Higher Lessons in English

Higher Lessons in English
by
Alonzo Reed and Braiderd
Kellogg

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Title: Higher Lessons in English

Author: Alonzo Reed and Braiderd Kellogg
Release Date: December, 2004 [EBook #7188] [Yes, we are more than
one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on March 25,
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIGHER
LESSONS IN ENGLISH ***

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** Transcriber's Notes **
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HIGHER LESSONS IN ENGLISH.
A WORK ON ENGLISH GRAMMAR AND COMPOSITION,
IN WHICH THE SCIENCE OF THE LANGUAGE IS MADE
TRIBUTARY TO THE ART OF EXPRESSION.
A COURSE OF PRACTICAL LESSONS CAREFULLY GRADED,
AND ADAPTED TO EVERY-DAY USE IN THE SCHOOL-ROOM.
BY ALONZO REED, A.M.,
FORMERLY INSTRUCTOR IN ENGLISH GRAMMAR IN THE
POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE, BROOKLYN,
AND BRAINERD KELLOGG, LL.D.,
PROFESSOR OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
IN THE POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE, BROOKLYN.
Revised Edition, 1896.

PREFACE.
The plan of "Higher Lessons" will perhaps be better understood if we
first speak of two classes of text-books with which this work is brought
into competition.
+Method of One Class of Text-books+.--In one class are those that aim

chiefly to present a course of technical grammar in the order of
Orthography, Etymology, Syntax, and Prosody. These books give large
space to grammatical Etymology, and demand much memorizing of
definitions, rules, declensions, and conjugations, and much formal
word parsing,--work of which a considerable portion is merely the
invention of grammarians, and has little value in determining the
pupil's use of language or in developing his reasoning faculties. This is
a revival of the long-endured, unfruitful, old-time method.
+Method of Another Class of Text-books.+--In another class are those
that present a miscellaneous collection of lessons in Composition,
Spelling, Pronunciation, Sentence-analysis, Technical Grammar, and
General Information, without unity or continuity. The pupil who
completes these books will have gained something by practice and will
have picked up some scraps of knowledge; but his information will be
vague and disconnected, and he will have missed that mental training
which it is the aim of a good text-book to afford. A text-book is of
value just so far as it presents a clear, logical development of its subject.
It must present its science or its art as a natural growth, otherwise there
is no apology for its being.
+The Study of the Sentence for the Proper Use of Words.+--It is the
plan of this book to trace with easy steps the natural development of the
sentence, to consider the leading facts first and then to descend to the
details. To begin with the parts of speech is to begin with details and to
disregard the higher unities, without which the details are scarcely
intelligible. The part of speech to which a word belongs is determined
only by its function in the sentence, and inflections simply mark the
offices and relations of words. Unless the pupil