Grand River times. [volume] (Grand Haven, Mich.) 1851-18??, 1852-03-09
LEARNING THE ARR on CONIPOSITION.


+ LEARNING THE ART OF COMPOSITION.
Whoever" says DIR. johnson, wishes to at
tain an English style, familiar but not coarse,
and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his
days and nights to the volumes of Addison
This is an important suggestion concerning the
presentation of matter or thought. But of what
avail is style to one who is destitute of thought
or matter, and the power Of invention. A per-
son having matter, and good inventive powers
of mind, and design to accomplish by writing,
finds the exercise of composing interesting and
attractive. With the ancients invention was
regarded as the soul of rhetoric; sand the sue
cess of their rhetorical training is to be attribut-
ed mainly to the fact, that their training was
chiefly directed to this department of the art of
composition"
Why does the boy or girl so dread the ap-
proach of the day in school, when the teacher re-
quires composition to be presented! Is not
this dread to be attributed chiefly, to the consd-
Grafton, that the young disciple is ignorant of
what he has to do! Let him be taught TO select
some familiar subject which he knows and fully
understands, and one great essential point is
gained. Young beginners in the art are too
apt to select topics entirely beyond their capac-
ity, and then mourn over their inability to write
anything fit to be read, just as if they had rea-
son to suppose that ideas would flow from the
pen with the ink, that were never conceived in
the minds of these pen-holders
Composition is an art that requires great
amount of practice in order to learn it, Learn
ers should be required to compose exercises dali
ly instead of once in two weeks, as is done in
some schools. Said a County Superintendent
a few years ago, For a long time have motto
ed with regret, the almost entire neglect Of the
art of original compositions in our schools, the
want of proper textbook upon this essential
branch of education. Hundreds graduate from
our Common Schools with no well defined ideas
of the construction of our language Why
should it be otherwise, never having been
taughts How shall they learn without a teach
err! And what proportion of the teachers of
the aforesaid schools have ever studied work
on Rhetoric ?-or, have practiced to any consid-
cradle degree the art of composition?
Mr.. Everett, late President of Harvard COL
lege, in remarks recently made at the dedication
of the High School in Cambridge Mass, said,
81 hold, that to read the English language well,
that is with intelligence, feeling, spirit and eff
feet; to write with despatch neat, handsome,
legible hand, (or it is after a,a great object in
writing to have others able to read what we
wrte) and to be master of the four rules ofarith-
metic, so as to dispose at once with accuracy of
every question of figures which comes up in
practical life,-l say callthis good education;
and if you add the ability to write pure gram
NAUTICAL English, with the help Of very few hard
words, regard it as an excellent education-
These are the tools. You can do much with
them, but youare helpless without them. They
are the foundation; and unless you begin with
these, all your fashy attainments, little natu-
raj philosophy, little mental philosophy, a lit
tie physiology, and little geology, and all the
other ologieS and osophies, are but ostentatious
rubbish.
Is it not a fact that in many of our Common
Schools, spelling, reading, writing, arithmetic
geography, and grammar combining with it the
art of composition, are neglected. in order to
study the ologies and the osophes.' How ma
ny College students have learned English Or
biography, and English grammar! We know
many that have not and never WILL because it is
too late now to do what could only be well done
in childhood either in the family or primary
school-A graduate of one of our colleges re-
Gently boosted that he never studied English
Grammar person standing by, remarked,
: no one would suppose that you ever had, judy
ing you by the manner you use the Queens
English"
Let all who would learn the art of compost |
tlon read observe, and reflect, and so furnish the
mind with NATTER then write. This will exer-
else your inventive powers, which may be great
ly aided by reading good authors, and studying
Quackenbos' I" First Lessons in English Com |
position" Days I" Elements of the art of Rhet-
eric." Rural New Yorker