C. THE CONCEPTION ESSENTIAL

The conception of composition as an art is essential, then, not only because it is the true conception, but because it provides a satisfactory method of study and practice. Through it we can come to have a just notion of the place that natural ability and individuality should have in our work; we can see the value of studying the theory of composition and models of good writing; we can appreciate the fundamental importance of practice; we can understand the limitations that are imposed upon us by our subject-matter and the character of written language; we can see the necessity of premeditation or design; and we can see the further necessity of bringing multiplicity of details under the molding influence of a few great principles. Scarcely less important is the fact that we are guided away from the embarrassment of assuming that since "writing is writing," we can express ourselves effectively only when we phrase our thought in elevated diction. In other words, we are made to see that writing may be instrumental or useful art as well as fine art. We shall hold to this conception in all the chapters that follow.

READINGS AND EXERCISES

1. If you wish to see the importance of full, accurate communication in a people's life, read C. H. Cooley's Social Organization. Charles Scribner's Sons.

2. Read Luther Halsey Gulick's The Spirit of the Game in the Outlook for March 16, 1907 (Vol. 85, p. 615). This is an interesting presentation of the influence of good spirit on one's work.

3. Professor Palmer's Self-Cultivation in English shows very clearly how anyone can increase the effectiveness of his writing if only he is willing to work. Every student ought to read and reread this little book. It is published by Houghton Mifflin Company.

4. Professor Brander Matthews's article on The Duty of Imitation, in the Outlook, Jan. 14, 1911 (Vol. 97, p. 77), distinguishes between helpful and harmful imitation.

5. Are you personally acquainted with a skilled worker in any art? Do you know how he works? Did you ever talk with him about

his ideals in art? Do you think it would be possible to learn anything from him about writing? Read the Reminiscences of SaintGaudens in the Century Magazine, Vols. 77 and 78.

6. La Farge's Considerations on Painting will be profitable reading for anyone who is interested in imaginative writing. Read especially Chapter II.

7. If you wish to study other classifications of writing that are based upon the essential difference between useful art and fine art, read De Quincey's discussion of the literature of knowledge and the literature of power, Professor J. H. Gardiner's longer discussion of literature of thought and literature of feeling, and Professor C. S. Baldwin's treatment of logical composition and literary composition.

De Quincey, Essays on Style, Rhetoric, and Language, pp. 238-240. Allyn and Bacon.

Gardiner, The Forms of Prose Literature, Introduction. Charles Scribner's Sons.

Baldwin, A College Manual of Rhetoric, Introduction. Longmans, Green, and Company.

CHAPTER II - THE WRITER'S MATERIAL

I. THE IMPORTANCE OF GOOD MATERIAL

IN writing, as in every other art, the first thing to consider is material. To be sure, good material alone will not make writing effective. As Mr. William M. Chase has said concerning material for paintings, one man's picture of a potato may be greater than another's of an angel, because of superior treatment. Similarly, in the field of literature we occasionally find a short story writer like Guy de Maupassant or a poet like Swinburne who, with the slightest material, gains literary eminence through his remarkable technical perfection. Yet cases of this kind are rare. Usually, if what we are asked to read is very slight in substance, we can see no reason for its existence; and quite naturally we exclaim, " Well, what of it?" There is no point for the reader, simply because there was no definite, substantial idea in the mind of the writer. As Voltaire put it, a man must always write badly when he has nothing to say. And Lowell was quite justified in his remark: "Blessed are those who have nothing to say-and cannot be persuaded to say it!" For communication without substance, however graceful or brilliant the technique of the writer, is fundamentally absurd. There can be no real definiteness, no real sincerity, where the writing is essentially empty.

II. THE CHARACTER OF GOOD MATERIAL

All incidents, all facts, all ideas, are not necessarily good material for composition. The writer must not be content with saying something; he must say something significant. In other words, he must exercise judgment in choosing what he is

to write about. First opinions of what is worth most are by no means always supported by maturer judgment. It is evident that the tests applied to material intended for informational writing cannot be used if the writing is designed to amuse or charm. Moreover, all facts are not equally significant, all ideas are not equally sound, all occurrences are not equally true to life; nor will the material that appeals to one reader and suits one occasion be equally well adapted to every other reader and occasion. Considering these differences in the character of material, both in its general possibilities and in its particular availability for a given piece of writing, it is plainly a matter of importance to the student of composition to develop a reliable judgment in determining what is good material and what is not.

A. TRUTH

In the first place, it is essential that the subject-matter be true. No writing can possibly be convincing which conveys material that is in any way false, for a reader will not give his attention long after the reliability and good faith of the writer have come into question. To be sure, there are various kinds of truth. Truth as a quality of writing is never absolute any more than it is necessarily literal. The truth of history or science is one thing, the truth of philosophy or criticism is another; the truth of fiction is not the truth of the fairy tale, nor is the truth of realism the truth of romance.

1. In instrumental writing. In writing that is intended to give information, such as biography or history or science, truth is primarily truth to fact; that is, accuracy. When anyone receives a letter specifying the terms of a business transaction, or reads a newspaper account of some public movement, or consults an encyclopedia for the details of some famous piece of engineering, he wants actual information and he must be able to depend upon the writer to give him the exact truth. Nor is this accuracy in detail, this matter of unassailably true

facts, any mean virtue. But a fuller accuracy is necessary, though often disregarded. As Parkman says in his Introduction to the Pioneers of France in the New World:1 “Faithfulness to the truth of history involves far more than a research, however patient and scrupulous, into special facts. Such facts may be detailed with the most minute exactness, and yet the narrative, taken as a whole, may be unmeaning or untrue. The narrator must seek to imbue himself with the life and spirit of the time. He must study events in their bearings near and remote; in the character, habits, and manners of those who took part in them. He must himself be, as it were, a sharer or a spectator of the action he describes." It is this complete accuracy, this telling of the whole truth, which the "popular" writer so often misses. It is easy to collect facts which are demonstrably true in themselves, yet present them in a way that will seriously violate essential truth. All too often, journalists write sensational articles about public men or public causes which are inaccurate and unfair because they offer incomplete facts. Likewise, the scientist who goes too far in simplifying the facts of nature for the popular mind is seriously misleading. The writer should remember, then, that his social duty demands not only that he adhere to literal truth, but also that he strive after complete truth.

Much writing, however, which appeals primarily to a reader's intellect does not convey facts; it explains or urges ideas. In material of this kind, truth is not truth to fact, but truth to reason; that is, soundness. The writer who has opinions about the social life of his college or his city, about the conduct of a friend or a public official, must test them not so much by their accuracy in matters of fact, but rather by their reasonableness. He must ask himself whether his ideas are the result of clear, true thinking or, on the contrary, thinking which is hasty or superficial or prejudiced. So the difference in the value of two men's discussion of an educational or civic issue may very well be basically a difference in the soundness of the ideas pre1 Copyright by Little, Brown, and Company.