Trochaic verse, treated
—Troch. verse, the stress in
—nature of the single-rhymed; error of MURR. et al. concerning the
last syll. in
—how may be changed to coincide with other measures; how is affected
by retrenchment
—confounded with iambic by several gramm. and prosodists
—Strictures on CHURCH., who doubts the existence of the troch. ord.
of verse
—Troch. verse shown in its eight measures
—Trochaics, Eng., the TETRAMETER the most common meas. of
—DR. CAMPB. on
—"Trochaic of One foot," account of.
Trochee, or choree, defined.
Tropes, what figures of rhetoric are so called; signif. of the term.
Trow, its signif., and where occurs; in what person and tenses read.
Truisms and senseless remarks, how to be dealt with in gram.
Tutoyant, to what extent prevalent among the French. See Youyouing, &c.
Type or character, two forms of the letters in every kind of.
U.
U, lett., which (as A, E, I, or O) names itself
—its plur. numb.
—sounds properly its own
—as self-naming, to what equivalent; requires art. a, and not an,
before it
—pronounced with borrowed sound
—long or diphthongal sound, as yu; sound of slender o or oo,
after r or rh.
Unamendable imperfections sometimes found in ancient writings, remarks in relation to.
Unauthorized words, use of, as opposed to purity, PREC. concerning.
Unbecoming, adj., from participle compounded, error of using transitively words of this form; such error how corrected.
Uncertain, the part of speech left, see Equivocal, &c.
Unco-passive voice, or form, of the verb, ("Is being built,") the use
of. conflicts with the older and better usage of the lang.
—the subject of, discussed by BROWN
—the true principle with respect to, stated.
Underlining words, in preparing manuscripts, to denote Italics &c.
Understood, words said, in technical phrase, to be, what such, (Lat., subaudita)
Ungrammatical language by which grammar itself is professedly taught, sample from MURR.; from PINNEO; et al. e diversis, Gram. of E. Gram., passim.
Unity, as a quality of style, in what consists
—required by every sentence
—Precepts aiming at offences against. Unity, THE IDEA OF, how
generally determined, in respect to a collect. noun, whether it
conveys such idea or not.
Usage, as a law of orthography for particular words
—Usage, as it has been, and as it is, the advantage of an exhibition
of, by the grammarian.
Useless words, employment of, as opposed to precision.
UTTERANCE, treated —Utterance, what, and what includes.
V.
V, name and plur. of: —written for a number: —sound of,
Value, &c., nouns of, see Time.
Verbal or participial noun, (see Participial, &c.)
—Verbal forms used substantively, by poet pecul.
VERBS, Etymol. of; —Verb, defined: —why so called: —a perf. definition of, why difficult to form; —CHIEF TERMS, or PRINCIP. PARTS, of an Eng. verb, named and defined. —Verbs. Classes of, with respect to their FORM, named and defined: —do., with respect to their signif., do. —(See Active-Transitive Verb, &c.) Verbs, whole numb, of, in Eng.; the regular, far the most numerous; account of the others —how divided with respect to signif. in most grammars and dictionaries; BROWN'S division —divided by certain grammarians into act., pass., and neut. —MURR, on the distribution of —NIX. on do. —Verbs, in Lat., grammarians of old differed respecting the distribut. of —different methods of distribut. of, by several other authors, noticed —Verbs, most act., may be used either as trans. or as intrans. —some may be used either in an act. or a neut. sense —act. form of, used in a pass. sense; so also PART. in ing, ("The books continue SELLING") —Verbs, Modifications of, named —Moods of, named and defined; (see Infinitive Mood, Indic. Mood, &c.) —Tenses of, named and defined; (see Present Tense, Imperf. Tense, &c.) —Persons and numbers of, what —Conjugations of —how principally conjugated —(See Conjugation) —Verbs, Irreg., List of —simp. irreg., numb. of; whence derived —Redundant, List of —Defective, do. —Verbs irreg. and redund., of what character all former lists of, have been —Verbs, of asking and teaching, construc. of —whether any, in Eng., can govern two cases —suppressed in exclamat. &c. —Verbs, Synt. of —Verbs requiring a regimen, should not be used without an object —Verb, AGREEM. of, with its subject —do., inferred —do., by sylleps., in plur., title of a book —do., in imperat. mood —Verb of the third pers. sing. with a plur. noun of the neut. gend., the use of, a strange custom of the Greeks; such use not existent in Eng. —Verb, AGREEM. of, with infin. phrase or sentence as subject —do., with infin. subject limited, ("FOR MEN TO SEARCH their own glory, IS," &c.) —do., with a nom. in interrog. sentences —do., with a rel., according to the true anteced. of the pron.; (examp. of error from DR. BLAIR) —do., with a nom. limited by adjuncts —do., with composite or converted subjects —do., with each, every, one, &c., as leading words —do., by change of nominative —Verb, the form of, to be adapted to the style —when requires a separate nom. expressed —Verb, AGREEM. of, with a nom. noun collective —do., with joint nominatives —do., with two connected nominatives in appos. —do., with two conn. nominatives emphatically distinguished —do., with two conn. nominatives preceded by each, every, or no —do., with nearest of connected nominatives, and understood to the rest; whether the usage is proper in Eng. —do., with connected nominatives of different persons —do., with connected subjects, one taken affirmat. and the other negat. —do., with two subjects connected by as well as, but, or save —do., with connected subjects preceded by each, every, or no —do., in ellipt. construc. of joint nominatives —do., with distinct subject phrases connected by and —do., with disjunct. nominatives —do., with disagreeing nominatives connected disjunctively —do., when connected nominatives require different forms of the verb —do., with distinct phrases disjunct, connected —Verbs, connected by and, or, or nor, how must agree —discordant, how managed with respect to agreem. —Verb, mixture of the diff. styles of, ineleg. —diff. moods of, not to be used under the same circumstances —when two connected terms require diff. forms of, what insertion is necessary —Verbs of commanding, desiring, expecting, &c., to what actions or events refer —of desisting, omitting, &c., with a part. following, rather than an infin. —of preventing, what should be made to govern —Verb, finite, punc. of —ellips. of, shown —derivation of, from nouns, adjectives, and verbs —poet. peculiarities in the use of
Verbosity, as affecting strength
Verse, in oppos. to prose, what
—Blank verse, as distinguished from rhyme
—Verse, general sense of the term; its derivation and literal
signif.; the visible form of verse
—Verse, as defined by JOH., WALK., et al.; do. by WEBST.
—Verse, Eng., the difficulty of treating the subject of, and from
what this arises
—A verse, or line of poetry, of what consists
—Verse, or poetic measure, the kinds, or orders of, named; (see
Iambic Verse, Trochaic Verse, &c.)
