"What, then it is said, would you legislate in haste? Would you legislate in times of great excitement concerning matters of such deep concern? Yes, Sir, I would; and if any bad consequences should follow from the haste and excitement, let those be answerable who, when there was no need to haste, when there existed no excitement, refused to listen to any project of reform; nay, made it an argument against reform that the public mind was not excited.... I allow that hasty legislation is an evil. But reformers are compelled to legislate fast, just because bigots will not legislate early. Reformers are compelled to legislate in times of excitement, because bigots will not legislate in times of tranquillity."
Thomas Babington Macaulay: On the Reform Bill, 1832
10. Describe the diction of the next extract. Describe the prevailing kind of sentences. Do you approve of these in such an instance? Explain your answer. Does it remind you—in tone—of any other passage already quoted in this book? What is your opinion of the style?
"There has been a change of government. It began two years ago, when the House of Representatives became Democratic by a decisive majority. It has now been completed. The Senate about to assemble will also be Democratic. The offices of President and Vice-President have been put into the hands of Democrats. What does the change mean? That is the question that is uppermost in our minds today. That is the question I am going to try to answer in order, if I may, to interpret the occasion.
"This is not a day of triumph; it is a day of dedication. Here muster, not the forces of party, but the forces of humanity. Men's hearts wait upon us; men's lives hang in the balance; men's hopes call upon us to say what we will do. Who shall live up to the great trust? Who dares fail to try? I summon all honest men, all patriotic, all forward-looking men to my side. God helping me, I will not fail them, if they will but counsel and sustain me."
Woodrow Wilson: Inaugural, 1918
11. Consider sentence length in the following: Which words are significant? How is concreteness secured?
"Ours is a government of liberty by, through, and under the law. No man is above it and no man is below it. The crime of cunning, the crime of greed, the crime of violence, are all equally crimes, and against them all alike the law must set its face. This is not and never shall be a government either of plutocracy or of a mob. It is, it has been, and it will be a government of the people; including alike the people of great wealth, of moderate wealth, the people who employ others, the people who are employed, the wage worker, the lawyer, the mechanic, the banker, the farmer; including them all, protecting each and everyone if he acts decently and squarely, and discriminating against any one of them, no matter from what class he comes, if he does not act squarely and fairly, if he does not obey the law. While all people are foolish if they violate or rail against the law, wicked as well as foolish, but all foolish—yet the most foolish man in this Republic is the man of wealth who complains because the law is administered with impartial justice against or for him. His folly is greater than the folly of any other man who so complains; for he lives and moves and has his being because the law does in fact protect him and his property."
Theodore Roosevelt at Spokane, 1903