The Conjunction
The conjunction, in its simple role as joiner, seems not to have much character, yet its use expresses of relatedness of things, which is bound to have signification. As either coordinator or subordinator of entities, it puts the world into a condition of mutual relationship through which a large variety of ideas may be suggested. From the different ways in which this relationship is expressed, the reader will consciously and even unconsciously infer different things. Sometimes the simple “and ... and” coordination is the expression of childlike mentality, as we saw in our discussion of the compound sentence. On the other hand, in a different speech situation it can produce a quite different effect: readers of the King James version of the Bible are aware of how the “and” which joins long sequences of verses sets up a kind of expectancy which is peculiarly in keeping with sacred text. One gets the feeling from the reiteration of “and” that the story is confirmed and inevitable; there are no contingencies, and everything happens with the double assurance of something foretold. When this pattern is dropped, as it is in a recent “American” version of the Bible, the text collapses into a kind of news story.
The frequent use of “but” to join the parts of a compound sentence seems to indicate a habit of mind. It is found congenial by those who take a “balanced view,” or who are uneasy over an assertion until it has been qualified or until some recognition has been made of its negative. Its influence is in the direction of the cautious or pedantic style because it makes this sort of disjunction, whereas “and” generously joins everything up.
Since conjunctions are usually interpreted as giving the plot of one’s thought, it is essential to realize that they have implicit meanings. They usually come at points where a pause is natural, and there is a temptation, if one may judge by indulgence in the habit, to lean upon the first one that comes to mind without reflecting critically upon its significance, so that although the conjunction may formally connect at this point, its semantic meaning does not aid in making the connection precise. A common instance of this fault is the casual interchange of “therefore” and “thus.” “Therefore” means “in consequence of,” but “thus” means “in this manner” and so indicates that some manner has already been described. “Hence” may take the place of “therefore” but “thus” may not. “Also” is a connective used with unimaginative regularity by poor speakers and writers, for whom it seems to signalize the next thought coming. Yet in precise meaning “also” signifies only a mechanical sort of addition such as we have in listing one item after another. To signalize the extension of an idea, “moreover” is usually more appropriate than “also.” Although “while” is often used in place of “whereas” to mean “on the other hand,” it has its other duty of signifying “at the same time.” “Whereas,” despite its pedantic or legalistic overtone, will be preferred in passages where precise relationship is the governing consideration. On the whole it would seem that the average writer suffers, in the department, from nothing more than poverty of vocabulary. What he does (what every writer does to some extent) is to keep on hand a small set of conjunctions and to use them in a sort of rotation without giving attention to how their distinctive meanings could further his purpose.
The Preposition
The preposition too is a word expressing relationships, but this definition gives only a faint idea of its great resources. When the false rules about the preposition have been set aside, it is seen that this is a tremendously inventive word. Like the adverb, it is a free rover, standing almost anywhere; it is constantly entering into combinations with verbs and nouns, in which it may direct, qualify, intensify, or even add something quite new to the meaning; at other times it combines with some other preposition to produce an indispensable idiom. It has given us “get out,” “put over,” “come across,” “eat up,” “butt in,” “off of,” “in between,” and many other expressions without which English, especially on the vital colloquial level, would be poorer indeed. Thornton Wilder maintains that it is in this extremely free use of the preposition that modern American English shows its superiority over British English. Such bold use of prepositional combinations gives to American English a certain flavor of the grand style, which British English has not had since the seventeenth century. Melville, an author working peculiarly on his own, is characterized in style by this imaginative use of the preposition.
Considered with reference to principle, the preposition seems to do what the adverb does, but to do it with a kind of substantive force. “Groundward,” for example, seems weak beside “toward the ground,” “lengthwise” beside “along the length of,” or “centrally” beside “in the center of.” The explanation may well lie in the preposition’s characteristic position; as a regular orderer of nouns and of verbs, it takes upon itself something of their solidity of meaning. “What is that for?” and “Where did you send it to?” lose none of their force through being terminated by these brief words of relationship.
The Phrase
It will not be necessary to say much about the phrase because its possibilities have been fairly well covered by our discussion of the noun and adjective. One qualifying remark about the force of the prepositional phrase, however, deserves making. The strength normally found in the preposition can be greatly diminished by connection with an abstract noun. That is to say, when the terminus of the preposition is lacking in vigor or concreteness, the whole expression may succumb to vagueness, in which cases the single adjective or adverb will be stronger by comparison. Thus the idea conveyed by “lazy” is largely frustrated by “of a lazy disposition”; that of “mercenary” by “of a mercenary character”; that of “deep” by “of depth,” and so on.
After the prepositional phrase, the most important phrasal combination to examine, from the standpoint of rhetorical usages, is the participial phrase. We could infer this truth from the fact alone that the Greeks made a very extensive use of the participle, as every student of that marvellous language knows. Greek will frequently use a participle where English employs a dependent clause or even a full sentence, so that the English expression “the man who is carrying a spear” would be in Greek “the spear carrying man”; “the one who spoke” would be “the one having spoken” and further accordingly, with even more economy of language than these examples indicate. I am disposed to think that the Greeks developed this habit because they were very quick to see opportunities of subordination. The clarity and subtlety of the Greek language derives in no small part from this highly “organized” character, in which auxiliary thoughts are compactly placed in auxiliary structures, where they permit the central thought to emerge more readily. In English the auxiliary status of the participle (recognized formally through its classification as an adjective) is not always used to like advantage.