—Verse, the proper reading of
VERSIFICATION, treated
—Versification, defined
—Versification, POE'S (E. A.) notions concerning; his censure of
BROWN'S former definition of; his rejection of the idea of versif.
from the principle of rhythm; his unfortunate derivat. of rhythm
from [Greek: hurithmos,] and vain attempts to explain the term: the
farrago summarily disposed of by BROWN
—EVERETT'S "System of Eng. Versification," account of, and strictures
on
Vision, or imagery, explained
Vocative case of Lat. and Gr. gram., not known in Eng.
Voice, ACTIVE, and PASSIVE, whether necessary terms in Eng. gram.
Vowel, defined
—Vowels named
—W and Y, when vowels; comp.
—Vowel sounds, or vocal elements, the different, how produced
—what are those in Eng.
—how each may be variously expressed by letters; notation of
—Vowels, two coming together, where may be parted in syllabication.
W.
W, its name and plur. numb.
—simpler term than Double-u perhaps desirable; DR. WEBST. on the
lett.
—W, when a vowel
—with vowel foll., sound of
—before h, how pronounced
—in Eng. never used alone as a vowel
—no diphthongs or triphth. in Eng., beginning with.
Wages, noun, plur. by formation; its construe, with a verb.
Walker, J., estimate of his Critical Pronouncing Dictionary —in his lexicography how far followed DR. JOH.
Was, contrary to usage preferred by some to were, in the imperf. sing, of the subj.
We, plur., as representing the speaker and others; how sometimes used in stead of the sing.; sometimes preferred by monarchs to I.
Webster, Dr. N., describes language as comprehending the voice of brutes
—never named the Eng. letters rightly
—his orthography as a standard; do. compared with that of DR. JOH.
—the result to himself of his various attempts to reform our orthog.;
the value of his definitions.
Weight, measure, &c., see Time.
Wert, as used in lieu of wast —its mood not easy to determine; authorities for a various use of.
What, its class and nature
—to what usually applied; its twofold relat. explained
—its numb.; example of solec. in the use of
—as a mere adj., or as a pron. indef.
—its use both as an adj. and as a relative at the same time; do. for
who or which, ludic. and vulg.
—declined
—how to be disposed of in etymolog. parsing; how to be parsed
syntactically
—how becomes an interj.
—used appar. for an adv.; uttered exclamatorily before an adj., to be
taken as an adj., ("WHAT PARTIAL judges are our," &c.,)
—followed by that, by way of pleonasm, ("WHAT I tell you in
darkness, THAT," &c.,)
—with but preceding, ("To find a friend, BUT WHAT" &c.,)
—vulg. use of, for that
—derivation of, from Sax., shown.
Whatever or whatsoever, its peculiarities of construe., the same as
those of what; its use in simp, relation
—its construc. as a double relative; whether it may be supposed
ellipt.
—its declension.
When, where, or while, in what instance not fit to follow the verb is
—When, where, whither, as partaking of the nature of a pron.;
construc, of do., with antecedent nouns of time, &c., how far
allowable
—derivation of, from Anglo-Sax.
Whether, as an interrog. pron.; as a disjunc. conjunc.
—conjunc. corresponsive to or
—as do., its derivation from Sax.
Which, relative
—its former use; to what objects now confined
—its use after a personal term taken by meton. for a thing; do., as
still applicable to persons
—is of all the genders, (in oppos. to MURR., WEBST., et. al.,)
—is less approp. than who, in all personifications
—its construc. when taken in its discrim. sense,
—how differs from the rel. that
—BLAIR'S incorrect remarks respecting
—Which, as rel. or interrog., declined
—Which, sometimes takes whose for its poss.,
—represents a prop. name taken merely as a name, ("Herod
—WHICH is but," &c.,)
—do. nouns of mult, expressing persons, when such are strictly of the
neut. gend., ("The COMMITTEES WHICH" &c.,)
—in what cases is less approp. than that
—does not fitly represent an indicative assertion, ('"Be ATTENTIVE,
without WHICH," &c.,)
—its Sax. derivation shown
—The which, obsol.,
—Which, interrog., what demands,
—to what objects applied
—now used for the obsol. whether.
Whichever, whichsoever, signif. and construc. of
—declension of.
Who, relative
—to what usually applied
—has superseded which, formerly applied to persons, ("Our Father
WHO art" &c.,)
—to be preferred to which, in all personifications
—how differs from the rel. that
—Who, as rel. or interrog., declined,
—Whose, use of, for the defec. poss., of which
—Than whom, (see Than.)
—Who, interrog., what demands
—may be the anteced. of the rel. that
—Who, derivation of, from Sax.
Whoever, and whoso or whosoever, signif. and construc. of
—declens. of
—Whoso and whatso, antiq., import and use of,
Whole, improp. use of, for all. ("Almost the WHOLE inhabitants," HUME.,).
Why, after nouns of cause, (see When, &c.)
—Why, wherefore, therefore, their class.
Will, verb, how varied
—use of, as a principal verb.
Wis, verb, pret. wist, signif. and use of
—Had I wist,
With, for and, (see Cum:)
—added to adv. of direc., with emphat. imperat. ("Up WITH it").
Withal its class and construc. Without, obsol. use of, for
unless or except. Withouten, paragog. and poet. form.
Withinside of Won't, whence formed; its pronunc.
Worcester, Dr. J. E., his Universal and Critical Dictionary WORDS,
treated.
—Word, defined.
—Words distinguished, and the divisions of, defined.
—(See Compound Word.)
—Words, Rules for the figure of;
—simp., when compounding is to be avoided
—when to be joined, or to be written separately
—Words, the nature of, explained
—the consid. of, as comm., and as prop.,
—brevity sought in the comm. use of
—the identity of, in what consists
—unsettled and variable usage with respect to the figure of
—Words that may constitute diff. parts of speech, their construc.
not to be left doubtf.
—the reference of, to other words, do.
—senselessly jumbled, charac. of
—entirely needless, how to be disposed of
—unintelligently misapplied, what indicates,
—Words, PUNCT. of: in pairs; alternated; put absol.; in appos.;
repeated
—Words, derivation of, treated
—most of those regarded as primitives in Eng., may be traced to
ulterior sources
—the study of, its importance
—how the knowledge of, may be promoted with respect to Eng.
—Words, the use of, as affecting Purity
—do., as affect. Propriety
—do., as affect. Precision
—do., as affect. Perspicuity
—do., as affect. Strength
Worshiper, whether properly written with a single or a double p
Worth, its class and construc.
Worthy, admits not ellips. of prep, of before obj. following
Writing, to write, what meant by
X.
X, its name and plur. num. —format. of the plur. of nouns in —why never doubled —written for a number —its sounds
Y.
Y, its name and plur. numb.;
—borrowed first by the Romans from the Greeks, by whom called Ypsilon
—in Eng. is either a vowel or a conson.
—classed with the semivowels
—final, changed or unchanged before terminations
—do., when, by former practice, retained in verbs ending in y,
before conson. terminations
—sounds of
—in poet. format. of adjectives
Ye, nom. plur., solemn style —its use as the obj. case —as a mere explet. in burlesque —its use in the lang. of tragedy —used for thee —in the Eng. Bible not found in the obj. case —Ye and you, promisc. use of, in the same case and the same style, ineleg.
