sions. All things fell into one of two great categories, fast or slow. Man's chief end was to be a brick. When the great calamities of life overtook their friends, these last were spoken of as being a good deal cut up. Ninetenths of human existence were summed up in the single word, bore. These expressions come to be the algebraic symbols of minds which have grown too weak or indolent to discriminate. They are the blank checks of intellectual bankruptcy; you may fill them up with what idea you like; it makes no difference, for there are no funds in the treasury upon which they are drawn." The use of slang, as Holmes suggests in the sentence. next to the last, shows a want of discrimination. Now discrimination is nothing more or less than the noting of differences between the things you see. To describe these differences in appropriate language helps you to note them. But all this requires mental exertion, more mental exertion than people with weak and lazy minds are either capable of putting forth, or willing to put forth. Such persons therefore resort to slang to save themselves the trouble of seeing and of thinking. To them a charming young girl is "swell" or "out of sight"; so is a difficult play in football, a good dinner, a red and green necktie, a fashionable gown, a thrilling story, a speaking picture, a gorgeous sunset in a California sky, and the dull muffled thunder of awful Niagara. The habitual use of slang produces mental atrophy. An occasional slang expression, it cannot be denied, works its way, through colloquial language, into reputable use. Some of our most vigorous idioms, it is true, were once slang expressions. Undoubtedly, too, some of the words and phrases which to-day are characterized as slang, will sooner or later be elevated to the dignity of idiomatic usage. But it is not the business of boys and girls in or out of school, or of young men and young women in or out of college, to make slang reputable. This business may safely be left to the nicer understanding of the writers and speakers who set the standard of good usage. Pope's rule, though hackneyed, is still the best: "In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold; Alike fantastic, if too new, or old; Be not the first by whom the new are tried, Exercise 52 1. Make an alphabetic list of the slang expressions you have heard about school recently. Indicate precisely how each expression was used. Thus: biff, n. A blow. "I gave him a biff in the eye.“ biff, v. To refuse; to repulse; to slight. crackerjack, n. 1. A select thing; something almost perfect. "He got a crackerjack when he bought that horse." 2. A person having unusual ability or sharpness at any particular thing. "As a pitcher he's a crackerjack." crush, v. To astonish. "Crush him by a perfect recitation.” Are any words in your list abbreviations of words in good use? Example: "exam" for "examination." Do any of the words show a change in pronunciation? Example: "varsity" for "university." Do you find any figurative expressions? Example: "That's a bird of a suit you have on." Account for the origin of as many of the expressions as you can. Finally, express in appropriate language the thought each slang word or phrase seems to suggest. 1 Essay on Criticism, part ii. 2. Make a list of the expressions you have used in conversation recently that are not sanctioned by good usage. 3. Make a list of not more than twenty expressions taken from your written work that violate good usage. 4. Look up two or three of the following references, and then tell how words not in good use may be used effectively in stories and poems: George Eliot, Silas Marner, chaps. vi-vii; Irving Bacheller, Eben Holden, chaps. i-v; S. R. Crockett, The Stickit Minister or The Raiders; Booth Tarkington, The Gentleman from Indiana, chap. x (last part); E. N. Westcott, David Harum, chaps. i-ii; F. H. Burnett, In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim, chap. i; Burns, For A' That An' A' That; Lowell, The Courtin'; J. W. Riley, The Old Swimmin' Hole. 5. Write a paragraph on a subject of your own choosing; revise the paragraph with a view to good usage. SECTION 44 Precision in the Use of Words Good usage determines not only what words are in good use, but also in what senses the words in good use shall be employed. Though many words shade into others almost imperceptibly, and though dictionaries confuse by giving to some words several apparently