2. The Sphinx was so mortified at the solving of her riddle that she cast herself down from the rock and perished. 3. Every individual has a place to fill in the world, and is important in some respect, whether he chooses to be so or not. 4. One of the illusions is that the present hour is not the critical, decisive hour. Write it on your heart that every day is the best in the year. 5. From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs, That makes her loved at home, revered abroad : Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, 'An honest man's the noblest work of God.' - BURNS. 6. Three Poets, in three distant ages born, Greece, Italy, and England did adorn; 7. Neither let mistakes nor wrong directions, of which every man, in his studies and elsewhere, falls into many, discourage you. There is precious instruction to be got by finding we were wrong. Let a man try faithfully, manfully, to be right; he will grow daily more and more right. It is at bottom the condition on which all men have to cultivate themselves. Our very walking is an incessant falling; a falling and a catching of ourselves before we come actually to the pavement! It is emblematic of all things a man does. 8. Shortly after this event, the city of Thebes was afflicted with a monster which infested the highroad. It was called the Sphinx. It had the body of a lion, and the upper part of a woman. It lay crouched on the top of a rock, and arrested all travellers who came that way, propos ing to them a riddle, with the condition that those who could solve it should pass safe, but those who failed should be killed. Not one had yet succeeded in solving it, and all had been slain. Edipus was not daunted by these alarming accounts, but boldly advanced to the trial. The Sphinx asked him, "What animal is that which in the morning goes on four feet, at noon on two, and in the evening upon three?" Edipus replied, "Man, who in childhood creeps on hands and knees, in manhood walks erect, and in old age with the aid of a staff.” 9. Seven cities claim old Homer dead Through which the living Homer begged his bread. B. Fill the blanks in the following in such a way as to give a satisfactory meaning. 1. Good manners do not require lying, for . 2. A dog, after plunging into a river, comes out wet to the skin, but the fur of a beaver or a mink 3. The chief value and virtue of money consists in its having power over human beings; without this power large material possessions are useless, and to any person possessing such power, comparatively unnecessary. But 4. The humblest mechanic now wields a mightier power, by means of machinery, than the kings and queens of antiquity ever exerted, and a factory boy can perform a task that would have startled Greece and Rome as a miracle of skilful strength. Admit all this; but . . . C. Tell in your own words the best anecdote you remember ever to have heard or read. Examine it carefully to see if it has unity and is complete in itself. D. What is the main idea of the following poem? Try reducing it to a single sentence such as might be inscribed on a banner. Old Ireland. Far hence, amid an isle of wondrous beauty, Crouching over a grave, an ancient, sorrowful mother, Once a queen ground, now lean and tatter'd seated on the Her old white hair drooping dishevel'd round her shoulders; At her feet fallen an unused royal harp, Long silent she, too, long silent mourning her shrouded hope and heir; Of all the earth her heart most full of sorrow, because most full of love. Yet a word, ancient mother; You need crouch there no longer on the cold ground, with forehead between your knees; O you need not sit there, veil'd in your old white hair, so dishevel'd; For know you, the one you mourn is not in that grave; It was an illusion the heir, the son you love, was not really dead; The Lord is not dead- he is risen again, young and strong, in another country; Even while you wept there by your fall'n harp by the grave, And now with rosy and new blood, WHITMAN. E. The following, from The Voiage and Travaile of Sir John Maundeville, shows what written English prose was like in the middle of the fourteenth century. Read it aloud and see how much of it you can understand. Then reread with the help of the footnotes. After you are sure that you understand it all, transform it into the more condensed modern English idiom, noticing where and how you have condensed the original. Imagine yourself a presentday tourist telling these astonishing things to a group of open mouthed neighbors. (Chaldea). 66 The country referred to is Caldilhe" 4 And there groweth a maner of fruyt, as though it weren gowrdes: and whan thei ben1 rype, men kutten hem 2 a-to and men fynden with-inne a lytylle best,3 in flesch, in bon and blode, as though it were a lytille lomb with-outen wolle. And men eten bothe the fruit and the best : and that is a gret merveylle. Of that frute I have eten; alle-though it were wondirfulle: but that I knowe wel, that God is merveyllous in his workes. And natheless I tolde hem of als gret a merveyle to hem, that is amonges us: and that was of the Bernakes. For I tolde hem, that in oure contree weren trees, that baren a fruyt, that becomen briddes fleeynge: and tho that fellen in the water, lyven; and thei that fallen on the erthe, dyen anon: and thei ben right gode to mannes mete. And here-of had thei als gret mervaylle, that summe of hem trowed, it were an impossible thing to be. 5 9 6 In that contre ben longe apples, of gode savour; where-of ben mo3 than an.c. in a clustre, and als mayne in another: and thei han grete longe leves and large, of .ij. fote long or more. And in that contree, and in other contrees there abouten, growen many trees, that beren clowe-gylofres 10 and notemuges," and grete notes of Ynde, and of Canelle 12 and of many other spices. And there ben vynes that beren so grete grapes, that a strong man shoulde have enow to done for to bere o 13 cluster with alle the grapes. Related Units. 4. Not only is a composition as a whole a unit, but if we separate it into its parts and examine each part, we shall discover that it is made up of smaller units. 11 13 If 5 barnacles, limpets 7 those 9 have nutmegs one 8 more 10 cloves 12 cinnamon 2 them 4 as 6 birds it is a sentence, it is made up of words. If it is a paragraph, it is made up of sentences. If it is an essay, it is made up of paragraphs. Still further, each of these small units, which together make up the whole composition, is related to all of the other units in a reasonable and necessary way. Each has its part to perform in the service of the whole. Just as the hand must do its peculiar work in helping the body, just as each finger must do its peculiar work in helping the hand, so must each paragraph play its peculiar part in the whole composition, and so must each sentence play its part in the paragraph. Each sentence is somehow necessary to every other sentence, and each paragraph to every other paragraph. All combine to make the meaning of the larger unit complete and satisfying. It follows that in any good composition no one of the smaller units can be taken out without disturbing the connection or removing some necessary part of the larger unit. Thus in the composition from Proverbs quoted on page 2, we find twelve sentences, each of which requires the help of others in order to make the meaning clear. Not one sentence of them all gives the complete meaning by itself. The fifth sentence answers the questions asked in the first four; the sixth gives personal advice which naturally follows from what is said in the five preceding sentences; and the rest of the composition shows why the advice should be heeded. None can be taken out and none can be added. These are called related sentences because they stand in a reasonable and necessary relation to one another and to the thought expressed by the whole composition. |