Yes, yea, in a simp. affirmation, construc. and class of —derivation of, from Anglo-Sax.
You, use of, for thou
—You, with was, ("YOU WAS BUILDING,") approved by DR. WEBST. et
al., as the better form for the sing. numb.
—You, and VERB PLUR., in reference to one person, how to be
treated in parsing. Your, facet. in conversation, and how uttered
("Dwells, like YOUR miser, sir," &c., SHAK.,) Yourself, its
pecul. of construc.
Your Majesty, your Highness, &c., see Address.
Youyouing and theethouing, history of
Z.
Z, its name and plur.
—has been called by several names; WALK., on the name
—peculiarity of its ordinary form
—its sounds described
Zeugma, (i.e., JUGATIO, vel CONNEXIO, Sanct.,) the various forms of,
were named and noticed, but not censured, by the ancient grammarians
—constructions of adjectives, referred to the figure, ("ONE or a
FEW judges,"); do. of verbs, ("But HE NOR I FEEL more," YOUNG,)
THE END OF THE INDEX,
AND OF THE GRAMMAR OF ENGLISH GRAMMARS.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Ben Jonson's notion of grammar, and of its parts, was as follows: "Grammar is the art of true and well-speaking a language: the writing is but an accident.
The Parts of Grammar are
Etymology \ which is / the true notation of words,
Syntaxe / \ the right ordering of them.
A word is a part of speech or note, whereby a thing is known or called; and consisteth of one or more letters. A letter is an indivisible part of a syllable, whose prosody, or right sounding, is perceived by the power; the orthography, or right writing, by the form. Prosody, and Orthography, are not parts of grammar, but diffused, like blood and spirits, through the whole."—Jonson's Grammar, Book I.
[2] Horne Tooke eagerly seized upon a part of this absurdity, to prove that Dr. Lowth, from whom Murray derived the idea, was utterly unprepared for what he undertook in the character of a grammarian: "Dr. Lowth, when he undertook to write his Introduction, with the best intention in the world, most assuredly sinned against his better judgment. For he begins most judiciously, thus—'Universal grammar explains the principles which are common to all languages. The grammar of any particular language, applies those common principles to that particular language.' And yet, with this clear truth before his eyes, he boldly proceeds to give a particular grammar; without being himself possessed of one single principle of universal grammar."—Diversions of Purley, Vol. 1, p. 224. If Dr. Lowth discredited his better judgement in attempting to write an English grammar, perhaps Murray, and his weaker copyists, have little honoured theirs, in supposing they were adequate to such a work. But I do not admit, that either Lowth or Murray "begins most judiciously," in speaking of Universal and Particular grammar in the manner above cited. The authors who have started with this fundamental blunder, are strangely numerous. It is found in some of the most dissimilar systems that can be named. Even Oliver B. Peirce, who has a much lower opinion of Murray's ability in grammar than Tooke had of Lowth's, adopts this false notion with all implicitness, though he decks it in language more objectionable, and scorns to acknowledge whence he got it. See his Gram., p. 16. De Suey, in his Principles of General Grammar, says, "All rules of Syntax relate to two things, Agreement and Government."—Foxdick's Tr., p. 108. And again: "None of these rules properly belong to General Grammar, as each language follows, in regard to the rules of Agreement and Government, a course peculiar to itself."—Ibid., p. 109." "It is with Construction [i.e., Arrangement] as with Syntax. It follows no general rule common to all languages."—Ibid. According to these positions, which I do not admit to be strictly true, General or Universal Grammar has no principles of Syntax at all, whatever else it may have which Particular Grammar can assume and apply.
[3] This verb "do" is wrong, because "to be contemned" is passive.
[4] "A very good judge has left us his opinion and determination in this matter; that he 'would take for his rule in speaking, not what might happen to be the faulty caprice of the multitude, but the consent and agreement of learned men.'"—Creighton's Dict., p. 21. The "good judge" here spoken of, is Quintilian; whose words on the point are these: "Necessarium est judicium, constituendumque imprimis, id ipsum quid sit, quod consuetudinem vocemus. * * * In loquendo, non, si quid vitiose multis insederit, pro regula sermonis, amplendum est. * * * Ergo consuetudinem sermonis, vocabo consensum eruditorum sicut vivendi, consenum honorum."—De Inst. Orat., Lib. i. Cap. 6, p. 57.
[5] "The opinion of plenty is amongst the causes of want; and the great quantity of books maketh a show rather of superfluity than lack; which surcharge, nevertheless, is not to be removed by making no more books, but by making more good books, which, as the serpent of Moses, might devour the serpents of the enchanters."—Bacon. In point of style, his lordship is here deficient; and he has also mixed and marred the figure which he uses. But the idea is a good one.
[6] Not, "Oldham, in Hampshire," as the Universal Biographical Dictionary has it; for Oldham is in Lancashire, and the name of Lily's birthplace has sometimes been spelled "Odiam."
[7] There are other Latin grammars now in use in England; but what one is most popular, or whether any regard is still paid to the ancient edict or not, I cannot say. Dr. Adam, in his preface, dated 1793, speaking of Lily, says: "His Grammar was appointed, by an act which is still in force, to be taught in the established schools of England." I have somehow gained the impression, that the act is now totally disregarded.—G. Brown.
[8] For this there is an obvious reason, or apology, in what his biographer states, as "the humble origin of his Grammar;" and it is such a reason as will go to confirm what I allege. This famous compilation was produced at the request of two or three young teachers, who had charge of a small female school in the neighbourhood of the author's residence: and nothing could have been more unexpected to their friend and instructor, than that he, in consequence of this service, should become known the world over, as Murray the Grammarian. "In preparing the work, and consenting to the publicaton, he had no expectation that it would be read, except by the school for which it was designed, and two or three other schools conducted by persons who were also his friends."—Life of L Murray, p. 250.
[9] Grammatici namque auctoritas per se nulla est; quom ex sola doctissimorum oraturum, historicorum, poetarum, et aliorum ideonorum scriptorum observatione, constet ortam esse veram grammaticam. Multa dicenda forent, si grammatistarum ineptias refellere vellem: sed nulla est gloria præterire asellos."—DESPAUTERII Præf. Art. Versif., fol. iii, 1517.
[10] The Latin word for participle is participium, which makes participio in the dative or the ablative case; but the Latin word for partake is participo, and not "participio."—G. BROWN.
[11] This sentence is manifestly bad English: either the singular verb "appears" should be made plural, or the plural noun "investigations" should be made singular.—G. BROWN.
[12] "What! a book have no merit, and yet be called for at the rate of sixty thousand copies a year! What a slander is this upon the public taste! What an insult to the understanding and discrimination of the good people of these United States! According to this reasoning, all the inhabitants of our land must be fools, except one man, and that man is GOOLD BROWN!"—KIRKHAM, in the Knickerbocker, Oct. 1837, p. 361.
