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RULE II.

Expressions divided into Simpler Parts.

A semicolon is placed between two or more parts of a sentence, when these, or any of them, are divisible by a comma into smaller portions.

EXAMPLES.

1. Men are not to be judged by their looks, habits, and appearances; but by the character of their lives and conversations, and by their works.

2. The noblest prophets and apostles have been children once; lisping the speech, laughing the laugh, thinking the thought, of boyhood.

3. As we perceive the shadow to have moved, but did not perceive it moving; so our advances in learning, as they consist of such minute steps, are perceivable only by the distance.

REMARK S.

u. It is obvious, that, if the sinaller portions of a sentence require to be separated by a comma from each other, the construction and sense of the whole passage will be more readily perceived, if the larger divisions are set apart by the insertion of a point indicating a ess intimate connection. This will show the propriety of putting a semicolon, in the first example, between the negative and the affirmative portion of the sentence; in the second, between the clause and the series of phrases; and, in the third, between the members.

b. When, however, in a sentence resolvable into two or more larger portions that require to be separated by a semicolon, the last ends with a series of phrases, of which only the final one is capable of subdivision, the comma will usually be found sufficient to distinguish all the final terms. Thus: "As, with a small telescope, a few feet in length and breadth, man learns to survey heavens beyond heavens almost infinite; so, with the aid of limited senses and faculties, does he rise to the conception of what is beyond all visible heavens, beyond all conceivable time, beyond all imagined power, beauty, ant glory."

c. When the insertion of a semicolon would tend to break up the harmony or the dependencies of the thought expressed, the larger portions of a sentence, though its smaller parts are susceptible of being grammatically divided, should be separated only by a comma,

as in the following passage: "Like one of those wondrous rocking stones reared by the Druids, which the finger of a child might vibrate to its centre, yet the might of an army could not move from its place, our Constitution is so nicely poised and balanced, that it seems to sway with every breath of opinion, yet so firmly rooted in the heart and affections of the people, that the wildest storms of treason and fanaticism break over it in vain." This sentence, though containing seven grammatical parts, or pointed groups of words, is divisible into two main portions, the first ending with the word place;" but these larger portions cannot be more separated from each other than the smaller ones, because they are so compactly and finely bound together, that any other mark than a comma would tend to loosen their connection, and to mar the unity which runs throughout the whole passage.

ORAL EXERCISE.

Assign the reason for the insertion of semicolons in the following sentenccs : —

Prosperity is naturally, though not necessarily, attached to virtue and merit; adversity, to vice and folly.

The furnace of affliction may be fierce; but, if it refineth thy soul, the good of one meek thought shall outweigh years of torment.

Every thing that happens is both a cause and an effect; being the effect of what goes before, and the cause of what follows.

There is a fierce conflict of good and evil throughout the universe; but good is in the ascendant, and must triumph at last.

Argument, as usually managed, is the worst sort of conversation; as it is generally, in books, the worst sort of reading.

The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn; and Egypt, Greece, Rome, Gaul, Britain, America, lie folded already in the first man.

He was respectful, not servile, to superiors; affable, not improperly familiar, to equals; and condescending, not supercilious, to those beneath him.

The little, bleak farm, sad and affecting in its lone and extreme simplicity, smiled like the paradise of poverty; when the lark, lured thither by some green barley-field, rose ringing over the solitude.

As a malicious censure, craftily worded and pronounced with assurance, is apt to pass with mankind for shrewd wit; so a virulent maxim in bold expressions, though without any justness of thought, is readily received for true philosophy.

It is the first point of wisdom to ward off evils; the second, to make them beneficial.

The look that is fixed on immortality wears not a perpetual smile; and eyes, through which shine the light of other worlds, are often dimmed with tears.

The golden rule is a protest against selfishness; and selfishness, cleaving as it does to the inmost core of our being, is the besetting sin of the world.

Books are standing counsellors and preachers, always at hand, and always disinterested; having this advantage over oral instructors, that they are ready to repeat their lesson as often as we please.

EXERCISES TO BE WRITTEN.

Agreeably to the Rule (p. 116), insert semicolons in the following sentences: —

By granting that intellectual improvement was unfavorable to productions of the imagination, we should look to the least cultivated minds for bolder flights than to Milton, Pope, or Byron the absurdity of which is seen by the mere statement of it.

Wordsworth, in his poetry, works out wisdom as it comes from the common heart of man, and appeals to that heart in turn causing us to recognize the truth, that there is something in humanity which deserves alike our love and reverence.