distinct meanings, good usage assigns to every word in the language some one meaning, or some one shade of meaning, which distinguishes that word from every other word in the language. That is, each word in the language says or implies something which no other word in the language can say or imply. Precision in the use of words requires you to use a word in the sense which good usage assigns to it, and to fit words with the utmost exactness to the thoughts you wish to express. To be precise in your use of words, you must first think with precision, and then find the one word or the one group of words which precisely expresses your thought. It is said of Flaubert that he was possessed with "an absolute belief that there exists but one way of expressing one thing, one word to call it by, one adjective to qualify, one verb to animate it," and that "he gave himself to superhuman labor for the discovery, in every phrase, of that word, that verb, that epithet. In this way, he believed in some mysterious harmony of expression, and when a true word seemed to him to lack euphony, still went on seeking another, with invincible patience, certain that he had not yet got hold of the unique word. . . . A thousand preoccupations would beset him at the same moment, always with this desperate certitude fixed in his spirit: Among all the expressions in the world, all forms and turns of expression, there is but one-one form, one mode - to express what I want to say."1 Exercise 53 1. The following words are frequently misused. Distinguish between enough of them to form the habit of never using a word whose meaning you do not know: Nouns: (1) ability, capacity; (2) acceptance, acceptation; (3) access, accession; (4) act, action; (5) advance, advancement; (6) alternative, choice; (7) avocation, vocation; (8) balance, remainder; (9) character, reputation; (10) college, university; (11) congressman, representative; (12) council, counsel; (13) couple, pair; (14) depot, railroad station; (15) discovery, invention; (16) duty, right; (17) emigration, immigration; (18) falseness, falsity; (19) home, 1 Quoted by Walter Pater in his Essay on Style. See Section 5, note. house, residence; (20) limit, limitation; (21) majority, plurality; (22) necessaries, necessities; (23) observance, observation; (24) part, portion; (25) party, person; (26) pupil, student, scholar; (27) receipt, recipe; (28) relation, relative; (29) significance, signification; (30) site, situation; (31) statue, statute. Verbs: (32) accept, except; (33) admire, like, love; (34) affect, effect; (35) aggravate, provoke; (36) allude, elude, mention; (37) approve, indorse, second; (38) assert, claim, maintain, state; (39) begin, commence; (40) bring, fetch; (41) calculate, intend; (42) counsel, recommend; (43) debase, demean, degrade; (44) desire, want, wish; (45) drive, ride; (46) excuse, pardon; (47) fix, mend, repair; (48) get, have; (49) guess, reckon, think; (50) happen, transpire; (51) lay, lie; (52) learn, teach; (53) leave, let; (54) lend, loan; (55) locate, settle; (56) persecute, prosecute; (57) prescribe, proscribe; (58) propose, purpose; (59) proved, proven; (60) raise, rear ; (61) recollect, remember; (62) set, sit; (63) stay, stop. Adjectives and adverbs: (64) almost, most; (65) angry, mad; (66) apt, liable, likely; (67) awfully, very; (68) bound, determined; (69) capacious, large; (70) common, mutual; (71) continual, continuous; (72) credible, credulous; (73) constantly, often; (74) contemptible, contemptuous; (75) elegant, excellent, pleasing; (76) eminent, prominent; (77) exceptional, exceptionable; (78) extremely, real, really; (79) famous, noted, notorious; (80) funny, odd; (81) healthy, healthful, wholesome; (82) informed, posted; (83) last, latest; (84) last, preceding; (85) oral, verbal; (86) partially, partly ; (87) practicable, practical; (88) some, somewhat; (89) rather, quite; (90) when, while. Prepositions and conjunctions: (91) among, between; (92) above, beyond; (93) after, afterward; (94) as, that; (95) as, like; (96) except, unless; (97) if, but, that; (98) unless, without. You may distinguish between the above words in something like this fashion: - Ability is power to plan, direct, give, or do. Capacity is power to receive or contain. Ability is an active power; capacity is a passive power. Lincoln had the ability to put noble thoughts into homely words. Franklin had a vast capacity for practical knowledge. |