Well may the honest critic expect to be called a slanderer of "the public taste," and an insulter of the nation's "understanding," if both the merit of this vaunted book and the wisdom of its purchasers are to be measured and proved by the author's profits, or the publisher's account of sales! But, possibly, between the intrinsic merit and the market value of some books there may be a difference. Lord Byron, it is said, received from Murray his bookseller, nearly ten dollars a line for the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold, or about as much for every two lines as Milton obtained for the whole of Paradise Lost. Is this the true ratio of the merit of these authors, or of the wisdom of the different ages in which they lived?
[13] Kirkham's real opinion of Murray cannot be known from this passage only. How able is that writer who is chargeable with the greatest want of taste and discernment? "In regard to the application of the final pause in reading blank verse, nothing can betray a greater want of rhetorical taste and philosophical acumen, than the directions of Mr. Murray."—Kirkham's Elocution, p. 145. Kirkham is indeed no judge either of the merits, or of the demerits, of Murray's writings; nor is it probable that this criticism originated with himself. But, since it appears in his name, let him have the credit of it, and of representing the compiler whom he calls "that able writer" and "that eminent philologist," as an untasteful dunce, and a teacher of nonsense: "To say that, unless we 'make every line sensible to the ear,' we mar the melody, and suppress the numbers of the poet, is all nonsense."—Ibid. See Murray's Grammar, on "Poetical Pauses;" 8vo, p. 260; 12mo, 210.
[14] "Now, in these instances, I should be fair game, were it not for the trifling difference, that I happen to present the doctrines and notions of other writers, and NOT my own, as stated by my learned censor."—KIRKHAM, in the Knickerbocker, Oct. 1837, p. 360. If the instructions above cited are not his own, there is not, within the lids of either book, a penny's worth that is. His fruitful copy-rights are void in law: the "learned censor's" pledge shall guaranty this issue.—G. B. 1838.
[15] I am sorry to observe that the gentleman, Phrenologist, as he professes to be, has so little reverence in his crown. He could not read the foregoing suggestion without scoffing at it. Biblical truth is not powerless, though the scornful may refuse its correction.—G. B. 1838.
[16] Every schoolboy is familiar with the following lines, and rightly understands the words "evil" and "good" to be nouns, and not adjectives.
"The evil that men do, lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones."—SHAKSPEARE.
Julius Cæsar, Act 3: Antony's Funeral Oration over Cæsar's Body.
Kirkham has vehemently censured me for omitting the brackets in which he encloses the words that be supposes to be understood in this couplet. But he forgets two important circumstances: First, that I was quoting, not the bard, but the grammatist; Second, that a writer uses brackets, to distinguish his own amendments of what he quotes, and not those of an other man. Hence the marks which he has used, would have been improper for me. Their insertion does not make his reading of the passage good English, and, consequently, does not avert the point of my criticism.
The foregoing Review of Kirkham's Grammar, was published as an extract from my manuscript, by the editors of the Knickerbocker, in their number for June, 1837. Four months afterwards, with friendships changed, they gave, him the "justice" of appearing in their pages, in a long and virulent article against me and my works, representing me, "with emphatic force," as "a knave, a liar, and a pedant." The enmity of that effusion I forgave; because I bore him no personal ill-will, and was not selfish enough to quarrel for my own sake. Its imbecility clearly proved, that in this critique there is nothing with which he could justly find fault. Perceiving that no point of this argument could be broken, he changed the ground, and satisfied himself with despising, upbraiding, and vilifying the writer. Of what use this was, others may judge.
This extraordinary grammarian survived the publication of my criticism about ten years, and, it is charitably hoped, died happily; while I have had, for a period somewhat longer, all the benefits which his earnest "castigation" was fit to confer. It is not perceived, that what was written before these events, should now be altered or suppressed by reason of them. With his pretended "defence," I shall now concern myself no further than simply to deny one remarkable assertion contained in it; which is this—that I, Goold Brown, "at the funeral of Aaron Ely," in 1830, "praised, and highly praised, this self-same Grammar, and declared it to be 'A GOOD WORK!'"—KIRKHAM, in the Knickerbocker, Oct., 1837, p. 362. I treated him always courteously, and, on this solemn occasion, walked with him without disputing on grammar; but, if this statement of his has any reasonable foundation, I know not what it is.—G. B. in 1850.
[17] See Notes to Pope's Dunciad, Book II, verse 140.
[18] A modern namesake of the Doctor's, the Rev. David Blair, has the following conception of the utility of these speculations: "To enable children to comprehend the abstract idea that all the words in a language consist but of nine kinds, it will be found useful to explain how savage tribes WHO having no language, would first invent one, beginning with interjections and nouns, and proceeding from one part of speech to another, as their introduction might successively be called for by necessity or luxury."—Blair's Pract. Gram., Pref., p. vii.
[19] "Interjections, I shewed, or passionate exclamations, were the first elements of speech. Men laboured to communicate their feelings to one another, by those expressive cries and gestures which nature taught them."—Dr. Hugh Blair's Lectures, p. 57.
[20] "It is certain that the verb was invented before the noun, in all the languages of which a tolerable account has been procured, either in ancient or modern times."—Dr. Alex. Murray's History of European Languages, Vol. I, p. 326.
[21] The Greek of this passage, together with a translation not very different from the foregoing, is given as a marginal note, in Harris's Hermes, Book III, Chap. 3d.
[22] The Bible does not say positively that there was no diversity of languages before the flood; but, since the life-time of Adam extended fifty-six years into that of Lamech, the father of Noah, and two hundred and forty-three into that of Methuselah, the father of Lamech, with both of whom Noah was contemporary nearly six hundred years, it is scarcely possible that there should have occurred any such diversity, either in Noah's day or before, except from some extraordinary cause. Lord Bacon regarded the multiplication of languages at Babel as a general evil, which had had no parallel but in the curse pronounced after Adam's transgression. When "the language of all the earth" was "confounded," Noah was yet alive, and he is computed to have lived 162 years afterwards; but whether in his day, or at how early a period, "grammar" was thought of, as a remedy for this evil, does not appear. Bacon says, "Concerning speech and words, the consideration of them hath produced the science of grammar. For man still striveth to redintegrate himself in those benedictions, of which, by his fault, he hath been deprived; and as he hath striven against the first general curse by the invention of all other arts, so hath he striven to come forth from the second general curse, which was the confusion of tongues, by the art of grammar; whereof the use in a mother tongue is small, in a foreign tongue more, but most in such foreign tongues as have ceased to be vulgar tongues, and are turned only to learned tongues."—See English Journal of Education, Vol. viii, p. 444.
[23] It should be, "to all living creatures;" for each creature had, probably, but one name.—G. Brown.
