Composition Rhetoric by Stratton D. Brooks

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EXERCISES

_A._ If you were to write three paragraphs describing a man, which of the
following details should be included in each paragraph?

(_a_) eyes, (_b_) shoes, (_c_) size, (_d_) complexion, (_e_) general
appearance, (_f_) hair, (_g_) carriage, (_h_) trousers,(_i_) mouth, (_j_)
coat, (_k_) nose.

_B._ Make a list of the details which might be mentioned in describing the
outside of a church. Arrange them in appropriate groups.

_C._ In the following paragraphs which sentences give the general outline
and which give details? Are the details arranged with reference to their
position in space? Can the paragraph be improved by rearranging them?

1. We came finally to a brook more wild and mysterious than the others.
There were a half dozen stepping-stones between the path we were on and
the place where it began again on the opposite side. After a few missteps
and much laughter we were landed at last, but several of the party had wet
feet to remember the experience by. We found ourselves in a space that had
once been a clearing. A tumbledown chimney overgrown with brambles and
vines told of an abandoned hearthstone. The blackened remnants of many a
picnic camp fire strewed the ground. A slight turn brought us to the spot
where the Indian Spring welled out of the hillside. The setting was all
that we could have hoped for,--great moss-grown rocks wet and slippery,
deep shade which almost made us doubt the existence of the hot August
sunshine at the edge of the forest, cool water dripping and tinkling. A
half-dozen great trees had been so undermined by the action of the water
long ago that they had tumbled headlong into the stream bed. There they
lay, heads down, crisscross--one completely spanning the brook just below
the spring--their tangled roots like great dragons twisting and thrusting
at the shadows. The water trickled slowly over the smooth rocky bottom as
if reluctant to leave a spot enchanted. A few yards below, the overflow
from Indian Spring joined the main stream, and their waters mingled in a
pretty little cataract. We went below and looked back at it. How it
wrinkled and paused over the level spaces, played with the bubbles in the
eddies, and ran laughing and turning somersaults wherever the ledges were
abrupt.

--Mary Rodgers Miller: _The Brook Book_. (Copyright, 1902, by Doubleday,
Page & Co.)

2. Rowena was tall in stature, yet not so much so as to attract
observation on account of superior height. Her complexion was exquisitely
fair, but the noble cast of her head and features prevented the insipidity
which sometimes attaches to fair beauties. Her clear blue eyes, which sat
enshrined beneath a graceful eyebrow of brown, sufficiently marked to give
expression to the forehead, seemed capable to kindle as well as to melt,
to command as well as to beseech. Her profuse hair, of a color betwixt
brown and flaxen, was arranged in a fanciful and graceful manner in
numerous ringlets, to form which art had probably been aided by nature.
These locks were braided with gems, and being worn at full length,
intimated the noble birth and free-born condition of the maiden. A golden
chain, to which was attached a small reliquary of the same metal, hung
around her neck. She wore bracelets on her arms, which were bare. Her
dress was an under gown and kirtle of pale sea-green silk, over which hung
a long loose robe, which reached to the ground, having very wide sleeves,
which came down, however, very little below the elbow. This robe was
crimson, and manufactured out of the very finest wool. A veil of silk,
interwoven with gold, was attached to the upper part of it, which could
be, at the wearer's pleasure, either drawn over the face and bosom after
the Spanish fashion, or disposed as a sort of drapery round the shoulders.

--Scott: _Ivanhoe_.

+Theme XXIV.+--_Write a paragraph and arrange the details with reference
to their association in space._

Suggested subjects:--

1. Ichabod Crane.
2. Rip Van Winkle.
3. The man who lives near us.
4. A minister I met yesterday.
5. Our family doctor.
6. The gymnasium.
7. A fire engine.
8. The old church.
9. The shoe factory.
10. Some character in the book you are reading.

(Which sentence gives the general impression and which sentences give the
details? Are the details arranged with reference to their real space
order? Should others be added? Can any be omitted? Will the reader form
the mental image you wish him to form?)

