The Art of Writing Speaking the English Language | Page 2

violinist should choose to play on a poor violin; or should one say nothing of the smoke nuisance in Chicago because more light and heat penetrate its murky atmosphere than are to be found in cities only a few miles farther north? The truth is, we must regard the bad spelling nuisance, the bad grammar nuisance, the in��rtistic and rambling language nuisance, precisely as we would the smoke nuisance, the sewer-gas nuisance, the stock-yards' smell nuisance. Some dainty people prefer pure air and correct language; but we now recognize that purity is something more than an esthetic fad, that it is essential to our health and well-being, and therefore it becomes a matter of universal public interest, in language as well as in air.
There is a general belief that while bad air may be a positive evil influence, incorrect use of language is at most no more than a negative evil: that while it may be a good thing to be correct, no special harm is involved in being incorrect. Let us look into this point.
While language as the medium of thought may be compared to air as the medium of the sun's influence, in other respects it is like the skin of the body; a scurvy skin shows bad blood within, and a scurvy language shows inaccurate thought and a confused mind. And as a disease once fixed on the skin reacts and poisons the blood in turn as it has first been poisoned by the blood, so careless use of language if indulged reacts on the mind to make it permanently and increasingly careless, illogical, and inaccurate in its thinking.
The ordinary person will probably not believe this, because he conceives of good use of language as an accomplishment to be learned from books, a prim system of genteel manners to be put on when occasion demands, a sort of superficial education in the correct thing, or, as the boys would say, "the proper caper." In this, however, he is mistaken. Language which expresses the thought with strict logical accuracy is correct language, and language which is sufficiently rich in its resources to express thought fully, in all its lights and bearings, is effective language. If the writer or speaker has a sufficient stock of words and forms at his disposal, he has only to use them in a strictly logical way and with sufficient fulness to be both correct and effective. If his mind can always be trusted to work accurately, he need not know a word of grammar except what he has imbibed unconsciously in getting his stock of words and expressions. Formal grammar is purely for critical purposes. It is no more than a standard measuring stick by which to try the work that has been done and find out if it is imperfect at any point. Of course constant correction of inaccuracies schools the mind and puts it on its guard so that it will be more careful the next time it attempts expression; but we cannot avoid the conclusion that if the mind lacks material, lacks knowledge of the essential elements of the language, it should go to the original source from which it got its first supply, namely to reading and hearing that which is acknowledged to be correct and sufficient---as the child learns from its mother. All the scholastic and analytic grammar in the world will not enrich the mind in language to any appreciable extent.
And now we may consider another objector, who says, "I have studied grammar for years and it has done me no good." In view of what has just been said, we may easily concede that such is very likely to have been the case. A measuring stick is of little value unless you have something to measure. Language cannot be acquired, only tested, by analysis, and grammar is an analytic, not a constructive science.
We have compared bad use of language to a scurvy condition of the skin. To cure the skin we must doctor the blood; and to improve the language we should begin by teaching the mind to think. But that, you will say, is a large undertaking. Yes, but after all it is the most direct and effective way. All education should be in the nature of teaching the mind to think, and the teaching of language consists in teaching thinking in connection with word forms and expression through language. The unfortunate thing is that teachers of language have failed to go to the root of the trouble, and enormous effort has counted for nothing, and besides has led to discouragement.
The American people are noted for being hasty in all they do. Their manufactures are quickly made and cheap. They have not hitherto had time to secure that perfection in minute details which constitutes "quality."