[24] Some recent German authors of note suppose language to have sprung up among men of itself, like spontaneous combustion in oiled cotton; and seem to think, that people of strong feelings and acute minds must necessarily or naturally utter their conceptions by words—and even by words both spoken and written. Frederick Von Schlegel, admitting "the spontaneous origin of language generally," and referring speech to its "original source—a deep feeling, and a clear discriminating intelligence," adds: "The oldest system of writing developed itself at the same time, and in the same manner, as the spoken language; not wearing at first the symbolic form, which it subsequently assumed in compliance with the necessities of a less civilized people, but composed of certain signs, which, in accordance with the simplest elements of language, actually conveyed the sentiments of the race of men then existing."—Millington's Translation of Schlegel's Æsthetic Works, p. 455.
[25] "Modern Europe owes a principal share of its enlightened and moral state to the restoration of learning: the advantages which have accrued to history, religion, the philosophy of the mind, and the progress of society; the benefits which have resulted from the models of Greek and Roman taste—in short, all that a knowledge of the progress and attainments of man in past ages can bestow on the present, has reached it through the medium of philology."—Dr. Murray's History of European Languages, Vol. II, p. 335.
[26] "The idea of God is a development from within, and a matter of faith, not an induction from without, and a matter of proof. When Christianity has developed its correlative principles within us, then we find evidences of its truth everywhere; nature is full of them: but we cannot find them before, simply because we have no eye to find them with."—H. N. HUDSON: Democratic Review, May, 1845.
[27] So far as mind, soul, or spirit, is a subject of natural science, (under whatever name,) it may of course be known naturally. To say to what extent theology may be considered a natural science, or how much knowledge of any kind may have been opened to men otherwise than by words, is not now in point. Dr. Campbell says, "Under the general term [physiology] I also comprehend natural theology and psychology, which, in my opinion, have been most unnaturally disjoined by philosophers. Spirit, which here comprises only the Supreme Being and the human soul, is surely as much included under the notion of natural object as a body is, and is knowable to the philosopher purely in the same way, by observation and experience."—Philosophy of Rhetoric, p. 66. It is quite unnecessary for the teacher of languages to lead his pupils into any speculations on this subject. It is equally foreign to the history of grammar and to the philosophy of rhetoric.
[28] "Except ye utter by the tongue words easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? for ye shall speak into the air. There are, it may be, so many kinds of voices in the world, and none of them is without signification. Therefore, if I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto him that speaketh, a barbarian; and he that speaketh, shall be a barbarian unto me."—1 Cor., xiv. 9, 10, 11. "It is impossible that our knowledge of words should outstrip our knowledge of things. It may, and often doth, come short of it. Words may be remembered as sounds, but [they] cannot be understood as signs, whilst we remain unacquainted with the things signified."—Campbell's Philosophy of Rhetoric, p. 160. "Words can excite only ideas already acquired, and if no previous ideas have been formed, they are mere unmeaning sounds."—Spurzheim on Education, p. 200.
[29] Sheridan the elecutionist makes this distinction: "All that passes in the mind of man, may be reduced to two classes, which I call ideas and emotions. By ideas, I mean all thoughts which rise, and pass in succession in the mind. By emotions, all exertions of the mind in arranging, combining, and separating its ideas; as well as the effects produced on all the mind itself by those ideas; from the more violent agitation of the passions, to the calmer feelings produced by the operation of the intellect and the fancy. In short, thought is the object of the one; internal feeling, of the other. That which serves to express the former, I call the language of ideas; and the latter, the language of emotions. Words are the signs of the one: tones, of the other. Without the use of these two sorts of language, it is impossible to communicate through the ear, all that passes in the mind of man."—Sheridan's Art of Reading; Blair's Lectures, p. 333.
[30] "Language is the great instrument, by which all the faculties of the mind are brought forward, moulded, polished, and exerted."—Sheridan's Elocution, p. xiv.
[31] It should be, "These are."—G. B.
[32] It should be, "They fitly represent."—G. B.
[33] This is badly expressed; for, according to his own deduction, each part has but one sign. It should be, "We express the several parts by as many several signs."—G. Brown.
[34] It would be better English to say, "the instruments and the signs."—G. Brown.
[35] "Good speakers do not pronounce above three syllables in a second of time; and generally only two and a half, taking in the necessary pauses."—Steele's Melody of Speech.
[36] The same idea is also conveyed in the following sentence from Dr. Campbell: "Whatever regards the analysis of the operations of the mind, which is quicker than lightning in all her energies, must in a great measure be abstruse and dark."—Philosophy of Rhetoric, p. 289. Yet this philosopher has given it as his opinion, "that we really think by signs as well as speak by them."—Ib., p. 284. To reconcile these two positions with each other, we must suppose that thinking by signs, or words, is a process infinitely more rapid than speech.
[37] That generalization or abstraction which gives to similar things a common name, is certainly no laborious exercise of intellect; nor does any mind find difficulty in applying such a name to an individual by means of the article. The general sense and the particular are alike easy to the understanding, and I know not whether it is worth while to inquire which is first in order. Dr. Alexander Murray says, "It must be attentively remembered, that all terms run from a general to a particular sense. The work of abstraction, the ascent from individual feelings to classes of these, was finished before terms were invented. Man was silent till he had formed some ideas to communicate; and association of his perceptions soon led him to think and reason in ordinary matters."—Hist. of European Languages, Vol. I, p. 94. And, in a note upon this passage, he adds: "This is to be understood of primitive or radical terms. By the assertion that man was silent till he had formed ideas to communicate, is not meant, that any of our species were originally destitute of the natural expressions of feeling or thought. All that it implies, is, that man had been subjected, during an uncertain period of time, to the impressions made on his senses by the material world, before he began to express the natural varieties of these by articulated sounds. * * * * * * Though the abstraction which formed such classes, might be greatly aided or supported by the signs; yet it were absurd to suppose that the sign was invented, till the sense demanded it."—Ib., p. 399.
[38] Dr. Alexander Murray too, In accounting for the frequent abbreviation of words, seems to suggest the possibility of giving them the celerity of thought: "Contraction is a change which results from a propensity to make the signs as rapid as the thoughts which they express. Harsh combinations soon suffer contraction. Very long words preserve only the principal, that is, the accented part. If a nation accents its words on the last syllable, the preceding ones will often be short, and liable to contraction. If it follow a contrary practice, the terminations are apt to decay."—History of European Languages, Vol. I, p. 172.
[39] "We cannot form a distinct idea of any moral or intellectual quality, unless we find some trace of it in ourselves."—Beattie's Moral Science, Part Second, Natural Theology, Chap. II, No. 424.
[40] "Aristotle tells us that the world is a copy or transcript of those ideas which are in the mind of the first Being, and that those ideas which are in the mind of man, are a transcript of the world. To this we may add, that words are the transcripts of those ideas which are in the mind of man, and that writing or printing are [is] the transcript of words."—Addison, Spect., No. 166.
[41] Bolingbroke on Retirement and Study, Letters on History, p. 364.
[42] See this passage in "The Economy of Human Life," p. 105—a work feigned to be a compend of Chinese maxims, but now generally understood to have been written or compiled by Robert Dodsley, an eminent and ingenious bookseller in London.
