Miller, motionless till now, lifts his right hand and the tassel is whirled round his head.
5. Thorold had just read the account of John Inglesant’s vision of the dead King Charles. He disliked the idea of spending the night in the old country house, and still more to go through the tapestried chamber; but it was immediately determined by him that such an invitation must not be refused.
The Loose Sentence.—The passage given at the beginning of the chapter, from Mandeville, is written in what are called loose sentences. Loose as applied to a sentence, does not necessarily mean that the sentence is bad,—that it is rambling or disjointed. A loose sentence is one in which an independent statement comes first, followed by others, dependent or independent. Example: “And some men say that in the Isle of Lango is yet the daughter of Hippocrates, in form and likeness of a great dragon, that is a hundred fathom of length, as men say: for I have not seen her.” In this sentence comes first a proposition,—“And some men say,” followed by several subordinate clauses, and by one independent clause,—“for I have not seen her.” The test of a loose sentence is a grammatical one: the sentence can be closed at some point before the end, without hurting the grammatical structure. At what places in the sentence just quoted is the grammatical structure complete?
The loose sentence is used freely in conversation. The speaker gives his main idea first, and qualifies it afterward. Therefore the legitimate effect of the loose sentence is to lend an air of simplicity, a colloquial air, to the style. The danger is that it may become a mere sequence of clauses, that dangle insecurely, each from the preceding, like needles hanging from a magnet. Avoid long loose sentences.
Examine the sentence by Defoe, p. 89. It is a fine example of what a loose sentence should not be.
The Periodic Sentence.—In the sentence, “A short time afterward my uncle died; so my aunt went to her country-house in Derbyshire,” the grammatical structure is complete at “died.” But if the two clauses be welded together by because, they will no longer be grammatically free. Thus: “Because my uncle died shortly afterward, my aunt went to her country-house in Derbyshire.” This sentence is periodic in form. A periodic sentence is a complex sentence in which the modifiers of the verb precede the verb. The effect of this structure is to delay the main idea of the sentence until the last.[22] Obviously, if too many subordinate ideas occur before the main one, the mind of the reader will weary with the tension of expectation. Short periodic sentences however are extremely effective in arousing the reader’s attention and holding it till the important idea is stated. It is plain that good periodic structure is highly conducive to unity in the sentence: each subordinate idea is held in its proper place of subordination till the main idea is stated, and on the reader is flashed a pleasant sense that the structure has grown naturally into one complete whole.
Oral Exercise.—Examine the oral exercise on pages 98, 99, and say which sentences were made periodic in the effort to improve their unity.
Oral Exercise.—Below are given some good periodic sentences.[23] Give equivalent loose sentences. Decide whether or not the loose are better than the periodic.
1. At this moment a large, comfortable white house, that had been heretofore hidden by green trees, came into view.