"Phrases may be used to advantage when well learned, the same as sign-words, but they should always be brief and easily made. The claim that the lifting of the pen is equal to the loss of a stroke will not always hold good; it often contributes to ease of writing, and ease in reading. Short, frequently used phrases, learned as you would learn a sign-word, can always be used with the greatest advantage. Three or four strokes joined together may be as easily learned as one stroke; in fact, oftentimes more easily; and in addition they are generally more easily read. Logically it may be urged that this principle could just as well be carried into long phrases as well as short ones, but I do not think it can be. Every practical stenographer, I have no doubt, has in his experience commenced a beautiful phrase that he had well learned, with full confidence that he was to reap a benefit of at least twenty-five per cent, when all at once the speaker varied it a little and made it necessary to strike out the whole thing from the beginning and re-write the words, thereby suffering a loss of considerable time and a good deal of patience. My rule is, use short phrases; have them well learned and as available as sign-words; never extend a phrase over a distinct punctuation mark, or where one should be: and never attempt those phrases that have to be measured, cut out and contracted while you are to follow the speaker."
