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II. FAULTS IN EMPHASIS.

In animated conversation, most persons emphasize correctly because they know clearly what they wish to express; but, in reading the long and involved sentences of literary composition, the faults of untrained readers

are numerous.

1. Sometimes the emphasis is misplaced because the reader does not clearly comprehend the sense of what is read.

2. Sometimes the emphasis is applied at random, without reference to prominent ideas.

3. Sometimes the untrained reader reads in a dull, monotonous tone, without any emphasis whatever.

4. Not unfrequently the pupil overdoes the emphasis, and reads in a jerky, dogmatic manner.

5. There is often a tendency to a regular recurrence of emphasis, combined with the falling inflection, on random words, particularly at the end of every line of poetry, or of every alternate line, or at the end of every phrase or clause.

III. GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF EMPHASIS.

1. Words or groups of words that express leading ideas are emphatic; those that express what is comparatively unimportant, or that merely repeat what has been previously stated, are unemphatic.

2. Words expressing contrast of ideas are emphatic. 3. The subject and predicate of a sentence are, in general, emphatic.

4. Articles, pronouns, and connectives are, in general, unemphatic, though any part of speech may sometimes become emphatic.

5. The emphatic words of a sentence are generally the words most strongly marked by the rising, falling, or circumflex inflection.

IV. DISTINCTION OF EMPHASIS.

Emphasis may be divided into two kinds, antithetic or relative emphasis, and absolute emphasis.

Antithetic emphasis is applied to words that indicate contrast of ideas: Absolute emphasis is used to show the importance of a single word or to express feeling, emotion, or passion.

The degree of emphasis to be applied to words may be considered as slight, moderate, or strong.

V. EXAMPLES OF ANTITHETIC EMPHASIS.

1. He is not a friend but an ènemy.
2. He raised a mórtal to the skies.
She drew an angel down.

3. To be or not to be-that is the question.
4. I come to bury Cæsar, not to praise him.
5. As for me, give me líberty or give me dèath.
6. You cannot dó wrong without suffering wrong.
7. He that cannot béar a jest should not make one.
8. I said my father, not my mother.

9. Tálent is power; táct is skìll.
10. After the snów, the emerald leaves,

After the harvest, golden shèaves.

11. He spoke for education, not against it.

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12. The clerk, in letting Scrooge's nephew out, had let two other people in.

13. Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust.

14. The noblest mind the best contentment has.

15. Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. 16. Give every man thine éar, but few thy voice. 17. Take each man's cénsure, but reserve thy judgment.

18. COMPENSATION.

Polárity, or áction and réaction, we meet in every part of nature-in dárkness and light; in heat and còld; in the ebb and flow of waters; in mále and female; in the inspiration and expiration of plants and ànimals; in the equation of quántity and quality in the fluids of the animal bòdy; in the sýstole and diastole of the heart; in the undulations of fluids and of sound; in the centrífugal and centripetal gravity; in electricity, gálvanism, and chemical affinity. Superinduce magnetism at one end of a needle, the opposite magnetism takes place at the other end. If the south attracts, the north repèls. To empty here, you must condense thère. An inevitable dualism bisects nature, so that each thing is a half and suggests another thing to make it whòle; as, spírit, màtter; mán, wòman; ódd, èven; súbjective, òbjective; ín, dut; úpper, under; mótion, rèst; yéa, này.

All things are double, óne against another-tít for tàt; an eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth; blood for blòod; méasure for measure; love for love. Give and it shall be given you. He that wátereth shall be watered hìmself. What will you have? quoth Gód; pay for it and take it. Nothing venture, nothing have. Thou shalt be paid exactly for what thou hast dòne, no móre, no lèss. Who doth not work shall not eat.

VI. EXAMPLES OF ABSOLUTE EMPHASIS.

EMERSON.

Absolute emphasis is applied to words according to their importance in the sentence, or according to the degree of emotion or passion to be expressed. When words are repeated for the purpose of intensifying emotion, each successive repetition is more forcibly emphasized. 1. It was a turkey! He never could have stood upon his légs, that bird. He would have snapped 'em short off in a minute, like sticks of sealing-wax.

2. What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have?

3. "Revenge! revenge!" the Saxons cried.

4. Then rose the terrible cry of fire! fire! fìre! 5. We must fight; I repeat it, sir, we must fight! 6. "To arms! to arms! to arms!" they cry. 7. Happy, happy, happy páir!

None but the brave,

None but the brave,

None but the brave deserves the fair!

8. CHRISTMAS CAROL.

"Why, bless my soul!" cried Fred, "who's that?" "It's I. Your uncle Scrooge. I have come to dinner. Will you let me in, Fred?"

Let him in! It is a mercy he did n't shake his arm óff. He was at home in five minutes. Nothing could be heàrtier. His niece looked just the same. So did Topper, when he cáme. So did the plump sister, when shě cáme. So did every one when they cáme. Wonderful párty, wonderful games, wonderful unanímity, wŏnderful happiness!

9. GRANDMOTHER'S STORY OF BUNKER-HILL BATTLE.

DICKENS.

Then we cried, "The troops are routed! they are beatit can't be doubted!

God be thanked, the fight is over!"--Ah! the grim old soldier's smile!

Tell us, TELL us why you look so? (we could hardly speak we shook so.)

"Are they beaten? áre they béaten? àre they beaten?" —“Wait awhile.”

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And we shout, "At last they're done for; it's the barges they have run for:

They are beaten! bèaten! BEATEN! and the battle's

over now."

HOLMES.

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But whatever may be our fate, be assúred-be assúred that this declaration will stand. It may cost treasure, and it may cost blood; but it will stand, and it will richly compensate for both. Through the thick gloom of the présent, I see the brightness of the fúture, as the sùn in heaven. We shall make this a glòrious, an immòrtal day. When we are in our gràves, our children will honor it. They will celebrate it with thanksgiving, with festivity, with bonfires, and illuminations. On its annual return, they will shed tears, còpious, gùshing tèars; not of subjection and slávery, not of agony and distréss, but of exultation, of gratitude, and of jòy.

My judgment approves this measure, and my whole heart is in it. All that I have, and all that I am, and all that I hope in this life, I am now ready here to stake upon it; and I leave off as I began, that, live or die, survive or pèrish, I am for the declaration.

11. UNCLE TOBY.

WEBSTER.

“In a fortnight or three weeks," said my uncle Toby, smiling, "he might màrch." "He will never march, an' please your honor, in this world," said the corporal. "He will march," said my uncle Tóby, rising up with one shoe óff. "An' please your honor," said the corporal, "he will never march but to his grave." "He shall march," cried my uncle Toby; "he shall march to his régiment." "He can not stand it," said the corporal. 'He shall be supported," said my uncle Toby. well-a-day, do what we can for him," said Trim, maintaining his point, "the poor soul will die." "He shall nôt," shouted my uncle Toby, with an oath. The Accusing Spirit which flew up to heaven's chancery, blushed as he gave it in, and the Recording Angel, as he wrote it down, dropped a tear upon the word and blotted it out forever.

"Ah,

STERNE.

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