[43] "Those philosophers whose ideas of being and knowledge are derived from body and sensation, have a short method to explain the nature of Truth.—It is a factitious thing, made by every man for himself; which comes and goes, just as it is remembered and forgot; which in the order of things makes its appearance the last of all, being not only subsequent to sensible objects, but even to our sensations of them! According to this hypothesis, there are many truths, which have been, and are no longer; others, that will be, and have not been yet; and multitudes, that possibly may never exist at all. But there are other reasoners, who must surely have had very different notions; those, I mean, who represent Truth not as the last, but as the first of beings; who call it immutable, eternal, omnipresent; attributes that all indicate something more than human."—Harris's Hermes, p. 403.
[44] Of the best method of teaching grammar, I shall discourse in an other chapter. That methods radically different must lend to different results, is no more than every intelligent person will suppose. The formation of just methods of instruction, or true systems of science, is work for those minds which are capable of the most accurate and comprehensive views of the things to be taught. He that is capable of "originating and producing" truth, or true "ideas," if any but the Divine Being is so, has surely no need to be trained into such truth by any factitious scheme of education. In all that he thus originates, he is himself a Novum Organon of knowledge, and capable of teaching others, especially those officious men who would help him with their second-hand authorship, and their paltry catechisms of common-places. I allude here to the fundamental principle of what in some books is called "The Productive System of Instruction," and to those schemes of grammar which are professedly founded on it. We are told that, "The leading principle of this system, is that which its name indicates—that the child should be regarded not as a mere recipient of the ideas of others, but as an agent capable of collecting, and originating, and producing most of the ideas which are necessary for its education, when presented with the objects or the facts from which they may be derived."—Smith's New Gram., Pref., p. 5: Amer. Journal of Education, New Series, Vol. I, No. 6, Art. 1. It ought to be enough for any teacher, or for any writer, if he finds his readers or his pupils ready recipients of the ideas which he aims to convey. What more they know, they can never owe to him, unless they learn it from him against his will; and what they happen to lack, of understanding or believing him, may very possibly be more his fault than theirs.
[45] Lindley Murray, anonymously copying somebody, I know not whom, says: "Words derive their meaning from the consent and practice of those who use them. There is no necessary connexion between words and ideas. The association between the sign and the thing signified, is purely arbitrary."—Octavo Gram., Vol. i, p. 139. The second assertion here made, is very far from being literally true. However arbitrary may be the use or application of words, their connexion with ideas is so necessary, that they cannot be words without it. Signification, as I shall hereafter prove, is a part of the very essence of a word, the most important element of its nature. And Murray himself says, "The understanding and language have a strict connexion."—Ib., Vol. i, p. 356. In this, he changes without amendment the words of Blair: "Logic and rhetoric have here, as in many other cases, a strict connexion."—Blair's Rhet., p. 120.
[46] "The language which is, at present, spoken throughout Great Britain, is neither the ancient primitive speech of the island, nor derived from it; but is altogether of foreign origin. The language of the first inhabitants of our island, beyond doubt, was the Celtic, or Gælic, common to them with Gaul; from which country, it appears, by many circumstances, that Great Britain was peopled. This Celtic tongue, which is said to be very expressive and copious, and is, probably, one of the most ancient languages in the world, obtained once in most of the western regions of Europe. It was the language of Gaul, of Great Britain, of Ireland, and very probably, of Spain also; till, in the course of those revolutions which by means of the conquests, first, of the Romans, and afterwards, of the northern nations, changed the government, speech, and, in a manner, the whole face of Europe, this tongue was gradually obliterated; and now subsists only in the mountains of Wales, in the Highlands of Scotland, and among the wild Irish. For the Irish, the Welsh, and the Erse, are no other than different dialects of the same tongue, the ancient Celtic."—Blair's Rhetoric, Lect. IX, p. 85.
[47] With some writers, the Celtic language is the Welsh; as may be seen by the following extract: "By this he requires an Impossibility, since much the greater Part of Mankind can by no means spare 10 or 11 Years of their Lives in learning those dead Languages, to arrive at a perfect Knowledge of their own. But by this Gentleman's way of Arguing, we ought not only to be Masters of Latin and Greek, but of Spanish, Italian, High- Dutch, Low-Dutch, French, the Old Saxon, Welsh, Runic, Gothic, and Islandic; since much the greater number of Words of common and general Use are derived from those Tongues. Nay, by the same way of Reasoning we may prove, that the Romans and Greeks did not understand their own Tongues, because they were not acquainted with the Welsh, or ancient Celtic, there being above 620 radical Greek Words derived from the Celtic, and of the Latin a much greater Number."—Preface to Brightland's Grammar, p. 5.
[48] The author of this specimen, through a solemn and sublime poem in ten books, generally simplified the preterit verb of the second person singular, by omitting the termination st or est, whenever his measure did not require the additional syllable. But his tuneless editors have, in many instances, taken the rude liberty both to spoil his versification, and to publish under his name what he did not write. They have given him bad prosody, or unutterable harshness of phraseology, for the sake of what they conceived to be grammar. So Kirkham, in copying the foregoing passage, alters it as he will; and alters it differently, when he happens to write some part of it twice: as,
"That morning, thou, that slumberedst not before,
Nor slept, great Ocean! laidst thy waves at rest,
And hushed thy mighty minstrelsy."—Kirkham's Elocution, p. 203.
Again:
"That morning, thou, that slumberedst not before,
Nor sleptst, great Ocean, laidst thy waves at rest,
And hush'dst thy mighty minstrelsy."—Kirkham's Elocution, p. 44.
[49] Camenes, the Muses, whom Horace called Camænæ. The former is an English plural from the latter, or from the Latin word camena, a muse or song. These lines are copied from Dr. Johnson's History of the English Language; their orthography is, in some respects, too modern for the age to which they are assigned.
[50] The Saxon characters being known nowadays to but very few readers, I have thought proper to substitute for them, in the latter specimens of this chapter, the Roman; and, as the old use of colons and periods for the smallest pauses, is liable to mislead a common observer, the punctuation too has here been modernized.
[51] Essay on Language, by William S. Cardell, New York, 1825, p. 2. This writer was a great admirer of Horne Tooke, from whom he borrowed many of his notions of grammar, but not this extravagance. Speaking of the words right and just, the latter says, "They are applicable only to man; to whom alone language belongs, and of whose sensations only words are the representatives."—Diversions of Purley, Vol. ii, p. 9.
[52] CARDELL: Both Grammars, p. 4.
[53] "Quoties dicimus, toties de nobis judicatur."—Cicero. "As often as we speak, so often are we judged."
[54] "Nor had he far to seek for the source of our impropriety in the use of words, when he should reflect that the study of our own language, has never been made a part of the education of our youth. Consequently, the use of words is got wholly by chance, according to the company that we keep, or the books that we read." SHERIDAN'S ELOCUTION, Introd., p. viii, dated "July 10, 1762," 2d Amer. Ed.
