of fact. Then comes the middle of the paragraph, the description proper:

(1) India and its inhabitants were not to him, as to most Englishmen, mere names and abstractions, but a real country and a real people. The burning sun; the strange vegetation of the palm and the cocoa tree; the rice-field; the tank; the huge trees, older than the Mogul Empire, under which the village crowds assemble; the thatched roof of the peasant's hut; the rich tracery of the mosque where the imaum prays with his face to Mecca; the drums and banners and gaudy idols; the devotee swinging in the air; the graceful maiden, with the pitcher on her head descending the steps to the river-side; the black faces; the long beards; the yellow streaks of sect; the turbans and the flowing robes, the spears and the silver maces; the elephants with their canopies of state; the gorgeous palanquin of the prince and the close litter of the noble lady,-all these things were to him as the objects amidst which his own life had been passed, as the objects which lay on the road between Beaconsfield and St. James's Street. (2) All India was present to the eye of his mind, from the halls where suitors laid gold and perfumes at the feet of sovereigns to the wild moor where the gypsy camp was pitched; from the bazaar, humming like a beehive with the crowd of buyers and sellers, to the jungle where the lonely courier shakes his bunch of iron rings to scare away the hyenas. (3) He had just as lively an idea of the insurrection at Benares as of Lord George Gordon's riots, and of the execution of Nuncomar as of the execution of Dr. Dodd. Oppression in Bengal was to him the same thing as oppression in the streets of London.-MACAULAY: Warren Hastings.

Of the three sections, (1) gives a long list of picturesque details, all in one sentence; (2), shorter, is more conspicu

it sums up Burke's knowledge; (3) is intentionally soberer in tone; it states the moral temper of Burke's mind, and goes back directly to the opening statement, "His knowledge," etc.

In Exposition and Argumentation the safest order is the logical. That is, premises should come before conclusions, definitions before illustrations, generals before particulars (except where the general is to be proved from the particulars by induction), a law before an instance or application. The quotation from Coleridge, § 3, is a good speci

men of sequence. The first sentence characterizes a theory by its use; the second gives the necessary limitations of theory; the third tells what theory cannot do; the fourth designates the only true theory; the fifth applies the whole doctrine to geology. This application was Coleridge's aim from the start.

But in Indirect Exposition (see §§ 50, 58) it is not uncommon to put a negative before a positive; e. g.:

It is not the confiscation of our church property from this example in France that I dread, though I think this would be no trifling evil. The great source of my solicitude is, lest it should ever be considered in England as the policy of a state to seek a resource in confiscations of any kind, or that any one description of citizens should be brought to regard any of the others as their proper prey.-BURKE: Reflections, p. 172.

An effective means of securing sequence is to introduce a number of short clauses, alike in structure and about equal in weight, and to wind up with one long clause of considerable weight. Thus:

The objects of a financier are, then, to secure an ample revenue; to impose it with judgment and equality; to employ it economically; and when necessity obliges him to make use of credit, to secure its foundations in that instance, and for ever, by the clearness and candor of his proceedings, the exactness of his calculations, and the solidity of his funds.-BURKE: Reflections, p. 257.

SELECTION, PROPORTION, VARIETY.

6. Some authorities upon the paragraph have mentioned additional features-viz.: Selection, Proportion, Variety. By Selection is meant that the writer introduces into the paragraph only those items which are most important. and most available. But no principle can be laid down for guiding us in our choice. Every writer must, on the one hand, acquire for himself the good taste to perceive that he has said enough and said his best; on the other, he must train his thinking faculties to judge that what he writes is essential to the purpose and is arranged in proper

order. The young cannot learn too soon that all good writing is merely the accurate expression of careful thinking. By Proportion is meant that each item in the paragraph gets that share of space and that prominence which it deserves. Here again no rule can be given. Every paragraph is to be considered as a law unto itself. But a close observance of the principles of Sequence will scarcely fail to ensure Proportion.

