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THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE.
By Herbert Spencer
PART I.
CAUSES OF FORCE IN LANGUAGE WHICH DEPEND UPON ECONOMY OF THE MENTAL
ENERGIES.
i. The Principle of Economy.
1. Commenting on the seeming incongruity between his father's
argumentative powers and his ignorance of formal logic, Tristram
Shandy says:--"It was a matter of just wonder with my worthy tutor,
and two or three fellows of that learned society, that a man who
knew not so much as the names of his tools, should be able to work
after that fashion with them." Sterne's intended implication that
a knowledge of the principles of reasoning neither makes, nor is
essential to, a good reasoner, is doubtless true. Thus, too, is it
with grammar. As Dr. Latham, condemning the usual school-drill in
Lindley Murray, rightly remarks: "Gross vulgarity is a fault to be
prevented; but the proper prevention is to be got from habit--not
rules." Similarly, there can be little question that good composition
is far less dependent upon acquaintance with its laws, than upon
practice and natural aptitude. A clear head, a quick imagination,
and a sensitive ear, will go far towards making all rhetorical precepts
needless. He who daily hears and reads well-framed sentences, will
naturally more or less tend to use similar ones. And where there
exists any mental idiosyncrasy--where there is a deficient verbal
memory, or an inadequate sense of logical dependence, or but little
perception of order, or a lack of constructive ingenuity; no amount
of instruction will remedy the defect. Nevertheless, some practical
result may be expected from a familiarity with the principles of
style. The endeavour to conform to laws may tell, though slowly.
And if in no other way, yet, as facilitating revision, a knowledge
of the thing to be achieved--a clear idea of what constitutes a
beauty, and what a blemish--cannot fail to be of service.
2. No general theory of expression seems yet to have
been enunciated. The maxims contained in works on composition and
rhetoric, are presented in an unorganized form. Standing as isolated
dogmas--as empirical generalizations, they are neither so clearly
apprehended, nor so much respected, as they would be were they
deduced from some simple first principle. We are told that "brevity
is the soul of wit." We hear styles condemned as verbose or involved.
Blair says that every needless part of a sentence "interrupts the
description and clogs the image;" and again, that "long sentences
fatigue the reader's attention." It is remarked by Lord Kaimes,
that "to give the utmost force to a period, it ought, if possible,
to be closed with that word which makes the greatest figure." That
parentheses should be avoided and that Saxon words should be used
in preference to those of Latin origin, are established precepts.
But, however influential the truths thus dogmatically embodied,
they would be much more influential if reduced to something like
scientific ordination. In this, as in other cases, conviction will
be greatly strengthened when we understand the why. And we may be
sure that a comprehension of the general principle from which the
rules of composition result, will not only bring them home to us
with greater force, but will discover to us other rules of like
origin,
3. On seeking for some clue to the law underlying these current
maxims, we may see shadowed forth in many of them, the importance
of economizing the reader's or hearer's attention, To so present
ideas that they may be apprehended with the least possible mental
effort, is the desideratum towards which most of the rules above
quoted point. When we condemn writing that is wordy, or confused,
or intricate--when we praise this style as easy, and blame that as
fatiguing, we consciously or unconsciously assume this desideratum
as our standard of judgment. Regarding language as an apparatus
of symbols for the conveyance of thought, we may say that, as in a
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