The ambitious student of speech culture, whether for use in conversation
or in public, will do well to emulate the example of such great
writers. One of the best ways to build a large vocabulary is to note
useful and striking phrases in one's general reading. It is advisable to
jot down such phrases in a note-book, and to read them aloud from time
to time. Such phrases may be classified according to their particular
application,--to business, politics, music, education, literature, or
the drama.

It is not recommended that such phrases should be consciously dragged
into conversation, but the practice of carefully observing felicitous
phrases, and of noting them in writing, cultivates the taste for better
words and a sense of discrimination in their use. Many phrases noted and
studied in this way will unconsciously find their way into one's
expression.

The list of phrases which follows is offered as merely suggestive. In
reading the phrases aloud it is well to think clearly what each one
means, and to fit it into a sentence of one's own making. This simple
exercise, practiced for a few weeks, will produce surprising results by
way of increased facility and flexibility of English style.


It is obviously desirable
I can well imagine
Broadly speaking
An admirable idea
In a literal sense
By sheer force of genius