+48. Development by Comparison.+--In Section 29 we found that comparison,
whether literal or figurative, aided us in forming mental images of
objects. In a similar way events and general principles may be explained
by making suitable comparisons. We are continually comparing one thing
with another. Every idea tends to recall other ideas that are similar to
it or in contrast with it. When an unfamiliar idea is presented to us we
at once seek to associate it with similar ideas already known to us. A
writer, therefore, will make his meaning clear by furnishing, the desired
comparisons. If these are familiar to us, they enable us to understand
the new ideas presented. Even when both ideas in the comparison are
unfamiliar, each may gain in clearness by comparison with the other.

In comparing two objects, events, or principles we may point out that they
are _not_ alike in certain respects. A comparison that thus emphasizes
differences, rather than likenesses, becomes a contrast. The contrast may
be given in a single sentence or in a single paragraph, but often a
paragraph or more may be required for each of the two ideas contrasted.

EXERCISE

Notice how comparisons and contrasts are used in the following
paragraphs:--

1. Niagara is the largest cataract in the world, while Yosemite is the
highest; it is the volume that impresses you at Niagara, and it is the
height of Yosemite and the grand surroundings that make its beauty.
Niagara is as wide as Yosemite is high, and if it had no more water than
Yosemite has, it would not be of much consequence. The sound of the two
falls is quite different: Niagara makes a steady roar, deep and strong,
though not oppressive, while Yosemite is a crash and rattle, owing to the
force of the water as it strikes the solid rock after its immense leap.

2. It is not only in appearance that London and New York differ widely.
They also speak with different accents, for cities have distinctive
accents as well as people. Tennyson wrote about "streaming London's
central roar"; the roar is a gentle hum compared with the din which
tingles the ears of visitors to New York. The accent of New York is harsh,
grating, jarring. The rattle of the elevated railroad, the whir of the
cable cars, the ringing of electric-car bells, the rumble of vehicles over
the hard stones, the roar of the traffic as it reechoes through the narrow
canyons of down-town streets, produce an appalling combination of
discords. The streets of New York are not more crowded than those of
London, but the noise in London is subdued. It is more regular, less
jarring and piercing. The muffled sounds in London are due partly to the
wooden and asphalt pavements, which deaden the sounds. London must be
soothing to the New Yorker, as the noise of New York is at first
disconcerting to the Londoner.--_Outlook._

3. Now their separate characters are briefly these. The man's power is
active, progressive, defensive. He is eminently the doer, the creator, the
discoverer, the defender. His intellect is for speculation and invention;
his energy for adventure, for war, and for conquest wherever war is just,
wherever conquest necessary. But the woman's power is for rule, not for
battle, and her intellect is not for invention or creation, but for sweet
ordering, arrangement, and decision. She sees the qualities of things,
their claims, and their places.

--Ruskin: _Sesame and Lilies_.

+Theme XXV.+--_Write a paragraph using comparison or contrast._

Suggested topics:--

1. The school, a beehive.
2. The body, a steam engine.
3. Two generals about whom you have read.
4. Girls, boys.
5. Two of your studies.
6. Graded school work, high school work.
7. Animal life, plant life.
8. Two of your classmates.

(Have you used comparison or contrast? Have you introduced any of the
other methods of development? Have you developed the paragraph so that the
reader will understand fully your topic statement? Omit sentences not
really needed.)

+49. Development by Stating Cause and Effect.+--We are better satisfied
with our understanding of a thing if we know the causes which have
produced it or the effects which follow it. Likewise we feel that another
has mastered the topic statement of a paragraph if he can answer the
question, Why is this so? or, What will result from this? When either is
stated, we naturally begin to think about the other. The idea of a topic
statement may, therefore, be satisfactorily developed by stating its
causes or its effects. A cause may be stated and the effects given or the
effects may be made the topic statement for which we account by giving its
causes.

The importance of the relation of cause and effect to scientific study is
discussed in the following paragraph from Mill:--

The relation of cause and effect is the fundamental law of nature. There
is no recorded instance of an effect appearing without a previous cause,
or of a cause acting without producing its full effect. Every change in
nature is the effect of some previous change and the cause of some change
to follow; just as the movement of each carriage near the middle of a long
train is a result of the movement of the one in front and a precursor
of the movement of the one behind. Facts or effects are to be seen
everywhere, but causes have usually to be sought for. It is the function
of science or organized knowledge to observe all effects, or phenomena,
and to seek for their causes. This twofold purpose gives richness and
dignity to science. The observation and classifying of facts soon become
wearisome to all but the specialist actually engaged in the work. But when
reasons are assigned, and classification explained, when the number of
causes is reduced and the effects begin to crystallize into essential and
clearly related parts of one whole, every intelligent student finds
interest, and many, more fortunate, even fascination in the study.

