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VIII. As regularity in the management of prepositions implies a proper choice of these particles, their omission is a great blemish when their presence is required.

The wrong choice of prepositions suggests the necessity of not using as synonymous such as rarely admit the same construction.

IX. Inaccuracies in the applications of the conjunctions and adverbs, arise from want of attention to those little things which ought not to be altogether disregarded by any writer.

Corol. The words of the language constitute the materials with which the orator must work; the rules of the language teach him by what management those materials are rendered useful. But purity is using rightly the words of the language by a careful observance of the rules. It is, therefore, justly considered as essential to all the other graces of expression. Hence, not only perspicuity and vivacity, but even elegance and animation, derive a lustre.

112. THE IMPROPRIETY is the third and last class of faults against purity. The barbarism is an offence against etymology, the solecism against syntax, the impropriety against lexicography.

Obs. The impropriety, then, may be in application of single words, or of phrases; but as none but those who are grossly ignorant of our tongue, can misapply the words that have no affinity to those whose place they are made to occupy, we shall only take notice of those improprieties, into which a writer is apt unwarily to be seduced by some resemblance or proximity in sound or sense, or both.

I. By proximity of sound some are misled to use the word observation for "observance." When to observe signifies "to remark," the verbal noun is observation, when it signifies "to obey," or " to keep," the verbal is observance.

II. Endurance for "duration." The former properly signifies" patience" as applied to suffering; the latter means "lasting" as applied

to time.

III. Ceremonious and "ceremonial" are distinguished thus: they come from the same noun ceremony, which signifies both a form of ci vility, and a religious rite. The epithet expressive of the first signification is ceremonious, of the second ceremonial.

IV. When genius denotes mental abilities, its plural is "geniuses," and not genii, a term which denotes spirits or demons, good or bad. 113. Of improprieties arising from a similitude in sense, we have,

I. Veracity, used for "reality." In strict propriety the word is only applicable to persons, and signifies not physical, but moral truth. II. Invention, for "discovery." One discovers truth; another invents falsehoods. A machinist invents, an observer discovers.

III. Verdict, for "testimony." A witness gives his testimony; the jury give their verdict.

IV. Risible, for "ridiculous." The former hath an active, the latter a passive signification. Thus, we say, "man is a risible animal." "A fop is a ridiculous character."

V. The word together often supplies the place of successively. The resemblance which continuity in time bears to continuity in place, is the source of this impropriety. When the Spectator says, "I do not

remember that I ever spoke three sentences together in my whole life." propriety teaches his reader to substitute successively for " together. VI. Everlasting for "eternity." The only proper sense of the former word is time without end; the latter denotes time without beginning.

VII. Apparent, for "certain,' ," "manifest," is often equivocal. By analogy, seeming is opposed to real; visible to concealed. And hence, also, "to make appear," for to prove, to evince, to show, is improper. A sophist may make a thing appear to be what it is not; but this is very different from showing what it is.

114. THE IDIOTISM, or the employing of an English word in a sense which it bears in some provincial dialect, in low and partial use, or which, perhaps, the corresponding word bears in some foreign tongue, but, unsupported by general use in our own language, belongs to the class of improprie ties now under consideration. (Art. 102.)

I. Impracticable for “impassable," when applied to roads, is an application which suits the French, but not the English idiom.

II. Decompound for "analyse." To decompound is "to compound of materials already compounded:" to analyse is to resolve a compound into its first principles.

III. To arrive for "happen." We arrive at a place, but misfortunes happen to man.

IV. To hold should never be employed for "to use; nor to give into for "to adopt."

Obs. Gallicisms, Latinisms, and vulgarisms, result from affectation, pedantry, and ignorance. (Obs. Art. 85.)

V. The PLEONASM, coupled with ambiguity, is the highest degree of idiomatical expression; as, "the general report is, that he should have said," for, "that he said." What a man said, is often very different from what he should have said; hence the pleonasm of the auxiliaries," should have," conveys also an ambiguity.

