Composition-Rhetoric Part 53

_C._ Consult the table of contents or opening chapters of any text-book and notice the main divisions.

_D._ Find in text-books five examples of cla.s.sification or division.

_E._ Make one or more divisions of each of the following:--

1. The pupils in your school.

2. Your neighbors.

3. The books in the school library.

4. The buildings you see on the way to school.

5. The games you know how to play.

6. Dogs.

7. Results of compet.i.tion.

+Theme Lx.x.xIX.+--_Write an introductory paragraph showing what divisions you, would make if called upon, to write about one of the following topics:_--

1. Mathematics.

2. The school system of our city.

3. The churches of our town.

4. Methods of transportation.

5. Our manufacturing interests.

6. Games that girls like.

7. The inhabitants of the United States.

(Have you mentioned all important divisions of your subject? Have you included any minor and unimportant divisions? Consider other possible principles of division of your subject. Have you chosen the one best suited to your purpose?)

+163. Exposition of a Proposition.+--Two terms united into a sentence so that one is affirmed of the other become a proposition. Propositions, like terms, may be either specific or general. "Napoleon was ambitious" is a specific proposition; "Politicians are ambitious" is a general one.

When a proposition is presented to the mind, its meaning may not at once be clear. The obscurity may arise from the fact that some of the terms in the proposition are unfamiliar, or are obscure, or misleading. In this case the first step, and often the only step necessary, is the explanation of the terms in the proposition. The following selection taken from Dewey's _Psychology_ ill.u.s.trates the exposition of a proposition by explaining its terms:--

The habitual act thus occurs automatically and mechanically. When we say that it occurs automatically, we mean that it takes place, as it were, of itself, spontaneously, without the intervention of the will. By saying that it is mechanical, we mean that there exists no consciousness of the process involved, nor of the relation of the means, the various muscular adjustments, to the end, locomotion.

It is possible for our listeners or readers to understand each term in a proposition and yet not be able to understand the meaning of the proposition as a whole. When this is the case, we shall find it necessary to make use of methods of exposition discussed later.

EXERCISES

Explain orally the following propositions by explaining any of the terms likely to be unfamiliar or misunderstood:

1. The purpose of muscular contraction is the production of motion.

2. Ping-pong is lawn tennis in miniature, with a few modifications.

3. An inevitable dualism bisects nature.

4. Never inflict corporal chastis.e.m.e.nt for intellectual faults.

5. Children should be led to make their own investigations and to draw their own inferences.

6. The black willow is an excellent tonic as well as a powerful antiseptic.

7. Give the Anglo-Saxon equivalent for "nocturnal."

8. A negative exponent signifies the reciprocal of what the expression would be if the exponent were positive.

+Theme XC.+--_Write an explanation of one of the following:_

1. Birds of a feather flock together.

2. Truths and roses have thorns about them.

3. Where there's a will, there's a way.

4. Who keeps company with a wolf will learn to howl.

5. He gives nothing but worthless gold, who gives from a sense of duty.

6. All things that are, Are with more spirit chased than enjoyed.

7. Be not simply good--be good for something.

8. He that hath light within his own clear breast, May sit i' the center, and enjoy bright day; But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts Benighted walks under the midday sun; Himself is his own dungeon.

(Select the sentence that seems most difficult to you, determine what it means, and then attempt to make an explanation that will show that you thoroughly understand its meaning.)

+164. Exposition by Repet.i.tion.+--In discussing paragraph development (Section 50) we have already learned that the meaning of a proposition may be made clearer by the repet.i.tion of the topic statement. This repet.i.tion may be used to supplement the definition of terms, or it may by itself make clear both the meaning of the terms and of the proposition. Each repet.i.tion of the proposition presents it to the reader in a new light or in a stronger light. Each time the idea is presented it seems more definite, more familiar, more clear. Such statements of a proposition take advantage of the fact that the reader is thinking, and we merely attempt to direct his thought in such a way that he will turn the proposition over and over in his mind until it is understood.

Notice how the following propositions are explained largely by means of repet.i.tions, each of which adds a little to the original statement.

How to live?--that is the essential question for us. Not how to live in the mere material sense only, but in the widest sense. The general problem, which comprehends every special problem, is the right ruling of conduct in all directions under all circ.u.mstances. In what way to treat the body; in what way to treat the mind; in what way to manage our affairs; in what way to bring up a family; in what way to behave as a citizen; in what way to utilize all those sources of happiness which nature supplies--how to use all our faculties to the greatest advantage of ourselves and others--how to live completely? And this being the great thing needful for us to learn, is, by consequence, the great thing which education has to teach. To prepare us for complete living is the function which education has to discharge: and the only radical mode of judging of any educational course, is, to judge in what degree it discharges such functions.

--Herbert Spencer: _Education_.