ellipsis

[dannyw]

Tone,

You usually help me out on my questions on ellipsis. This from the Wordsmith weekly round-up:

"Martin Luther employs a reductio ad absurdum to counter the idea that abuse should be met with disuse: '[W]e must not ... reject [or] condemn anything because it is abused ... [W]ine and women bring many a man to misery and make a fool of him (Ecclus. 19:2; 31:30); so [we would need to] kill all the women and pour out all the wine.'"

Would you have elided that differently: [We] instead of [W]e, for instance?

Best,

Danny

[Dave]

A reader is writing this to Wordsmith and quoting from a Wikipedia article, but has left off the first part of the sentence (On the second point,). Perhaps this should've been indicated by an ellipsis as well.

As for your specific question ([We] instead of [W]e), I wouldn't call this an elision but an editing wherein the bracketed items have been changed by an editor (who perhaps is also the author) to make it more readable. In this instance he's indicating that the original wasn't capitalized, because it was mid-sentence, but needs to be for this quotation. So only the W has been changed (capitalized) and therefore only it is bracketed. The full paragraphs translated and then quoted are

We must, therefore, be on our guard, for the devil is after us, through his apostles, with all his craft and cunning. Now, although it is true, and no one can deny that the images are evil because they are abused, nevertheless we must not on that account reject them, nor condemn anything because it is abused. That would result in utter confusion. God has commanded us not to lift up our eyes unto the sun, etc., that we may not worship them, for they are created to serve all nations. (Deuteronomy 4:19) But there are many people who worship the sun and the stars. Shall we, therefore, essay to pull the sun and stars from the skies? Nay, we will not do it.

Again, wine and women bring many a man to misery and make a fool of him. Shall we, therefore, kill all the women and pour out all the wine?

The semicolon and so don't appear in the quoted material; thus I would think that they should also be included within the brackets surrounding we would need to.

An odd thing here that struck me is that Luther probably didn't write this in English, but perhaps German or Latin; so how important is this English editing?

[Tone]

Danny,
>Tone,
You usually help me out on my questions on ellipsis. This from the Wordsmith weekly round-up:<

I make no claim to expertitude on elision. I mere point out the (frequent mis-) use of the ellipsis by some posters.

But I certainly would not do that which you have done.
I think it is wrong to force "correct" grammar/punctuation by misquoting a quotation.

If I have judged the quoted article correctly, I would probably produce:

"Martin Luther employs a reductio ad absurdum to counter the idea that abuse should be met with disuse: '... we must not ... reject [or] condemn anything because it is abused ... wine and women bring many a man to misery and make a fool of him (Ecclus. 19:2; 31:30)' and '... so ... kill all the women and pour out all the wine'."

Tone