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 beyond 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 history of humankind. (para. 18)