Punctuation the marks hierarchically, in terms of weight". Cecil Hartley's poem identifies their relative values: <poem style=margin:4em;> The stop point out, with truth, the time of pause A sentence doth require at ev'ry clause. At ev'ry comma, stop while "one" you count; At semicolon, "two" is the amount; A colon doth require the time of "three"; The period "four", as learned men agree. </poem> The use of punctuation was not standardised until after the invention of printing. According to the 1885 edition of "The American Printer", the importance of punctuation was noted in various sayings by children such as: <poem style=margin:4em;>
Slovene punctuation punctuation is not changed when using dashes, so an inserted sentence before a comma is usually followed by a comma nonetheless, even though some might see this usage as rather pedantic. A dash at the end of a sentence marks an abrupt end, a breaking of thought or unwillingness to continue: In sentences without a predicate, a dash can represent the connexion between the subject and the object. A dash can introduce direct speech if there is no accompanying sentence before direct speech itself. Dash sometimes separates multiple surnames, though it is more usual to merely use a space. A