a horse, one must ride behind.
Stone walls do not a prison make.
A merry heart goes all the day.
Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just.
As the twig is bent, so the tree is inclined.

10. Describe a town as seen from a particular point of view, or at a
particular time of day, or under particular atmospheric conditions. Make
your description as concrete as possible.

11. Compare your description with this from Stevenson: "The town came down
the hill in a cascade of brown gables, bestridden by smooth white roofs,
and spangled here and there with lighted windows." Stevenson's sentence
contains twenty-five words. How many of them are "color" words? How many
"motion" words? How many of the first twenty-five words in your
description appeal to one or another of the five senses?

12. Narrate as vividly as possible an experience in your own life. Compare
what you have written with the account of Crusoe's escape to the island
(Appendix 5). Which narrative is the more concrete? How much?

<2. Literal vs. Figurative Terms>

Phraseology is literal when it says exactly what it means; is figurative
when it says one thing, but really means another. Thus "He fought bravely"
is literal; "He was a lion in the fight" is figurative. Literal
phraseology as a rule appeals to our scientific or understanding
faculties; figurative to our emotional faculties. Here again, as with
abstraction and concreteness, you should learn to express yourself by
either method.

Both have their advantages and their drawbacks. We all admire the man who
has observed, and can state, accurately. It is upon this belief of ours in
the literal that Defoe shrewdly traffics. (See Appendix 5.) He does not
stir us as some writers do, but he gains our implicit confidence. Dame
Quickly, on the contrary, makes egregious use of the literal. (See
paragraph above EXERCISE - Wordiness III above.) Her facts are accurate,
yes; but how strictly, how unsparingly accurate! And how many of them are
beside the point! She quite convinces us that the devotee of the literal
may be dull.

An advantage of the figurative also is that it may make meanings lucid.
Thus when Burke near the close of his discussion (Appendix 2) wishes to
make it clear that by a law of nature the authority of extensive empires
is slighter in its more remote territories, he has recourse to a figure of
speech: "In large bodies, the circulation of power must be less vigorous
at the extremities. Natu