Chapter XIII: General Rule (1)

The following comprehensive canon for the correction of all sorts of nondescript errors in syntax, and the several critical or general notes under it, seem necessary for the completion of my design; which is, to furnish a thorough exposition of the various faults against which the student of English grammar has occasion to be put upon his guard.

GENERAL RULE OF SYNTAX.

In the formation of sentences, the consistency and adaptation of all the words should be carefully observed; and a regular, clear, and correspondent construction should be preserved throughout.

CRITICAL NOTES TO THE GENERAL RULE.

CRITICAL NOTE I.--OF THE PARTS OF SPEECH.

Words that may constitute different parts of speech, must not be left doubtful as to their classification, or to what part of speech they belong.

CRITICAL NOTE II.--OF DOUBTFUL REFERENCE.

The reference of words to other words, or their syntactical relation according to the sense, should never be left doubtful, by any one who means to be understood.

CRITICAL NOTE III.--OF DEFINITIONS.

A definition, in order to be perfect, must include the whole thing, or class of things, which it pretends to define, and exclude every thing which comes not under the name.

CRITICAL NOTE IV.--OF COMPARISONS.

A comparison is a form of speech which requires some similarity or common property in the things compared; without which, it becomes a solecism.

CRITICAL NOTE V.--OF FALSITIES.

Sentences that convey a meaning manifestly false, should be changed, rejected, or contradicted; because they distort language from its chief end, or only worthy use; which is, to state facts, and to tell the truth. CRITICAL NOTE VI.--OF ABSURDITIES.

Absurdities, of every kind, are contrary to grammar, because they are contrary to reason, or good sense, which is the foundation of grammar.

CRITICAL NOTE VII.--OF SELF-CONTRADICTION.

Every writer or speaker should be careful not to contradict himself; for what is self-contradictory, is both null in argument, and bad in style.

CRITICAL NOTE VIII.--OF SENSELESS JUMBLING.

To jumble together words without care for the sense, is an unpardonable negligence, and an abuse of the human understanding.

CRITICAL NOTE IX.--OF WORDS NEEDLESS.

Words that are entirely needless, and especially such as injure or encumber the expression, ought in general to be omitted.

CRITICAL NOTE X.--OF IMPROPER OMISSIONS.

Words necessary to the sense, or even to the melody or beauty of a sentence, ought seldom, if ever, to be omitted.

CRITICAL NOTE XI.--OF LITERARY BLUNDERS.

Grave blunders made in the name of learning, are the strongest of all certificates against the books which contain them unreproved.

CRITICAL NOTE XII.--OF PERVERSIONS.

Proof-texts in grammar, if not in all argument, should be quoted literally; and even that which needs to be corrected, must never be perverted.

CRITICAL NOTE XIII.--OF AWKWARDNESS.

Awkwardness, or inelegance of expression, is a reprehensible defect in style, whether it violate any of the common rules of syntax or not.

CRITICAL NOTE XIV.--OF IGNORANCE.

Any use of words that implies ignorance of their meaning, or of their proper orthography, is particularly unscholarlike; and, in proportion to the author's pretensions to learning, disgraceful.

CRITICAL NOTE XV.--OF SILLINESS. Silly remarks and idle truisms are traits of a feeble style, and, when their weakness is positive, or inherent, they ought to be entirely omitted. CRITICAL NOTE XVI.--OF THE INCORRIGIBLE.

Passages too erroneous for correction, may be criticised, orally or otherwise, and then passed over without any attempt to amend them.[445]

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE SYNTAX.

OBS. 1.--In the foregoing code of syntax, the author has taken the parts of speech in their order, and comprised all the general principles of relation, agreement, and government, in twenty-four leading Rules. Of these rules, eight--(namely, the 1st, of _Articles_; the 4th, of _Possessives_; the 9th, of _Adjectives_; the 20th, of _Participles_; the 21st, of _Adverbs_; the 22d, of _Conjunctions_; the 23d, of _Prepositions_; and the 24th, of _Interjections_--) are used only in parsing. The remaining sixteen, because they embrace principles that are sometimes violated in practice, answer the double purpose of parsing and correcting. The Exceptions, of which there are thirty-two, (all occasionally applicable in parsing,) belong to nine different rules, and refer to all the parts of speech, except nouns and interjections. The Notes, of which there are one hundred and fifty-two, are subordinate rules of syntax, not designed to be used in parsing, but formed for the exposition and correction of so many different forms of false grammar. The Observations, of which there are, in this part of the work, without the present series, four hundred and ninety-seven, are designed not only to defend and confirm the doctrines adopted by the author, but to explain the arrangement of words, and whatever is difficult or peculiar in construction.

OBS. 2.--The rules in a system of syntax may be more or less comprehensive, as well as more or less simple or complex; consequently they may, without deficiency or redundance, be more or less numerous. But either complexity or vagueness, as well as redundance or deficiency, is a fault; and, when all these faults are properly avoided, and the two great ends of methodical syntax, _parsing_ and _correcting_, are duly answered, perhaps the requisite number of syntactical rules, or grammatical canons, will no longer appear very indeterminate. In the preceding chapters, the essential principles of English syntax are supposed to be pretty fully developed; but there are yet to be exhibited some forms of error, which must be corrected under other heads or maxims, and for the treatment of which the several dogmas of this chapter are added. Completeness in the system, however, does not imply that it must have shown the pupil how to correct every form of language that is amiss: for there may be in composition many errors of such a nature that no rule of grammar can show, either what should be substituted for the faulty expression, or what fashion of amendment may be the most eligible. The inaccuracy may be gross and obvious, but the correction difficult or impossible. Because the sentence may require a change throughout; and a total change is not properly a correction; it is a substitution of something new, for what was, perhaps, in itself incorrigible.

OBS. 3.--The notes which are above denominated _Critical_ or _General_, are not all of them obviously different in kind from the other notes; but they all are such as could not well have been placed in any of the earlier chapters of the book. The _General Rule of Syntax_, since it is not a canon to be used in parsing, but one that is to be applied only in the correcting of false syntax, might seem perhaps to belong rather to this order of notes; but I have chosen to treat it with some peculiar distinction, because it is not only more comprehensive than any other rule or note, but is in one respect more important; it is the rule which will be cited for the correction of the greatest number and variety of errors. Being designed to meet every possible form of inaccuracy in the mere construction of sentences,--or, at least, every corrigible solecism by which any principle of syntax can be violated,--it necessarily includes almost all the other rules and notes. It is too broad to convey very definite instruction, and therefore ought not in general to be applied where a more particular rule or note is clearly applicable. A few examples, not properly fitting under any other head, will serve to show its use and application: such examples are given, in great abundance, in the false syntax below. If, in some of the instances selected, this rule is applied to faults that might as well have been corrected by some other, the choice, in such cases, is deemed of little or no importance.

