Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.
John SteinbeckRead
Syntax, my lad. It has been restored to the highest place in the republic.
Interpretation
The importance of syntax highlights its role in clear communication and understanding.
In this quote, Steinbeck emphasizes the significance of syntax in language and thought, suggesting that the structure of our communication has been recognized as vital to society's functioning. By placing syntax in a prominent position, he points out its foundational role in conveying meaning and fostering meaningful discourse in the republic, reflecting on how language shapes our social interactions and collective identity.
In practice
In a lecture about the significance of language in society, one might quote Steinbeck to highlight the role of syntax.
Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.
At one point, as Samuel urges Adam to raise his boys well regardless of the blood that might be in them, Adam tells him, "You can't make a race horse of a pig." Samuel replies, "No, but you can make a very fast pig.
And when that crop grew, and was harvested, no man had crumbled a hot clod in his fingers and let the earth sift past his fingertips. No man had touched the seed, or lusted for the growth. Men ate what they had not raised, had no connection with the bread. The land bore under iron, and under iron gradually died; for it was not loved or hated, it had no prayers or curses.
The comfortable people in tight houses felt pity at first, and then distaste, and finally hatred for the migrant people.
People do not want advice - they want corroboration.
It is one of the triumphs of the human that he can know a thing and still not believe it.
There is no better way to learn than to teach.
As I've often said, you can shop online and find whatever you're looking for, but bookstores are where you find what you weren't looking for.
A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.
I believe we owe our young an education that captures the exhilarating drama of science.
The aim of education is to guide young persons in the process _x000D_ through which they shape themselves as human persons-armed with knowledge, strength of judgment, and moral virtues-while at the same time conveying to them the spiritual heritage of the nation and the civilization in which they are involved.
It is not like studying German, where you mull along, in a groping, uncertain way, for thirty years; and at last, just as you think you've got it, they spring the subjunctive on you, and there you are. No- and I see now plainly enough, that the great pity about the German language is, that you can't fall off it and hurt yourself. There is nothing like that feature to make you attend strictly to business.
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