When you
have invented, and that your business be matter, and not bare form,
or mere ceremony, but some earnest, then are you to proceed to the
ordering of it, and digesting the parts, which is had out of two
circumstances. One is the understanding of the persons to whom you
are to write; the other is the coherence of your sentence; for men's
capacity to weigh what will be apprehended with greatest attention
or leisure; what next regarded and longed for especially, and what
last will leave satisfaction, and (as it were) the sweetest memorial
and belief of all that is passed in his understanding whom you write
to. For the consequence of sentences, you must be sure that every
clause do give the cue one to the other, and be bespoken ere it
come. So much for invention and order.
Modus.--1. Brevitas.--Now for fashion: it consists in four things,
which are qualities of your style. The first is brevity; for they
must not be treatises or discourses (your letters) except it be to
learned men. And even among them there is a kind of thrift and
saving of words. Therefore you are to examine the clearest passages
of your understanding, and through them to convey the sweetest and
most significant words you can devise, that you may the easier teach
them the readiest way to another man's apprehension, and open their
meaning fully, roundly, and distinctly, so as the reader may not
think a second view cast away upon your letter.
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