III. OF WORDS…

III. OF WORDS

A Word is one or more syllables spoken or written as the sign of some idea, or of some manner of thought. Words are distinguished as primitive or derivative, and as simple or compound. The former division is called their species; the latter, their figure.

A primitive word is one that is not formed from any simpler word in the language; as, harm, great, connect.

A derivative word is one that is formed from some simpler word in the language; as, harmless, greatly, connected, disconnect, unconnected.

A simple word is one that is not compounded, not composed of other words; as, watch, man, house, tower, never, the, less.

A compound word is one that is composed of two or more simple words; as, watchman, watchhouse, watchtower, nevertheless.

Permanent compounds are consolidated; as, bookseller, schoolmaster: others, which may be called temporary compounds, are formed by the hyphen; as, good-natured, negro-merchant.

RULES FOR THE FIGURE OF WORDS.

RULE I.--COMPOUNDS.

Words regularly or analogically united, and commonly known as forming a compound, should never be needlessly broken apart. Thus, steamboat, railroad, red-hot, well-being, new-coined, are preferable to the phrases, steam boat, rail road, red hot, well being, new coined; and toward us is better than the old phrase, to us ward.

RULE II.--SIMPLES.

When the simple words would only form a regular phrase, of the same meaning, the compounding of any of them ought to be avoided. Thus, the compound instead is not to be commended, because the simple phrase, in stead of, is exactly like the other phrases, in lieu of, in place of, in room of, in which we write no compound.

RULE III.--THE SENSE.

Words otherwise liable to be misunderstood, must be joined together or written separately, as the sense and construction may happen to require. Thus, a glass house is a house made of glass, but a glasshouse is a house in which glass is made; so a negro merchant is a coloured trader, but a negro-merchant is a man who buys and sells negroes.

RULE IV.--ELLIPSES.

When two or more compounds are connected in one sentence, none of them should be split to make an ellipsis of half a word. Thus, "six or seventeen" should not be said for "sixteen or seventeen;" nor ought we to say, "calf, goat, and sheepskins" for "calfskins, goatskins, and sheepskins" In the latter instance, however, it might be right to separate all the words; as in the phrase, "soup, coffee, and tea houses."--Liberator, x, 40.

RULE V.--THE HYPHEN.

When the parts of a compound do not fully coalesce, as to-day, to-night, to-morrow; or when each retains its original accent, so that the compound has more than one, or one that is movable, as first-born, hanger-on, laughter-loving, garlic-eater, butterfly-shell, the hyphen should be inserted between them.

RULE VI.--NO HYPHEN.

When a compound has but one accented syllable in pronunciation, as watchword, statesman, gentleman, and the parts are such as admit of a complete coalescence, no hyphen should be inserted between them. Churchill, after much attention to this subject, writes thus: "The practical instruction of the countinghouse imparts a more thorough knowledge of bookkeeping, than all the fictitious transactions of a mere schoolbook, however carefully constructed to suit particular purposes."--New Gram., p. vii. But counting-house, having more stress on the last syllable than on the middle one, is usually written with the hyphen; and book-keeping and school-book, though they may not need it, are oftener so formed than otherwise.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--Words are the least parts of significant language; that is, of language significant in each part; for, to syllables, taken merely as syllables, no meaning belongs. But, to a word, signification of some sort or other, is essential; there can be no word without it; for a sign or symbol must needs represent or signify something. And as I cannot suppose words to represent external things, I have said "A Word is one or more syllables spoken or written as the sign of some idea." But of what ideas are the words of our language significant? Are we to say, "Of all ideas;" and to recognize as an English word every syllable, or combination of syllables, to which we know a meaning is attached? No. For this, in the first place, would confound one language with an other; and destroy a distinction which must ever be practically recognized, till all men shall again speak one language. In the next place, it would compel us to embrace among our words an infinitude of terms that are significant only of local ideas, such as men any where or at any time may have had concerning any of the individuals they have known, whether persons, places, or things. But, however important they may be in the eyes of men, the names of particular persons, places, or things, because they convey only particular ideas, do not properly belong to what we call our language. Lexicographers do not collect and define proper names, because they are beyond the limits of their art, and can be explained only from history. I do not say that proper names are to be excluded from grammar; but I would show wherein consists the superiority of general terms over these. For if our common words did not differ essentially from proper names, we could demonstrate nothing in science: we could not frame from them any general or affirmative proposition at all; because all our terms would be particular, and not general; and because every individual thing in nature must necessarily be for ever itself only, and not an other.

OBS. 2.--Our common words, then, are the symbols neither of external particulars, nor merely of the sensible ideas which external particulars excite in our minds, but mainly of those general or universal ideas which belong rather to the intellect than to the senses. For intellection differs from sensation, somewhat as the understanding of a man differs from the perceptive faculty of a brute; and language, being framed for the reciprocal commerce of human minds, whose perceptions include both, is made to consist of signs of ideas both general and particular, yet without placing them on equal ground. Our general ideas--that is, our ideas conceived as common to many individuals, existing in any part of time, past, present, or future--such, for example, as belong to the words man, horse, tree, cedar, wave, motion, strength, resist--such ideas, I say, constitute that most excellent significance which belongs to words primarily, essentially, and immediately; whereas, our particular ideas, such as are conceived only of individual objects, which arc infinite in number and ever fleeting, constitute a significance which belongs to language only secondarily, accidentally, and mediately. If we express the latter at all, we do it either by proper names, of which but very few ever become generally known, or by means of certain changeable limitations which are added to our general terms; whereby language, as Harris observes, "without wandering into infinitude, contrives how to denote things infinite."--Hermes, p. 345. The particular manner in which this is done, I shall show hereafter, in Etymology, when I come to treat of articles and definitives.

OBS. 3.--If we examine the structure of proper names, we shall find that most of them are compounds, the parts of which have, in very many instances, some general signification. Now a complete phrase commonly conveys some particular notion or conception of the mind; but, in this case, the signification of the general terms is restricted by the other words which are added to them. Thus smith is a more general term than goldsmith; and goldsmith is more general than a goldsmith; a goldsmith, than the goldsmith; the goldsmith, than one Goldsmith; one Goldsmith, than Mr. Goldsmith; Mr. Goldsmith, than Oliver Goldsmith. Thus we see that the simplest mode of designating particular persons or objects, is that of giving them proper names; but proper names must needs be so written, that they may be known as proper names, and not be mistaken for common terms. I have before observed, that we have some names which are both proper and common; and that these should be written with capitals, and should form the plural regularly. It is surprising that the Friends, who are in some respects particularly scrupulous about language, should so generally have overlooked the necessity there is, of compounding their numerical names of the months and days, and writing them uniformly with capitals, as proper names. For proper names they certainly are, in every thing but the form, whenever they are used without the article, and without those other terms which render their general idea particular. And the compound form with a capital, is as necessary for Firstday, Secondday, Thirdday, &c., as for Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, &c. "The first day of the week,"--"The seventh day of the month,"--"The second month of summer,"--"The second month in the year," &c., are good English phrases, in which any compounding of the terms, or any additional use of capitals, would be improper; but, for common use, these phrases are found too long and too artificial. We must have a less cumbersome mode of specifying the months of the year and the days of the week. What then? Shall we merely throw away the terms of particularity, and, without substituting in their place the form of proper names, apply general terms to particular thoughts, and insist on it that this is right? And is not this precisely what is done by those who reject as heathenish the ordinary names of the months and days, and write "first day," for Sunday, in stead of "the first day of the week;" or "second month," for February, in stead of "the second month in the year;" and so forth? This phraseology may perhaps be well understood by those to whom it is familiar, but still it is an abuse of language, because it is inconsistent with the common acceptation of the terms. Example: "The departure of a ship will take place every sixth day with punctuality."--Philadelphia Weekly Messenger. The writer of this did not mean, "every Friday;" and it is absurd for the Friends so to understand it, or so to write, when that is what they mean.

OBS. 4.--In the ordinary business of life, it is generally desirable to express our meaning as briefly as possible; but legal phraseology is always full to the letter, and often redundant. Hence a merchant will write, "Nov. 24, 1837," or, "11 mo. 24th, 1837;" but a conveyancer will have it, "On the twenty-fourth day of November, one thousand eight hundred and thirty-seven;"--or, perhaps, "On the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and thirty-seven." Accordingly we find that, in common daily use, all the names of the months, except March, May, June, and July, are abbreviated; thus, Jan., Feb., Apr., Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov., Dec. And sometimes even the Arabic number of the year is made yet shorter; as '37 for 1837; or 1835-6-7, for 1835, 1836, and 1837. In like manner, in constructing tables of time, we sometimes denote the days of the week by the simple initials of their names; as, S. for Sunday, M. for Monday, &c. But, for facility of abbreviation, the numerical names, whether of the months or of the days, are perhaps still more convenient. For, if we please, we may put the simple Arabic figures for them; though it is better to add d. for day, and mo. for month: as, 1 d., 2 d., 3 d., &c.;--1 mo., 2 mo., 3 mo., &c.:--or more compactly thus: 1d., 2d., 3d., &c.;--1mo., 2mo., 3mo., &c. But, take which mode of naming we will, our ordinary expression of these things should be in neither extreme, but should avoid alike too great brevity and too great prolixity; and, therefore, it is best to make it a general rule in our literary compositions, to use the full form of proper names for the months and days, and to denote the years by Arabic figures written in full.

OBS. 5.--In considering the nature of words, I was once a little puzzled with a curious speculation, if I may not term it an important inquiry, concerning the principle of their identity. We often speak of "the same words," and of "different words;" but wherein does the sameness or the difference of words consist? Not in their pronunciation; for the same word may be differently pronounced; as, p=at'ron or p=a'tron, m=at'ron or m=a'tron. Not in their orthography; for the same word may be differently spelled; as, favour or favor, music or musick, connexion or connection. Not in their form of presentation; for the same word may be either spoken or written; and speech and writing present what we call the same words, in two ways totally different. Not in their meaning; for the same word may have different meanings, and different words may signify precisely the same thing. This sameness of words, then, must consist in something which is to be reconciled with great diversity. Yet every word is itself, and not an other: and every word must necessarily have some property peculiar to itself, by which it may be easily distinguished from every other. Were it not so, language would be unintelligible. But it is so; and, therefore, to mistake one word for an other, is universally thought to betray great ignorance or great negligence, though such mistakes are by no means of uncommon occurrence. But that the question about the identity of words is not a very easy one, may appear from the fact, that the learned often disagree about it in practice; as when one grammarian will have an and a to be two words, and an other will affirm them to be only different forms of one and the same word.

OBS. 6.--Let us see, then, if amidst all this diversity we can find that principle of sameness, by which a dispute of this kind ought to be settled. Now, although different words do generally differ in orthography, in pronunciation, and in meaning, so that an entire sameness implies one orthography, one pronunciation, and one meaning; yet some diversity is allowed in each of these respects, so that a sign differing from an other only in one, is not therefore a different word, or a sign agreeing with an other only in one, is not therefore the same word. It follows thence, that the principle of verbal identity, the principle which distinguishes every word from every other, lies in neither extreme: it lies in a narrower compass than in all three, and yet not singly in any one, but jointly in any two. So that signs differing in any two of these characteristics of a word, are different words; and signs agreeing in any two, are the same word. Consequently, if to any difference either of spelling or of sound we add a difference of signification everybody will immediately say, that we speak or write different words, and not the same: thus dear, beloved, and deer, an animal, are two such words as no one would think to be the same; and, in like manner, use, advantage, and use, to employ, will readily be called different words. Upon this principle, an and a are different words; yet, in conformity to old usage, and because the latter is in fact but an abridgement of the former, I have always treated them as one and the same article, though I have nowhere expressly called them the same word. But, to establish the principle above named, which appears to me the only one on which any such question can be resolved, or the identity of words be fixed at all, we must assume that every word has one right pronunciation, and only one; one just orthography, and only one; and some proper signification, which, though perhaps not always the same, is always a part of its essence. For when two words of different meaning are spelled or pronounced alike, not to maintain the second point of difference, against the double orthography or the double pronunciation of either, is to confound their identity at once, and to prove by the rule that two different words are one and the same, by first absurdly making them so.

OBS. 7.--In no part of grammar is usage more unsettled and variable than in that which relates to the figure of words. It is a point of which modern writers have taken but very little notice. Lily, and other ancient Latin grammarians, reckoned both species and figure among the grammatical accidents of nearly all the different parts of speech; and accordingly noticed them, in their Etymology, as things worthy to be thus made distinct topics, like numbers, genders, cases, moods, tenses, &c. But the manner of compounding words in Latin, and also in Greek, is always by consolidation. No use appears to have been made of the hyphen, in joining the words of those languages, though the name of the mark is a Greek compound, meaning "under one." The compounding of words is one principal means of increasing their number; and the arbitrariness with which that is done or neglected in English, is sufficient of itself to make the number of our words a matter of great uncertainty. Such terms, however, having the advantage of explaining themselves in a much greater degree than others, have little need of definition; and when new things are formed, it is very natural and proper to give them new names of this sort: as, steamboat, railroad. The propriety or impropriety of these additions to the language, is not to be determined by dictionaries; for that must be settled by usage before any lexicographer will insert them. And so numerous, after all, are the discrepancies found in our best dictionaries, that many a word may have its day and grow obsolete, before a nation can learn from them the right way of spelling it; and many a fashionable thing may go entirely out of use, before a man can thus determine how to name it. Railroads are of so recent invention that I find the word in only one dictionary; and that one is wrong, in giving the word a hyphen, while half our printers are wrong, in keeping the words separate because Johnson did not compound them. But is it not more important, to know whether we ought to write railroad, or rail-road, or rail road, which we cannot learn from any of our dictionaries, than to find out whether we ought to write rocklo, or roquelo, or roquelaur, or roquelaure, which, in some form or other, is found in them all? The duke of Roquelaure is now forgotten, and his cloak is out of fashion.

OBS. 8.--No regular phrase, as I have taught in the second rule above, should be needlessly converted into a compound word, either by tacking its parts together with the hyphen, or by uniting them without a hyphen; for, in general, a phrase is one thing, and a word is an other: and they ought to be kept as distinct as possible.[113] But, when a whole phrase takes the relation of an adjective, the words must be compounded, and the hyphen becomes necessary; as, "An inexpressibly apt bottle-of-small-beer comparison."--Peter Pindar. The occasions for the compounding of words, are in general sufficiently plain, to any one who knows what is intended to be said; but, as we compound words, sometimes with the hyphen, and sometimes without, there is no small difficulty in ascertaining when to use this mark, and when to omit it. "Some settled rule for the use of the hyphen on these occasions, is much wanted. Modern printers have a strange predilection for it; using it on almost every possible occasion. Mr. L. Murray, who has only three lines on the subject, seems inclined to countenance this practice; which is, no doubt, convenient enough for those who do not like trouble. His words are: 'A Hyphen, marked thus - is employed in connecting compounded words: as, Lap-dog, tea-pot, pre-existence, self-love, to-morrow, mother-in-law.' Of his six examples, Johnson, our only acknowledged standard, gives the first and third without any separation between the syllables, lapdog, preexistence; his second and fifth as two distinct words each, tea pot, to morrow; and his sixth as three words, mother in law: so that only his fourth has the sanction of the lexicographer. There certainly can be no more reason for putting a hyphen after the common prefixes, than before the common affixes, ness, ly, and the rest."--Churchill's Gram., p. 374.

OBS. 9.--Again: "While it would be absurd, to sacrifice the established practice of all good authors to the ignorance of such readers [as could possibly mistake for a diphthong the two contiguous vowels in such words as preexistence, cooperate, and reenter]; it would unquestionably be advantageous, to have some principle to guide us in that labyrinth of words, in which the hyphen appears to have been admitted or rejected arbitrarily, or at hap-hazard. Thus, though we find in Johnson, alms-basket, alms-giver, with the hyphen; we have almsdeed, almshouse, almsman, without: and many similar examples of an unsettled practice might be adduced, sufficient to fill several pages. In this perplexity, is not the pronunciation of the words the best guide? In the English language, every word of more than one syllable is marked by an accent on some particular syllable. Some very long words indeed admit a secondary accent on another syllable; but still this is much inferior, and leaves one leading accent prominent: as in expos'tulatory. Accordingly, when a compound has but one accented syllable in pronunciation, as night'cap, bed'stead, broad'sword, the two words have coalesced completely into one, and no hyphen should be admitted. On the other hand, when each of the radical words has an accent, as Chris'tian-name', broad'-shoul'dered, I think the hyphen should be used. Good'-na'tured is a compound epithet with two accents, and therefore requires the hyphen: in good nature, good will, and similar expressions, good is used simply as an adjective, and of course should remain distinct from the noun. Thus, too, when a noun is used adjectively, it should remain separate from the noun it modifies; as, a gold ring, a silver buckle. When two numerals are employed to express a number, without a conjunction between them, it is usual to connect them by a hyphen; as, twenty-five, eighty-four: but when the conjunction is inserted, the hyphen is as improper as it would be between other words connected by the conjunction. This, however, is a common abuse; and we often meet with five-&-twenty, six-&-thirty, and the like."--Ib., p. 376. Thus far Churchill: who appears to me, however, too hasty about the hyphen in compound numerals. For we write one hundred, two hundred, three thousand, &c., without either hyphen or conjunction; and as five-and-twenty is equivalent to twenty-five, and virtually but one word, the hyphen, if not absolutely necessary to the sense, is certainly not so very improper as he alleges. "Christian name" is as often written without the hyphen as with it, and perhaps as accurately.

IMPROPRIETIES FOR CORRECTION.

ERRORS IN THE FIGURE, OR FORM, OF WORDS.

UNDER RULE I.--OF COMPOUNDS.

"Professing to imitate Timon, the man hater."--Goldsmith's Rome, p. 161.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the compound term manhater is here made two words. But, according to Rule 1st, "Words regularly or analogically united, and commonly known as forming a compound, should never be needlessly broken apart." Therefore, manhater should be written as one word.]

"Men load hay with a pitch fork."--Webster's New Spelling-Book, p. 40. "A pear tree grows from the seed of a pear."--Ib., p. 33. "A tooth brush is good to brush your teeth."--Ib., p. 85. "The mail is opened at the post office."--Ib., p. 151. "The error seems to me two fold."--Sanborn's Gram., p. 230. "To pre-engage means to engage before hand."--Webster's New Spelling-Book, p. 82. "It is a mean act to deface the figures on a mile stone."--Ib., p. 88. "A grange is a farm and farm house."--Ib., p. 118. "It is no more right to steal apples or water melons, than money."--Ib., p. 118. "The awl is a tool used by shoemakers, and harness makers."--Ib., p. 150. "Twenty five cents are equal to one quarter of a dollar."--Ib., p. 107. "The blowing up of the Fulton at New York was a terrible disaster."--Ib., p. 54. "The elders also, and the bringers up of the children, sent to Jehu."--SCOTT: 2 Kings, x, 5. "Not with eye service, as men pleasers."--Bickersteth, on Prayer, p. 64. "A good natured and equitable construction of cases."--Ash's Gram., p. 138. "And purify your hearts, ye double minded."--Gurney's Portable Evidences, p. 115. "It is a mean spirited action to steal; i. e. to steal is a mean spirited action."--Grammar of Alex. Murray, the schoolmaster, p. 124. "There is, indeed, one form of orthography which is a kin to the subjunctive mood of the Latin tongue."--Booth's Introd. to Dict., p. 71. "To bring him into nearer connexion with real and everyday life."--Philological Museum, Vol. i, p. 459. "The common place, stale declamation of its revilers would be silenced."--Ib., i, 494. "She formed a very singular and unheard of project."--Goldsmith's Rome, p. 160. "He had many vigilant, though feeble talented, and mean spirited enemies."--ROBERTS VAUX: The Friend, Vol. vii, p. 74. "These old fashioned people would level our psalmody," &c.--Music of Nature, p. 292. "This slow shifting scenery in the theatre of harmony."--Ib., p. 398. "So we are assured from Scripture it self."--Harris's Hermes, p. 300. "The mind, being disheartened, then betakes its self to trifling."--R. Johnson's Pref. to Gram. Com. "Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them."--Beacon, p. 115: SCOTT, ALGER, FRIENDS: John, xx, 23. "Tarry we our selves how we will."--Walker's English Particles, p. 161. "Manage your credit so, that you need neither swear your self, nor want a voucher."--Collier's Antoninus, p. 33. "Whereas song never conveys any of the above named sentiments."--Rush, on the Voice, p. 424. "I go on horse back."--Guy's Gram., p. 54. "This requires purity, in opposition to barbarous, obsolete, or new coined words."--Adam's Gram., p. 242; Gould's, 234. "May the Plough share shine."--White's Eng. Verb, p. 161. "Which way ever we consider it."--Locke, on Ed., p. 83.

