[Footnote 1: King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry.]



2


MY DEAR ANTONY,

I alluded, in my first letter to you about English literature, to the
necessity of your learning from the beginning the wide distinction
between what is good and what is bad style.

I do not know a better instance of a display of the difference between
what is fine style and what is not, than may be made by putting side by
side almost any sentence from the old authorised translation of the
Bible and the same sentence from _The Bible in Modern Speech_.

I will just put two quotations side by side:--

"Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not,
neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in
all his glory was not arrayed like one of these."

"Learn a lesson from the wild lilies. Watch their growth. They
neither toil nor spin, and yet I tell you that not even Solomon
in all his magnificence could array himself like one of these."