Talks on Writing English: Second seriesHoughton Mifflin Company, 1901 - 259 pages |
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Common terms and phrases
admirable Anthony Trollope ARLO BATES beginning clause clear complete composition conjunctions connection consciously convey definite dialogue difference effect ellipsis entirely eral euphony example exposition expression fact fault feel figure force George Meredith gerund give given Honoré de Balzac human idea illustration importance impression instance language less letter literary literature little foxes matter MATTHEW ARNOLD means mind mood naturally ness noun once paragraph parallel construction participle perhaps person phatic phrase picture point of view possible practical prepositions principle produce pronoun proper prose reader realize regard relation relative clause revision seems sense similes sort speak speech Stevenson story student style substantive sure Talks on Writing tence theme things thought tion topic sentence truth uncon verb verbal verbal noun Victor Hugo Walter Pater whole wish words writer Writing English written
Popular passages
Page 239 - I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race, where that immortal garland is to be run for not without dust and heat.
Page 146 - The moment our discourse rises above the ground line of familiar facts, and is inflamed with passion or exalted by thought, it clothes itself in images.
Page 208 - Trollope, with his want of discretion in this particular. In a digression, a parenthesis or an aside, he concedes to the reader that he and this trusting friend are only "making believe.
Page 57 - And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night...
Page 81 - In this character of the Americans, a love of freedom is the predominating feature which marks and distinguishes the whole : and as an ardent is always a jealous affection, your colonies become suspicious, restive, and untractable, whenever they see the least attempt to wrest from them by force, or shuffle from them by chicane, what they think the only advantage worth living for. This fierce spirit of liberty is stronger in the English colonies probably than in any other people of the earth...
Page 18 - ... elixir of life — he has still a flaw at heart, he still has his business habits. Now, there is no time when business habits are more mitigated than on a walking tour. And so during these halts, as I say, you will feel almost free. But it is at night, and after dinner, that the best hour comes. There are no such pipes to be smoked as those that follow a good day's march ; the flavor of the tobacco is a thing to be remembered, it is so dry and aromatic, so full and so fine.
Page 73 - Thou shalt come to thy grave in a full age, Like as a shock of corn cometh in in his season.
Page 161 - Not in vain the distance beacons. Forward, forward let us range ; Let the great world spin forever down the ringing grooves of change.
Page 43 - I have said, simply to know the best that is known and thought in the world, and by in its turn making this known, to create a current of true and fresh ideas.
Page 129 - WHEN Farmer Oak smiled, the corners of his mouth spread till they were within an unimportant distance of his ears, his eyes were reduced to mere chinks, and diverging wrinkles appeared round them, extending upon his countenance like the rays in a rudimentary sketch of the rising sun.