"Where e'er the silent (e) a Place obtains, The Voice foregoing, Length and softness gains." --Brightland's Gr., p. 15.

UNDER RULE II.--OF SIMPLES.

"It qualifies any of the four parts of speech abovenamed."--Kirkham's Gram., p. 83.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because abovenamed is here unnecessarily made a compound. But, according to Rule 2d, "When the simple words would only form a regular phrase, of the same meaning, the compounding of any of them ought to be avoided." Therefore, above and named should here have been written as two words.]

"After awhile they put us out among the rude multitude."--Fox's Journal. Vol. i, p. 169. "It would be ashame, if your mind should falter and give in."--Collier's Meditations of Antoninus, p. 94. "They stared awhile in silence one upon another."--Rasselas, p. 73. "After passion has for awhile exercised its tyrannical sway."--Murray's Gram., ii, 135 and 267. "Though set within the same general-frame of intonation."--Rush, on the Voice, p. 339. "Which do not carry any of the natural vocal-signs of expression."--Ib., p. 329. "The measurable constructive-powers of a few associable constituents."--Ib., p. 343. "Before each accented syllable or emphatic monosyllabic-word."--Ib., p. 364. "One should not think too favourably of oneself."--See Murray's Gram., Vol. i, p. 154. "Know ye not your ownselves, how that Jesus Christ is in you."--Barclay's Works, Vol. i, p. 355. "I judge not my ownself, for I know nothing of my ownself."-- Wayland's Moral Science, p. 84. "Though they were in such a rage, I desired them to tarry awhile."--Josephus, Vol. v, p. 179. "A instead of an is now used before words beginning with a long."--Murray's Gram., p. 31. "John will have earned his wages the next new-year's day."--Murray's Gram., p. 82. "A new-year's-gift is a present made on the first day of the year."--See Johnson, Walker, Webster, et al. "When he sat on the throne, distributing new-year's-gifts."--STILLINGFLEET, in Johnson's Dict. "St. Paul admonishes Timothy to refuse old-wives'- fables."--Author. "The world, take it altogether, is but one."-- Collier's Antoninus, B. vii, Sec. 9. "In writings of this stamp we must accept of sound instead of sense."--Murray's Gram., p. 298. "A male-child, A female-child, Male-descendants, Female-descendants."-- Goldsbury's C. S. Gram., p. 13; Rev. T. Smith's Gram., p. 15. "Male-servants, Female-servants. Male-relations, Female-relations."-- Felton's Gram., p. 15.

"Reserved and cautious, with no partial aim, My muse e'er sought to blast another's fame."--Lloyd, p. 162.

UNDER RULE III.--THE SENSE.

"Our discriminations of this matter have been but four footed instincts."--Rush, on the Voice, p. 291.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the term four footed is made two words, as if the instincts were four and footed. But, according to Rule 3d, "Words otherwise liable to be misunderstood, must be joined together, or written separately, as the sense and construction may happen to require." Therefore, four-footed, as it here means quadruped, or having four feet, should be one word.]

"He is in the right, (says Clytus,) not to bear free born men at his table."--Goldsmith's Greece, Vol. ii, p. 128. "To the short seeing eye of man, the progress may appear little."--The Friend, Vol. ix, p. 377. "Knowledge and virtue are, emphatically, the stepping stone to individual distinction."--Town's Analysis, p. 5. "A tin peddler will sell tin vessels as he travels."--Webster's New Spelling-Book, p. 44. "The beams of a wood-house are held up by the posts and joists."--Ib., p. 39. "What you mean by future tense adjective, I can easily understand."--Tooke's Diversions, Vol. ii, p. 450. "The town has been for several days very well behaved."--Spectator, No. 532. "A rounce is the handle of a printing press."--Webster's' Dict.; also El. Spelling-Book, p. 118. "The phraseology we call thee and thouing is not in so common use with us, as the tutoyant among the French."--Walker's Dict., w. Thy. "Hunting, and other out door sports, are generally pursued."--Balbi's Geog., p. 227. "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden."--SCOTT, ALGER, FRIENDS: Matt., xi, 28. "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son to save it."--Barclay's Works, i, p. 71. See SCOTT'S BIBLE: John, iii, 16. "Jehovah is a prayer hearing God: Nineveh repented, and was spared."--N. Y. Observer, Vol. x, p. 90. "These are well pleasing to God, in all ranks and relations."--Barclay's Works, Vol. i, p. 73. "Whosoever cometh any thing near unto the tabernacle."--Numb., xvii, 13. "The words coalesce, when they have a long established association."-- Murray's Gram., p. 169. "Open to me the gates of righteousness: I will go in to them."--OLD BIBLE: Ps., cxviii, 19. "He saw an angel of God coming into him."--See Acts, x, 3. "The consequences of any action are to be considered in a two fold light."--Wayland's Moral Science, p. 108. "We commonly write two fold, three fold, four fold, and so on up to ten fold, without a hyphen; and, after that, we use one."--Author. See Matt., xiii, 8. "When the first mark is going off, he cries turn! the glass holder answers done!"--Bowditch's Nav., p. 128. "It is a kind of familiar shaking hands with all the vices."--Maturin's Sermons, p. 170. "She is a good natured woman;" "James is self opinionated;" "He is broken hearted."--Wright's Gram., p. 147. "These three examples apply to the present tense construction only."--Ib., p. 65. "So that it was like a game of hide and go seek."--Edward's First Lessons in Grammar, p. 90.

"That lowliness is young ambition's ladder, Whereto the climber upward turns his face."--Bucke's Gram., p. 97.

UNDER RULE IV.--OF ELLIPSES.

"This building serves yet for a school and a meeting-house."

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the compound word schoolhouse is here divided to avoid a repetition of the last half. But, according to Rule 4th, "When two or more compounds are connected in one sentence, none of them should be split to make an ellipsis of half a word." Therefore, "school" should be "schoolhouse;" thus, "This building serves yet for a schoolhouse and a meeting-house."]

"Schoolmasters and mistresses of honest friends [are] to be encouraged."--N. E. Discipline, p. xv. "We never assumed to ourselves a faith or worship-making-power."--Barclay's Works, Vol. i, p. 83. "Pot and pearl ashes are made from common ashes."--Webster's New Spelling-Book, p. 69. "Both the ten and eight syllable verses are iambics."--Blair's Gram., p. 121. "I say to myself, thou, he says to thy, to his self; &c."--Dr. Murray's Hist. of Europ. Lang., Vol. ii p. 121. "Or those who have esteemed themselves skilful, have tried for the mastery in two or four horse chariots."--Zenobia, Vol. i, p. 152. "I remember him barefooted and headed, running through the streets."--Castle Rackrent, p. 68. "Friends have the entire control of the school and dwelling-houses."--The Friend, Vol. vii, p. 231. "The meeting is held at the first mentioned place in the first month, at the last in the second, and so on."--Ib., p. 167. "Meetings for worship are held at the same hour on first and fourth days."--Ib., p. 230. "Every part of it, inside and out, is covered with gold leaf."--Ib., p. 404. "The Eastern Quarterly Meeting is held on the last seventh day in second, fifth, eighth, and eleventh month."--Ib., p. 87. "Trenton Preparative Meeting is held on the third fifth day in each month, at ten o'clock; meetings for worship at the same hour on first and fifth days."--Ib., p. 231. "Ketch, a vessel with two masts, a main and mizzen-mast."--Webster's Dict., "I only mean to suggest a doubt, whether nature has enlisted herself as a Cis or Trans-Atlantic partisan?"-- Jefferson's Notes, p. 97. "By large hammers, like those used for paper and fullingmills, they beat their hemp."--MORTIMER: in Johnson's Dict. "Ant-hill, or Hillock, n. s. The small protuberances of earth, in which ants make their nests."--Ib. "It became necessary to substitute simple indicative terms called pro-names or nouns."--Enclytica, p. 16.

"Obscur'd, where highest woods, impenetrable To star or sun-light, spread their umbrage broad."--Milton.

UNDER RULE V.--THE HYPHEN.

"Evilthinking; a noun, compounded of the noun evil and the imperfect participle thinking; singular number;" &c.--Churchill's Gram., p. 180.

[FORMULE--Not proper, because the word evilthinking, which has more than one accented syllable, is here compounded without the hyphen. But, according to Rule 5th, "When the parts of a compound do not fully coalesce, or when each retains its original accent, so that the compound has more than one, or one that is movable, the hyphen should be inserted between them." Therefore, the hyphen should be used in this word; thus, evil-thinking.]

"Evilspeaking; a noun, compounded of the noun evil and the imperfect participle speaking."--Ib. "I am a tall, broadshouldered, impudent, black fellow."--SPECTATOR: in Johnson's Dict. "Ingratitude! thou marblehearted fiend."--SHAK.: ib. "A popular licence is indeed the manyheaded tyranny."--SIDNEY: ib. "He from the manypeopled city flies."--SANDYS: ib. "He manylanguaged nations has surveyed."--POPE: ib. "The horsecucumber is the large green cucumber, and the best for the table."--MORTIMER: ib. "The bird of night did sit, even at noonday, upon the market-place."--SHAK.: ib. "These make a general gaoldelivery of souls, not for punishment."--SOUTH: ib. "Thy air, thou other goldbound brow, is like the first."--SHAK.: ib. "His person was deformed to the highest degree; flatnosed, and blobberlipped."--L'ESTRANGE: ib. "He that defraudeth the labourer of his hire, is a bloodshedder."--ECCLUS., xxxiv, 22: ib. "Bloodyminded, adj. from bloody and mind. Cruel; inclined to blood-shed."--See Johnson's Dict. "Bluntwitted lord, ignoble in demeanour."--SHAK.: ib. "A young fellow with a bobwig and a black silken bag tied to it."--SPECTATOR: ib. "I have seen enough to confute all the boldfaced atheists of this age."--BRAMHALL: ib. "Before milkwhite, now purple with love's wound."--SHAK: ib. "For what else is a redhot iron than fire? and what else is a burning coal than redhot wood?"--NEWTON: ib. "Pollevil is a large swelling, inflammation, or imposthume in the horse's poll, or nape of the neck just between the ears."--FARRIER: ib.

"Quick-witted, brazenfac'd, with fluent tongues, Patient of labours, and dissembling wrongs."--DRYDEN: ib.

UNDER RULE VI.--NO HYPHEN.

"From his fond parent's eye a tear-drop fell."--Snelling's Gift for Scribblers, p. 43.

[FORMULE--Not proper, because the word tear-drop, which has never any other than a full accent on the first syllable, is here compounded with the hyphen. But, according to Rule 6th, "When a compound has but one accented syllable in pronunciation, and the parts are such as admit of a complete coalescence, no hyphen should be inserted between them." Therefore, teardrop should be made a close compound.]

"How great, poor jack-daw, would thy sufferings be!"--Ib., p. 29. "Placed like a scare-crow in a field of corn."--Ib., p. 39. "Soup for the alms-house at a cent a quart."--Ib., p. 23. "Up into the watch-tower get, and see all things despoiled of fallacies."--DONNE: Johnson's Dict., w. Lattice. "In the day-time she sitteth in a watchtower, and flieth most by night."--BACON: ib., w. Watchtower. "In the daytime Fame sitteth in a watch-tower, and flieth most by night."--ID.: ib., w. Daytime. "The moral is the first business of the poet, as being the ground-work of his instruction."--DRYDEN: ib., w. Moral. "Madam's own hand the mouse-trap baited."--PRIOR: ib., w. Mouse-trap. "By the sinking of the air-shaft the air hath liberty to circulate."--RAY: ib., w. Airshaft. "The multiform and amazing operations of the air-pump and the loadstone."--WATTS: ib., w. Multiform. "Many of the fire-arms are named from animals."--Ib., w. Musket. "You might have trussed him and all his apparel into an eel-skin."--SHAK.: ib., w. Truss. "They may serve as land-marks to shew what lies in the direct way of truth."--LOCKE: ib., w. Landmark. "A pack-horse is driven constantly in a narrow lane and dirty road."--Id. ib., w. Lane. "A mill-horse, still bound to go in one circle."--SIDNEY: ib., w. Mill-horse. "Of singing birds they have linnets, goldfinches, ruddocks, Canary-birds, black-birds, thrushes, and divers others."--CAREW: ib., w. Goldfinch. "Of singing birds, they have linnets, gold-finches, blackbirds, thrushes, and divers others."--ID.: ib., w. Blackbird. "Of singing birds, they have linnets, gold-finches, ruddocks, canary birds, blackbirds, thrushes, and divers other."--ID.: ib., w. Canary bird. "Cartrage, or Cartridge, a case of paper or parchment filled with gun-powder."--Johnson's Dict., 4to.

"Deep night, dark night, the silent of the night, The time of night when Troy was set on fire, The tune when screech-owls cry, and ban-dogs howl." SHAKSPEARE: ib., w. Silent.

"The time when screech-owls cry, and bandogs howl." IDEM.: ib., w. Bandog.

PROMISCUOUS ERRORS IN THE FIGURE OF WORDS.

LESSON I.--MIXED.

"They that live in glass-houses, should not throw stones."--Old Adage. "If a man profess Christianity in any manner or form soever."--Watts, p. 5. "For Cassius is a weary of the world."--SHAKSPEARE: in Kirkham's Elocution, p. 67. "By the coming together of more, the chains were fastened on."--Walker's Particles, p. 223. "Unto the carrying away of Jerusalem captive in the fifth month."--Jer., i, 3. "And the goings forth of the border shall be to Zedad."--Numbers, xxxiv, 8. "And the goings out of it shall be at Hazar-enan."--Ib., ver. 9. "For the taking place of effects, in a certain particular series."--Dr. West, on Agency, p. 39. "The letting go of which was the occasion of all that corruption."--Dr. J. Owen. "A falling off at the end always hurts greatly."--Blair's Lect., p. 126. "A falling off at the end is always injurious."--Jamieson's Rhetoric, p. 127. "As all holdings forth were courteously supposed to be trains of reasoning."--Dr. Murray's Hist. of Europ. Lang., Vol. i, p. 333. "Whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting."-- Micah, v, 2. "Some times the adjective becomes a substantive."-- Bradley's Gram., p. 104. "It is very plain, I consider man as visited a new."--Barclay's Works, Vol. iii, p. 331. "Nor do I any where say, as he falsely insinuates."--Ib., p. 331. "Every where, any where, some where, no where."--Alex. Murray's Gram., p. 55. "The world hurries off a pace, and time is like a rapid river."--Collier's Antoninus, p. 58. "But to now model the paradoxes of ancient skepticism."--Brown's Estimate, Vol. i, p. 102. "The south east winds from the ocean invariably produce rain."--Webster's Essays, p. 369. "North west winds from the high lands produce cold clear weather."--Ib. "The greatest part of such tables would be of little use to English men."--Priestley's Gram., p. 155. "The ground floor of the east wing of Mulberry street meeting house was filled."--The Friend, vii, 232. "Prince Rupert's Drop. This singular production is made at the glass houses."--Red Book, p. 131.

"The lights and shades, whose well accorded strife Gives all the strength and colour of our life." --Murray's Gram., p. 54; Fisk's, 65.

LESSON II.--MIXED.

"In the twenty and seventh year of Asa king of Judah did Zimri reign seven days in Tirzah."--1 Kings, xvi, 15. "In the thirty and first year of Asa king of Judah, began Omri to reign over Israel."--Ib., xvi, 23. "He cannot so deceive himself as to fancy that he is able to do a rule of three sum."--Foreign Quarterly Review. "The best cod are those known under the name of Isle of Shoals dun fish."--Balbi's Geog., p. 26. "The soldiers, with down cast eyes, seemed to beg for mercy."--Goldsmith's Greece, Vol. ii, p. 142. "His head was covered with a coarse worn out piece of cloth."--Ib., p. 124. "Though they had lately received a reinforcement of a thousand heavy armed Spartans."--Ib., p. 38. "But he laid them by unopened; and, with a smile, said, 'Business to morrow.'"--Ib., p. 7. "Chester monthly meeting is held at Moore's town, the third day following the second second day."--The Friend, Vol. vii, p. 124. "Eggharbour monthly meeting is held the first second day."--Ib., p. 124. "Little Egg Harbour Monthly Meeting is held at Tuckerton on the second fifth day in each month."--Ib., p. 231. "At three o'clock, on first day morning the 24th of eleventh month, 1834," &c.--Ib., p. 64. "In less than one-fourth part of the time usually devoted."--Kirkham's Gram., p. 4. "The pupil will not have occasion to use it one-tenth part as much."--Ib., p. 11. "The painter dips his paint brush in paint, to paint the carriage."--Ib., p. 28. "In an ancient English version of the New-Testament."--Ib., p. 74. "The little boy was bare headed."--Red Book, p. 36. "The man, being a little short sighted, did not immediately know him."--Ib., p. 40. "Picture frames are gilt with gold."--Ib., p. 44. "The park keeper killed one of the deer."--Ib., p. 44. "The fox was killed near the brick kiln."--Ib., p. 46. "Here comes Esther, with her milk pail."--Ib., p. 50. "The cabinet maker would not tell us."--Ib., p. 60. "A fine thorn hedge extended along the edge of the hill."--Ib., p. 65. "If their private interests should be ever so little affected."--Ib., p. 73. "Unios are fresh water shells, vulgarly called fresh water clams."--Ib., p. 102.

"Did not each poet mourn his luckless doom, Jostled by pedants out of elbow room."--Lloyd, p. 163.

LESSON III.--MIXED.

