Talks on Writing English

After a brief introduction follows a statement of the disrepute in which Machiavelli has been held. This is intentionally made strong to the verge of absurdity, and to it is added a brief acknowledgment that “The Prince,” Machiavelli’s famous and infamous book, is indeed shocking. This requires about three hundred and fifty words.

Assuming the attitude which he wishes the reader to take, that of a puzzled seeker for truth, Macaulay states several theories which might account for the moral obliquity of the Italian, yet points out that his personal career was elevated, patriotic, and just; and that there is in “The Prince” much good as well as much evil. He also calls attention to the fact that at the time the book was written it apparently shocked nobody. To this are given about eight hundred words.

This leads directly to the conclusion which is the key-note of the whole essay: —

It is, therefore, in the state of moral feeling among the Italians of those times that we must seek for the real explanation of what seems most mysterious in the life of this remarkable man.

This proposition being the one which it is the aim of the essay to establish, nearly seventy-five hundred words, almost half of the whole, are given to tracing the growth of the peculiar conditions of moral sentiment which obtained in Italy in the time when Machiavelli wrote. The subject is led on toward the next point in this way: —

Every age and every nation has certain characteristic vices… Posterity, … finding the delinquents too numerous to be all punished, … selects some of them at hazard to bear the whole penalty… In the present case the lot has fallen on Machiavelli; a man whose public conduct was upright and honorable.

The essayist then turns from the man to his work, pointing out the merits of his novels, comedies, and letters. About twenty-three hundred words are given to this, – rather more than an eighth of the paper. Some eighteen hundred follow on his public services. His struggles to establish a regular army are emphasized, both because here he appears to the best advantage, and because this line of thought is artfully made to lead up to and to suggest the view of “The Prince” which is put forward immediately after: the view that the book was really designed to forward the substitution of a regular army for the mercenary troops which had demoralized all Italy. The proportion is here admirably judged. Enough space is given to the matter to make the point seem one of dignity and weight, yet not so much as to let it appear as if the author were insisting upon it too much. The economy of effect is observed throughout; enough is always done, but never too much.

We have now, roughly speaking, thirteen thousand out of the not much over sixteen thousand words in the essay; and the author has practically done his work. He has pretty well developed his theory, and the remainder of the monograph is given to making it more clear and to enforcing it. To the personal merit of Machiavelli is devoted about a quarter of the entire essay; to the immorality of the age and its influence upon him, nearly one half; to the admirable way in which he played his part in public life, nearly an eighth. To the hatred and abhorrence of Machiavelli which the essayist desires to overcome, he gives directly but three or four hundred words in the whole sixteen thousand. Proportion so careful and so effective as this can only be the result of studied and accurate design.

A word of caution may not be amiss. Proportion is to be determined not by the interest of the writer or by his ease in writing upon particular points, but by the relation of the parts to the whole. The reason for saying this is that almost any author is liable to be led away by the facility with which it is possible for him to enlarge upon certain points. An opportunity presents itself for the introduction of a charming episode; there is a temptation to develop a thought, a sentiment, a seductively favorite theory; and the result of yielding to this is apt to be a violation of unity. What the old-fashioned writers – as if confession were an excuse – were accustomed to confess by saying, “But this is a digression,” hopelessly injured the effect of a composition as a whole. Only the clever and cunning artificer of style can introduce digressions without marring the fair proportions of the complete work.

Proportion, here as elsewhere, is emotional as well as mechanical. One must bear in mind the fact that a few emphatic words are of more account than many mild and commonplace ones. Consider not only the space given to particular portions of a work, but the stress laid upon them.

And here it is well to consider a feature of human frailty. Such is man’s weakness that blame always counts for more than praise. If I were to say to you that looked at from a purely literary standpoint “The Heavenly Twins” is morbid and unhealthy rubbish; that “Trilby” is a pleasant transient excitement; but that “The Return of the Native” seems to me the most notable English novel since Thackeray – you would have no difficulty in remembering that I condemned “The Heavenly Twins;” you would have a fairly clear idea that I had been less enthusiastic than is the general public about “Trilby;” and you would perhaps recall vaguely that there was something else – really it is astonishing how quickly a name slips from the memory! – which I praised.4 The point is one to be remembered when one is dealing with delicate shades of emphasis.

As I have more than once used Carlyle in warning, it is no more than fair to mention him here as one of the masters of emotional emphasis. He had an instinct for the proportion of stress, and used it with the greatest success. It is an excellent lesson in the study of this quality to analyze the cumulative and unified effect of the stronger chapters of the “French Revolution.”

