Word: reader
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...many weak points, and a malevolent critic, like the writer in the Spectator, might have made Mr. Thwing feel very uncomfortably: but the attack is too general and too short-sighted to do that gentleman much damage; the author of the article has wasted a good opportunity. His proof-reader has not learned to spell President Eliot's name. The Spectator contains a very friendly notice of the Harvard Theatricals in New York...
...never been the reader's fortune to meet a man who tries to impress on others his familiarity with every topic under discussion? If such has never been the reader's fortune, he cannot have a very wide acquaintance in college, for there are shoals of men of this description here. One cannot detect them by their walk or their dress, but they betray themselves by their conversation...
...beginnings is not well founded. [See Hill's Rhet., Book II. Chap. VI.] A similar quotation somewhat longer and, if possible, more brilliant will make a good conclusion. The intervening part, the body of the dissertation, should be carefully arranged, and have several marked divisions. Such divisions encourage the reader, for, without counting the remaining pages, he can see that he is drawing nearer the end; and they also are extremely handy when you wish to serve up an extract as a theme or forensic. Treat your subject with all possible skill, and remember that when it proves rather unmanageable...
...World has the following remark (the italics are our own): "Mr. Hill illustrates his treatise by copious citations from the works of others, - in a large part, rumor says, the theses and other exercises in composition of Harvard students; but not wholly so, for he is obviously a watchful reader of all best literature, and has read pencil in hand." Besides the compliment to our literary productions, what a vivid picture those last lines bring before...
...thoughts distracted and wandering away from the subject, which should absorb his whole attention. Instead of brief, simple, terse statements, easily grasped and understood, we have attempts at profound, high-sounding expositions, whose object is to exhibit the learning of the author or utterer, rather than to teach the reader or hearer. Trite sayings, which might be found endurable when succinctly stated, are spun out into a labyrinth of empty phrases, and shallow ideas are harped upon through infinite paragraphs, to give them an importance which they do not deserve...