"The captive hovers a-while upon the sad remains."--PRIOR: in Johnson's Dict., w. Hover. "Constantia saw that the hand writing agreed with the contents of the letter."--ADDISON: ib., w. Hand. "They have put me in a silk night-gown, and a gaudy fool's cap."--ID.: ib., w. Nightgown. "Have you no more manners than to rail at Hocus, that has saved that clod-pated, numskull'd ninnyhammer of yours from ruin, and all his family?"--ARBUTHNOT: ib., w. Ninnyhammer. "A noble, that is, six, shillings and eightpence, is, and usually hath been paid."--BACON: ib., w. Noble. "The king of birds thick feather'd and with full-summed wings, fastened his talons east and west."--HOWELL: ib., w. Full-summed. "To morrow. This is an idiom of the same kind, supposing morrow to mean originally morning: as, to night, to day."--Johnson's Dict., 4to. "To-day goes away and to-morrow comes."--Id., ib., w. Go, No. 70. "Young children, who are try'd in Go carts, to keep their steps from sliding."--PRIOR: ib., w. Go-cart. "Which, followed well, would demonstrate them but goers backward."--SHAK.: ib., w. Goer. "Heaven's golden winged herald late he saw, to a poor Galilean virgin sent."--CRASHAW: ib., w. Golden. "My penthouse eye-brows and my shaggy beard offend your sight."--DRYDEN: ib., w. Penthouse. "The hungry lion would fain have been dealing with good horse-flesh."-- L'ESTRANGE: ib., w. Nag. "A broad brimmed hat ensconced each careful head."--Snelling's Gift, p. 63. "With harsh vibrations of his three stringed lute."--Ib., p. 42. "They magnify a hundred fold an author's merit."--Ib., p. 14. "I'll nail them fast to some oft opened door."--Ib., p. 10. "Glossed over only with a saint-like show, still thou art bound to vice."--DRYDEN: in Johnson's Dict., w. Gloss. "Take of aqua-fortis two ounces, of quick-silver two drachms."--BACON: ib., w. Charge. "This rainbow never appears but when it rains in the sun-shine."--NEWTON: ib., w. Rainbow.

"Not but there are, who merit other palms; Hopkins and Stern hold glad the heart with Psalms." British Poets, Lond., 1800, Vol. vi, p. 405.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

IV. OF SPELLING

Spelling is the art of expressing words by their proper letters. This important art is to be acquired rather by means of the spelling-book or dictionary, and by observation in reading, than by the study of written rules; because what is proper or improper, depends chiefly upon usage.

The orthography of our language is attended with much uncertainty and perplexity: many words are variously spelled by the best scholars, and many others are not usually written according to the analogy of similar words. But to be ignorant of the orthography of such words as are spelled with uniformity, and frequently used, is justly considered disgraceful.

The following rules may prevent some embarrassment, and thus be of service to those who wish to be accurate.

RULES FOR SPELLING.

RULE I.--FINAL F, L, OR S.

Monosyllables ending in f, l, or s, preceded by a single vowel, double the final consonant; as staff, mill, pass--muff, knell, gloss--off, hiss, puss.

EXCEPTIONS.--The words clef, if, and of, are written with single f; and as, gas, has, was, yes, his, is, this, us, pus, and thus, with single s. So bul, for the flounder; nul, for no, in law; sol, for sou or sun; and sal, for salt, in chemistry, have but the single l.

OBS.--Because sal, salis, in Latin, doubles not the l, the chemists write salify, salifiable, salification, saliferous, saline, salinous, saliniform, salifying, &c., with single l, contrary to Rule 3d. But in gas they ought to double the s; for this is a word of their own inventing. Neither have they any plea for allowing it to form gases and gaseous with the s still single; for so they make it violate two general rules at once. If the singular cannot now be written gass, the plural should nevertheless be gasses, and the adjective should be gasseous, according to Rule 3d.

RULE II.--OTHER FINALS.

Words ending in any other consonant than f, l, or s, do not double the final letter; as, mob, nod, dog, sum, sun, cup, cur, cut, fix, whiz.

EXCEPTIONS.--We double the consonant in abb, ebb, add, odd, egg, jagg, ragg, inn, err, burr, purr, butt, buzz, fuzz, yarr, and some proper names. But we have also ab (from) and ad (to) for prefixes; and jag, rag, in, bur, and but, are other words that conform to the rule.

RULE III.--DOUBLING.

Monosyllables, and words accented on the last syllable, when they end with a single consonant preceded by a single vowel, or by a vowel after qu, double their final consonant before an additional syllable that begins with a vowel: as, rob, robbed, robber; fop, foppish, foppery; squat, squatter, squatting; thin, thinner, thinnest; swim, swimmer, swimming; commit, committeth, committing, committed, committer, committees; acquit, acquittal, acquittance, acquitted, acquitting, acquitteth.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. X final, being equivalent to ks, is never doubled: thus, from mix, we have mixed, mixing, and mixer. 2. When the derivative retains not the accent of the root, the final consonant is not always doubled: as, prefer', pref'erence, pref'erable; refer', ref'erence, ref'erable, or refer'rible; infer', in'ference, in'ferable, or infer'rible; transfer', a trans'fer, trans'ferable, or transfer'rible. 3. But letters doubled in Latin, are usually doubled in English, without regard to accent, or to any other principle: as, Britain, Britan'nic, Britannia; appeal, appel'lant; argil, argil'laus, argilla'ceous; cavil, cav'illous, cavilla'tion; excel', ex'cellent, ex'cellence; inflame', inflam'mable, inflamma'tion. See Observations 13 and 14, p. 199.

RULE IV.--NO DOUBLING.

A final consonant, when it is not preceded by a single vowel, or when the accent is not on the last syllable, should remain single before an additional syllable: as, toil, toiling; oil, oily; visit, visited; differ, differing; peril, perilous; viol, violist; real, realize, realist; dial, dialing, dialist; equal, equalize, equality; vitriol, vitriolic, vitriolate.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. The final l of words ending in el, must be doubled before an other vowel, lest the power of the e be mistaken, and a syllable be lost: as, travel, traveller; duel, duellist; revel, revelling; gravel, gravelly; marvel, marvellous. Yet the word parallel, having three Ells already, conforms to the rule in forming its derivatives; as, paralleling, paralleled, and unparalleled. 2. Contrary to the preceding rule, the preterits, participles, and derivative nouns, of the few verbs ending in al, il, or ol, unaccented,--namely, equal, rival, vial, marshal, victual, cavil, pencil, carol, gambol, and pistol,--are usually allowed to double the l, though some dissent from the practice: as, equalled, equalling; rivalled, rivalling; cavilled, cavilling, caviller; carolled, carolling, caroller. 3. When ly follows l, we have two Ells of course, but in fact no doubling: as, real, really; oral, orally; cruel, cruelly; civil, civilly; cool, coolly; wool, woolly. 4. Compounds, though they often remove the principal accent from the point of duplication, always retain the double letter: as, wit'snapper, kid'napper,[114] grass'hopper, duck'-legged, spur'galled, hot'spurred, broad'-brimmed, hare'-lipped, half-witted. So, compromitted and manumitted; but benefited is different.

RULE V.--FINAL CK.

Monosyllables and English verbs end not with c, but take ck for double c; as, rack, wreck, rock, attack: but, in general, words derived from the learned languages need not the k, and common use discards it; as, Italic, maniac, music, public.

EXCEPTIONS.--The words arc, part of a circle; orc, the name of a fish; lac, a gum or resin; and sac, or soc, a privilege, in old English law, are ended with c only. Zinc is, perhaps, better spelled zink; marc, mark; disc, disk; and talc, talck.

RULE VI.--RETAINING.

Words ending with any double letter, preserve it double before any additional termination, not beginning with the same letter;[115] as in the following derivatives: wooer, seeing, blissful, oddly, gruffly, equally, shelly, hilly, stiffness, illness, stillness, shrillness, fellness, smallness, drollness, freeness, grassless, passless, carelessness, recklessness, embarrassment, enfeoffment, agreement, agreeable.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. Certain irregular derivatives in d or t, from verbs ending in ee, ll, or ss, (as fled from flee, sold from sell, told from tell, dwelt from dwell, spelt from spell, spilt from spill, shalt from shall, wilt from will, blest from bless, past from pass,) are exceptions to the foregoing rule. 2. If the word pontiff is properly spelled with two Effs, its eight derivatives are also exceptions to this rule; for they are severally spelled with one; as, pontific, pontifical, pontificate, &c. 3. The words skillful, skillfully, willful, willfully, chillness, tallness, dullness, and fullness, have generally been allowed to drop the second l, though all of them might well be made to conform to the general rule, agreeably to the orthography of Webster.

RULE VII.--RETAINING.

Words ending with any double letter, preserve it double in all derivatives formed from them by means of prefixes: as, see, foresee; feoff, enfeoff; pass, repass; press, depress; miss, amiss; call, recall; stall, forestall; thrall, inthrall; spell, misspell; tell, foretell; sell, undersell; add, superadd; snuff, besnuff; swell, overswell.

OBSERVATION.--The words enroll, unroll, miscall, befall, befell, bethrall, reinstall, disinthrall, fulfill, and twibill, are very commonly written with one l, and made exceptions to this rule; but those authors are in the right who retain the double letter.

RULE VIII.--FINAL LL.

Final ll is peculiar to monosyllables and their compounds, with the few derivatives formed from such roots by prefixes; consequently, all other words that end in l, must be terminated with a single l: as, cabal, logical, appal, excel, rebel, refel, dispel, extol, control, mogul, jackal, rascal, damsel, handsel, tinsel, tendril, tranquil, gambol, consul.

OBSERVATION.--The words annul, until, distil, extil, and instil, are also properly spelled with one l; for the monosyllables null, till, and still are not really their roots, but rather derivatives, or contractions of later growth. Webster, however, prefers distill, extill, and instill with ll; and some have been disposed to add the other two.

RULE IX.--FINAL E.

The final e of a primitive word, when this letter is mute or obscure, is generally omitted before an additional termination beginning with a vowel: as, remove, removal; rate, ratable; force, forcible; true, truism; rave, raving; sue, suing; eye, eying; idle, idling; centre, centring.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. Words ending in ce or ge, retain the e before able or ous, to preserve the soft sounds of c and g: as, trace, traceable; change, changeable; outrage, outrageous. 2. So, from shoe, we write shoeing, to preserve the sound of the root; from hoe, hoeing, by apparent analogy; and, from singe, singeing; from swinge, swingeing; from tinge, tingeing; that they may not be confounded with singing, swinging, and tinging. 3. To compounds and prefixes, as firearms, forearm, anteact, viceagent, the rule does not apply; and final ee remains double, by Rule 6th, as in disagreeable, disagreeing.

RULE X.--FINAL E.

The final e of a primitive word is generally retained before an additional termination beginning with a consonant: as, pale, paleness; edge, edgeless; judge, judgeship; lodge, lodgement; change, changeful; infringe, infringement.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. When the e is preceded by a vowel, it is sometimes omitted; as in duly, truly, awful, argument; but much more frequently retained; as in dueness, trueness, blueness, bluely, rueful, dueful, shoeless, eyeless. 2. The word wholly is also an exception to the rule, for nobody writes it wholely. 3. Some will have judgment, abridgment, and acknowledgment, to be irreclaimable exceptions; but I write them with the e, upon the authority of Lowth, Beattie, Ainsworth, Walker, Cobb, Chalmers, and others: the French "jugement," judgement, always retains the e.

RULE XI--FINAL Y.

The final y of a primitive word, when preceded by a consonant, is generally changed into i before an additional termination: as, merry, merrier, merriest, merrily, merriment; pity, pitied, pities, pitiest, pitiless, pitiful, pitiable; contrary, contrariness, contrarily.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. This rule applies to derivatives, but not to compounds: thus, we write merciful, and mercy-seat; penniless, and pennyworth; scurviness, and scurvy-grass; &c. But ladyship and goodyship, being unlike secretariship and suretiship; handicraft and handiwork,[116] unlike handygripe and handystroke; babyship and babyhood, unlike stateliness and likelihood; the distinction between derivatives and compounds, we see, is too nice a point to have been always accurately observed. 2. Before ing or ish, the y is retained to prevent the doubling of i: as, pity, pitying; baby, babyish. 3. Words ending in ie, dropping the e by Rule 9th, change the i into y, for the same reason: as, die, dying; vie, vying; lie, lying.

RULE XII--FINAL Y.

The final y of a primitive word, when preceded by a vowel, should not be changed into i before any additional termination: as, day, days; key, keys; guy, guys; valley, valleys; coy, coyly; cloy, cloys, cloyed; boy, boyish, boyhood; annoy, annoyer, annoyance; joy, joyless, joyful.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. From lay, pay, say, and stay, are formed laid, paid, said, and staid; but the regular words, layed, payed, stayed, are sometimes used. 2. Raiment, contracted from arrayment, is never written with the y. 3. Daily is more common than the regular form dayly; but gayly, gayety, and gayness, are justly superseding gaily and gaiety.

RULE XIII.--IZE AND ISE.

Words ending in ize or ise sounded alike, as in wise and size, generally take the z in all such as are essentially formed by means of the termination; and the s in monosyllables, and all such as are essentially formed by means of prefixes: as, gormandise, apologize, brutalize, canonize, pilgrimize, philosophize, cauterize, anathematize, sympathize, disorganize, with z;[117] rise, arise, disguise, advise, devise, supervise, circumcise, despise, surmise, surprise, comprise, compromise, enterprise, presurmise, with s.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. Advertise, catechise, chastise, criticise,[118] exercise, exorcise, and merchandise, are most commonly written with s and size, assize, capsize, analyze, overprize, detonize, and recognize, with z. How many of them are real exceptions to the rule, it is difficult to say. 2. Prise, a thing taken, and prize, to esteem; apprise, to inform, and apprize, to value, or appraise, are often written either way, without this distinction of meaning, which some wish to establish. 3. The want of the foregoing rule has also made many words variable, which ought, unquestionably, to conform to the general principle.

RULE XIV.--COMPOUNDS.

Compounds generally retain the orthography of the simple words which compose them: as, wherein, horseman, uphill, shellfish, knee-deep, kneedgrass, kneading-trough, innkeeper, skylight, plumtree, mandrill.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. In permanent compounds, or in any derivatives of which, they are not the roots, the words full and all drop one l; as, handful, careful, fulfil, always, although, withal; in temporary compounds, they retain both; as, full-eyed, chock-full,[119] all-wise, save-all. 2. So the prefix mis, (if from miss, to err,) drops one s; but it is wrong to drop them both, as in Johnson's "mispell" and "mispend," for misspell and misspend. 3. In the names of days, the word mass also drops one s; as, Christmas, Candlemas, Lammas. 4. The possessive case often drops the apostrophe; as in herdsman, kitesfoot. 5. One letter is dropped, if three of the same kind come together: as, Rosshire, chaffinch; or else a hyphen is used: as, Ross-shire, ill-looking, still-life. 6. Chilblain, welcome, and welfare, drop one l. 7. Pastime drops an s. 8. Shepherd, wherever, and whosever, drop an e; and wherefore and therefore assume one.

RULE XV.--USAGE.

Any word for the spelling of which we have no rule but usage, is written wrong if not spelled according to the usage which is most common among the learned: as, "The brewer grinds his malt before he brues his beer."--Red Book, p. 38.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--The foregoing rules aim at no wild and impracticable reformation of our orthography; but, if carefully applied, they will do much to obviate its chief difficulties. Being made variable by the ignorance of some writers and the caprice of others, our spelling is now, and always has been, exceedingly irregular and unsettled. Uniformity and consistency can be attained in no other way, than by the steady application of rules and principles; and these must be made as few and as general as the case will admit, that the memory of the learner may not be overmatched by their number or complexity. Rules founded on the analogy of similar words, and sanctioned by the usage of careful writers, must be taken as our guides; because common practice is often found to be capricious, contradictory, and uncertain. That errors and inconsistencies abound, even in the books which are proposed to the world as standards of English orthography, is a position which scarcely needs proof. It is true, to a greater or less extent, of all the spelling-books and dictionaries that I have seen, and probably of all that have ever been published. And as all authors are liable to mistakes, which others may copy, general rules should have more weight than particular examples to the contrary. "The right spelling of a word may be said to be that which agrees the best with its pronunciation, its etymology, and with the analogy of the particular class of words to which it belongs."--Philological Museum, Vol. i, p. 647.

OBS. 2.--I do not deny that great respect is due to the authority of our lexicographers, or that great improvement was made in the orthography of our language when Dr. Johnson put his hand to the work. But sometimes one man's authority may offset an other's; and he that is inconsistent with himself, destroys his own: for, surely, his example cannot be paramount to his principles. Much has been idly said, both for and against the adoption of Johnson's Dictionary, or Webster's, as the criterion of what is right or wrong in spelling; but it would seem that no one man's learning is sufficiently extensive, or his memory sufficiently accurate, to be solely relied on to furnish a standard by which we may in all cases be governed. Johnson was generally right; but, like other men, he was sometimes wrong. He erred sometimes in his principles, or in their application; as when he adopted the k in such words as rhetorick, and demoniack; or when he inserted the u in such words as governour, warriour, superiour. Neither of these modes of spelling was ever generally adopted, in any thing like the number of words to which he applied them; or ever will be; though some indiscreet compilers are still zealously endeavouring to impose them upon the public, as the true way of spelling. He also erred sometimes by accident, or oversight; as when he spelled thus: "recall and miscal, inthrall and bethral, windfall and downfal, laystall and thumbstal, waterfall and overfal, molehill and dunghil, windmill and twibil, uphill and downhil." This occasional excision of the letter l is reprehensible, because it is contrary to general analogy, and because both letters are necessary to preserve the sound, and show the derivation of the compound. Walker censures it as a "ridiculous irregularity," and lays the blame of it on the "printers," and yet does not venture to correct it! See Johnson's Dictionary, first American edition, quarto; Walker's Pronouncing Dictionary, under the word Dunghil; and his Rhyming Dictionary, Introd., p. xv.

OBS. 3.--"Dr. Johnson's Dictionary" has been represented by some as having "nearly fixed the external form of our language." But Murray, who quotes this from Dr. Nares, admits, at the same time, that, "The orthography of a great number of English words, is far from being uniform, even amongst writers of distinction."--Gram., p. 25. And, after commending this work of Johnson's, as A STANDARD, from which, "it is earnestly to be hoped, that no author will henceforth, on light grounds, be tempted to innovate," he adds, "This Dictionary, however, contains some orthographical inconsistencies which ought to be rectified: such as, immovable, moveable; chastely, chastness; fertileness, fertily; sliness, slyly; fearlessly, fearlesness; needlessness, needlesly."--Ib. In respect to the final ck and our, he also intentionally departs from THE STANDARD which he thus commends; preferring, in that, the authority of Walker's Rhyming Dictionary, from which he borrowed his rules for spelling. For, against the use of k at the end of words from the learned languages, and against the u in many words in which Johnson used it, we have the authority, not only of general usage now, but of many grammarians who were contemporary with Johnson, and of more than a dozen lexicographers, ancient or modern, among whom is Walker himself. In this, therefore, Murray's practice is right, and his commended standard dictionary, wrong.

OBS. 4.--Of words ending in or or our, we have about three hundred and twenty; of which not more than forty can now with any propriety be written with the latter termination. Aiming to write according to the best usage of the present day, I insert the u in so many of these words as now seem most familiar to the eye when so written; but I have no partiality for any letters that can well be spared; and if this book should ever, by any good fortune, happen to be reprinted, after honour, labour, favour, behaviour, and endeavour, shall have become as unfashionable as authour, errour, terrour, and emperour, are now, let the proof-reader strike out the useless letter not only from these words, but from all others which shall bear an equally antiquated appearance.

OBS. 5.--I have suggested the above-mentioned imperfections in Dr. Johnson's orthography, merely to justify the liberty which I take of spelling otherwise; and not with any view to give a preference to that of Dr. Webster, who is now contending for the honour of having furnished a more correct standard. For the latter author, though right in some things in which the former was wrong, is, on the whole, still more erroneous and inconsistent. In his various attempts at reformation in our orthography, he has spelled many hundreds of words in such a variety of ways, that he knows not at last which of them is right, and which are wrong. But in respect to definitions, he has done good service to our literature; nor have his critics been sufficiently just respecting what they call his "innovations." See Cobb's Critical Review of the Orthography of Webster. To omit the k from such words as publick, or the u from such as superiour, is certainly no innovation; it is but ignorance that censures the general practice, under that name. The advocates for Johnson and opponents of Webster, who are now so zealously stickling for the k and the u in these cases, ought to know that they are contending for what was obsolete, or obsolescent, when Dr. Johnson was a boy.

