THE-HISTORY-OF-THE-ENGLISH-PARAGRAPH-1894

216 Pages·2021·5.12 MB·English

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THE GIFT OF

3ames Morgan Mnvt

Cornell
University
Library
PE
1439.L67
1894

Historv
of the
English paragraph.

3
1924 026 640 247

Cornell University
Library

The original of this book is in

the Cornell University Library.

There are no known copyright restrictions in

the United States on the use of the text.

http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924026640247

THE HISTORY

OF THE

ENGLISH PARAGRAPH

A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE FACULTY OF

ARTS, LITERATURE, AND
SCIENCE, OF THE

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, IN CANDIDACY

FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR

OF PHILOSOPHY

mUr^Jxi-^c

EDWIN HERBERT LEWIS

CHICAGO

C^e mnibetisfts of att)icago ^tese

1894

/
-

THE
HISTORY

OF THE

ENGLISH
PARAGRAPH

A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE FACULTY OF

ARTS, LITERATURE, AND
SCIENCE, OF THE

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, IN CANDIDACY

FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR

OF PHILOSOPHY

BY

EDWIN HERBERT LEWIS

CHICAGO

Elje ^anibrcsitg of (Hljicago
iPresB

1894

'TV

4

A.Z.85 "7

CONTENTS,

Preface
.
5

CHAPTER
I.

The Mechanical Signs of the Paragraph
1

1

CHAPTER
II.

Rhetorical Theories of the Paragraph
20

CHAPTER
III.

Paragraph-Length and Sentence-Length

'
34.

CHAPTER
IV.

Recent Investigations in Prose- Form:
their Bearing on the His-

tory of the Paragraph
52

CHAPTER
V.

Alfred to Tyndale

,
66

CHAPTER VI.

Tyndale to Temple
75

CHAPTER
VII.

Temple to De Quincey
104

CHAPTER
VIII.

De Quincey to Holmes
i37

CHAPTER
IX.

The Prose Paragraph
: Summary
i6g

Bibliography
'79

APPENDIX.

Notes on the Verse Paragraph of Middle English
185

3

PREFACE,

Historically
considered, the word paragraph means
(a)
a

marginal character or note employed
to direct attention to some

part of the text
;
(d) a character
similar
to
(a), but placed in the

text itself

;
(c) the division of discourse introduced by a paragraph

mark or
by indentation, and
extending
to
the
next paragraph

mark or the next indentation

;
(d) the rhetorical paragraph, that

is,
(c) developed
to
a structural unit capable of organic internal

arrangement.

The plan of the present essay is to discuss, in the first chapter,

(a) and {6) and other mechanical signs of the paragraph
;
in the

second chapter
to
introduce
(<:) for the purpose of further defi-

nition
;
in the next seven chapters to show
the
historical
devel-

opment of
(c) in English prose, first by a statement of the general

development,
then
by
a
particularized
account
according
to

periods, then by a summary of
this account
;
lastly, in an appen-

dix, to offer a few incomplete notes on the development of
{/:) in

Middle English verse.

It is a pleasure to acknowledge here my indebtedness,
first to

Professor W. D. McClintock, who approved the choice of subject,
and made most searching and suggestive comments upon the whole

course of
the
treatment; and
to Professors F. A. Blackburn, W.

C. Wilkinson, and A. H. Tolman,
for many helpful
criticisms.

Professor
L.
A. Sherman, of
the University of Nebraska, gener-

ously furnished me with certain statistics, noted in the text by the

parenthesis
(Sherman).
Mr.
G. W. Gerwig,
of Allegheny,
Pa.,

kindly supplied me
in advance with
the
results of
his
research

concerning the decrease of predication,— research pursued under

Professor Sherman's
direction.
I
have quoted
freely from
his

results, using as reference mark the parenthesis (Gerwig).
In such

5

6
PREFACE.

cases
the expression
" clauses saved " needs a word of explana-

tion.
Mr. Gerwig says
:

" The manifest effect of such verb suppression
is a lightening

of the style of the authors engaging in
it.
A partial
effort was

made
to
find
out
the
line
of
this movement, but no complete

or
final
results were
obtained.
The number
of
clauses
saved

by the substitution of present and
past
participles or by the use

of
appositives was
noted, and
is made a systematic
part of the

present exhibits.
No especial
value
is claimed
for
the
results,

except perhaps
as an
aid
to
later
investigators.
.
.
.
This

exhibit
of
course
includes only the verb
suppressions through

aid of
the simplest
substitutes.
That
there has been
a similar

saving by the use of verbal nouns, gerundive constructions, and

other devices will be apparent to any student."

I have made no effort to extend the line of investigation thus

indicated.
But, since the matter concerns indirectly the develop-

ment
of paragraph
structure,
I have quoted many of Mr. Ger-

wig's results on this point, as suggestive, though incomplete.

Professor W.
I. Knapp, of
this University, was good enough

to
let me examine the
rubrication in certain
rare Romance texts

in
his
possession.
To
the
authorities
of
the
British Museum,

the Cambridge
University Library,
the Astor Library, and
the

Newberry
Library (especially Dr. Karl
Pietsch)
I
owe
repeated

courtesies.
Two other friends, Mr. L. D. Thornton and Mr. W.

E. Moffatt, from time to time lightened for me the burden of the
numerical work
; one of these, Mr. Moffatt, interested himself in

the general
theme, and
called my attention
to several
enlight-

ening facts.

A discussion of the history of the paragraph must necessarily

concern itself chiefly with what De Quincey called
the mechan-

ology of style.
The danger in such
study
is that the method of

investigation may
itself
become mechanical.
But, though no

other method
is
so mechanical as the numerical
method, and

though
I have wished to lay the
chief emphasis upon the purely

rhetorical discussion,
I have not been
able to resist
the tempta-

PREFACE.
7

tion to do a little counting.
For
the
figures obtained
I do not

wish to claim any significance that
is not in them
;
they seem
to

me
interesting
in
themselves, and have proved
to some extent

a means of
testing conclusions reached by freer and more sym-

pathetic reading.
Psychological meaning, too, they must
have,

but
I understand little of
it.
Had time permitted the making of

curves, from the
tables
in hand, to illustrate the exact course of

each
author's numbers,
these
curves would
have
possessed
far

more meaning than
the system of averages
I have had
to
use.

Manifestly, in employing a system of averages, one
is constantly

in danger of implying more than he wishes
to.
For the mere

numerical average may not be the most important thing to know

in a given
case
;
the course
of an
author's
fluctuations
in
sen-

tence length
or paragraph
length, may be the really significant

thing
; and
this matter of
fluctuations I have not been
able
to

deal with adequately.
Again, when, in the
later
chapters, refer-

ences are freely made to a given author's average paragraph length,

it must be remembered that in most cases only a small part of the

author's whole work serves as a basis of induction.
The numer-

ical results are therefore avowedly tentative, and the interpretation

of them
is often inadequate.

E. H.
L.