IV. VERSIFICATION (part 1 of 2)

IV. VERSIFICATION (part 1 of 2)

FALSE PROSODY, OR ERRORS OF METRE, CORRECTED.

LESSON I.--RHYTHM RESTORED.

"Where thy true treasure? Gold says, 'Not in me.'" --Young.

"Canst thou grow sad, thou say'st, as earth grows bright." --Dana.

"It must be so;--Plato, thou reason'st well" --CATO: Enfield, p. 321.

"Slow rises worth by poverty depressed." --Wells's Gram., Late Ed., p. 211.

"Rapt into future times, the bard begun." --POPE.--Ib., p. 165.

"Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy But to confront the visage of offence?" --Shak., Hamlet.

"Look! in this place ran Cassius' dagger through." --Id., J. Cæsar.

"And when they list, their lean and flashy songs Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw." --Milton, Lycidas.

"Did not great Julius bleed for justice' sake?" --Dodd and Shak. cor.

"May I express thee' unblam'd? since God is light" --Milton, B. iii, l. 3.

"Or hear'st thou rather pure ethereal stream?" --Id., B. iii, l. 7.

"Republics, kingdoms, empires, may decay; Great princes, heroes, sages, sink to nought." --Peirce or La-Rue cor.

"Thou bringst, gay creature as thou art, A solemn image to my heart." --Hallock cor.

"Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is Man." --Pope, on Man, Ep. ii, l. 1.

"Raised on pilasters high of burnished gold." --Dr. S. Butler cor.

"Love in Adalgise' breast has fixed his sting." --Id.

"Thirty days each have September, April, June, and old November; Each of the rest has thirty-one, Bating February alone, Which has twenty-eight in fine, Till leap-year gives it twenty-nine." --Dean Colet cor.

LESSON II.--RHYTHM RESTORED.

"'Twas not the fame of what he once had been, Or tales in records old and annals seen." --Rowe cor.

"And Asia now and Afric are explored For high-priced dainties and the citron board." --Rowe cor.

"Who knows not how the trembling judge beheld The peaceful court with arm~ed legions fill'd?" --Rowe cor.

"With thee the Scythian wilds we'll wander o'er, With thee the burning Libyan sands explore." --Rowe cor.

"Hasty and headlong, different paths they tread, As impulse blind and wild distraction lead." --Rowe cor.

"But Fate reserv'd him to perform its doom, And be the minister of wrath to Rome." --Rowe cor.

"Thus spoke the youth. When Cato thus express'd The sacred counsels of his inmost breast." --Rowe cor.

"These were the rigid manners of the man, This was the stubborn course in which they ran; The golden mean unchanging to pursue, Constant to keep the purpos'd end in view." --Rowe cor.

"What greater grief can on a Roman seize, Than to be forced to live on terms like these!" --Rowe cor.

"He views the naked town with joyful eyes, While from his rage an arm~ed people flies." --Rowe cor.

"For planks and beams, he ravages the wood, And the tough oak extends across the flood." --Rowe cor.

"A narrow pass the horn~ed mole divides. Narrow as that where strong Euripus' tides Beat on Euboean Chalcis' rocky sides." --Rowe cor.

"No force, no fears their hands unarm~ed bear,"--or, "No force, no fears their hands unarm'd now bear, But looks of peace and gentleness they wear." --Rowe cor.

"The ready warriors all aboard them ride, And wait return of the retiring tide." --Rowe cor.

"He saw those troops that long had faithful stood, Friends to his cause, and enemies to good, Grown weary of their chief, and satiate with blood." --Rowe cor.

END OF THE KEY.

APPENDIX I. TO PART FIRST, OR ORTHOGRAPHY. OF THE SOUNDS OF THE LETTERS.

In the first chapter of Part I, the powers of the letters, or the elementary sounds of the English language, were duly enumerated and explained; for these, as well as the letters themselves, are few, and may be fully stated in few words: but, since we often express the same sound in many different ways, and also, in some instances, give to the same letter several different sounds,--or, it may be, no sound at all,--any adequate account of the powers of the letters considered severally according to usage,--that is, of the sound or sounds of each letter, with its mute positions, as these occur in practice,--must, it was thought, descend to a minuteness of detail not desirable in the first chapter of Orthography. For this reason, the following particulars have been reserved to be given here as an Appendix, pertaining to the First Part of this English Grammar.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--A proper discrimination of the different vowel sounds by the epithets most commonly used for this purpose,--such as long and short, broad and slender, open and close, or open and shut,--is made difficult, if not impossible, by reason of the different, and sometimes directly contradictory senses in which certain orthoepists [sic--KTH] have employed such terms. Wells says, "Vowel sounds are called open or close, according to the relative size of the opening through which the voice passes in forming them. Thus, a in father, and o in nor, are called open sounds, because they are formed by a wide opening of the organs of speech; while e in me, and u in rule, are called close sounds, because the organs are nearly closed in uttering them."--School Grammar, 1850, p. 32. Good use should fix the import of words. How does the passage here cited comport with this hint of Pope?

"These equal syllables alone require, Though oft the ear the open vowels tire." --Essay on Criticism, l. 344.

OBS. 2.--Walker, too, in his Principles, 64 and 65, on page 19th of his Critical Pronouncing Dictionary, mentions a similar distinction of vowels, "which arises from the different apertures of the mouth in forming them;" and says, "We accordingly find vowels denominated by the French, ouvert and fermé; by the Italians, aperto and chiuso; and by the English [,] open and shut. But whatever propriety there may be in the use of these terms in other languages, it is certain they must be used with caution in English for fear of confounding them with long and short. Dr. Johnson and other grammarians call the a in father the open a: which may, indeed, distinguish it from the slender a in paper; but not from the broad a in water, which is still more open. Each of these letters [the seven vowels] has a short sound, which may be called a shut sound; but the long sounds cannot be so properly denominated open as more or less broad; that is, the a in paper, the slender sound; the a in father, the broadish or middle sound; and the a in water, the broad sound. The same may be observed of the o. This letter has three long sounds, heard in move, note, nor; which graduate from slender to broadish, and broad [,] like [those three sounds of] the a. The i also in mine may be called the broad i, and that in machine, the slender i; though each of them is equally long; and though these vowels that are long [,] may be said to be more or less open according to the different apertures of the mouth in forming them, yet the short vowels cannot be said to be more or less shut; for as short always implies shut (except in verse,) though long does not always imply open, we must be careful not to confound long and open, and close and shut, when we speak of the quantity and quality of the vowels. The truth of it is," continues he, "all vowels either terminate a syllable, or are united with a consonant. In the first case, if the accent be on the syllable, the vowel is long, though it may not be open: in the second case, where a syllable is terminated by a consonant, except that consonant be r, whether the accent be on the syllable or not, the vowel has its short sound, which, compared with its long one, may be called shut: but [,] as no vowel can be said to be shut that is not joined to a consonant, all vowels that end syllables may be said to be open, whether the accent be on them or not."--Crit. Pron. Dict., New York, 1827, p. 19.

OBS. 3.--These suggestions of Walker's, though each in itself may seem clear and plausible, are undoubtedly, in several respects, confused and self-contradictory. Open and shut are here inconsistently referred first to one principle of distinction, and then to another;--first, (as are "open and close" by Wells,) to "the relative size of the opening," or to "the different apertures of the mouth;" and then, in the conclusion, to the relative position of the vowels with respect to other letters. These principles improperly give to each of the contrasted epithets two very different senses: as, with respect to aperture, wide and narrow; with respect to position, closed and unclosed. Now, that open may mean unclosed, or close be put for closed, is not to be questioned; but that open is a good word for wide, or that shut (not to say close) can well mean narrow, is an assumption hardly scholarlike. According to Walker, "we must be careful not to confound" open with long, or shut with short, or close with shut; and yet, if he himself does not, in the very paragraph above quoted, confound them all,--does not identify in sense, or fail to distinguish, the two words in each of these pairs,--I know not who can need his "caution." If there are vowel sounds which graduate through several degrees of openness or broadness, it would seem most natural to express these by regularly comparing the epithet preferred; as, open, opener, openest; or broad, broader, broadest. And again, if "all vowels that end syllables may be said to be open," then it is not true, that "the long sounds" of a in paper, father, water, cannot be so "denominated;" or that to "call the a in father the open a, may, indeed, distinguish it from the slender a in paper." Nor, on this principle, can it be said that "the broad a in water is still more open;" for this a no more "ends a syllable" than the others. If any vowel sound is to be called the open sound because the letter ends a syllable, or is not shut by a consonant, it is, undoubtedly, the primal and most usual sound, as found in the letter when accented, and not some other of rare occurrence.

OBS. 4.--Dr. Perley says, "It is greatly to be regretted that the different sounds of a vowel should be called by the names long, short, slender, and broad, which convey no idea of the nature of the sound, for mat and not are as long in poetry as mate and note. The first sound of a vowel[,] as [that of a in] fate[,] may be called open, because it is the sound which the vowel generally has when it ends a syllable; the second sound as [that of a in] fat, may be called close, because it is the sound which the vowel generally has when it is joined with a consonant following in the same syllable, as fat-ten; when there are more than two sounds of any vowel[,] they may be numbered onward; as 3 far, 4 fall."--Perley's Gram., p. 73.

OBS. 5.--Walker thought a long or short vowel sound essential to a long or short quantity in any syllable. By this, if he was wrong in it, (as, in the chapter on Versification, I have argued that he was,) he probably disturbed more the proper distinction of quantities, than that of vowel sounds. As regards long and short, therefore, Perley's regret seems to have cause; but, in making the same objection to "slender and broad," he reasons illogically. So far as his view is right, however, it coincides with the following earlier suggestion: "The terms long and short, which are often used to denote certain vowel sounds; being also used, with a different import, to distinguish the quantity of syllables, are frequently misunderstood; for which reason, we have substituted for them the terms open and close;--the former, to denote the sound usually given to a vowel when it forms or ends an accented syllable; as, ba, be, bi, bo, bu, by;--the latter, to denote the sound which the vowel commonly takes when closed by a consonant; as, ab, eb, ib, ob, ub"--Brown's Institutes, p. 285.

I. OF THE LETTER A.

The vowel A has four sounds properly its own; they are named by various epithets: as,

1. The English, open, full, long, or slender a; as in aid, fame, favour, efficacious.

2. The French, close, curt, short, or stopped a; as in bat, banner, balance, carrying.

3. The Italian, broadish, grave, or middle a; as in far, father, aha, comma, scoria, sofa.

4. The Dutch, German, Old-Saxon, or broad a; as in wall, haul, walk, warm, water.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--Concerning the number of sounds pertaining to the vowel a, or to certain other particular letters, and consequently in regard to the whole number of the sounds which constitute the oral elements of the English language, our educational literati,--the grammarians, orthoepists [sic--KTH], orthographers, elocutionists, phonographers, and lexicographers,--are found to have entertained and inculcated a great variety of opinions. In their different countings, the number of our phonical elements varies from twenty-six to more than forty. Wells says there are "about forty elementary sounds."--School Gram., §64. His first edition was more positive, and stated them at "forty-one." See the last and very erroneous passage which I have cited at the foot of page 162. In Worcester's Universal and Critical Dictionary, there appear to be noted several more than forty-one, but I know not whether this author, or Walker either, has anywhere told us how many of his marked sounds he considered to be severally different from all others. Sheridan and Jones admitted twenty-eight. Churchill acknowledges, as undisputed and indisputable, only twenty-six; though he enumerates, "Of simple vowel sounds, twelve, or perhaps thirteen" (New Grammar, p. 5,) and says, "The consonant sounds in the English language, are nineteen, or rather twenty."--P. 13.

OBS. 2.--Thus, while Pitman, Comstock, and others, are amusing themselves with the folly of inventing new "Phonetic Alphabets," or of overturning all orthography to furnish "a character for each of the 38 elementary sounds," more or fewer, one of the acutest observers among our grammarians can fix on no number more definite or more considerable than thirty-one, thirty-two, or thirty-three; and the finding of these he announces with a "perhaps," and the admission that other writers object to as many as five of the questionable number. Churchill's vowel sounds, he says, "may be found in the following words: 1. B_a_te, 2. B_a_t, 3. B_a_ll; 4. B_e_t, 5. B_e_; 6. B_i_t; 7. B_o_t, 8. B_o_ne, 9. B_oo_n; 10. B_u_t, 11. B_u_ll; 12. Lovel_y_; 13. _W_ool."--New Grammar, p. 5. To this he adds: "Many of the writers on orthoepy [sic--KTH], however, consider the first and fourth of the sounds above distinguished as actually the same, the former differing from the latter only by being lengthened in the pronunciation. They also reckon the seventh sound, to be the third shortened; the twelfth, the fifth shortened; and the eleventh, the ninth shortened. Some consider the fifth and sixth as differing only in length; and most esteem the eleventh and thirteenth as identical."--Ib.

OBS. 3.--Now, it is plain, that these six identifications, or so many of them as are admitted, must diminish by six, or by the less number allowed, the thirteen vowel sounds enumerated by this author. By the best authorities, W initial, as in "_W_ool." is reckoned a consonant; and, of course, its sound is supposed to differ in some degree from that of oo in "B_oo_n," or that of u in "B_u_ll,"--the ninth sound or the eleventh in the foregoing series. By Walker, Murray, and other popular writers, the sound of y in "Lovel_y_" is accounted to be essentially the same as that of e in "B_e_." The twelfth and the thirteenth, then, of this list, being removed, and three others added,--namely, the a heard in far, the i in fine, and the u in fuse,--we shall have the fourteen vowel sounds which are enumerated by L. Murray and others, and adopted by the author of the present work.

OBS. 4.--Wells says, "A has six sounds:--1. Long; as in late. 2. Grave; as in father. 3. Broad; as in fall. 4. Short; as in man. 5. The sound heard in care, hare. 6. Intermediate between a in man and a in father; as in grass, pass, branch."--School Grammar, 1850, p. 33. Besides these six, Worcester recognizes a seventh sound,--the "A obscure; as in liar, rival"--Univ. and Crit. Dict., p. ix. Such a multiplication of the oral elements of our first vowel.--or, indeed, any extension of them beyond four,--appears to me to be unadvisable; because it not only makes our alphabet the more defective, but is unnecessary, and not sustained by our best and most popular orthoepical [sic--KTH] authorities. The sound of a in liar, (and in rival too, if made "obscure") is a borrowed one, pertaining more properly to the letter u. In grass, pass, and branch, properly uttered, the a is essentially the same as in man. In care and hare, we have the first sound of a, made as slender as the r will admit.

OBS. 5.--Concerning his fifth sound of a, Wells cites authorities thus: "Walker, Webster, Sheridan, Fulton and Knight, Kenrick, Jones, and Nares, give a in care the long sound of a, as in late. Page and Day give it the short sound of a, as in mat. See Page's Normal Chart, and Day's Art of Elocution. Worcester and Perry make the sound of a in care a separate element; and this distinction is also recognized by Russell, Mandeville, and Wright. See Russell's Lessons in Enunciation, Mandeville's Elements of Reading and Oratory, and Wright's Orthography."--Wells's School Grammar, p. 34. Now the opinion that a in care has its long, primal sound, and is not properly "a separate element," is maintained also by Murray, Hiley, Bullions, Scott, and Cobb; and is, undoubtedly, much more prevalent than any other. It accords, too, with the scheme of Johnson. To count this a by itself, seems too much like a distinction without a difference.

OBS. 6.--On his sixth sound of a, Wells remarks as follows: "Many persons pronounce this a incorrectly, giving it either the grave or the short sound. Perry, Jones, Nares, Webster, and Day, give to a in grass the grave sound, as in father; while Walker, Jamieson, and Russell, give it the short sound, as in man. But good speakers generally pronounce a in grass, plant, etc., as a distinct element, intermediate between the grave and the short sound."--School Gram., p. 34. He also cites Worcester and Smart to the same effect; and thinks, with the latter, "There can be no harm in avoiding the censure of both parties by shunning the extreme that offends the taste of each."--Ib., p. 35. But I say, that a needless multiplication of questionable vowel powers difficult to be discriminated, is "harm," or a fault in teaching; and, where intelligent orthoepists [sic--KTH] dispute whether words have "the grave or the short sound" of a, how can others, who condemn both parties, acceptably split the difference, and form "a distinct element" in the interval? Words are often mispronounced, and the French or close a may be mistaken for the Italian or broadish a, and vice versa; but, between the two, there does not appear to be room for an other distinguishable from both. Dr. Johnson says, (inaccurately indeed,) "A has three sounds, the slender, [the] open, and [the] broad. A slender is found in most words, as face, mane. A open is the a of the Italian, or nearly resembles it; as father, rather, congratulate, fancy, glass. A broad resembles the a of the German; as all, wall, call. [fist] The short a approaches to the a open, as grass."--Johnson's Grammar, in his Quarto Dictionary, p. 1. Thus the same word, grass, that serves Johnson for an example of "the short a" is used by Wells and Worcester to exemplify the "a intermediate;" while of the Doctor's five instances of what he calls the "a open," three, if not four, are evidently such as nearly all readers nowadays would call close or short!

OBS. 7.--There are several grammarians who agree in ascribing to our first vowel five sounds, but who nevertheless oppose one an other in making up the five. Thus, according to Hart, "A has five sounds of its own, as in fate, fare, far, fall, fat,"--Hart's E. Gram., p. 26. According to W. Allen, "A has five sounds;--the long or slender, as in cane; the short or open, as in can; the middle, as in arm; the broad, as in all; and the broad contracted, as in want."--Allen's E. Gram., p. 6. P. Davis has the same sounds in a different order, thus: "a [as in] mane, mar, fall, mat, what."--Davis's E. Gram., p. xvi. Mennye says, "A has five sounds; as, 1 fame, 2 fat, 3 false, 4 farm, 5 beggar."--Mennye's E. Gram., p. 55. Here the fifth sound is the seventh of Worcester,--the "A obscure."

DIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH A.

The only proper diphthong in which a is put first, is the word ay, meaning yes: in which a has its middle sound, as in ah, and y is like open e, or ee, uttered feebly--ah-ee. Aa, when pronounced as an improper diphthong, and not as pertaining to two syllables, usually takes the sound of close a; as in Balaam, Canaan, Isaac. In many words, as in Baäl, Gaäl, Gaäsh, the diæresis occurs. In baa, the cry of a sheep, we hear the Italian sound of a; and, since we hear it but once, one a or the other must be silent.

Æ, a Latin improper diphthong, common also in the Anglo-Saxon, generally has, according to modern orthoëpists, the sound of open e or ee; as in Cæsar, ænigma, pæan;--sometimes that of close or short e; as in aphæresis, diæresis, et cætera. Some authors, judging the a of this diphthong to be needless, reject it, and write Cesar, enigma, &c.

Ai, an improper diphthong, generally has the sound of open or long a; as in sail, avail, vainly. In a final unaccented syllable, it sometimes preserves the first sound of a; as in chilblain, mortmain: but oftener takes the sound of close or short i; as in certain, curtain, mountain, villain. In said, saith, again, and against, it takes the sound of close or short e; and in the name Britain, that of close or short u.

Ao, an improper diphthong, occurs in the word gaol, now frequently written as it is pronounced, jail; also in gaoler, which may be written jailer; and in the compounds of gaol: and, again, it is found in the adjective extraordinary, and its derivatives, in which, according to nearly all orthoëpists, the a is silent. The name Pharaoh, is pronounced F=a'r=o.

Au, an improper diphthong, is generally sounded like broad a; as in cause, caught, applause. Before n and an other consonant, it usually has the sound of grave or middle a; as in aunt, flaunt, gaunt, launch, laundry. So in laugh, laughter, and their derivatives. Gauge and gauger are pronounced gage and gager, and sometimes written so.

Aw, an improper diphthong, is always sounded like broad a; as in draw, drawn, drawl.

Ay, an improper diphthong, like ai, has usually the sound of open or long a; as in day, pay, delay: in sayst and says, it has the sound of close or short e.

TRIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH A.

Awe is sounded au, like broad a. Aye, an adverb signifying always, has the sound of open or long a only; being different, both in sound and in spelling, from the adverb ay, yes, with which it is often carelessly confounded. The distinction is maintained by Johnson, Walker, Todd, Chalmers, Jones, Cobb, Maunder, Bolles, and others; but Webster and Worcester give it up, and write "ay, or aye," each sounded ah-ee, for the affirmation, and "aye," sounded =a, for the adverb of time: Ainsworth on the contrary has ay only, for either sense, and does not note the pronunciation.

II. OF THE LETTER B.

The consonant B has but one sound; as in boy, robber, cub. B is silent before t or after m in the same syllable; as in debt, debtor, doubt, dumb, lamb, climb, tomb. It is heard in subtile, fine; but not in subtle, cunning.

III. OF THE LETTER C.

The consonant C has two sounds, neither of them peculiar to this letter; the one hard, like that of k, and the other soft, or rather hissing, like that of s. C before a, o, u, l, r, t, or when it ends a syllable, is generally hard, like k; as in can, come curb, clay, crab, act, action, accent, flaccid. C before e, i, or y, is always soft, like s; as in cent, civil, decency, acid.

In a few words, c takes the flat sound of s, like that of z; as in discern, suffice, sacrifice, sice. C before ea, ia, ie, io, or eou, when the accent precedes, sounds like sh; as in ocean, special, species, gracious, cetaceous. C is silent in czar, czarina, victuals, indict, muscle, corpuscle, and the second syllable of Connecticut.

Ch is generally sounded like tch, or tsh, which is the same to the ear; as in church, chance, child. But in words derived from the learned languages, it has the sound of k; as in character, scheme, catechise, chorus, choir, chyle, patriarch, drachma, magna charta: except in chart, charter, charity. Ch, in words derived from the French, takes the sound of sh; as in chaise, machine. In Hebrew words or names, in general, ch sounds like k; as in Chebar, Sirach, Enoch: but in Rachel, cherub, and cherubim, we have Anglicized the sound by uttering it as tch. Loch, a Scottish word, sometimes also a medical term, is heard as lok.

"Arch, before a vowel, is pronounced ark; as in archives, archangel, archipelago: except in arched, archer, archery, archenemy. Before a consonant it is pronounced artch; as in archbishop, archduke, archfiend."--See W. Allen's Gram., p. 10. Ch is silent in schism, yacht, and drachm. In schedule, some utter it as k; others, as sh; and many make it mute: I like the first practice.

IV. OF THE LETTER D.

The general sound of the consonant D, is that which is heard in dog, eddy, did. D, in the termination ed, preceded by a sharp consonant, takes the sound of t, when the e is suppressed or unheard: as in faced, stuffed, cracked, tripped, passed; pronounced faste, stuft, cract, tript, past. D before ia, ie, io, or eou, when the accent precedes, generally sounds like j; as in Indian, soldier, tedious, hideous. So in verdure, arduous, education.

V. OF THE LETTER E.

The vowel E has two sounds properly its own,--and I incline to think, three:--

1. The open, long, full, or primal e; as in me, mere, menial, melodious.

2. The close, curt, short, or stopped e; as in men, merry, ebony, strength.

3. The obscure or faint e; as in open, garden, shovel, able. This third sound is scarcely perceptible, and barely sufficient to articulate the consonant and form a syllable.

E final is mute and belongs to the syllable formed by the preceding vowel or diphthong; as in age, eve, ice, ore. Except--1. In the words, be, he, me, we, she, in which it has the open sound; and the article the, wherein it is open before a vowel, and obscure before a consonant. 2. In Greek and Latin words, in which it has its open sound, and forms a distinct syllable, or the basis of one; as in Penelope, Pasiphaë, Cyaneë, Gargaphië, Arsinoë, apostrophe, catastrophe, simile, extempore, epitome. 3. In the terminations ere, gre, tre, in which it has the sound of close or curt u, heard before the r; as in acre, meagre, centre.

Mute e, after a single consonant, or after st or th, generally preserves the open or long sound of the preceding vowel; as in cane, here, pine, cone, tune, thyme, baste, waste, lathe, clothe: except in syllables unaccented; as in the last of genuine;--and in a few monosyllables; as bade, are, were, gone, shone, one, done, give, live, shove, love.

DIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH E.

E before an other vowel, in general, either forms with it an improper diphthong, or else belongs to a separate syllable. We do not hear both vowels in one syllable, except perhaps in eu or ew.

Ea, an improper diphthong, mostly sounds like open or long e; as in ear, fear, tea; frequently like close or curt e; as in head, health, leather: sometimes, like open or long a; as in steak, bear, forswear: rarely, like middle a; as in heart, hearth, hearken. Ea in an unaccented syllable, sounds like close or curt u; as in vengeance, pageant.

Ee, an improper diphthong, mostly sounds like one open or long e; as in eel, sheep, tree, trustee, referee. The contractions e'er and ne'er, are pronounced air and nair, and not like ear and near. E'en, however, preserves the sound of open e. Been is most commonly heard with the curt sound of i, bin.

Ei, an improper diphthong, mostly sounds like the primal or long a; as in reign, veil: frequently, like open or long e; as in deceit, either, neither, seize: sometimes, like open or long i; as in height, sleight, heigh-ho: often, in unaccented syllables, like close or curt i; as in foreign, forfeit, surfeit, sovereign: rarely, like close e; as in heifer, nonpareil.

Eo, an improper diphthong, in people, sounds like open or long e; in leopard and jeopard, like close or curt e; in yeoman, according to the best usage, like open or long o; in George, Georgia, georgic, like close o; in dungeon, puncheon, sturgeon, &c., like close u. In feoff, and its derivatives, the close or short sound of e is most fashionable; but some prefer the long sound of e; and some write the word "fief." Feod, feodal, feodary, feodatory, are now commonly written as they are pronounced, feud, feudal, feudary, feudatory.

Eu and ew are sounded alike, and almost always with the diphthongal sound of open or long u; as in feud, deuce, jewel, dew, few, new. These diphthongs, when initial, sound like yu. Nouns beginning with this sound, require the article a, and not an, before them; as, A European, a ewer. After r or rh, eu and ew are commonly sounded like oo; as in drew, grew, screw, rheumatism. In sew and Shrewsbury, ew sounds like open o: Worcester, however, prefers the sound of oo in the latter word. Shew and strew, having the same meaning as show and strow, are sometimes, by sameness of pronunciation, made to be the same words; and sometimes distinguished as different words, by taking the sounds shu and stroo.

Ey, accented, has the sound of open or long a; as in bey, prey, survey: unaccented, it has the sound of open e; as in alley, valley, money. Key and ley are pronounced kee, lee.

TRIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH E.

Eau, a French triphthong, sounds like open o; as in beau, flambeau, portmanteau, bureau: except in beauty, and its compounds, in which it is pronounced like open u, as if the word were written buty.

Eou is a combination of vowels sometimes heard in one syllable, especially after c or g; as in crus-ta-ceous, gor-geous. Walker, in his Rhyming Dictionary, gives one hundred and twenty words ending in eous, in all of which he separates these vowels; as in ex-tra-ne-ous. And why, in his Pronouncing Dictionary, he gave us several such anomalies as fa-ba-ce-ous in four syllables and her-ba-ceous in three, it is not easy to tell. The best rule is this: after c or g, unite these vowels; after the other consonants, separate them.

Ewe is a triphthong having the sound of yu, and forming a word. The vulgar pronunciation yoe should be carefully avoided.

Eye is an improper triphthong which also forms a word, and is pronounced like open i, or the pronoun I.

VI. OF THE LETTER F.

The consonant F has one unvaried sound, which is heard in fan, effort, staff: except of, which, when simple, is pronounced ov.

VII. OF THE LETTER G.

The consonant G has two sounds;--the one hard, guttural, and peculiar to this letter; the other soft, like that of j. G before a, o, u, l, r, or at the end of a word, is hard; as in game, gone, gull, glory, grace, log, bog; except in gaol. G before e, i, or y, is soft; as in gem, ginger, elegy. Except--1. In get, give, gewgaw, finger, and a few other words. 2. When a syllable is added to a word ending in g: as, long, longer; fog, foggy.