OBS. 6.--I have before observed that some of the grammarians who were contemporary with Johnson, did not adopt his practice respecting the k or the u, in publick, critick, errour, superiour, &c. And indeed I am not sure there were any who did. Dr. Johnson was born in 1709, and he died in 1784. But Brightland's Grammar, which was written during the reign of Queen Anne, who died in 1714, in treating of the letter C, says, "If in any Word the harder Sound precedes (e), (i), or (y), (k) is either added or put in its Place; as, Skill, Skin, Publick: And tho' the additional (k) in the foregoing Word be an old Way of Spelling, yet it is now very justly left off, as being a superfluous Letter; for (c) at the End is always hard."--Seventh Edition, Lond., 1746, p. 37.

OBS. 7.--The three grammars of Ash, Priestley, and Lowth, all appeared, in their first editions, about one time; all, if I mistake not, in the year 1763; and none of these learned doctors, it would seem, used the mode of spelling now in question. In Ash, of 1799, we have such orthography as this: "Italics, public, domestic, our traffic, music, quick; error, superior, warrior, authors, honour, humour, favour, behaviour." In Priestley, of 1772: "Iambics, dactyls, dactylic, anapæstic, monosyllabic, electric, public, critic; author, emperor's, superior; favour, labours, neighbours, laboured, vigour, endeavour; meagre, hillock, bailiwick, bishoprick, control, travelling." In Lowth, of 1799: "Comic, critic, characteristic, domestic; author, favor, favored, endeavored, alledging, foretells." Now all these are words in the spelling of which Johnson and Webster contradict each other; and if they are not all right, surely they would not, on the whole, be made more nearly right, by being conformed to either of these authorities exclusively. For THE BEST USAGE is the ultimate rule of grammar.

OBS. 8.--The old British Grammar, written before the American Revolution, and even before "the learned Mr. Samuel Johnson" was doctorated, though it thus respectfully quotes that great scholar, does not follow him in the spelling of which I am treating. On the contrary, it abounds with examples of words ending in ic and or, and not in ick and our, as he wrote them; and I am confident, that, from that time to this, the former orthography has continued to be more common than his. Walker, the orthoëpist, who died in 1807, yielded the point respecting the k, and ended about four hundred and fifty words with c in his Rhyming Dictionary; but he thought it more of an innovation than it really was. In his Pronouncing Dictionary, he says, "It has been a custom, within these twenty years, to omit the k at the end of words, when preceded by c. This has introduced a novelty into the language, which is that of ending a word with an unusual letter," &c. "This omission of k is, however, too general to be counteracted, even by the authority of Johnson; but it is to be hoped it will be confined to words from the learned languages."-- Walker's Principles of Pronunciation, No. 400. The tenth edition of Burn's Grammar, dated 1810, says, "It has become customary to omit k after c at the end of dissyllables and trisyllables, &c. as music, arithmetic, logic; but the k is retained in monosyllables; as, back, deck, rick, &c."--P. 25. James Buchanan, of whose English Syntax there had been five American editions in 1792, added no k to such words as didactic, critic, classic, of which he made frequent use; and though he wrote honour, labour, and the like, with u, as they are perhaps most generally written now, he inserted no u in error, author, or any of those words in which that letter would now be inconsistent with good taste.

OBS. 9.--Bicknell's Grammar, of 1790, treating of the letter k, says, "And for the same reason we have dropt it at the end of words after c, which is there always hard; as in publick, logick, &c. which are more elegantly written public, logic."--Part ii, p. 13. Again: "It has heretofore joined with c at the end of words; as publick, logick; but, as before observed, being there quite superfluous, it is now left out"--Ib., p. 16. Horne Tooke's orthography was also agreeable to the rule which I have given on this subject. So is the usage of David Booth: "Formerly a k was added, as, rustick, politick, Arithmetick, &c. but this is now in disuse."--Booth's Introd. to Dict., Lond., 1814, p. 80.

OBS. 10.--As the authors of many recent spelling-books--Cobb, Emerson, Burhans, Bolles, Sears, Marshall, Mott, and others--are now contending for this "superfluous letter," in spite of all the authority against it, it seems proper briefly to notice their argument, lest the student be misled by it. It is summed up by one of them in the following words: "In regard to k after c at the end of words, it may be sufficient to say, that its omission has never been attempted, except in a small portion of the cases where it occurs; and that it tends to an erroneous pronunciation of derivatives, as in mimick, mimicking, where, if the k were omitted, it would read mimicing; and as c before i is always sounded like s, it must be pronounced mimising. Now, since it is never omitted in monosyllables, where it most frequently occurs, as in block, clock, &c., and can be in a part only of polysyllables, it is thought better to preserve it in all cases, by which we have one general rule, in place of several irregularities and exceptions that must follow its partial omission."--Bolles's Spelling-Book, p. 2. I need not tell the reader that these two sentences evince great want of care or skill in the art of grammar. But it is proper to inform him, that we have in our language eighty-six monosyllables which end with ck, and from them about fifty compounds or derivatives, which of course keep the same termination. To these may be added a dozen or more which seem to be of doubtful formation, such as huckaback, pickapack, gimcrack, ticktack, picknick, barrack, knapsack, hollyhock, shamrock, hammock, hillock, hammock, bullock, roebuck. But the verbs on which this argument is founded are only six; attack, ransack, traffick, frolick, mimick, and physick; and these, unquestionably, must either be spelled with the k, or must assume it in their derivatives. Now that useful class of words which are generally and properly written with final c, are about four hundred and fifty in number, and are all of them either adjectives or nouns of regular derivation from the learned languages, being words of more than one syllable, which have come to us from Greek or Latin roots. But what has the doubling of c by k, in our native monosyllables and their derivatives, to do with all these words of foreign origin? For the reason of the matter, we might as well double the l, as our ancestors did, in naturall, temporall, spirituall, &c.

OBS. 11.--The learner should observe that some letters incline much to a duplication, while gome others are doubled but seldom, and some, never. Thus, among the vowels, ee and oo occur frequently; aa is used sometimes; ii, never--except in certain Latin words, (wherein the vowels are separately uttered,) such as Horatii, Veii, iidem, genii. Again, the doubling of u is precluded by the fact that we have a distinct letter called Double-u, which was made by joining two Vees, or two Ues, when the form for u was v. So, among the consonants, f, l, and s, incline more to duplication, than any others. These letters are double, not only at the end of those monosyllables which have but one vowel, as staff, mill, pass; but also under some other circumstances. According to general usage, final f is doubled after a single vowel, in almost all cases; as in bailiff, caitiff, plaintiff, midriff, sheriff, tariff, mastiff: yet not in calif, which is perhaps better written caliph. Final l, as may be seen by Rule 8th, admits not now of a duplication like this; but, by the exceptions to Rule 4th, it is frequently doubled when no other consonant would be; as in travelling, grovelling; unless, (contrary to the opinion of Lowth, Walker, and Webster,) we will have fillipping, gossipping, and worshipping, to be needful exceptions also.

OBS. 12.--Final s sometimes occurs single, as in alas, atlas, bias; and especially in Latin words, as virus, impetus; and when it is added to form plurals, as verse, verses: but this letter, too, is generally doubled at the end of primitive words of more than one syllable; as in carcass, compass, cuirass, harass, trespass, embarrass. On the contrary, the other consonants are seldom doubled, except when they come under Rule 3d. The letter p, however, is commonly doubled, in some words, even when it forms a needless exception to Rule 4th; as in the derivatives from fillip, gossip, and perhaps also worship. This letter, too, was very frequently doubled in Greek; whence we have, from the name of Philip of Macedon, the words Philippic and Philippize, which, if spelled according to our rule for such derivatives, would, like galloped and galloper, siruped and sirupy, have but one p. We find them so written in some late dictionaries. But if fillipped, gossipped, and worshipped, with the other derivatives from the same roots, are just and necessary exceptions to Rule 4th, (which I do not admit,) so are these; and for a much stronger reason, as the classical scholar will think. In our language, or in words purely English, the letters h, i, j, k, q, v, w, x, and y, are, properly speaking, never doubled. Yet, in the forming of compounds, it may possibly happen, that two Aitches, two Kays, or even two Double-ues or Wies, shall come together; as in withhold, brickkiln, slowwoorm, bayyarn.

OBS. 13.--There are some words--as those which come from metal, medal, coral, crystal, argil, axil, cavil, tranquil, pupil, papil--in which the classical scholar is apt to violate the analogy of English derivation, by doubling the letter l, because he remembers the ll of their foreign roots, or their foreign correspondents. But let him also remember, that, if a knowledge of etymology may be shown by spelling metallic, metalliferous, metallography, metallurgic, metallurgist, metallurgy, medallic, medallion, crystallize, crystalline, argillous, argillaceous, axillar, axillary, cavillous, cavillation, papillate, papillous, papillary, tranquillity, and pupillary, with double l, ignorance of it must needs be implied in spelling metaline, metalist, metaloid, metaloidal, medalist, coralaceous, coraline, coralite, coralinite, coraloid, coraloidal, crystalite, argilite, argilitic, tranquilize, and pupilage, in like manner. But we cannot well double the l in the former, and not in the latter words. Here is a choice of difficulties. Etymology must govern orthography. But what etymology? our own, or that which is foreign? If we say, both, they disagree; and the mere English scholar cannot know when, or how far, to be guided by the latter. If a Latin diminutive, as papilla from papula or papa, pupillus from pupus, or tranquillus from trans and quietus, happen to double an l, must we forever cling to the reduplication, and that, in spite of our own rules to the contrary? Why is it more objectionable to change pupillaris to pupilary, than pupillus to pupil? or, to change tranquillitas to tranquility, than tranquillus to tranquil? And since papilous, pupilage, and tranquilize are formed from the English words, and not directly from the Latin, why is it not as improper to write them with double l, as to write perilous, vassalage, and civilize, in the same manner?

OBS. 14.--If the practice of the learned would allow us to follow the English rule here, I should incline to the opinion, that all the words which I have mentioned above, ought to be written with single l. Ainsworth exhibits the Latin word for coral in four forms, and the Greek word in three. Two of the Latin and two of the Greek have the l single; the others double it. He also spells "coraliticus" with one l, and defines it "A sort of white marble, called coraline." [120] The Spaniards, from whose medalla, we have medal; whose argil[121] is arcilla, from the Latin argilla; and to whose cavilar, Webster traces cavil; in all their derivatives from these Latin roots, metallum, metal--coralium, corallium, curalium, or corallum, coral--crystallus or crystallum, crystal--pupillus, pupil--and tranquillus, tranquil--follow their own rules, and write mostly with single l: as, pupilero, a teacher; metalico, metalic; corolina (fem.) coraline; cristalino, crystaline; crystalizar, crystalize; traquilizar, tranquilize; and tranquilidad, tranquility. And if we follow not ours, when or how shall the English scholar ever know why we spell as we do? For example, what can he make of the orthography of the following words, which I copy from our best dictionaries: equip', eq'uipage; wor'ship, wor'shipper;--peril, perilous; cavil, cavillous;[122]--libel, libellous; quarrel, quarrelous;--opal, opaline; metal, metalline;[123]--coral, coralliform; crystal, crystalform;--dial, dialist; medal, medallist;--rascal, rascalion; medal, medallion;--moral, moralist, morality; metal, metallist, metallurgy;--civil, civilize, civility; tranquil, tranquillize, tranquillity;--novel, novelism, novelist, novelize; grovel, grovelling, grovelled, groveller?

OBS. 15.--The second clause of Murray's or Walker's 5th Rule for spelling, gives only a single l to each of the derivatives above named.[124] But it also treats in like manner many hundreds of words in which the l must certainly be doubled. And, as neither "the Compiler," nor any of his copiers, have paid any regard to their own principle, neither their doctrine nor their practice can be of much weight either way. Yet it is important to know to what words the rule is, or is not, applicable. In considering this vexatious question about the duplication of l, I was at first inclined to admit that, whenever final l has become single in English by dropping the second l of a foreign root, the word shall resume the ll in all derivatives formed from it by adding a termination beginning with a vowel; as, beryllus, beryl, berylline. This would, of course, double the l in nearly all the derivatives from metal, medal, &c. But what says Custom? She constantly doubles the l in most of them; but wavers in respect to some, and in a few will have it single. Hence the difficulty of drawing a line by which we may abide without censure. Pu'pillage and pu'pillary, with ll, are according to Walker's Rhyming Dictionary; but Johnson spells them pu'pilage and pu'pilary, with single l; and Walker, in his Pronouncing Dictionary, has pupilage with one l, and pupillary with two. Again: both Johnson's and the Pronouncing Dictionary, give us medallist and metallist with ll, and are sustained by Webster and others; but Walker, in his Rhyming Dictionary, writes them medalist and metalist, with single l, like dialist, formalist, cabalist, herbalist, and twenty other such words. Further: Webster doubles the l in all the derivatives of metal, medal, coral, axil, argil, and papil; but writes it single in all those of crystal, cavil, pupil, and tranquil--except tranquillity.

OBS. 16.--Dr. Webster also attempts, or pretends, to put in practice the hasty proposition of Walker, to spell with single l all derivatives from words ending in l not under the accent. "No letter," says Walker, "seems to be more frequently doubled improperly than l. Why we should write libelling, levelling, revelling, and yet offering, suffering, reasoning, I am totally at a loss to determine; and, unless l can give a better plea than any other letter in the alphabet, for being doubled in this situation, I must, in the style of Lucian, in his trial of the letter T, declare for an expulsion."--Rhyming Dict., p. x. This rash conception, being adopted by some men of still less caution, has wrought great mischief in our orthography. With respect to words ending in el, it is a good and sufficient reason for doubling the l, that the e may otherwise be supposed servile and silent. I have therefore made this termination a general exception to the rule against doubling. Besides, a large number of these words, being derived from foreign words in which the l was doubled, have a second reason for the duplication, as strong as that which has often induced these same authors to double that letter, as noticed above. Such are bordel, chapel, duel, fardel, gabel, gospel, gravel, lamel, label, libel, marvel, model, novel, parcel, quarrel, and spinel. Accordingly we find, that, in his work of expulsion, Dr. Webster has not unfrequently contradicted himself, and conformed to usage, by doubling the l where he probably intended to write it single. Thus, in the words bordeller, chapellany, chapelling, gospellary, gospeller, gravelly, lamellate, lamellar, lamellarly, lamelliform, and spinellane, he has written the l double, while he has grossly corrupted many other similar words by forbearing the reduplication; as, traveler, groveling, duelist, marvelous, and the like. In cases of such difficulty, we can never arrive at uniformity and consistency of practice, unless we resort to principles, and such principles as can be made intelligible to the English scholar. If any one is dissatisfied with the rules and exceptions which I have laid down, let him study the subject till he can furnish the schools with better.

OBS. 17.--We have in our language a very numerous class of adjectives ending in able or ible, as affable, arable, tolerable, admissible, credible, infallible, to the number of nine hundred or more. In respect to the proper form and signification of some of these, there occurs no small difficulty. Able is a common English word, the meaning of which is much better understood than its origin. Horne Tooke supposes it to have come from the Gothic noun abal, signifying strength; and consequently avers, that it "has nothing to do with the Latin adjective habilis, fit, or able, from which our etymologists erroneously derive it."--Diversions of Purley, Vol. ii, p. 450. This I suppose the etymologists will dispute with him. But whatever may be its true derivation, no one can well deny that able, as a suffix, belongs most properly, if not exclusively, to verbs; for most of the words formed by it, are plainly a sort of verbal adjectives. And it is evident that this author is right in supposing that English words of this termination, like the Latin verbals in bilis, have, or ought to have, such a signification as may justify the name which he gives them, of "potential passive adjectives;" a signification in which the English and the Latin derivatives exactly correspond. Thus dis'soluble or dissolv'able does not mean able to dissolve, but capable of being dissolved; and divisible or dividable does not mean able to divide, but capable of being divided.

OBS. 18.--As to the application of this suffix to nouns, when we consider the signification of the words thus formed, its propriety may well be doubted. It is true, however, that nouns do sometimes assume something of the nature of verbs, so as to give rise to adjectives that are of a participial character; such, for instance, as sainted, bigoted, conceited, gifted, tufted. Again, of such as hard-hearted, good-natured, cold-blooded, we have an indefinite number. And perhaps, upon the same principle, the formation of such words as actionable, companionable, exceptionable, marketable, merchantable, pasturable, treasonable, and so forth, may be justified, if care be taken to use them in a sense analogous to that of the real verbals. But, surely, the meaning which is commonly attached to the words amicable, changeable, fashionable, favourable, peaceable, reasonable, pleasurable, seasonable, suitable, and some others, would never be guessed from their formation. Thus, suitable means fitting or suiting, and not able to suit, or capable of being suited.

OBS. 19.--Though all words that terminate in able, used as a suffix, are properly reckoned derivatives, rather than compounds, and in the former class the separate meaning of the parts united is much less regarded than in the latter; yet, in the use of words of this formation, it would be well to have some respect to the general analogy of their signification as stated above; and not to make derivatives of the same fashion convey meanings so very different as do some of these. Perhaps it is from some general notion of their impropriety, that several words of this doubtful character have already become obsolete, or are gradually falling into disuse: as, accustomable, chanceable, concordable, conusable, customable, behoovable, leisurable, medicinable, personable, powerable, razorable, shapable, semblable, vengeable, veritable. Still, there are several others, yet currently employed, which might better perhaps, for the same reason, give place to more regular terms: as, amicable, for friendly or kind; charitable, for benevolent or liberal; colourable, for apparent or specious; peaceable, for peaceful or unhostile; pleasurable, for pleasing or delightful; profitable, for gainful or lucrative; sociable, for social or affable; reasonable, for rational or just.

OBS. 20.--In respect to the orthography of words ending in able or ible, it is sometimes difficult to determine which of these endings ought to be preferred; as whether we ought to write tenable or tenible, reversable or reversible, addable or addible. In Latin, the termination is bilis, and the preceding vowel is determined by the conjugation to which the verb belongs. Thus, for verbs of the first conjugation, it is a; as, from arare, to plough, arabilis, arable, tillable. For the second conjugation, it is i; as, from doc=ere, to teach, docibilis, or docilis, docible or docile, teachable. For the third conjugation, it is i; as, from vend=ere, to sell, vendibilis, vendible, salable. And, for the fourth conjugation, it is i; as, from sepelire, to bury, sepelib~ilis, sep'elible,[125] buriable. But from solvo and volvo, of the third conjugation, we have ubilis, uble; as, solubilis, sol'uble, solvible or solvable; volubilis, vol'uble, rollable. Hence the English words, rev'oluble, res'oluble, irres'oluble, dis'soluble, indis'soluble, and insol'uble. Thus the Latin verbals in bilis, are a sufficient guide to the orthography of all such words as are traceable to them; but the mere English scholar cannot avail himself of this aid; and of this sort of words we have a much greater number than were ever known in Latin. A few we have borrowed from the French: as, tenable, capable, preferable, convertible; and these we write as they are written in French. But the difficulty lies chiefly in those which are of English growth. For some of them are formed according to the model of the Latin verbals in ibilis; as forcible, coercible, reducible, discernible; and others are made by simply adding the suffix able; as traceable, pronounceable, manageable, advisable, returnable. The last are purely English; and yet they correspond in form with such as come from Latin verbals in abilis.

