WRITERS for publication ought to write just as their matter should appear in print, but often they do not. Though every educated English-speaking person is expected to know how to use his own language correctly, no one needs such knowledge more than the proof-reader does. Very commonly matters of form, as punctuation, capitalization, compounding, and almost entirely the division of words at the ends of lines, are left to the proof-reader’s decision. How shall he decide reasonably if he have not the requisite knowledge? And how shall he have knowledge without study? And how shall he succeed in his study if he use not close thought and wise discretion?

The proof-reader, like every one else, must get at least the foundation of his knowledge through the medium of books. His practical use of knowledge, his faculty for instant perception of error, and his equally useful faculty for merely challenging what an author may wish to keep unchanged—all these must be acquired or confirmed by experience; but books must furnish the groundwork. One who desires thorough equipment as a proof-reader may never cease studying.

Good books on the English language are plentiful, but even the best of them contain statements that are not beyond question. It is our purpose here to note a few questionable teachings, by way of warning against acceptance of anything simply because it is found in any book, and our most prominent example is from a work really good and really authoritative.

An incident will illustrate the aim of the warning. A customer in a New York store, taking up a book treating of word-forms, asked, “Does it follow Webster?” Information that its author had not closely followed any one dictionary, but had made the work for the special purpose of selecting the best forms from all sources, caused instant and almost contemptuous dropping of the book. Evidently that person had no idea that anything in language could be right if not according to Webster. Undoubtedly there are to-day thousands who would instantly decide such a matter in just this way. Each of them has always been accustomed to refer to some one authority, and to think that what is found there must be right. Indeed, so far is this species of hero-worship carried that a critic, reviewing the book on word-forms mentioned above, could hardly find words strong enough to express his condemnation of its author, theretofore unknown to the literary world, for daring to criticise statements made by noted scholars. It is amusing to recall the fact that one of the heroes of this champion’s worship began his career in exactly the way objected to, having devoted a large part of his first book to severe condemnation of some famous grammarians for doing something that he did himself, namely, copying and preserving errors.

Even yet we have not gone back to the earliest recorded condemnation of such hero-worship. One of the most famous of the grammarians scored by our preceding hero was Lindley Murray, and his stated reason for writing on grammar was identical with that of his critic—the work of his predecessors was not sufficiently accurate. Long before Murray’s time, also, “peremptory adhesion unto authority,” as Sir Thomas Brown wrote in the seventeenth century, had been “the mortallest enemy unto knowledge, and that which hath done the greatest execution upon truth.”

Where can “peremptory adhesion unto authority” be found better exemplified than in children’s persistence in believing what they are first taught? Impressions made in childhood days certainly retain a strong hold long afterward, and this should be a powerful incentive toward giving them true impressions. One of the most popular language books now in use in primary schools, if not the most popular, has conversations between teacher and pupil. Here is one: “T.—When I say, falling leaves rustle, does falling tell what is thought of leaves? P.—No. T.—What does falling do? P.—It tells the kind of leaves you are thinking and speaking of.” Is it not simply astounding that our children must learn in school that falling leaves means a kind of leaves?

There is plenty of the same quality in books at the other extreme of schooling—the very popular university grammar, for instance, William Chauncey Fowler’s “English in its Elements and Forms,” which says: “While language has power to express the fine emotions and the subtle thoughts of the human mind with wonderful exactness, still it must be admitted that it is imperfect as a sign of thought. It is imperfect because the thing signified by a term in a proposition either does not exist at all in the mind of the hearer, or because it exists under different relations from what it does in the mind of the speaker. In other words, language is imperfect because the term in a proposition, if it has any meaning in the mind of the speaker, has a different one from what it has in the mind of the hearer. Hardly any abstract term has precisely the same meaning in any two minds; when mentioned, the term calls up different associations in one mind from what it does in another.... The phrase ‘beast of burden’ might, to one mind, mean a horse; to another, a mule; to another, a camel.... It should be added that there is great vagueness in the common use of language, which, in practice, increases its imperfection as a medium of thought.”

Yes, there is “great vagueness,” and here, in passing, is an amusing instance of it by a well-known writer on meteorology: “All cloud which lies as a thin flat sheet must either be pure stratus or contain the word strato in combination.” Did any one ever see a cloud containing the word strato in combination? “Great vagueness” is exemplified also in the grammarian’s own writing, and in a connection that demands a full exposition of it.

We need not quarrel with the expression “thoughts of the human mind” because we do not suppose that animals have mind; but certainly mind would be sufficient, without human, in discussing language. It is another matter, though, that the next sentence shows a constructive method at variance with the rules of grammar, and of a kind which the author himself brands as false syntax in his exercises. Either in the sentence is not in correct construction with the complementary or; it would be if because it were omitted—“because the thing ... either does not exist at all, ... or exists under different relations.” In the last clause, “it exists under different relations from what it does in the mind of the speaker,” what is improperly used, since the antecedent is plural—those which should have been used instead of what; the construction makes does a principal verb, wrongly, because it is used for does exist or exists, and even with the right verb another preposition should be inserted, thus—“from those under which it exists in the mind of the speaker.” The whole sentence would have been much better expressed in this way: “It is imperfect because sometimes a thing mentioned is either not known at all to the hearer, or presents associations to his mind different from those conceived by the speaker.”

The third sentence ludicrously transposes speaker and hearer—“because the term, ... if it has any meaning in the mind of the speaker, has a different one from what it has in the mind of the hearer.” Possibly the writer accidentally placed these words in the wrong order, and the error is one of carelessness; but error it certainly is, for of course the speaker in every instance must suppose that his words mean something, whether his hearers think so or not.

In the fourth sentence “great vagueness” is again shown. What is the meaning of “when mentioned”? As here used, it can mean only “when a term is spoken of as a term,” and that is nonsense. The sentence would be complete and accurately constructed without “when mentioned.”

The fourth sentence also contains the only so-called imperfection which the grammarian mentions, “beast of burden.” Undoubtedly there are many possibilities of ambiguity, but this phrase, chosen to illustrate imperfection, is really one of the beauties of the language. It is absurd to suppose that any one would attribute to such an abstract term a concrete meaning; but even if “beast of burden” does suggest to one person a horse, to another a mule, and to another a camel, there is nothing in that circumstance to prove that language is imperfect. All that is expressed in the phrase is “some kind of beast used for carrying,” and it is not said imperfectly. The imperfection is in the mind of the writer, not in the language—unless he can give a better example. If this author had omitted this section of his work, he would have shortened his book to the extent of half a page, and he would not have afforded a text for preaching against imperfection of mental training. If a thoroughly qualified proof-reader had suggested proper corrections, in the proper way, it must be that the matter would have been bettered; and every proof-reader should know how to make such suggestions.