G is silent before m or n in the same syllable; as in phlegm, apothegm, gnaw, design. G, when silent, usually lengthens the preceding vowel; as in resign, impregn, impugn.

Gh at the beginning of a word has the sound of g hard; as in ghastly, gherkin, Ghibelline, ghost, ghoul, ghyll: in other situations, it is generally silent; as in high, mighty, plough, bough, though, through, fight, night, bought. Gh final sometimes sounds like f; as in laugh, rough, tough; and sometimes, like g hard; as in burgh. In hough, lough, shough, it sounds like k, or ck; thus, hock, lock, shock.

VIII. OF THE LETTER H.

The sound of the consonant H, (though articulate and audible when properly uttered,) is little more than an aspirate breathing. It is heard in hat, hit, hot, hut, adhere.

H at the beginning of a word, is always sounded; except in heir, herb, honest, honour, hospital, hostler, hour, humble, humour, with their compounds and derivatives. H after r, is always silent; as in rhapsody, rhetoric, rheum, rhubarb. H final, immediately following a vowel, is always silent; as in ah, Sarah, Nineveh, Shiloh.

IX. OF THE LETTER I.

The vowel I has three sounds, each very common to it, and perhaps properly its own:--

1. The open, long, full, or primal i; as in life, fine, final, time, bind, child, sigh, pint, resign. This is a diphthongal sound, equivalent to the sounds of middle a and open e quickly united.

2. The close, curt, short, or stopped i; as in ink, limit, disfigure, mimicking.

3. The feeble, faint, or slender i, accentless; as in divest, doctrinal, diversity.

This third sound is equivalent to that of open e, or ee uttered feebly. I generally has this sound when it occurs at the end of an unaccented syllable: except at the end of Latin words, or of ancient names, where it is open or long; as in literati, Nervii, Eli, Levi.

In some words, (principally from other modern languages,) i has the full sound of open e, under the accent; as in Porto Rico, machine, magazine, antique, shire.

Accented i followed by a vowel, has its open or primal sound; and the vowels belong to separate syllables; as in pliant, diet, satiety, violet, pious. Unaccented i followed by a vowel, has its feeble sound; as in expatiate, obedient, various, abstemious.

DIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH I.

I, in the situation last described, readily coalesces with the vowel which follows, and is often sunk into the same syllable, forming a proper diphthong: as in fustian, quotient, question. The terminations cion, sion, and tion, are generally pronounced shun; and cious and tious are pronounced shus.

Ie is commonly an improper diphthong. Ie in die, hie, lie, pie, tie, vie, and their derivatives, has the sound of open i. Ie in words from the French, (as cap-a-pie, ecurie, grenadier, siege, bier,) has the sound of open e. So, generally, in the middle of English roots; as in chief, grief, thief; but, in sieve, it has the sound of close or short i. In friend, and its derivatives or compounds, it takes the sound of close e.

TRIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH I.

The triphthongs ieu and iew both sound like open or long u; as in lieu, adieu, view.

The three vowels iou, in the termination ious, often fall into one syllable, and form a triphthong. There are two hundred and forty-five words of this ending; and more than two hundred deriva- tives from them. Walker has several puzzling inconsistencies in their pronunciation; such as fas-tid-i-ous and per-fid-ious, con-ta-gi-ous and sac-ri-le-gious. After c, g, t, or x, these vowels should coalesce: as in gra-cious, re-li-gious, vex-a-tious, ob-nox-ious, and about two hundred other words. After the other consonants, let them form two syllables; (except when there is a syn- seresis in poetry;) as in dw-bi-ou-s, o-di-ous, va-ri-ous, en-vi-ous.

X. OF THE LETTER J.

The consonant J, the tenth letter of the English alphabet, has invariably the sound of soft g, like the g in giant, which some say is equivalent to the complex sound dzh; as, jade, jet, jilt, joy, justice, jewel, prejudice.

XI. OF THE LETTER K.

The consonant K, not silent, has uniformly the sound of c hard; and occurs where c would have its soft sound: as in keep, looking, kind, smoky.

K before n is silent; as in knave, know, knuckle. In stead of doubling c final, we write ck; as in lack, lock, luck, attack. In English words, k is never doubled, though two Kays may come together in certain compounds; as in brickkiln, jackknife. Two Kays, belonging to different syllables, also stand together in a few Scripture names; as in Akkub, Bakbakkar, Bukki, Bukkiah, Habakkuk. Hakkoz, Ikkesh, Sukkiims. C before k, though it does not always double the sound which c or k in such a situation must represent, always shuts or shortens the preceding vowel; as in rack, speck, freckle, cockle, wicked.

XII. OF THE LETTER L.

The consonant L, the plainest of the semivowels, has a soft, liquid sound; as in line, lily, roll, follow. L is sometimes silent; as in Holmes, alms, almond, calm, chalk, walk, calf, half, could, would, should. L, too, is frequently doubled where it is heard but once; as in hill, full, travelled. So any letter that is written twice, and not twice sounded, must there be once mute; as the last in baa, ebb, add, see, staff, egg, all, inn, coo, err, less, buzz.

XIII. OF THE LETTER M.

The consonant M is a semivowel and a liquid, capable of an audible, humming sound through the nose, when the mouth is closed. It is heard in map, murmur, mammon. In the old words, compt, accompt, comptroller, (for count, account, controller,) the m is sounded as n. M before n, at the beginning of a word, is silent; as in Mnason, Mnemosyne, mnemonics.

XIV. OF THE LETTER N.

The consonant N, which is also a semivowel and a liquid, has two sounds;--the first, the pure and natural sound of n; as in nun, banner, cannon;--the second, the ringing sound of ng, heard before certain gutturals; as in think, mangle, conquer, congress, singing, twinkling, Cen'chreä. The latter sound should be carefully preserved in all words ending in ing, and in such others as require it. The sounding of the syllable ing as if it were in, is a vulgarism in utterance; and the writing of it so, is, as it would seem by the usage of Burns, a Scotticism.

N final preceded by m, is silent; as in hymn, solemn, column, damn, condemn, autumn. But this n becomes audible in an additional syllable; as in autumnal, condemnable, damning.

XV. OF THE LETTER O.

The vowel O has three different sounds, which are properly its own:--

1. The open, full, primal, or long o; as in no, note, opiate, opacity, Roman.

2. The close, curt, short, or stopped o; as in not, nor, torrid, dollar, fondle.

3. The slender or narrow o, like oo; as in prove, move, who, to, do, tomb.

O, in many words, sounds like close or curt u; as in love, shove, son, come, nothing, dost, attorney, gallon, dragon, comfit, comfort, coloration. One is pronounced wun; and once, wunce. In the termination on immediately after the accent, o is often sunk into a sound scarcely perceptible, like that of obscure e; as in mason, person, lesson.

DIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH O.

Oa, an improper diphthong, has the sound of open or long o; as in boat, coal, roach, coast, coastwise: except in broad and groat, which have the sound of broad a.

Oe, an improper diphthong, when final, has the sound of open or long o: as in doe, foe, throe: except in canoe, shoe, pronounced canoo, shoo. OE, a Latin diphthong, generally sounds like open e; as in Antoeci, foetus: sometimes, like close or curt e; as in foetid, foeticide. But the English word f~etid is often, and perhaps generally, written without the o.

Oi is generally a proper diphthong, uniting the sound of close o or broad a, and that of open e; as in boil, coil, soil, rejoice. But the vowels, when they appear together, sometimes belong to separate syllables; as in Stoic, Stoicism. Oi unaccented, sometimes has the sound of close or curt i; as in avoirdupois, connoisseur, tortoise.

Oo, an improper diphthong, generally has the slender sound of o; as in coo, too, woo, fool, room. It has, in some words, a shorter or closer sound, (like that of u in bull,) as in foot, good, wood, stood, wool;--that of close u in blood and flood;--and that of open o in door and floor. Derivatives from any of these, sound as their primitives.

Ou is generally a proper diphthong, uniting the sound of close or curt o, and that of u as heard in bull,--or u sounded as oo; as in bound, found, sound, ounce, thou. Ou is also, in certain instances, an improper diphthong; and, as such, it has six different sounds:--(l.) That of close or curt u; as in rough, tough, young, flourish. (2.) That of broad a; as in ought, bought, thought. (3.) That of open or long o; as in court, dough, four, though. (4.) That of close or curt o; as in cough, trough, lough, shough: which are, I believe, the only examples. (5.) That of slender o, or oo; as in soup, you, through. (6.) That of u in bull, or of oo shortened; only in would, could, should.

Ow generally sounds like the proper diphthong ou,--or like a union of short o with oo; as in brown, dowry, now, shower: but it is often an improper diphthong, having only the sound of open or long o; as in know, show, stow.

Oy is a proper diphthong, equivalent in sound to oi; as in joy, toy, oyster.

TRIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH O.

OEu is a French triphthong, pronounced in English as oo, and occurring in the word manoeuvre, with its several derivatives. Owe is an improper triphthong, and an English word, in which the o only is heard, and heard always with its long or open sound.

XVI. OF THE LETTER P.

The consonant P, when not written before h, has commonly one peculiar sound; which is heard in pen, pine, sup, supper. The word cupboard is usually pronounced kubburd. P, written with an audible consonant, is sometimes itself silent; as in psalm, psalter, pseudography, psychology, ptarmigan, ptyalism, receipt, corps.

Ph generally sounds like f; as in philosophy. In Stephen and nephew, ph has the sound of v. The h after p, is silent in diphthong, triphthong, naphtha, ophthalmic; and both the p and the h are silent in apophthegm, phthisis, phthisical. From the last three words, ph is sometimes dropped.

XVII. OF THE LETTER Q.

The consonant Q, being never silent, never final, never doubled, and not having a sound peculiar to itself, is invariably heard, in English, with the power of k; and is always followed by the vowel u, which, in words purely English, is sounded like the narrow o, or oo,--or, perhaps, is squeezed into the consonantal sound of w;--as in queen, quaver, quiver, quarter, request. In some words of French origin, the u after q is silent; as in coquet, liquor, burlesque, etiquette.

XVIII. OF THE LETTER R.

The consonant R, called also a semivowel and a liquid, has usually, at the beginning of a word, or before a vowel, a rough or pretty strong sound; as in roll, rose, roam, proudly, prorogue. "In other positions," it is said by many to be "smooth" or "soft;" "as in hard, ford, word."--W. Allen.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--The letter R turns the tip of the tongue up against or towards the roof of the mouth, where the sound may be lengthened, roughened, trilled, or quavered. Consequently, this element may, at the will of the speaker, have more or less--little or nothing, or even very much--of that peculiar roughness, jar, or whur, which is commonly said to constitute the sound. The extremes should here be avoided. Some readers very improperly omit the sound of r from many words to which it pertains; pronouncing or as awe, nor as knaw, for as faugh, and war as the first syllable of water. On the other hand, "The excessive trilling of the r, as practised by some speakers, is a great fault."--D. P. Page.

OBS. 2.--Dr. Johnson, in his "Grammar of the English Tongue," says, "R has the same rough snarling sound as in other tongues."--P. 3. Again, in his Quarto Dictionary, under this letter, he says, "R is called the canine letter, because it is uttered with some resemblance to the growl or snarl of a cur: it has one constant sound in English, such as it has in other languages; as, red, rose, more, muriatick." Walker, however, who has a greater reputation as an orthoepist [sic--KTH], teaches that, "There is a distinction in the sound of this letter, which is," says he, "in my opinion, of no small importance; and that is, the [distinction of] the rough and [the] smooth r. Ben Jonson," continues he, "in his Grammar, says, 'It is sounded firm in the beginning of words, and more liquid in the middle and ends, as in rarer, riper; and so in the Latin.' The rough r is formed by jarring the tip of the tongue against the roof of the mouth near the fore teeth: the smooth r is a vibration of the lower part of the tongue, near the root, against the inward region of the palate, near the entrance of the throat."--Walker's Principles, No. 419; Octavo Dict., p. 48.

OBS. 3.--Wells, with his characteristic indecision, forbears all recognition of this difference, and all intimation of the quality of the sound, whether smooth or rough; saying, in his own text, only this: "R has the sound heard in rare."--School Grammar, p. 40. Then, referring the student to sundry authorities, he adds in a footnote certain "quotations," that are said to "present a general view of the different opinions which exist among orthoepists respecting this letter." And so admirably are these authorities or opinions balanced and offset, one class against an other, that it is hard to tell which has the odds. First, though it is not at all probable that Wells's utterance of "rare" exhibits twice over the rough snarl of Johnson's r, the "general view" seems intended to confirm the indefinite teaching above, thus: "'R has one constant sound in English.'--Johnson. The same view is adopted by Webster, Perry, Kendrick, Sheridan, Jones, Jameson, Knowles, and others."--School Grammar, p. 40. In counterpoise of these, Wells next cites about as many more--namely, Frazee, Page, Russell, Walker, Rush, Barber, Comstock, and Smart,--as maintaining or admitting that r has sometimes a rough sound, and sometimes a smoother one.

XIX. OF THE LETTER S.

The consonant S has a sharp, hissing, or hard sound; as in sad, sister, thus: and a flat, buzzing, or soft sound, like that of z; as in rose, dismal, bosom, husband. S, at the beginning of words, or after any of the sharp consonants, is always sharp; as in see, steps, cliffs, sits, stocks, smiths. S, after any of the flat mutes, or at the end of words when not preceded by a sharp consonant, is generally flat; as in eyes, trees, beds, bags, calves. But in the English termination ous, or in the Latin us, it is sharp; as joyous, vigorous, hiatus.

Ss is generally sharp; as in pass, kiss, harass, assuage, basset, cassock, remissness. But the first two Esses in possess, or any of its regular derivatives, as well as the two in dissolve, or its proximate kin, sound like two Zees; and the soft or flat sound is commonly given to each s in hyssop, hussy, and hussar. In scissel, scissible, and scissile, all the Esses hiss;--in scissors, the last three of the four are flat, like z;--but in the middle of scissure and scission we hear the sound of zh.

S, in the termination sion, takes the sound of sh, after a consonant; as in aspersion, session, passion, mission, compulsion: and that of zh, after a vowel; as in evasion, elision, confusion.

In the verb assure, and each of its derivatives, also in the nouns pressure and fissure, with their derivatives, we hear, according to Walker, the sound of sh for each s, or twice in each word; but, according to the orthoëpy of Worcester, that sound is heard only in the accented syllable of each word, and the vowel in each unaccented syllable is obscure.

S is silent or mute in the words, isle, island, aisle, demesne, corps, and viscount.

XX. OF THE LETTER T.

The general sound of the consonant T, is heard in time, letter, set. T, immediately after the accent, takes the sound of tch, before u, and generally also before eou; as in nature, feature, virtue, righteous, courteous: when s or x precedes, it takes this sound before ia or io; as in fustian, bastion, mixtion. But the general or most usual sound of t after the accent, when followed by i and an other vowel, is that of sh; as in creation, patient, cautious.

In English, t is seldom, if ever, silent or powerless. In depot, however, a word borrowed from the French, we do not sound it; and in chestnut, which is a compound of our own, it is much oftener written than heard. In often and soften, some think it silent; but it seems rather to take here the sound of f. In chasten, hasten, fasten, castle, nestle, whistle, apostle, epistle, bustle, and similar words, with their sundry derivatives, the t is said by some to be mute; but here it seems to take the sound of s; for, according to the best authorities, this sound is beard twice in such words. Th, written in Greek by the character called Theta, ([Greek: th] or O capital, [Greek: th] or [Greek: th] small,) represents an elementary sound; or, rather, two distinct elementary sounds, for which the Anglo-Saxons had different characters, supposed by Dr. Bosworth to have been applied with accurate discrimination of "the hard or sharp sound of th," from "the soft or flat sound."--(See Bosworth's Compendious Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, p. 268.) The English th is either sharp, as in thing, ethical, thinketh; or flat, as in this, whither, thither.

"Th initial is sharp; as in thought: except in than, that, the, thee, their, them, then, thence, there, these, they, thine, this, thither, those, thou, thus, thy, and their compounds."--W. Allen's Grammar, p. 22.

Th final is also sharp; as in south: except in beneath, booth, with, and several verbs formerly with th last, but now frequently (and more properly) written with final e; as loathe, mouthe, seethe, soothe, smoothe, clothe, wreathe, bequeathe, unclothe.

Th medial is sharp, too, when preceded or followed by a consonant; as in Arthur, ethnic, swarthy, athwart: except in brethren, burthen, farther, farthing, murther, northern, worthy. But "th between two vowels, is generally flat in words purely English; as in gather, neither, whither: and sharp in words from the learned languages; as in atheist, ether, method"--See W. Allen's Gram., p. 22.

"Th, in Thames, Thomas, thyme, asthma, phthisis, and their compounds, is pronounced like t."--Ib.

XXI. OF THE LETTER U.

The vowel U has three sounds which may be considered to be properly its own:--

1. The open, long, full, primal, or diphthongal u; as in tube, cubic, juvenile.

2. The close, curt, short, or stopped u; as in tub, butter, justice, unhung.

3. The middle u, resembling a short or quick oo; as in pull, pulpit, artful.

U forming a syllable by itself or U as naming itself is nearly equivalent in sound to you, and requires the article a, and not an, before it; as, a U, a union.

U sometimes borrows the sound of some other vowel; for bury is pronounced berry, and busy is pronounced bizzy. So in the derivatives, burial, buried, busied, busily, and the like.

The long or diphthongal u, commonly sounded as yu, or as ew in ewer,--or any equivalent diphthong or digraph, as ue, ui, eu, or ew.--when it follows r or rh, assumes the sound of slender o or oo; as in rude, rhubarb, rue, rueful, rheum, fruit, truth, brewer.

DIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH U.

U, in the proper diphthongs, ua, ue, ui, uo, uy, has the sound of w or of oo feeble; as in persuade, query, quell, quiet, languid, quote, obloquy.

Ua, an improper diphthong, has the sound--1. Of middle a; as in guard, guardian. 2. Of close a; as in guarantee, piquant. 3. Of obscure e; as in victuals and its compounds or kindred. 4. Of open u; as in mantuamaker.

Ue, an improper diphthong, has the sound--1. Of open u; as in blue, ensue, ague. 2. Of close e; as in guest, guesser. 3. Of close u; as in leaguer. Ue final is sometimes silent; as in league, antique. Ui, an improper diphthong, has the sound--1. Of open i; as in guide, guile. 2. Of close i; as in conduit, circuit. 3. Of open u; as in juice, sluice, suit.

Uo can scarcely be called an improper diphthong, except, perhaps, after q in liquor, liquorice, liquorish, where uor is heard as ur.

Uy, an improper diphthong, has the sound--1. Of open y; as in buy, buyer. 2. Of feeble y, or of ee feeble; as in plaguy, roguy.

TRIPHTHONGS BEGINNING WITH U.

Uai is pronounced nearly, if not exactly, like way; as in guai-a-cum, quail, quaint. Uaw is sounded like wa in water; as in squaw, a female Indian. Uay has the sound of way; as in Par-a-guay: except in quay, which nearly all our orthoepists pronounce kee. Uea and uee are each sounded wee; as in queasy, queer, squeal, squeeze. Uoi and woy are each sounded woi; as in quoit, buoy. Some say, that, as u, in these combinations, sounds like w, it is a consonant; others allege, that w itself has only the sound of oo, and is therefore in all cases a vowel. U has, certainly, in these connexions, as much of the sound of oo, as has w; and perhaps a little more.

XXII. OF THE LETTER V.

The consonant V always has a sound like that of f flattened; as in love, vulture, vivacious. In pure English, it is never silent, never final, never doubled: but it is often doubled in the dialect of Craven; and there, too, it is sometimes final.

XXIII. OF THE LETTER W.

W, when reckoned a consonant, (as it usually is when uttered with a vowel that follows it,) has the sound heard at the beginning of wine, win, woman, woody; being a sound less vocal than that of oo, and depending more upon the lips.

W before h, is usually pronounced as if it followed the h; as in what, when, where, while: but, in who, whose, whom, whole, whoop, and words formed from these, it is silent. Before r, in the same syllable, it is also silent; as in wrath, wrench, wrong. So in a few other cases; as in sword, answer, two.

W is never used alone as a vowel; except in some Welsh or foreign names, in which it is equivalent to oo; as in "Cwm Cothy," the name of a mountain in Wales; "Wkra" the name of a small river in Poland.--See Lockhart's Napoleon, Vol. ii, p. 15. In a diphthong, when heard, it has the power of u in bull, or nearly that of oo; as in new, now, brow, frown. Aw and ow are frequently improper diphthongs, the w being silent, the a broad, and the o long; as in law, flaw,--tow, snow. W, when sounded before vowels, being reckoned a consonant, we have no diphthongs or triphthongs beginning with this letter.

XXIV. OF THE LETTER X.

The consonant "X has a sharp sound, like ks; as in ox: and a flat one, like gz; as in example. X is sharp, when it ends an accented syllable; as in exercise, exit, excellence: or when it precedes an accented syllable beginning with a consonant; as in expand, extreme, expunge. X unaccented is generally flat, when the next syllable begins with a vowel; as in exist, exemption, exotic. X initial, in Greek proper names, has the sound of z; as in Xanthus, Xantippe, Xenophon, Xerxes"--See W. Allen's Gram., p. 25.

XXV. OF THE LETTER Y.

Y, as a consonant, has the sound heard at the beginning of yarn, young, youth; being rather less vocal than the feeble sound of i, or of the vowel y, and serving merely to modify that of a succeeding vowel, with which it is quickly united. Y, as a vowel, has the same sounds as i:--

1. The open, long, full, or primal y; as in cry, crying, thyme, cycle.

2. The close, curt, short, or stopped y; as in system, symptom, cynic.

3. The feeble or faint y, accentless; (like open e feeble;) as in cymar, cycloidal, mercy.

The vowels i and y have, in general, exactly the same sound under similar circumstances, and, in forming derivatives, we often change one for the other: as in city, cities; tie, tying; easy, easily.

Y, before a vowel heard in the same syllable, is reckoned a consonant; we have, therefore, no diphthongs or triphthongs commencing with this letter.

XXVI. OF THE LETTER Z.

The consonant Z, the last letter of our alphabet, has usually a soft or buzzing sound, the same as that of s flat; as in Zeno, zenith, breeze, dizzy. Before u primal or i feeble, z, as well as s flat, sometimes takes the sound of zh, which, in the enumeration of consonantal sounds, is reckoned a distinct element; as in azure, seizure, glazier; osier, measure, pleasure.

END OF THE FIRST APPENDIX.

APPENDIX II.

TO PART SECOND, OR ETYMOLOGY.

OF THE DERIVATION OF WORDS.

Derivation, as a topic to be treated by the grammarian, is a species of Etymology, which explains the various methods by which those derivative words which are not formed by mere grammatical inflections, are deduced from their primitives. Most of those words which are regarded as primitives in English, may be traced to ulterior sources, and many of them are found to be compounds or derivatives in the other languages from which they have come to us. To show the composition, origin, and literal sense of these, is also a part, and a highly useful part, of this general inquiry, or theme of instruction.

This species of information, though insignificant in those whose studies reach to nothing better,--to nothing valuable and available in life,--is nevertheless essential to education and to science; because it is essential to a right understanding of the import and just application of such words. All reliable etymology, all authentic derivation of words, has ever been highly valued by the wise. The learned James Harris has a remark as follows: "How useful to ETHIC SCIENCE, and indeed to KNOWLEDGE in general, a GRAMMATICAL DISQUISITION into the Etymology and Meaning of WORDS was esteemed by the chief and ablest Philosophers, may be seen by consulting Plato in his Cratylus; Xenophon's Memorabilia, IV, 5, 6; Arrian. Epict. I, 17; II, 10; Marc. Anton. III, 11;" &c.--See Harris's Hermes, p. 407.

A knowledge of the Saxon, Latin, Greek, and French languages, will throw much light on this subject, the derivation of our modern English; nor is it a weak argument in favour of studying these, that our acquaintance with them, whether deep or slight, tends to a better understanding of what is borrowed, and what is vernacular, in our own tongue. But etymological analysis may extensively teach the origin of English words, their composition, and the import of their parts, without demanding of the student the power of reading foreign or ancient languages, or of discoursing at all on General Grammar. And, since many of the users of this work may be but readers of our current English, to whom an unknown letter or a foreign word is a particularly uncouth and repulsive thing, we shall here forbear the use of Saxon characters, and, in our explanations, not go beyond the precincts of our own language, except to show the origin and primitive import of some of our definitive and connecting particles, and to explain the prefixes and terminations which are frequently employed to form English derivatives.

The rude and cursory languages of barbarous nations, to whom literature is unknown, are among those transitory things which, by the hand of time, are irrecoverably buried in oblivion. The fabric of the English language is undoubtedly of Saxon origin; but what was the particular form of the language spoken by the Saxons, when about the year 450 they entered Britain, cannot now be accurately known. It was probably a dialect of the Gothic or Teutonic. This Anglo-Saxon dialect, being the nucleus, received large accessions from other tongues of the north, from the Norman French, and from the more polished languages of Rome and Greece, to form the modern English. The speech of our rude and warlike ancestors thus gradually improved, as Christianity, civilization, and knowledge, advanced the arts of life in Britain; and, as early as the tenth century, it became a language capable of expressing all the sentiments of a civilized people. From the time of Alfred, its progress may be traced by means of writings which remain; but it can scarcely be called English, as I have shown in the Introduction to this work, till about the thirteenth century. And for two or three centuries later, it was so different from the modern English, as to be scarcely intelligible at all to the mere English reader; but, gradually improving by means upon which we need not here dilate, it at length became what we now find it,--a language copious, strong, refined, impressive, and capable, if properly used, of a great degree of beauty and harmony.

SECTION I.--DERIVATION OF THE ARTICLES.

1. For the derivation of our article THE, which he calls "an adjective," Dr. Webster was satisfied with giving this hint: "Sax. the; Dutch, de."--Amer. Dict. According to Horne Tooke, this definite article of ours, is the Saxon verb "THE," imperative, from THEAN, to take; and is nearly equivalent in meaning to that or those, because our that is "the past participle of THEAN," and "means taken."--Diversions of Purley, Vol. ii, p. 49. But this is not very satisfactory. Examining ancient works, we find the word, or something resembling it, or akin to it, written in various forms, as se, see, ye, te, de, the, thá, and others that cannot be shown by our modern letters; and, tracing it as one article, or one and the same word, through what we suppose to be the oldest of these forms, in stead of accounting the forms as signs of different roots, we should sooner regard it as originating in the imperative of SEON, to see.

2. AN, our indefinite article, is the Saxon oen, ane, an, ONE; and, by dropping n before a consonant, becomes a. Gawin Douglas, an ancient English writer, wrote ane, even before a consonant; as, "Ane book,"--"Ane lang spere,"--"Ane volume."

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--The words of Tooke, concerning the derivation of That and The, as nearly as they can be given in our letters, are these: "THAT (in the Anglo-Saxon Thæt, i.e. Thead, Theat) means taken, assumed; being merely the past participle of the Anglo-Saxon verb Thean, Thegan, Thion, Thihan, Thicgan, Thigian; sumere, assumere, accipere; to THE, to get, to take, to assume.

'Ill mote he THE That caused me To make myselfe a frere.'--Sir T. More's Workes, pag. 4.

THE (our article, as it is called) is the imperative of the same verb Thean: which may very well supply the place of the correspondent Anglo-Saxon article Se, which is the imperative of Seon, videre: for it answers the same purpose in discourse, to say.... see man, or take man."--Diversions of Purley, Vol. ii, p. 49.

