ordinate
ancillary ideas; make them take their proper rank in the sentence.
Reduce them to a clause or to a phrase; and if a word justly expresses
the relative importance of the thought, reduce its expression to a
single word.

The Dynamic Point of a Sentence.

In the chapter on paragraphs it was said that one sentence is often
the source of the succeeding sentence; that such a sentence seemed to
be charged like a Leyden jar, and to discharge its whole power through
a single word or phrase; and further, that this word or phrase should
be left free to act,--it should be uncovered. How a sentence can be
arranged so that this word or phrase shall have the prominence it
deserves, and can unhindered transmit the undiminished force of one
sentence to the next, has now been explained. First, such words can be
made dynamic by placing them at the beginning or the end of a
sentence; second, by placing them near the major marks of punctuation;
third, by forcing them from their natural order; and fourth, by the
subdual of the other parts of the sentence. The greatest care in
massing sentences so that none of their power be lost in transmission
is one of the secrets of the literature that carries the reader
irresistibly forward. Sometimes he may be annoyed by the repetition of
phrases; but he cannot get away; he must go forward. In the paragraph
below, quoted from Matthew Arnold, every phrase that is the point from
which the next sentence springs is in a position where it can act
untrammeled. Through it the whole force of the sentence passes:--

"It will be said that it is a very subtle and indirect
action which I am thus prescribing for criticism, and that,
by embracing in this manner the Indian virtue of detachment
and abandoning the sphere of practical life, it condemns
itself as a slow and obscure work. Slow and obscure it may
be, but it is the only proper work of criticism. The mass of
mankind will never have any ardent zeal for seeing things as
they are; very inadequate ideas will satisfy them. On these
inadequate ideas reposes, and must repose, the general
practice of the world. That is as much as saying that
whoever sets himself to see things as they are will find
himself one of a very small circle; but it is only by this
small circle resolutely doing its own work that adequate
ideas will ever get current at all. The rush and uproar of
practica