--Mill: _The Realm of Nature_. (Copyright, 1892, by Charles Scribner's
Sons.)

EXERCISES

_A._ In your reading, notice how often the effects are indicated by the
use of some one of the following expressions: _as a result, accordingly,
consequently, for, hence, so, so that, thus._

_B._ Which sentences state causes and which state effects in the following
paragraphs?

1. The power of water to dissolve most minerals increases with its
temperature and the amount of gases it contains. Percolating water at
great depths, therefore, generally dissolves more mineral matter than it
can hold in solution when it reaches the surface, where it cools, and,
being relieved of pressure, much of its carbonic acid gas escapes to the
atmosphere or is absorbed by aquatic plants or mosses. Hence, deep-seated
springs are usually surrounded by a deposit of the minerals with which the
water is impregnated. Sometimes this deposit may even form large hills;
sometimes it forms a mound around the spring, over the sides of which the
water falls, while the spray, evaporating from surrounding objects, leaves
them also incrusted with a mineral deposit. Percolating water evaporating
on the sides and roof of limestone caverns, leaves the walls incrusted
with carbonate of lime in beautiful masses of crystals. Water slowly
evaporating as it drips from the roof of caverns to the floor beneath
leaves a deposit on both places, which gradually grows downward from the
roof as a _stalactite_, and upward from the floor as a _stalagmite_, until
these meet and form one continuous column of stone.

--Hinman: _Eclectic Physical Geography_.

2. The frequent use of cigars or cigarettes by the young seriously affects
the quality of the blood. The red blood corpuscles are not fully developed
and charged with their normal supply of life-giving oxygen. This causes
paleness of the skin, often noticed in the face of the young smoker.
Palpitation of the heart is also a common result, followed by permanent
weakness, so that the whole system is enfeebled, and mental vigor is
impaired as well as physical strength. Observant teachers can usually tell
which of the boys under their care are addicted to smoking, simply by the
comparative inferiority of their appearance, and by their intellectual and
bodily indolence and feebleness. After full maturity is attained the evil
effects of commencing the use of tobacco are less apparent; but competent
physicians assert that it cannot be safely used by those under the age of
forty.

--Macy-Norris: _Physiology for High Schools_.

3. In many other ways, too, the Norman Conquest affected England. For
example, before long all the best places in the Church were filled with
foreigners. But most of the new bishops and abbots were far superior in
morals and education to the Englishmen whom they succeeded. They were also
devoted to the Pope of Rome, and soon made the English National Church a
part of the Roman Catholic Church. But William, while willing to bow to
the Pope as his chief in religious matters, refused to give way to him in
things which concerned only this world. No former English king had done
that, he knew, and no more would he. This union with the Roman Catholic
Church was of the greatest benefit to England, as it brought her once more
into connection with the educated men of Europe. Indeed, Lanfranc, the
Conqueror's Archbishop of Canterbury, was one of the best and wisest men
of his day.

--Higginson and Channing: _English History for American Readers_.

+Theme XXVI.+--_Develop one of the following topic statements into
paragraphs by stating causes or effects:_--

1. A government which had no soldiers to call upon in an emergency would
not last long.

2. One of the first needs of a new country is roads.

3. The number of people receiving public support is smaller in this
country than in Europe.

4. An efficient postal system is a great aid to civilization.

5. A straight stream is an impossibility in nature.

6. Mountain ranges have great influence upon climate.

7. The United States holds first place as a manufacturing nation.

8. There are many swift rivers in New England.

9. Towns or cities are located at the mouths of navigable rivers.

(Which sentences state causes and which state effects? Would the effects
which you have stated really follow the given causes?)