OBS. 2.--Now, between Thæt and Theat, there is a considerable difference of form, for æ and ea are not the same diphthong; and, in the identifying of so many infinitives, as forming but one verb, there is room for error. Nor is it half so probable that these are truly one root, as that our article The is the same, in its origin, as the old Anglo-Saxon Se. Dr. Bosworth, in his Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, gives no such word as Thean or Thegan, no such participle as Thead or Theat, which derivative is perhaps imaginary; but he has inserted together "Thicgan, thicgean, thigan, to receive, or take;" and separately, "Theon, to thrive, or flourish,"--"Thihan, to thrive,"--and "Thion, to flourish;" as well as the preterit "Theat, howled," from "Theotan, to howl." And is it not plain, that the old verb "THE," as used by More, is from Theon, to thrive, rather than from Thicgan, to take? "Ill mote he THE"--"Ill might he thrive," not, "Ill might he take."

OBS. 3.--Professor Hart says, "The word the was originally thæt, or that. In course of time [,] it became abbreviated, and the short form acquired, in usage, a shade of meaning different from the original long one. That is demonstrative with emphasis; the is demonstrative without emphasis."--Hart's E. Grammar, p. 32. This derivation of The is quite improbable; because the shortening of a monosyllable of five letters by striking out the third and the fifth, is no usual mode of abbreviation. Bosworth's Dictionary explains THE as "An indeclinable article, often used for all the cases of Se, seo, thæt, especially in adverbial expressions and in corrupt Anglo-Saxon, as in the Chronicle after the year 1138."

OBS. 4--Dr. Latham, in a section which is evidently neither accurate nor self-consistent, teaches us--"that there exist in the present English two powers of the word spelled t-h-e, or of the so-called definite article;" then, out of sixteen Anglo-Saxon equivalents, he selects two for the roots of this double-powered the; saying, "Hence the the that has originated out of the Anglo-Saxon thy is one word; whilst the the that has originated out of the Anglo-Saxon the, [is] another. The latter is the common article: the former the the in expressions like all the more, all the better--more by all that, better by all that, and the Latin phrases eo majus, eo melius."--Latham's Hand-Book, p. 158. This double derivation is liable to many objections. The Hand-Book afterwards says, "That the, in expressions like all the more, all the better, &c., is no article, has already been shown."--P. 196. But in fact, though the before comparatives or superlatives be no article, Dr. Latham's etymologies prove no such thing; neither does he anywhere tell us what it is. His examples, too, with their interpretations, are all of them fictitious, ambiguous, and otherwise bad. It is uncertain whether he meant his phrases for counterparts to each other or not. If the means "by that," or thereby, it is an adverb; and so is its equivalent "eo" denominated by the Latin grammarians. See OBS. 10, under Rule I.

SECTION II.--DERIVATION OF NOUNS.

In English, Nouns are derived from nouns, from adjectives, from verbs, or from participles.

I. Nouns are derived from Nouns in several different ways:--

1. By the adding of ship, dom, ric, wick, or, ate, hood, or head: as, fellow, fellowship; king, kingdom; bishop, bishopric; bailiff, or baily, bailiwick; senate, senator; tetrarch, tetrarchate; child, childhood; God, Godhead. These generally denote dominion, office, or character.

2. By the adding of ian: as, music, musician; physic, physician; theology, theologian; grammar, grammarian; college, collegian. These generally denote profession.

3. By the adding of r, ry, or ery: as, grocer, grocery; cutler, cutlery; slave, slavery; scene, scenery; fool, foolery. These sometimes denote state or habit; sometimes, an artificer's wares or shop.

4. By the adding of age or ade: as, patron, patronage; porter, porterage; band, bandage; lemon, lemonade; baluster, balustrade; wharf, wharfage; vassal, vassalage.

5. By the adding of kin, let, ling, ock, el, erel, or et: as, lamb, lambkin; ring, ringlet; cross, crosslet; duck, duckling; hill, hillock; run, runnel; cock, cockerel; pistol, pistolet; eagle, eaglet; circle, circlet. All these denote little things, and are called diminutives.

6. By the addition of ist: as, psalm, psalmist; botany, botanist; dial, dialist; journal, journalist. These denote persons devoted to, or skilled in, the subject expressed by the primitive.

7. By the prefixing of an adjective, or an other noun, so as to form a compound word: as, foreman, broadsword, statesman, tradesman; bedside, hillside, seaside; bear-berry, bear-fly, bear-garden; bear's-ear, bear's-foot, goat's-beard.

8. By the adoption of a negative prefix to reverse the meaning: as, order, disorder; pleasure, displeasure; consistency, inconsistency; capacity, incapacity; observance, nonobservance; resistance, nonresistance; truth, untruth; constraint, unconstraint.

9. By the use of the prefix counter, signifying against or opposite: as, attraction, counter-attraction; bond, counter-bond; current, counter-current; movement, counter-movement.

10. By the addition of ess, ix, or ine, or the changing of masculines to feminines so terminating: as, heir, heiress; prophet, prophetess; abbot, abbess; governor, governess; testator, testatrix; hero, heroine.

II. Nouns are derived from Adjectives in several different ways:--

1. By the adding of ness, ity, ship, dom, or hood: as, good, goodness; real, reality; hard, hardship; wise, wisdom; free, freedom; false, falsehood.

2. By the changing of t into ce or cy: as, radiant, radiance; consequent, consequence; flagrant, flagrancy; current, currency; discrepant, discrepance, or discrepancy.

3. By the changing of some of the letters, and the adding of t or th: as, long, length; broad, breadth; wide, width; high, height. The nouns included under these three heads, generally denote abstract qualities, and are called abstract nouns.

4. By the adding of ard: as, drunk, drunkard; dull, dullard. These denote ill character.

5. By the adding of ist: as, sensual, sensualist; separate, separatist; royal, royalist; fatal, fatalist. These denote persons devoted, addicted, or attached, to something.

6. By the adding of a, the Latin ending of neuter plurals, to certain proper adjectives in an: as, Miltonian, Miltoniana; Johnsonian, Johnsoniana. These literally mean, Miltonian things, sayings, or anecdotes, &c.; and are words somewhat fashionable with the journalists, and are sometimes used for titles of books that refer to table-talk.

III. Nouns are derived from Verbs in several different ways:--

1. By the adding of ment, ance, ence, ure, or age: as, punish, punishment; abate, abatement; repent, repentance; condole, condolence; forfeit, forfeiture; stow, stowage; equip, equipage; truck, truckage.

2. By a change of the termination of the verb, into se, ce, sion, tion, ation, or ition: as, expand, expanse, expansion; pretend, pretence, pretension; invent, invention; create, creation; omit, omission; provide, provision; reform, reformation; oppose, opposition. These denote either the act of doing, or the thing done.

3. By the adding of er or or: as, hunt, hunter; write, writer; collect, collector; assert, assertor; instruct, instructer, or instructor. These generally denote the doer. To denote the person to whom something is done, we sometimes form a derivative ending in ee: as, promisee, mortgagee, appellee, consignee.

4. Nouns and Verbs are sometimes alike in orthography, but different in pronunciation: as, a house, to house; a use, to use; a reb'el, to rebel'; a rec'ord, to record'; a cem'ent, to cement'. Of such pairs, it may often be difficult to say which word is the primitive.

5. In many instances, nouns and verbs are wholly alike as to form and sound, and are distinguished by their sense and construction only: as, love, to love; fear, to fear; sleep, to sleep;--to revise, a revise; to rebuke, a rebuke. In these, we have but the same word used differently.

IV. Nouns are often derived from Participles in ing; as, a meeting, the understanding, murmurings, disputings, sayings, and doings: and, occasionally, one is formed from such a word and an adverb or a perfect participle joined with it; as, "The turning-away,"--"His goings-forth,"--"Your having-boasted of it."

SECTION III.--DERIVATION OF ADJECTIVES.

In English, Adjectives are derived from nouns, from adjectives, from verbs, or from participles.

I. Adjectives are derived from Nouns in several different ways:--

1. By the adding of ous, ious, eous, y, ey, ic, al, ical or ine: (sometimes with an omission or change of some of the final letters:) as, danger, dangerous; glory, glorious; right, righteous; rock, rocky; clay, clayey; poet, poetic, or poetical; nation, national; method, methodical; vertex, vertical; clergy, clerical; adamant, adamantine. Adjectives thus formed, generally apply the properties of their primitives, to the nouns to which they relate.

2. By the adding of ful: as, fear, fearful; cheer, cheerful; grace, graceful; shame, shameful; power, powerful. These come almost entirely from personal qualities or feelings, and denote abundance.

3. By the adding of some: as, burden, burdensome; game, gamesome; toil, toilsome. These denote plenty, but do not exaggerate.

4. By the adding of en: as, oak, oaken; silk, silken; wheat, wheaten; oat, oaten; hemp, hempen. Here the derivative denotes the matter of which something is made.

5. By the adding of ly or ish: as, friend, friendly; gentleman, gentlemanly; child, childish; prude, prudish. These denote resemblance. The termination ly signifies like.

6. By the adding of able or ible: as, fashion, fashionable; access, accessible. But these terminations are generally, and more properly, added to verbs. See Obs. 17th, 18th, &c., on the Rules for Spelling.

7. By the adding of less: as, house, houseless; death, deathless; sleep, sleepless; bottom, bottomless. These denote privation or exemption--the absence of what is named by the primitive.

8. By the adding of ed: as, saint, sainted; bigot, bigoted; mast, masted; wit, witted. These have a resemblance to participles, and some of them are rarely used, except when joined with some other word to form a compound adjective: as, three-sided, bare-footed, long-eared, hundred-handed, flat-nosed, hard-hearted, marble-hearted, chicken-hearted.

9. Adjectives coming from proper names, take various terminations: as, _America, American; England, English; Dane, Danish; Portugal, Portuguese; Plato, Platonic_.

10. Nouns are often converted into adjectives, without change of termination: as, paper currency; a gold chain; silver knee-buckles.

II. Adjectives are derived from Adjectives in several different ways:--

1. By the adding of ish or some: as, white, whitish; green, greenish; lone, lonesome; glad, gladsome. These denote quality with some diminution.

2. By the prefixing of dis, in, or un: as, honest, dishonest; consistent, inconsistent; wise, unwise. These express a negation of the quality denoted by their primitives.

3. By the adding of y or ly: as, swarth, swarthy; good, goodly. Of these there are but few; for almost all the derivatives of the latter form are adverbs.

III. Adjectives are derived from Verbs in several different ways:--

1. By the adding of able or ible: (sometimes with a change of some of the final letters:) as, perish, perishable; vary, variable; convert, convertible; divide, divisible, or dividable. These, according to their analogy, have usually a passive import, and denote susceptibility of receiving action. 2. By the adding of ive or ory: (sometimes with a change of some of the final letters:) as, elect, elective; interrogate, interrogative, interrogatory; defend, defensive; defame, defamatory; explain, explanatory.

3. Words ending in ate, are mostly verbs; but some of them may be employed as adjectives, in the same form, especially in poetry; as, reprobate, complicate.

IV. Adjectives are derived from Participles, not by suffixes, but in these ways:--

1. By the prefixing of un, meaning not; as, unyielding, unregarded, unreserved, unendowed, unendeared, unendorsed, unencountered, unencumbered, undisheartened, undishonoured. Of this sort there are very many.

2. By a combining of the participle with some word which does not belong to the verb; as, way-faring, hollow-sounding, long-drawn, deep-laid, dear-purchased, down-trodden. These, too, are numerous.

3. Participles often become adjectives without change of form. Such adjectives are distinguished from participles by their construction alone: as, "A lasting ornament;"--"The starving chymist;"--"Words of learned length;"--"With counterfeited glee."

SECTION IV.--DERIVATION OF THE PRONOUNS.

I. The English Pronouns are all of Saxon origin; but, in them, our language differs very strikingly from that of the Anglo-Saxons. The following table compares the simple personal forms:--

Eng. I, My or Me; We, Our or Us. Mine, Ours, Sax. Ic, Min, Me or We, Ure or Us. Mec; User, Eng. Thou, Thy or Thee; Ye, Your You. Thine, or Yours, Sax. Thu, Thin, The or Ge Eower, Eow or Thec; Eowie. Eng. He, His Him; They, Their or Them. Theirs, Sax. He, His or Him or Hi or Hira or Heom or Hys, Hine; Hig, Heora, Hi. Eng. She, Her or Her; They, Their or Them. Hers, Theirs, Sax. Heo, Hire or Hi; Hi or Hira or Heom or Hyre, Hig, Heora, Hi. Eng. It, Its, It; They, Their or Them. Theirs, Sax. Hit, His or Hit; Hi or Hira or Heom or Hys, Hig, Heora, Hi.

Here, as in the personal pronouns of other languages, the plurals and oblique cases do not all appear to be regular derivatives from the nominative singular. Many of these pronouns, perhaps all, as well as a vast number of other words of frequent use in our language, and in that from which it chiefly comes, were very variously written by the Middle English, Old English, Semi-Saxon, and Anglo-Saxon authors. He who traces the history of our language, will meet with them under all the following forms, (or such as these would be with Saxon characters for the Saxon forms,) and perhaps in more:--

1. I, J, Y, y, i, ay, ic, che, ich, Ic;--MY, mi, min, MINE, myne, myn;--ME, mee, me, meh, mec, mech;--WE, wee, ve;--OUR or OURS, oure, ure, wer, urin, uren, urne, user, usse, usser, usses, ussum;--Us, ous, vs, uss, usic, usich, usig, usih, uz, huz.

2. THOU, thoue, thow, thowe, thu, tou, to, tu;--THY or THINE, thi, thyne, thyn, thin;--THEE, the, theh, thec;--YE, yee, yhe, ze, zee, ge, ghe;--YOUR or YOURS, youre, zour, hure, goure, yer, yower, yowyer, yorn, yourn, youre, eower;--You, youe, yow, gou, zou, ou, iu, iuh, eow, iow, geow, eowih, eowic, iowih.

3. HE, hee, hie, se;--His, hise, is, hys, ys, hyse, hus;--HIM, hine, hiene, hion, hen, hyne, hym, im;--THEY, thay, thei, the, tha, thai, thii, yai, hi, hie, heo, hig, hyg, hy;--THEIR or THEIRS, ther, theyr, theyrs, thair, thare, theora, hare, here, her, hir, hire, hira, hiora, hiera, heora, hyra;--THEM, thym, theym, thaym, thaim, thame, tham, em, hem, heom, hiom, eom, hom, him, hi, hig.

4. SHE, shee, sche, scho, sho, shoe, scæ, seo, heo, hio, hiu, hoo, hue;--HER, (possessive,) hur, hir, hire, hyr, hyre, hyra, hera;--HER, (objective,) hire, hyre, hur, hir, hi. The plural forms of this feminine pronoun are like those of the masculine He; but the "Well-Wishers to Knowledge," in their small Grammar, (erroneously, as I suppose,) make hira masculine only, and heora feminine only. See their Principles of Grammar, p. 38.

5. IT, yt, itt, hit, hyt, hytt. The possessive Its is a modern derivative; His or Hys was formerly used in lieu of it. The plural forms of this neuter pronoun, It, are like those of He and She. According to Horne Tooke, who declares hoet to have been one of its ancient forms, "this pronoun was merely the past participle of the verb HAITAN, hætan, nominare," to name, and literally signifies "the said;" (Diversions of Purley, Vol. ii, p. 46; W. Allen's Gram., p. 57;) but Dr. Alexander Murray, exhibiting it in an other form, not adapted to this opinion, makes it the neuter of a declinable adjective, or pronoun, inflected from the masculine, thus: "He, heo hita, this"--Hist. of Lang., Vol. i, p. 315.

II. The relatives and interrogatives are derived from the same source, the Anglo-Saxon tongue, and have passed through similar changes, or varieties in orthography; but, the common relative pronoun of the Anglo-Saxons being like their article the,--or, with the three genders, se, seo, thæt,--and not like our who, which, and what, it is probable that the interrogative use of these words was the primitive one. They have been found in all the following forms:--

1. WHO, ho, hue, wha, hwa, hua, wua, qua, quha;--WHOSE, who's, whos, whois, whoise, wheas, quhois, quhais, quhase, hwæs;--WHOM, whome, quham, quhum, quhome, hwom, hwam, hwæm, hwæne, hwone.

2. WHICH, whiche, whyche, whilch, wych, quilch, quilk, quhilk, hwilc, hwylc, hwelc, whilk, huilic, hvilc. For the Anglo-Saxon forms, Dr. Bosworth's Dictionary gives "hwilc, hwylc, and hwelc;" but Professor Fowler's E. Grammar makes them "huilic and hvilc."--See p. 240. Whilk, or quhilk, is a Scottish form.

3. WHAT, hwat, hwet, quhat, hwæt. This pronoun, whether relative or interrogative, is regarded by Bosworth and others as a neuter derivative from the masculine or femine [sic--KTH] hwa, who. It may have been thence derived, but, in modern English, it is not always of the neuter gender. See the last note on page 312.

4. THAT, Anglo-Saxon Thæt. Tooke's notion of the derivation of this word is noticed above in the section on Articles. There is no certainty of its truth; and our lexicographers make no allusion to it. W. Allen reaffirms it. See his Gram., p. 54.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--In the Well-Wishers' Grammar, (p. 39,) as also in L. Murray's and some others, the pronoun Which is very strangely and erroneously represented as being always "of the neuter gender." (See what is said of this word in the Introduction, Chap. ix, ¶ 32.) Whereas it is the relative most generally applied to brute animals, and, in our common version of the Bible, its application to persons is peculiarly frequent. Fowler says, "In its origin it is a Compound."--E. Gram., p. 240. Taking its first Anglo-Saxon form to be "Huilic," he thinks it traceable to "hwa, who," or its ablative "hwi," and "lie, like."--Ib. If this is right, the neuter sense is not its primitive import, or any part of it.

OBS. 2.--From its various uses, the word That is called sometimes a pronoun, sometimes an adjective, and sometimes a conjunction; but, in respect to derivation, it is, doubtless, one and the same. As a relative pronoun, it is of either number, and has no plural form different from the singular; as, "Blessed is the man that heareth me."--Prov., viii, 34. "Blessed are they that mourn."--Matt., v, 4. As an adjective, it is said by Tooke to have been formerly "applied indifferently to plural nouns and to singular; as, 'Into that holy orders.'--Dr. Martin. 'At that dayes.'--Id. 'That euyll aungels the denilles.'--Sir Tho. More. 'This pleasure undoubtedly farre excelleth all that pleasures that in this life maie be obteined.'--Id."--Diversions of Purley, Vol. ii, pp. 47 and 48. The introduction of the plural form those, must have rendered this usage bad English.

SECTION V.--DERIVATION OF VERBS.

In English, Verbs are derived from nouns, from adjectives, or from verbs.

I. Verbs are derived from Nouns in the following different ways:--

1. By the adding of ize, ise, en, or ate: as, author, authorize; critic, criticise; length, lengthen; origin, originate. The termination ize is of Greek origin, and ise is most probably of French: the former is generally preferable in forming English derivatives; but both are sometimes to be used, and they should be applied according to Rule 13th for Spelling.

2. Some few verbs are derived from nouns by the changing of a sharp or hard consonant to a flat or soft one, or by the adding of a mute e, to soften a hard sound: as, advice, advise; price, prize; bath, bathe; cloth, clothe; breath, breathe; wreath, wreathe; sheath, sheathe; grass, graze.

II. Verbs are derived from Adjectives in the following different ways:--

1. By the adding of ize or en: as legal, legalize; immortal, immortalize; civil, civilize; human, humanize; familiar, familiarize; particular, particularize; deaf, deafen; stiff, stiffen; rough, roughen; deep, deepen; weak, weaken.

2. Many adjectives become verbs by being merely used and inflected as verbs: as, warm, to warm, he warms; dry, to dry, he dries; dull, to dull, he dulls; slack, to slack, he slacks; forward, to forward, he forwards.

III. Verbs are derived from Verbs in the following modes, or ways:--

1. By the prefixing of dis or un to reverse the meaning: as, please, displease; qualify, disqualify; organize, disorganize; fasten, unfasten; muzzle, unmuzzle; nerve, unnerve.

2. By the prefixing of a, be, for, fore, mis, over, out, under, up, or with: as, rise, arise; sprinkle, besprinkle; bid, forbid; see, foresee; take, mistake; look, overlook; run, outrun; go, undergo; hold, uphold; draw, withdraw.

SECTION VI.--DERIVATION OF PARTICIPLES.

All English Participles are derived from English verbs, in the manner explained in Chapter 7th, under the general head of Etymology; and when foreign participles are introduced into our language, they are not participles with us, but belong to some other class of words, or part of speech.

SECTION VII.--DERIVATION OF ADVERBS.

1. In English, many Adverbs are derived from adjectives by the addition of ly: which is an abbreviation for like, and which, though the addition of it to a noun forms an adjective, is the most distinctive as well as the most common termination of our adverbs: as, candid, candidly; sordid, sordidly; presumptuous, presumptuously. Most adverbs of manner are thus formed.

2. Many adverbs are compounds formed from two or more English words; as, herein, thereby, to-day, always, already, elsewhere, sometimes, wherewithal. The formation and the meaning of these are, in general, sufficiently obvious.

3. About seventy adverbs are formed by means of the prefix, or inseparable preposition, a; as, Abreast, abroach, abroad, across, afar, afield, ago, agog, aland, along, amiss, atilt.

4. Needs, as an adverb, is a contraction of need is; prithee, or pr'ythee, of I pray thee; alone, of all one; only, of one-like; anon, of the Saxon an on; i.e., in one [instant]; never, of ne ever; i.e., not ever. Prof. Gibbs, in Fowler's Grammar, makes needs "the Genitive case of the noun need."--P. 311.

5. Very is from the French veray, or vrai, true; and this, probably, from the Latin verus. Rather appears to be the regular comparative of the ancient rath, soon, quickly, willingly; which comes from the Anglo-Saxon "Rathe, or Hrathe, of one's own accord."--Bosworth. But the parent language had also "Hrathre, to a mind."--Id. That is, to one's mind, or, perhaps, more willingly.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--Many of our most common adverbs are of Anglo-Saxon derivation, being plainly traceable to certain very old forms, of the same import, which the etymologist regards but as the same words differently spelled: as, All, eall, eal, or æll; Almost, ealmæst, or ælmæst; Also, ealswa, or ælswa; Else, elles; Elsewhere, elleshwær; Enough, genog, or genoh; Even, euen, efen, or æfen; Ever, euer, æfer, or æfre; Downward, duneweard; Forward, forweard, or foreweard; Homeward, hamweard; Homewards, hamweardes; How, hu; Little, lytel; Less, læs; Least, læst; No, na; Not, noht, or nocht; Out, ut, or ute; So, swa; Still, stille, or stylle; Then, thenne; There, ther, thar, thær; Thither, thider, or thyder; Thus, thuss, or thus; Together, togædere, or togædre; Too, tó; When, hwenne, or hwænne; Where, hwær; Whither, hwider, hwyder, or hwyther; Yea, ia, gea, or gee; Yes, gese, gise, or gyse.

OBS. 2.--According to Horne Tooke, "Still and Else are the imperatives Stell and Ales of their respective verbs Stellan, to put, and Alesan, to dismiss."--Diversions, Vol. i, p. 111. He afterwards repeats the doctrine thus: "Still is only the imperative Stell or Steall, of Stellan or Steallian, ponere."--Ib., p. 146. "This word Else, formerly written alles, alys, alyse, elles, ellus, ellis, ells, els, and now else; is, as I have said, no other than Ales or Alys, the imperative of Alesan or Alysan, dimittere."--Ib., p. 148. These ulterior and remote etymologies are perhaps too conjectural.

SECTION VIII.--DERIVATION OF CONJUNCTIONS.

The English Conjunctions are mostly of Anglo-Saxon origin. The best etymological vocabularies of our language give us, for the most part, the same words in Anglo-Saxon characters; but Horne Tooke, in his Diversions of Purley, (a learned and curious work which the advanced student may peruse with advantage,) traces, or professes to trace, these and many other English particles, to Saxon verbs or participles. The following derivations, so far as they partake of such speculations, are offered principally on his authority:--

1. ALTHOUGH, signifying admit, allow, is from all and though; the latter being supposed the imperative of Thafian or Thafigan, to allow, to concede, to yield.

2. AN, an obsolete or antiquated conjunction, signifying if, or grant, is the imperative of the Anglo-Saxon verb Anan or Unan, to grant, to give.

3. AND, [Saxon, And,] add, is said by Tooke to come from "An-ad, the imperative of Ananad, Dare congeriem."--D. of P., Vol. i, p. 111. That is, "To give the heap." The truth of this, if unapparent, I must leave so.

4. AS, according to Dr. Johnson, is from the Teutonic als; but Tooke says that als itself is a contraction for all and the original particle es or as, meaning it, that, or which.

5. BECAUSE, from be and cause, means by cause; the be being written for by.

6. BOTH, the two, is from the pronominal adjective both; which, according to Dr. Alexander Murray, is a contraction of the Visigothic Bagoth, signifying doubled. The Anglo-Saxons wrote for it butu, butwu, buta, and batwa; i. e., ba, both, twa, two.

7. BUT,--(in Saxon, bute, butan, buton, or butun--) meaning except, yet, now, only, else than, that not, or on the contrary,--is referred by Tooke and some others, to two roots,--each of them but a conjectural etymon for it. "BUT, implying addition," say they, "is from Bot, the imperative of Botan, to boot, to add; BUT, denoting exception, is from Be-utan, the imperative of Beon-utan, to be out."--See D. of P., Vol. i, pp. 111 and 155.

8. EITHER, one of the two, like the pronominal adjective EITHER, is from the Anglo-Saxon Æther, or Egther, a word of the same uses, and the same import.

9. EKE, also, (now nearly obsolete,) is from "Eac, the imperative of Eacan, to add."

10. EVEN, whether a noun, an adjective, an adverb, or a conjunction, appears to come from the same source, the Anglo-Saxon word Efen or Æfen.

11. EXCEPT, which, when used as a conjunction, means unless, is the imperative, or (according to Dr. Johnson) an ancient perfect participle, of the verb to except.

12. FOR, because, is from the Saxon preposition For; which, to express this meaning, our ancestors combined with something else, reducing to one word some such phrase as, For that, For this, For this that; as, "Fortha, Fortham, Forthan, Forthamthe, Forthan the."--See Bosworth's Dict.

13. IF, give, grant, allow, is from "Gif, the imperative of the Anglo-Saxon Gifan, to give."--Tooke's Diversions, Vol. i, p. 111.

14. LEST, that not, dismissed, is from "Lesed, the perfect participle of Lesan, to dismiss."

15. NEITHER, not either, is a union and contraction of ne either: our old writers frequently used ne for not; the Anglo-Saxons likewise repeated it, using ne--ne, in lieu of our corresponsives neither--nor; and our modern lexicographers still note the word, in some of these senses.

16. NOR, not other, not else, is supposed to be a union and contraction of ne or.

17. NOTWITHSTANDING, not hindering, is an English compound of obvious formation.

18. OR, an alternative conjunction, seems to be a word of no great antiquity. It is supposed to be a contraction of other, which Johnson and his followers give, in Saxon characters, either as its source, or as its equivalent.

19. PROVIDED, the perfect participle of the verb provide, becomes occasionally a disjunctive conjunction, by being used alone or with the particle that, to introduce a condition, a saving clause, a proviso.

20. SAVE, anciently used with some frequency as a conjunction, in the sense of but, or except is from the imperative of the English verb save, and is still occasionally turned to such a use by the poets.

21. SEEING, sometimes made a copulative conjunction, is the imperfect participle of the verb see. Used at the head of a clause, and without reference to an agent, it assumes a conjunctive nature.

22. SINCE is conjectured by Tooke to be "the participle of Seon, to see," and to mean "seeing, seeing that, seen that, or seen as."--Diversions of P., Vol. i, pp. 111 and 220. But Johnson and others say, it has been formed "by contraction from sithence, or sith thence, from sithe, Sax."--Joh. Dict.