[55] "To Write and Speak correctly, gives a Grace, and gains a favourable Attention to what one has to say: And since 'tis English, that an English Gentleman will have constant use of, that is the Language he should chiefly Cultivate, and wherein most care should be taken to polish and perfect his Stile. To speak or write better Latin than English, may make a Man be talk'd of, but he would find it more to his purpose to Express himself well in his own Tongue, that he uses every moment, than to have the vain Commendation of others for a very insignificant quality. This I find universally neglected, and no care taken any where to improve Young Men in their own Language, that they may thoroughly understand and be Masters of it. If any one among us have a facility or purity more than ordinary in his Mother Tongue, it is owing to Chance, or his Genius, or any thing, rather than to his Education or any care of his Teacher. To Mind what English his Pupil speaks or writes is below the Dignity of one bred up amongst Greek and Latin, though he have but little of them himself. These are the learned Languages fit only for learned Men to meddle with and teach: English is the Language of the illiterate Vulgar."—Locke, on Education, p. 339; Fourth Ed., London, 1699.
[56] A late author, in apologizing for his choice in publishing a grammar without forms of praxis, (that is, without any provision for a stated application of its principles by the learner,) describes the whole business of Parsing as a "dry and uninteresting recapitulation of the disposal of a few parts of speech, and their often times told positions and influence;" urges "the unimportance of parsing, generally;" and represents it to be only "a finical and ostentatious parade of practical pedantry."—Wright's Philosophical Gram., pp. 224 and 226. It would be no great mistake to imagine, that this gentleman's system of grammar, applied in any way to practice, could not fail to come under this unflattering description; but, to entertain this notion of parsing in general, is as great an error, as that which some writers have adopted on the other hand, of making this exercise their sole process of inculcation, and supposing it may profitably supersede both the usual arrangement of the principles of grammar and the practice of explaining them by definitions. It is asserted in Parkhurst's "English Grammar for Beginners, on the Inductive Method of Instruction," that, "to teach the child a definition at the outset, is beginning at the wrong end;" that, "with respect to all that goes under the name of etymology in grammar, it is learned chiefly by practice in parsing, and scarcely at all by the aid of definitions."— Preface, pp. 5 and 6.
[57] Hesitation in speech may arise from very different causes. If we do not consider this, our efforts to remove it may make it worse. In most instances, however, it may be overcome by proper treatment, "Stammering," says a late author, "is occasioned by an over-effort to articulate; for when the mind of the speaker is so occupied with his subject as not to allow him to reflect upon his defect, he will talk without difficulty. All stammerers can sing, owing to the continuous sound, and the slight manner in which the consonants are touched in singing; so a drunken man can run, though he cannot walk or stand still."—Gardiner's Music of Nature, p. 30.
"To think rightly, is of knowledge; to speak fluently, is of nature;
To read with profit, is of care; but to write aptly, is of practice."
Book of Thoughts, p. 140.
[58] "There is nothing more becoming [to] a Gentleman, or more useful in all the occurrences of life, than to be able, on any occasion, to speak well, and to the purpose."—Locke, on Education, §171. "But yet, I think I may ask my reader, whether he doth not know a great many, who live upon their estates, and so, with the name, should have the qualities of Gentlemen, who cannot so much as tell a story as they should; much less speak clearly and persuasively in any business. This I think not to be so much their fault, as the fault of their education.—They have been taught Rhetoric, but yet never taught how to express themselves handsomely with their tongues or pens in the language they are always to use; as if the names of the figures that embellish the discourses of those who understood the art of speaking, were the very art and skill of speaking well. This, as all other things of practice, is to be learned, not by a few, or a great many rules given; but by EXERCISE and APPLICATION according to GOOD RULES, or rather PATTERNS, till habits are got, and a facility of doing it well."—Ib., §189. The forms of parsing and correcting which the following work supplies, are "patterns," for the performance of these practical "exercises;" and such patterns as ought to be implicitly followed, by every one who means to be a ready and correct speaker on these subjects.
[59] The principal claimants of "the Inductive Method" of Grammar, are Richard W. Green, Roswell C. Smith, John L. Parkhurst, Dyor H. Sanborn, Bradford Frazee, and, Solomon Barrett, Jr.; a set of writers, differing indeed in their qualifications, but in general not a little deficient in what constitutes an accurate grammarian.
[60] William C. Woodbridge edited the Journal, and probably wrote the article, from which the author of "English Grammar on the Productive System" took his "Preface."
[61] Many other grammars, later than Murray's, have been published, some in England, some in America, and some in both countries; and among these there are, I think, a few in which a little improvement has been made, in the methods prescribed for the exercises of parsing and correcting. In most, however, nothing of the kind has been attempted. And, of the formularies which have been given, the best that I have seen, are still miserably defective, and worthy of all the censure that is expressed in the paragraph above; while others, that appear in works not entirely destitute of merit, are absolutely much worse than Murray's, and worthy to condemn to a speedy oblivion the books in which they are printed. In lieu of forms of expression, clear, orderly, accurate, and full; such as a young parser might profitably imitate; such as an experienced one would be sure to approve; what have we? A chaos of half-formed sentences, for the ignorant pupil to flounder in; an infinite abyss of blunders, which a world of criticism could not fully expose! See, for example, the seven pages of parsing, in the neat little book entitled, "A Practical Grammar of the English Language, by the Rev. David Blair: Seventh Edition: London, 1815:" pp. 49 to 57. I cannot consent to quote more than one short paragraph of the miserable jumble which these pages contain. Yet the author is evidently a man of learning, and capable of writing well on some subjects, if not on this. "Bless the Lord, O my soul!" Form: "Bless, a verb, (repeat 97); active (repeat 99); active voice (102); infinitive mood (107); third person, soul being the nominative (118); present tense (111); conjugate the verb after the pattern (129); its object is Lord (99)."—Blair's Gram., p. 50. Of the paragraphs referred to, I must take some notice: "107. The imperative mood commands or orders or intreats."—Ib., p. 19. "118. The second person is always the pronoun thou or you in the singular, and ye or you in the plural."—Ib., p. 21. "111. The imperative mood has no distinction of tense: and the infinitive has no distinction of persons."—Ib., p. 20. Now the author should have said: "Bless is a redundant active-transitive verb, from bless, blessed or blest, blessing, blessed or blest; found in the imperative mood, present tense, second person, and singular number:" and, if he meant to parse the word syntactically, he should have added: "and agrees with its nominative thou understood; according to the rule which says, 'Every finite verb must agree with its subject or nominative, in person and number.' Because the meaning is—Bless thou the Lord." This is the whole story. But, in the form above, several things are false; many, superfluous; some, deficient; several, misplaced; nothing, right. Not much better are the models furnished by Kirkham, Smith, Lennie, Bullions, and other late authors.
