QUESTIONS ON LETTER III.-SERIES II.

1. What makes a sentence appear either long or short? 2. What is the third essential of clearness ?

8. What is the objection to a very long sentence?

4. What is the objection to a string of very short sentences?

5. To what style are long sentences better adapted, and for what are short ones proper?

6. What is meant by style?

7. What is it that renders a period confused? 8. What is meant by an incidental phrase?

9. Give an instance of your meaning.

10. Name the inconveniences resulting from too frequent or too long incidental clauses.

EXERCISES.

1. The person who immediately walked before him was remarkable for an embroidered garment, who, not being well acquainted with the place, was conducting him to an apartment appointed for the reception of fabulous heroes.

2. We have reason to believe that the Queen has in contemplation a step which will show the active interest which she takes in the welfare of her people.

3. I with my family reside in the parish of Stockton, which consists of my wife and daughters.

4. A married A.B., holding a sole charge, will be disengaged on the 17th September. He is an extempore preacher of the doctrines of grace in all their sanctifying influence, and now seeks another.

5. The Divine Being heapeth favours on his servants, ever liberal and faithful.

6. Hence he considered marriage with a political economist as very dangerous.

7. All these designs, which any man who is a born Briton, in any circumstances, in any situation, ought to I be ashamed or afraid to avow.

LETTER IV.-SERIES II.

On the Syntax of the Article and the Personal Pronoun.

My dear Boy,

I will now give you a few rules on the Syntax of some of the parts of speech that present most difficulty to a young writer; attention to them will conduce much to clearness. And first, as regards the Article. The principal uses of this are to enumerate and define objects. When, therefore, two or more substantives denoting the same object follow one another, the article is placed with the first only, as a or the secretary and treasurer,' the two offices being held by the same person. But when the substantives denote different persons or things, the article is used before each, as, the secretary and the treasurer.' Sometimes the repetition of a noun, though not actually taking place, is implied by the use of adjectives of opposite signification, in that case it is necessary to repeat the article; as the long and the short stick ;' the same stick not being long and short at the same time. There is another case where want of attention to the use of the article may occasion ambiguity. (1) He would make a better soldier than scholar.' (2) He would make a better soldier than a scholar.' These two senThe meaning

tences express two different propositions. of No. is He would make a better soldier than he would a scholar;' of No. 2, 'He would make a better soldier than a scholar would.' I will mention only one more case requiring care in the employment of the article. 'He was a little disposed to be angry," means almost the opposite of 'He was little disposed to be angry.' In sentences similar to the last two, the use of the article implies the presence of a quality or feeling, the omission of the article implies the absence of it.

Great care is required too in the management of Pronouns, for standing as they do in the place of nouns, their reference to those nouns should be as distinct as possible. Much confusion results from want of attention to this important caution.

Take the following example from Dr. Hugh Blair's Lectures on Rhetoric. The Doctor, speaking of the preference given by the French critics to Cicero over Demosthenes, alludes to the opinion of P. Rapin thus: "For the preference he gives Cicero he assigns and lays stress on one reason of a pretty extraordinary nature, viz., that Demosthenes could not possibly have so clear an insight as Cicero into the manners and passions of men. Why? Because he had not the advantage of perusing Aristotle's Treatise on Rhetoric, wherein, says our critic, he has fully laid open that mystery; and to support this weighty argument he enters into a controversy with A. Gellius, &c."

"In criticising this passage," Cobbett says, "the he which comes immediately after the word because may relate to Demosthenes, but to what noun does the second he relate? It would, when we first look at it, seem to relate to the same noun as the first he relates to, for the Doctor cannot call Aristotle's Treatise on Rhetoric a he. No; in speaking of this the Doctor says, 'wherein,' that is to say, 'in which.' He means, I daresay, that the he should stand for Aristotle, but it does not stand for Aristotle. This noun is not a nominative in the sentence, and it cannot have the pronoun relating to it as such. This he may relate to Cicero, who may be supposed to have laid open a mystery in the perusing of the treatise, and the words which follow the he would seem to give countenance to the supposition; for what mystery is meant by the words that mystery'? Is it the mystery of rhetoric, or the mystery of the manners and passions of men? This is not all however; for the Doctor, as if bewitched by the love of confusion, must

tack on another long member to the sentence, and bring forward another he to stand for P. Rapin." The paragraph would have been better thus, 'Wherein, says our critic, the author has fully investigated the springs of human action. To support this argument, P. Rapin enters,' &c.

I will give you another quotation to show the consequences of being careless in the use of personal pronouns. "For the custom of the manor has, in both cases, so far superseded the will of the lord, that, provided the services be performed, or stipulated for by fealty, he cannot in the first instance refuse to admit the heir of his tenant upon his death, nor in the second can he remove his present tenant so long as he lives." Here are lord, heir, tenant, all confounded. We can guess at the meaning, but we cannot say that we know what it is; we cannot say that we are certain whose life or whose death is meant. The sense would have been much more evident had the sentence run thus: 'He cannot in the first instance remove his tenant, nor in the second can he at his tenant's death refuse to admit his heir.'

The neuter pronoun 'it' is a most difficult word to manage, from the circumstance that it as frequently refers to a word or phrase coming after it as to one going before it. Here is an example of what I mean: "There are so many advantages of speaking one's own language well and being master of it, that, let a man's calling be what it may, it cannot but be worth our taking some pains with it." The variety of reference here is very great. The first it has 'language' for its antecedent, the prominent subject of the preceding clause, and is therefore unexceptionable; the second it readily refers us to the noun immediately preceding, 'calling;' but the third changes the reference to something prospective, our taking some pains;' and the fourth carries us back to language.' To improve the composition, the

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third it should be done away with, and the second removed to the end; thus: The advantages of speaking one's own language well are so many, that the taking some pains to be master of it cannot but be worth while to every man, let his calling be what it may.'

In my next letter I will speak about the Relative Pronoun. I am, &c.

QUESTIONS ON LETTER IV.-SERIES II.

1. What are the principal uses of the article? 2. When is the article placed only before the first of two or more nouns ? when is it used before each ? 3. How may the repetition of a noun be implied if not expressed?

4. In this case, how is the article employed?

5. Show how the omission of an article may alter the sense of a sentence; and may sometimes make a sentence mean almost the opposite of what it meant with the article inserted.

6. Why is great care requisite in the use of pronouns ?

EXERCISES.

1.-On the Article.

1. He was much censured for conducting himself with a little attention to his business.

2. So bold a breach of order called for little severity in punishing the offender.

3. There were many hours, both of the night and day, which he could spend without suspicion in solitary thought.

4. The ecclesiastical and seculár powers concurred in this measure.