23. THAN, which introduces the latter term of a comparison, is from the Gothic than, or the Anglo-Saxon thanne, which was used for the same purpose. 24. THAT, when called a conjunction, is said by Tooke to be etymologically the same as the adjective or pronoun THAT, the derivation of which is twice spoken of above; but, in Todd's Johnson's Dictionary, as abridged by Chalmers, THAT, the conjunction, is referred to "thatei, Gothic;" THAT, the pronoun, to "that, thata, Gothic; thæt, Saxon; dat, Dutch."

25. THEN, used as a conjunction, is doubtless the same word as the Anglo-Saxon Thenne, taken as an illative, or word of inference.

26. "THOUGH, allow, is [from] the imperative Thaf, or Thafig, of the verb Thafian or Thafigan, to allow."--Tooke's Diversions, Vol. i, pp. 111 and 150.

27. "UNLESS, except, dismiss, is [from] Onles, the imperative of Onlesan, to dismiss."--Ib.

28. WHETHER, a corresponsive conjunction, which introduces the first term of an alternative, is from the Anglo-Saxon hwæther, which was used for the same purpose.

29. YET, nevertheless, is from "Get, the imperative of Getan, to get."--Tooke.

SECTION IX.--DERIVATION OF PREPOSITIONS.

The following are the principal English Prepositions, explained in the order of the list:--

1. ABOARD, meaning on board of, is from the prefix or preposition a and the noun board, which here means "the deck of a ship" or vessel. Abord, in French, is approach, arrival, or a landing.

2. ABOUT, [Sax. Abútan, or Abúton,] meaning around, at circuit, or doing, is from the prefix a, meaning at, and the noun bout, meaning a turn, a circuit, or a trial. In French, bout means end; and about, end, or but-end.

3. ABOVE, [Sax. Abufan, Abufon, A-be-ufan.] meaning over, or, literally, at-by-over, or at-by-top, is from the Saxon or Old English a, be, and ufa, or ufan, said to mean "high, upwards, or the top."

4. ACROSS, at cross, athwart, traverse, is from the prefix a and the word cross.

5. AFTER, [Sax. Æfter, or Æftan,] meaning behind, subsequent to, is, in form, the comparative of aft, a word common to seamen, and it may have been thence derived.

6. AGAINST, opposite to, is probably from the Anglo-Saxon, Ongean, or Ongegen, each of which forms means again or against. As prefixes, on and a are often equivalent.

7. ALONG, [i.e., at-long,] meaning lengthwise of, near to, is formed from a and long.

8. AMID, [i. e., at mid or middle,] is from a and mid; and AMIDST [, i.e., at midst,] is from a and midst, contracted from middest, the superlative of mid.

9. AMONG, mixed with, is probably an abbreviation of amongst; and AMONGST, according to Tooke, is from a and mongst, or the older "Ge-meneged," Saxon for "mixed, mingled."

10. AROUND, about, encircling, is from a and round, a circle, or circuit.

11. AT, gone to, is supposed by some to come from the Latin ad; but Dr. Murray says, "We have in Teutonic AT for AGT, touching or touched, joined, at."--Hist. of Lang., i, 349.

12. ATHWART, across, is from a and thwart, cross; and this from the Saxon Thweor.

13. BATING, a preposition for except, is the imperfect participle of bate, to abate.

14. BEFORE, [i.e., by-fore,] in front of, is from the prefix be and the adjective fore.

15. BEHIND, [i.e., by-hind,] in rear of, is from the prefix be and the adjective hind.

16. BELOW, [i.e., by-low,] meaning under, or beneath, is from be and the adjective low.

17. BENEATH [, Sax. or Old Eng. Beneoth,] is from be and neath, or Sax. Neothe, low.

18. BESIDE [, i.e., by-side,] is probably from be and the noun or adjective side.

19. BESIDES [, i.e., by-sides,] is probably from be and the plural noun sides.

20. BETWEEN, [Sax. Betweonan, or Betwynan,] literally, by-twain, seems to have been formed from be, by, and twain, two--or the Saxon Twegen, which also means two, twain.

21. BETWIXT, meaning between, [Sax. Betweox, Betwux, Betwyx, Betwyxt, &c.,] is from be, by, and twyx, originally a "Gothic" word signifying "two, or twain."--See Tooke, Vol. i, p. 329.

22. BEYOND, past, [Sax. Begeond,] is from the prefix be, by, and yond, [Sax. Geond,] past, far.

23. BY [, Sax. Be, Bi, or Big,] is affirmed by Tooke to be "the imperative Byth, of the Anglo-Saxon verb Beon, to be."--Diversions of P., Vol. i, p. 326. This seems to be rather questionable.

24. CONCERNING, the preposition, is from the first participle of the verb concern.

25. DOWN, the preposition, is from the Anglo-Saxon Dune, down.

26. DURING, prep. of time, is from the first participle of an old verb dure, to last, formerly in use; as, "While the world may dure."--Chaucer's Knight's Tale.

27. ERE, before, prep. of time, is from the Anglo-Saxon Ær, a word of like sort.

28. EXCEPT, bating, is from the imperative, or (according to Dr. Johnson) the ancient perfect participle of the verb to except; and EXCEPTING, when a preposition, is from the first participle of the same verb.

29. FOR, because of, is the Anglo-Saxon preposition For, a word of like import, and supposed by Tooke to have come from a Gothic noun signifying cause, or sake.

30. FROM, in Saxon, Fram, is probably derived from the old adjective Frum, original.

31. IN, or the Saxon In, is the same as the Latin in: the Greek is [Greek: en]; and the French, en.

32. INTO, like the Saxon Into, noting entrance, is a compound of in and to.

33. MID and MIDST, as English prepositions, are poetical forms used for Amid and Amidst.

34. NOTWITHSTANDING, not hindering, is from the adverb not, and the participle withstanding, which, by itself, means hindering, or preventing. 35. OF is from the Saxon Of, or Af; which is supposed by Tooke to come from a noun signifying offspring.

36. OFF, opposed to on, Dr. Johnson derives from the "Dutch af."

37. ON, a word very often used in Anglo-Saxon, is traced by some etymologists to the Gothic ana, the German an, the Dutch aan; but no such derivation fixes its meaning.

38. OUT, [Sax. Ut, Ute, or Utan,] when made a preposition, is probably from the adverb or adjective Out, or the earlier Ut; and OUT-OF, [Sax. Ut-of,] opposed to Into, is but the adverb Out and the preposition Of--usually written separately, but better joined, in some instances.

39. OVER, above, is from the Anglo-Saxon Ofer, over; and this, probably, from Ufa, above, high, or from the comparative, Ufera, higher.

40. OVERTHWART, meaning across, is a compound of over and thwart, cross.

41. PAST, beyond, gone by, is a contraction from the perfect participle passed.

42. PENDING, during or hanging, has a participial form, but is either an adjective or a preposition: we do not use pend alone as a verb, though we have it in depend.

43. RESPECTING, concerning, is from the first participle of the verb respect.

44. ROUND, a preposition for about or around, is from the noun or adjective round.

45. SINCE is most probably a contraction of the old word Sithence; but is conjectured by Tooke to have been formed from the phrase, "Seen as."

46. THROUGH [, Sax. Thurh, or Thurch,] seems related to Thorough, Sax. Thuruh; and this again to Thuru, or Duru, a Door.

47. THROUGHOUT, quite through, is an obvious compond of through and out.

48. TILL, [Sax. Til or Tille,] to, until, is from the Saxon Til or Till, an end, a station.

49. TO, whether a preposition or an adverb, is from the Anglo-Saxon particle To.

50. TOUCHING, with regard to, is from the first participle of the verb touch.

51. TOWARD or TOWARDS, written by the Anglo-Saxons Toweard or Toweardes, is a compound of To and Ward or Weard, a guard, a look-out; "Used in composition to express situation or direction."--Bosworth.

52. UNDER, [Gothic, Undar; Dutch, Onder,] beneath, below, is a common Anglo-Saxon word, and very frequent prefix, affirmed by Tooke to be "nothing but on-neder," a Dutch compound = on lower.--See Diversions of Purley, Vol. i, p. 331.

53. UNDERNEATH is a compound of under and neath, low; whence nether, lower.

54. UNTIL is a compound from on or un, and till, or til, the end.

55. UNTO, now somewhat antiquated, is formed, not very analogically, from un and to.

56. UP is from the Anglo-Saxon adjective, "Up or Upp, high, lofty."

57. UPON, which appears literally to mean high on, is from two words up and on.

58. WITH comes to us from the Anglo-Saxon With, a word of like sort and import; which Tooke says is an imperative verb, sometimes from "Withan, to join," and sometimes from "Wyrthan, to be."--See his Diversions, Vol. i, p. 262.

59. WITHIN [, i.e., by-in,] is from with and in: Sax. Withinnan, Binnan, or Binnon.

60. WITHOUT [, i.e., by-out,] is from with and out: Sax. Withútan, -úten, -úton; Bútan, Búton, Bútun.

OBSERVATION.

In regard to some of our minor or simpler prepositions, as of sundry other particles, to go beyond the forms and constructions which present or former usage has at some period given them as particles, and to ascertain their actual origin in something ulterior, if such they had, is no very easy matter; nor can there be either satisfaction or profit in studying what one suspects to be mere guesswork. "How do you account for IN, OUT, ON, OFF, and AT?" says the friend of Tooke, in an etymological dialogue at Purley. The substance of his answer is, "The explanation and etymology of these words require a degree of knowledge in all the antient northern languages, and a skill in the application of that knowledge, which I am very far from assuming; and though I am almost persuaded by some of my own conjectures concerning them, I am not willing, by an apparently forced and far-fetched derivation, to justify your imputation of etymological legerdemain."--Diversions, Vol. i, p. 370.

SECTION X.--DERIVATION OF INTERJECTIONS.

Those significant and constructive words which are occasionally used as Interjections, (such as Good! Strange! Indeed!,) do not require an explanation here; and those mere sounds which are in no wise expressive of thought, scarcely admit of definition or derivation. The Interjection HEY is probably a corruption of the adjective High;--ALAS is from the French Hélas:--ALACK is probably a corruption of Alas;--WELAWAY or WELLAWAY, (which is now corrupted into WELLADAY,) is said by some to be from the Anglo-Saxon Wá-lá-wá, i.e., Wo-lo-wo;--"FIE," says Tooke, "is the imperative of the Gothic and Anglo-Saxon verb Fian, to hate;"--Heyday is probably from high day;--AVAUNT, perhaps from the French avant, before;--LO, from look;--BEGONE, from be and gone;--WELCOME, from well and come;--FAREWELL, from fare and well.

SECTION XI--EXPLANATION OF THE PREFIXES.

In the formation of English words, certain particles are often employed as prefixes; which, as they generally have some peculiar import, may be separately explained. A few of them are of Anglo-Saxon origin, or character; and the greater part of these are still employed as separate words in our language. The rest are Latin, Greek, or French prepositions. The roots to which they are prefixed, are not always proper English words. Those which are such, are called SEPARABLE RADICALS; those which are not such, INSEPARABLE RADICALS.

CLASS I--THE ENGLISH OR ANGLO-SAXON PREFIXES.

1. A, as an English prefix, signifies on, in, at, or to: as in a-board, a-shore, a-foot, a-bed, a-soak, a-tilt, a-slant, a-far, a-field; which are equal to the phrases, on board, on shore, on foot, in bed, in soak, at tilt, at slant, to a distance, to the fields. The French à, to, is probably the same particle. This prefix is sometimes redundant, adding little or nothing to the meaning; as in awake, arise, amend.

2. BE, as a prefix, signifies upon, over, by, to, at, or for: as in be-spatter, be-cloud, be-times, be-tide, be-howl, be-speak. It is sometimes redundant, or merely intensive; as in be-gird, be-deck, be-loved, be-dazzle, be-moisten, be-praise, be-quote.

3. COUNTER, an English prefix, allied to the French Contre, and the Latin Contra, means against, or opposite; as in counter-poise, counter-evidence, counter-natural.

4. FOR, as a prefix, unlike the common preposition For, seems generally to signify from: it is found in the irregular verbs for-bear, for-bid, for-get, for-give, for-sake, for-swear; and in for-bathe, for-do, for-pass, for-pine, for-say, for-think, for-waste, which last are now disused, the for in several being merely intensive.

5. FORE, prefixed to a verb, signifies before; as in fore-know, fore-tell: prefixed to a noun, it is usually an adjective, and signifies anterior; as in fore-side, fore-part.

6. HALF, signifying one of two equal parts, is much used in composition; and, often, merely to denote imperfection: as, half-sighted, seeing imperfectly.

7. MIS signifies wrong or ill; as in mis-cite, mis-print, mis-spell, mis-chance, mis-hap.

8. OVER denotes superiority or excess; as in over-power, over-strain, over-large.

9. OUT, prefixed to a verb, generally denotes excess; as in out-do, out-leap, out-poise: prefixed to a noun, it is an adjective, and signifies exterior; as in out-side, out-parish.

10. SELF generally signifies one's own person, or belonging to one's own person; but, in self-same, it means very. We have many words beginning with Self, but most of them seem to be compounds rather than derivatives; as, self-love, self-abasement, self-abuse, self-affairs, self-willed, self-accusing.

11. UN denotes negation or contrariety; as in un-kind, un-load, un-truth, un-coif.

12. UNDER denotes inferiority; as in under-value, under-clerk, under-growth.

13. UP denotes motion upwards; as in up-lift: sometimes subversion; as in up-set.

14. WITH, as a prefix, unlike the common preposition With, signifies against, from, or back; as in with-stand, with-hold, with-draw, with-stander, with-holdment, with-drawal.

CLASS II.--THE LATIN PREFIXES.

The primitives or radicals to which these are prefixed, are not many of them employed separately in English. The final letter of the prefix Ad, Con, Ex, In, Ob, or Sub, is often changed before certain consonants; not capriciously, but with uniformity, to adapt or assimilate it to the sound which follows.

1. A, AB, or ABS, means From, or Away: as, a-vert, to turn from, or away; ab-duce, to lead from; ab-duction, a carrying-away; ab-stract, to draw from, or away.

2. AD,--forming ac, af, al, an, ap, as, at,--means To, or At: as, ad-vert, to turn to; ac-cord, to yield to; af-flux, a flowing-to; al-ly, to bind to; an-nex, to link to; ap-ply, to put to; as-sume, to take to; at-test, to witness to; ad-mire, to wonder at.

3. ANTE means Fore, or Before: as, ante-past, a fore-taste; ante-cedent, foregoing, or going before; ante-mundane, before the world; ante-date, to date before.

4. CIRCUM means Round, Around, or About: as circum-volve, to roll round; circum-scribe, to write round; circum-vent, to come round; circum-spect, looking about one's self.

5. CON,--which forms com, co, col, cor,--means Together: as, con-tract, to draw together; compel, to drive together; co-erce, to force together; col-lect, to gather together; cor-rade, to rub or scrape together; con-junction, a joining-together.

6. CONTRA, or CONTRO, means Against, or Counter: as, contra-dict, to speak against; contra-vene, to come against; contra-mure, countermure; contro-vert, to turn against.

7. DE means Of, From, or Down: as, de-note, to be a sign of; de-tract, to draw from; de-pend, to hang down; de-press, to press down; de-crease, to grow down, to grow less.

8. DIS, or DI, means Away, or Apart: as, dis-pel, to drive away; dis-sect, to cut apart; di-vert, to turn away.

9. E, or Ex,--making also ec, ef,--means Out: as, e-ject, to cast out; e-lect, to choose out; ex-clude, to shut out; ex-cite, to summon out; ec-stacy, a raising out; ef-face, to blot out.

10. EXTRA means Beyond, or Out of: as, extra-vagant, syllabled ex-trav'a-gant, roving be-yond; extra-vasate, ex-trav'a-sate, to flow out of the vessels; extra-territorial, being out of the territory.

11. IN,--which makes also il, im, ir,--means In, Into, or Upon: as, in-spire, to breathe in; il-lude, to draw in by deceit; im-mure, to wall in; ir-ruption, a rushing in; in-spect, to look into; in-scribe, to write upon; in-sult, to jump upon. These syllables, prefixed, to English nouns or adjectives, generally reverse their meaning; as in in-justice, il-legality, im-partiality, ir-religion, ir-rational, in-secure, in-sane.

12. INTER means Between, or In between: as, inter-sperse, to scatter in between; inter-jection, something thrown in between; inter-jacent, lying between; inter-communication, communication between.

13. INTRO means In, Inwards, or Within: as, intro-duce, to lead in; intro-vert, to turn inwards; intro-spect, to look within; intro-mission, a sending-in.

14. OB,--which makes also oc, of, op,--means Against: as, ob-trude, to thrust against; oc-cur, to run against; of-fer, to bring against; op-pose, to place against; ob-ject, to cast against.

15. PER means Through or By: as, per-vade, to go through; per-chance, by chance; per-cent, by the hundred; per-plex, to tangle through, or to entangle thoroughly.

16. POST means After: as, post-pone, to place after; post-date, to date after.

17. PRÆ, or PRE, means Before: as, pre-sume, to take before; pre-position, a placing-before, or thing placed before; præ-cognita, things known before.

18. PRO means For, Forth, or Forwards: as, pro-vide, to take care for; pro-duce, to bring forth; pro-trude, to thrust forwards; pro-ceed, to go forward; pro-noun, for a noun.

19. PRETER means By, Past, or Beyond: as, preter-it, bygone, or gone by; preter-imperfect, past imperfect; preter-natural, beyond what is natural; preter-mit, to put by, to omit.

20. RE means Again or Back: as, re-view, to view again; re-pel, to drive back.

21. RETRO means Backwards, Backward, or Back: as, retro-active, acting backwards; retro-grade, going backward; retro-cede, to cede back again.

22. SE means Aside or Apart: as, se-duce, to lead aside; se-cede, to go apart.

23. SEMI means Half: as, semi-colon, half a colon; semi-circle, half a circle.

24. SUB,--which makes suf, sug, sup, sur, and sus,--means Under, and sometimes Up: as, sub-scribe, to write under; suf-fossion, an undermining; sug-gest, to convey under; sup-ply, to put under; sur-reption, a creeping-under; sus-tain, to hold up; sub-ject, cast under.

25. SUBTER means Beneath: as, subter-fluous, flowing beneath.

26. SUPER means Over or Above: as, super-fluous, flowing over; super-natant, swimming above; super-lative, carried over, or carrying over; super-vise, to overlook, to oversee.

27. TRANS,--whence TRAN and TRA,--means Beyond, Over, To another state or place: as, trans-gress, to pass beyond or over; trans-cend, to climb over; trans-mit to send to an other place; trans-form, to change to an other shape; tra-montane, from beyond the mountains; i.e., Trans-Alpine, as opposed to Cis-Alpine.

CLASS III.--THE GREEK PREFIXES.

1. A and AN, in Greek derivatives, denote privation: as, a-nomalous, wanting rules; an-ony-mous, wanting name; an-archy, want of government; a-cephalous, headless.

2. AMPHI means Two, Both, or Double: as, amphi-bious, living in two elements; amphi-brach, both [sides] short; amphi-theatre, a double theatre.

3. ANTI means Against: as, anti-slavery, against slavery; anti-acid, against acidity; anti-febrile, against fever; anti-thesis, a placing-against.

4. APO, APH,--From: as, apo-strophe, a turning-from; aph-aeresis, a taking from.

5. DIA,--Through: as, dia-gonal, through the corners; dia-meter, measure through.

6. EPI, EPH,--Upon: as, epi-demic, upon the people; eph-emera, upon a day.

7. HEMI means Half: as, hemi-sphere, half a sphere; hemi-stich, half a verse.

8. HYPER means Over: as, hyper-critical, over-critical; hyper-meter, over measure. 9. HYPO means Under: as, hypo-stasis, substance, or that which stands under; hypo-thesis, supposition, or a placing-under; hypo-phyllous, under the leaf.

10. META means Beyond, Over, To an other state or place: as, meta-morphose, to change to an other shape; meta-physics, mental science, as beyond or over physics.

11. PARA means Against: as, para-dox, something contrary to common opinion.

12. PERI means Around: as, peri-phery, the circumference, or measure round.

13. SYN,--whence Sym, Syl,--means Together: as, syn-tax, a putting-together; sym-pathy, a suffering-together; syl-lable, what we take together; syn-thesis a placing-together.

CLASS IV.--THE FRENCH PREFIXES.

1. A is a preposition of very frequent use in French, and generally means To. I have suggested above that it is probably the same as the Anglo-Saxon prefix a. It is found in a few English compounds or derivatives that are of French, and not of Saxon origin: as, a-dieu, to God; i.e., I commend you to God; a-larm, from alarme, i e., à l'arme, to arms.

2. DE means Of or From: as in de-mure, of manners; de-liver, to ease from or of.

3. DEMI means Half: as, demi-man, half a man; demi-god, half a god; demi-devil, half a devil; demi-deify, to half deify; demi-sized, half sized; demi-quaver, half a quaver. 4. EN,--which sometimes becomes em,--means In, Into, or Upon: as, en-chain, to hold in chains; em-brace, to clasp in the arms; en-tomb, to put into a tomb; em-boss, to stud upon. Many words are yet wavering between the French and the Latin orthography of this prefix: as, embody, or imbody; ensurance, or insurance; ensnare, or insnare; enquire, or inquire.

5. SUR, as a French prefix, means Upon, Over, or After: as, sur-name, a name upon a name; sur-vey, to look over; sur-mount, to mount over or upon; sur-render, to deliver over to others; sur-feit, to overdo in eating; sur-vive, to live after, to over-live, to outlive.

END OF THE SECOND APPENDIX

APPENDIX III TO PART THIRD, OR SYNTAX.

OF THE QUALITIES OF STYLE.

Style, as a topic connected with syntax, is the particular manner in which a person expresses his conceptions by means of language. It is different from mere words, different from mere grammar, in any limited sense, and is not to be regulated altogether by rules of construction. It always has some relation to the author's peculiar manner of thinking; involves, to some extent, and shows his literary, if not his moral, character; is, in general, that sort of expression which his thoughts most readily assume; and, sometimes, partakes not only of what is characteristic of the man, of his profession, sect, clan, or province, but even of national peculiarity, or some marked feature of the age. The words which an author employs, may be proper in themselves, and so constructed as to violate no rule of syntax, and yet his style may have great faults.

In reviews and critical essays, the general characters of style are usually designated by such epithets as these;--concise, diffuse,--neat, negligent,--terse, bungling,--nervous, weak,--forcible, feeble,--vehement, languid,--simple, affected,--easy, stiff,--pure, barbarous,--perspicuous, obscure,--elegant, uncouth,--florid, plain,--flowery, artless,--fluent, dry,--piquant, dull,--stately, flippant,--majestic, mean,--pompous, modest,--ancient, modern. A considerable diversity of style, may be found in compositions all equally excellent in their kind. And, indeed, different subjects, as well as the different endowments by which genius is distinguished, require this diversity. But, in forming his style, the learner should remember, that a negligent, feeble, affected, stiff, uncouth, barbarous, or obscure style is always faulty; and that perspicuity, ease, simplicity, strength, neatness, and purity, are qualities always to be aimed at.

In order to acquire a good style, the frequent practice of composing and writing something, is indispensably necessary. Without exercise and diligent attention, rules or precepts for the attainment of this object, will be of no avail. When the learner has acquired such a knowledge of grammar, as to be in some degree qualified for the undertaking, he should devote a stated portion of his time to composition. This exercise will bring the powers of his mind into requisition, in a way that is well calculated to strengthen them. And if he has opportunity for reading, he may, by a diligent perusal of the best authors, acquire both language and taste as well as sentiment;--and these three are the essential qualifications of a good writer.

In regard to the qualities which constitute a good style, we can here offer nothing more than a few brief hints. With respect to words and phrases, particular attention should be paid to three things--purity, propriety, and precision; and, with respect to sentences, to three others,--perspicuity, unity, and strength. Under each of these six heads, we shall arrange, in the form of short precepts, a few of the most important directions for the forming of a good style.

SECTION I.--OF PURITY.

Purity of style consists in the use of such words and phrases only, as belong to the language which we write or speak. Its opposites are the faults aimed at in the following precepts.

PRECEPT I.--Avoid the unnecessary use of foreign words or idioms: such as the French words fraicheur, hauteur, delicatesse, politesse, noblesse;--the expression, "He repented himself;"--or, "It serves to an excellent purpose."

PRECEPT II.--Avoid obsolete or antiquated words, except there be some special reason for their use: that is, such words as acception, addressful, administrate, affamish, affrontiveness, belikely, blusterous, clergical, cruciate, rutilate, timidous.

PRECEPT III.--Avoid strange or unauthorized words: such as, flutteration, inspectator, judgematical, incumberment, connexity, electerized, martyrized, reunition, marvelize, limpitude, affectated, adorement, absquatulate. Of this sort is O. B. Peirce's "assimilarity," used on page 19th of his English Grammar; and still worse is Jocelyn's "irradicable," for uneradicable, used on page 5th of his Prize Essay on Education.

PRECEPT IV.--Avoid bombast, or affectation of fine writing. It is ridiculous, however serious the subject. The following is an example: "Personifications, however rich the depictions, and unconstrained their latitude; analogies, however imposing the objects of parallel, and the media of comparison; can never expose the consequences of sin to the extent of fact, or the range of demonstration."--Anonymous.

SECTION II.--OF PROPRIETY.

Propriety of language consists in the selection and right construction of such words as the best usage has appropriated to those ideas which we intend to express by them. Impropriety embraces all those forms of error, which, for the purpose of illustration, exercise, and special criticism, have been so methodically and so copiously posted up under the various heads, rules, and notes, of this extensive Grammar. A few suggestions, however, are here to be set down in the form of precepts.

PRECEPT I.--Avoid low and provincial expressions: such as, "Now, says I, boys;"--"Thinks I to myself;"--"To get into a scrape;"--"Stay here while I come back;"--"By jinkers;"--"By the living jingoes."

PRECEPT II.--In writing prose, avoid words and phrases that are merely poetical: such as, morn, eve, plaint, corse, weal, drear, amid, oft, steepy;--"what time the winds arise."

PRECEPT III.--Avoid technical terms: except where they are necessary in treating of a particular art or science. In technology, they are proper.

PRECEPT IV.--Avoid the recurrence of a word in different senses, or such a repetition of words as denotes paucity of language: as, "His own reason might have suggested better reasons."--"Gregory favoured the undertaking, for no other reason than this; that the manager, in countenance, favoured his friend."--"I want to go and see what he wants."

PRECEPT V.--Supply words that are wanting: thus, instead of saying, "This action increased his former services," say, "This action increased the merit of his former services."--"How many [kinds of] substantives are there? Two; proper and common."--See E. Devis's Gram., p. 14. "These changes should not be left to be settled by chance or by caprice, but [should be determined] by the judicious application of the principles of Orthography."--See Fowlers E. Gram., 1850, p. 170.

PRECEPT VI.--Avoid equivocal or ambiguous expressions: as, "His memory shall be lost on the earth."--"I long since learned to like nothing but what you do."

PRECEPT VII.--Avoid unintelligible, inconsistent, or inappropriate expressions: such as, "I have observed that the superiority among these coffee-house politicians proceeds from an opinion of gallantry and fashion."--"These words do not convey even an opaque idea of the author's meaning."

PRECEPT VIII.--Observe the natural order of things or events, and do not put the cart before the horse: as, "The scribes taught and studied the Law of Moses."--"They can neither return to nor leave their houses."--"He tumbled, head over heels, into the water."--"'Pat, how did you carry that quarter of beef?' 'Why, I thrust it through a stick, and threw my shoulder over it.'"

SECTION III.--OF PRECISION.

Precision consists in avoiding all superfluous words, and adapting the expression exactly to the thought, so as to say, with no deficiency or surplus of terms, whatever is intended by the author. Its opposites are noticed in the following precepts.

