use as evidence, (2) to run counter to the witness's own interests or prejudices, and (3) to concur with the testimony of other witnesses.

Fallacies. Even after a writer or a speaker is satisfied that the evidence in hand is trustworthy and sufficient, he must examine his reasoning to make sure that from this evidence he has drawn no unwarranted conclusions. Among the fallacies into which he is liable to fall is that of deducing a conclusion from an assumed proposition, and then of using the conclusion so reached as proof of the proposition originally assumed. The nature of this fallacy, which is called BEGGING THE QUESTION, or ARGUING in a Circle, is made clear by the following anecdote:

A woman, on seeing a very small porringer, said to a child, "That must have been the little wee bear's porringer, it is so small"; and then she added, "He must have been smaller than we thought, mustn't he?"

A single word may involve a begging of the question. In the title of Horace Bushnell's work on woman suffrage, "The Reform against Nature," "against" begs the question by assuming that the reform is against nature.

Another common fallacy, known as ARGUING beside the POINT, is that of trying to prove something which is not contained in the proposition in dispute. To prove a man's cleverness as a writer, when the question is whether he has business ability, is to argue beside the point. Still another form of fallacious reasoning consists in assuming a causal connection where none exists, in arguing that because one thing follows another it is caused by that other, the fallacy technically known as POST HOC PROPTER HOC. Instances of this fallacy are the supposition, common in the Middle Ages, that eclipses and comets caused disasters, and the belief among half-educated persons to-day that changes in the moon cause changes in the weather. Another fallacy is that technically called ARGUMENTUM AD HOMINEM,- - that is, an argument based, not on the merits of the case under consideration, but on the weaknesses or the prejudices of the persons addressed. Thus, an argument concerning the wisdom of corporal punishment in schools may be so put as to affect a weakarmed and weak-willed teacher in one way and a strong-armed and strong-willed teacher in another. Again, if A, for example, in order to convince B that written examinations ought to count for more than daily work, lays undue stress on B's success in examinations, he uses an argument ad hominem.

Reductio ad Absurdum.

A common method of refuting a fallacious argument is to show that it proves too much. If the conclusion is true, a general proposition that lies behind it and includes it is also true; to show that this proposition is absurd is to overthrow the argument, a process technically called REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM. Thus, to those who argue that football should be given up because it sometimes occasions severe injuries, the answer may be made that, since all athletic sports may occasion severe injuries, they all ought to be abandoned, a manifest absurdity. Another instance of the use of this method is furnished by the reply to the arguments which attempt to prove by means of an alleged cipher that Bacon wrote the plays attributed to Shakspere. All the arguments adduced in favor of this proposition may, as its opponents contend, be used to prove that anybody wrote anything.

Irony. - A reasoner frequently overthrows a proposition by pretending to agree with his opponent, but really by maintaining with mock seriousness - IRONY the opposite of what he believes. Job is ironical when he says, "No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you." A notable example of irony is Mark Antony's speech over Cæsar's body. Another is Swift's "Argument against Abolishing Christianity," which shows the alleged disadvantages of religion in such a light as to prove them to be advantages:

Another advantage proposed by the abolishing of Christianity is the clear gain of one day in seven, which is now entirely lost, and consequently the kingdom one seventh less considerable in trade, business, and pleasure; besides the loss to the public of so many stately structures now in the hands of the clergy, which might be converted into play-houses, exchanges, market-houses, common dormitories, and other public edifices.

Persuasion. Argument, if understood to mean the process of convincing, is seldom found alone; it is usually combined with PERSUASION, which includes all those processes that make the persons addressed willing to be convinced and ready to carry conviction into action. Cold logic may convince, but will not take firm hold of, those who do not already feel a vital interest in the subject. To inspire interest, a writer or a speaker must himself have interest in what he is saying. "No one," says Scott, "is disposed to weigh any man's arguments more favourably than he himself does, and if you are not

1 Job xii. 2, quoted in Goold Brown's "Grammar of English Grammars."

considered as gravely interested in what you say, and conscious of its importance, your audience will not be so."