OBS. 21.--From these different modes of formation, with the choice of different roots, we have sometimes two or three words, differing in orthography and pronunciation, but conveying the same meaning; as, divis'ible and divi'dable, des'picable and despi'sable, ref'erable and refer'rible, mis'cible and mix'able, dis'soluble, dissol'vible, and dissol'vable. Hence, too, we have some words which seem to the mere English scholar to be spelled in a very contradictory manner, though each, perhaps, obeys the law of its own derivation; as, peaceable and forcible, impierceable and coercible, marriageable and corrigible, damageable and eligible, changeable and tangible, chargeable and frangible, fencible and defensible, pref'erable and referrible, conversable and reversible, defendable and descendible, amendable and extendible, bendable and vendible, dividable and corrodible, returnable and discernible, indispensable and responsible, advisable and fusible, respectable and compatible, delectable and collectible, taxable and flexible.

OBS. 22.--The American editor of the Red Book, to whom all these apparent inconsistencies seemed real blunders, has greatly exaggerated this difficulty in our orthography, and charged Johnson and Walker with having written all these words and many more, in this contradictory manner, "without any apparent reason!" He boldly avers, that, "The perpetual contradictions of the same or like words, in all the books, show that the authors had no distinct ideas of what is right, and what is wrong;" and ignorantly imagines, that, "The use of ible rather than able, in any case, originated in the necessity of keeping the soft sound of c and g, in the derivatives; and if ible was confined to that use, it would be an easy and simple rule."--Red Book, p. 170. Hence, he proposes to write peacible for peaceable, tracible for traceable, changible for changeable, managible for manageable; and so for all the rest that come from words ending in ce or ge. But, whatever advantage there might be in this, his "easy and simple rule" would work a revolution for which the world is not yet prepared. It would make audible audable, fallible fallable, feasible feasable, terrible terrable, horrible horrable, &c. No tyro can spell in a worse manner than this, even if he have no rule at all. And those who do not know enough of Latin grammar to profit by what I have said in the preceding observation, may console themselves with the reflection, that, in spelling these difficult words entirely by guess, they will not miss the way more than some have done who pretended to be critics. The rule given by John Burn, for able and ible, is less objectionable; but it is rendered useless by the great number of its exceptions.

OBS. 23.--As most of the rules for spelling refer to the final letters of our primitive words, it may be proper for the learner to know and remember, that not all the letters of the alphabet can assume that situation, and that some of them terminate words much more frequently than others. Thus, in Walker's Rhyming Dictionary, the letter a ends about 220 words; b, 160; c, 450; d, 1550; e, 7000; f, 140; g, 280; h, 400; i, 29; j, none; k, 550; l, 1900; m, 550; n, 3300; o, 200; p, 450; q, none; r, 2750; s, 3250; t, 3100; u, 14; v, none; w, 200; x, 100; y, 5000; z, 5. We have, then, three consonants, j, q, and v, which never end a word. And why not? With respect to j and v, the reason is plain from their history. These letters were formerly identified with i and u, which are not terminational letters. The vowel i ends no pure English word, except that which is formed of its own capital I; and the few words which end with u are all foreign, except thou and you. And not only so, the letter j is what was formerly called i consonant; and v is what was called u consonant. But it was the initial i and u, or the i and u which preceded an other vowel, and not those which followed one, that were converted into the consonants j and v. Hence, neither of these letters ever ends any English word, or is ever doubled. Nor do they unite with other consonants before or after a vowel: except that v is joined with r in a few words of French origin, as livre, manoeuvre; or with l in some Dutch names, as Watervleit. Q ends no English word, because it is always followed by u. The French termination que, which is commonly retained in pique, antique, critique, opaque, oblique, burlesque, and grotesque, is equivalent to k; hence we write packet, lackey, checker, risk, mask, and mosk, rather than paquet, laquey, chequer, risque, masque, and mosque. And some authors write burlesk and grotesk, preferring k to que.

OBS. 24.--Thus we see that j, q, and v, are, for the most part, initial consonants only. Hence there is a harshness, if not an impropriety, in that syllabication which some have recently adopted, wherein they accommodate to the ear the division of such words as maj-es-ty, proj-ect, traj-ect,--eq-ui-ty, liq-ui-date, ex-cheq-uer. But v, in a similar situation, has now become familiar; as in ev-er-y, ev-i-dence: and it may also stand with l or r, in the division of such words as solv-ing and serv-ing. Of words ending in ive, Walker exhibits four hundred and fifty--exactly the same number that he spells with ic. And Horne Tooke, who derives ive from the Latin ivus, (q. d. vis,) and ic from the Greek [Greek: ikos], (q. d. [Greek: ischus]) both implying power, has well observed that there is a general correspondence of meaning between these two classes of adjectives--both being of "a potential active signification; as purgative, vomitive, operative, &c.; cathartic, emetic, energetic, &c."--Diversions of Purley, Vol. ii, p. 445. I have before observed, that Tooke spelled all this latter class of words without the final k; but he left it to Dr. Webster to suggest the reformation of striking the final e from the former.

OBS. 25.--In Dr. Webster's "Collection of Essays and Fugitiv Peeces," published in 1790, we find, among other equally ingenious improvements of our orthography, a general omission of the final e in all words ending in ive, or rather of all words ending in ve, preceded by a short vowel; as, "primitiv, derivativ, extensiv, positiv, deserv, twelv, proov, luv, hav, giv, liv." This mode of spelling, had it been adopted by other learned men, would not only have made v a very frequent final consonant, but would have placed it in an other new and strange predicament, as being subject to reduplication. For he that will write hav, giv, and liv, must also, by a general rule of grammar, write havving, givving, and livving. And not only so, there will follow also, in the solemn style of the Bible, a change of givest, livest, giveth, and liveth, into givvest, livvest, givveth, and livveth. From all this it may appear, that a silent final e is not always quite so useless a thing as some may imagine. With a levity no less remarkable, does the author of the Red Book propose at once two different ways of reforming the orthography of such words as pierceable, manageable, and so forth; in one of which, the letter j would be brought into a new position, and subjected sometimes to reduplication. "It would be a useful improvement to change this c into s, and g into j;" as, piersable, manajable, &c. "Or they might assume i;" as, piercibe, managible, &c.--Red Book, p. 170. Now would not this "useful improvement" give us such a word as allejjable? and would not one such monster be more offensive than all our present exceptions to Rule 9th? Out upon all such tampering with orthography!

OBS. 26.--If any thing could arrest the folly of innovators and dabbling reformers, it would be the history of former attempts to effect improvements similar to theirs. With this sort of history every one would do well to acquaint himself, before he proceeds to disfigure words by placing their written elements in any new predicament. If the orthography of the English language is ever reduced to greater regularity than it now exhibits, the reformation must be wrought by those who have no disposition either to exaggerate its present defects, or to undertake too much. Regard must be had to the origin, as well as to the sounds, of words. To many people, all silent letters seem superfluous; and all indirect modes of spelling, absurd. Hence, as the learner may perceive, a very large proportion of the variations and disputed points in spelling, are such as refer to the silent letters, which are retained by some writers and omitted by others. It is desirable that such as are useless and irregular should be always omitted; and such as are useful and regular always retained. The rules which I have laid down as principles of discrimination, are such as almost every reader will know to be generally true, and agreeable to present usage, though several of them have never before been printed in any grammar. Their application will strike out some letters which are often written, and retain some which are often omitted; but, if they err on either hand, I am confident they err less than any other set of rules ever yet formed for the same purpose. Walker, from whom Murray borrowed his rules for spelling, declares for an expulsion of the second l from traveller, gambolled, grovelling, equalling, cavilling, and all similar words; seems more willing to drop an l from illness, stillness, shrillness, fellness, and drollness, than to retain both in smallness, tallness, chillness, dullness, and fullness; makes it one of his orthographical aphorisms, that, "Words taken into composition often drop those letters which were superfluous in their simples; as, Christmas, dunghil, handful;" and, at the same time, chooses rather to restore the silent e to the ten derivatives from move and prove, from which Johnson dropped it, than to drop it from the ten similar words in which that author retained it! And not only so, he argues against the principle of his own aphorism; and says, "It is certainly to be feared that, if this pruning of our words of all the superfluous letters, as they are called, should be much farther indulged, we shall quickly antiquate our most respectable authors, and irreparably maim our language."--Walker's Rhyming Dict., p. xvii.

OBS. 27.--No attempt to subject our orthography to a system of phonetics, seems likely to meet with general favour, or to be free from objection, if it should. For words are not mere sounds, and in their orthography more is implied than in phonetics, or phonography. Ideographic forms have, in general, the advantage of preserving the identity, history, and lineage of words; and these are important matters in respect to which phonetic writing is very liable to be deficient. Dr. Johnson, about a century ago, observed, "There have been many schemes offered for the emendation and settlement of our orthography, which, like that of other nations, being formed by chance, or according to the fancy of the earliest writers in rude ages, was at first very various and uncertain, and [is] as yet sufficiently irregular. Of these reformers some have endeavoured to accommodate orthography better to the pronunciation, without considering that this is to measure by a shadow, to take that for a model or standard which is changing while they apply it. Others, less absurdly indeed, but with equal unlikelihood of success, have endeavoured to proportion the number of letters to that of sounds, that every sound may have its own character, and every character a single sound. Such would be the orthography of a new language to be formed by a synod of grammarians upon principles of science. But who can hope to prevail on nations to change their practice, and make all their old books useless? or what advantage would a new orthography procure equivalent to the confusion and perplexity of such an alteration?"--Johnson's Grammar before Quarto Dict., p. 4.

OBS. 28.--Among these reformers of our alphabet and orthography, of whose schemes he gives examples, the Doctor mentions, first, "Sir Thomas Smith, secretary of state to Queen Elizabeth, a man of real learning, and much practised in grammatical disquisitions;" who died in 1597;--next, "Dr. Gill, the celebrated master of St. Paul's School in London;" who died in 1635;--then, "Charles Butler, a man who did not want an understanding which might have qualified him for better employment;" who died in 1647;--and, lastly, "Bishop Wilkins, of Chester, a learned and ingenious critic, who is said to have proposed his scheme, without expecting to be followed;" he died in 1672.

OBS. 29.--From this time, there was, so far as I know, no noticeable renewal of such efforts, till about the year 1790, when, as it is shown above on page 134 of my Introduction, Dr. Webster, (who was then only "Noah Webster, Jun., attorney at law,") attempted to spell all words as they are spoken, without revising the alphabet--a scheme which his subsequent experience before many years led him to abandon. Such a reformation was again attempted, about forty years after, by an other young lawyer, the late lamented Thomas S. Grimke, of South Carolina, but with no more success. More recently, phonography, or phonetic writing, has been revived, and to some extent spread, by the publications of Isaac Pitman, of Bath, England, and of Dr. Andrew Comstock, of Philadelphia. The system of the former has been made known in America chiefly by the lectures and other efforts of Andrews and Boyle, of Dr. Stone, a citizen of Boston, and of E. Webster, a publisher in Philadelphia.

OBS. 30.--The pronunciation of words being evidently as deficient in regularity, in uniformity, and in stability, as is their orthography, if not more so, cannot be conveniently made the measure of their written expression. Concerning the principle of writing and printing by sounds alone, a recent writer delivers his opinion thus: "Let me here observe, as something not remote from our subject, but, on the contrary, directly bearing upon it, that I can conceive no [other] method of so effectually defacing and barbarizing our English tongue, no [other] scheme that would go so far to empty it, practically at least and for us, of all the hoarded wit, wisdom, imagination, and history which it contains, to cut the vital nerve which connects its present with the past, as the introduction of the scheme of 'phonetic spelling,' which some have lately been zealously advocating among us; the principle of which is, that all words should be spelt according as they are sounded, that the writing should be, in every case, subordinated to the speaking. The tacit assumption that it ought so to be, is the pervading error running through the whole system."--R. C. Trench, on the Study of Words, p. 177.

OBS. 31.--The phonographic system of stenography, tachygraphy, or short-hand writing, is, I incline to believe, a very great improvement upon the earlier methods. It is perhaps the most reliable mode of taking down speeches, sermons, or arguments, during their delivery, and reporting them for the press; though I cannot pronounce upon this from any experience of my own in the practice of the art. And it seems highly probable, if it has not been fully proved, that children may at first be taught to read more readily, and with better articulation, from phonetic print, or phonotypy, as it has been called, than from books that exhibit words in their current or established orthography. But still it is questionable whether it is not best for them to learn each word at first by its peculiar or ideographic form--the form in which they must ultimately learn to read it, and which indeed constitutes its only orthography.

IMPROPRIETIES FOR CORRECTION.

ERRORS IN SPELLING.

UNDER RULE I.--OF FINAL F, L, OR S.

"He wil observe the moral law, in hiz conduct."--Webster's Essays, p. 320.

[FORMULES--1. Not proper, because the word "wil" is here spelled with one l. But, according to Rule 1st, "Monosyllables ending in f, l, or s, preceded by a single vowel, double the final consonant." Therefore, this l should be doubled; thus, will.

2. Not proper again, because the word "hiz" is here spelled with z. But, according to the exceptions to Rule 1st, "The words as, gas, has, was, yes, his, &c., are written with single s." Therefore, this z should be s; thus, his.]

"A clif is a steep bank, or a precipitous rock."--See Rhyming Dict. "A needy man's budget is ful of schemes."--Old Adage. "Few large publications in this country wil pay a printer."--Noah Webster's Essays, p. x. "I shal, with cheerfulness, resign my other papers to oblivion."--Ib., p. x. "The proposition waz suspended til the next session of the legislature."--Ib., p. 362. "Tenants for life wil make the most of lands for themselves."--Ib., p. 366. "While every thing iz left to lazy negroes, a state wil never be wel cultivated."--Ib., p. 367. "The heirs of the original proprietors stil hold the soil."--Ib., p. 349. "Say my annual profit on money loaned shal be six per cent."--Ib., p. 308. "No man would submit to the drudgery of business, if he could make money az fast by lying stil."--Ib., p. 310. "A man may az wel feed himself with a bodkin, az with a knife of the present fashion."--Ib., p. 400. "The clothes wil be ill washed, the food wil be badly cooked; and you wil be ashamed of your wife, if she iz not ashamed of herself."--Ib., p. 404. "He wil submit to the laws of the state, while he iz a member of it."--Ib., p. 320. "But wil our sage writers on law forever think by tradition?"--Ib., p. 318. "Some stil retain a sovereign power in their territories."--Ib., p. 298. "They sel images, prayers, the sound of bels, remission of sins, &c."--Perkins's Theology, p. 401. "And the law had sacrifices offered every day for the sins of al the people."--Ib., p. 406. "Then it may please the Lord, they shal find it to be a restorative."--Ib., p. 420. "Perdition is repentance put of til a future day."--Old Maxim. "The angels of God, which wil good and cannot wil evil, have nevertheless perfect liberty of wil."--Perkins's Theology, p. 716. "Secondly, this doctrine cuts off the excuse of al sin."--Ib., p. 717. "Knel, the sound of a bell rung at a funeral."--Johnson and Walker.

"If gold with dros or grain with chaf you find, Select--and leave the chaf and dros behind."--Author.

UNDER RULE II.--OF OTHER FINALS.

"The mobb hath many heads, but no brains."--Old Maxim.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "mobb" is here spelled with double b. But, according to Rule 2d, "Words ending in any other consonant than f, l, or s, do not double the final letter." Therefore, this b should be single: thus, mob.]

"Clamm, to clog with any glutinous or viscous matter."--Johnson's Dict. "Whurr, to pronounce the letter r with too much force."--Ib. "Flipp, a mixed liquor, consisting of beer and spirits sweetened."--Ib. "Glynn, a hollow between two mountains, a glen."--Churchill's Grammar, p. 22. "Lamm, to beat soundly with a cudgel or bludgeon."--Walker's Dict. "Bunn, a small cake, a simnel, a kind of sweet bread."--See ib. "Brunett, a woman with a brown complexion."--Ib. and Johnson's Dict. "Wad'sett, an ancient tenure or lease of land in the Highlands of Scotland."--Webster's Dict. "To dodd sheep, is to cut the wool away about their tails."--Ib. "In aliquem arietare, CIC. To run full but at one."--Walker's Particles, p. 95. "Neither your policy nor your temper would permitt you to kill me."--Philological Museum, Vol. i, p. 427. "And admitt none but his own offspring to fulfill them."--Ib., i, 437. "The summ of all this Dispute is, that some make them Participles," &c.--Johnson's Gram. Com., p. 352. "As, the whistling of winds, the buz and hum of insects, the hiss of serpents, the crash of falling timber."--Blair's Rhet., p. 129; Adam's Lat. Gram., p. 247; Gould's, 238. "Vann, to winnow, or a fan for winnowing."--Walker's Rhyming Dict. "Creatures that buz, are very commonly such as will sting."--Author "Begg, buy, or borrow; butt beware how you find."--Id. "It is better to have a house to lett, than a house to gett."--Id. "Let not your tongue cutt your throat."--Old Precept. "A little witt will save a fortunate man."--Old Adage. "There is many a slipp 'twixt the cup and the lipp."--Id. "Mothers' darlings make but milksopp heroes."--Id. "One eye-witness is worth tenn hearsays."--Id.

"The judge shall jobb, the bishop bite the town, And mighty dukes pack cards for half a crown."--POPE: in Joh. Dict., w. Pack.

UNDER RULE III.--OF DOUBLING.

"Friz, to curl; frized, curled; frizing, curling."--Webster's Dict., 8vo. Ed. of 1829.

[FORMULE--Not proper, because the words "frized" and "frizing" are here spelled with the single z, of their primitive friz. But, according to Rule 3d, "Monosyllables, and words accented on the last syllable, when they end with a single consonant preceded by a single vowel, double their final consonant before an additional syllable that begins with a vowel." Therefore, this z should be doubled; thus, frizzed, frizzing.]

"The commercial interests served to foster the principles of Whigism."--Payne's Geog., Vol. ii, p. 511. "Their extreme indolence shuned every species of labour."--Robertson's Amer., Vol. i, p. 341. "In poverty and stripedness they attend their little meetings."--The Friend, Vol. vii, p. 256. "In guiding and controling[126] the power you have thus obtained."--Abbott's Teacher, p. 15. "I began, Thou beganest, He began; We began, You began, They began."--Alex. Murray's Gram., p. 92. "Why does began change its ending; as, I began, Thou beganest?"--Ib., p. 93. "Truth and conscience cannot be controled by any methods of coercion."--Hints on Toleration, p. xvi. "Dr. Webster noded, when he wrote 'knit, kniter, and knitingneedle' without doubling the t."--See El. Spelling-Book, 1st Ed., p. 136. "A wag should have wit enough to know when other wags are quizing him."--G. Brown. "Bon'y, handsome, beautiful, merry."--Walker's Rhyming Dict. "Coquetish, practicing coquetry; after the manner of a jilt."--Webster's Dict. "Potage, a species of food, made of meat and vegetables boiled to softness in water."--See ib. "Potager, from potage, a porringer, a small vessel for children's food."--See ib., and Worcester's. "Compromit, compromited, compromiting; manumit, manumitted, manumitting."--Webster. "Inferible; that may be inferred or deduced from premises."--Red Book, p. 228. "Acids are either solid, liquid, or gaseous."--Gregory's Dict., art. Chemistry. "The spark will pass through the interrupted space between the two wires, and explode the gases."--Ib. "Do we sound gases and gaseous like cases and caseous? No: they are more like glasses and osseous."--G. Brown. "I shall not need here to mention Swiming, when he is of an age able to learn."--Locke, on Ed., p. 12. "Why do lexicographers spell thinnish and mannish with two Ens, and dimish and ramish with one Em, each?"--See Johnson and Webster. "Gas forms the plural regularly, gases."--O. B. Peirce's Gram., p. 38. "Singular, Gas; Plural, Gases."--S. W. Clark's Gram., p. 47. "These are contractions from sheded, bursted."--Hiley's Grammar, p. 45. "The Present Tense denotes what is occuring at the present time."--Day's Gram., p. 36, and p. 61. "The verb ending in eth is of the solemn or antiquated style; as, he loveth, he walketh, he runeth."--P. Davis's Gram., p. 34.

