• EXERCISE 3a The following paragraph from The Future of Life by E. O.
Wilson consists of
three sentences: a simple declarative sentence, then a periodic sentence, and
finally a cumulative sentence. Keep the first one as it is: then rewrite the
periodic sentence as cumulative and the cumulative as periodic. Compare
the two paragraphs. Discuss the relationship among the sentences in each
paragraph and the rhetorical effect of syntax on meaning and tone.
The guiding principles of a united environmental movement must be and
eventually will be, chiefly long term. If two hundred years of history of
environmentalism have taught us anything, it is that a change of heart
occurs when people look bevond themselves to others, and then to the rest
of life. It is strengthened when they also expand their view of landscape,
from parish to nation and beyond and their sweep of time from their own
life spans to multiple generations and finally to the extended future his-
tory of humankind, para. 181
• EXERCISE.