Success in persuasion is furthered by the use of concrete examples, by a simple, concise, and sincere style, and by obedience to the principles of variety and climax. In all cases, success depends upon the adaptation of the argument to the character and the circumstances of the persons addressed.

The spirit of persuasion is in Lincoln's appeal to his countrymen "to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace":

Neither party expected for the wai the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow, and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

APPENDIX B

ADDITIONAL DEFINITIONS

FOR the convenience of both teachers and pupils, it has been thought desirable to define and exemplify, in this place, the meaning of certain terms sometimes used in the schoolroom.

An Allegory is a narrative of considerable length which has a figurative meaning; it usually aims to convey moral instruction. Familiar examples of sustained allegories are Spenser's "Faerie Queene," Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress," and Johnson's "Rasselas.” Examples of allegories on a smaller scale are Addison's "Vision of Mirza" and Hawthorne's "Gentle Boy."

A Parable is a short allegory which aims less at enforcing moral instruction of a general character than at bringing out some particular point. The term is rarely used nowadays except in the Biblical

sense.

A Fable is a form of allegory in which the speakers or the actors are usually animals or inanimate things. The fables attributed to Æsop are the oldest and the best known. A modern example is Stevenson's "Tadpole and Frog":

"Be ashamed of yourself," said the frog. had no tail."

"Just what I thought!" said the tadpole. pole."

"When I was a tadpole, I

"You never were a tad

An Epigram was originally "a short poem ending in a witty or ingenious turn of thought";1 but the term is now commonly applied to any short, pointed saying. The following lines, written by Pope for a dog's collar, are an epigram in verse:—

I am his Highness' dog at Kew;

Pray tell me, Sir, whose dog are you:

Other examples are:

If I am Sophocles, I am not beside myself; if I am beside myself, I am not Sophocles. -SOPHOCLES.

A great thing is a great book, but greater than all is a great man. — DISRAELI.

1 The Oxford English Dictionary.

A style in which epigrams abound, or which has the characteristics of an epigram, is called EPIGRAMMATIC. Emerson often wrote in this style:

If we live truly, we shall see truly. It is as easy for the strong man to be strong, as it is for the weak to be weak. When we have new perception, we shall gladly disburden the memory of its hoarded treasures as old rubbish. When a man lives with God, his voice shall be as sweet as the murmur of the brook and the rustle of the corn.

use.

A Barbarism is a word or a phrase that is not now in good English Such a word is "afeard" for " "afraid," "unbeknown for "unknown," "ad" for "advertisement," "furore" for "rage." A gross form of barbarism is called a VULGARISM.

An Impropriety is a word or a phrase used in a sense that is not English. Under this head may be classed many of the misused words enumerated in Part I, -as 'acceptation” for “acceptance," "accession" for "access," "enormity" for "enormousness," etc.

66

A Solecism is a construction that is not English. Errors of this class occur in the misuse of one case or number or tense or mood for another, in the misuse of "can" and "may or "shall" and "will," in the choice of the wrong preposition or conjunction or adverb, etc.

Circumlocution, or Periphrasis, is a roundabout way of saying what might be said directly. Addison uses circumlocution when he calls a fan a "little modish machine." Mr. Dowden uses it when, instead of saying that Mary Godwin had known affliction, he writes, “Mary was herself not unlearned in the lore of pain.” 1

A Paraphrase is a reproduction of a passage in language different from that of the original, and usually less compact. Texts of Scripture are frequently paraphrased by ministers and hymn-writers.

In a Trope (from a Greek word meaning to turn) a word or a phrase is turned from its usual meaning and employed in a figurative, as distinguished from a literal, sense. The commonest kinds of trope are SIMILE, METAPHOR, and PERSONIFICATION.2

Synecdoche is the name of a figure of speech in which a part is put for the whole, a species for the genus, an individual for the species, the abstract for the concrete, or vice versa. Thus, by "twenty sail in the offing," we mean twenty ships; by "our daily bread," we mean

1 Quoted by Mark Twain in the "North American Review," July, 1894. ? These are explained and illustrated on pages 402-409.