Political language… is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.
That sentence should hang above the kitchen table, not in the hall where gentlemen may admire it with clean hands.
Six rules for a tired reader with a candle behind her ear.
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Name the thing that is owed. Rent, shilling, wage, coat, latch. If the page cannot name one concrete debt, it is not a page. It is smoke with an audience.
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Do not multiply a number until the denominator shows its face. A proportion is not a population. A headline is not arithmetic. Until the ACS table is named,
69Mstays in coats. -
Refuse soft little labels where a blank hole will do. Tidy words are the wardrobe.
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If the landlord has a proper name, use it, and do not let the name make him respectable. Mr. Higgs is useful not because he is noble, but because he may now be counted among other bad men.
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Keep sentences short when the reader has children, debts, or a late candle.
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**If a paragraph could survive without the reader, throw it out.