PRECEPT I.--Avoid a useless tautology, either of expression or of sentiment; as, "When will you return again?"--"We returned back home again."--"On entering into the room, I saw and discovered he had fallen down on the floor and could not rise up."--"They have a mutual dislike to each other."--"Whenever I go, he always meets me there."--"Where is he at? In there."--"His faithfulness and fidelity should be rewarded."

PRECEPT II.--Repeat words as often as an exact exhibition of your meaning requires them; for repetition may be elegant, if it be not useless. The following example does not appear faulty: "Moral precepts are precepts the reasons of which we see; positive precepts are precepts the reasons of which we do not see."--Butler's Analogy, p. 165.

PRECEPT III.--Observe the exact meaning of words accounted synonymous, and employ those which are the most suitable; as, "A diligent scholar may acquire knowledge, gain celebrity, obtain rewards, win prizes, and get high honour, though he earn no money." These six verbs have nearly the same meaning, and yet no two of them can here be correctly interchanged.

PRECEPT IV.--Observe the proper form of each word, and do not confound such as resemble each other. "Professor J. W. Gibbs, of Yale College," in treating of the "Peculiarities of the Cockney Dialect," says, "The Londoner sometimes confounds two different forms; as contagious for contiguous; eminent for imminent; humorous for humorsome; ingeniously for ingenuously; luxurious for luxuriant; scrupulosity for scruple; successfully for successively."--See Fowler's E. Gram., p. 87; and Pref., p. vi.

PRECEPT V.--Think clearly, and avoid absurd or incompatible expressions. Example of error: "To pursue those remarks, would, probably, be of no further service to the learner than that of burdening his memory with a catalogue of dry and uninteresting peculiarities; which may gratify curiosity, without affording information adequate to the trouble of the perusal."--Wright's Gram., p. 122.

PRECEPT VI.--Avoid words that are useless; and, especially, a multiplication of them into sentences, members, or clauses, that may well be spared. Example: "If one could really be a spectator of what is passing in the world around us without taking part in the events, or sharing in the passions and actual performance on the stage; if we could set ourselves down, as it were, in a private box of the world's great theatre, and quietly look on at the piece that is playing, no more moved than is absolutely implied by sympathy with our fellow-creatures, what a curious, what an amusing, what an interesting spectacle would life present."--G. P. R. JAMES: "The Forger," commencement of Chap. xxxi. This sentence contains eighty-seven words, "of which sixty-one are entirely unnecessary to the expression of the author's idea, if idea it can be called."--Holden's Review.

OBSERVATION.

Verbosity, as well as tautology, is not so directly opposite to precision, as to conciseness, or brevity. From the manner in which lawyers usually multiply terms in order to express their facts precisely, it would seem that, with them, precision consists rather in the use of many words than of few. But the ordinary style of legal instruments no popular writer can imitate without becoming ridiculous. A terse or concise style is very apt to be elliptical: and, in some particular instances, must be so; but, at the same time, the full expression, perhaps, may have more precision, though it be less agreeable. For example: "A word of one syllable, is called a monosyllable; a word of two syllables, is called a dissyllable: a word of three syllables, is called a trisyllable: a word of four or more syllables, is called a polysyllable."--O. B. Peirce's Gram., p. 19. Better, perhaps, thus: "A word of one syllable is called a monosyllable; a word of two syllables, a dissyllable; a word of three syllables, a trissyllable; and a word of four or more syllables, a polysyllable."--Brown's Institutes, p. 17.

SECTION IV.--OF PERSPICUITY.

Perspicuity consists in freedom from obscurity or ambiguity. It is a quality so essential to every kind of writing, that for the want of it no merit of other name can compensate. "Without this, the richest ornaments of style, only glimmer through the dark, and puzzle in stead of pleasing the reader."--Dr. Blair. Perspicuity, being the most important property of language, and an exemption from the most embarrassing defects, seems even to rise to a degree of positive beauty. We are naturally pleased with a style that frees us from all suspense in regard to the meaning; that carries us through the subject without embarrassment or confusion; and that always flows like a limpid stream, through which we can "see to the very bottom." Many of the errors which have heretofore been pointed out to the reader, are offences against perspicuity. Only three or four hints will here be added.

PRECEPT I.--Place adjectives, relative pronouns, participles, adverbs, and explanatory phrases near enough to the words to which they relate, and in a position which will make their reference clear. The following sentences are deficient in perspicuity: "Reverence is the veneration paid to superior sanctity, intermixed with a certain degree of awe."--Unknown. "The Romans understood liberty, at least, as well as we."--See Murray's Gram., p. 307. "Taste was never made to cater for vanity."--J. Q. Adams's Rhet., Vol. i, p. 119.

PRECEPT II.--In prose, avoid a poetic collocation of words. For example: "Guard your weak side from being known. If it be attacked, the best way is, to join in the attack."--KAMES: Art of Thinking, p. 75. This maxim of prudence might be expressed more poetically, but with some loss of perspicuity, thus: "Your weak side guard from being known. Attacked in this, the assailants join."

PRECEPT III.--Avoid faulty ellipses, and repeat all words necessary to preserve the sense. The following sentences require the words which are inserted in crotchets: "Restlessness of mind disqualifies us, both for the enjoyment of peace, and [for] the performance of our duty."--Murray's Key, 8vo, p. 166. "Double Comparatives and [Double] Superlatives should be avoided."--Fowler's E. Gram., 1850, p. 489.

PRECEPT IV.--Avoid the pedantic and sense-dimming style of charlatans and new theorists, which often demands either a translation or a tedious study, to make it at all intelligible to the ordinary reader. For example: "RULE XL Part 3. An intransitive or receptive asserter in the unlimited mode, depending on a word in the possessive case, may have, after it, a word in the subjective case, denoting the same thing: And, when it acts the part of an assertive name, depending on a relative, it may have after it a word in the subjective case. EXAMPLES:--John's being my friend, saved me from inconvenience. Seth Hamilton was unhappy in being a slave to party prejudice."--O. B. Peirce's Gram., 1839, p. 201. The meaning of this third part of a Rule of syntax, is, in proper English, as follows: "A participle not transitive, with the possessive case before it, may have after it a nominative denoting the same thing; and also, when a preposition governs the participle, a nominative may follow, in agreement with one which precedes." In doctrine, the former clause of the sentence is erroneous: it serves only to propagate false syntax by rule. See the former example, and a note of mine, referring to it, on page 531 of this work.

SECTION V.--OF UNITY.

Unity consists in avoiding needless pauses, and keeping one object predominant throughout a sentence or paragraph. Every sentence, whether its parts be few or many, requires strict unity. The chief faults, opposite to this quality of style, are suggested in the following precepts. PRECEPT I.--Avoid brokenness, hitching, or the unnecessary separation of parts that naturally come together. Examples: "I was, soon after my arrival, taken out of my Indian habit."--Addison, Tattler, No. 249. Better: "Soon after my arrival, I was taken out of my Indian habit."--Churchill's Gram., p. 326. "Who can, either in opposition, or in the ministry, act alone?"--Ib. Better: "Who can act alone, either in opposition, or in the ministry?"--Ib. "I, like others, have, in my youth, trifled with my health, and old age now prematurely assails me."--Ib., p. 327. Better: "Like others, I have trifled with my health, and old age now prematurely assails me."

PRECEPT II.--Treat different topics in separate paragraphs, and distinct sentiments in separate sentences. Error: "The two volumes are, indeed, intimately connected, and constitute one uniform system of English Grammar."--Murray's Preface, p. iv. Better thus: "The two volumes are, indeed, intimately connected. They constitute one uniform system of English grammar."

PRECEPT III.--In the progress of a sentence, do not desert the principal subjects in favour of adjuncts, or change the scene unnecessarily. Example: "After we came to anchor, they put me on shore, where I was welcomed by all my friends, who received me with the greatest kindness, which was not then expected." Better: "The vessel having come to anchor, I was put on shore; where I was unexpectedly welcomed by all my friends, and received with the greatest kindness."--See Blair's Rhet., p. 107.

PRECEPT IV.--Do not introduce parentheses, except when a lively remark may be thrown in without diverting the mind too long from the principal subject. Example: "But (saith he) since I take upon me to teach the whole world, (it is strange, it should be so natural for this man to write untruths, since I direct my Theses only to the Christian world; but if it may render me odious, such Peccadillo's pass with him, it seems, but for Piæ Fraudes:) I intended never to write of those things, concerning which we do not differ from others."--R. Barclay's Works, Vol. iii. p. 279. The parts of this sentence are so put together, that, as a whole, it is scarcely intelligible.

SECTION VI.--OF STRENGTH.

Strength consists in giving to the several words and members of a sentence, such an arrangement as shall bring out the sense to the best advantage, and present every idea in its due importance. Perhaps it is essential to this quality of style, that there be animation, spirit, and vigour of thought, in all that is uttered. A few hints concerning the Strength of sentences, will here be given in the form of precepts.

PRECEPT I.--Avoid verbosity; a concise style is the most favourable to strength. Examples: "No human happiness is so pure as not to contain any alloy."--Murray's Key, 8vo, p. 270. Better: "No human happiness is unalloyed." "He was so much skilled in the exercise of the oar, that few could equal him."--Ib., p. 271. Better: "He was so skillful at the oar, that few could match him." Or thus: "At the oar, he was rarely equalled." "The reason why they [the pronouns] are considered separately is, because there is something particular in their inflections."-- Priestley's Gram., p. 81. Better: "The pronouns are considered separately, because there is something peculiar in their inflections."

PRECEPT II.--Place the most important words in the situation in which they will make the strongest impression. Inversion of terms sometimes increases the strength and vivacity of an expression: as, "All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me."--Matt., iv, 9. "Righteous art thou, O Lord, and upright are thy judgements."--Psalms, cxix, 137. "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints."--Ps., cxvi, 15.

PRECEPT III.--Have regard also to the relative position of clauses, or members; for a weaker assertion should not follow a stronger; and, when the sentence consists of two members, the longer should be the concluding one. Example: "We flatter ourselves with the belief that we have forsaken our passions, when they have forsaken us." Better: "When our passions have forsaken us, we flatter ourselves with the belief that we have forsaken them."--See Blair's Rhet., p. 117; Murray's Gram., p. 323.

PRECEPT IV.--When things are to be compared or contrasted, their resemblance or opposition will be rendered more striking, if a pretty near resemblance in the language and construction of the two members, be preserved. Example: "The wise man is happy, when he gains his own approbation; the fool, when he recommends himself to the applause of those about him." Better: "The wise man is happy, when he gains his own approbation; the fool, when he gains the applause of others."--See Murray's Gram., p. 324.

PRECEPT V.--Remember that it is, in general, ungraceful to end a sentence with an adverb, a preposition, or any inconsiderable word or phrase, which may either be omitted or be introduced earlier. "For instance, it is a great deal better to say, 'Avarice is a crime of which wise men are often guilty,' than to say, 'Avarice is a crime which wise men are often guilty of.'"--Blair's Rhet., p. 117; Murray's Gram., p. 323.

END OF THE THIRD APPENDIX.

APPENDIX IV.

TO PART FOURTH, OR PROSODY.

OF POETIC DICTION.

Poetry, as defined by Dr. Blair, "is the language of passion, or of enlivened imagination, formed, most commonly, into regular numbers."--Rhet., p. 377. The style of poetry differs, in many respects, from that which is commonly adopted in prose. Poetic diction abounds in bold figures of speech, and unusual collocations of words. A great part of the figures, which have been treated of in one of the chapters of Prosody, are purely poetical. The primary aim of a poet, is, to please and to move; and, therefore, it is to the imagination, and the passions, that he speaks. He may also, and he should, have it in his view, to instruct and to reform; but it is indirectly, and by pleasing and moving, that such a writer accomplishes this end. The exterior and most obvious distinction of poetry, is versification: yet there are some forms of verse so loose and familiar, as to be hardly distinguishable from prose; and there is also a species of prose, so measured in its cadences, and so much raised in its tone, as to approach very nearly to poetic numbers.

This double approximation of some poetry to prose, and of some prose to poetry, not only makes it a matter of acknowledged difficulty to distinguish, by satisfactory definitions, the two species of composition, but, in many instances, embarrasses with like difficulty the attempt to show, by statements and examples, what usages or licenses, found in English works, are proper to be regarded as peculiarities of poetic diction. It is purposed here, to enumerate sundry deviations from the common style of prose; and perhaps all of them, or nearly all, may be justly considered as pertaining only to poetry.

POETICAL PECULIARITIES.

The following are among the chief peculiarities in which the poets indulge, and are indulged:--

I. They not unfrequently omit the ARTICLES, for the sake of brevity or metre; as,

"What dreadful pleasure! there to stand sublime, Like shipwreck'd mariner on desert coast!" --Beattie's Minstrel, p. 12.

"Sky lour'd, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops Wept at completing of the mortal sin." --Milton, P. L., B. ix, l. 1002.

II. They sometimes abbreviate common NOUNS, after a manner of their own: as, amaze, for amazement; acclaim, for acclamation; consult, for consultation; corse, for corpse; eve or even, for evening; fount, for fountain; helm, for helmet; lament, for lamentation; morn, for morning; plaint, for complaint; targe, for target; weal, for wealth.

III. By enallage, they use verbal forms substantively, or put verbs for nouns; perhaps for brevity, as above: thus,

1. "Instant, without disturb, they took alarm." --P. Lost: Joh. Dict., w. Aware.

2. "The gracious Judge, without revile reply'd." --P. Lost, B. x, l. 118.

3. "If they were known, as the suspect is great." --Shakspeare.

4. "Mark, and perform it: seest thou? for the fail Of any point in't shall be death." --Shakspeare.

IV. They employ several nouns that are not used in prose, or are used but rarely; as, benison, boon, emprise, fane, guerdon, guise, ire, ken, lore, meed, sire, steed, welkin, yore.

V. They introduce the noun self after an other noun of the possessive case; as,

1. "Affliction's semblance bends not o'er thy tomb, Affliction's self deplores thy youthful doom."--Byron.

2. "Thoughtless of beauty, she was beauty's self."--Thomson.

VI. They place before the verb nouns, or other words, that usually come after it; and, after it, those that usually come before it: as,

1. "No jealousy their dawn of love o'ercast, Nor blasted were their wedded days with strife." --Beattie.

2. "No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets." --W. Allen's Gram.

3. "Thy chain a wretched weight shall prove." --Langhorne.

4. "Follows the loosen'd aggravated roar." --Thomson.

5. "That purple grows the primrose pale." --Langhorne.

VII. They more frequently place ADJECTIVES after their nouns, than do prose writers; as,

1. "Or where the gorgeous East, with richest hand, Show'rs on her kings barbaric, pearl and gold." --Milton, P. L., B. ii, l. 2.

2. "Come, nymph demure, with mantle blue." --W. Allen's Gram., p. 189.

3. "This truth sublime his simple sire had taught." --Beattie's Minstrel, p. 14.

VIII. They ascribe qualities to things to which they do not literally belong; as,

1. "The ploughman homeward plods his weary way." --Gray's Elegy, l. 3.

2. "Or drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds." --Ibidem, l. 8.

3. "Imbitter'd more and more from peevish day to day." --Thomson.

4. "All thin and naked, to the numb cold night." --Shakspeare.

IX. They use concrete terms to express abstract qualities; (i. e., adjectives for nouns;) as,

1. "Earth's meanest son, all trembling, prostrate falls, And on the boundless of thy goodness calls." --Young.

2. "Meanwhile, whate'er of beautiful or new, Sublime or dreadful, in earth, sea, or sky, By chance or search, was offer'd to his view, He scann'd with curious and romantic eye." --Beattie.

3. "Won from the void and formless infinite." --Milton.

4. "To thy large heart give utterance due; thy heart Contains of good, wise, just, the perfect shape." --Id., P. R., B. iii, l. 10.

X. They often substitute quality for manner; (i. e., adjectives for adverbs;) as,

1. ----"The stately-sailing swan Gives out his snowy plumage to the gale, And, arching proud his neck, with oary feet, Bears forward fierce, and guards his osier isle." --Thomson.

2. "Thither continual pilgrims crowded still." --Id., Cos. of Ind., i, 8.

3. "Level at beauty, and at wit; The fairest mark is easiest hit." --Butler's Hudibras.

XI. They form new compound epithets, oftener than do prose writers; as,

1. "In world-rejoicing state, it moves sublime." --Thomson.

2. "The dewy-skirted clouds imbibe the sun." --Idem.

3. "By brooks and groves in hollow-whispering gales." --Idem.

4. "The violet of sky-woven vest." --Langhorne.

5. "A league from Epidamnum had we sail'd, Before the always-wind-obeying deep Gave any tragic instance of our harm." --Shakspeare.

6. "'Blue-eyed, strange-voiced, sharp-beaked, ill-omened fowl, What art thou?' 'What I ought to be, an owl.'" --Day's Punctuation, p. 139.

XII. They connect the comparative degree to the positive, before a verb; as,

1. "Near and more near the billows rise." --Merrick.

2. "Wide and wider spreads the vale." --Dyer's Grongar Hill.

3. "Wide and more wide, the overflowings of the mind Take every creature in, of every kind." --Pope.

4. "Thick and more thick the black blockade extends, A hundred head of Aristotle's friends." --Id., Dunciad.

XIII. They form many adjectives in y, which are not common in prose; as, The dimply flood,--dusky veil,--a gleamy ray,--heapy harvests,--moony shield,--paly circlet,--sheety lake,--stilly lake,--spiry temples,--steely casque,--steepy hill,--towery height,--vasty deep,--writhy snake.

XIV. They employ adjectives of an abbreviated form: as, dread, for dreadful; drear, for dreary; ebon, for ebony; hoar, for hoary; lone, for lonely; scant, for scanty; slope, for sloping: submiss, for submissive; vermil, for vermilion; yon, for yonder.

XV. They employ several adjectives that are not used in prose, or are used but seldom; as, azure, blithe, boon, dank, darkling, darksome, doughty, dun, fell, rife, rapt, rueful, sear, sylvan, twain, wan.

XVI. They employ the personal PRONOUNS, and introduce their nouns afterwards; as,

1. "It curl'd not Tweed alone, that breeze." --Sir W. Scott.

2. "What may it be, the heavy sound That moans old Branksome's turrets round?" --Idem, Lay, p. 21.

3. "Is it the lightning's quivering glance, That on the thicket streams; Or do they flash on spear and lance, The sun's retiring beams" --Idem, L. of L., vi, 15.

XVII. They use the forms of the second person singular oftener than do others; as,

1. "Yet I had rather, if I were to chuse, Thy service in some graver subject use, Such as may make thee search thy coffers round, Before thou clothe my fancy in fit sound." --Milton's Works, p. 133.

2. "But thou, of temples old, or altars new, Standest alone--with nothing like to thee." --Byron, Pilg., iv, 154.

3. "Thou seest not all; but piecemeal thou must break, To separate contemplation, the great whole." --Id., ib., iv, 157.

4. "Thou rightly deemst, fair youth, began the bard; The form then sawst was Virtue ever fair." --Pollok, C. of T., p. 16.

XVIII. They sometimes omit relatives that are nominatives; (see Obs. 22, at p. 555;) as,

"For is there aught in sleep can charm the wise?" --Thomson.

XIX. They omit the antecedent, or introduce it after the relative; as,

1. "Who never fasts, no banquet e'er enjoys, Who never toils or watches, never sleeps." --Armstrong.

2. "Who dares think one thing and an other tell, My soul detests him as the gates of hell." --Pope's Homer.

XX. They remove relatives, or other connectives, into the body of their clauses; as,

1. "Parts the fine locks, her graceful head that deck." --Darwin.

2. "Not half so dreadful rises to the sight Orion's dog, the year when autumn weighs." --Pope, Iliad, B. xxii, l. 37.

XXI. They make intransitive VERBS transitive, changing their class; as,

1. ----"A while he stands, Gazing the inverted landscape, half afraid To meditate the blue profound below." --Thomson.

2. "Still in harmonious intercourse, they liv'd The rural day, and talk'd the flowing heart." --Idem.

3. ----"I saw and heard, for we sometimes Who dwell this wild, constrain'd by want, come forth." --Milton, P. R., B. i, l. 330.

XXII. They make transitive verbs intransitive, giving them no regimen; as,

1. "The soldiers should have toss'd me on their pikes, Before I would have granted to that act." --Shakspeare.

2. "This minstrel-god, well-pleased, amid the quire Stood proud to hymn, and tune his youthful lyre." --Pope.

XXIII. They give to the imperative mood the first and the third person; as,

1. "Turn we a moment fancy's rapid flight." --Thomson.

2. "Be man's peculiar work his sole delight." --Beattie.

3. "And what is reason? Be she thus defin'd: Reason is upright stature in the soul." --Young.

XXIV. They employ can, could, and would, as principal verbs transitive; as,

1. "What for ourselves we can, is always ours." --Anon.

2. "Who does the best his circumstance allows, Does well, acts nobly; angels could no more." --Young.

3. "What would this man? Now upward will he soar, And, little less than angel, would be more." --Pope.

XXV. They place the infinitive before the word on which it depends; as,

1. "When first thy sire to send on earth Virtue, his darling child, design'd" --Gray.

2. "As oft as I, to kiss the flood, decline; So oft his lips ascend, to close with mine." --Sandys.

3. "Besides, Minerva, to secure her care, Diffus'd around a veil of thicken'd air." --Pope.

XXVI. They place the auxiliary verb after its principal, by hyperbaton; as,

1. "No longer heed the sunbeam bright That plays on Carron's breast he can" --Langhorne.

2. "Follow I must, I cannot go before." --Beauties of Shakspeare, p. 147.

3. "The man who suffers, loudly may complain; And rage he may, but he shall rage in vain." --Pope.

XXVII. Before verbs, they sometimes arbitrarily employ or omit prefixes: as, bide, or abide; dim, or bedim; gird, or begird; lure, or allure; move, or emove; reave, or bereave; vails, or avails; vanish, or evanish; wail, or bewail; weep, or beweep; wilder, or bewilder:--

1. "All knees to thee shall bow, of them that bide In heav'n, or earth, or under earth in hell." --Milton, P. L., B. iii, l. 321.

2. "Of a horse, ware the heels; of a bull-dog, the jaws; Of a bear, the embrace; of a lion, the paws." --Churchills Cram., p. 215.

XXVIII. Some few verbs they abbreviate: as list, for listen; ope, for open; hark, for hearken; dark, for darken; threat, for threaten; sharp, for sharpen.

XXIX. They employ several verbs that are not used in prose, or are used but rarely; as, appal, astound, brook, cower, doff, ken, wend, ween, trow.

XXX. They sometimes imitate a Greek construction of the infinitive; as,

1. "Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme." --Milton.

2. "For not, to have been dipp'd in Lethè lake, Could save the son of Thetis from to die." --Spenser.

XXXI. They employ the PARTICIPLES more frequently than prose writers, and in a construction somewhat peculiar; often intensive by accumulation: as,

1. "He came, and, standing in the midst, explain'd The peace rejected, but the truce obtain'd." --Pope.

2. "As a poor miserable captive thrall Comes to the place where he before had sat Among the prime in splendor, now _depos'd, Ejected, emptied, gaz'd, unpitied, shunn'd_, A spectacle of ruin or of scorn." --Milton, P. R., B. i, l. 411.

3. "Though from our birth the faculty divine Is chain'd and tortured--cabin'd, cribb'd, confined." --Byron, Pilg., C. iv, St. 127.

XXXII. In turning participles to adjectives, they sometimes ascribe actions, or active properties, to things to which they do not literally belong; as,

"The green leaf quivering in the gale, The warbling hill, the lowing vale." --MALLET: Union Poems, p. 26.

XXXIII. They employ several ADVERBS that are not used in prose, or are used but seldom; as, oft, haply, inly, blithely, cheerily, deftly, felly, rifely, starkly.

XXXIV. They give to adverbs a peculiar location in respect to other words; as,

1. "Peeping from forth their alleys green." --Collins.

2. "Erect the standard there of ancient Night" --Milton.

3. "The silence often of pure innocence Persuades, when speaking fails." --Shakspeare.

4. "Where Universal Love not smiles around." --Thomson.

5. "Robs me of that which not enriches him." --Shakspeare.

XXXV. They sometimes omit the introductory adverb there: as,

"Was nought around but images of rest." --Thomson.

XXXVI. They briefly compare actions by a kind of compound adverbs, ending in like; as,

"Who bid the stork, Columbus-like, explore Heavens not his own, and worlds unknown before?" --Pope.

XXXVII. They employ the CONJUNCTIONS, or--or, and nor--nor, as correspondents; as,

1. "Or by the lazy Scheldt or wandering Po." --Goldsmith.

2. "Wealth heap'd on wealth, nor truth, nor safety buys." --Johnson.

3. "Who by repentance is not satisfied, Is nor of heaven, nor earth; for these are pleas'd." --Shakspeare.

4. "Toss it, or to the fowls, or to the flames." --Young, N. T., p. 157.

5. "Nor shall the pow'rs of hell, nor wastes of time, Or vanquish, or destroy." --Gibbon's Elegy on Davies.

XXXVIII. They oftener place PREPOSITIONS and their adjuncts, before the words on which they depend, than do prose writers; as,

"Against your fame with fondness hate combines; The rival batters, and the lover mines." --Dr. Johnson.

XXXIX. They sometimes place a long or dissyllabic preposition after its object; as,

1. "When beauty, Eden's bowers within, First stretched the arm to deeds of sin, When passion burn'd and prudence slept, The pitying angels bent and wept." --James Hogg.

2. "The Muses fair, these peaceful shades among, With skillful fingers sweep the trembling strings." --Lloyd.

3. "Where Echo walks steep hills among, List'ning to the shepherd's song." --J. Warton, U. Poems, p. 33.

XL. They have occasionally employed certain prepositions for which, perhaps, it would not be easy to cite prosaic authority; as, adown, aloft, aloof, anear, aneath, askant, aslant, aslope, atween, atwixt, besouth, traverse, thorough, sans. (See Obs. 10th, and others, at p. 441.)

XLI. They oftener employ INTERJECTIONS than do prose writers; as,

"O let me gaze!--Of gazing there's no end. O let me think!--Thought too is wilder'd here." --Young.

XLII. They oftener employ ANTIQUATED WORDS and modes of expression; as,

1. "Withouten that, would come an heavier bale." --Thomson.

2. "He was, to weet, a little roguish page, Save sleep and play, who minded nought at all." --Id.

3. "Not one eftsoons in view was to be found." --Id.

4. "To number up the thousands dwelling here, An useless were, and eke an endless task." --Id.

5. "Of clerks good plenty here you mote espy." --Id.

6. "But these I passen by with nameless numbers moe." --Id.

THE END OF APPENDIX FOURTH

INDEX TO THE GRAMMAR OF ENGLISH GRAMMARS.

[Asterism] In the following Index, the page of the Grammar is directly referred to: Obs. or N. before a numeral, stands for Observation or Observations, or for Note or Notes of the text: R. after a reference, stands for RULE. The small letter n., with an asterisk or other mark affixed to it, relates to a footnote with such mark in the Grammar. Occasionally, t., m., or b., or u., or l., accompanies a reference, to indicate the top, middle, or bottom, or the upper or the lower half, of the page referred to. Few abbreviations are employed beyond those of the ordinary grammatical terms. The Index is not intended to supersede the use of the Table of Contents, which stands after the Preface. It is occupied wholly with the matter of the Grammar proper; hence there are in it no references to the Introduction Historical and Critical, which precedes the didactic portion of the work. In the Table before-mentioned must be sought the general division of English grammar, and matters pertaining to praxis, to examination, and to the writing of exercises.

A.

