or Gradation, in rhetoric, a figure wherein the word or expression which ends the first member of a period begins the second, and so on; so that every member will make a distinct sentence, tak- ing its rise from the next foregoing, till the argument and period be beautifully finished; as in the following gradation of Dr Tillotson: "After we have practised good actions a while, they become easy; and when they are easy, we begin to take pleasure in them; and when they please us, we do them frequently; and by frequency of acts, a thing grows into a habit; and confirmed habit is a kind of second nature; and so far as anything is natural, so far it is necessary; and we can hardly do otherwise; nay, we do it many times when we do not think of it."