Punctuality

“ A right estimate of the value of time is the best and surest foundation for habits of punctuality, for you are not likely to economize time, either for yourself or others, unless you fully realize how valuable it is, and when lost how utterly irreclaimable. ”

“ Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, his principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. ”

“ The easiest and pleasantest way to secure punctuality is for the scholars to come early of their own accord, upon principle. It is evident, from the reports, that many of you do so, but some do not. Now there is no other plan which will not be attended with very serious difficulty, but I am willing to adopt the one which will be most agreeable to yourselves, if it will be likely to accomplish the object. Has any one any plan to propose? ”

“ Constantly striving to promote the prosperity of the household, she should oversee all that goes on in the house, that every department is thoroughly attended to, and that the servants are comfortable, at the same time that their various duties are properly performed.
Cleanliness, punctuality, and method are essentials in the character of a good housekeeper. Without these qualities, no household can be well managed. ”

“ The three great distinctions of time are present, past, and future. All tenses referring to present or future time are called primary tenses, and those referring to past time are called secondary tenses. Now it is a very common law of language that in a complex sentence the tense in the dependent clause should be of the same kind as the tense in the principal clause. In the sentence He says that he is coming, the principal verb, says, is present, that is, is in a primary tense; and is coming, in the dependent clause, is naturally also primary. ”

“ How can we say, In the beginning was the Word, when a word neither exists before, nor lives after, a definite point of time? Can we even say that there is a point of time in which a word exists? Not only are the words in a speaker’s mouth non-existent until they are spoken, and perished the instant they are uttered, but even in the moment of utterance there is a change from the sound which commences to that which ends a word. Such is the reply that suggests itself to me as a bystander. But your opponent the Fisherman has an answer of his own. ”

“ Refrain not to speak, when by speaking you may be useful to others.
Here “when” may not refer to time, but may be equivalent to if, thus introducing a condition under which to speak; or it may be equivalent to because, thus giving a reason. Such meaning would make a sentence very much like No. 49-1.
We find an exact counterpart of No. 53, with similar punctuation, in the following sentence from the New Testament, Common Version:
53-1. Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you.
The same sentence in the Revised Version appears without the comma, thus giving “when” its full sense of time:
53-2. ”

“ If my own work is of any value, or possesses any degree of originality, it is to be found in my efforts to show that the sense relations between groups of words are a large factor in determining the meaning of language, and that a mark of punctuation, or even its absence, sometimes determines a sense relation, and at other times only serves readily to point it out. Neither the comma in illustrative Sentence 1-1 nor the semicolons in Sentence 7 determine meanings: they simply suggest them. ”

“ Amateurs in literary composition soon acquire the bad habit of writing carelessly; they spell strange names in two or more different ways; they form capital letters, and even the small lower-case letters, so obscurely that one word may be mistaken for another; they have no clearly defined system, or at least observe none, for the proper placing of capitals, italic, and the marks of punctuation.
The above sentence is from the preface of what is probably the most complete work on composition written in recent years. ”

“ In the sentence,—“What do you think of your home now that you see it?”—Black, there is certainly more of time than of cause, for if the verb in the principal proposition were changed from the present tense to either past or future, when would be substituted for now that.
What the Time Clause modifies.—Since we use a time clause to tell (1) when a state exists or when an activity is performed, (2) the duration of an activity or a state, it is clear that the clause modifies a word denoting [Pg 57] state or action, namely, a verb. ”

“ From which, of course, it follows that, broadly speaking, every composition—sentence, paragraph, chapter, book—may conveniently begin and end with the words which stand for ideas that we wish to impress on our readers.... Broadly speaking, the office of punctuation is to emphasize,—to do for the eye what vocal pauses and stress do for the ear,—to show what parts of a composition belong together, and among these parts to indicate the most significant. It is clear that periods emphasize more strongly than semi-colons ”

“ SECTION IV.—THE PERIOD. The Period, or Full Stop, is used to mark an entire and independent sentence, whether simple or compound.
RULE I.—DISTINCT SENTENCES. When a sentence, whether long or short, is complete in respect to sense, and independent in respect to construction, it should be marked with the period: as, "Every deviation from truth is criminal. Abhor a falsehood. Let your words be ingenuous. Sincerity possesses the most powerful charm."—"The force of a true individual is felt through every clause and part of a right book ”

“ Expect can relate only to future time, and must be followed by a future tense, or a verb in the infinitive mood; as, "I expect my brother will go to Richmond to-day," "I expect to find those books were sent to Paris last year." Here the introduction of a future tense, or of a verb in the infinitive mood, rectifies the grammar without altering the sense; but such a portion of the sentence must not be omitted in expression, as no such ellipsis is allowable. ”

“ The time used in order to identify a single letter is a quarter of a second, the time to pronounce it one-tenth of a second. Colors and pictures require noticeably more, not because they are not recognized, but because it is necessary to think what the right name is. We are much more accustomed to reading words. ”

“ The punctuating of time at that early period—every thing that gives it an articulate voice—seems of the utmost consequence; for we do not know what scenes in the ideal world may run out of them: a world of interest may hang upon every instant, and we can hardly sustain the weight of future years which are contained in embryo in the most minute and inconsiderable passing events. ”

“ When, however, successive actions are recounted, it is not enough to fix the time to be past or future at the beginning, and to go on with we, as if a particle conjunctive merely of one verb to another, and devoid of the sense of time. ”

“ The aim now is to make a mental note of the several parts which make up the whole. This demands close concentration, in order that we may unify matters and prevent abrupt transitions. We are to break up the whole into parts, and each part represents a thought group.
1. Punctuation makes the meaning clear, and the clear meaning determines the various groups. Example: “It came, rushing in torrents like an avalanche of rock.” We do not pause after “came,” although it is so punctuated. Question: Do you find like instances in the selection under consideration? ”