I have spoken of progression as being one of the important matters to be considered in connection with Exposition. Perhaps a better name for what I mean would be continuity. It is necessary to arrange ideas in a logical order which is not only unbroken, but which is perfectly obvious. It is not enough that the author is aware how one thought logically follows another; he must make it evident to all who read. He must remember that so long as the connection of ideas is clear and inevitable the reader is led on unconsciously; while every pause which the reader is forced to make to see how one statement follows from another leaves him less fully in the author’s control. So great a thinker and so great a writer as Emerson materially lessened the circle of his readers by a lack of this very quality. The ordinary student often finds it hard to supply the thoughts which make the sequence of ideas complete. Emerson stalks like a giant from mountain peak of thought to mountain peak, while the reader is often sorely puzzled to know how to cross the deep gullies between. Emerson was a genius, and prophesied so gloriously on his mountain-tops, that we struggle forward after him despite all difficulties. Those who are not geniuses cannot hope that readers will follow their lead unless the road is shown and the chasms bridged.

One may go farther than this in insisting upon the need of continuousness in literature. The present age is impatient of being called upon to take trouble in apprehension, so that it is necessary to use every art – whether of connectives, of arrangement of thought, of sequence of ideas or incidents – to make more inevitably evident the connection of parts. Indeed, this must be not only plain but easy and attractive. To blaze out a path through the woods avails in pioneer life and in the beginnings of literature; but when civilization has advanced, the way must be graded until it is comfortable to the foot accustomed to smooth pavements and velvet carpets. Sequence in expository writing should usually be so complete that the reader goes forward so glidingly that the mere progress itself shall be a pleasure.

XI

EXPOSITION CONTINUED

In expository writing – and indeed the rule might safely be applied to all composition – it is wise to proceed from the near to the remote; from cause to effect; from the physical to the mental; from the clear to the obscure; and from that which is generally allowed to that which is doubtful or disputed.

It is well to proceed from the near to the remote. We do not say “All the way from London to here,” but “All the way from here to London.” The exception would be when the point of view is that of one in London, since then that city would be the near, and “here” the remote. “Near” in this connection is always near to the point of view. We say, “What we do will be talked of all the way from here to London.” We say also, “When Tom came home from England last year, he was ill all the way from London to here.” We begin with that which the mind accepts most readily. The principle is the same which we have already found to underlie the use of figurative language. There the unknown is made clear by comparison with the known; and it is well to lead the mind from what is near, physically or mentally, to what is remote. Take this example from Stevenson: —

It is difficult to see why the fellow does a thing so nameless and yet so formidable to look at, unless on the theory that he likes it. I suspect that is why; and I suspect it is at least ten per cent. of why Lord Beaconsfield and Mr. Gladstone have debated so much in the House of Commons, and why Burnaby rode to Khiva the other day, and why the Admirals courted war like a mistress. —The English Admirals.

This was published in England, and at a time when the speeches of Lord Beaconsfield and Mr. Gladstone were matters of every-day comment in the newspaper; the ride to Khiva was famous, but not so near in place or in realization, while the bravery of the English Admirals was part of history stretching back for centuries.

Here is illustration from Lowell: —

J. H., one of those choice poets who will not tarnish their bright fancies by publication, always insists on a snowstorm as essential to the true atmosphere of whist. Mrs. Battles, in her famous rule for the game, implies winter, and doubtless would have added tempest, if it could be had for the asking. For a good, solid read also, into the small hours, there is nothing like that sense of safety against having your evening laid waste, which Euroclydon brings, as he bellows down the chimney. —A Good Word for Winter.

Here we are given the pleasant saying of a neighbor, such as any of us might have heard; we go on to Mrs. Battles, dear to every reader of Elia; and from that to Euroclydon, the wind which put the apostle in danger of his life.

The same principle of course holds good in dealing wholly with ideas. Speaking of Leonardo da Vinci, Walter Pater writes: —

He brooded over the hidden virtues of plants and crystals, the lines traced by the stars as they moved in the sky, over the correspondences which exist between the different orders of living things, through which, to eyes opened, they interpret each other; and for years he seemed to those about him as one listening to a voice silent for other men.

From the idea of the virtues of plants and crystals, things which one might hold in the hand, the mind is led to the stars, far yet visible; while only after this is introduced the mysterious and intangible bond which has been conceived of as existing between all living things. Last of all is the suggestion of that thing still more remote, the silent voice heard only by the artist of all men who walked the earth.

I read in a scientific book the other day, in the description of a proposed machine, “On account of difficulty in handling and great weight, this is unsuitable.” Here the effect is put before the cause, and the result is a loss of smoothness in progression. The point of view is that of a scientist who knows all about the machine, and he should have written: “great weight and consequent difficulty of handling.” If the point of view were that of an investigator, the phrase might perhaps properly be, “difficulty in handling consequent upon the great weight,” because the investigator would discover first the difficulty and then reflect upon the cause. This may seem a little like hair splitting, but no principle can be too closely examined, and for the student there is no such thing as being too careful in the study of means and effects.