"Thro' freedom's sons no more remonstrance rings, Degrading nobles and controling kings."--Murray's Sequel, p. 292.

UNDER RULE IV.--NO DOUBLING.

"A bigotted and tyrannical clergy will be feared."--Brown's Estimate, Vol. ii, p. 78.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the final t of bigot is here doubled in "bigotted." But, according to Rule 4th, "A final consonant, when it is not preceded by a single vowel, or when the accent is not on the last syllable, should remain single before an additional syllable." Therefore, this t should be single; thus, bigoted.]

"Jacob worshipped his Creator, leaning on the top of his staff."--Key in Merchant's Gram., p. 185. "For it is all marvelously destitute of interest."--Merchant's Criticisms. "As, box, boxes; church, churches; lash, lashes; kiss, kisses; rebus, rebusses."--Murray's Gram., 12mo, p. 42. "Gossipping and lying go hand in hand."--Old Maxim. "The substance of the Criticisms on the Diversions of Purley was, with singular industry, gossipped by the present precious secretary of war, in Payne the bookseller's shop."--See Key. "Worship makes worshipped, worshipper, worshipping; gossip, gossipped, gossipper, gossipping; fillip, fillipped, fillipper, fillipping."--Nixon's Parser, p. 72. "I became as fidgetty as a fly in a milk-jug."--Blackwood's Mag., Vol. xl, p. 674. "That enormous error seems to be rivetted in popular opinion."--Webster's Essays, p. 364. "Whose mind iz not biassed by personal attachments to a sovereign."--Ib., p. 318. "Laws against usury originated in a bigotted prejudice against the Jews."--Ib., p. 315. "The most criticcal period of life iz usually between thirteen and seventeen."--Ib., p. 388. "Generallissimo, the chief commander of an army or military force."--See El. Spelling-Book, p. 93. "Tranquillize, to quiet, to make calm and peaceful."--Ib., p. 133. "Pommeled, beaten, bruised; having pommels, as a sword or dagger."--Webster and Chalmers. "From what a height does the jeweler look down upon his shoemaker!"--Red Book, p. 108. "You will have a verbal account from my friend and fellow traveler."--Ib., p. 155. "I observe that you have written the word counseled with one l only."--Ib., p. 173. "They were offended at such as combatted these notions."--Robertson's America, Vol. ii, p. 437. "From libel, come libeled, libeler, libeling, libelous; from grovel, groveled, groveler, groveling; from gravel, graveled and graveling."--See Webster's Dict. "Wooliness, the state of being woolly."--Ib. "Yet he has spelled chappelling, bordeller, medallist, metalline, metallist, metallize, clavellated, &c. with ll, contrary to his rule."--Cobb's Review of Webster, p. 11. "Again, he has spelled cancelation and snively with single l, and cupellation, pannellation, wittolly, with ll."--Ib. "Oilly, fatty, greasy, containing oil, glib."--Rhyming Dict. "Medallist, one curious in medals; Metallist, one skilled in metals."--Johnson, Webster, Worcester, Cobb, et al. "He is benefitted."--Town's Spelling-Book, p. 5. "They traveled for pleasure."--S. W. Clark's Gram., p. 101.

"Without you, what were man? A groveling herd, In darkness, wretchedness, and want enchain'd." --Beattie's Minstrel, p. 40.

UNDER RULE V.--OF FINAL CK.

"He hopes, therefore, to be pardoned by the critick."--Kirkham's Gram., p. 10.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "critick" is here spelled with a final k. But, according to Rule 5th, "Monosyllables and English verbs end not with c, but take ck for double c; as, rack, wreck, rock, attack: but, in general, words derived from the learned languages need not the k, and common use discards it." Therefore, this k should be omitted; thus, critic.]

"The leading object of every publick speaker should be to persuade."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 153. "May not four feet be as poetick as five; or fifteen feet, as poetick as fifty?"--Ib., p. 146. "Avoid all theatrical trick and mimickry, and especially all scholastick stiffness."--Ib., p. 154. "No one thinks of becoming skilled in dancing, or in musick, or in mathematicks, or logick, without long and close application to the subject."--Ib., p. 152. "Caspar's sense of feeling, and susceptibility of metallick and magnetick excitement were also very extraordinary."--Ib., p. 238. "Authorship has become a mania, or, perhaps I should say, an epidemick."--Ib., p. 6. "What can prevent this republick from soon raising a literary standard?"--Ib., p. 10. "Courteous reader, you may think me garrulous upon topicks quite foreign to the subject before me."--Ib., p. 11. "Of the Tonick, Subtonick, and Atoniek elements."--Ib., p. 15. "The subtonick elements are inferiour to the tonicks in all the emphatick and elegant purposes of speech."--Ib., p. 32. "The nine atonicks, and the three abrupt subtonicks cause an interruption to the continuity of the syllabick impulse."--Ib., p. 37. "On scientifick principles, conjunctions and prepositions are but one part of speech."--Kirkham's Gram., p. 120. "That some inferior animals should be able to mimic human articulation, will not seem wonderful."--Murray's Gram., 8vo, Vol. i, p. 2.

"When young, you led a life monastick, And wore a vest ecelesiastick; Now, in your age, you grow fantastick."--Johnson's Dict.

UNDER RULE VI.--OF RETAINING.

"Fearlesness, exemption from fear, intrepidity."--Johnson's Dict.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "fearlesness" is here allowed to drop one s of fearless. But, according to Rule 6th, "Words ending with any double letter, preserve it double before any additional termination not beginning with the same letter." Therefore, the other s should be inserted; thus, fearlessness.]

"Dreadlesness; fearlesness, intrepidity, undauntedness."--Johnson's Dict. "Regardlesly, without heed; Regardlesness, heedlessness, inattention."--Ib. "Blamelesly, innocently; Blamlesness, innocence."--Ib. "That is better than to be flattered into pride and carelesness."--TAYLOR: Joh. Dict. "Good fortunes began to breed a proud recklesness in them."--SIDNEY: ib. "See whether he lazily and listlesly dreams away his time."--LOCKE: ib. "It may be, the palate of the soul is indisposed by listlesness or sorrow."--TAYLOR: ib. "Pitilesly, without mercy; Pitilesness, unmercifulness."--Johnson. "What say you to such as these? abominable, accordable, agreable, &c."--Tooke's Diversions, Vol. ii, p. 432. "Artlesly; naturally, sincerely, without craft."--Johnson. "A chilness, or shivering of the body, generally precedes a fever."--Murray's Key, p. 167. "Smalness; littleness, minuteness, weakness."--Rhyming Dict. "Gall-less, a. free from gall or bitterness."--Webster's Dict. "Talness; height of stature, upright length with comparative slenderness."--See Johnson et al. "Wilful; stubborn, contumacious, perverse, inflexible."--Id. "He guided them by the skilfulness of his hands."--Psal. lxxviii, 72. "The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof."--Murray's Key, p. 172. "What is now, is but an amasment of imaginary conceptions."--GLANVILLE: Joh. Dict. "Embarrasment; perplexity, entanglement."--See Littleton's Dict. "The second is slothfulness, whereby they are performed slackly and carelesly."--Perkins's Theology, p. 729. "Instalment; induction into office; part of a large sum of money, to be paid at a particular time."--See Johnson's Dict. "Inthralment; servitude, slavery."--Ib.

"I, who at some times spend, at others spare, Divided between carelesness and care."--Pope.

UNDER RULE VII.--OF RETAINING.

"Shall, on the contrary, in the first person, simply foretels."--Murray's Gram., p. 88; Ingersoll's, 136; Fisk's, 78; Jaudon's, 59; A. Flint's, 42; Wright's, 90; Bullions's, 32.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "foretels" does not here retain the double l of tell. But, according to Rule 7th, "Words ending with any double letter, preserve it double in all derivatives formed from them by means of prefixes." Therefore, the other l should be inserted; thus, foretells.]

"There are a few compound irregular verbs, as befal, bespeak, &c."--Ash's Gram., p. 46. "That we might frequently recal it to our memory."--Calvin's Institutes, p. 112. "The angels exercise a constant solicitude that no evil befal us."--Ib., p. 107. "Inthral; to enslave, to shackle, to reduce to servitude."--Walker's Dict. "He makes resolutions, and fulfils them by new ones."--Red Book, p. 138. "To enrol my humble name upon the list of authors on Elocution."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 12. "Forestal; to anticipate, to take up beforehand."--Walker's Rhym. Dict. "Miscal; to call wrong, to name improperly."--Johnson. "Bethral; to enslave, to reduce to bondage."--See id. "Befal; to happen to, to come to pass."--Rhym. Dict. "Unrol; to open what is rolled or convolved."--Johnson. "Counterrol; to keep copies of accounts to prevent frauds."--See id. "As Sisyphus uprols a rock, which constantly overpowers him at the summit."--Author. "Unwel; not well, indisposed, not in good health."--See Red Book, p. 336. "Undersel; to defeat by selling for less, to sell cheaper than an other."--See id., p. 332. "Inwal; to enclose or fortify with a wall."--See id., p. 295. "Twibil; an instrument with two bills, or with a point and a blade; a pickaxe, a mattock, a halberd, a battle-axe."--See Dict. "What you miscal their folly, is their care."--Dryden. "My heart will sigh when I miscal it so."--Shakspeare. "But if the arrangement recal one set of ideas more readily than another."--Blair's Rhet., p. 130.

"'Tis done; and since 'tis done, 'tis past recal; And since 'tis past recal, must be forgotten."--Dryden.

UNDER RULE VIII.--OF FINAL LL.

"The righteous is taken away from the evill to come."--Perkins's Works, p. 417.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "evill" is here written with final ll. But, according to Rule 8th, "Final ll is peculiar to monosyllables and their compounds, with the few derivatives formed from such roots by prefixes; consequently, all other words that end in l, must be terminated with a single l." Therefore, one l should be here omitted; thus, evil.]

"Patroll; to go the rounds in a camp or garrison, to march about and observe what passes."--Webster's Amer. Dict., 8vo. "Marshall; the chief officer of arms, one who regulates rank and order."--See Bailey's Dict. "Weevill; a destructive grub that gets among corn."--See Rhym. Dict. "It much excells all other studies and arts."--Walker's Particles, p. 217. "It is essentiall to all magnitudes, to be in one place."--Perkins's Works, p. 403. "By nature I was thy vassall, but Christ hath redeemed me."--Ib., p. 404. "Some, being in want, pray for temporall blessings."--Ib., p. 412. "And this the Lord doth, either in temporall or spirituall benefits."--Ib., p. 415. "He makes an idoll of them, by setting his heart on them."--Ib., p. 416. "This triall by desertion serveth for two purposes."--Ib., p. 420. "Moreover, this destruction is both perpetuall and terrible."--Ib., p. 726. "Giving to severall men several gifts, according to his good pleasure."--Ib., p. 731. "Untill; to some time, place, or degree, mentioned."--See Red Book, p. 330. "Annull; to make void, to nullify, to abrogate, to abolish." "Nitric acid combined with argill, forms the nitrate of argill."--Gregory's Dict., art. Chemistry.

"Let modest Foster, if he will, excell Ten Metropolitans in preaching well."--Pope, p. 414.

UNDER RULE IX.--OF FINAL E.

"Adjectives ending in able signify capacity; as, comfortable, tenable, improvable."--Priestley's Gram., p. 33.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "improveable" here retains the final e of improve. But, according to Rule 9th, "The final e of a primitive word is generally omitted before an additional termination beginning with a vowel." Therefore, this e should be omitted; thus, improvable.]

"Their mildness and hospitality are ascribeable to a general administration of religious ordinances."--Webster's Essays, p. 336. "Retrench as much as possible without obscureing the sense."--James Brown's Amer. Gram., 1821, p. 11. "Changable, subject to change; Unchangeable, immutable."--Walker's Rhym. Dict. "Tameable, susceptive of taming; Untameable, not to be tamed."--Ib. "Reconcileable, Unreconcileable, Reconcileableness; Irreconcilable, Irreconcilably, Irreconcilableness."--Johnson's Dict. "We have thought it most adviseable to pay him some little attention."-- Merchants Criticisms. "Proveable, that may be proved; Reprovable. blameable, worthy of reprehension."--Walker's Dict. "Moveable and Immovable, Moveably and Immovably, Moveables and Removal, Moveableness and Improvableness, Unremoveable and Unimprovable, Unremoveably and Removable, Proveable and Approvable, Irreproveable and Reprovable, Unreproveable and Improvable, Unimproveableness and Improvably."--Johnson's Dict. "And with this cruelty you are chargable in some measure yourself."--Collier's Antoninus, p. 94. "Mothers would certainly resent it, as judgeing it proceeded from a low opinion of the genius of their sex."--British Gram., Pref., p. xxv. "Titheable, subject to the payment of tithes; Saleable, vendible, fit for sale; Loseable, possible to be lost; Sizeable, of reasonable bulk or size."--Walker's Rhyming Dict. "When he began this custom, he was puleing and very tender."--Locke, on Ed., p. 8.

"The plate, coin, revenues, and moveables, Whereof our uncle Gaunt did stand possess'd."--Shak.

UNDER RULE X.--OF FINAL E.

"Diversly; in different ways, differently, variously."--Rhym. Dict., and Webster's.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "Diversly" here omits the final e of its primitive word, diverse. But, according to Rule 10th, "The final e of a primitive word is generally retained before an additional termination beginning with a consonant." Therefore, this e should be retained; thus, Diversely.]

"The event thereof contains a wholsome instruction."--Bacon's Wisdom of the Ancients, p. 17. "Whence Scaliger falsly concluded that articles were useless."--Brightland's Gram., p. 94. "The child that we have just seen is wholesomly fed."--Murray's Key, 8vo, p. 187. "Indeed, falshood and legerdemain sink the character of a prince."--Collier's Antoninus, p. 5. "In earnest, at this rate of managment, thou usest thyself very coarsly."--Ib., p. 19. "To give them an arrangment and diversity, as agreeable as the nature of the subject would admit"--Murray's Pref. to Ex., p. vi. "Alger's Grammar is only a trifling enlargment of Murray's little Abridgment."--Author. "You ask whether you are to retain or omit the mute e in the word judgment, abridgment, acknowledgment, lodgment, adjudgment, and prejudgment."--Red Book, p. 172. "Fertileness, fruitfulness; Fertily, fruitfully, abundantly."--Johnson's Dict. "Chastly, purely, without contamination; Chastness, chastity, purity."--Ib., and Walker's. "Rhymster, n. One who makes rhymes; a versifier; a mean poet."--Johnson and Webster. "It is therefore an heroical achievment to dispossess this imaginary monarch."--Berkley's Minute Philos., p. 151. "Whereby, is not meant the Present Time, as he imagins, but the Time Past."--Johnson's Gram. Com., p. 344 "So far is this word from affecting the noun, in regard to its definitness, that its own character of definitness or indefinitness, depends upon the name to which it is prefixed."--Webster's Philosophical Gram., p. 20.

"Satire, by wholsome Lessons, wou'd reclaim, And heal their Vices to secure their Fame." --Brightland's Gr., p. 171.

UNDER RULE XI.--OF FINAL Y.

"Solon's the veryest fool in all the play."--Dryden, from Persius, p. 475.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "veryest" here retains the final y of its primitive very. But, according to Rule 13th, "The final y of a primitive word, when preceded by a consonant, is generally changed into i before an additional termination." Therefore, this y should be changed to i; thus, veriest.]

"Our author prides himself upon his great slyness and shrewdness."--Merchant's Criticisms. "This tense, then, implys also the signification of Debeo."--B. Johnson's Gram. Com., p. 300. "That may be apply'd to a Subject, with respect to something accidental."--Ib., p. 133. "This latter accompanys his Note with a distinction."--Ib., p. 196. "This Rule is defective, and none of the Annotators have sufficiently supply'd it."--Ib., p. 204. "Though the fancy'd Supplement of Sanctius, Scioppius, Vossius, and Mariangelus, may take place."--Ib., p. 276. "Yet as to the commutableness of these two Tenses, which is deny'd likewise, they are all one."--Ib., p. 311. "Both these Tenses may represent a Futurity implyed by the dependence of the Clause."--Ib., p. 332. "Cry, cries, crying, cried, crier, decrial; Shy, shyer, shyest, shyly, shyness; Fly, flies, flying, flier, high-flier; Sly, slyer, slyest, slyly, slyness; Spy, spies, spying, spied, espial; Dry, drier, driest, dryly, dryness."--Cobb's Dict. "Cry, cried, crying, crier, cryer, decried, decrier, decrial; Shy, shyly, shily, shyness, shiness; Fly, flier, flyer, high-flyer; Sly, slily, slyly, sliness, slyness; Ply, plyer, plying, pliers, complied, compiler; Dry, drier, dryer, dryly, dryness."--Webster's Dict., 8vo. "Cry, crier, decrier, decrial; Shy, shily, shyly, shiness, shyness; Fly, flier, flyer, high-flier; Sly, slily, slyly, sliness, slyness; Ply, pliers, plyers, plying, complier; Dry, drier, dryer, dryly, dryness."--Chalmers's Abridgement of Todd's Johnson. "I would sooner listen to the thrumming of a dandyzette at her piano."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 24. "Send her away; for she cryeth after us."--Felton's Gram., p. 140. "IVYED, a. Overgrown with ivy."--Todd's Dict., and Webster's.

"Some dryly plain, without invention's aid, Write dull receipts how poems may be made."--Pope.

UNDER RULE XII.--OF FINAL Y.

"The gaiety of youth should be tempered by the precepts of age."--Mur. Key, p. 175.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "gaiety" does not here retain the final y of the primitive word gay. But, according to Rule 12th, "The final y of a primitive word, when preceded by a vowel, should not be changed into i before an additional termination." Therefore, this y should be retained; thus, gayety.]

"In the storm of 1703, two thousand stacks of chimnies were blown down, in and about London."--See Red Book, p. 112. "And the vexation was not abated by the hacknied plea of haste."--Ib., p. 142. "The fourth sin of our daies is lukewarmness."--Perkins's Works, p. 725. "God hates the workers of iniquity, and destroies them that speak lies."--Ib., p. 723. "For, when he laies his hand upon us, we may not fret."--Ib., p. 726. "Care not for it; but if thou maiest be free, choose it rather."--Ib., p. 736. "Alexander Severus saith, 'He that buieth, must sell: I will not suffer buyers and sellers of offices.'"--Ib., p. 737. "With these measures fell in all monied men."--SWIFT: Johnson's Dict. "But rattling nonsense in full vollies breaks."--POPE: ib., w. Volley. "Vallies are the intervals betwixt mountains."--WOODWARD: ib. "The Hebrews had fifty-two journies or marches."--Wood's Dict. "It was not possible to manage or steer the gallies thus fastened together."--Goldsmith's Greece, Vol. ii, p. 106. "Turkies were not known to naturalists till after the discovery of America."--See Gregory's Dict. "I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkies."--See Key. "Men worked at embroidery, especially in abbies."--Constable's Miscellany, Vol. xxi, p. 101. "By which all purchasers or mortgagees may be secured of all monies they lay out."--TEMPLE: Johnson's Dict. "He would fly to the mines and the gallies for his recreation."--SOUTH: Ib.