“ The Period is the simplest punctuation mark. It is simply used to mark the end of a complete sentence that is neither interrogative nor exclamatory.
After every sentence conveying a complete meaning: "Birds fly." "Plants grow." "Man is mortal."
In abbreviations: after every abbreviated word: Rt. Rev. T. C. Alexander, D.D., L.L.D.
A period is used on the title pages of books after the name of the book, after the author's name, after the publisher's imprint: American Trails. By Theodore Roosevelt. New York. Scribner Company.
The Mark of Interrogation is used to ask or suggest a question. ”

“ Conversely, one can give first somewhat less time than it would occupy in prose, without thereby diminishing [Pg 404] its accent. The word and, in the fourth foot, would in prose utterance be allowed almost no time-value; and it may be treated in the same way in the verse, by permitting the pause at the comma to fill up the normal time of the foot. It would seem to be better, however, to give and a fairly distinct utterance for metrical purposes (without, of course, adding any stress) , and thus to approach more closely to the scheme of time-intervals. ”

“ The sixth line is in these words: “Keeping time, time, time, in a sort of Runic rhyme.” We observe that as “time” is here repeated three times, so “tinkle” was repeated three times in the third line. We must have observed, too, that it is “stars” of the fourth line that are said to “twinkle” in the fifth line. The two lines are as closely connected as grammatical construction and the expression of thought could make them. And the sixth line is an obvious continuation of the description. Analytically we say: 1. Keeping time in a rhyme. 2. Keeping time, time, in a rhyme. 3. ”

“ With examples of one's own making, the quotation points may be used or not, as the writer pleases; but not on their insertion or omission, nor even on the quality of the separating point, depends in all cases the propriety or impropriety of using initial capitals. For example: "The Future Tense is the form of the verb which denotes future time; as, John will come, you shall go, they will learn, the sun will rise to-morrow, he will return next week."—Frazee's Improved Gram., p. ”

“ He says to me he will fix up the spelling wherever needed and attend to the punctuating; but all the rest of it will be my own just like I puts it down. I reads and writes very well but someway I never learned to puncture. So the places where it is necessary to be punctual in order to make good sense and keep everything regulation and make the talk sound natural is his doings and also some of the spelling. ”

“ This, if I mistake not, is the normal order of procedure: the mental act is momentary, its formulation in words occupies time; we have our thought to start with, and then go on to give it deliberate expression. ”

“ In accordance with the principle of emphasis at the beginning of the paragraph, the “feature” of the story should be placed in the first group of words of the opening sentence of the lead. Although any of the essential points may be “played up,” some are less likely than others to deserve that emphasis. The time of the event, for example, is generally not a significant point in the story, and therefore stories should seldom begin with “Early this morning,” “At two o’clock this afternoon,” “Yesterday,” or similar unimportant phrases. ”

“ The meaning of voice-changes is understood by children long before the meaning of marks of punctuation is understood; while the full value of marks is rarely understood, even by educated and cultured people.
9
In spoken language the meaning of No. 3 is expressed by a continuous reading with neither pause nor voice-inflection within the sentence. The reading of No. 3-1, in order to convey its meaning to another person, requires quite a different voice process, which may be represented diagrammatically:
3-2. ”

“ This method evidently tends to suspend the sense till the close of the period; for without the verb the sense cannot be complete. And when the verb happens to be the capital word, which is frequently the case, it ought at any rate to be put last, according to another rule, above laid down. I proceed as usual to illustrate this rule by examples. The following period is placed in its natural order.{326}
Were instruction an essential circumstance in epic poetry, I doubt whether a single instance could be given of this species of composition, in any language. ”

“ The apparent meaning of such group of words is the meaning it conveys when read at sight.
The apparent meaning should always be the real meaning. If it is not, the language needs either recasting or regrouping. Recasting is done by changing the positions of words or by the use of new words. Regrouping is done by the use of marks of punctuation, which thus perform their functions. Each of the three end-marks also determines the character of the group it follows, as we have already seen. ”

“ The question of movement resolves itself into these two: how is rapidity of movement obtained, and how can the writer delay the movement. Rapidity is gained by the omission of all unnecessary details, and the use of the shortest, tersest sentences to express the absolutely essential. Dependent clauses disappear; either the sentences are simple, just one sharp statement, or they are made of coördinate clauses with no connectives. Every weight that could clog the story is thrown away, and it runs with the 33 swiftness of the thought. ”

“ A writer must, therefore, observe the rules of punctuation if his writing is to be intelligible.
800. Use a period (.) at the end of declarative and of imperative sentences.
801. Use a period after every abbreviation.
Right. Mr. C. S. McIntyre of the C. R. I. and P. Ry. Co. received a ten per cent increase.
Right. The editors, reporters, feature writers, etc., and the printers, advertising solicitors, circulation men, etc., of the Springfield (Mass.) Republican are all able men.
802. Never use a period at the end of an incomplete sentence element. ”

“ Here the action of trembling is said to take place at the time of another action, the telling of Marion’s name. Notice that from this sentence we get double information, (1) that two actions occur simultaneously, (2) that one is the cause of the other.
Introductory Word.—All time clauses are introduced by some word which in itself denotes time, and which is chosen because of the special meaning attached to it. This word subordinates the clause to the principal proposition, and connects it to that part of the principal proposition which the clause modifies. ”

“ Others use all the points, but misplace them in a most ludicrous manner. A sentence may be made by the omission or addition of a comma to express a meaning exactly opposite to the one it expressed before the little mark was written or erased. The best mode{258} of studying punctuation is to read over what you write, aloud, and put in the points as you would dwell a longer or shorter time on the words, were you speaking. ”