OBS. 4.--The imperfection of _ancient_ writing, especially in regard to division and punctuation, has left the syntactical relation of words, and also the sense of passages, in no few instances, uncertain; and has consequently made, where the text has been thought worthy of it, an abundance of difficult work for translators, critics, and commentators. Rules of grammar, now made and observed, as they ought to be, may free the compositions of this, or a future age, from similar embarrassments; and it is both just and useful, to test our authors by them, criticising or correcting their known blunders according to the present rules of accurate writing. But the readers and expounders of what has come to us from remote time, can be rightly guided only by such principles and facts as have the stamp of creditable antiquity. Hence there are, undoubtedly, in books, some errors and defects which have outlived the _time in which_, and the _authority b which_, they might have been corrected. As we have no right to make a man say that which he himself never said or intended to say, so we have in fact none to fix a positive meaning upon his language, without knowing for a certainty what he meant by it. Reason, or good sense, which, as I have suggested, is the foundation of grammar and of all good writing, is indeed a perpetual as well as a universal principle; but, since the exercises of our reason must, from the very nature of the faculty, be limited to what we know and understand, we are not competent to the positive correction, or to the sure translation, of what is obscure and disputable in the standard books of antiquity.

OBS. 5.--Let me cite an example: "For all this I considered in my heart, even to declare all this, that the righteous, and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God: no man knoweth either love or hatred _by_ all _that is_ before them. All _things come_ alike to all."-- _Ecclesiastes_, ix, 1. Here is, doubtless, _one_ error which any English scholar may point out or correct. The pronoun "_them_" should be _him_, because its intended antecedent appears to be "_man_," and not "_the righteous and the wise_," going before. But are there not _other_ faults in the version? The common French Bible, in this place, has the following import: "Surely I have applied my heart to all that, and to unfold all this; _to wit_, that the righteous and the wise, and their actions, _are_ in the hand of God and love and hatred; _and that_ men know nothing of all _that which is_ before them. All _happens_ equally to all." The Latin Vulgate gives this sense: "All these things have I considered in my heart, that I might understand them accurately: the righteous and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God; and yet man doth not know, whether by love or by hatred lie may be worthy: but all things in the future are kept uncertain, so that all may happen alike to the righteous man and to the wicked." In the Greek of the Septuagint, the introductory members of this passage are left at the end of the preceding chapter, and are literally thus: "that all this I received into my heart, and my heart understood all this." The rest, commencing a new chapter, is as follows: "For the righteous and the wise and their works _are_ in the hand of God, and indeed both love and hatred man knoweth not: all things before their face _are_ vanity to all." Now, which of these several readings is the nearest to what Solomon meant by the original text, or which is the farthest from it, and therefore the most faulty, I leave it to men more learned than myself to decide; but, certainly, there is no _inspired authority_ in any of them, but _in so far as they convey the sense which he really intended_. And if his meaning had not been, by some imperfection in the oldest expression we have of it, _obscured and partly lost_, there could be neither cause nor excuse for these discrepancies. I say this with no willingness to depreciate the general authority of the Holy Scriptures, which are for the most part clear in their import, and very ably translated into English, as well as into other languages.

IMPROPRIETIES FOR CORRECTION.

FALSE SYNTAX UNDER THE GENERAL RULE.

LESSON I.--ARTICLES.

(1.) "An article is a part of speech placed before nouns."--_Comly's Gram._, p. 11.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the article _an_ is here inconsistent with the term "_part of speech_;" for the text declares one thing of a kind to be the whole kind. But, according to the General Rule of Syntax, "In the formation of sentences, the consistency and adaptation of all the words should be carefully observed; and a regular, clear, and correspondent construction should be preserved throughout." The sentence may be corrected in two ways, thus: "_The_ article is a part of speech placed before nouns;"--or better, "_An_ article is a word placed before nouns." [446]]

