reproducing your sentence, omitted from the quotation; and then, of the mangled remains of the sentence, you exclaim, "It "will be hardly believed that he professes "to set this right". I professed nothing of the sort; you must know well, that my attack was against the one word which you have omitted. That this was the case, may clearly be seen on reference to my former letter,* where that word was, and still is, printed in italics, to draw special attention to it. You betray the weakness of your cause when you have recourse to such a suppression.

of an opponent's

Nor is the above instance of misquota-Misquotation the only one in your essay. On page words. 429, you put into my mouth words which I never uttered; words which express a meaning totally at variance with what I said. You enclose the sentence in inverted commas to mark that it is a quotation; and, as if that were not enough, you preface that sentence with this doubly emphatic remark; "these are his words, not mine". You then make me say that I hope "as I

* Page 7.

Misrepresentations.

so strongly advocate our following the "Greeks in the pronunciation of their

proper names, I shall be consistent, and "never again, in reading the Lessons, call "those ancient cities Samaria and Phila"delphia otherwise than Samaria and "Philadelphia." I never had any such thought, nor did I ever express any such wish. These words are not mine; nor are they any more like mine, than I am like you. The original sentence, of which the above is a perversion, will be found on page 30 of my former letter.

But the part of my letter which you most fully notice in your reply, is that which treats of the arrangement of sentences; and, exactly as you suppress, in the instance I have given, the one important word on which the whole of the argument turns; so, in the matter of the arrangement of sentences, you suppress the one important paragraph which qualifies all the rest! You privately draw the teeth of the lion and then publicly show how valiantly you can put your head into his mouth; thus not only damaging your own character for

honesty of representation, but also insulting the intelligence of the public, who, you imagine, can be deceived by such childish performances. The following are the facts of the case. You say, after mentioning the authorities I had named, "The one rule of all others" (!) “which "he" (Mr. Moon) "cites from these au'thorities, and which he believes me to "have continually violated, is this: that ""those parts of a sentence which are most

closely connected in their meaning, should "be as closely as possible connected in "position". Or, as he afterwards quotes "it from Dr. Blair, ‘A capital rule in the arrangement of sentences is, that the "words or members most nearly related

should be placed in the sentence as near "to each other as possible, so as to make “'their mutual relation clearly appear". You then go on to say, "Now doubtless "this rule is, in the main, and for general

guidance, a good and useful one; indeed, "so plain to all, that it surely needed no "inculcating by these venerable writers. But there are more things in the English

language than seem to have been dreamt "of in their philosophy. If this rule "were uniformly applied, it would break "down the force and the living interest of "style in any English writer, and reduce his "matter to a dreary and dull monotony; "for it is in exceptions to its application "that almost all vigour and character of "style consist". Would any personcould any person-in reading the above extract from your reply to my letter, ever imagine that that letter contains such a paragraph as the following? I quote from page 26, where I say, "In contending for "the law of position, as laid down by Lord

Kames, Dr. Campbell, and others, I do "so on the ground, that the observance of "this law contributes to that most essen"tial quality in all writings-perspicuity; " and although I would not, on any account, "wish to see all sentences constructed on

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one uniform plan, I maintain that the "law of position must never be violated "when such violation would in any way "obscure the meaning. Let your meaning "still be obvious, and you may vary your

"mode of expression as you please, and your "language will be the richer for the varia"tion. Let your meaning be obscure, and "no grace of diction, nor any music of a "well-turned period, will make amends to "your readers for their being liable to “misunderstand you". The existence of this paragraph, by which I so carefully qualify the reader's acceptance of Dr. Blair's law of position as a universal rule, you utterly ignore; and, with the most strange injustice, you charge me, through sentence after sentence, and column after column, of your tedious essay, with maintaining that all expressions should be worded on one certain uniform plan. Sentences so arranged are, you say, according to "Mr. Moon's rule". Sentences differing from that arrangement are, you say, a violation of "Mr. Moon's rule". With as much reasonableness might you leave out the word "not", from the ninth commandment, and assert that it teaches, Thou shalt bear false witness against thy "neighbour."

This being your method of conducting