A helpful book for everyone who aspires to correct the everyday errors ofspeaking and writing.
Homer, in all probability, knew no rules of rhetoric, and was not tortured withthe consideration of grammatical construction, and yet his verse will endurethrough time. If everybody possessed the genius of Homer, rules and cautions inwriting would be unnecessary.
To-day all men speak, and most men write, but it is observed that those whomost closely follow Homer’s method of writing without rules are mostunlike Homer in the results. The ancient bard was a law unto himself; we needrules for our guidance.
Rules of writing are the outgrowth of the study of the characteristics andqualities of style which distinguish the best writers from those of inferiorskill and ability. Grammarians and rhetoricians, according to their severallines of investigation, set forth the laws and principles governing speech, andformulate rules whereby we may follow the true, and avoid the false.
Grammar and rhetoric, as too often presented in the schools, are suchuninviting studies that whenschool-days are ended, the books are laid aside, and are rarely consultedafterward. The custom of formally burning the text-books after the finalexaminations—a custom that prevails in some institutions—is butan emphatic method of showing how the students regard the subjects treated inthe books.
If all the rules and principles had been thoroughly mastered, the huge bonfireof text-books in grammar and rhetoric might be regarded a fitting celebrationof the students’ victory over the difficulties of “Englishundefiled.” But too often these rules are merely memorized by the studentfor the purpose of recitation, and are not engrafted upon his everyday habit ofspeech. They are, therefore, soon forgotten, and the principles involved aresubject to daily violation.
Hence arises the need of books like SLIPS OF SPEECH, in which the commo