The most precious of all possessions is power over ourselves power to withstand trial, to bear suffering, to front danger power over pleasure and pain power to follow our convictions, however resisted by menace and scorn the power of calm reliance in scenes of darkness and storms.

There, cold and lifeless, is the heart which just now was the seat of friendship there, dim and sightless, is the eye whose radiant and enlivening orb beamed with intelligence and there, closed for ever, are those lips on whose persuasive accents we have so often and so lately hung with transport.

But who the melodies of morn can tell? -
The wild brook, babbling down the mountain-side
The lowing herd the sheepfold's simple bell
The pipe of early shepherd, dim descried
In the lone valley echoing far and wide,
The clamorous horn along the cliffs above
The hollow murmur of the ocean-tide
The hum of bees the linnet's lay of love
And the full choir that wakes the universal grove.

Insert commas and semicolons in the following sentences, where they are required by the references : —

Be not anxious impatient over-inquisitive but thoughtful serious and calm. (Page 116, Rule; and p. 37, Rule.)

If ever Christianity appears in its power it is when it erects its trophies upon the tomb when it takes up its votaries where the world leaves them and fills the breast with immortal hope in dying moments. (Page 116, Rule; p. 89, Rule and d; p. 98, Rule.)

When we look up to heaven and behold the sun shining in glory or the moon and the stars walking in brightness untaught nature prompts us to adore Him that made them to bow down and worship in the temple not made with hands. (Page 116, Remark c; p. 98.)

Every particle of dust every grain of sand every minutest atom is an active agent in the mighty whole making itself felt through all the masses in our solar system and through this on all systems in the universe. (Rule, p. 116; and Rule, p. 98.)

When the virtuous father of a family stands before us great in native worth of soul amidst all the outward tokens of poverty and an humble calling what a feeling of honor and sympathy goes forth spontaneously from our hearts to greet that truest expression of human respectability! (Page 116, Remark c; p. 64; p. 79, h.)

As we trust the long tried affection of a human friend when for reasons satisfactory to him he now and then withholds from us his ultimate purposes so pious souls acquiescing in ignorance and conscious of absolute dependence on the Parent Mind dissolve their fears and their doubts in perfect faith. (Page 116, Rule; p. 89, Rule and d; and p. 64.)

There also are the eloquence the literature the poetry of all times and tongues, those glorious efforts of genius that rule with a neverdying sway over our sympathies and affections commanding our smiles and tears kindling the imagination warming the heart filling the fancy with beauty and awing the soul with the sublime the terrible the powerful the infinite. (Page 116, Rule and b; pp. 37, 57, 64, 98.)

Though sometimes on passing from the turmoil of the city and the heats of restless life into the open temple of the silent universe we are tempted to think that there is the taint of earth and here the purity of heaven yet sure it is that God is seen by us through man rather than through nature and that without the eye of our brother and the voices of our kind the winds might sigh and the stars look down on us in vain. (Page 116, Rule; p. 64; p. 98, Rule and b.)

RULE III.

A Series of Expressions having a Common Dependence. When, in a series of expressions, the particulars depend on a commencing or a concluding portion of the sentence, they should be separated from each other by a semicolon, if they are either laid down as distinct propositions, or are of a compound nature.

EXAMPLES.

1. Philosophers assert, that Nature is unlimited in her operations; that she has inexhaustible treasures in reserve; that knowledge will always be progressive; and that all future generations will continue to make discoveries, of which we have not the slightest idea.

2. To give an early preference to honor above gain, when they stand in competition; to despise every advantage which cannot be attained without dishonest arts; to brook no meanness, and stoop to no dissimulation, — are the indications of a great mind, the presages of future eminence and usefulness in life.

3. If we think of glory in the field; of wisdom in the cabinet; of the purest patriotism; of the highest integrity, public and private; of morals without a stain; of religious feelings without intolerance and without extravagance, -the august figure of Washington presents itself as the personation of all these ideas.

REMARKS.

a. The first sentence exemplifies a series of clauses, being each a distinct proposition, but depending all on the words that precede them, namely, "philosophers assert." The second example illustrates a series of expressions, the first two consisting each of a phrase and a clause; the third, of two coupled phrases; and all depending on the portion which concludes the sentence, on the predicate, are the indications of a great mind," &c. The third example exhibits a series of phrases, which, according to Rule XVI., p. 98, would be punctuated only with a comma, were it not for the compound phrase, "of the highest integrity, public and private," the subdivision of which requires to be distinguished by a point less significant than that between the other phrases.

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b. Commas are sometimes preferable to semicolons, when none of the particulars in a series of clauses, except perhaps the last, are

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