We shall have occasion to speak of this matter again, particularly in its application to description. Here it is enough to add that the simplest course is to follow in writing the order which seems most natural; and then in revision to apply the rule given at the beginning of this chapter.

The order which seems most natural will generally be that in which the thoughts have presented themselves to your own notice, and a perception of this order is one of the advantages which belong to the collection of material from personal experience. Whoever has done literary work is likely to have discovered how constantly the literary mind must be on the alert. The daughters of the horse-leech that in the Scriptures are said continually to cry “Give! Give!” are less insatiable than is the greedy pen of the professional writer. Like the grave, it has never enough. He who makes literature a profession must take for his model the barnacle at high tide. As that busy and tireless unpleasantness grasps ceaselessly with finger-like tentacles, so the mind of the writer must be always reaching out, – grasping, grasping, grasping, – until the accumulation of ideas, of facts, of impressions, with the realization that this is literary material, becomes a second nature. Life itself must for the professional writer be so much material. Joy and sorrow, hope, disappointment, whatever he sees and feels, must yield him something which he may set down in words for the instruction or the delight of others. It is not that his feelings are less genuine than those of others; it is not that he writes of his emotions as if they were his own; it is simply that a sort of sub-consciousness takes note always of the world around him and of the world within him no less, seizing all fact and emotion as stuff for the web it weaves.

And here, at the risk of setting down a platitude, it may be well to say that it seems to me of the utmost importance that the professional writer, and especially the young aspirant for literary honors, keep a note-book. It is as foolish to start upon a literary career without the habit of jotting things down as it would be to put to sea without water in the casks. The need is especially great if one is going into any sort of journalistic work, because there is always danger of being called upon to produce “copy” without warning and without material offered either by the editor or by circumstances. There is at such times a great practical value in a well-filled note-book, while the moral support is perhaps of importance even greater. No man who has had literary experience will fail, I believe, to realize the folly of trusting to memory to hold and to bring forward at the right time the thoughts, the reflections, or the facts which come to one unexpectedly. The memory is apt to be a careless servant. It mislays, it injures, it mars the things which are intrusted to it. It is necessary to acquire the habit of setting thoughts down, and of setting them down at once. Do not delude yourself with the notion that you will recall in the morning the clever phrase or acute deduction which your brain evolves after you are tucked safely into bed at night; that you can put upon paper at the end of the journey the incident which struck you in traveling. You may remember to make the record later, but a thought is like a sunset, – the instant it reaches its full glory it begins to fade. What is written while it is fresh has a vitality, a spontaneity which nothing can have that is recalled and set down later. If you are reading and the thought of the author suggests a reflection, throws a sudden illumination upon some spot in your mind hitherto in darkness, do not wait to finish the chapter, but interrupt your reading to write it down. It is a bother. No reader likes to break off to use pencil and note-book, – but the professional writer is forbidden to consider whether he like a thing or not, if it will assist his progress. The first thing in his life is his art, – moral questions aside, – and to this he is to sacrifice everything.

Of the cultivation of the habit of observing, one is almost ashamed to say anything, so often has this been discussed. Every one who discourses upon this subject has spoken of the prime necessity of training the faculties of observation; yet every one who shall discourse hereafter is likely to be called upon to say the same thing. Remember that if you lack material for writing, the fault is entirely your own. The world is around you, infinite and inexhaustible; the question is whether you take what is at hand. Our daily walks and ways afford us all that is needed – except the eye to see and the heart to understand.

Yesterday – which you remember was a sharply cold day – I had occasion to go down town. I noticed at least three things any one of which a clever writer might make the theme of a charming little essay. I saw in the street-car a large, middle-aged man, coarsely dressed, and of rather a forbidding face. He was seated in a corner, and gave an impression of surly ill-nature. A little, thin, weazened lad of not more than six or seven, with pinched features and starved look, poorly clad, and seeming to have been always cold or hungry when he was not both, came in and took the seat next to this man. There was nothing to indicate that the two knew each other, and indeed the boy’s air showed plainly enough that they did not; but when the poor forlorn little fellow blew on his small, grimy fists, in vain attempt to warm them, the big, sulky-looking man put out a great hand hardly cleaner, took the boy’s blue fingers between his palms, and held them there to warm them. His grim face hardly relaxed, but the kindliness of the act, and the queer mingling of astonishment and pleasure on the child’s face, made the incident good to see.

Again, on Washington Street I passed a woman in Quaker garb, who stood looking in at the window of a jeweler. She regarded placidly, yet with an inscrutable look, the gems on velvet cushions within. What she was thinking it would not be easy to say; but what a delightful essay Charles Lamb might have written “On a Quakeress looking in at a Jeweler’s Window”!

