We prefer to use only one mark when required by the text without reference to the parenthesis, and to put it after the parentheses, thus more clearly confining the parenthesis to what precedes.
Our illustrative examples will show these points more clearly.
1. The Senator [Davis] may strongly condemn the measure, but I shall vote for it. [Applause.]
As the above example is quoted matter, the two interpolated words take brackets.
In the above algebraic expression brackets and parentheses are used conventionally to group the letters (algebraic symbols) which they respectively enclose.
Indeed an exceedingly gifted man; Almost all he says is beyond comprehension.
4. Let every one of us please _his_ neighbor for his good to edification.—Romans xv, 2.
5. “Yours of the 14th has just arrived, and I hasten to reply to it.
“Here is a list of the six best novels in the English language:
“Tom Jones. (Fielding.) “Tristam Shandy. (Sterne.) “David Copperfield. (Dickens.) “Henry Esmond. (Thackeray.) “The Cloister and the Hearth. (Reade.) “The Egoist. (Meredith.)
“I don’t know whether ‘Tristam Shandy’ can strictly be called a novel. If the rules of your game cut it out, then I would replace it by
to my mind the most perfect of Scott’s novels.”
While we have not used quotation-marks with our illustrative sentences and examples, practically all of which are quoted, we do so with the above examples, in order to exhibit their use.
The punctuation of this example illustrates the following points:
1. The use of marks of quotation at the beginning of every paragraph, or group of words put in paragraph form, with like closing marks after the last line, informs the reader that the paragraphs quoted appear consecutively in the original.
2. The titles of the books named, with one exception, are not enclosed in marks of quotation in the original. If they were so enclosed, each title in our example would be enclosed in single marks of quotation, in addition to the double marks at the beginning.
3. The name of each novel (Tom Jones, etc.) is treated as a complete sentence, and so takes a period after it. The matter following each sentence (name of a novel) refers to the entire sentence, thus requiring a period within the marks of parenthesis enclosing the name of the author.