Deacon's Composition and Style; A Handbook for Literary Students, with a Complete Guide to All Matters Connected with Printing and Publishing (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 188? edition. Excerpt: ... those of the nicest virtue, who pay and receive visits from them, without any manner of scruple? Which proceeding, as it is not very old among us, so I take it to be of most pernicious consequence. It looks like a sort of compounding between virtue and vice; as if a woman were Johnson's Lives of English Poets. allowed to be vicious, provided she be not profligate; as if there was a certain point where gallantry ends and infamy begins; or that an hundred criminal amours were not as pardonable as half a score.--Swift on the Advancement of Religion. THE NEAT STYLE. Neatness of style implies a certain degree of ornament. Its ornaments however are not of the most showy or brilliant kind, but such as are easily attained. A writer who employs this kind of style, considers the beauties of language as an object worthy of attention. He is careful in the choice of his words, and endeavours to arrange them with propriety and elegance; but he seldom attempts any bold flight of eloquence. His sentences are free from the incumbrance of superfluous words; they are of a moderate length, and rather inclining to brevity than to a swelling structure; the' generally close with propriety, and are unincumbered with long tails. His cadence is varied, but not of the studied musical kind. Such figures as he employs, are short and correct, rather than elaborate and imaginative. This style may perhaps be adopted by an author of superior genius; but it is attainable by one of no uncommon capacity. Any writer of ordinary attainments may acquire it, by carefully attending to the rules of rhetoric, and to the practice of writers of established reputation. It is a mode of writing that never becomes disagreeable. A familiar letter, or a law paper, may be written with neatness;...