"Here pullies make the pond'rous oak ascend."--GAY: ib.

------------"You need my help, and you say, Shylock, we would have monies."--SHAKSPEARE: ib.

UNDER RULE XIII.--OF IZE AND ISE.

"Will any able writer authorise other men to revise his works?"--Author.

[FORMULES.--1. Not proper, because the word "authorise" is here written with s in the last syllable, in stead of z. But, according to Rule 13th, "Words ending in ize or ise sounded alike, as in wise and size, generally take the z in all such as are essentially formed by means of the termination." Therefore, this s should be z; thus, authorize.

2. Not proper again, because the word "revize" is here written with z in the last syllable, in lieu of s. But, according to Rule 13th, "Words ending in ize or ise sounded alike, as in wise and size, generally take the s, in monosyllables, and all such as are essentially formed by means of prefixes." Therefore, this z should be s; thus, revise.]

"It can be made as strong and expressive as this Latinised English."--Murray's Gram., p. 295. "Governed by the success or the failure of an enterprize."--Ib., Vol. ii, pp. 128 and 259. "Who have patronised the cause of justice against powerful oppressors."--Ib., pp. 94 and 228; Merchant, p. 199. "Yet custom authorises this use of it."--Priestley's Gram., p. 148. "They surprize myself, * * * and I even think the writers themselves will be surprized."--Ib., Pref., p. xi. "Let the interest rize to any sum which can be obtained."--Webster's Essays, p. 310. "To determin what interest shall arize on the use of money."--Ib., p. 313. "To direct the popular councils and check a rizing opposition."--Ib., p. 335. "Five were appointed to the immediate exercize of the office."--Ib., p. 340. "No man ever offers himself [as] a candidate by advertizing."--Ib., p. 344. "They are honest and economical, but indolent, and destitute of enterprize."--Ib., p. 347. "I would however advize you to be cautious."--Ib., p. 404. "We are accountable for whatever we patronise in others."--Murray's Key, p. 175. "After he was baptised, and was solemnly admitted into the office."--Perkins's Works, p. 732. "He will find all, or most of them, comprized in the Exercises."--British Gram., Pref., p. v. "A quick and ready habit of methodising and regulating their thoughts."--Ib., p. xviii. "To tyrannise over the time and patience of his reader."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. iii. "Writers of dull books, however, if patronised at all, are rewarded beyond their deserts."--Ib., p. v. "A little reflection, will show the reader the propriety and the reason for emphasising the words marked."--Ib., p. 163. "The English Chronicle contains an account of a surprizing cure."--Red Book, p. 61. "Dogmatise, to assert positively; Dogmatizer, an asserter, a magisterial teacher."--Chalmers's Dict. "And their inflections might now have been easily analysed."--Murray's Gram., 8vo, Vol. i, p. 113. "Authorize, disauthorise, and unauthorized; Temporize, contemporise, and extemporize."--Walkers Dict. "Legalize, equalise, methodise, sluggardize, womanise, humanize, patronise, cantonize, gluttonise, epitomise, anatomize, phlebotomise, sanctuarise, characterize, synonymise, recognise, detonize, colonise."--Ibid.

"This BEAUTY Sweetness always must comprize, Which from the Subject, well express'd will rise." --Brightland's Gr., p. 164.

UNDER RULE XIV.--OF COMPOUNDS.

"The glory of the Lord shall be thy rereward."--COMMON BIBLES: Isa., lviii, 8.

[FORMULE--Not proper, because the compound word "rereward" has not here the orthography of the two simple words rear and ward, which compose it. But, according to Rule 14th, "Compounds generally retain the orthography of the simple words which compose them." And, the accent being here unfixed, a hyphen is proper. Therefore, this word should be spelled thus, rear-ward.]

"A mere vaunt-courier to announce the coming of his master."--Tooke's Diversions, Vol. i, p. 49. "The parti-coloured shutter appeared to come close up before him."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 233. "When the day broke upon this handfull of forlorn but dauntless spirits."--Ib., p. 245. "If, upon a plumbtree, peaches and apricots are ingrafted, no body will say they are the natural growth of the plumbtree."--Berkley's Minute Philos., p. 45. "The channel between Newfoundland and Labrador is called the Straits of Bellisle."--Worcester's Gaz. "There being nothing that more exposes to Headach." [127]--Locke, on Education, p. 6. "And, by a sleep, to say we end the heartach."--SHAK.: in Joh. Dict. "He that sleeps, feels not the toothach."--ID., ibid. "That the shoe must fit him, because it fitted his father and granfather."--Philological Museum, Vol. i, p. 431. "A single word, mispelt, in a letter, is sufficient to show, that you have received a defective education."--Bucke's Gram., p. 3. "Which mistatement the committee attributed to a failure of memory."--Professors' Reasons, p. 14. "Then he went through the Banquetting-House to the scaffold."-- Smollett's England, Vol. iii, p. 345. "For the purpose of maintaining a clergyman and skoolmaster."--Webster's Essays, p. 355. "They however knew that the lands were claimed by Pensylvania."--Ib., p. 357. "But if you ask a reason, they immediately bid farewel to argument."--Red Book, p. 80. "Whom resist stedfast in the faith."--SCOTT: 1 Peter, v, 9. "And they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine."--Acts, ii, 42. "Beware lest ye also fall from your own stedfastness."--2 Peter, iii, 17. "Galiot, or galliott, a Dutch vessel, carrying a main-mast and a mizen-mast."--Web. Dict. "Infinitive, to overflow; Preterit, overflowed; Participle, overflown."--Cobbett's E. Gram., (1818,) p. 61. "After they have mispent so much precious Time."--British Gram., p. xv. "Some say, two handsfull; some, two handfulls; and others, two handfull."-- Alex. Murray's Gram., p. 106. "Lapfull, as much as the lap can contain."--Webster's Octavo Dict. "Darefull, full of defiance."-- Walker's Rhym. Dict. "The road to the blissfull regions, is as open to the peasant as to the king."--Murray's Key, 8vo, p. 167. "Mis-spel is mis-spell in every Dictionary which I have seen."--Barnes's Red Book. p. 303. "Downfal; ruin, calamity, fall from rank or state."--Johnson's Dict. "The whole legislature likewize acts az a court."--Webster's Essays, p. 340. "It were better a milstone were hanged about his neck."--Perkins's Works, p. 731. "Plum-tree, a tree that produces plums; Hog-plumbtree, a tree."--Webster's Dict. "Trisyllables ending in re or le, accent the first syllable."--Murray's Gram., p. 238.

"It happen'd on a summer's holiday, That to the greenwood shade he took his way." --Churchill's Gr., p. 135.

UNDER RULE XV.--OF USAGE.

"Nor are the modes of the Greek tongue more uniform."--Murray's Gram., p. 112.

[FORMULE.--Not proper, because the word "modes" is here written for moods, which is more common among the learned, and usually preferred by Murray himself. But, according to Rule 15th, "Any word for the spelling of which we have no rule but usage, is written wrong if not spelled according to the usage which is most common among the learned." Therefore, the latter form should be preferred; thus, moods, and not modes.]

"If we analize a conjunctive preterite, the rule will not appear to hold."--Priestley's Gram., p. 118. "No landholder would have been at that expence."--Ib., p. 116. "I went to see the child whilst they were putting on its cloaths."--Ib., p. 125. "This stile is ostentatious, and doth not suit grave writing."--Ib., p. 82. "The king of Israel, and Jehosophat the king of Judah, sat each on his throne."--Mur. Gram., p. 165, twice; Merchant's, 89; Churchill's, 300. "The king of Israel, and Jehosaphat the king of Judah, sat each on his throne."--Lowth's Gram., p. 90; Harrison's, 99; Churchill's, 138; Wright's, 148. "Lisias, speaking of his friends, promised to his father, never to abandon them."--Murray's Gram., Vol. ii, pp. 121 and 253. "Some, to avoid this errour, run into it's opposite."--Churchill's Gram., p. 199. "Hope, the balm of life, sooths us under every misfortune."--Merchants Key, p. 204. "Any judgement or decree might be heerd and reversed by the legislature."--Webster's Essays, p. 340. "A pathetic harang wil skreen from punishment any knave."--Ib., p. 341. "For the same reezon, the wimen would be improper judges."--Ibid. "Every person iz indulged in worshiping az he pleezes."--Ib., p. 345. "Most or all teechers are excluded from genteel company."--Ib., p. 362. "The Kristian religion, in its purity, iz the best institution on erth."--Ib., p. 364. "Neether clergymen nor human laws hav the leest authority over the conscience."--Ib., p. 363. "A gild is a society, fraternity, or corporation."--Red Book, p. 83. "Phillis was not able to unty the knot, and so she cut it."--Ib., p. 46. "An aker of land is the quantity of one hundred and sixty perches."--Ib., p. 93. "Oker is a fossil earth combined with the oxid of some metal."--Ib., p. 96. "Genii, when denoting ærial spirits: Geniuses, when signifying persons of genius."--Mur.'s Gram., i, p. 42. "Genii, when denoting æriel spirits; Geniuses, when signifying persons of genius."--Frost's Gram., p. 9. "Genius, Plu. geniuses, men of wit; but genii, ærial beings."--Nutting's Gram., p. 18. "Aerisius, king of Argos, had a beautiful daughter, whose name was Danæ."--Classic Tales, p. 109. "Phæton was the son of Apollo and Clymene."--Ib., p. 152. "But, after all, I may not have reached the intended Gaol."--Buchanan's Syntax, Pref., p. xxvii. "'Pitticus was offered a large sum.' Better: 'A large sum was offered to Pitticus.'"--Kirkham's Gram., p. 187. "King Missipsi charged his sons to respect the senate and people of Rome."--See ib., p. 161. "For example: Gallileo invented the telescope."--Ib., pp. 54 and 67. "Cathmor's warriours sleep in death."--Ib., p. 54. "For parsing will enable you to detect and correct errours in composition."--Ib., p. 50.

"O'er barren mountains, o'er the flow'ry plain, Extends thy uncontroul'd and boundless reign."--Dryden.

PROMISCUOUS ERRORS IN SPELLING.

LESSON I.--MIXED.

"A bad author deserves better usage than a bad critick."--POPE: Johnson's Dict., w. Former. "Produce a single passage superiour to the speech of Logan, a Mingo chief, delivered to Lord Dunmore, when governour of Virginia."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 247. "We have none synonimous to supply its place."--Jamieson's Rhetoric, p. 48. "There is a probability that the effect will be accellerated."--Ib., p. 48. "Nay, a regard to sound hath controuled the public choice."--Ib., p. 46. "Though learnt from the uninterrupted use of gutterel sounds."--Ib., p. 5. "It is by carefully filing off all roughness and inequaleties, that languages, like metals, must be polished."--Ib., p. 48. "That I have not mispent my time in the service of the community."--Buchanan's Syntax, Pref., p. xxviii. "The leaves of maiz are also called blades."--Webster's El. Spelling-Book, p. 43. "Who boast that they know what is past, and can foretel what is to come."--Robertson's Amer., Vol. i, p. 360. "Its tasteless dullness is interrupted by nothing but its perplexities."-- Abbott's Teacher, p. 18. "Sentences constructed with the Johnsonian fullness and swell."--Jamieson's Rhet., p. 130. "The privilege of escaping from his prefatory dullness and prolixity."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. iv. "But in poetry this characteristick of dulness attains its full growth."--Ib., p. 72. "The leading characteristick consists in an increase of the force and fullness."--Ib., p. 71. "The character of this opening fulness and feebler vanish."--Ib., p. 31. "Who, in the fullness of unequalled power, would not believe himself the favourite of heaven?"--Ib., p. 181. "They marr one another, and distract him."--Philological Museum, Vol. i, p. 433. "Let a deaf worshipper of antiquity and an English prosodist settle this."--Rush, on the Voice, p. 140. "This phillipic gave rise to my satirical reply in self-defence."-- Merchant's Criticisms. "We here saw no inuendoes, no new sophistry, no falsehoods."--Ib. "A witty and humourous vein has often produced enemies."--Murray's Key, p. 173. "Cry holla! to thy tongue, I pr'ythee: it curvetts unseasonably."--Shak. "I said, in my slyest manner, 'Your health, sir.'"--Blackwood's Mag., Vol. xl, p. 679. "And attornies also travel the circuit in pursute of business."--Red Book, p. 83. "Some whole counties in Virginia would hardly sel for the valu of the dets du from the inhabitants."--Webster's Essays, p. 301. "They were called the court of assistants, and exercized all powers legislativ and judicial."--Ib., p. 340. "Arithmetic is excellent for the guaging of liquors."--Murray's Gram., 8vo, p. 288. "Most of the inflections may be analysed in a way somewhat similar."--Ib., p. 112.

"To epithets allots emphatic state, Whilst principals, ungrac'd, like lacquies wait." --C. Churchill's Ros., p. 8.

LESSON II.--MIXED.

"Hence it [less] is a privative word, denoting destitution; as, fatherless, faithless, pennyless."--Webster's Dict., w. Less. "Bay; red, or reddish, inclining to a chesnut color."--Same. "To mimick, to imitate or ape for sport; a mimic, one who imitates or mimics."--Ib. "Counterroil, a counterpart or copy of the rolls; Counterrolment, a counter account."--Ib. "Millenium, the thousand years during which Satan shall be bound."--Ib. "Millenial, pertaining to the millenium, or to a thousand years."--Ib. "Thraldom; slavery, bondage, a state of servitude."--See Johnson's Dict. "Brier, a prickly bush; Briery, rough, prickly, full of briers; Sweetbriar, a fragrant shrub."--See Johnson, Walker, Chalmers, Webster, and others. "Will, in the second and third Persons, barely foretels."--British Gram., p. 132. "And therefor there is no Word false, but what is distinguished by Italics."--Ib., Pref., p. v. "What should be repeted is left to their Discretion."--Ib., p. iv. "Because they are abstracted or seperated from material Substances."--Ib., p. ix. "All Motion is in Time, and therefor, where-ever it exists, implies Time as its Concommitant."--Ib., p. 140. "And illiterate grown persons are guilty of blameable spelling."--Ib., Pref., p. xiv. "They wil always be ignorant, and of ruf uncivil manners."--Webster's Essays, p. 346. "This fact wil hardly be beleeved in the northern states."--Ib., p. 367. "The province however waz harrassed with disputes."--Ib., p. 352. "So little concern haz the legislature for the interest of lerning."--Ib., p. 349. "The gentlemen wil not admit that a skoolmaster can be a gentleman."--Ib., p. 362. "Such absurd qui-pro-quoes cannot be too strenuously avoided."--Churchill's Gram., p. 205. "When we say, 'a man looks slyly;' we signify, that he assumes a sly look."--Ib., p. 339. "Peep; to look through a crevice; to look narrowly, closely, or slyly."--Webster's Dict. "Hence the confession has become a hacknied proverb."--Wayland's Moral Science, p. 110. "Not to mention the more ornamental parts of guilding, varnish, &c."--Tooke's Diversions, Vol. i, p. 20. "After this system of self-interest had been rivetted."--Brown's Estimate, Vol. ii, p. 136. "Prejudice might have prevented the cordial approbation of a bigotted Jew."--SCOTT: on Luke, x.

"All twinkling with the dew-drop sheen, The briar-rose fell in streamers green."--Lady of the Lake, p. 16.

LESSON III.--MIXED.

"The infinitive mode has commonly the sign to before it."--Harrison's Gram., p. 25. "Thus, it is adviseable to write singeing, from the verb to singe, by way of distinction from singing, the participle of the verb to sing."--Ib., p. 27. "Many verbs form both the preterite tense and the preterite participle irregularly."--Ib., p. 28. "Much must be left to every one's taste and judgment."--Ib., p. 67. "Verses of different lengths intermixed form a Pindarick poem."--Priestley's Gram., p. 44. "He'll surprize you."--Frost's El. of Gram., p. 88. "Unequalled archer! why was this concealed?"--KNOWLES: ib., p. 102. "So gaily curl the waves before each dashing prow."--BYRON: ib., p. 104. "When is a dipthong called a proper dipthong?"--Infant School Gram., p. 11. "How many ss would goodness then end with? Three."--Ib., p. 33. "Q. What is a tripthong? A. A tripthong is the union of three vowels, pronounced in like manner."--Bacon's Gram., p. 7. "The verb, noun, or pronoun, is referred to the preceding terms taken seperately."--Ib., p. 47. "The cubic foot of matter which occupies the center of the globe."--Cardell's Gram., 18mo, p. 47. "The wine imbibes oxigen, or the acidifying principle, from the air."--Ib., p. 62. "Charcoal, sulphur, and niter, make gun powder."--Ib., p. 90. "It would be readily understood, that the thing so labeled, was a bottle of Madeira wine."--Ib., p. 99. "They went their ways, one to his farm, an other to his merchandize."--Ib., p. 130. "A dipthong is the union of two vowels, sounded by a single impulse of the voice."--Russell's Gram., p. 7. "The professors of the Mahommedan religion are called Mussulmans."--Maltby's Gram., p. 73. "This shews that let is not a sign of the imperative mood, but a real verb."--Ib., p. 51. "Those preterites and participles, which are first mentioned in the list, seem to be the most eligible."--Ib., p. 47. "Monosyllables, for the most part, are compared by er and est; and dyssyllables by more and most."--Ib., p. 19. "This termination, added to a noun, or adjective, changes it into a verb: as modern, to modernise; a symbol, to symbolize."--Churchill's Gram., p. 24. "An Abridgment of Murray's Grammar, with additions from Webster, Ash, Tooke, and others."--Maltby's title-page. "For the sake of occupying the room more advantagously, the subject of Orthography is merely glanced at."--Nutting's Gram., p. 5. "So contended the accusers of Gallileo."--O. B. Peirce's Gram., 12mo, 1839, p. 380. "Murray says, 'They were traveling past when we met them.'"--Peirce, ib., p. 361. "They fulfil the only purposes for which they are designed."--Ib., p. 359. "On the fulfillment of the event."--Ib., p. 175. "Fullness consists in expressing every idea."--Ib., p. 291. "Consistently with fulness and perspicuity."--Ib., p. 337. "The word verriest is a gross corruption; as, 'He is the verriest fool on earth.'"--Wright's Gram., p. 202. "The sound will recal the idea of the object."--Hiley's Gram., p. 142. "Formed for great enterprizes."--Bullions's Prin. of E. Gram., p. 153. "The most important rules and definitions are printed in large type, italicised."--Hart's Gram., p. 3. "HAMLETTED, a. Accustomed to a hamlet; countrified."-- Bolles's Dict., and Chalmers's. "Singular, spoonful, cup-full, coach-full, handful; plural, spoonfuls, cup-fulls, coach-fulls, handfuls."--Bullions's Analyt. and Pract. Gram., p. 27.