Half an hour later I passed the silk counter of one of the large dry-goods stores. There a couple of nuns were selecting a sumptuous white brocade, examining it with an air serious and absorbed, and yet subtilely suggestive of feminine delight in the beauty of the stuff. What to them were the pomps and vanities of this world that their taste should be concerned in a purchase so incongruous? Did they buy a new robe wherein the image of some Madonna is to shine forth in splendor at the coming Christmastide, or the garment which some young novice shall wear at her mystic spousals with the church, thenceforth to know no raiment but the strait livery of the sisterhood?

I grant you that one does not chance upon three things so suggestive as these in every trip down town; but there is always something. Learn to see and to hear. Seeing and hearing are more matters of the brain than of eye and ear. Train the mind to observe, and no less train it to phrase; then the whole question of material is settled. Exposition demands, of course, the exercise of reason as well as of observation, but the two are closely bound together; and the mind which is trained to see is as sure to reason about what it sees as the plant which thrusts its rootlets into rich soil is to grow.

XII

ARGUMENT

It is one of the most trying conditions of human life that conviction is not proof. It is hard to be brought face to face with the fact that the most ardent belief does not make a thing true. We have most of us known moments when it seemed that there could be no justice in the universe because some hope or some faith which we have cherished with the whole soul was found after all to be but a delusion. Truth in this world must be tried not by desire but by reason; and we can hardly be too careful in studying the processes by which reason attempts its proofs.

Argument has been defined as the endeavor to establish the truth or the falsity of an idea or a proposition. Naturally a written argument is supposed to be addressed to others, but the methods used in constructing it are those which we employ in examining a theory or a proposition in our own minds. It is necessary to study these for the sake of using them in composition; yet it is of no less importance that we apply their principles to our thinking. It may seem to you that I have a tendency to treat English Composition as if it involved the whole duty of man, but it is certainly true that the advantages of familiarity with legal processes may be very great, not only intellectually, but ethically. Since conviction is not proof, either in things emotional or things ethical any more than in things intellectual, it follows that it is essential to be provided with the means of testing the many propositions and ideas which life puts before us. It is not my intention to discuss Argument as a means of spiritual advancement, yet it is not amiss to call attention to its great value, even for one who never intends to write at all.

Looking at Argument simply as a division of composition, we need not have difficulty in perceiving its importance. No intellectual necessity is more common than that of endeavoring to make others think or believe as we think or believe. The effort to establish truth by argument is one which from the dawn of civilization has occupied the best powers of mankind. Openly, in avowed reasoning, or covertly, in cunningly disguised forms, those who write are constantly arguing for one theory or another, for some idea, for some conviction. The writer who is trained to the craft of logic has the same advantage in discussion with one who has not that a trained boxer has in an encounter with a green hand.

It must be evident to any one that Argument is closely allied to Exposition. Much discussion may be resolved into a dispute over definitions, and when thinkers disagree it is more often about terms than about principles. It has happened before now that men have gone to the stake upon a question whether a thing in regard to which everybody was in substantial accord should be called by one name or by another; and it is evident that Exposition may sometimes be more effectively convincing than formal Argument, since if a truth is clearly set forth it is likely to carry conviction with it.

Macaulay’s “Machiavelli,” which we have examined, goes very near the line of Argument, since, as has been said, it is essentially an endeavor to prove that the vices of the Italians of the fifteenth century were national rather than personal and individual. Indeed, in perhaps the majority of expositions of any complexity there is likely to be an underlying basis of argument. It is difficult to suppose a logical sequence of facts or ideas which does not involve argumentative reasoning, at least tacitly. Here, as everywhere in composition, one form passes into another, and no arbitrary line of division can be drawn. Exposition and Argument are constantly united; and moreover it is true that the latter is constantly given the guise of the former, so that at first glance a chain of logical reasoning is easily mistaken for a simple statement of facts. To quote once more from the “Machiavelli:” —

When war becomes the trade of a separate class, the least dangerous course left to a government is to form a standing army. It is scarcely possible that men can pass their lives in the service of one state without feeling some interest in its greatness. Its victories are their victories. Its defeats are their defeats. The contract loses something of its mercantile character. The services of the soldier are considered as the effects of patriotic zeal, his pay as the tribute of national gratitude. To betray the power which employs him, to be even remiss in its service, are in his eyes the most atrocious and degrading of crimes.

This is a complete argument, easily reducible to logical terms. It opens with the proposition that if war becomes a trade the nation should enlist and control the army; and the remainder of the paragraph is taken up with the proof of this statement. It is not all expressed; but it may be said to consist of three propositions supported as follows: —