By Variety is meant that the writer does not make hist sentences all long, or all short; does not employ the same words or the same sentence-structure too frequently; does not construct his paragraphs too much alike. Here again taste and judgment will be more helpful than any rules. Also, one must study the methods of the best masters. Thus:

(1) So, then, Oxford Street, stony-hearted stepmother, thou that listenest to the sighs of orphans and drinkest the tears of children, at length I was dismissed from thee! The time was come that I no more should pace in anguish thy never-ending terraces, no more should wake and dream in captivity to the pangs of hunger. Successors too many to myself and Ann have, doubtless, since then trodden in our footsteps, inheritors of our calamities. Other orphans than Ann have sighed ; tears have been shed by other children; and thou, Oxford. Street, hast since those days echoed to the groans of innumerable hearts. (2) For myself, however, the storm which I had outlived seemed to have been the pledge of a long fair weather; the premature sufferings which I' had paid down, to have been accepted as a ransom for many years to come, as a price of long immunity from sorrow; and if again I walked in London, a solitary and contemplative man (as oftentimes I did), I walked for the most part in serenity and peace of mind. (3) And, although it is true that the calamities of my novitiate in London had struck root so deeply in my bodily constitution that afterwards they shot up and flourished afresh, and grew into a noxious umbrage that has overshadowed and darkened my latter years, yet these second assaults of suffering were met with a fortitude more confirmed, with the resources of a maturer intellect, and with alleviations, how deep! from sympathising affection.-DE QUINCEY (Confessions), iii. 375.

In the above there is every element of variety. In (1)

the clauses are crisp and nervous; in (2), longer and more reflective; (3) is all one long sentence, one profound reflection. Such concrete phrases as "sighs of orphans," "tears of children," "pangs of hunger," are replaced in (2) by the vaguer general phrase "premature sufferings." "Pace in anguish" (1) is contrasted with "walked in serenity and peace of mind" (2). There is also a marked linguistic contrast between "stony-hearted," " never-ending " (1) and noxious umbrage," "alleviations from sympathising affection" (3).

PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS.

7. It has been stated that no general rule can be given for securing sequence. But the following suggestions will be of help to the young writer:

1. Study carefully the sequence in the paragraphs of the best prose authors. Of the authors usually read in school, the best in this respect are Hawthorne, Irving, and Macaulay. De Quincey is scarcely an author for the school; he is extremely painstaking in his paragraphstructure when writing seriously, but in his humorous passages is apt to bring in irrelevant matter, and thereby mar both sequence and unity. Webster's paragraphs are well constructed. So are Addison's, with an occasional slip. Scott, Dickens, Thackeray, and George Eliot are less. careful.

2. Having read a paragraph through, write down, in a short clause, what you judge to be its leading subject. Then write down, in still shorter clauses, the items which make up the body of the paragraph. This will lay bare the mechanism of the paragraph-its "skeleton."

3. Before composing a paragraph of your own, prepare a skeleton in like manner. That is, write down the subject (what you purpose treating in the paragraph) and the several items, and arrange and rearrange the items until you are satisfied that you have hit upon the best order. See § 122.

B

order. The young cannot learn too soon that all good writing is merely the accurate expression of careful thinking. By Proportion is meant that each item in the paragraph gets that share of space and that prominence which it deserves. Here again no rule can be given. Every paragraph is to be considered as a law unto itself. But a close observance of the principles of Sequence will scarcely fail to ensure Proportion.

By Variety is meant that the writer does not make his sentences all long, or all short; does not employ the same words or the same sentence-structure too frequently; does not construct his paragraphs too much alike. Here again taste and judgment will be more helpful than any rules. Also, one must study the methods of the best masters. Thus:

(1) So, then, Oxford Street, stony-hearted stepmother, thou that listenest to the sighs of orphans and drinkest the tears of children, at length I was dismissed from thee! The time was come that I no more should pace in anguish thy never-ending terraces, no more should wake and dream in captivity to the pangs of hunger. Successors too many to myself and Ann have, doubtless, since then trodden in our footsteps, inheritors of our calamities. Other orphans than Ann have sighed; tears have been shed by other children; and thou, Oxford. Street, hast since those days echoed to the groans of innumerable hearts. (2) For myself, however, the storm which I had outlived seemed to have been the pledge of a long fair weather; the premature sufferings which I' had paid down, to have been accepted as a ransom for many years to come, as a price of long immunity from sorrow; and if again I walked in London, a solitary and contemplative man (as oftentimes I did), I walked for the most part in serenity and peace of mind. (3) And, although it is true that the calamities of my novitiate in London had struck root so deeply in my bodily constitution that afterwards they shot up and flourished afresh, and grew into a noxious umbrage that has overshadowed and darkened my latter years, yet these second assaults of suffering were met with a fortitude more confirmed, with the resources of a maturer intellect, and with alleviations, how deep! from sympathising affection.-DE QUINCEY (Confessions), iii. 375.

In the above there is every element of variety. In (1)