A, lett., names itself --its plur. --sounds properly its own --numb. of sounds pertaining to, orthoëpists differ concerning --diphthongs beginning with, --triphth. do. --its true sound to be carefully preserved at end of words, A, as prep, or prefix --before part, in ing. A and an, in Gr. derivatives. A or an, art., see An, A

Abbreviations, frequent in writt. lang. --rule of punct. for. C, M, D, &c., as numerals, see Letters. Needless abbreviations, to be avoided

Able, ible, class of adjectives in, numerous in Eng.; difficulty with resp. to the prop. form and signif. of; to what able most properly belongs --application of able to nouns, its propriety doubtf. --Able or ible, prop. application of, how far determined from Lat. etymol. --Able and ible, words of the same meaning in, how formed from different roots,

About, with infin., as substitute for Lat. fut. part, in rus --About, with of preced., ("OF ABOUT one hundred feet") --About, derivat. of, from Sax.

Abrupt transitions in the Bible

Absolute, when, and in what case, a noun or a pron. is put --Absol., case, defect of the common rule for --in how many ways the nom. case is put --nom. case put, with part., to what often equivalent; what part. frequently understood after nouns put --case, its existence denied by what authors --words put, punct. of,

Abstract numbers, synt. of the phraseology used in speaking of, ("Twice two IS four," or "Twice two ARE four")

Absurd or incompatible expressions, to be avoided

Absurdities of expression, Crit. N. concerning

Acatalectic, when a line is said to be

Accent and quantity, critical observations on

Accent, difficulty with respect to the import of the word --various definitions of, cited --Accent, confounded by some with emphasis --defined, as commonly understood --chief or primary and secondary --Accent, by what regulated --compared with emphasis --as affected by do. --is distinct from quantity --as understood by DR. JOH. --SHERID. teachings concerning; mostly adopted by MURR. --what lett. of a word receives the mark of --stress on a monosyl. more properly emphasis than --Accents, more than one on a word --DR. ADAM'S view of

Accentuation, modern, of Gr. and Lat. words, by what regulated; SANCTIUS'S rule for, new vers. of

According to, as to, resolved. Accordingly, whether may be said for the questionable according

Accusative before infin., in Lat. and Gr., of what reckoned the subject --whether the construc. can in general be imitated in Eng. --who adopt the Lat. doctrine of --what our nearest approach to the Lat. construc. of

Active, in reference to verbs, in what sense may be used

Active-transitive verb, defined --Act.-trans. verbs gov. obj. case --place of agent and object in respect to --Act.-trans. verb, or part., has some noun or pron. for its object --with two words in appos. ("Proclaim THEE KING,") --with do., neither in appos. nor connected by conjunc., ("I paid HIM the MONEY,") --with redund. me, thee, you --should not be used without an object --should not assume a governm. incompatible with its signif.

Active-intransitive verb, defined --Act.-intrans. verb, with prep. and its object, put in the pass. form --in pass. form with neut. signif. ("I AM COME,") --should not be used transitively

Addison, undeservedly criticised by BLAIR, for his frequent use of that, as a relative

Addition, enumeration, of numbers, by what number of the verb to be expressed

Address, ordinary fashion of, in Eng., the plur. numb. --has introduced the anomal. compound yourself --Address, direct, nom. absol. by --terms of, your Majesty, your Highness, &c., in what construc. used --general usage of, in Fr.; in Span., Portug., or Germ.

ADJECTIVES, Etymol. of --Classes of, named and defined --Modifications of --Comparison of, reg.; by adverbs; irreg. --Adjectives in able and ible, (see Able, Ible.) --Adjectives, number of, in Eng. --how have been otherwise called --how distinguished from nouns --other parts of speech may become --MURR., on nouns assuming the nature of --whether nouns plur. can assume the character of --Adjectives that cannot be compared --that are compared by means of adverbs --(See Comparison, Comparative Deg., and Superlative Deg.) --Adjectives requiring the article the --denoting place or situation, comparison of --become adverbs --use of, for adv., improper --with prep., ellipt., equivalent to adv. --poet., for nouns --do., for adverbs --Adjectives, Synt. of --do., in what consists --to what relate --substituted ellipt. for their abstr. nouns --relate to nouns or pronouns understood --used with def. art., ellipt., as nouns --two or more before a noun, order of --two, joined by hyphens --denoting unity or plurality, how agree with their nouns --connected, position of --differing in numb., connected without repetition of noun ("ONE _or more letters_,") --much, little, &c., preceded by too, how, &c., taken substantively --Adjectives, punct. of --derivation of, from nouns, from adjectives, &c. --poet. peculiarities in respect to --Adjective, taken abstractly with infin. or part. --following a finite verb, without a noun --do. an infin. or a part. --position of, in Eng. --when may either precede or follow its noun --Whether adj. or adv. is required, how determined --Adjective, one superadded to an other, without conjunc., position of --when the figure of, affects the sense, what to be done --should not be represented by a pronoun --ellipsis of, shown

Adjectives, common, probable numb. of, in Eng. --enumeration of, according to their endings

Adjectives, compound, analogies of their formation, traced --nouns derived from, generally disapproved

Adjectives, numeral, kinds of, named --Cardinal numb. and its corresponding numeral, what denote --Construction and figure of the numerals

Adjectives, participial, what words to be referred to the class of --cannot be construed to govern obj. case

Adjectives, pronominal, list of --which, sometimes used adverbially --which, sometimes used partitively, appar. as nouns --without nouns expressed, how parsed --distribution of, by CHURCH See Other, &c.

Adjectives, proper, peculiarities of, considered --rule for initial capital in

Adjuncts of nominative in the agreement of a verb

Admitting, allowing, &c., appar. independent, to what may relate

ADVERBS, Etymol. of --Adverb, defined --Adverbs, serve to abbreviate expression --other classes of words sometimes take the nature of --appar. take the nat. of other parts of speech --how distinguished from adjectives --Classes of, named and defined --proper classification of, by what indicated --of time, place, and manner, with what connected; of degree, do. --conjunctive (see Conjunctive Adverb:) --Modifications of --number of, in Eng. --Whether adverb or adjective required, how determined --Adverbs, Synt. of --in what do. consists --to what relate --Adverb before a prep. ("CONSIDERABLY beyond,") --Adverbs, whether sometimes qualify nouns --of participles which become nouns, how managed --above, then, &c., as relating directly to a noun, how parsed --Adverbs, of degree, to what adjectives not applicable --direct use of, for pronouns, inelegant --position of --needless use of, for adjectives --hither, &c., for here, &c., with verb of motion --hence, &c., with from prefixed --when, &c., not to follow is in a definition ("Concord is WHEN," &c.,) --ever and never, to be carefully distinguished --in ly, when preferable to other forms --Adverb, appar. made object of a prep. ("At ONCE,") --emphatic, with verb of self-motion suppressed ("I'll HENCE,") --Adverb HOW, misuse of ("He said HOW," &c.,) --NO, not to be used in reference to a verb or a part. --Adverbial form or character, words of, how parsed --Adverbs, punct. of --Adverb, ellips. of, shown --Adverbs, derivation of, --many common Eng., of Anglo-Sax. origin --poet. peculiarities in the use of --peculiar use of those of two syllables in ly, by MILT. and his contemporaries --Adverbial phrase, a needless and improper designation in analysis

Affectation of fine writing, PREC. against

Ago and since, difference between

AGREEMENT, of words, defined --with what synonymous --Agreement, how many of the parts of speech in Eng., incapable of; none necessary between words unrelated --as differing from relation --of words in the same construc., not easy to determine --rules of, as applied to articles, impertinent --Agreements, syntactical, in Eng., specified --Agreement, general principles of --figurative, of pronouns with antecedents

Ah, sometimes departs from usage

Alexandrine verse, description of

Alias, for the equivocal or, use of, in judicial proceedings

All, when may be reckoned a noun

Allegory, defined --Allegory includes most parables of Script., and some fables

Alphabet, Eng., names and plur. numb. of the letters --Hebrew, names and characters of, given, --Greek, do. --Latin, names of the letters of, scarcely known even to the learned; account of its letters --A perfect alphabet in Eng., what it would effect --Letters of the alphabet, when and how used in the sciences

Alphabetic writing, its advantage over the syllabic

Ambiguous, construc., with respect to the class of a word --do., with resp. to the case of a word --expressions, PREC. against

Amen, use and import of

Among and amongst, amid and amidst, different in sense and construc. from between and betwixt --incompatible with the distributive one an other --derivation of, from Sax.

Amphibrach, defined

Amphimac, amphimacer, or Cretic, defined.

An, conjunc., obsolete for if ("Nay, AN thou 'lt mouthe," &c., SHAK.,) --derivation of, from Sax.

An, a, art., one and the same --preferable form before a particular sound --A or an before genus --how commonly limits the sense --belongs to sing. numb. only --with adjective of numb. --its effect upon proper and common nouns --is without agreem. --Whether an is from a or a from an --An, a, origin of --of proportion --with numerals --by what definitives superseded --implies unity; sometimes precedes collective noun conveying the idea of plurality --present usage of, how differs from that of ancient writers --use of, before humble, and its compounds and derivatives --erroneous use of, as relating to a plural --not to be used for the, to denote emphat. a whole kind

Analysis, "to analyze a sentence," what --Analysis of sentences shown in five different methods; which method BROWN calls "the best and most thorough" --Analysis, notices of the different methods of --importance of, in teaching grammar; the truest method of, parsing

Anapest, defined

Anapestic verse, treated --what syll. of, has stress; first foot of, how may be varied --what variation of, produces composite verse --whether a surplus syll. in, may compensate for a deficient one --what number of syllables in the longest measure of --Anapestic verse shown in its four measures --Anapestic, measures, why few --poetry, pieces in general short --(instance of a long piece, L. HUNT'S "Feast of the Poets,")

And, discriminated from or --when preferable to with, or, or nor --whether emphatic of word or phrase following it ("Part pays, AND justly;" &c., POPE,) --derivation of, from Sax.

Anglo-Saxon dialect, and accessions thereto, as forming the modern Eng. lang.

An other, see Other

Antecedent, proper sense of the term --sometimes placed after its pronoun --sometimes doubly restricted --of pron., applied figuratively --sing., with the adj. many, and a plur. pron. --suppressed --Antecedents of different persons, numbers, and genders, disjunctively connected, how represented --joint, agreem. of pron. in ellipt. construct. of

Antibacchy, or hypobacchy, defined

Antiquated words and modes of expression, more frequent in poetry than in prose

Antithesis, defined

Aorist, or indefinite, may be applied to imperf. tense pot. and subjunc.

Aphæresis, defined

Apocope, defined

Apophasis, or paralipsis, explained

Apostrophe, mark, what denotes; for what sometimes used --at what period introduced into the poss. case Apostrophe, figure, defined

Apposition, Synt. --agreement between words in --Apposition, what, and from whom received this name --different from same cases put after verbs and participles not trans.; false teachings of MURR. et al. hereon --the rule for, to which apposed term applied; whether words in, should be parsed separately --common rule and definition of, wherein faulty --which word of, the explanatory term; when explan. word placed first --in what case of, either word may be taken as the explan. term, --why two possessive words cannot be in --two or more nouns in, where sign of possession put --whether compat. with, to supply relative and verb between the apposed words --Apposition, appar., of noun without poss. sign, with pron. possess. ("YOUR success as an INSTRUCTER,") --noun or pron. emphat. repeated ("Cisterns, broken CISTERNS," &c.,) --appar., of a noun to a sentence --of words differing in numb. ("Go YE every MAN,") --of proper nouns with appellatives ("The river THAMES,") --act. verb followed by two words in --whether requires any other agreem. than that of cases --words in, punct. of --of a common with a prop. name, use of capital lett.

Archaism, what

Aristotle, division of the Greek letters --what neoterics wiser than; how considers the compounding or non-compounding of terms

Arithmetical numbers, relation of the terms in

ARRANGEMENT of words, term defined --Arrang. of words, of what importance in synt.; whether it affects the method of parsing words

ARTICLES, Etymol. of --Article, defined --Article, common noun without; Eng. nouns without, taken indefinitely partitive --words of mere being, used without --Articles, how often inserted --needless, to be omitted --Classes of, named and defined --Modificat. (an short, to a, the only,) --Articles, the frequent use of; freq. misapplication of --to be distinguished from adjectives, and from each other --appar. used for adverbs --Article, Eng., its demonstrative character --do., compared with the Gr. def. art.; no rule for agreement of, appropriate in Eng. --use of, before names of rivers --Articles, Synt. of --to what RELATE --Article, with the poss. and its governing noun, only one, used --one noun admits of one, only; before an adj., relates to a noun understood --why not repeated, as in Fr., before every noun of a series; why the omission of, cannot constitute a proper ellips. --position of, with respect to its noun; ditto, with respect to an adj. and noun --relative position of, and adj., not a matter of indifference --excluded by certain pronom. adjectives; what ones precede it; its position in respect to an adj. of quality, limited by too, so, as, or how --position of, when an adj. is preceded by another adv. than _too, so, as_, or how --do., when an adj. follows its noun --whether the insertion or the omission of, can greatly affect the import of a sentence --Article, repetition of, with nouns connected --do. with adjectives connected, and, oppos. --added to each of two or more nouns sing., or a plural put ("THE nominative and THE objective CASE," or "THE _nominative and objective_ CASES,") --use of, in special correspondence of phrases --do., in correspondence peculiar --do., in a series of terms --erroneous use of, before the species, for THE; do., when the species is said to be of the genus ("A JAY is a sort of A BIRD,") --not used before names of the virtues, vices, &c., before limited terms, and before nouns of definite signif. --do. before titles or names mentioned merely as such --do. before a part. not taken as a noun --insertion or omission of, with respect to a comparison or an alternation made with two nouns --required in the construc. which converts a part. into a verbal noun --Articles, what the false synt. of, includes --Ellips. of article, shown --Articles, derivation of --frequently omitted by the poets See also Definite Article, and _An, A_

Articulate or elementary sound, nature of

Articulation, as defined by COMST.; do. by BOLLES --Articulation, how differs from pronunciation --the principles of, what they constitute --a good one, what, in the view of COMST.; do., in what consists, according to SHERID.; do. importance of; do., how delivers words

As, as subject or object of a verb, its CLASS --with a clause or sentence as anteced., do. As, as relative, WEBST. absurd explanation of; CHAND. do.; BULL. denial --to what construc. limited --peculiarities with respect to position --declined --derivation of, from Teuton., DR. JOH. --As follow, as follows, &c., construction of; MURR., himself perplexed by TOOKE and CAMPB., delivers dubious instructions concerning --Opinion of NIX. and CROMB. concerning. As, as a conjunc., uniting words in appos. --between adj. or part. and its noun ("Actions AS such") --with ellips. of latter term of comparison ("For such AS HE") --As and than, character and import of --words connected by, generally put in the same case --_As --as; as --so; so_ (preceded by a negative,) --_as; so --as_ (with an infin. following;) correspondents

Asking and exclaiming, simple and appropriate names for the marks of, desirable

Aspirates, see Semivowels

Asterisk, use of. Asterism, do.

Ate, particular words ending in, peculiarities of

Auxiliary, defined --Auxiliary, form of a verb, when preferable to the simp. --verbs, are mostly defective --do., are needful in the conjug. of English verbs --do., inflection of, shown --Auxiliaries used as expletives --Auxiliary, poet. placed after verb

Averse, aversion, whether to be construed with from or to

Avoiding, verbs of, with part. in stead of infin.

Awkwardness, literary, Crit. N. censuring

Ay, I, assentive adv. --Ay, sometimes improp. written for ah

B.

B, its name and plur. number --its sound --in what situations silent

Bacchy, described

BE, how varied --CONJUGATED, affirmat. --Use of the form be for the pres. indic. --Be, ellips. of the infin. often needlessly supposed by ALLEN _et al._ --whether it should be inserted after the verb make --Is, contracted, giving its nom. the same form as that of the poss. case ("A WIT'S a feather," &c., POPE)

Become, &c., whether they demand the auxiliary am or have

Besides, prep., in what cases proper to be used after else or other, in lieu of than

Between, cannot refer to more than two things --Between or betwixt, how differs in use from among or amongst --Between, betwixt, derivation of, from Sax.

Bible, the Holy, application of the name --what is shown by Italics in the text of --quotations in, how indicated --abrupt transitions in --its general accuracy of lang. --in the lang. of, ye and you, in what constructions not found

Bid, as commanding, or as promising, its construction with the infin.

Blair, Dr., unjustly censures Addison's frequent use of that, as a relative

Blank verse, as distinguished from rhyme

Blunders, as readily copied, as originated, by makers of school-books --literary, Crit. N. concerning

Bombast, as opposed to purity, PREC. against Books, mentioned by name, rule for capitals

Both, as conjunc., corresponding to and --as adj. --derivation of, acc. to DR. MURR.

Brace, its purpose

Breve, or stenotone, for what used

Brevity of expression, sought in the ordinary business of life

Brokenness, or hitching, as a fault of style, PREC. censuring

But, save, as well as, construc. of two nouns connected by --But, how has acquired the signif. of only --in ambiguous construc. ("There cannot be BUT one," &c., KAMES) --as used for that, contrary to its import --derivation of, from Sax. --But and save, whether they ever govern the obj. case as prepositions --Cannot but, construc. and signif. of --Not but, to what equivalent, and the class of but

C.

C, name and plur. numb. of --sounds of --where silent --with cedilla placed under (ç) --written for a number --Ch, sounds of --Arch, sound of, before a vowel, and before a conson. --Ck, final, for double c

Cadence, explained --faulty, precept against, by RIPP. --MURR. direction concerning

Cadmus, carried the Phoenician alphabet into Greece

Cæsura, signif. and application of --Cæsural or divisional pause; demi-cæsuras, or minor rests; (see Pauses)

Can, verb, varied --derivation and signif. of --Can not and cannot, with what distinction used --Cannot, with a verb of avoiding, or with BUT --Can, could, would, as principal verbs, by poet. use

Capital letters, capitals, for what used; how marked for the printer, in manuscript --what things are exhibited wholly in, --Rules for the use of, --use of, in comp. prop, names, --needless, --lavish use of, its effect, --discrepancies with respect to, abound in books.

Cardinal numeral, distinguished from its corresponding ordinal, --should follow the ordinal, in a specification of a part of a series, ("The first TWO,").

Caret, in what used, and for what purpose.

Cases, in grammar, what, --named and defined, --nom. and obj., alike in form, how distinguished, --on what founded, and to what parts of speech belong. --(See Nominative Case, &c.) --Cases, whether infinitives, participles, &c., can take the nature of, --what is the proper number of, to be assigned to Eng. nouns, --what authorities for the true doctrine of three, --discordant doctrine of sundry grammarians concerning the numb, of, --WEBST. and MURR. opposite instructions concerning do. --Cases, whether personal pronouns have two, only, --rules for the construc. of, --whether a noun may be in two, at once, --whether Eng. verbs govern two, --whether in Eng., as in Lat., when a verb governs two, the pass. retains the latter case. --Cases, same, (see Same Cases.) --Cases, what kinds of words take different, after them. --Case of noun or pron. after part. governed by prep., whether undetermined; err. of SANB. and BULL. hereon expos.; GREE. false teaching, do., --doubtful, after participles, in what kind of examples found; canon concerning do.

Case, technical term with printers, ("Letters of the lower case.")

Catachresis, how commonly explained, and what sort of fig.

Catalectic, when a measure is said to be.

Cedilla, from whom borrowed, and how applied.

Change, of numb. in the second pers., ineleg., --of the connective of two nominatives appar. requiring a plur. verb, canon concerning. --Changing the scene, or deserting the principal subj., in a sent., PREC. against.

Chaucer's imperfect measures, DRYDEN'S remarks on.

Cherokee alphabet, some account of.

Cherubim and seraphim, Heb. plurals, sometimes mistaken for singulars.

Chief terms, or principal parts, of a verb, necessary to be first ascertained. --Chief words may be distinguished by capitals.

Circumflex, inflection, (see Inflection,) --mark, use of.

Classes under the parts of speech, what meant by.

Classification of words, explanations to assist beginners in making, --DR. WILSON'S observations on.

Clause, see Member.

Climax, defined.

Cognomination, relation of the article, in instances of, ("Alexander the Great").

Collective noun, defined. --Collective nouns, forms of, sing. and plur.; how understood, --gend. of, how determined, --by what relative represented. --Collec. noun, represented by plur. pron., --in what two ways may be taken, and with what accord of pron.; the plur. construc. of, under what fig. of synt. ranked by the old grammarians, --whether with a sing. definitive, admits a plur. verb or pronoun. --Collec. nouns generally admit of plur. form. --Collect. noun, represented by sing. pron. neut., --uniformity of numb. to be preserved in words constructed with, --agreem. of verb with, --how determined whether it conveys the idea of plurality or not, --strictures on the rules of ADAM, LOWTH, et. al., concerning, --NIX. notion of the construc. of verb and. --Coll. nouns, partitive of plur., construc. of, --as expressing collections of persons, or coll. of things, which most often taken plurally, --when not plur. in form, whether it admits of plur. adj. before it.

Colon, from what takes its name, --for what used, --in what year adopted in England, --its utility maintained against some objectors, --Rules for the use of, --used by some between numb. of chap. and that of verse, in quotations from the Bible.

Comma, from what takes its name, --what denotes, --less common in Germ. than in Eng., --its ancient form, --Rules for the use of, --use of, in a series of words.

Commanding, desiring, expecting, &c., verbs of, to what actions or events, refer.

Commandments, the ten, how expressed as to forms of verb, --by what points divided in books, --example of, versified in iamb. hexameter, by DR. WATTS.

Common gender, unnecessary and improper term in Eng. gram.

Common noun, defined, --when admits of no art., --with def. art. sometimes becomes proper, --by personif. often do. --Common nouns include the classes, collective, abstract, and verbal. --Common nouns, their nature and numerical distribution, as distinguished from proper.

Comparative degree, defined. --Compar. degree, why BROWN presents a new definit. of, in place of his former one, --true nature of --whether always required in a comparison of two objects --with what construc. proper in exclusive comparisons, canon of BROWN --Comparatives, certain, not construed with the conjunc. than --double, how to be considered and treated --Comparative terminations, to what adjectives not to be applied --Compar. degree in Gr. and in Lat., construc. of --poet. connected to the positive

Comparison, defined --Comparison, degrees of, named and defined --what adjectives admit not of --CHURCH. on the different, (and BROWN on CHURCH.) --character of BROWN'S definitions of; do. of those of MURR. et al., exhibited --MURR. definitions of, criticised --relative nature of --Comparison, regular --to what adjectives applicable --when preferable to the comparison by adverbs --Comparison, HARR. on the degrees of; the positive a degree --(in oppos. to HARR. et al.) --Comparison of equality, what; sometimes involves solec., ("Nothing SO uncertain AS,") --Comparison of equality and of ineq., canon on --Comparison, adaptation of the terms of, to the deg. to be expressed --belongs chiefly to comm. adjectives --Comparis., irregular --Comparis., whether to be mentioned in parsing adverbs --inclusive, and exclusive --Comparisons, extra, their impropriety --Crit. N. on, See also Comparative Degree, and Superlative Degree.

Comparison or contrast of things, the resemblance or opposition how rendered more striking

Complex prepositions, how may be formed

Composite orders of verse, what uniformity of construc. they require --Composite verse --description of; why requires rhythm --kinds of, unlimited; which preferable --liable to doubtful scansion

Composition, the frequent practice of, necessary, in order to acquire a good style, Composition of language, two kinds of

Compound or progressive form of verb, how made --exemplified in the verb READ, conjugated, what verbs do not admit of; what it implies --verbs of, having a pass. signif.

Compound word, defined, Compounds, permanent, consolidated; temporary, formed by hyphen --Comp. words, not to be needlessly broken --two or more, not to be split --when to be written with hyphen; when without it --Compounding of words, unsettled usage respecting; manner of, in Lat. and Gr.; arbitrary practice of, in Eng., its effect --does not necessarily preclude their separate use --propriety of, sometimes difficult to decide --Compounds, orthog. of --Compounding the words of a reg. phrase, its impropriety --Compound adjectives, see Adjectives, Compound.

Concord, (see Agreement.) --Concords and governments, examples of false ones from the grammarians --in Lat., diversely enumerated by the Lat. grammarians

_Concrete _terms for abstract qualities, poet. use of

Confusion of senses, in use of pron., to be avoided

Conjugation of a verb, defined --what some teachers choose to understand by --Conjugating a verb, four ways of, named --Conjugation of an Eng. verb, what the simplest form of --Conjug. of verbs, shown in five Examples --(See also Compound or Progressive, &c.) --Conjugat. negative, how made, interrogative, do. --interrog. and negative, do.

CONJUNCTIONS, Etymol. of --Conjunction, defined --Conjunctions, how differ from other connectives --nature and office of; R. F. MOTT quot. --nature of the connexions made by --how many in common use --how parsed --as "connecting the same moods, &c.," strictures on the doctrine of MURR. et al., concerning --Conjunctions, classes of, named and defined --(See Copulative Conjunction, Disjunc. Conj., and _Corresp. Conjunc.) --Conjunctions_, List of --appar. used as adverbs --peculiar phrases having the force of --importance of, as copulative or as disjunctive, to be carefully observed --Conjunctions, Synt. of --do., in what consists, (MURR. et al. teaching erron.) --what connect --declinable words connected by, why in the same case --power and position of those that connect sentences or clauses --absurd and contradictory notions concerning the office of, by LENN., BULL., et al. --two or three coming together, how parsed --Conjunction, followed by a phrase, and not a whole member --connecting two terms to one --do. two terms the same in kind or quality --Conjunctions, to be used with due regard to import and idiom --punct. of --ellips. of, shown --derivation of --are mostly of Anglo-Sax. origin --H. TOOKE'S derivations of, given --poet. usage of _or --or_, and _nor --nor_

Conjunctive adverbs, what office perform; what classes of words embrace --often relate equally to two verbs in different clauses --list of --whence, whither, &c., sometimes partake of the nature of pronouns Connected terms, two, limited by a third, what both must be --should be the same in kind or quality. Connected adjectives, how should be placed. Connective words, or connectives, kinds of, named --do., how may be distinguished

Consonants, divisions and subdivisions of --properties of, as sharp, flat, labial, &c.

Construing, whether differs from parsing

Continuance of action, see Compound or Progressive

Contractions, in the orthog. and the pronunciation of words --ocular, in printing poetry, not important

Correlatives, combinations of, ("Father's son,") how to be regarded

Corresponding, or corresponsive conjunctions, in what manner used --named and exemplified in their several pairs --nature of the terms standing in the relat. of --the former of two, how parsed --CHURCH. canon on the use of --Or --or, and nor --nor, by poet. usage Crotchets, or brackets, how used --confused and inaccurate teaching of WEBST. et al., concerning

Cum with an ablative, Lat., ("Dux CUM aliquibus," &c.,) the construc. imitated in Eng. --canon on do.

Curves, or marks of parenthesis --have been in use for centuries --the use of, not to be discarded --confused teaching of WEBST. et al., respecting do. --what used to distinguish --clause enclosed by, how to be uttered; pause of do. --Rules for the application of

Customary actions require to be expressed by indic. pres.

D.

D, name and plur. numb. --sounds of --written for a number

Dactyl, defined

Dactylic verse --stress, on what syll. laid; what rhyme it generally forms --is not very common; seldom pure and regular --shown in its eight measures --has been but little noticed by prosodists and grammarians --misconceived and misrepresented Rev. D. BLAIR

Dare, construc. with infin. foll. --Use of the form DARE for the third pers. sing.

Dash, the mark, explanation of --LOWTH et al. make no mention of --Rules for the application of --Dash, needless, how to be treated --between quotation and name of the author --applied to side-title --used to signify omission

Dates, ordinarily abbreviated; how best written --objectives in, without their prepositions

Dative case, faulty relic, in Eng., of old Sax., ("It ascends ME into," &c., SHAK.)

