*37 a. Repeat Verbs after the conjunctions "than," "as," &c.*
"I think he likes me better than you;" i.e. either "than you like me," or "he likes you."
"Cardinal Richelieu hated Buckingham as sincerely as did the
Spaniard Olivares." Omit "did," and you cause ambiguity.
*38. If the sentence is so long that it is difficult to keep the thread of meaning unbroken, repeat the subject, or some other emphatic word, or a summary of what has been said.*
"Gold and cotton, banks and railways, crowded ports, and populous cities—these are not the elements that constitute a great nation."
This repetition (though useful and, when used in moderation, not unpleasant) is more common with speakers than with writers, and with slovenly speakers than with good speakers.
"The country is in such a condition, that if we delay longer some fair measure of reform, sufficient at least to satisfy the more moderate, and much more, if we refuse all reform whatsoever—I say, if we adopt so unwise a policy, the country is in such a condition that we may precipitate a revolution."
Where the relative is either implied (in a participle) or repeated, the antecedent must often be repeated also. In the following sentence we have the Subject repeated not only in the final summary, but also as the antecedent:—
"But if there were, in any part of the world, a national church regarded as heretical by four-fifths of the nation committed to its care; a church established and maintained by the sword; a church producing twice as many riots as conversions; a church which, though possessing great wealth and power, and though long backed by persecuting laws, had, in the course of many generations, been found unable to propagate its doctrines, and barely able to maintain its ground; a church so odious that fraud and violence, when used against its clear rights of property, were generally regarded as fair play; a church whose ministers were preaching to desolate walls, and with difficulty obtaining their lawful subsistence by the help of bayonets,—such a church, on our principles, could not, we must own, be defended."
*39. It is a help to clearness, when the first part of the sentence prepares the way for the middle and the middle for the end, in a kind of ascent. This ascent is called "climax."*