The great bulk of the writings of the world is in prose. It is the medium of hard sense, of practical knowledge, of argument and of dialogue. Yet often it appeals to the imagination, charms with its beauty and inspires to heroic deeds.
It seems to be generally accepted that four methods of expression are to be found in prose: narration, description, exposition and argumentation. Narration deals with things in action, description with the appearance of things, exposition explains the relations ideas bear to one another, and argumentation not only does this, but tries at the same time to convince. Theoretically, this distinction is very easy to make, for action is the life of narration, appearance the theme of description, explanation and exposition are synonymous, and no one argues but with the hope of convincing. What can man do more than to tell what has been done, tell how a thing looks, show how one thing follows from another or is related to it, and endeavor to bring another person to the same state of mind?

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