Obs. These remarks on the idiotism, do not extend to satire and burlesque, (Obs. Art. 105.) in which a vulgar, or even what is called a cant expression, will sometimes be more emphatical than any proper term whatever; as in these lines of Pope :

Whether the charmer sinner it or saint it,

If folly grows romantic, I must paint it.

VI. The derivatives falseness, falsity, falsehood, from the root false, are often by mistake employed for one another, though in the best use they are evidently distinguished.

Illus. 1. Falseness is properly used, in a moral sense, for want of veracity, and applied only to persons: the other two are applied only to things.

2. Falsity denotes that quality in the abstract, which may be defined contrariety to truth, as an error arising in a demonstration from false premises in the proposition.

3. Falsehood is an untrue assertion.

VII. Negligence is improperly used for " neglect." The former implies habit, the latter denotes act.

VIII. Conscience for "consciousness." The former denotes the faculty, the latter a particular exertion.

IX. Sophism, for "sophistry." The former denotes a fallacious argument, the latter fallacious reasoning.

X. Remember, for" remind." We are reminded by others: we remember of ourselves.

XI. Plenty, for "plentiful." The latter is an adjective, the former a noun. The misapplication of either is a gross vulgarism.

XII. Doctrines, for "precepts." The former are credenda, which we are required to believe; the latter, we are called on to obey, as rules of life.

115. THE VULGARISM springs from an affectation of an easy, familiar, and careless manner of writing; but it is an error to imagine, that the less pains one bestows upon style, it must appear the more natural.

Obs. 1. Ease is one thing, carelessness another; and the former is most commonly the result of the greatest care. It is like ease in motion, which, though originally the effect of discipline, when once it hath become habitual, has a more simple and more natural appearance, than is to be observed in any manner which untutored nature can produce.

But ease in writing flows from art, not chance;
As those move easiest who have learnt to dance.*

116. The love of novelty, and a fondness for variety, are the two sources whence flow those numerous inadvertencies with which the style of many writers is chargeable. (Art. 78, Illus.)

Illus. 1. The former, when excessive, tends directly to misguide us, by making us disdain the beaten track, for no other reason but because it is the beaten track. The idea of vulgarity, in the imaginations of those who are affected with this principle, is connected with every thing that is conceived as customary. The genuine issue of this extreme, is, not only improprieties, but even absurdities, and fustian and Dombast.

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2. The latter, to wit, a fondness for variety, produceth often the same effect, though more indirectly. It begets an immoderate dread of becoming tedious, by repeating too frequently the same sound. order to avoid this, a writer resolves, at any rate, to diversify his style, let it cost what it will. But this fancied excellence usually costs more than it is worth; for to it, very often, propriety and perspicuity are both sacrificed.

Obs. From these illustrations, we derive the following criteria:— Crit. I. The mind is fatigued by the frequent recurrence of the same idea that performance which grows dull as we advance, is chargeable with an excess of uniformity.

Corol. If, therefore, there be a remarkable paucity of ideas, a diversity of words will not answer the purpose, or give to the work the ap pearance of variety.

II. On the contrary, when an author is at great pains to vary his expressions, and for this purpose ever deserts the common road, he will, to an intelligent reader, but the more expose his poverty, the more * Pope's Imitations.

he is solicitous to conceal it. You will discover this penury, when an author is always recurring to such words as custom hath appropriated to purposes different from those for which we use them.

117. IMPROPRIETY IN PHRASES is ascertained, when the expression, on being grammatically analysed, is discovered to contain some inconsistency.

Illus. 1. Such is the phrase of all others, after the superlative degree, which, when interpreted by the rules of English syntax, implies a thing different from itself; as it "celebrates the Church of England as the most perfect of all others." Properly, either-" as more perfect than any other;"-or, " as the most perfect of all churches."