Days of the week, names of, to be reckoned prop. names, and written with capital

Deaf and dumb --The deaf and dumb, to whom the letters represent no sounds, learn to read and write; what inferred herefrom

Defective verb, what verb so called --which tenses of, wanting --Defective verbs, whether they should be reckoned a distinct class --may, can, must, and shall, not to be referred to the class of --will, beware, &c., construc. and import of explained --Defec. verbs, List of

Definite article, defined --Definite art., its demonstrative character --used before names of rivers --do. by way of eminence --no rule of agreem. for, in Eng. --prefixed as an adv., to comparatives and superlatives --repeated before every term in a series of adjectives used ellipt. as nouns --used for a poss. pron., ("Full in THE face") --position with respect to its noun --required before antecedent to a restricted relative. See also The

Definition, defined --A perfect definition, what --Definitions, needful qualities of certain, in gram. --bad, peculiar vice of --Crit. N. on

Definitives, what, in Eng., and how to be classed --example to show what is meant by --Definitive word required before antecedent to restricted relative

Degrees of comparison, see Comparison

Deity, names of, use of capitals in --in all languages, masc.; direct names of, do.. The sing. numb, universally employed in reference to the Supreme Being

Demonstratives, from the class, pronominal adjectives

Derivation, as a topic of gram., what explains --importance of --a knowledge of what languages will throw light on the subject of Eng.

Desiring, verbs of; see Commanding

Desisting, verbs of; with part., in stead of infin.

Despauter, (Despauterius Joannes,) grammarian, when died --his Lat. Gram. --his remark on the origin of using plur. pron. of second pers. for sing. --gives the rule that the verb governs the nominative before it

Diæresis, or dialysis, mark, place and use of --explained

Diesis, or double dagger, for what purpose used. Dimeter, line, iambic, examples of --trochaic, do. --anapæstic, do. --dactylic, do.

Diphthong, defined --Diphthongs, distinction of --enumeration and specification of the Eng.

Discourse, or narration, its nature and requirements

Disjunctive conjunction, defined --Disjunctives, List of --Disjunctive OR, see Or

Distance, see Time, &c.

Distribution, of words into classes, a matter of some difficulty; explanations concerning, for learners --of verbs in Lat., grammarians have disputed respecting

Distributives, of the class pronominal adjectives --Distributive term sing. in apposit. with a plur.

Division, literary, see Literary Division

Do, verb, how varied: --particular uses of --in what manner may be substituted for an other term

Double comparatives and double superlatives, how may be regarded; canon; (LATH. and CHILD)

Double negatives, see Negation, and Negatives

Doubling of the final consonant before additional syll.; not doubling, before do. --Double letter retained --Doubling, certain letters incline to; others, do not

Doubtful case after a part., in what kind of examples found; the construc. to be avoided

Drink, verb, grammarians greatly at variance respecting the pret. and the perf. part. of

Dual number, found in Gr. and in Arab., what denotes

Duplication, see Doubling

Du Vivier, G., his Grammaire des Grammaires, and his Traité des Participes, a copious treatment of the Fr. participle

E.

E, (as A, O, I, and U,) self-naming: --how spoken and written --its plur. --sounds properly its own --final, mute, and to what belongs; exceptions --effect on preced. vowel, of e mute after a sing. conson., or after st, or th --diphthongs beginning with --triphthongs do.

Each, pronom. adj., always of the third pers. sing.; its agreements. Each other, see Other

Ecphoneme, or note of exclamation --occasional introduction into the classics --diversely called by MURR. et al. --for what used, and of what a sign --Rules for the application of

Ecphonesis, defined

Either and neither, pronom. adjectives, relate to two only --M. HARR. on the illegit. use of --their numb. and pers.; what agreements they require, when they are the leading words in their clauses --derivation of, from the Sax.

_Either --or, neither --nor_, corresponsives: --transposed, with repeated disjunction or negat.

Elegiac stanza, description of

Elementary sound, or elements of speech, defined. See Sounds

Ellipsis, figure defined --either not defined by grammarians in general, or absurdly defined --frequent in comp. sentences --to be supplied in parsing --supposed, may change the construc. without affecting the sense --the principle of, as explaining several questionable but customary expressions, ("Fair and softly GOES far") --MURR. on "THE ellipsis" --Ellipsis supplied, EXAMPLES of --Needless ellipses, the supposition of, to be avoided --Ellipses, faulty, as opposed to perspicuity, PREC. against. Ellipsis, or suppression, mark of, how figured, and what used to denote

Elliptical construction of nouns, ("A horse, a horse," &c., SHAK.)

Elocution, defined

Else, other, &c., with than, in exclusive comparisons --Else or other, sometimes construed with besides --Else, derivation of

Emphasis, defined: --comparative view of accent and --as connected with quantity, MURR. --as affecting accent --what the guide to a right. --Emphatic words, not to be multiplied

Enallage, defined --signif. of the Gr. word --special application of the term --with what other terms synonymous --the most common forms of, in Eng. --examples of, how differ from solecisms --too much latitude was given to the fig. by Despauter, and by others

Enallixis, see Enallage

Ending of a sentence with an adv., a prep., or any inconsid. word or phrase, PREC. concerning

English Grammar, see Grammar

English language, some account of its origin --its character --its simplicity and facility asserted by LOWTH --its chief defect, according to DR. JOH.

Enumeration of numbers, see Addition

Epicene nouns, see Generic Names Epithets, new compound, poets frequently form

Equivalence, the argument of, has often led into errors

Equivocal, or ambiguous construc. of cases, to be avoided --of rel. pron., by misplacement --of prep. with converted part., how amended --of the word but, ("There cannot be BUT one," &c.) --of words, leaving the classification doubtful, Crit. N. concerning --Equiv., or ambig. expressions, as opposed to propriety, PREC. against

Eroteme, its form in Greek --derivation; fitness of the name --diversely called by MURR. et al. --its use --Rules for do. --its value as a sign of pause --retained by a quoted question

Erotesis, explained

Errors, incorrigible, Crit. N. concerning

ETYMOLOGY --Etymol., of what treats --when and how should be taught --figures of, term defined; the principal do., named and defined --Etymology and meaning of words, HARRIS on the usefulness of disquisitions into

Ever, contrac., e'er; so in comp. rel. pronouns --Ever a one, contrac. by the comm. people into e'er a one --Ever and never, opposite to each other in sense, yet freq. confounded and misapplied; canon on the employment of --Ever so, (prop., everso,) signif. of --Ever so wisely, its propriety determined, against the false phraseology never so wisely --Ever, derivation of, from Sax.

Example, as used in teaching, meaning of --Examples, use of capitals in

Exception, noun, and except, verb, whether more properly followed by from or by to

Exclamation, note of, (see Ecphoneme) --Exclamation, nom. absolute by --the case of nouns used in

Exclusive and inclusive terms of a comparison

Exercise, in grammar, what

Expecting, &c., verbs of, see Commanding

Extended compositions, gradation of the parts in

F.

F, its name and plur. numb. --final in monosyllables, to be doubled --formation of the plur. of nouns in, and in ff --its sound

Fable, how may be defined --What the term denotes in the Scriptures

Fall short of, make bold with, &c., how the adjective in such phrases is to be explained in parsing

False identification, (under synt. of SAME CASES,) Note exposing the error of

Falsities in sentences, Crit. N. directed against

Feel, its construc. with the infin.

Few and many, form and construc. of. Fewer, see Little

FIGURES, treated --Figure, in gram., what --Figures, distinctive names of some; frequent occurrence of those of rhetoric --Figure of words, signif. of the term --Figure of words, Rules for --suggestions additional to do. --unsettled and variable usage in that which relates to --Figure of orthog., what; what the principal figures of do. --Figure of etymol., what --Figures of etymol., the principal, named and defined --Figure of synt., what --Figures of synt., the principal, named and defined --Figure of rhet., what --Figures of rhet., why certain are called tropes --on what mostly founded --the principal, named and defined --affect the agreem. of pronouns with their antecedents --Figures, how many BROWN deems it needful to define and illustrate --Figures, definitions of sundry, in the lang. of authors, corrected, KEY. Figures, Arabic, in what cases pointed by some

Final f, l, or s, in spelling; other finals than, in do. --ck or c, use of --ll, to what confined --e of a primitive, when omitted; when retained --y of a prim. word before a terminat., how managed --ise or ize, which termination to be taken --Finals, what letters may assume the position of; what may not, and why

Finite verbs, agreem. of, with subjects, a principle of Univ. Gram. --Rules concerning --Fin. verb understood, punct. of First words, initial capital to --faulty practice of grammarians with respect to

Foot, poetic, see Poetic Feet

Foreign words or idioms, unnecessary use of, in opposition to purity

For, with all, as equivalent to although --For as much as, &c., having the nature of conjunctions --For that --For, with perf. part., ("FOR lost") --with ever --before TO and infin. --as introducing its object before an infin.. For, conj., because, from Sax.; anc. expressed for that

Forever, or for ever, its class

Former and latter, nature and applic. of Forms of letters, in type or character --Forms OF VERBS, a knowledge of THE TRUE, nothing more important in gram. than Forsooth, signif. and use of

Friends, the Society of; their employment, in familiar discourse, of the sing. pron. of the second pers. --generally neglect to compound their numeral names of the months and days --their misemployment of thee for thou --their manner of speaking, different from the solemn style --examples of their manner of forming the verb with the pron. thou; their simplificat. of the verb

From, derivation of, from Sax. --From forth, from out, construc. of, explained --Off from, examp. of the use of

Full, in permanent compounds, how written; in temporary do., do. --compounds in, (spoonful, handful, &c.,) how pluralized

Future, contingency, how best expressed

Future tense, FIRST, how formed, and what expresses --SECOND, do., do., and how varied

Futurity, often denoted by the infin., ("The world TO COME")

G.

G, its name and plur. --its sounds --when silent --Gh, sounds of, and silence

Gardiner, W., his new analysis of the Eng. alphab., noticed

Genders, term defined --Genders, the diff., named and defined --on what founded, and to what belong --Gender, inconsistent views of, as given by many of the grammarians; WELLS and MURR. criticised --confounded with sex by some writers; others otherwise confuse the matter --Common gender, of the old grammarians, the term objectionable with respect to Eng. --Gender, how in many instances determined --figuratively ascribed, how indicated --denoted by he and she prefixed to nouns --denied by MURR. et al. to pronouns of the first and second persons --of pron., the preference of, when joint antecedents are of different genders

General truths and customary actions, to be expressed by the indic. pres.

Generic names, sense and construc. of

"Genitives, double," discovered by our grammarians, the true explanation of all such

Gentile names, nature and construc. of

German language, form of its type --use of the comma less freq. in, than in Eng.

Gerund, Lat., explanation of --what form of an Eng. participle corresponds to --"Gerund in English," how becomes "a substantive," according to DR. ADAM et al., Gerundives, what

Giving, paying, procuring, &c., verbs of, with ellips. of to or for before the objective of the person

GOVERNMENT, of words, defined --to what parts of speech has respect --the rules of, whether to be applied to the governing or the governed words --do., how many in the best Lat. grammars; usual faults in the distribution of these --Governments in Eng. synt. how many --false, examples of, cited from grammarians

Grecism, literal, in Eng., ("Before Abraham was, I AM") comp.

GRAMMAR, defined --An English Grammar, what professes to be --ENGLISH GRAMMAR, what in itself; what knowledge implies --when worthy to be named a science --Grammar, how to be taught, and its principles how made known --the true principles of, in whose possession --a rule of, what --Grammar, how divided; its parts, of what severally treat --what it requires --rightly learned, what ability it confers --what many vain pretenders to, have shown by their works --on questions of, the practice of authors should have more weight than the dogmatism of grammarians. Grammars of different languages, how far must needs differ; strictures on those of PROF. BULL., _A grammar designed for English_, the chief end of. Grammatical doctrine, the truth of, in what consists

Granting, supposing, &c., see Admitting

Grave accent, as opposed to acute --as preserving the vocality of e

Greek alphabet, characters of, shown and named

Guillemets, or quotation points, what words they distinguish --how applied to a quotation within a quotation --not used in our common Bibles; the defect in what measure relieved

H.

H, its name and plur. numb. --its sound --in what words silent --in what positions do. --an used formerly before all words beginning with

Hand, or index, use of

Handwriting, script letters in

Harmonical pauses, see Pauses

Have, verb, how varied --derivation of; with perf. part., import of the tense --Had, with better, rather, &c., before the infin.

He and she, sometimes used as nouns --as prefixed to nouns to denote gend. --whether to be connected by a hyphen to the nouns to which prefixed

Hear, with objective, and an infin. without to --with infin. alone, perhaps ellipt, ("I HAVE HEARD TELL") --Heard, verb, why irregular --its pronunc.

Hebrew letters, some account of; names, characters, and significations of --whether they are, or are not, all consonants, long a subject of dispute --The

Hebrew names for the months, were prop. nouns --Hebrew, what pointing adopted in

Hence, thence, whence, with from prefixed. "I'll HENCE," see Adverbs

Heptameter line, iambic, examples of --trochaic, do --dactylic, do.

Here, there, where, force of, when compounded with prepositions --with verb of motion, perh. allowable for hither, thither, whither. Hereof, thereof, whereof, placed after nouns, what to be called. Herein, therein, &c., their class and nature

Heroic verse, see Pentameter

Heterogeneous terms, in general, two such not to be connected by a conjunc.

Hexameter line, iambic, examples of --trochaic, do --dactylic, do.

Hissing sounds, concurrence of, in forming the poss. case, how avoided

Hold, noun, after lay, take, &c., whether preferably construed with of, on, or upon

Hoping, &c., verbs of, see Commanding

How, after nouns of manner, its nature --not to be used before that, or in stead of it --derivation of, from Anglo-Sax.

Hyperbaton, explained --its frequency in poetry; how should be used --is diff. from synchysis

Hyperbole, defined --Hyperboles, by what commonly expressed

Hypermeter, meaning of, in scansion

Hyphen, its uses --present use in compound names --Rules for the insertion of, in compounds --signif. of the name --Hyphen, abuse of --CHURCH, on the use of, in comp. words --in the figure of an adj., with a change of the synt. and sense --necessary with a verbal noun and an adjunct --do. with comp. participles, converted

Hypobacchy, or antibacchy, defined

I.

I, lett., self-naming; its plur. --its usual sounds --diphthongs beginning with; triphth. do., I, pron. with cap. lett., I, as written for a number. I, adv., see Ay

Iambic verse, treated --Iamb. verse, stress where laid in; effect of a short syll. added to a line of --shown in its eight measures --is seldom pure through a long succession of lines --some of its diversifications shown. See also Dimeter, Trimeter, &c.

Iambus, or iamb, defined

Idea of unity, and of plurality, how formed

Identity of words, the principle of, considered --Identity, proper, RULE for, ("Same Cases.") Identification, false, N. concerning

Idioms or peculiarities of expression, when to be approved or valued

If, the Biblical use of, to express an emphat. negation --its derivation from Sax.

Ignorance, literary, Crit. N. concerning

Imagery, or Vision, explained

Imperative mood, defined --Imperat. mood, why so called; in what manner applied --its one tense, and the import of do --its inflection shown in the verb LOVE, conjugated --what nominatives only it takes --use of, in the Gr. lang.; do., in Lat., Ital., Fr., and Span --may have all the persons and numbers --poet.

Imperfect tense, defined --Imperf. tense, the form, how far applicable to the Eng. tense so called --in its simple form is the preterit --in the pot. and subj. moods, an aorist --of the indic. and the subj., how distinguished --of the sub., to express a mere supposition, with indef. time

Imperfect participle, or first part., defined --its form --The first part., has been variously called --why rightly termed imperfect participle --for what forms of the Lat. gram., stands --is applicable to time pres., past, or fut.; is not always active, even when derived from an act. verb --may be turned to a multiplicity of uses --appar. put absolute, (_Admitting, --Allowing_, &c.) --distinguished, with respect to governm., from a particip. noun --as equivalent to infin. mood; heads of regular equivalence --how compares with the Lat. gerund --its nature and construc.

Impersonal verbs, so called, their peculiarity of use --called monopersonal by some

Impropriety of language, what embraces

In and into, difference between; nature of the relation expressed by each; derivation of, from Sax.

Inclusive and exclusive terms of a comparison

Incorrigible errors, Crit. N. concerning

Indefinite article, see An, A Indefinite pronouns, of the class pronom. adjectives

Independent, see Absolute

Index, or hand, use of

Indicative mood, defined --Indic. mood, why so called; its nature and use --use of its pres. tense --do. of its form of the pluperf. in lieu of the pot. pluperf. --wherein differs characteristically from the subj.; the two moods continually confounded by writers --Indic. mood, format, and inflec. of its tenses shown in the verb LOVE, conjug. --employed to express a conditional circumstance assumed as a fact

Inelegance of language, see Awkwardness.

Infinitive mood, defined --Infin. mood, so called in oppos. to the other moods --usually distinguished by the prep. to before it --its pres., the ROOT, or radical verb; what time it expresses --archaic form in en --its two tenses shown in the verb LOVE, conjug. --Synt. of --Infin. mood, by what governed; (see To:) --true construc. of, explained by the 18th Rule of the Synt. --why simple of solution in Eng.; whether ever governed by a prep, in Fr., Span., or Ital. --whimsical account of, given by NIX. --how expressed in the Anglo-Sax. of the 11th century --why may not, as some grammarians teach, be | considered a noun --DR. WILS. on the charac. and import of --to what other terms may be connected --what in its nature, and for what things chiefly may stand --taken abstractly, as subject of finite verb --Loose infinitives, improp. in precise language --Infin. mood, position of --misplacement of, to be avoided --distinction of voice in, often disregarded, ("You are to BLAME;") hypercrit. teachings of SANB. and BLAIR hereon --Infin., after bid, dare, &c., without TO --whether used with TO after have, help, and find --Infin., BY WHAT governed, often imposs. to say, according to the instructions of MURR. --Infinitives connected, governed by one preposition --Infinitive, ellipsis of, after to, whether to be approved --sometimes doubtful whether transitive or intransitive --in pause, or in remote dependence, punct. of --poet. placing of --Greek construc. of, in poetic use

Inflections, defined --rising and falling, explained; do., as applied to questions --notation of, in writing and printing --the rising more numerous than the falling; predominance of the rising in oral lang.; the falling, for what used, COMST. --what kind of rules for, have been given by writers --the rising and the falling, to be used with prop. discrimination; what should determine the direction of --Inflection, what constitutes the circumflex

Innovation extravagant, into the system of synt. or gram., a particular instance of, noticed

Inscriptions appear best in full capitals

Instead, what reckoned, and how best written

Intending, &c., verbs of, see Commanding.

Intensive nature of comparatives and superlatives, A. MURR.

Interrogative pronouns, defined --what they severally demand --their use and construc. --in what differ from relatives --are always of the third pers. --declined --their place in a sentence --their construc. of cases, to what similar

Interrogative sentences, agreem. of verbs in

INTERJECTIONS, Etymol. of --Interjection, defined --derivation and signif. of the term; LOWTH'S error in describing the interjections --Interjections, numb. of, in common use --List of --Interjections, the frequent use of, an indication of thoughtlessness; expressiveness of some interjections in earnest utterance, &c. --should be discriminatively used --chief characteristics of; referred to the class of adverbs by the Gr. grammarians --significant words uttered as, ("Out! out!") --appar. taken substantively --Synt. of --absolute construc. of --have no construc. with cases, as in Lat. and Gr. --appar., sometimes connected to other words by a prep., or by that --place of --punct. of --ellips. of, shown --derivation of --frequency of, in poet. lang.

Inversion of terms, sometimes of advantage, in respect to strength and vivacity of expression.

Irony, figure explained

Is being, with a perf. part., or the subject of the UNCO-PASSIVE form of verbs, canvassed

Ise or ize, which of these terminations to be taken in forming derivatives under Deriv. of Verbs

Ish, termination, whether it may be accounted a degree of comparison

It. its chief use --declined --to what creatures may be applied --put for the distance, ("How far do you call IT?" &c., PRIESTL.,) --without definite reference to an anteced. --as explet., and referring to something expressed afterwards; faulty omission of, before verb, in such construc. --had formerly no variation of cases --its poss. form ITS, for of it, of recent origin, and not found in the text of the common Bible --wrongly excluded by some from the list of pers. pronouns: --its derivation from Sax., traced

Italic letters, Italics, some account of --for what purpose used --how denoted in preparing manuscripts

J.

J, its name and plur. numb. --why never doubled --why never ends a word in Eng. --impropriety of dividing on the letter, in syllabication --sounds of,

Johnson, Dr. S., his authority in Eng. orthography

Joint nominatives, agreem. of verb with --whether words connected by with can be used as. _Joint antecedents_, agreem. of pron. with --of different persons, agreem. of verb or pron. with, in ellipt. construc.

Jumbling together of the active voice and the passive, the manner of some --Jumbling, senseless, Crit. N. censuring

K.

K, its name and plur. --in general, not needed in words derived from the learned languages --its sounds --when silent --Two Kays standing together

Kind, sort, with these or those improp. preceding

L.

L, its name and plur. numb. --of the class liquids --final, monosyllables ending in --final double, to what words peculiar --its sound; in what words silent --where doubled --written for a number

Labial letters, how articulated

Language, the primitive sense of the term, what embraced; signif. of do., as now used --in opposition to some grammarians, BROWN confines the term to speech and writing --loose explanations of the word by certain slack thinkers; WEBST. notion of --SHERID. idea of; KIRKH. wild and contradictory teachings concerning --Language, PROPRIETY of, in what consists; IMPROPRIETY of, what embraces --PRECISION of, in what consists; Precepts concerning its opposites --Language, Eng., (see English Language) --Languages, uniform SERIES OF GRAMMARS for teaching the Eng., Lat., and Gr., that of DR. BULL., noticed

Lay, pay, and say, how written in the pret. and the perf. part.

Leading principles in the construc. of sentences, in what embraced in the Grammar

Least parts of language, as written, as spoken, &c., what constituents so called

Legal phraseology, in contrast with that of common life

Less, improper use of, for fewer, ("No LESS than three dictionaries," DR. WEBST.)

Lest, use of, for THAT, without due regard to its import, ("I feared LEST," &c.) --derivation of, from Sax.

Let, verb, its construc, with an infin. following

LETTERS, in the Eng. alphabet, numb. of, and numb. of sounds which they represent --a knowledge of, in what consists --infinite variety in, yet the letters always THE SAME --different sorts of types, or styles of, used in Eng. --names of, in Eng.; do., sing, and plur. --Classes of, named and defined --powers of --the JUST POWERS of, (see Power) --Forms of, and their distinctions, in the Eng. lang. --different sorts of, to be kept distinct --slanting strokes of the Roman, described --Italic, chief use of --capital, employment of --small, do. --Letters, history of --the names of, are words of a peculiar kind --the names and powers of, not always identical --general neglect of learning to write the names of, in Eng. --importance of learning to write do. --erron. teaching with respect to certain names of --Letters of the Heb. alphabet given, with their names, and the significations of do. --of the Gr. alphabet, with their names --of the Lat. alphab., their names nearly lost --of do., as now printed --Letters, the twenty-six, possible combinations and mutations of --of the alphab., read by their names, how taken --do., written for numbers, what their nature; omission of period after such letters --DAY'S account of do. --Letters, the SOUNDS of, treated --Letters, the small, period of their adoption --used for references --Letter, definition of --Letter, the sound of, called its POWER; yet its power not necessarily identified with its sound --A letter, in what consists Like, near, nigh, appar., prepositions; why not placed by BROWN with the prep. Lily, W., grammarian, his arrangement of Lat. syntax

Lines, poetic, technical denominations of

Liquids, what letters so called

Literary division of a work, common order of, downwards, and throughout; but all literary works not thus divided. Literary blunders, Crit. N. concerning --awkwardness, do. --ignorance, do. --silliness, do.

Little, lesser, less, different uses and import of --Little, much, &c., preceded by not, too, or other such adv., how taken --Less, improp. used as an adj. of number; does not signify fewer; not to be used in the sense of do. --Less, least, adv., to be parsed separately, in the comparison of adjectives and adverbs

LOVE, verb active-trans., CONJUGATED affirmatively --BE LOVED, pass., do. --LOVE, conjug. negatively --do., interrogatively --do., interrogatively and negatively

Low and provincial expressions, use of, as opp. to purity, PREC. against

Ly, most common terminal of Eng. adverbs; added to nouns to form adjectives

(I,) u; 1055, b; 1053, L: --when adverbs ending in, are preferable to those of other forms.

M.

M, its name and plur. numb., --of the class liquids, --its sounds, --when silent, --as written for a number.

Macron, or macrotone, mark, its use.

Make, verb, whether to should be suppressed, and be, inserted, after, ("MAKE yourself BE heard," BLAIR,) --its construc. with infin. following.

Man and woman, comp. nouns in, (man-servant, woman-servant, &c.,) how pluralized.

Many a, with noun sing. represented by a plur. pronoun.

Marks, or points, used in literary composition, the principal; occasional. See Punctuation.

May, verb, how varied, --derivation and uses of.

Mean, means, use and construc. of.

Measure, &c., see Time. Measure, poetical, see Verse.

Melody or beauty of a sentence, words necessary to, rarely to be omitted.

Member, or clause, defined. --Memb. and clause, generally used as synonymous, are discriminated by some, --Clause and phrase, confounded by some, --Members, simple, of a sent., punct. of, --complex, do., do., --Members of a sentence, arrangem. of, as affecting STRENGTH.

Metaphor, defined, --what commonly understood to be, --agreem. of pron. with antecedent in cases of.

Methinks, explanation of; the lexicographers on the word.

Metonymy, defined, --Meton., on what founded, --agreem. of pron. with its antecedent, in cases of.

Metres, more found in actual use, than those acknowledged in the ordinary schemes of prosody. Metre, see Verse.

Milton, MURR. proposed amendment of the "unintelligible" language of a certain passage of, criticised, --double solec. in a pass, of, noticed, --his poem, L'Allegro, what its versificat.; what the management of the orders of its verse, --do., Il Penseroso, what its extent and construction.

Miss or Misses, Mr. or Messrs., what the proper applicat. of, when name and title are to be used together, in a plur. sense.

Mistaken, to be, irregularity of the verb; its import as applied to persons, and as applied to things.

Mimesis, explained; droll examples of.

Minus, plus, versus, viâ, Lat., use of, in Eng., in partic. constructions.

Mixing of synt. with etymol., the manner of INGERS., KIRKH., et al., censured. Mixture of the forms of style, inelegance of.

Modifications, defined, --sense of the term as employed by BROWN.

Moloss, defined.

Monometer, scarcely constitutes a line, yet is sometimes so placed. --Monometer line, iambic, examples of, --trochaic, do., --anapestic, do., --dactylic, an examp. of.

Monopersonal verbs, see Impersonal Verbs.

Monotone, what, and how produced in elocution.

Months and days, names of, appar. proper names, and require capitals, --how best expressed in literary compositions.

Moods of a verb, term defined, --the five, named and defined, --Mood, or MODE, the name. See Infinitive Mood, Indic. Mood, &c.

More and most, in ambiguous construction, ("Some people MORE than them," MURR.,) --how parsed in comparisons of adjectives and adverbs.

Moses, in what characters, is supposed to have written.

Most, for almost, by vulgarism.

Motion, verbs of, with hither, &c., in stead of here.

Much, little, all, &c., as nouns, --preceded by not, too, or other such adv., --This much, in stead of thus much, DR. BLAIR.

Mulkey, W., strictures on his system of orthoëpy.

Multiplication, subject of the verb in, see Abstract Numbers.

Multiplicative numerals, as running on in a series; how written above decuple or tenfold.

Multitude, noun of, see Collective Noun.

Mute or silent, epithet applied to what letters. --Mutes, what so reckoned; of these, which imperfect. --Where a letter must be once mute.

My and mine, thy and thine, as duplicate forms of the poss. case, use of.