(2.) "An article is a part of speech used to limit nouns."--_Gilbert's Gram._, p. 19. (3.) "An article is a part of speech set before nouns to fix their vague Signification."--_Ash's Gram._, p. 18. (4.) "An adjective is a part of speech used to describe a noun."--_Gilbert's Gram._, p. 19. (5.) "A pronoun is a part of speech used instead of a noun."--_Ibid._; and _Weld's Gram._, pp. 30 and 50; _Abridg._, pp. 29 and 46. (6.) "A Pronoun is a Part of Speech which is often used instead of a Noun Substantive common, and supplies the Want of a Noun proper."--_British Gram._, p. 102; _Buchanan's Gram._, p. 29. (7.) "A verb is a part of speech, which signifies _to be, to do, or to be acted upon_"--_Merchant's School Gram._, p. 17. (8.) "A verb is a part of speech, which signifies _to be, to act, or to receive an action_."--_Comly's Gram._, p. 11. (9.) "A verb is a part of speech by which any thing is asserted."--_Weld's Gram_, p. 50; _Abridg._, 46 and 58. (10.) "A verb is a part of speech which expresses action, or existence, in a direct manner."--_Gilbert's Gram._, p. 20. (11.) "A participle is a part of speech derived from a verb, and expresses action or existence in an indirect manner."--_Ibid._ (12.) "A Participle is a Part of Speech derived from a Verb, and denotes being, doing, or suffering, and implies Time, as a Verb does."--_British Gram._, p. 139; _Buchanan's_, p. 46. "An adverb is a part of speech used to add to the meaning of verbs, adjectives, and participles."--_Gilbert's Gram._, p. 20. (14.) "An adverb is an indeclinable part of speech, added to a verb, adjective, or other adverb, to express some circumstance, quality, or manner of their signification."-- _Adam's Gram._, p. 142; _Gould's_, 147. (15.) "An Adverb is a part of speech joined to a verb, an Adjective, a Participle, and sometimes to another Adverb, to express the quality or circumstance of it."--_Ash's Gram._, p. 47, (16.) "An Adverb is a part of speech joined to a Verb, Adjective, Participle, and sometimes to another Adverb, to express some circumstances respecting it."--_Beck's Gram._, p. 23. (17.) "An Adverb is a Part of Speech which is joined to a Verb, Adjective, Participle, or to another Adverb to express some Modification, or Circumstance, Quality, or Manner of their Signification."--_Buchanan's Gram._, p. 61. (18.) "An Adverb is a part of speech added to a Verb (whence the name), and sometimes even to another word."--_Bucke's Gram._, p. 76. (19.) "A conjunction is a part of speech used to connect words and sentences."--_Gilbert's Gram._, p. 20; _Weld's_, 51. (20.) "A Conjunction is a part of speech that joins words or sentences together."--_Ash's Gram._, p. 43. (21.) "A Conjunction is that part of speech which connect sentences, or parts of sentences or single words."--_Blair's Gram._, p. 41. (22.) "A Conjunction is a part of speech, that is used principally to connect sentences, so as, out of two, three, or more, sentences, to make one."--_Bucke's Gram._, p. 28. (23.) "A Conjunction is a part of speech that is chiefly used to connect sentences, joining two or more simple sentences into one compound sentence: it sometimes connects only words."--_Kirkham's Gram._, p. 118. (24.) "A Conjunction is a Part of Speech which joins Sentences together, and shews the Manner of their Dependance upon one another."--_British Gram._, p. 163; _Buchanan's_, p. 64; _E. Devis's_. 103. (25.) "A preposition is a part of Speech used to show the relation between other words."--_Gilbert's Gram._, p. 20. (26.) "A Preposition is a part of speech which serves to connect words and show the relation between them."--_Frost's El. of Gram._, p. 42. (27.) "A _preposition_ is a part of speech used to connect words and show their relation."--_Weld's Gram._, p. 51; _Abridg_. 47. (28.) "A preposition is that part of speech which shows the position of persons or things, or the relation that one noun or pronoun bears toward another."--_Blair's Gram._, p. 40. (29.) "A Preposition is a Part of Speech, which being added to any other Parts of Speech serves to shew their State, Relation or Reference to each other."--_British Gram._, p. 165; _Buchanan's_, p. 65. (30.) "An interjection is a part of speech used to express sudden passion or emotion."--_Gilbert's Gram._, p. 20. (31.) "An interjection is a part of speech used in giving utterance to some sudden feeling or emotion."-- _Weld's Gram._, pp. 49 and 51; _Abridg._, 44 and 47. (32.) "An Interjection is that part of speech which denotes any sudden affection or emotion of the mind."--_Blair's Gram._, p. 42. (33) "An Interjection is a Part of Speech thrown into discourse, and denotes some sudden Passion or Emotion of the Soul."--_British Gram._, p. 172; _Buchanan's_, p. 67.

(34.) "A scene might tempt some peaceful sage
To rear him a lone hermitage."
--_Union Poems_, p. 89.

(35.) "Not all the storms that shake the pole
Can e'er disturb thy halcyon soul,
And smooth th' unaltered brow."
--_Day's Gram._, p. 78; _E. Reader_, 230.

LESSON II.--NOUNS. "The thrones of every monarchy felt the shock."--_Frelinghuysen_.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the plural noun _thrones_ has not a clear and regular construction, adapted to the author's meaning. But, according to the General Rule of Syntax, "In the formation of sentences the consistency and adaptation of all the words should be carefully observed; and a regular, clear, and correspondent construction should be preserved throughout." The sentence may be corrected thus: "The _throne_ of every monarchy felt the shock."]

"These principles ought to be deeply impressed upon the minds of every American."--_Webster's Essays_, p. 44. "The word _church_ and _shire_ are radically the same."--_Ib._, p. 256. "They may not, in their present form, be readily accommodated to every circumstance belonging to the possessive cases of nouns."--_L. Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 53. "_Will_, in the second and third person, only foretels."--_Ib._, p. 88. "Which seem to form the true distinction between the subjunctive and the indicative moods."--_Ib._, p. 208. "The very general approbation, which this performance of Walker has received from the public."--_Ib._, p. 241. "Lest she carry her improvements this way too far."--CAMPBELL: _ib._, p. 371. "Charles was extravagant, and by this means became poor and despicable."--_Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 189. "We should entertain no prejudices against simple and rustic persons."--_Ib._, p. 205. "These are indeed the foundations of all solid merit."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 175. "And his embellishment, by means of musical cadence, figures, or other parts of speech."--_Ib._, p. 175. "If he is at no pains to engage us by the employment of figures, musical arrangement, or any other art of writing."--_Ib._, p. 181. "The most eminent of the sacred poets are, the Author of the book of Job, David and Isaiah."--_Ib._, p. 418. "Nothing, in any poet, is more beautifully described than the death of old Priam."--_Ib._, p. 439. "When two vowels meet together, and are sounded at one breath, they are called _diphthongs_."--_Infant School Gram._, p. 10. "How many _ss_ would goodness then end with? Three."--_Ib._, p. 33. "_Birds_ is a noun, the name of a thing or creature."--_Kirkham's Gram._, p. 53. "Adam gave names to every living creature."--_Bicknell's Gram._, Part ii, p. 5. "The steps of a stair ought to be accommodated to the human figure."--_Kames, El. of Crit._, Vol. ii, p. 337. "Nor ought an emblem more than a simile to be founded on low or familiar objects."--_Ib._, Vol. ii. p. 357. "Whatever the Latin has not from the Greek, it has from the Goth."--_Tooke's Diversions_, Vol. ii, p. 450. "The mint and secretary of state's offices are neat buildings."--_The Friend_, Vol. iv, p. 266. "The scenes of dead and still life are apt to pall upon us."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 407. "And Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus, the angelical and the subtle doctors, are the brightest stars in the scholastic constellation."--_Literary Hist._, p. 244. "The English language has three methods of distinguishing the sex."--_Murray's Gram._, p. 38; _Ingersoll's_, 27; _Alger's_, 16; _Bacon's_, 13; _Fisk's_, 58; _Greenleaf's_, 21. "The English language has three methods of distinguishing sex."--_Smith's New Gram._, p. 44. "In English there are the three following methods of distinguishing sex."--_Jaudon's Gram._, p. 26. "There are three ways of distinguishing the sex."--_Lennie's Gram._, p. 10; _Picket's_, 26; _Bullions's_, 10. "There are three ways of distinguishing sex."--_Merchant's School Gram._, p. 26. "Gender is distinguished in three ways."--_Maunder's Gram._, p. 2. "Neither discourse in general, nor poetry in particular, can be called altogether imitative arts."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 51.