+50. Development by Repetition.+--The repetition of a thought in different
form will often make plain that which we do not at first understand. This
is especially true if the repetitions are accompanied by new comparisons.
In every school the teacher makes daily use of repetition in her efforts
to explain to the pupils that which they do not understand. In a similar
way a writer makes use of this tendency of ours, and develops the idea of
the topic sentence by repetition. Each sentence should, however, do more
than merely repeat. It should add something to the central idea, making
this idea clearer, more definite, or more emphatic. If repetition is
excessive and purposeless, it becomes a fault.

Repetition may extend through the whole paragraph, or it may be used to
explain any sentence or any part of a sentence. It may tell what the thing
is or what it is not, and in effect becomes a definition setting limits to
the original idea.

EXERCISE

Notice how the idea in the topic statement of each of the following
paragraphs is repeated in those which follow:--

1. No man ever made a complete new system of law and gave it to a people.
No monarch, however absolute or powerful, ever had the power to change the
habits of a people to that extent. Revolution generally means, not a
change of law, but merely a change of government officials; even when it
is a change from monarchy to democracy. Our Revolution made practically no
changes in the criminal and civil laws of the colonies.

--Clark: _The Government_.

2. People talk of liberty as if it meant the liberty to do just what a man
likes. I call that man free who fears doing wrong, but fears nothing else.
I call that man free who has learned the most blessed of all truths,--that
liberty consists in obedience to the power, and to the will, and to the
law that his higher soul reverences and approves. He is not free because
he does what he likes; but he is free because he does what he ought, and
there is no protest in his soul against the doing.

--Frederick William Robertson.

3. This dense forest was to the Indians a home in which they had lived
from childhood, and where they were as much at ease as a farmer on his own
acres. To their keen eyes, trained for generations to more than a wild
beast's watchfulness, the wilderness was an open book. Nothing at rest or
in motion escaped them. They had begun to track game as soon as they could
walk; a scrape on a tree trunk, a bruised leaf, a faint indentation of the
soil, which no white man could see, all told them a tale as plainly as if
it had been shouted in their ears.

--Theodore Roosevelt: _The Winning of the West_.

4. Public enterprises, whether conducted by the municipality or committed
to the public service corporation, exist to render public services.
Streets are public highways. They exist for the people's use. Nothing
should be placed in them unless required to facilitate their use by or for
the people. Only the general need of water, gas, electricity, and
transportation justifies the placing of pipes and wires and tracks in the
streets. The public need is the sole test and measure of such occupation.
To look upon the streets as a source of private gain, or even municipal
revenue, except as incidents of their public use, is to disregard their
public character. Adequate service at the lowest practicable rates, not
gain or revenue, is the test. The question is, not how much the public
service corporation may gain, but what can be saved to the people by its
employment.

--Edwin Burrett Smith: _The Next Step in Municipal Reform_
("Atlantic Monthly").

+Theme XXVII.+--_Develop one of the following topic statements into a
paragraph, using the method, of repetition as far as possible:_--

1. It is difficult to become angry with one who is always good-natured.

2. It is gloomy in the woods on a rainy day.

3. The government is always in need of honest men.

4. Rural free delivery of mail will have a great effect on country life.

5. Not every boy in school uses his time to the best advantage.

6. Haste is waste.

7. Regular exercise is one of the essentials of good health.

(Have the repetitions really made the idea of the topic sentence clearer
or more emphatic or more definite? What other methods of development have
you used?)

+51. Development by a Combination of Methods.+--A paragraph should have
unity of thought, and, so long as this unity of thought is kept, it does
not matter what methods of development are used. A dozen paragraphs taken
at random will show that combinations are very frequent. Often it will be
difficult to determine just how a paragraph has been developed. In
general, however, it may be said that an indiscriminate mixture of methods
is confusing and interferes with unity of thought. If more than one is
used, it requires skillful handling to maintain such a relation between
them that both contribute to the clear and emphatic statement of the main
thought.

The paragraph from Dryer, page 74, shows a combination of cause and effect
with specific illustrations; that from Wolstan Dixey, page 81, shows a
combination of repetition with specific instances.

EXERCISES

What methods of paragraph development, or what combinations of methods,
are used in the following selections?

