Practical English Composition Part 23

IV. a.n.a.lysis

Observe the framework. Paragraph 1 states the point to be proved.

Paragraphs 2-5 are composed of examples, arranged thus:

1. The War of 1871.

2. The War of 1905.

3. The Present War.

(a) France.

(b) England.

(c) Germany.

The order, in other words, is at once the order of chronology and that of climax, which combine to make the facts easy to remember. Paragraph 6 summarizes the argument and clinches it by a sharp ant.i.thesis.

V. Exercises

1. Using a similar framework, write an editorial disproving by examples the point made by the writer of the model.

2. Write an editorial proving by examples any proposition which you believe to be true and in which you are deeply interested.

3. Prove or disprove by example any one of the following propositions:

(a) Left-hand batters are better than right-hand batters.

(b) Germans are better ball-players than Irishmen.

(c) Frenchmen cannot play ball.

(d) Men write better than women.

(e) Asphalt pavements are more durable than brick pavements.

(f) Germany has contributed more to the world's culture than England.

(g) College graduates are more successful as statesmen than are self-made men.

(h) Very tall men have ever very empty heads.

(i) Athletes usually succeed well in after life.

(j) Dr. Samuel Johnson was a great wit. (For Johnson, subst.i.tute, if you wish, Geoffrey Chaucer, William Shakespeare, Francis Bacon, Samuel Butler, Alexander Pope, Charles Lamb, Sidney Smith, Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Russell Lowell, or Mark Twain.)

In the model there are twenty-two examples. In your composition there must be at least ten.

VI. Model II

WHAT DOES A MAN PRODUCE?

Among the banners of the unemployed in New York when they came in collision with the police was one reading, "We Want All We Produce."

There is a common impression among Socialistic workmen, encouraged by some of the new-fangled college professors, that the weaver produces all the cloth that comes off the loom he tends, and he is robbed if his wages are only a part of the value of the cloth. But he is only one of a long line of producers, each of whom has to get some of the money for which that cloth is sold.

There was a farmer who grew the raw fiber. There was a railroad that transported the fiber. There was a long list of workmen who did various things in the preparation of that fiber. It took several cla.s.ses of men to convert that fiber into yarn. Some men dug the coal and a railroad hauled it. It took a good many men a considerable time to build the loom and the engine and the mill, and all of them have got to be paid. The men who have paid all these previous cla.s.ses of workers may reimburse themselves out of a part of the proceeds of the bolt of cloth without committing any robbery. What are the dividends but the reimburs.e.m.e.nt of the people that have paid the miners and mechanics and builders for their work before the cloth was sold?

The report of the Comptroller of the Currency shows that the average return on all the shares and bonds of all the corporations in the United States is 4.3 per cent. That doesn't look unreasonable. It isn't very much more than savings-bank interest. Of course, some corporations make very much more, but many must make nothing in order to bring the average down to 4.3 per cent. Besides, there are a few bonds that do not pay 4.5 per cent or more, so that the average return on the shares, which represent the owners.h.i.+p of the mills and factories, would be less than 4.3 per cent.

What does a man produce? Well, put a man with only his bare hands upon a spot of earth, or in a mine hole, or by the side of a stream and how much will he produce? What are the chances that he will not starve to death before he can produce anything? If you give him tools, and "grub-stake" him, in mining lingo, or support him until he has produced something and it has been marketed, the produce of other men has been given him. They have got to be paid for their produce in some way. The man in question can't have all he produces without defrauding the men who produced the tools and food which he used during the time he was getting his product made or extracted.[14]--_Philadelphia Record._

[14] Reprinted by permission of the _Philadelphia Record_.

VII. a.n.a.lysis

1. What is proved by this editorial?

2. The method of Model I consists of overwhelming the enemy with an avalanche of examples. The method of Model II is to define the words used by an opponent and, by a.n.a.lyzing the meaning of what he a.s.serts, to prove that he does not see his way through the question.

3. Note the framework: (Par. 1) "Four W's"; (Par. 2) Statement of Positions of Opponent and Writer; (Par. 3) Exposition of Writer's Position; (Par. 4) Refutation of Opponent's Idea; (Par. 5) Conclusion.

VIII. Exercises

1. Define and discuss the etymology of "collision," "transported,"

"convert," "considerable," "reimburse," "dividend,"

"corporations," "factories," "starve," "lingo," "support,"

"extract," "percentage," "average."

2. Subject for short expository speeches: "Socialism," "Shares,"

"Bonds," "Corporations," "Savings Banks," "Interest."

3. Write an answer to the model.

4. Write an editorial refuting some current fallacy or what you deem such. Use the a.n.a.lytic method of the model.

5. Examine the editorials in some current paper to determine whether they are expository or argumentative, constructive or destructive, if their frameworks are as good as those of the models, if their matter is as convincing, if their style is as good, and if their total effect is better or worse.

IX. Suggested Reading

Thomas Gray's _Elegy in a Country Churchyard_.

X. Memorize

OLD IRONSIDES[15]

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down!