"Do we for this the gods and conscience brave,
That one may rule and make the rest a slave?"
--_Rowe's Lucan_, B. ii, l. 96.

LESSON III.--ADJECTIVES.

"There is a deal of more heads, than either heart or horns."--_Barclay's Works_, i, 234.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the adjective _more_ has not a clear and regular construction, adapted to the author's meaning. But, according to the General Rule of Syntax, "In the formation of sentences, the consistency and adaptation of all the words should be carefully observed; and a regular, clear, and correspondent construction should be preserved throughout." The sentence may be corrected thus: "There is a deal _more_ of heads, than _of_ either heart or horns."]

"For, of all villains, I think he has the wrong name."--_Bunyan's P. P._, p. 86. "Of all the men that I met in my pilgrimage, he, I think bears the wrong name."--_Ib._, p. 84. "I am surprized to see so much of the distribution, and technical terms of the Latin grammar, retained in the grammar of our tongue."--_Priestley's Gram., Pref._, p. vi. "Nor did the Duke of Burgundy bring him the smallest assistance."--HUME: _Priestley's Gram._, p. 178. "Else he will find it difficult to make one obstinate believe him."--_Brightland's Gram._, p. 243. "Are there any adjectives which form the degrees of comparison peculiar to themselves?"--_Infant School Gram._, p. 46. "Yet the verbs are all of the indicative mood."--_Lowth's Gram._, p. 33. "The word _candidate_ is in the absolute case."--_L. Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 155. "An Iambus has the first syllable unaccented, and the latter accented."--_Russell's Gram._, p. 108; _Smith's New Gram._, 188. "A Dactyl has the first syllable accented, and the two latter unaccented."--_L. Murray_, p. 253; _Bullions's E. Gram._, 170; _Smith's_, 188; _Kirkham's_, 219; _Guy's_, 120; _Blair's_, 118; _Merchant's_, 167; _Russell's_, 109. "It is proper to begin with a capital the first word of every book, chapter, letter, note, or any other piece of writing."--_L. Murray_, p. 284; _R. C. Smith's New Gram._, 192; _Ingersoll's_, 295; _Comly's_, 166; _Merchant's_, 14; _Greenleaf's_, 42; _D. C. Allen's_, 85; _Fisk's_, 159; _Bullions's_, 158; _Kirkham's_, 219; _Hiley's_, 119; _Weld's Abridged_, 16; _Bullions's Analyt. and Pract._, 16; _Fowler's E. Gr._, 674. "Five and seven make twelve, and one makes thirteen."--_Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 227. "I wish to cultivate a farther acquaintance with you."--_Ib._, p. 272. "Let us consider the proper means to effect our purpose."--_Ib._, p. 276. "Yet they are of such a similar nature, as readily to mix and blend."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 48. "The Latin is formed on the same model, but more imperfect."--_Ib._, p. 83. "I know very well how much pains have been taken."--_Sir W. Temple_. "The management of the breath requires a good deal of care."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 331. "Because the mind, during such a momentary stupefaction, is in a good measure, if not totally, insensible."--_Kames, El. of Crit._, Vol. i, p. 222. "Motives alone of reason and interest are not sufficient."--_Ib._, Vol. i, p. 232. "To render the composition distinct in its parts, and striking on the whole,"--_Ib._, Vol. ii, p. 333. "_A_ and _an_ are named indefinite because they denote some one thing of a kind."--_Maunder's Gram._, p. 1. "_The_ is named definite, because it points out some particular thing."--_Ibid._ "So much depends upon the proper construction of sentences, that, in every sort of composition, we cannot be too strict in our attention to it."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 103. "All sort of declamation and public speaking, was carried on by them."--_Ib._, p. 123. "The first has on many occasions, a sublimity to which the latter never attains."--_Ib._, p. 440. "When the words _therefore, consequently, accordingly_, and the like are used in connexion with other conjunctions, they are adverbs."--_Kirkham's Gram._, p. 88. "Rude nations make little or no allusions to the productions of the arts."--_Jamieson's Rhet._, p. 10. "While two of her maids knelt on either side of her."--_Mirror_, xi, 307. "The third personal pronouns differ from each other in meaning and use, as follows."--_Bullions, Lat. Gram._, p. 65. "It was happy for the state, that Fabius continued in the command with Minucius: the former's phlegm was a check upon the latter's vivacity."--_L. Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 57. "If it should be objected that the words must and ought, in the preceding sentences, are all in the present tense."--_Ib._, p. 108. "But it will be well if you turn to them, every now and then."--_Buckets Classical Gram._, p. 6. "That every part should have a dependence on, and mutually contribute to support each other."--_Rollin's Hist._, ii, 115. "The phrase, '_Good, my Lord_,' is not common, and low."--_Priestley's Gram._, p. 110.

"That brother should not war with brother,
And worry and devour each other."--_Cowper_.

LESSON IV.--PRONOUNS.

"If I can contribute to your and my country's glory."--_Goldsmith_.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the pronoun _your_ has not a clear and regular construction, adapted to the author's meaning. But, according to the General Rule of Syntax, "In the formation of sentences, the consistency and adaptation of all the words should be carefully observed; and a regular, clear, and correspondent construction should be preserved throughout." The sentence, having a doubtful or double meaning, may be corrected in two ways, thus: "If I can contribute to our country's glory;"--or, "If I can contribute to your _glory_ and _that of my country_."]

"As likewise of the several subjects, which have in effect each their verb."--_Lowth's Gram._, p. 120. "He is likewise required to make examples himself."--_J. Flint's Gram._, p. 3. "If the emphasis be placed wrong, we shall pervert and confound the meaning wholly."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 242. "If the emphasis be placed wrong, we pervert and confound the meaning wholly."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 330. "It was this that characterized the great men of antiquity; it is this, which must distinguish moderns who would tread in their steps."--_Ib._, p. 341. "I am a great enemy to implicit faith, as well the Popish as Presbyterian, who in that are much what alike."--_Barclay's Works_, iii, 280. "Will he thence dare to say the apostle held another Christ than he that died?"--_Ib._, iii, 414. "What need you be anxious about this event?"--_Collier's Antoninus_, p. 188. "If a substantive can be placed after the verb, it is active."--_Alex. Murray's Gram._, p. 31 "When we see bad men honoured and prosperous in the world, it is some discouragement to virtue."--_L. Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 224. "It is a happiness to young persons, when they are preserved from the snares of the world, as in a garden enclosed."--_Ib._, p. 171. "The court of Queen Elizabeth, which was but another name for prudence and economy."-- _Bullions, E. Gram._, p. 24. "It is no wonder if such a man did not shine at the court of Queen Elizabeth, who was but another name for prudence and economy. Here which ought to be used, and not who."--_Priestley's Gram._, p. 99; _Fowler's_, §488. "Better thus; Whose name was but another word for prudence, &c."--_Murray's Gram._, p. 157; _Fish's_, 115; Ingersoll's, 221; Smith's, 133; and others. "A Defective verb is one that wants some of its parts. They are chiefly the Auxiliary and Impersonal verbs."--_Bullions, E. Gram._, p. 31; _Old Editions_, 32. "Some writers have given our moods a much greater extent than we have assigned to them."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 67. "The Personal Pronouns give information which no other words are capable of conveying."--_M'Culloch's Gram._, p. 37, "When the article _a, an_, or _the_ precedes the participle, it also becomes a noun."-- _Merchant's School Gram._, p. 93. "There is a preference to be given to some of these, which custom and judgment must determine."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 107. "Many writers affect to subjoin to any word the preposition with which it is compounded, or the idea of which it implies."--_Ib._, p. 200; _Priestley's Gram._, 157.

"Say, dost thou know Tectidius?--Who, the wretch
Whose lands beyond the Sabines largely stretch?"
--_Dryden's IV Sat. of Pers._

LESSON V.--VERBS.

"We would naturally expect, that the word _depend_, would require _from_ after it."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 201. "A dish which they pretend to be made of emerald."--_Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 198. "For the very nature of a sentence implies one proposition to be expressed."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 106. "Without a careful attention to the sense, we would be naturally led, by the rules of syntax, to refer it to the rising and setting of the sun."--_Ib._, p. 105. "For any rules that can be given, on this subject, are very general."--_Ib._, p. 125. "He is in the right, if eloquence were what he conceives it to be."--_Ib._, p. 234. "There I would prefer a more free and diffuse manner."--_Ib._, p. 178. "Yet that they also agreed and resembled one another, in certain qualities."--_Ib._, p. 73. "But since he must restore her, he insists to have another in her place."--_Ib._, p. 431. "But these are far from being so frequent or so common as has been supposed."--_Ib._, p. 445. "We are not misled to assign a wrong place to the pleasant or painful feelings." _Kames, El. of Crit._, Introd., p. xviii. "Which are of greater importance than is commonly thought."--Vol. ii, p. 92. "Since these qualities are both coarse and common, lets find out the mark of a man of probity."--_Collier's Antoninus_, p. 40. "Cicero did what no man had ever done before him, draw up a treatise of consolation for himself."--_Life of Cicero_. "Then there can be no other Doubt remain of the Truth."--_Brightland's Gram._, p. 245. "I have observed some satirists use the term."--_Bullions's Prin. of E. Gram._, p. 79. "Such men are ready to despond, or commence enemies."--_Webster's Essays_, p. 83. "Common nouns express names common to many things."--_Infant School Gram._, p. 18. "To make ourselves be heard by one to whom we address ourselves."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 328. "That, in reading poetry, he may be the better able to judge of its correctness, and relish its beauties."--_Murray's Gram._, p. 252. "On the stretch to comprehend, and keep pace with the author."-- _Blair's Rhet._, p. 150. "For it might have been sold for more than three hundred pence, and have been given to the poor."--_Mark_, xiv, 5. "He is a beam that is departed, and left no streak of light behind."--OSSIAN: _Kames, El. of Crit._, ii, 262. "No part of this incident ought to have been represented, but reserved for a narrative."--_Kames, El. of Crit._, ii, 294. "The rulers and people debauching themselves, brings ruin on a country."--_Ware's Gram._, p. 9. "When _Doctor, Miss, Master, &c._, is prefixed to a name, the last of the two words is commonly made plural; as, the _Doctor Nettletons_--the two _Miss Hudsons_."--_Alex. Murray's Gram._, p. 106. "Wherefore that field was called, The field of blood, unto this day."--_Matt._, xxvii, 8. "To comprehend the situations of other countries, which perhaps may be necessary for him to explore."--_Brown's Estimate_, ii, 111. "We content ourselves, now, with fewer conjunctive particles than our ancestors did."--_Priestley's Gram._, p. 139. "And who will be chiefly liable to make mistakes where others have been mistaken before them."--_Ib._, p. 156. "The voice of nature and revelation unites."--_Wayland's Moral Science_, 3d Ed., p. 307.

"This adjective you see we can't admit,
But changed to _worse_, will make it just and fit."
--_Tobitt's Gram._, p. 63.

LESSON VI.--PARTICIPLES.

"Its application is not arbitrary, depending on the caprice of readers."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, Vol. i, p. 246. "This is the more expedient, from the work's being designed for the benefit of private learners."--_Ib._, Vol. ii, p. 161. "A man, he tells us, ordered by his will, to have erected for him a statue."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 106. "From some likeness too remote, and laying too far out of the road of ordinary thought."--_Ib._, p. 146. "Money is a fluid in the commercial world, rolling from hand to hand."--_Webster's Essays_, p. 123. "He pays much attention to learning and singing songs."--_Ib._ p. 246. "I would not be understood to consider singing songs as criminal."--"It is a decided case by the Great Master of writing."--_Preface to Waller_, p. 5. "Did they ever bear a testimony against writing books?"--_Bates's Misc. Repository_. "Exclamations are sometimes mistaking for interrogations."--_Hist. of Printing_, 1770. "Which cannot fail proving of service."--_Smith's Printer's Gram._ "Hewn into such figures as would make them easily and firmly incorporated."--BEATTIE: _Murray's Gram._, i, 126. "Following the rule and example are practical inductive questions."--_J. Flint's Gram._, p. 3. "I think there will be an advantage in my having collected examples from modern writings."--_Priestley's Gram._, Pref., p. xi. "He was eager of recommending it to his fellow-citizens."--HUME: p. 160. "The good lady was careful of serving me of every thing."--"No revelation would have been given, had the light of nature been sufficient in such a sense, as to render one not wanting and useless."--_Butler's Analogy_, p. 155. "Description, again is the raising in the mind the conception of an object by means of some arbitrary or instituted symbols."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 52. "Disappointing the expectation of the hearers, when they look for our being done."--_Ib._ p. 326. "There is a distinction which, in the use of them, is deserving of attention."--_Maunder's Gram._, p. 15. "A model has been contrived, which is not very expensive, and easily managed."--_Education Reporter_. "The conspiracy was the more easily discovered, from its being known to many."--_Murray's Key_, ii, 191. "That celebrated work had been nearly ten years published, before its importance was at all understood."--_Ib._ p. 220. "The sceptre's being ostensibly grasped by a female hand, does not reverse the general order of Government."--_West's Letters to a Lady_, p. 43. "I have hesitated signing the Declaration of Sentiments."--_Liberator_, x, 16. "The prolonging of men's lives when the world needed to be peopled, and now shortening them when that necessity hath ceased to exist."--_Brown's Divinity_, p. 7. "Before the performance commences, we have displayed the insipid formalities of the prelusive scene."--_Kirkham's Elocution_, p. 23. "It forbade the lending of money, or sending goods, or in any way embarking capital in transactions connected with that foreign traffic."--LORD BROUGHAM: _B. and F. Anti-Slavery Reporter_, Vol. ii, p. 218. "Even abstract ideas have sometimes conferred upon them the same important prerogative."--_Jamieson's Rhet._, p. 171. "Like other terminations, _ment_ changes _y_ into _i_, when preceded by a consonant."--_Walker's Rhyming Dict._, p. xiii; _Murray's Gram._, p. 24: _Ingersoll's_, 11. "The term _proper_ is from being _proper_, that is, _peculiar_ to the individual bearing the name. The term _common_ is from being _common_ to every individual comprised in the class."--_Fowler's E. Gram._, 8vo, 1850, §139.

"Thus oft by mariners are shown (Unless the men of Kent are liars)
Earl Godwin's castles overflown, And palace-roofs, and steeple-spires."
--_Swift_, p. 313.

LESSON VII.--ADVERBS.

"He spoke to every man and woman there."--_Murray's Gram._, p. 220; _Fisk's_, 147. "Thought and language act and react upon each other mutually."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 120; _Murray's Exercises_, 133. "Thought and expression act upon each other mutually."--See _Murray's Key_, p. 264. "They have neither the leisure nor the means of attaining scarcely any knowledge, except what lies within the contracted circle of their several professions."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 359. "Before they are capable of understanding but little, or indeed any thing of many other branches of education."--_Olney's Introd. to Geog._, p. 5. "There is not more beauty in one of them than in another."--_Murray's Key_, ii, 275. "Which appear not constructed according to any certain rule."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 47. "The vehement manner of speaking became not so universal."--_Ib._, p. 61. "All languages, however, do not agree in this mode of expression."--_Ib._, p. 77. "The great occasion of setting aside this particular day."--ATTERBURY: p. 294. "He is much more promising now than formerly."--_Murray's Gram._, Vol. ii, p. 4. "They are placed before a participle, independently on the rest of the sentence."--_Ib._, Vol. ii, p. 21. "This opinion appears to be not well considered."--_Ib._, Vol. i, p. 153; _Ingersoll's_, 249. "Precision in language merits a full explication; and the more, because distinct ideas are, perhaps, not commonly formed about it."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 94. "In the more sublime parts of poetry, he [Pope] is not so distinguished."--_Ib._, p. 403. "How far the author was altogether happy in the choice of his subject, may be questioned."--_Ib._, p. 450. "But here also there is a great error in the common practice."--_Webster's Essays_, p. 7. "This order is the very order of the human mind, which makes things we are sensible of, a means to come at those that are not so."--_Formey's Belles-Lettres, Foreman's Version_, p. 113. "Now, Who is not Discouraged, and Fears Want, when he has no money?"--_Divine Right of Tythes_, p. 23. "Which the Authors of this work, consider of but little or no use."--_Wilbur and Livingston's Gram._, p. 6. "And here indeed the distinction between these two classes begins not to be clear."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 152. "But this is a manner which deserves not to be imitated."--_Ib._, p. 180. "And in this department a person never effects so little, as when he attempts too much."--_Campbell's Rhet._, p. 173; _Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 367. "The verb that signifies merely being, is neuter."--_Dr. Ash's Gram._, p. 27. "I hope not much to tire those whom I shall not happen to please."--_Rambler_, No. 1. "Who were utterly unable to pronounce some letters, and others very indistinctly."--_Sheridan's Elocution_, p. 32. "The learner may point out the active, passive, and neuter verbs in the following examples, and state the reasons why."--_C. Adams's Gram._, p. 27. "These words are most always conjunctions."--_S. Barrett's Revised Gram._, p. 73.

"How fluent nonsense trickles from his tongue!
How sweet the periods, neither said, nor sung!"--_Dunciad_.

LESSON VIII.--CONJUNCTIONS.

"Who at least either knew not, nor loved to make, a distinction."--_Dr. Murray's Hist. of Europ. Lang._, i, 322. "It is childish in the last degree, if this become the ground of estranged affection."--_L. Murray's Key_, ii, 228. "When the regular or the irregular verb is to be preferred, p. 107."--_Murray's Index, Gram._, ii, 296. "The books were to have been sold, as this day."--_Priestley's E. Gram._, p. 138. "Do, an if you will."--_Beauties of Shak._, p. 195. "If a man had a positive idea of infinite, either duration or space, he could add two infinites together."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 174. "None shall more willingly agree and advance the same nor I."--EARL OF MORTON: _Robertson's Scotland_, ii, 428. "That it cannot be but hurtful to continue it."--_Barclay's Works_, i, 192. "A conjunction joins words and sentences."--_Beck's Gram._, pp. 4 and 25. "The copulative conjunction connects words and sentences together and continues the sense."--_Frost's El. of Gram._, p. 42. "The Conjunction Copulative serves to connect or continue a sentence, by expressing an addition, a supposition, a cause, &c."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, i, 123. "All Construction is either true or apparent; or in other Words just and figurative."--_Buchanan's Syntax_, p. 130; _British Gram._, 234. "But the divine character is such that none but a divine hand could draw."--_The Friend_, Vol. v, p. 72. "Who is so mad, that, on inspecting the heavens, is insensible of a God?"--CICERO:--_Dr. Gibbons_. "It is now submitted to an enlightened public, with little desire on the part of the Author, than its general utility."--_Town's Analysis_, 9th Ed., p. 5. "This will sufficiently explain the reason, that so many provincials have grown old in the capital without making any change in their original dialect."--_Sheridan's Elocution_, p. 51. "Of these they had chiefly three in general use, which were denominated accents, and the term used in the plural number."--_Ib._, p. 56. "And this is one of the chief reasons, that dramatic representations have ever held the first rank amongst the diversions of mankind."--_Ib._, p. 95. "Which is the chief reason that public reading is in general so disgusting."--_Ib._, p. 96. "At the same time that they learn to read."--_Ib._, p. 96. "He is always to pronounce his words exactly with the same accent that he speaks them."--_Ib._, p. 98. "In order to know what another knows, and in the same manner that he knows it."--_Ib._, p. 136. "For the same reason that it is in a more limited state assigned to the several tribes of animals."--_Ib._, p. 145. "Were there masters to teach this, in the same manner as other arts are taught."--_Ib._, p. 169.

"Whose own example strengthens all his laws;
And is himself that great Sublime he draws."--_Pope, on Crit._, l. 680.

LESSON IX.--PREPOSITIONS.

"The word _so_ has, sometimes, the same meaning with _also, likewise, the same_."--_Priestley's Gram._, p. 137. "The verb _use_ relates not to pleasures of the imagination, but to the terms of fancy and imagination, which he was to employ as synonymous."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 197. "It never can view, clearly and distinctly, above one object at a time."--_Ib._, p. 94. "This figure [Euphemism] is often the same with the Periphrasis."--_Adam's Gram._, p. 247; _Gould's_, 238. "All the between time of youth and old age."--_Walker's Particles_, p. 83. "When one thing is said to act upon, or do something to another."--_Lowth's Gram._, p. 70. "Such a composition has as much of meaning in it, as a mummy has life."--_Journal of Lit. Convention_, p. 81. "That young men of from fourteen to eighteen were not the best judges."--_Ib._, p. 130. "This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and blasphemy."--_2 Kings_, xix, 3. "Blank verse has the same pauses and accents with rhyme."--_Kames, El. of Crit._, ii, 119. "In prosody, long syllables are distinguished by ([=]), and short ones by what is called _breve_ ([~])."--_Bucke's Gram._, p. 22. "Sometimes both articles are left out, especially in poetry."--_Ib._, p. 26. "In the following example, the pronoun and participle are omitted: [_He being_] 'Conscious of his own weight and importance, the aid of others was not solicited.'"--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 221. "He was an excellent person; a mirror of ancient faith in early youth."--_Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 172. "The carrying on its several parts into execution."--_Butler's Analogy_, p. 192. "Concord, is the agreement which one word has over another, in gender, number, case, and person."--_Folker's Gram._, p. 3. "It might perhaps have given me a greater taste of its antiquities."--ADDISON: _Priestley's Gram._, p. 160. "To call of a person, and to wait of him."--_Priestley, ib._, p. 161. "The great difficulty they found of fixing just sentiments."--HUME: _ib._, p. 161. "Developing the difference between the three."--_James Brown's first American Gram._, p. 12. "When the substantive singular ends in _x, ch_ soft, _sh, ss_, or _s_, we add _es_ in the plural."--_Murray's Gram._, p. 40. "We shall present him with a list or specimen of them."--_Ib._, p. 132. "It is very common to hear of the evils of pernicious reading, of how it enervates the mind, or how it depraves the principles."--_Dymond's Essays_, p. 168. "In this example, the verb 'arises' is understood before 'curiosity' and 'knowledge.'"--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 274; _Ingersoll's_, 286; _Comly's_, 155; and others. "The connective is frequently omitted between several words."--_Wilcox's Gram._, p. 81. "He shall expel them from before you, and drive them from out of your sight."--_Joshua_, xxiii, 5. "Who makes his sun shine and his rain to descend upon the just and the unjust."--_M'Ilvaine's Lectures_, p. 411.

LESSON X.--MIXED EXAMPLES.

"This sentence violates the rules of grammar."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, Vol. ii, pp. 19 and 21. "The words _thou_ and _shalt_ are again reduced to short quantities."--_Ib._, Vol. i, p. 246. "Have the greater men always been the most popular? By no means."--DR. LIEBER: _Lit. Conv._, p. 64. "St. Paul positively stated that, 'he who loves one another has fulfilled the law.'"--_Spurzheim, on Education_, p. 248. "More than one organ is concerned in the utterance of almost every consonant."--_M'Culloch's Gram._, p. 18. "If the reader will pardon my descending so low."--_Campbell's Rhet._, p. 20. "To adjust them so, as shall consist equally with the perspicuity and the grace of the period."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 118: _Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 324. "This class exhibits a lamentable want of simplicity and inefficiency."--_Gardiner's Music of Nature_, p. 481. "Whose style flows always like a limpid stream, where we see to the very bottom."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 93. "Whose style flows always like a limpid stream, through which we see to the very bottom."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 293. "We make use of the ellipsis." [447]--_Ib._, p. 217. "The ellipsis of the article is thus used."--_Ib._, p. 217. "Sometimes the ellipsis is improperly applied to nouns of different numbers: as, 'A magnificent house and gardens.'"--_Ib._, p. 218. "In some very emphatic expressions, the ellipsis should not be used."--_Ib._, 218. "The ellipsis of the adjective is used in the following manner."--_Ib._, 218. "The following is the ellipsis of the pronoun."--_Ib._, 218. "The ellipsis of the verb is used in the following instances."--_Ib._, p. 219. "The ellipsis of the adverb is used in the following manner."--_Ib._, 219. "The following instances, though short, contain much of the ellipsis."--_Ib._, 220. "If no emphasis be placed on any words, not only will discourse be rendered heavy and lifeless, but the meaning often ambiguous."--_Ib._, 242. See _Hart's Gram._, p. 172. "If no emphasis be placed on any words, not only is discourse, rendered heavy and lifeless, but the meaning left often ambiguous."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 330; _Murray's Eng. Reader_, p. xi. "He regards his word, but thou dost not regard it."--_Bullions's E. Gram._, p. 129; _his Analytical and Practical Gram._, p. 196. "He regards his word, but thou dost not: i.e. dost not regard it."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 219; _Parker and Fox's_, p. 96; _Weld's_, 192. "I have learned my task, but you have not; i.e. have not learned."--_Ib., Mur._, 219; &c. "When the omission of words would obscure the sentence, weaken its force, or be attended with an impropriety, they must be expressed."--_Ib._, p. 217; _Weld's Gram._ 190. "And therefore the verb is correctly put in the singular number, and refers to the whole separately and individually considered."--_Murray's Gram._ 8vo, ii, 24 and 190. "I understood him the best of all who spoke on the subject."--_Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 192. "I understood him better than any other who spoke on the subject."--_Ibid._, "The roughness found on our entrance into the paths of virtue and learning, grow smoother as we advance."--_Ib._, p. 171. "The roughnesses," &c.--_Murray's Key_, 12mo, p 8. "Nothing promotes knowledge more than steady application, and a habit of observation."--_Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 265. "Virtue confers supreme dignity on man: and should be his chief desire."--_Ib._, p. 192; _and Merchant's_, 192. "The Supreme author of our being has so formed the soul of man, that nothing but himself can be its last, adequate, and proper happiness."--_Addison, Spect._, No. 413; _Blair's Rhet._, p. 213. "The inhabitants of China laugh at the plantations of our Europeans; because, they say, any one may place trees in equal rows and uniform figures."--_Ad., Spect._, No. 414; _Blair's Rhet._, p. 222. "The divine laws are not reversible by those of men."--_Murray's Key_, ii, 167. "In both of these examples, the relative and the verb _which was_, are understood."--_Murray's Gram._, p. 273; _Comly's_, 152; _Ingersoll's_, 285. "The Greek and Latin languages, though, for many reasons, they cannot be called dialects of one another, are nevertheless closely connected."--_Dr. Murray's Hist. of European Lang._, Vol. ii, p. 51. "To ascertain and settle which, of a white rose or a red rose, breathes the sweetest fragrance."--_J. Q. Adams, Orat._, 1831. "To which he can afford to devote much less of his time and labour."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 254.

"Avoid extremes; and shun the fault of such,
Who still are pleas'd too little or too much."
--_Pope, on Crit._, 1, 384.

LESSON XI.--BAD PHRASES.

"He had as good leave his vessel to the direction of the winds."--SOUTH: _in Joh. Dict._ "Without good nature and gratitude, men had as good live in a wilderness as in society."--L'ESTRANGE: _ib._ "And for this reason such lines almost never occur together."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 385. "His being a great man did not make him a happy man."--_Crombie's Treatise_, p. 288. "Let that which tends to the making cold your love be judged in all."--_S. Crisp_. "It is worthy the observing, that there is no passion in the mind of man so weak but it mates and masters the fear of death."--_Bacon's Essays_, p. 4. "Accent dignifies the syllable on which it is laid, and makes it more distinguished by the ear than the rest."--_Sheridan's Lect._, p. 80; _Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 244. "Before he proceeds to argue either on one side or other."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 313. "The change in general of manners throughout all Europe."--_Ib._, p. 375. "The sweetness and beauty of Virgil's numbers, throughout his whole works."--_Ib._, p. 440. "The French writers of sermons study neatness and elegance in laying down their heads."--_Ib._, p. 13. "This almost never fails to prove a refrigerant to passion."--_Ib._, p. 321. "At least their fathers, brothers, and uncles, cannot, as good relations and good citizens, dispense with their not standing forth to demand vengeance."--_Goldsmith's Greece_, Vol. i, p. 191. "Alleging, that their crying down the church of Rome, was a joining hand with the Turks."--_Barclay's Works_, i, 239. "To which is added the Assembly of Divines Catechism."--_New-England Primer_, p. 1. "This treachery was always present in both their thoughts."--_Dr. Robertson_. "Thus far both their words agree." ("_Convenient adhuo utriusqus verba_. Plaut.")--_Walker's Particles_, p. 125. "Aparithmesis, or Enumeration, is the branching out into several parts of what might be expressed in fewer words."--_Gould's Gram_, p. 241. "Aparithmesis, or Enumeration, is when what might be expressed in a few words, is branched out into several parts."--_Adam's Gram._, p. 251. "Which may sit from time to time where you dwell or in the neighbouring vicinity."--_Taylor's District School_, 1st Ed., p. 281. "Place together a large and a small sized animal of the same species."--_Kames, El. of Crit._, i, 235. "The weight of the swimming body is equal to that of the weight, of the quantity of fluid displaced by it."--_Percival's Tales_, ii, 213. "The Subjunctive mood, in all its tenses, is similar to that of the Optative."--_Gwilt's Saxon Gram._, p. 27. "No other feeling of obligation remains, except that of fidelity."--_Wayland's Moral Science_, 1st Ed., p. 82. "Who asked him, 'What could be the reason, that whole audiences should be moved to tears, at the representation of some story on the stage.'"--_Sheridan's Elocution_, p. 175. "Art not thou and you ashamed to affirm, that the best works of the Spirit of Christ in his saints are as filthy rags?"--_Barclay's Works_, i, 174. "A neuter verb becomes active, when followed by a noun of the same signification with its own."--_Sanborn's Gram._, p. 127. "But he has judged better, in omitting to repeat the article _the_."--_Blair's Rhet._, p. 194. "Many objects please us as highly beautiful, which have almost no variety at all."--_Ib._, p. 46. "Yet notwithstanding, they sometimes follow them."--_Emmons's Gram._, p. 21. "For I know of nothing more material in all the whole Subject, than this doctrine of Mood and Tense."--_Johnson's Gram. Com._, p. 292. "It is by no means impossible for an errour to be got rid of or supprest."-- _Philological Museum_, Vol. i, p. 642. "These are things of the highest importance to the growing age."--_Murray's Key_, 8vo, p. 250. "He had better have omitted the word _many_."--_Blair's Rhet._ p. 205. "Which had better have been separated."--_Ib._, p. 225. "Figures and metaphors, therefore, should, on no occasion be stuck on too profusely."--_Ib._, p. 144; _Jamieson's Rhet._, 150. "Metaphors, as well as other figures, should on no occasion, be stuck on too profusely."--_Murray's Gram._, p. 338; _Russell's_, 136. "Something like this has been reproached to Tacitus."--BOLINGBROKE: _Priestley's Gram._, p. 164.

"O thou, whom all mankind in vain withstand,
Each of whose blood must one day stain thy hand!"
--_Sheffield's Temple of Death_.

LESSON XII.--TWO ERRORS.[448]