Ambrose Bierce: Write It Right. A Little Blacklist of Literary Faults

The word means entireness, wholeness. It may be rightly used to affirm possession of all the virtues, that is, unity of moral character.

"Proof of the charges will involve his dismissal." Not at all; it will entail it. To involve is, literally, to infold, not to bring about, nor cause to ensue. An unofficial investigation, for example, may involve character and reputation, but the ultimate consequence is entailed. A question, in the parliamentary sense, may involve a principle; its settlement one way or another may entail expense, or injury to interests. An act may involve one's honor and entail disgrace.

"Going into the lion's cage is dangerous; you should not do it." Do so is the better expression, as a rule, for the word it is a pronoun, meaning a thing, or object, and therefore incapable of being done. Colloquially we may say do it, or do this, or do that, but in serious written discourse greater precision is desirable, and is better obtained, in most cases, by use of the adverb.

Commonly used of a narrative in a newspaper. Item connotes an aggregate of which it is a unit – one thing of many. Hence it suggests more than we may wish to direct attention to.

Vulgar, and especially offensive to seamen.

The correct word is jeopard, but in any case there is no need for anything so farfetched and stilted.

Juncture means a joining, a junction; its use to signify a time, however critical a time, is absurd. "At this juncture the woman screamed." In reading that account of it we scream too.

Nothing is gained in strength nor precision by this kind of pleonasm. Omit just.

This needless use of the adjective for the noun is probably supposed to be humorous, like "canine" for dog, "optic" for eye, "anatomy" for body, and the like. Happily the offense is not very common.

"He was that kind of a man." Say that kind of man. Man here is generic, and a genus comprises many kinds. But there cannot be more than one kind of one thing. Kind of followed by an adjective, as, "kind of good," is almost too gross for censure.

Dreadful!

"Last week." "The past week." Neither is accurate: a week cannot be the last if another is already begun; and all weeks except this one are past. Here two wrongs seem to make a right: we can say the week last past. But will we? I trow not.

On is redundant; say, later.

Meaning a place where clothing is washed, this word cannot mean, also, clothing sent there to be washed.

"The ship lays on her side." A more common error is made in the past tense, as, "He laid down on the grass." The confusion comes of the identity of a present tense of the transitive verb to lay and the past tense of the intransitive verb to lie .

A leading question is not necessarily an important one; it is one that is so framed as to suggest, or lead to, the answer desired. Few others than lawyers use the term correctly.

To say of a man that he leases certain premises leaves it doubtful whether he is lessor or lessee. Being ambiguous, the word should be used with caution.

"He left yesterday." Leave is a transitive verb; name the place of departure.

"Leave it alone." By this many persons mean, not that it is to be left in solitude, but that it is to be untouched, or unmolested.

Usually said in disparagement of some wearisome discourse. It is no better than breadthy, or thicknessy.

The words are synonymous, but the latter is the better.

"The regiment had less than five hundred men." Less relates to quantity, fewer, to number.

"The army's operations were confined to a limited area." "We had a limited supply of food." A large area and an adequate supply would also be limited. Everything that we know about is limited.

"Man is liable to err." Man is not liable to err, but to error. Liable should be followed, not by an infinitive, but by a preposition.

"The matter is now like it was." "The house looked like it would fall."

"He will likely be elected." If likely is thought the better word ( and in most cases it is ) put it this way: "It is likely that he will be elected," or, "He is likely to be elected."

"This line of goods." Leave the word to "salesladies" and "salesgentlemen." "That line of business." Say, that business.

"The stream was literally alive with fish." "His eloquence literally swept the audience from its feet." It is bad enough to exaggerate, but to affirm the truth of the exaggeration is intolerable.

"I loaned him ten dollars." We lend, but the act of lending, or, less literally, the thing lent, is a loan.

"After many removals the family located at Smithville." Some dictionaries give locate as an intransitive verb having that meaning, but – well, dictionaries are funny.

"Lots of things." "A lot of talk."

"I love to travel." "I love apples." Keep the stronger word for a stronger feeling.

But do not use luncheon as a verb.

An Americanism of lessening prevalence. It is probable that anger is a kind of madness (insanity), but that is not what the misusers of the word mad mean to affirm.

"The senator maintained that the tariff was iniquitous." He maintained it only if he proved it.

Concerning votes cast in an election, a majority is more than half the total; a plurality is the excess of one candidate's votes over another's. Commonly the votes compared are those for the successful candidate and those for his most nearly successful competitor.

"He makes fifty dollars a month by manual labor."

Usually mere hyperbole, a lamentable fault of our national literature. Even our presidents, before Roosevelt, called their dwelling the Executive Mansion.

See Feminine .

"They mended the road." To mend is to repair, but to repair is not always to mend. A stocking is mended, a road repaired.