Do not slight the exercises in these lessons. The study of the lesson is only the beginning of the theoretical knowledge. You do not really know a thing until you put it into practice. You may take a correspondence course on how to run an automobile but you can not really know how to run a machine until you have had the practical experience. There is only one way to become expert in the use of words and that is to use them. Every day try to talk to some one who thinks and reads. While talking watch their language and your own. When a word is used that you do not fully understand, look it up at your very first opportunity and if you like the word use it a number of times until it has become your word.
We have been following in these letters, which are our weekly talks together, the development of the alphabet. It is really a wonderful story. It brings to us most vividly the struggle of the men of the past. Last week we found how they began to use symbols to express syllables, parts of a word. We found that this was a great step in advance. Do you not see that this was not an eye picture but an ear picture? The symbol did not stand for the picture of the object it named but each symbol stood for the sound which composed part of the word.
After a while it dawned upon some one that all the words which man used were expressed by just a few sounds. We do not know just when this happened but we do know that it was a wonderful step in advance. Cumbersome pictures and symbols could be done away with now. The same idea could be expressed by a few signs which represented the few sounds which were used over and over again in all words. Let us not fail to realize what a great step in advance this was. These symbols represented sounds. The appeal was through the ear gate of man, not through the eye gate.
Thus came about the birth of the alphabet, one of the greatest and most momentous triumphs of the human mind. Because of this discovery, we can now form thousands of combinations expressing all our ideas with only twenty-three or twenty-four symbols,—letters that represent sounds. Since we have at our command all of this rich fund of words, let us not be content to possess only a few for ourselves. Add a word daily to your vocabulary and you will soon be surprised at the ease and fluency of your spoken and written speech; and with this fluency in speech will come added power in every part of your life.
Yours for Education,
THE PEOPLE'S COLLEGE.
COMPARISON OF ADVERBS
292. You will recall that we found that adjectives change in form to show different degrees of quality. A few adverbs are compared the same as adjectives. Some form the comparative and superlative degree in the regular way, just as adjectives, by adding er and est; for example:
| Positive | Comparative | Superlative |
|---|---|---|
| soon | sooner | soonest |
| late | later | latest |
| often | oftener | oftenest |
| early | earlier | earliest |
| fast | faster | fastest |
293. Most adverbs form their comparative and superlative by the use of more and most or less and least, just as adjectives do; for example: