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RULE III.

Extracts composed of Successive Paragraphs.

When an extract is composed of successive paragraphs, each is commenced with inverted commas; but the apostrophes are not used till the quotation finally terminates.

EXAMPLE.

To exemplify this rule, a passage, consisting of more than one paragraph, may be taken from an essay by Godwin:

"No subject is of more importance, in the morality of private life, than that of domestic or family life.

"Every man has his ill humors, his fits of peevishness and exacerbation. Is it better that he should spend these upon his fellow-beings, or suffer them to subside of themselves?

"It seems to be one of the most important of the arts of life, that men should not come too near each other, or touch in too many points. Excessive familiarity is the bane of social happiness."

REMARKS.

a. When phrases or sentences in an extract consist of portions not connected in the discourse or book from which they have been taken, each portion should begin and end with the quotation-marks, as in those cited on p. 228, Remark a; unless several points (....) are inserted to indicate the omission, in which case it will be sufficient to put the marks of quotation at the beginning and the end of the whole extract, if it is contained in one paragraph.

b. In the leading articles of newspapers, and sometimes in books, when particular attention would be drawn to an extract embodied in the text, the inverted commas are placed at the beginning of each line of the quotation; as, Slavery must fall, because it stands in "direct hostility to all the grand movements, principles, and reforms "of our age; because it stands in the way of an advancing world. "One great idea stands out amidst the discoveries and improvements "of modern times. It is, that man is not to exercise arbitrary, "irresponsible power over man." But, except in the more transient class of publications, this mode of exhibiting extracts is now seldom used.

ORAL EXERCISE.

Show how the Rules and the Remarks (pp. 228-30) apply to the use or omission of quotation-marks in the following sentences:·

The psalmist says again, "I am a stranger with thee and a sojourner, as all my fathers were."

When Fénélon's library was on fire, " God be praised," said he, "that it is not the dwelling of a poor man!"

I repeat what I said on a former occasion, that "no man can be happy who is destitute of good feelings and generous principles." "There is but one object," says St. Augustine, "greater than the soul; and that one is its Creator."

Plato, hearing that some asserted he was a very bad man, said, "I shall take care so to live that nobody will believe them."

"Let me make the ballads of a nation," said Fletcher of Saltoun "and I care not who makes its laws."

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Any man," it has been well said, " who has a proneness to see a beauty and fitness in all God's works, may find daily food for his mind even in an infant."

A minister of some experience remarks, “I have heard more than one sufferer say, 'I am thankful; God is good to me;' and, when I heard that, I said, 'It is good to be afflicted.'"

The celebrated and ingenious Bishop of Cloyne, in his " Principles of Human Knowledge," denies, without any ceremony, the existence of every kind of matter whatever.

After Cicero, the literary history of the Romans is written in one line of Tacitus, Gliscente adulatione, magna ingenia deterrebantur; "As adulation increased, great minds were deterred."

A being crowned with all the blessings which men covet and admire, with youth, health, beauty, rank, genius, and fame, writes four cantos of melodious verse to prove that he is the most miserable of mortals.

-as we are

Trench well says, "What a lesson the word 'diligence' contains! How profitable is it for every one of us to be reminded, reminded when we make ourselves aware of its derivation from diligo, 'to love,' that the only secret of true industry in our work is love of that work!"

To the man who walks among the flowers which he has tended,

"Each odoriferous leaf,

Each opening blossom, freely breathes abroad
Its gratitude, and thanks him with its sweets."

EXERCISE TO BE WRITTEN.

Insert the marks of quotation agreeably to some of the directions given in pp. 228-32.

Johnson's Lives of the English Poets may justly be considered ns the noblest specimen of elegant and solid criticism which any age has produced. (Rule I. and Remark e.)

Terrific examples of license and anarchy in Greece and Rome are quoted to prove, that man requires to be protected from himself; forgetting the profound wisdom wrapped up in the familiar inquiry, Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Who shall guard the keepers? (Rule I. and Remark c.)

