Slips of Speech : a Helpful Book for Everyone Who Aspires to Correct the Everyday Errors of Speaking eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 164 pages of information about Slips of Speech .

Slips of Speech : a Helpful Book for Everyone Who Aspires to Correct the Everyday Errors of Speaking eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 164 pages of information about Slips of Speech .

“Shall you go to town to-morrow?” “I shall.”

“Will you attend to this matter promptly?” “I will.”

Should, Would, Ought

Should is often used in the sense of ought; as, “Mary should remain at
home to-day and wait upon her sick mother.”
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Should and would are employed to express a conditional assertion; as, “I should go to college, if I could secure the necessary means.”  “He would have gone fishing, if his father had been willing.”

Would is often used to express a custom, a determination, or a wish; as, “He would sit all day and moan.”  “Would to God we had died in the land of Egypt.”  “He would go, and his parents could not prevent him.”

Talented

Certain authors and critics, including Coleridge, have objected strongly to the use of talented.  One writer argues that since there is no such verb as to talent, the formation of such a participle as talented cannot be defended, and he further declares that no good writer is known to use it, Webster (The International Dictionary) states that, as a formative, talented is just as analogical and legitimate as gifted, bigoted, moneyed, lauded, lilied, honeyed, and numerous other adjectives having a participial form, but derived directly from nouns and not from verbs.

We must therefore conclude that the use of talented as an adjective is entirely legitimate.

Climb down

The critics generally oppose the use of the expression climb down. 
When the verb is employed without
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its adverbial modifier, the upward direction is always understood.  In figurative language, as “Black vapors climb aloft, and cloud the day,” “The general climbed the heights of fame,” the upward direction is also understood.

But in a specific sense climb is defined “to mount laboriously, especially by the use of hands and feet.”  Here the manner seems to be as important as the direction.  When the same manner must be employed in descending, as a tree, a mast, or a steep, rocky cliff, the general term descend fails to convey the meaning, and to use slip, slide, drop, tumble, fall, would be incorrect.  We are then left to choose between the short and clear, but objectionable, expression climb down and some long and cumbersome equivalent.

Mighty

Never use mighty in the sense of very, or exceedingly.  It is not only inappropriate but inelegant.

Of, From

“She had consumption and died from the disease.”  Say, “died of the disease.”

On, Over, Upon

“Mary called upon her friend.”  Say, “called on her friend.”  “The Senator prevailed over his friends to support his bill.”  Say, “prevailed upon his
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Slips of Speech : a Helpful Book for Everyone Who Aspires to Correct the Everyday Errors of Speaking from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.