1. I believe the first test of a truly great man is his humility. I do not
mean, by humility, doubt of his power, or hesitation in speaking of his
opinions; but a right understanding of the relation between what he can do
and say and the rest of the world's sayings and doings. All great men not
only know their business, but usually know that they know it; and are not
only right in their main opinions, but they usually know that they are
right in them; only they do not think much of themselves on that account.
Arnolfo knows he can build a good dome at Florence; Albert Duerer writes
calmly to one who had found fault with his work, "It cannot be better
done"; Sir Isaac Newton knows that he has worked out a problem or two
that would have puzzled anybody else; only they do not expect their
fellow-men therefore to fall down and worship them; they have a curious
undersense of powerlessness, feeling that the greatness is not _in_ them,
but _through_ them; that they could not do or be anything else than God
made them. And they see something divine and God-made in every other man
they meet, and are endlessly, foolishly, and incredibly merciful.

--Ruskin.

2. The first thing to be noted about the dress of the Romans is that its
prevalent material was always woolen. Sheep raising for wool was practiced
among them on an extensive scale, from the earliest historic times, and
the choice breeds of that animal, originally imported from Greece or Asia
Minor, took so kindly to the soil and climate of Italy that home-grown
wool came even to be preferred to the foreign for fineness and softness of
quality. Foreign wools were, however, always imported more or less, partly
because the supply of native wools seems never to have been quite
sufficient, partly because the natural colors of wools from different
parts varied so considerably as to render the art of the dyer to some
extent unnecessary. Thus, the wools of Canusium were brown or reddish,
those of Pollentia in Liguria were black, those from the Spanish Baetica,
which comprised Andalusia and a part of Granada, had either a golden brown
or a grayish hue; the wools of Asia were almost red; and there was a
Grecian fleece, called the crow colored, of which the natural tint was a
peculiarly deep and brilliant black.

--Preston and Dodge: _'The Private Life of the Romans_.

3. Art has done everything for Munich. It lies on a large flat plain
sixteen hundred feet above the sea and continually exposed to the cold
winds from the Alps. At the beginning of the present century it was but a
third-rate city, and was rarely visited by foreigners; since that time its
population and limits have been doubled, and magnificent edifices in every
style of architecture erected, rendering it scarcely secondary in this
respect to any capital in Europe. Every art that wealth or taste could
devise seems to have been spent in its decoration. Broad, spacious streets
and squares have been laid out; churches, halls, and colleges erected, and
schools of painting and sculpture established which drew artists from all
parts of the world.

--Taylor: _Views Afoot_.

4. In all excursions to the woods or to the shore the student of
ornithology has an advantage over his companions. He has one more, avenue
of delight. He, indeed, kills two birds with one stone and sometimes
three. If others wander, he can never get out of his way. His game is
everywhere. The cawing of a crow makes him feel at home, while a new note
or a new song drowns all care. Audubon, on the desolate coast of Labrador,
is happier than any king ever was; and on shipboard is nearly cured of his
seasickness when a new gull appears in sight.

--Burroughs: _Wake Robin_.

+Theme XXVIII.+--_Write a paragraph, using any method or combination of
methods which best suits your thought. Use any of the subjects hitherto
suggested that you have not already used._

(Is every sentence related to the topic statement so that your paragraph
possesses unity? What methods of development have you used?)

+52. The Topical Recitation.+--In conducting a recitation the teacher may
ask direct questions about each part of a paragraph or she may ask a pupil
to discuss some topic. Such a topical recitation should be an exercise in
clear thinking rather than in word memory, and in order to prepare for it,
the pupil should have made a careful analysis of the thought in each
paragraph similar to that discussed on page 74. When this analysis has
been made he will have clearly in mind the topic statement and the way it
has been developed, and will be able to distinguish the essential from the
non-essential elements.

A topical recitation demands that the pupil know the main idea and be able
to develop it in one of the following methods, or by a combination of
them: (1) by giving specific instances, (2) by giving details, (3) by
giving comparisons or contrasts, (4) by giving causes or effects, and (5)
by repetition.

Thoughts so mastered are our own. We understand them and believe them; and
consequently we can explain them, or describe them, or prove them to
others. We can furnish details or instances, originate comparisons, or
state causes and effects. _When ideas gained from language have thus
become our own, we do not need to remember the language in which they were
expressed, and not until then do they become proper material for
composition purposes._

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