N.

N, its name and plur. numb., --of the class liquids, --its sounds, --in what position silent.

Name and title, see Proper Names.

Naming the letters of the alphab., importance of.

Narration, see Discourse.

Nasals, what consonants so called.

Near and nigh, see Like.

Need, as an uninflected third pers. sing. of the verb, --has perh. become an auxiliary of the pot. mood, --to what tenses must be understood to belong, if to be recognized as an auxil. of the pot. mood, --that good writers sometimes inflect the verb, and sometimes do not, and that they sometimes use to after it, and sometimes do not, how may be accounted for --three authorized forms of expression, with respect to the verb. Needs, as an adv., its composition

Needless, mixing of characters in printing, bad effect of --capitals; effect of --articles, to be omitted --ellipses, the supposition of, a common error among grammarians --use of participles for nouns, or nouns for participles --words, ineleg. --possessive or art. before a part., how corrected --periods, or other points, after certain numeral expressions --abbreviations, offend against taste --dashes inserted, how to be treated

Negation, expressed in the early Eng. by multiplied negatives; such manner of expression now obsolete and improper --Effect on a negation, of two negatives in the same clause

Negatives, the comm. rule of the grammars, that "two negatives, in Eng., destroy each other, or &c.," whether a correct one

Neither, see Either

Neuter verb, defined --Neuter verbs, the active-trans. verbs are so called in most grammars and dictionaries; the absurdity of this --extent of this class of verbs; their existence in any lang. denied by some grammarians --Neut. verb BE, conjugated --Neuter verbs, made from active-transitives, (am come, is gone, &c.;) these called by some, "neuter passives" --of passive form, (am grown, are flown, &c.,) as errors of conjugat., or of synt. --do., how may be distinguished from pass. verbs --do., DR. PRIESTL. mistaken notions concerning their nature and propriety --Neut. verbs, and their participles, take the same case after as before them --Neuter verb between two nominatives, its agreem.

Nevertheless, its composition and class

No or none, pronom. adj. No, as negative adj., "remarkable ambiguity in the use of," noticed by PRIESTL., ("No laws are better than the English;") how the ambiguity may be avoided --as a simple negation, its construc. --as an adv. of deg., relating only to comparatives, ("NO more," --"NO better") --set before a noun, is an adj., corresponding to Lat. nullus --In the phrases, no longer, no more, no where, DR. JOH. appar. suggests wrongly the class; its true class according to its several relations --No, or an other independent negative, repeated, its effect --No, adv., not to be used with reference to a verb or part. --derivation of, from Anglo-Sax.

Nominative case, defined --Nom. case, how distinguished from the objective in nouns --as subj. of a finite verb --different ways of using --Nominative and verb, usual position of, and when varied --Nom. case and object., at the same time, noun placed in the relation of --Nom. following a verb or part, with what must accord in signif. See also Subject, &c.

Nominative sentences, examples of what MURR. erron. so terms; the prop. construc. shown

Nor, see Or.

Not, its place in negative questions --how spoken in grave discourse, and how ordinarily --vulg. contractions of, with certain verbs --used with other negatives --do. with nor (in stead of or) following, whether correctly, or not --derivation of, from Anglo-Sax. Not but, how resolved. _Not only, not merely_, to what are correspondents

Notwithstanding, import and construc. of; misunderstood by DR. WEBST. --formation and signif. of

NOUNS, Etymol. of --Noun, defined --Nouns, Classes of, named and defined --Modifications of, named --Persons of, named and defined; (see Persons) --Numbers of, do.; (see Plural Number) --Genders of, do.; (see Genders) --Cases of, do.; (see Cases) --Declension of --Nouns, number of, in Eng. --the sense of, how made indefinitely partitive --examples of words commonly belonging to other classes, used as --collective, abstract, and verbal or participial, included among common nouns; (see Collective Noun, and Particip. Noun) --proper, (see Proper Names) --Nouns, Synt. of --Noun, why may not be put in the relation of two cases at once --taken figuratively sing. for literally plur. --required to be repeated, or inserted, in stead of a pronoun --ellips. of, shown --Nouns of time, measure, distance, &c., (see Time) --Nouns, derivation of, from nouns, adjectives, verbs, or participles --poet. peculiarities of

Numbers, the distinction of, to what belongs, and how applied. (See Plural Number.) Numbers, cardinal, ordinal, &c., (see Cardinal Numbers, &c.) --Numbers, abstract, expressions of multiplication in, ("Twice one IS two," --"Twice two ARE four," &c.,) seven different opinions of grammarians respecting, examined by BROWN; who determines the prop. forms of expression --Numbers, expressed by letters, how to be considered; whether to be marked by the period --combined arithmetical, one adjective relating to an other

Numerals, numeral adjectives, see Adjectives, Numeral. Numerical figures used for references

O.

O, lett., as A, E, I, and U, self-naming --its plural --formation of the plur. of nouns in --sounds properly its own --where sounded as short u --do. as obscure e --diphthongs beginning with --triphth. do. O, interj., with cap. lett. --what emotion indicates --differs from oh --as denoting earnestness, before nouns or pronouns put absol. by direct address; is no positive index of the vocative --O, &c., MURR., erron. doctrine concerning, to what teaching it has given rise --O, &c., with a case following, Lat. construc. of, examined --O, not unfreq. confounded with oh, even by grammarians.

Obelisk, or dagger, as mark of reference.

Objective case, defined --Obj. case, how distinguished from the nom. in nouns --before the infin. mood, how taken in Eng. --as governed by active-trans. verb or part. --"Active verbs govern the obj. case," MURR., defect of this brief assertion; its uselessness as a RULE for "the syntax of verbs." --Obj. case, of how many constructions susceptible --whether infinitives, participles, &c., can be in --two nouns in, after a verb, how parsed, --Whether any verb in Eng. governs two objectives not coupled --Obj. case as governed by passive verbs, erron. allowed by some --what verbs not to be employed without --Obj. case as governed by prep. --"Prepositions gov. the obj. case," why the brief assertion is exceptionable, as the sole RULE, in parsing prep.

Obsolete or antiquated words, use of, as opposed to purity, PREC. against --Things obsolete in Eng., DR. LATHAM'S attempts to revive.

Ocean, figurative representation of, as uttering his voice in tones of varied quantity.

Octometer line, may be reduced to tetrameter --iambic, examples of --trochaic, do --dactylic, example of --Octometer, trochaic, rhyme and termination of; its pauses, and how may be divided; the most common form of.

Of and on or upon, difference between.

Old English, characters of its alphabet, shown --occasional use of do.

Omissions of words that are needful to the sense, Crit. N. against.

Omitting, verbs of, with part. in stead of infin.

One, employment of, as a noun or as a substitute for a noun; how classed by some grammarians --may be preceded by the articles, or by adjectives --like Fr. on or l'on, used indef. for any person; in this sense preferable to a pers. pron. applied indefinitely --CHURCH., citation ridiculing the too frequent use of, for pers. pron. --as pronom. adj., requires verb and pron. in the third pers. sing. to agree with it. One an other, see Other. One, or a unit, whether it is a number.

Only, derivation of; class and meaning of, in its several different relations --strictures on the instructions of grammarians respecting the classification and placing of --ambiguous use of, (as also of but,) --use of, for but, or except that, not approved of by BROWN --_Not only, not merely --but_, &c., correspondents.

Onomatopoeia described and exemplified (extr. from SWIFT.)

Or, as expressing an alternation of terms, (Lat., sive.) --in Eng., is frequently equivocal; the ambiguity how avoided --Or, perh. contracted from other --Or and nor discriminated --Or, nor, grammarians dispute which of these words should be adopted after an other negative than neither or nor; MURR., following PRIESTL., teaches that either word may be used with equal propriety; BURN'S doctrine; BROWN, after revising CHURCH., attempts to settle the question, --Or ever, ("OR EVER the earth was,") the term explained.

Or or our, terminat., number of Eng. words in; how many of these may be written with our; BROWN'S practice and views in respect to this matter.

Oral spelling, the advantage of, to learners.

Order of things or events, the natural, PREC. directing the observance of, in the use of lang.

Orders of verse, see Verse.

Ordinal numeral, (see Numerals.) --Ordinal adjectives may qualify card. numbers; cannot properly be qualified by do.

Orthoëpy, see Pronunciation.

ORTHOGRAPHY --Orthography, of what treats --difficulties attending it in Eng. --DR. JOHNSON'S improvements in --DR. WEBSTER'S do., in a different direction --ignorance of, with respect to any word used, what betokens in the user (See also Spelling.) Orthography, figures of, MIMESIS and ARCHAISM --its substantive or pronominal character; (with one.) how classed by some; may be preceded by the articles --requires than before the latter term of an exclusive comparison; yet sometimes perhaps better takes the prep. _besides. Each other one an other_, import and just application of, --misapplication of, frequent in books, --DR. WEBST. erron. explanation of other, as "a correlative to each," --One and other, frequently used as terms relative and partitive, appar. demanding a plur. form, --An other, in stead of another. Somehow or other, somewhere or other, how other is to be disposed of.

Ought, principal verb, and not auxiliary, as called by MURR. et al., --originally part of the verb to OWE; now used as defec. verb, --its tense, as limited by the infin. which follows.

Ourself, anomalous form peculiar to the regal style, --peculiar construc. of.

Own, its origin and import; its class and construc., --strangely called a noun by DR. JOH.

P.

P, its name and plur. numb., --its sound, --when silent, --Ph, its sounds.

Pairs, words in, punct. of.

Palatals, what consonants so called.

Parables, in the Scriptures, see Allegory.

Paragoge, explained.

Paragraph mark, for what used.

Paralipsis, or apophasis, explained.

Parallels, as marks of reference.

Parenthesis, signif. and twofold application of the term, --Parenthesis, marks of, (see Curves.) --What clause to be inclosed within the curves as a PARENTHESIS, and what should be its punct., --Parentheses, the introduction of, as affecting unity.

Parsing, defined. --Parsing, its relation to grammar, --what must be considered in, --the distinction between etymological and syntactical, to be maintained, against KIRKH. et al., --character of the forms of etymological adopted by BROWN, --what implied in the right performance of, --whether different from analysis, --what to be supplied in. --Parsing, of a prep., how performed, --of a phrase, implies its separation, --the RULES OF GOVERNM., how to be applied in, --of words, is not varied by mere transposition. --Parsing, etymological and syntactical, in what order to be taken, --the SENSE, why necessary to be observed in; what required of the pupil in syntactical, --syntactical, EXAMPLE of. --Parsing or CORRECTING, which exercise perh. the more useful.

Participial adjectives, see Adjectives, Participial.

Participial or verbal noun, defined, --how distinguished from the participle. --Participial noun and participle, the distinction between, ill preserved by MURR. and his amenders. --Participial noun, distinc. of VOICE in, sometimes disregarded, ("The day of my BURYING,") --with INFIN. following, strictures on MURR., LENN., and BULL., with respect to examples of.

PARTICIPLES, Etymol. of. --Participle, defined. --Participles, whether they ought to be called verbs, --appropriate naming of the kinds of, --often become adjectives, --become adjectives by composition with something not belonging to the verb, --number of, simp. and comp., --imply time, but do not divide it, --retain the essential meaning of their verbs, but differ from them in the formal, --in Eng., from what derived, --H. TOOKE'S view of the time of; with whom BROWN differs. --Participles, Classes of, named and defined, --(See Imperfect Participle and Perfect Part.) --Participles, grammarians differ in their opinion with respect to the time and voice of, --how have been called and treated by some, --explanation of the different, --how distinguished from particip. nouns, --elegantly taken as plur. nouns, ("All his REDEEMED,") --appar. used for adverbs, --some become prepositions. --Participle and ADJUNCTS, as forming "one name," and as such, governing the poss., whence the doctrine; PRIESTL. criticised; MURR. et al. adopt PRIESTL. doctrine, which they badly sustain; teachers of do. disagree among themselves, --governm. of possessives by, how BROWN generally disposes of; how determines with respect to such governm. --Participles, Synt. of, --regular synt. of, twofold; nature of the two constructions; OTHER less regular constructions; which two constructions of all, are legitimate uses of the participle; which constructions are of doubtf. propriety. --Participles, to what RELATE, or in what state GOVERNED. --Participle, as relating to a phrase or sentence, --taken abstractly, --irregularly used in Eng. as substitute for infin. mood, --in irreg. and mixed construc. --Participle, transitive, what case governs, --nom. absol. with, to what equivalent, --each requires its appropriate FORM, --questionable uses of, admitted by MURR. et al.; why BROWN is disposed to condemn these irregularities. --Participle and particip. noun, distinction between, with respect to governm. --Participle in ing, multiplied uses of, lawful and forced, illustrated, --equivalence of do. to infin. mood, instances of, --every mixed construc. of, how regarded by BROWN, --the "double nature" of, CROMB. on; his views, how accord with those of MURR. et al., HILEY'S treatment of; BROWN'S strictures on do. --Participles, place of: --active, governm. of. --Participle, trans., converted to a noun: --converted, when the expression should be changed: --followed by an adj., its conversion into a noun appar. improper: --comp. converted, how managed: --not to be used for infin., or other more appropriate term: --use of, for a nominative after be, is, was, &c., faulty: --following a verb of preventing, how to be managed. --Participles, converted, disposal of their adverbs: --must be construed with a regard to the leading word in sense: --should have a clear reference to their subjects: --needless use of, for nouns, to be avoided: --punct. of: --derivation of: --poet. peculiarities in the use of.

Parts of speech, meaning of the term: --Parts of speech, named and defined: --what explanations may aid learners to distinguish the different: --why needful that learners be early taught to make for themselves the prop. distribution of: --WILS. on the distribution of: --the preferable number with respect to; the office of, specifically stated. --The parts of speech, passage exemplifying all. --Examples of a partic. part of speech accumulated in a sentence. --Etymol. and Synt. of the different parts of speech, see _Article, Noun, Adjective_, &c.

Passions of the mind, by what tones to be expressed.

Passive verb, defined. --Pass. verbs contrasted with active-trans, verbs, in respect to the object or the agent of the action; their compos, and construc.: --their FORM in Eng. --Pass. verb BE LOVED, conjug. affirmatively. --Pass. verbs, how distinguished from neuters of the same form: --having active forms nearly equivalent to them, (_is rejoiced, rejoices_; am resolved, know, &c.,): --erroneously allowed by some to govern the obj. case in Eng.; CROMB. in this category, cited, canon, pseudo-canons. --Pass. verb, what should always take for its subj. or nom.: --takes the same case after as before it, when both words refer to the same thing: --between two nominatives, with which should be made to agree, ("Words ARE wind,"). See Unco-Passive, &c.

Passive form of an active-intrans. verb followed by a prep. and its objective, ("He WAS LAUGHED AT,"). Passive sense of the act. form of the verb, ("The books continue SELLING,").

Past for future, see Prophecy.

Pauses, term defined. --Pauses, kinds of, named and explained: --the distinctive, duration of: --after what manner should be formed: --forced, unintentional, their effect: --emphatic or rhetorical, applicat. and office of: --harmonic, kinds of; these, essential to verse. --Pauses, abrupt, punct.: --emphatic, do.

Pedantic and sense-dimming style of charlatans &c., as offending against purity.

Pentameter line, iambic, examples of: --is the regular Eng. HEROIC; its quality and adaptation: --embraces the elegiac stanza: --trochaic, example of, said by MURR. et al. to be very uncommon; was unknown to DR. JOH. and other old prosodists: --the two examples of. in sundry grammars, whence came; a couplet of these scanned absurdly by HIL.; HART mistakes the metre of do.: --dactylic, example of, ("Salutation to America,").

Perfect, adj., whether admits of comparison; why its comparis. by adverbs not wholly inadmissible.

Perfect definition, what.

Perfect participle, or second part., defined: --its form: --how has been variously called: --its character and name as distinguished from the imperf. part: --why sometimes called the passive part.; why this name liable to objection: --how may be distinguished from the preterit of the same form: --should not be made to govern an objective term. ("The characters MADE USE OF," MURR.,): --not to be used for the pret., nor confounded with the pres.: --what care necessary in the employment of; when to be distinguished from the preterits of their verbs.

Perfect tense, defined. --Perf. tense of indic., as referring to time relatively fut.

Period, or full stop, its pause. --Period, or circuit, nature of. --Period, probably the oldest of the points; how first used: --how used in Hebrew: --what used to mark: --Rules for the use of: --not required when short sentences are rehearsed as examples: --whether to be applied to letters written for numbers: --with other points set after it: --whether proper after Arabic figures used as ordinals. --Period of abbreviation, whether always supersedes other points.

Permanent propositions, to be expressed in the pres. tense.

Permitting, &c., verbs of, see Commanding.

Personal pronoun, defined. --Personal pronouns, simple, numb, and specificat. of: --declension of: --often used in a reciprocal sense, ("Wash YOU," &c.,). --(See also It.) --Personal pronouns, compound, numb. and specificat. of. 298: --explanat. and declension of: --CHURCH. account of: --of the first and second persons, placed before nouns to distinguish their persons.

Personification, defined, --MURR. definition of, blamed, --what constitutes the purest kind of, --change of the gend. of inanimate objects by, --whether it always changes the gender of anteced. term, --agreem. of pronouns with their antecedents in cases of, --Rule for capitals in do., --comp., --Personifications, CHURCH, on the determination of gender in, --Personified objects, names of, put in the second pers., and why, --how pronouns agree with,

Persons, term defined, --Persons, named and defined, --the distinction of, on what founded, --Persons, numbers, &c., character of BROWN'S definitions of, --Persons, in gram., nature of; absurd teachings of some grammar-makers concerning, --distinctions of, in written lang., --Person and number of a verb, what, --Persons, second and third, of a verb, distinctive formations of, --do., in Lat., shown, --Person, nouns of the second, in Eng., in how many ways can be employed, --the third, put with the pron. I, by vulgarism, ("THINKS I _to myself_,") --the first, place of, --Persons, whether the imperat. mood may have three, --connected antecedents of different, agreem. of pron. with, --connected nominatives of different, agreem. of verb with,

Perspicuity, as a quality of style, in what consists, --is essential in composition; BLAIR quoted, --the excellence of, --Precepts aiming at offences against,

Perversions of Eng. grammar, the design, in part, of BROWN'S code of synt, is to make intelligent judges of, --Perversions, literary, Crit. N. concerning,

Phonetics, phonography, phonotopy, BROWN'S estimate of; DR. JOH. cited, --account of, --TRENCH'S views of, --Phonographic system of stenography, its practical value; phonotopy, to what may be advantageously applied,

Phrase, defined, --Phrase made the subject of a verb, how to be taken, --Phrases, distinct, conjunctively connected, agreem. of verb with, --distinct, disjunctively connected, do., --unconnected, do., --BAD phrases, examples of, from authors, --do., corrected, --Phrases or clauses, ellips. of, shown, --Adverbial phrase, (so termed by some,) see Adverb.

Place or position of the different parts of speech, see Article, Noun, Adjective, &c.

Pleonasm, defined, --Pleonasm, when allowable with respect to a pron., --in what instances impressive and elegant; when, the vice of ill writing, --occurs sundry times in the Bible,

Pluperfect tense, defined, --Pluperf. tense, what implies when used conditionally; what, in the negative form of supposition, --how formed in the indic. mood; do. in the potential, --indic. form of, put by enall. for pluperf. of the pot., --PLUPERFECT, signif. of the term; several innovators (as BULL., BUTL., et al.) have been fain to discard it,

Plural number, of nouns, how formed, --of most nouns in Eng., is simple and regular, --of nouns ending in a vowel preceded by a vowel, --of do. in y preceded by a consonant, --of do. in o preceded by a consonant, --construc. of, when several persons of the same name are spoken of ("The Stuarts,") --of prop. names, its formation, --of nouns in i, o, u, or y, preceded by a consonant, --when name and title are to be used together, ("_The Miss Bells_,") --of nouns in f, --of nouns not formed in s or es, --of compounds, --of certain compound terms, ("Ave-Maries," &c.,) --wanting to some nouns, --of nouns of multitude, --Plural, nouns made so by nature or art, --of foreign nouns, 253, --improperly formed by adding apostrophic s, --of mere characters, how denoted,

Plurality, the idea of; see Unity, &c.

Poetic feet, treated, --(See Iambus, Trochee, &c.) --Poetic foot, of what consists, --Poet. feet, number to be recognized in Eng., --principal Eng., named and defined, --kinds of, which form ORDERS OF VERSE, --what combinations of, severally form dimeter, trimeter, &c., --(See Dimeter, Trimeter, &c.) --Poetic collocation of words, in prose, as offending against perspicuity, PREC. respecting, --Poetic diction, treated, --in what abounds, --Poetical Peculiarities,

Poetry, as defined by BLAIR, --character of its style, --aim and end of, --exterior distinction of, --why difficult, by a definition, to be distinguished from prose, --inept directions of some grammatists respecting the parsing of, --Poetry, every line in, should begin with a capital,

Points, or stops, the principal, named, and their forms shown, --the purpose of, --length of pauses denoted by, --often variously used in different editions of the same work, --origin of, See Punctuation.

Points of the compass, adjectives for; modes of varying them,

Possession, relation of, see Property.

Possessive case, defined, --Poss. case, how formed --disputes of the earlier grammarians respecting, --CARD. et al. attempt to revive exploded error concerning, --form of, --origin of, in Eng., --odd notions of some grammarians concerning the regular formation of --exceptions or irregularities in the formation of --Poss. case, PEI. on, criticised --ASH and PRIESTL. on the plur. --use of the two forms of, in pers. pronouns --of the simp. pers. pronouns, grammarians differ with respect to; should not be considered mere adjectives --are pronom. adjectives, according to DR. LOWTH and his followers, --whose doctrine BROWN canvasses, also, WEBSTER'S, WILSON'S, MURRAY'S --Poss. case, its equivalence to of and the objective, not a sameness of case, (in oppos. to Nix.) --of pronouns, not to be written with apostrophe --of nouns in appos., application of the possessive sign to --by what governed --whether the rule for, has true exceptions --appos. of one with an other, ("For DAVID my SERVANT'S sake,") the construc. examined --appar. in abstract construc., ("All MINE are THINE,") --as governed by a part, the construc. examined; COROL. --why the governm. of, should be limited to nouns only --whether before a real part., denotes the possession of something --Possessive sign, omission oL not a true ellips. --always implies a governing word, --how taken by compounds --liable to be added to adjunct of the former noun --whether it can be rightly added to separate adjectives, ("The GUILTY'S prayer,") --which noun of connected possessives takes --Poss. case, place and order of --generally equivalent to prep. of and the objective, --governed by something not expressed, ("St. Paul's,") --Possessives, connected, how to be taken, --Poss. singular, with s omitted, ("For CONSCIENCE' sake") --Poss. case of nouns sing, in ss, false teaching of KIRKH. _et al._, respecting the formation of --MURR. rule for the construc. of, why objectionable, --compounds embracing, lack uniformity in writing, --peculiarity of, with respect to correlatives, ("Father's son,") --Possessive relation between a portion of time and its correlative action, ("THREE YEARS' hard work" or, "Three years OF HARD WORK,") --Poss. case, appropriate form of, to be observed, --plural, with a noun in forced agreem., ("For OUR PARTS,") ib., N. iv: --needless use of, before a participle, ("In THEIR _pronouncing the Greek_,") --Possessive pronouns, my, thy, his, &c., how often should be inserted, or repeated

Potential mood, defined --Potential mood, why so called; by what signs distinguished, --may, like the indic., be used in asking questions; why by some included in the subj. --in what tenses used; nature of the imperf. tense --formation and inflection of its tenses, shown in the verb LOVE, conjugated,

Power of a letter, the powers of the letters, what meant by, when spoken of, --The power of a letter is not its sound, as MURR. et al incorrectly teach --The simple powers of the letters, many irreconcileable doctrines have been advanced thereon; GARDINER'S notions concerning, stated in brief, --RUSH'S explanations of, his pretentious scheme of the alphab. how estimated by BROWN --The just powers of the letters, what, and how are to be learned, --Powers of the letters, variable; how become so; WALK, cited

Praxis, defined; lit. signif. of the word, as from the Gr.

Precision, as a quality of style, in what consists, --Precepts aiming at offences against --conciseness, or brevity, as opposed to

Prefixes, their management in syllabication, R.: --Explanation of --import and character of the particles used as, in Eng.; the roots to which prefixed, not always proper Eng. words --Prefixes, ENG. or ANGLO-SAX., --Prefixes, poet, usage with respect to,

Preperfect participle, defined --Preperf. part., its form --its nature and name,

PREPOSITIONS, Etymol. of --Preposition defined --importance of a right use, and a right explan. of --HARR. explanation of, as cited by LOWTH, stricture on HARR. --its simplicity among the parts of speech; how should be explained in parsing, --no sufficient RULE for the synt. of, in most of the Eng. grammars, Prepositions and their objects, as preceding the words on which they depend, ("Of man's first disobedience, &c., Sing" MILC.,) --Prepositions, what it is, to find the terms of relations of; disput. text cited in illustration --the special adaptation of; example of misuse by MURR., remarked on --HARR., on the purpose for which almost all prepositions were orig. formed, and on the nature of their relations; his views controverted by BROWN, --Prepositions and their governed objects, the true determination of; examples of joint objects, and of joint antecedents, wrong views of MURR. and his followers concerning this matter. --Prepositions, two connected, for what different purposes used --two coming together, ("FROM AMONG the just,") --Prepositions complex, what their character, and how may be resolved; are occasionally compounded by the hyphen --Prepositions, how might be divided into classes; the inutility in parsing of the division into "separable and inseparable;"

HALL'S absurd idea of a divis., noticed --whether "two in immediate succession require a noun to be understood between them," (NUTT.) --words commonly reckoned, (in, on, of, &c.,) used after infinitives or participles, in adverbial construc., ("Houses to eat and drink IN") --Prepositions, List of --grammarians differ considerably in their tables of; do. concerning the characteristics of; what BROWN supposes, in oppos. to the assertion that "Every prep. requires an obj. case after it" --LENN. and BULL. on "prepositions becoming adverbs," criticised --MURR. on "prepositions appearing to be adverbs," criticised --Preposition, whether it can be justly said to take a sent. for its object --Prepositions, words in the list of, sometimes used as other parts of speech --extension of the list of --examples of the less usual, a, and others beginning with a --do. of unusual ones beginning with b, c, or d --unusual, quotations illustrating further the list of --Preposition, RULE of synt. for the word governed by --Prepositions, in Eng., govern no other case than the obj.; most, may take the imperf. part. for their obj. --The brief assertion, that "Prepositions govern the obj. case," wherein is exceptionable as the sole rule for both terms --Prepositions, ellipt. construc. of, with adjectives, (_in vain, in secret_, &c.) --sometimes appar. govern adverbs --Preposition, appar. governing a perf. part., ("To give it up FOR LOST") --Prepositions, Synt. of --do., in what consists --what RELATIONS, show; (see To and For) --the parsing of; why tolerable writers are liable to err most in their use of --Preposition, the true terms of the relat. of, how may be discovered --when beginning or ending a sent. or clause, what the construc. --the terms of relation of, what may be; both usually expressed --position of, with respect to the governed word --Prepositions, several, dependent on one anteced. term, ("_A declaration_ FOR virtue and AGAINST vice," BUTL.) --two coming together between the same terms of relat.; do. in the same construc.; erron. remark of PRIESTL., MURR., et al., concerning the latter --Preposition, the separating of, from its noun, false doctrine of LOWTH, MURR., et al., concerning --Prepositions, prop, choice of --do., with respect to the allowable uses of --as adapted in meaning to two objects, or to more --Preposition, ellips. or omiss. of, where ineleg. --insertion of, when do. --Prep. and its object, position of, in respect to other words --do., punc. of --Prep., ellips. of, shown --Prepositions, derivation of --poet. usage with respect to