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2. On this principle, Milton falls into an impropriety in these words:

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3. The general laws of the language, which constitute the most extensive and important use, may be pleaded against these expressions. Now it is one principal method of purifying a language, to lay aside such idioms as are inconsistent with its radical principles and constituent rules; or as, when interpreted by such principles and rules, exhibit manifest nonsense. Nor does the least inconvenience result from this conduct, as we can be at no loss to find expressions of our meaning altogether as natural, and entirely unexceptionable.

4. "Than the rest of our neighbours," is an impropriety which may be corrected by omitting the words in Italics. And when Swift, in his voyage to Brobdignag, says, "I had like to have gotten one or two broken heads;" one unavoidably asks," how many heads he had on his body?" That" once or twice" he had like to have got his head broken for his impertinence, one can easily conceive.

5. One thing may be cut into two or more; but it is inconceivable, that by cutting, two or more things should be made one. We cannot therefore speak of shortening discourse, “by cutting polysyllables into one."§

6. A wrong, wilfully committed, is no mistake. The words used in the following sentence, are therefore incompatible:-" I have not wilfully committed the least mistake."||

7. A pure limpid stream cannot also be foul with stains; therefore the following lines,

So the pure limpid stream, when foul with stains,

Of rushing torrents and descending rains, T

involve in them an absurdity, rather than an impropriety.

8. When an author says one thing and means another, his fault may be classed with impropriety in phrases; or it may come under the article of perspicuity.

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9. It is an incongruity in the combination of words, to speak of falling into a man's conversation;"** and to "fall into conversation

* Swift's Apology for the Tale of a Tub.
"Voyage to Laputa."
Addison's Cato.

† Paradise Lost. Ibid b. iv. Swift's "Remarks on the Barrier Treaty." ** Spectator, No. 49.

with a man," ,"* is little better than the impropriety in another dress; for grammatical purity, the most essential of all the virtues of elocution, would teach another construction.

118. PRECISION is the last ingredient of perspicuity. Precision means, that all redundant phraseology shall, without hesitation, be expunged; and that no more words and phrases, however pure and proper, shall be employed, than are necessary to convey the meaning.

Illus. The exact import of precision, may be drawn from the etymology of the word. It comes from " præcidere," to cut off: it imports retrenching all superfluities, and pruning the expression so as to exhibit neither more nor less than an exact copy of his idea who uses it. It is often difficult to separate the quantities of style from the qualities of thought; and it is found so in this instance; for, in order to write with precision, though this be properly a quality of style, one must possess a very considerable degree of distinctness and accuracy in his manner of thinking. (Art. 74. Corol.)

119. The words which a man uses to express his ideas may be faulty in three respects; they may either not express that idea which the author intends, but some other which only resembles, or is akin to it; or, they may express that idea, but not quite fully and completely; or, they may express it, together with something more than he in

tends.

Illus. 1. Precision stands opposed to all these three faults; but chief ly to the last. In an author's writing with propriety, his being free from the two former faults seems implied. The words which he uses are proper; that is, they express that idea which he intends, and they express it fully; but to be precise, signifies that they express that idea, and no more. There is nothing in his words which introduces any foreign idea, any superfluous, unseasonable accessary, so as to mix it confusedly with the principal object, and thereby to render our conception of that object loose and indistinct. This requires a writer to have, himself, a very clear apprehension of the object he means to represent to us; to have laid fast hold of it in his mind; and never to waver in any one view he takes of it; a perfection to which, indeed, few writers attain.

2. The following examples possess all the ingredients now specified. "Those who live in the world, and in good company, are quicksighted with regard to every defect or singularity in behaviour; the slightest irregularity in motion, in speech, or in dress, which, to a peasant, would be invisible, escapes not their observation."—" The very populace in Athens, were critics in pronunciation, in language, and even in eloquence; and in Rome at present, the most illiterate shop-keeper is a better judge of statues and of pictures, than many persons of refined education in London." No word or phrase is wanting; no word or phrase is superfluous; all are pure and all are proper.

*Campbell's Phil. of Rhet. Vol. I. Book ii. Chap. iii.
† Lord Kame's Elements of Criticism.

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