An eloquent preacher asks, Who would not far prefer our wintry storm, and the hoarse sighings of the east wind, as it sweeps around us, if they will brace the mind to nobler attainments, and the heart to better duties? [The author of this passage quotes the phrase, "the hoarse sighings of the east wind."] (Rule II.)

What is the soul? was a question once put to Marivaux. — I know nothing of it, he answered, but that it is spiritual and immortal. Well, said his friend, let us ask Fontenelle, and he will tell us what it is. - No, cried Marivaux: ask anybody but Fontenelle; for he has too much good sense to know any more about it than we do. (Rule I.)

D'Alembert congratulated a young man very coldly, who brought him the solution of a problem. I have done this to have a seat in the Academy, said the young man. - Sir, answered D'Alembert, with such motives you will never earn one. Science must be loved for its own sake, and not for the advantage to be derived. No other principle will enable a man to make true progress. (Rule I.)

The following sarcastic rules for behavior are said by Goldsmith to have been drawn up by an indigent philosopher:

1. If you be a rich man, you may enter the room with three loud hems, march deliberately up to the chimney, and turn your back to the fire.

2. If you be a poor man, I would advise you to shrink into the room as fast as you can, and place yourself, as usual, upon a corner of a chair, in a remote corner.

3. If you be young, and live with an old man, I would advise you not to like gravy. I was disinherited myself for liking gravy. (Rule III.)

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CHAPTER V.

MISCELLANEOUS MARKS AND CHARACTERS.

In addition to the sentential points and marks treated of in the preceding pages, there are other characters, sometimes occurring in English composition, which will now be explained.

I. BRACKETS, or CROTCHETS [ ], are employed for the same purpose nearly as the marks of parenthesis; but they are usually confined to words, phrases, or sentences, inserted in or appended to a quotation, and not belonging to it; as, "The captain had several men died [who died] in the ship."

Brackets are chiefly intended to give an explanation, to rectify a mistake, or to supply an omission. But they are also sometimes used in dictionaries and in poetry to separate such words as are put, for the saving of room, into lines to which they do not belong; and in psalms and hymns to include verses that may be omitted by a congregation. They are used, besides, in a single form, in printed dramas, to note the entrance or the departure of certain characters; as, "[Exeunt Portia and Nerissa."

Marks of parenthesis and the brackets are often employed indiscriminately; but the following rule, from Parker's "Exercises in Rhetorical Reading," will aid the pupil in distinguishing the difference as to their application: "Crotchets [the writer means marks of parenthesis] are used to enclose a sentence, or part of a sentence,

which is inserted between the parts of another sentence: brackets are generally used to separate two subjects, or to enclose an explanation, note, or observation, standing by itself."

The grammatical punctuation of the words or sentences enclosed by brackets, and of the context, when they require such pointing, should be the same as that adopted in respect to the parenthesis, and to the clauses between which it is inserted. See pp. 168-70.

Dashes are sometimes used, one before the first bracket, and another after the second, to lead the eye from the preceding portion of the main sentence to the latter. They may with propriety be introduced in such passages as the following: "I know the banker I deal with, or the physician I usually call in,-['There is no need,' cried Dr. Slop (waking), 'to call in any physician in this case.']— to be neither of them men of much religion."

II. A COMMA INVERTED [] is sometimes used instead of a very small c, in many proper names beginning with Mac; as, M'Donald, the abbreviation of Macdonald.

This mark seems to be getting out of use; authors and printers now generally preferring the c, either on or above the line, as in McKenzie, McFarlane.

The same mark is sometimes annexed to the letter O in proper names; as, O'Neil: but an apostrophe is more frequently used, and is more correct; as, O'Neil.

III. TWO COMMAS [,,] are occasionally employed to indicate that something is understood which was expressed in the line and word immediately above; as,

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By many printers the commas are inverted [thus, "]; but the mode of using them here presented, which was once very common, is a more exact imitation of handwriting.

Names of different persons, though spelled in the same way,

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are commonly repeated.

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