[62] Of Dr. Bullions's forms of parsing, as exhibited in his English Grammar, which is a modification of Lennie's Grammar, it is difficult to say, whether they are most remarkable for their deficiencies, their redundancies, or their contrariety to other teachings of the same author or authors. Both Lennie and Bullions adopt the rule, that, "An ellipsis is not allowable when it would obscure the sentence, weaken its force, or be attended with an impropriety."—L., p. 91; B., p. 130. And the latter strengthens this doctrine with several additional observations, the first of which reads thus: "In general, no word should be omitted that is necessary to the full and correct construction, or even harmony of a sentence."—Bullions, E. Gr., 130. Now the parsing above alluded to, has been thought particularly commendable for its brevity—a quality certainly desirable, so far as it consists with the end of parsing, or with the more needful properties of a good style, clearness, accuracy, ease, and elegance. But, if the foregoing rule and observation are true, the models furnished by these writers are not commendably brief, but miserably defective. Their brevity is, in fact, such as renders them all bad English; and not only so, it makes them obviously inadequate to their purpose, as bringing into use but a part of the principles which the learner had studied. It consists only in the omission of what ought to have been inserted. For example, this short line, "I lean upon the Lord," is parsed by both of these gentlemen thus: "I, the first personal pronoun, masculine, or feminine, singular, the nominative—lean, a verb, neuter, first person singular, present, indicative—upon, a preposition—the, an article, the definite—Lord, a noun, masculine, singular, the objective, (governed by upon.)"—Lennie's Principles of English Gram., p. 51; Bullions's, 74. This is a little sample of their etymological parsing, in which exercise they generally omit not only all the definitions or "reasons" of the various terms applied, but also all the following particulars: first, the verb is, and certain definitives and connectives, which are "necessary to the full and correct construction" of their sentences; secondly, the distinction of nouns as proper or common; thirdly, the person of nouns, first, second, or third; fourthly, the words, number, gender, and case, which are necessary to the sense and construction of certain words used; fifthly, the distinction of adjectives as belonging to different classes; sixthly, the division of verbs as being regular or irregular, redundant or defective; seventhly, sometimes, (Lennie excepted,) the division of verbs as active, passive, or neuter; eighthly, the words mood and tense, which Bullions, on page 131, pronounces "quite unnecessary," and inserts in his own formule on page 132; ninthly, the distinction of adverbs as expressing time, place, degree, or manner; tenthly, the distinction of conjunctions as copulative or disjunctive; lastly, the distinction of interjections as indicating different emotions. All these things does their completest specimen of etymological parsing lack, while it is grossly encumbered with parentheses of syntax, which "must be omitted till the pupil get the rules of syntax."—Lennie, p. 51. It is also vitiated with several absurdities, contradictions, and improper changes of expression: as, "His, the third personal pronoun;" (B., p. 23;)—"me, the first personal pronoun;" (Id., 74;)—"A, The indefinite article;" (Id., 73;)—"a, an article, the indefinite;" (Id., 74;)—"When the verb is passive, parse thus: 'A verb active, in the passive voice, regular, irregular,' &c."—Bullions, p. 131. In stead of teaching sufficiently, as elements of etymological parsing, the definitions which belong to this exercise, and then dismissing them for the principles of syntax, Dr. Bullions encumbers his method of syntactical parsing with such a series of etymological questions and answers as cannot but make it one of the slowest, longest, and most tiresome ever invented. He thinks that the pupil, after parsing any word syntactically, "should be requested to assign a reason for every thing contained in his statement!"—Principles of E. Grammar, p. 131. And the teacher is to ask questions as numerous as the reasons! Such is the parsing of a text-book which has been pronounced "superior to any other, for use in our common schools"—"a complete grammar of the language, and available for every purpose for which Mr. Brown's can possibly be used."—Ralph K. Finch's Report, p, 12.
[63] There are many other critics, besides Murray and Alger, who seem not to have observed the import of after and before in connexion with the tenses. Dr. Bullions, on page 139th of his English Grammar, copied the foregoing example from Lennie, who took it from Murray. Even Richard Hiley, and William Harvey Wells, grammarians of more than ordinary tact, have been obviously misled by the false criticism above cited. One of Hiley's Rules of Syntax, with its illustration, stands thus: "In the use of the different tenses, we must particularly observe to use that tense which clearly and properly conveys the sense intended; thus, instead of saying, 'After I visited Europe, I returned to America;' we should say, 'After I had visited Europe, I returned to America."—Hiley's Gram., p. 90. Upon this he thought it needful to comment thus: "'After I visited Europe, I returned to America;' this sentence is incorrect; visited ought to be had visited, because the action implied by the verb visited WAS COMPLETED before the other past action returned."—Ib., p. 91. See nearly the same thing in Wells's School Grammar, 1st Edition, p. 151; but his later editions are wisely altered. Since "visited and was completed" are of the same tense, the argument from the latter, if it proves any thing, proves the former to be right, and the proposed change needless, or perhaps worse than needless. "I visited Europe before I returned to America," or, "I visited Europe, and afterwards returned to America," is good English, and not to be improved by any change of tense; yet here too we see the visiting "was completed before" the return, or HAD BEEN COMPLETED at the time of the return. I say, "The Pluperfect Tense is that which expresses what had taken place at some past time mentioned: as, 'I had seen him, when I met you.'" Murray says, "The Pluperfect Tense represents a thing not only as past, but also as prior to some other point of time specified in the sentence: as, I had finished my letter before he arrived." Hiley says, "The Past-Perfect expresses an action or event which was past before some other past action or event mentioned in the sentence, and to which it refers; as, I had finished my lessons before he came." With this, Wells appears to concur, his example being similar. It seems to me, that these last two definitions, and their example too, are bad; because by the help of before or after, "the past before the past" may be clearly expressed by the simple past tense: as, "I finished my letter before he arrived."—"I finished my lessons before he came." "He arrived soon after I finished the letter."—"Soon after it was completed, he came in."
[64] Samuel Kirkham, whose grammar is briefly described in the third chapter of this introduction, boldly lays the blame of all his philological faults, upon our noble language itself; and even conceives, that a well-written and faultless grammar cannot be a good one, because it will not accord with that reasonless jumble which he takes every existing language to be! How diligently he laboured to perfect his work, and with what zeal for truth and accuracy, may be guessed from the following citation: "The truth is, after all which can be done to render the definitions and rules of grammar comprehensive and accurate, they will still be found, when critically examined by men of learning and science, more or less exceptionable. These exceptions and imperfections are the unavoidable consequence of the imperfections of the language. Language as well as every thing else of human invention, will always be imperfect. Consequently, a perfect system of grammatical principles, would not suit it. A perfect grammar will not be produced, until some perfect being writes it for a perfect language; and a perfect language will not be constructed, until some super-human agency is employed in its production. All grammatical principles and systems which are not perfect are exceptionable."—Kirkham's Grammar, p. 66. The unplausible sophistry of these strange remarks, and the palliation they afford to the multitudinous defects of the book which contains them, may be left, without further comment, to the judgement of the reader.