"Between Superlatives and following Names, OF, by Grammatick Right, a Station claims." --Brightland's Gram., p. 146.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

V. QUESTIONS

ORDER OF REHEARSAL, AND METHOD OF EXAMINATION.

[Fist][The student ought to be able to answer with readiness, and in the words of the book, all the following questions on grammar. And if he has but lately commenced the study, it may be well to require of him a general rehearsal of this kind, before he proceeds to the correction of any part of the false grammar quoted in the foregoing chapters. At any rate, he should be master of so many of the definitions and rules as precede the part which he attempts to correct; because this knowledge is necessary to a creditable performance of the exercise. But those who are very quick at reading, may perform it tolerably, by consulting the book at the time, for what they do not remember. The answers to these questions will embrace all the main text of the work; and, if any further examination be thought necessary, extemporaneous questions may be framed for the purpose.]

LESSON I.--GRAMMAR.

1. What is the name, or title, of this book? 2. What is Grammar? 3. What is an English Grammar? 4. What is English Grammar, in itself? and what knowledge does it imply? 5. If grammar is the art of reading, writing, and speaking, define these actions. What is it, to read? 6. What is it, to write? 7. What is it, to speak? 8. How is grammar to be taught, and by what means are its principles to be made known? 9. What is a perfect definition? 10. What is an example, as used in teaching? 11. What is a rule of grammar? 12. What is an exercise? 13. What was language at first, and what is it now? 14. Of what two kinds does the composition of language consist? and how do they differ? 15. What are the least parts of language? 16. What has discourse to do with sentences? or sentences, with points? 17. In extended compositions, what is the order of the parts, upwards from a sentence? 18. What, then, is the common order of literary division, downwards, throughout? 19. Are all literary works divided exactly in this way? 20. How is Grammar divided? 21. Of what does Orthography treat? 22. Of what does Etymology treat? 23. Of what does Syntax treat? 24. Of what does Prosody treat?

PART FIRST, ORTHOGRAPHY.

LESSON II.--LETTERS.

1. Of what does Orthography treat? 2. What is a letter? 3. What is an elementary sound of human voice, or speech? 4. What name is given to the sound of a letter? and what epithet, to a letter not sounded? 5. How many letters are there in English? and how many sounds do they represent? 6. In what does a knowledge of the letters consist? 7. What variety is there in the letters? and how are they always the same? 8. What different sorts of types, or styles of letters, are used in English? 9. What are the names of the letters in English? 10. What are their names in both numbers, singular and plural? 11. Into what general classes are the letters divided? 12. What is a vowel? 13. What is a consonant? 14. What letters are vowels? and what, consonants? 15. When are w and y consonants? and when, vowels? 16. How are the consonants divided? 17. What is a semivowel? 18. What is a mute? 19. What letters are reckoned semivowels? and how many of these are aspirates? 20. What letters are called liquids? and why? 21. What letters are reckoned mutes? and which of them are imperfect mutes?

LESSON III.--SOUNDS.

1. What is meant, when we speak of the powers of the letters? 2. Are the sounds of a language fewer than its words? 3. How are different vowel sounds produced? 4. What are the vowel sounds in English? 5. How may these sounds be modified in the formation of syllables? 6. Can you form a word upon each by means of an f? 7. Will you try the series again with a p? 8. How may the vowel sounds be written? and how uttered when they are not words? 9. Which of the vowel sounds form words? and what of the rest? 10. How many and what are the consonant sounds in English? 11. In what series of words may all these sounds be heard? 12. In what series of words may each of them be heard two or three times? 13. What is said of the sounds of j and x? 14. What is said of the sounds of c and g? 15. What is said of sc, or s before c? 16. What, of ce, ci, and ch? 17. What sounds has the consonant g? 18. In how many different ways can the letters of the alphabet be combined? 19. What do we derive from these combinations of sounds and characters?

LESSON IV.--CAPITALS.

1. What characters are employed in English? 2. Why should the different sorts of letters be kept distinct? 3. What is said of the slanting strokes in Roman letters? 4. For what purpose are Italics chiefly used? 5. In preparing a manuscript, how do we mark these things for the printer? 6. What distinction of form belongs to each of the letters? 7. What is said of small letters? and why are capitals used? 8. What things are commonly exhibited wholly in capitals? 9. How many rules for capitals are given in this book? and what are their titles? 10. What says Rule 1st of books? 11. What says Rule 2d of first words? 12. What says Rule 3d of names of Deity? 13. What says Rule 4th of proper names? 14. What says Rule 5th of titles? 15. What says Rule 6th of one capital? 16. What says Rule 7th of two capitals? 17. What says Rule 8th of compounds? 18. What says Rule 9th of apposition? 19. What says Rule 10th of personifications? 20. What says Rule 11th of derivatives? 21. What says Rule 12th of I and O? 22. What says Rule 13th of poetry? 23. What says Rule 14th of examples? 24. What says Rule 15th of chief words? 25. What says Rule 16th of needless capitals?

[Now turn to the first chapter of Orthography, and correct the improprieties there quoted for the practical application of these rules.]

LESSON V.--SYLLABLES.

1. What is a syllable? 2. Can the syllables of a word be perceived by the ear? 3. Under what names are words classed according to the number of their syllables? 4. Which of the letters can form syllables of themselves? and which cannot? 5. What is a diphthong? 6. What is a proper diphthong? 7. What is an improper diphthong? 8. What is a triphthong? 9. What is a proper triphthong? 10. What is an improper triphthong? 11. How many and what are the diphthongs in English? 12. How many and which of these are so variable in sound that they may be either proper or improper diphthongs? 13. How many and what are the proper diphthongs? 14. How many and what are the improper diphthongs? 15. Are proper triphthongs numerous in our language? 16. How many and what are the improper triphthongs? 17. What guide have we for dividing words into syllables? 18. How many special rules of syllabication are given in this book? and what are their titles, or subjects? 19. What says Rule 1st of consonants? 20. What says Rule 2d of vowels? 21. What says Rule 3d of terminations? 22. What says Rule 4th of prefixes? 23. What says Rule 5th of compounds? 24. What says Rule 6th of lines full?

[Now turn to the second chapter of Orthography, and correct the improprieties there quoted for the practical application of these rules.]

LESSON VI.--WORDS.

1. What is a word? 2. How are words distinguished in regard to species and figure? 3. What is a primitive word? 4. What is a derivative word? 5. What is a simple word? 6. What is a compound word? 7. How do permanent compounds differ from others? 8. How many rules for the figure of words are given in this book? and what are their titles, or subjects? 9. What says Rule 1st of compounds? 10. What says Rule 2d of simples? 11. What says Rule 3d of the sense? 12. What says Rule 4th of ellipses? 13. What says Rule 5th of the hyphen? 14. What says Rule 6th of no hyphen?

[Now turn to the third chapter of Orthography, and correct the improprieties there quoted for the practical application of these rules.]

LESSON VII.--SPELLING.

1. What is spelling? 2. How is this art to be acquired? and why so? 3. Why is it difficult to learn to spell accurately? 4. Is it then any disgrace to spell words erroneously? 5. What benefit may be expected from the rules for spelling? 6. How many rules for spelling are given in this book? and what are their titles, or subjects? 7. What says Rule 1st of final f, l, or s? 8. Can you mention the principal exceptions to this rule? 9. What says Rule 2d of other finals? 10. Are there any exceptions to this rule? 11. What says Rule 3d of the doubling of consonants? 12. Under what three heads are the exceptions to this rule noticed? 13. What says Rule 4th against the doubling of consonants? 14. Under what four heads are the apparent exceptions to this Rule noticed? 15. What says Rule 5th of final ck? 16. What monosyllables, contrary to this rule, end with c only? 17. What says Rule 6th of the retaining of double letters before affixes? 18. Under what three heads are the exceptions to this rule noticed? 19. What says Rule 7th of the retaining of double letters after prefixes? 20. What observation is made respecting exceptions to this rule?

LESSON VIII.--SPELLING.

21. What says Rule 8th of final ll, and of final l single? 22. What words does this rule claim, which might seem to come under Rule 7th? and why? 23. What says Rule 9th of final e omitted? 24. Under what three heads are the exceptions, real or apparent, here noticed? 25. What says Rule 10th of final e retained? 26. Under what three heads are the exceptions to this rule noticed? 27. What says Rule 11th of final y changed? 28. Under what three heads are the limits and exceptions to this rule noticed? 29. What says Rule 12th of final y unchanged? 30. Under what three heads are the exceptions to this rule noticed? 31. What says Rule 13th of the terminations ize and ise? 32. Under what three heads are the apparent exceptions to this rule noticed? 33. What says Rule 14th of compounds? 34. Under what seven heads are the exceptions to this rule noticed? 35. What says Rule 15th of usage, as a law of spelling?

[Now turn to the fourth chapter of Orthography, and correct the improprieties there quoted for the practical application of these rules and their exceptions.]

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

VI. FOR WRITING

EXERCISES IN ORTHOGRAPHY.

[Fist] [The following examples of false orthography are inserted here, and not explained in the general Key, that they may he corrected by the pupil in writing. Some of the examples here quoted are less inaccurate than others, but all of them, except a few shown in contrast, are, in some respect or other, erroneous. It is supposed, that every student who can answer the questions contained in the preceding chapter, will readily discern wherein the errors lie, and be able to make the necessary corrections.]

EXERCISE I.--CAPITALS.

"Alexander the great killed his friend Clitus."--Harrison's Gram., p. 68. "The words in italics are parsed in the same manner."--Maltby's Gram., p. 69. "It may be read by those who do not understand latin."--Barclay's Works, Vol. iii, p. 262. "A roman s being added to a word in italics or small capitals."--Churchill's Gram., p. 215. "This is not simply a gallicism, but a corruption of the French on; itself a corruption."-- Ib., p. 228. "The Gallicism, 'it is me,' is perpetually striking the ear in London."--Ib., p. 316. "'Almost nothing,' is a common Scotticism, equally improper: it should be, 'scarcely any thing.'"--Ib., p. 333. "To use learn for teach, is a common Scotticism, that ought to be carefully avoided."--See ib., p. 261. "A few observations on the subjunctive mood as it appears in our English bible."--Wilcox's Gram., p. 40. "The translators of the bible, have confounded two tenses, which in the original are uniformly kept distinct."--Ib., p. 40. "More like heaven on earth, than the holy land would have been."--Anti-Slavery Mag., Vol. i, p. 72. "There is now extant a poetical composition, called the golden verses of Pythagoras."-- Lempriere's Dict. "Exercise of the Mind upon Theorems of Science, like generous and manly Exercise of the Body, tends to call forth and strengthen Nature's original Vigour."--Harris's Hermes, p. 295. "O that I could prevail on Christians to melt down, under the warm influence of brotherly love, all the distinctions of methodists, independents, baptists, anabaptists, arians, trinitarians, unitarians, in the glorious name of christians."--KNOX: Churchill's Gram., p. 173. "Pythagoras long ago remarked, 'that ability and necessity dwell near each other.'"--Student's Manual, p. 285.

"The Latin Writers Decency neglect, But modern Readers challenge more Respect." --Brightland's Gram., p. 172.

EXERCISE II.--SYLLABLES.

1. Correct Bolles, in the division of the following words: "Del-ia, Jul-ia, Lyd-ia, heigh-ten, pat-ron, ad-roit, worth-y, fath-er, fath-er-ly, mar-chi-o-ness, i-dent-ic-al, out-ra-ge-ous, ob-nox-i-ous, pro-di-gi-ous, tre-mend-ous, ob-liv-i-on, pe-cul-i-ar."--Revised Spelling-Book: New London, 1831.

2. Correct Sears, in the division of the following words: "A-quil-a, hear-ty, drea-ry, wor-my, hai-ry, thor-ny, phil-os-o-phy, dis-cov-e-ry, re-cov-e-ry, ad-diti-on, am-biti-on, au-spici-ous, fac-titi-ous, fla-giti-ous, fru-iti-on, sol-stiti-al, ab-o-liti-on."--Standard Spelling-Book: "New Haven," 1826.

3. Correct Bradley, in the division of the following words: "Jes-ter, rai-ny, forg-e-ry, fin-e-ry, spic-e-ry, brib-e-ry, groc-e-ry, chi-can-e-ry, fer-riage, line-age, cri-ed, tri-ed, sù-ed, slic-ed, forc-ed, pledg-ed, sav-ed, dup-ed, strip-ed, touch-ed, trounc-ed."--Improved Spelling-Book: Windsor, 1815.

4. Correct Burhans, in the division of the following words: "Boar-der, brigh-ten, cei-ling, frigh-ten, glea-ner, lea-kage, suc-ker, mos-sy, fros-ty, twop-ence, pu-pill-ar-y, crit-i-call-y, gen-er-all-y, lit-er-all-y, log-i-call-y, trag-i-call-y, ar-ti-fici-al, po-liti-call-y, sloth-full-y, spite-full-y, re-all-y, sui-ta-ble, ta-mea-ble, flumm-er-y, nesc-i-ence, shep-her-dess, trav-ell-er, re-pea-ter, re-pressi-on, suc-cessi-on, un-lear-ned."--Critical Pronouncing Spelling-Book:[128] Philadelphia, 1823.

5. Correct Marshall, in the division of the following words: "Trench-er, trunch-eon, dros-sy, glos-sy, glas-sy, gras-sy, dres-ses, pres-ses, cal-ling, chan-ging, en-chan-ging, con-ver-sing, mois-ture, join-ture, qua-drant, qua-drate, trans-gres-sor, dis-es-teem."--New Spelling-Book: New York, 1836.

6. Correct Emerson, in the division of the following words: "Dus-ty mis-ty, mar-shy, mil-ky, wes-tern, stor-my, nee-dy, spee-dy, drea-ry, fros-ty, pas-sing, roc-ky, bran-chy, bland-ish, pru-dish, eve-ning, a-noth-er."--National Spelling-Book: Boston, 1828.

"Two Vowels meeting, each with its full Sound, Always to make Two Syllables are bound."--Brightland's Gram., p. 64.

EXERCISE III.--FIGURE OF WORDS.

"I was surprised by the return of my long lost brother."--Parker's Exercises in English Composition, p. 5. "Such singular and unheard of clemency cannot be passed over by me in silence."--Ib., p. 10. "I perceive my whole system excited by the potent stimulus of sun-shine."--Ib., p. 11. "To preserve the unity of a sentence, it is sometimes necessary to employ the case absolute, instead of the verb and conjunction."--Ib., p. 17. "Severity and hard hearted opinions accord with the temper of the times."--Ib., p. 18. "That poor man was put into the mad house."--Ib., p. 22. "This fellow must be put into the poor house."--Ib. p. 22. "I have seen the breast works and other defences of earth, that were thrown up."--Ib., p. 24. "Cloven footed animals are enabled to walk more easily on uneven ground."--Ib., p. 25. "Self conceit blasts the prospects of many a youth."--Ib., p. 26. "Not a moment should elapse without bringing some thing to pass."--Ib., p. 36. "A school master decoyed the children of the principal citizens into the Roman camp."--Ib., p. 39. "The pupil may now write a description of the following objects. A school room. A steam boat. A writing desk. A dwelling house. A meeting house. A paper mill. A grist mill. A wind mill."--Ib., p. 45. "Every metaphor should be founded on a resemblance which is clear and striking; not far fetched, nor difficult to be discovered."--Ib., p. 49. "I was reclining in an arbour overhung with honey suckle and jessamine of the most exquisite fragrance."--Ib., p. 51. "The author of the following extract is speaking of the slave trade."--Ib., p. 60. "The all wise and benevolent Author of nature has so framed the soul of man, that he cannot but approve of virtue."--Ib., p. 74. "There is something of self denial in the very idea of it."--Ib., p. 75. "Age therefore requires a well spent youth to render it happy."--Ib., p. 76. "Pearl-ash requires much labour in its extraction from ashes."--Ib., p. 91. "Club, or crump, footed, Loripes; Rough, or leather, footed, Plumipes."--Ainsworth's Dict.

"The honey-bags steal from the humble bees, And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs." --SHAK.: Joh.'s Dict., w. Glowworm.

"The honeybags steal from the bumblebees, And for night tapers crop their waxen thighs." --SHAK.: Joh.'s Dict., w. Humblebee.

"The honey bags steal from the humble-bees, And, for night tapers crop their waxen thighs." --Dodd's Beauties of Shak., p. 51.

EXERCISE IV.--SPELLING.

"His antichamber, and room of audience, are little square chambers wainscoted."--ADDISON: Johnson's Dict., w. Antechamber. "Nobody will deem the quicksighted amongst them to have very enlarged views of ethicks."--LOCKE: Ib., w. Quicksighted. "At the rate of this thick-skulled blunderhead, every plow-jobber shall take upon him to read upon divinity."--L'ESTRANGE: Ib., m. Blunderhead. "On the topmast, the yards, and boltsprit would I flame distinctly."--SHAK.: Ib., w. Bowsprit. "This is the tune of our catch plaid by the picture of nobody."--ID.: Ib., w. Nobody. "Thy fall hath left a kind of blot to mark the fulfraught man."--ID.: Ib., w. Fulfraught. "Till blinded by some Jack o'Lanthorn sprite."--Snelling's Gift, p. 62. "The beauties you would have me eulogise."--Ib., p. 14. "They rail at me--I gaily laugh at them."--Ib., p. 13. "Which the king and his sister had intrusted to him withall."--Josephus, Vol. v, p. 143. "The terms of these emotions are by no means synonimous."--Rush, on the Voice, p. 336. "Lillied, adj. Embellished with lilies."--Chalmers's Dict. "They seize the compendious blessing without exertion and without reflexion."--Philological Museum, Vol. i, p. 428. "The first cry that rouses them from their torpour, is the cry that demands their blood."--Ib., p. 433. "It meets the wants of elementary schools and deserves to be patronised."--Kirkham's Gram., p. 5. "Whose attempts were paralysed by the hallowed sound."--Music of Nature, p. 270. "It would be an amusing investigation to analyse their language."--Ib., p. 200. "It is my father's will that I should take on me the hostess-ship of the day."--SHAK.: in Johnson's Dict. "To retain the full apprehension of them undiminisht."--Phil. Museum., Vol. i, p. 458. "The ayes and noes were taken in the House of Commons."--Anti-Slavery Mag., Vol. i, p. 11. "Derivative words are formed by adding letters or syllables to primatives."--Davenport's Gram., p. 7. "The minister never was thus harrassed himself."--Nelson, on Infidelity, p. 6. "The most vehement politician thinks himself unbiassed in his judgment."--Ib., p. 17. "Mistress-ship, n. Female rule or dominion."--Webster's Dict.

"Thus forced to kneel, thus groveling to embrace, The scourge and ruin of my realm and race." --POPE: Ash's Gram., p. 83.

EXERCISE V.--MIXED ERRORS.

"The quince tree is of a low stature; the branches are diffused and crooked."--MILLER: Johnson's Dict. "The greater slow worm, called also the blindworm, is commonly thought to be blind, because of the littleness of his eyes."--GREW: ib. "Oh Hocus! where art thou? It used to go in another guess manner in thy time."--ARBUTHNOT: ib. "One would not make a hotheaded crackbrained coxcomb forward for a scheme of moderation."--ID.: ib. "As for you, colonel huff-cap, we shall try before a civil magistrate who's the greatest plotter."--DRYDEN: ib., w. Huff. "In like manner, Actions co-alesce with their Agents, and Passions with their Patients."--Harris's Hermes, p. 263. "These Sentiments are not unusual even with the Philosopher now a days."--Ib., p. 350. "As if the Marble were to fashion the Chizzle, and not the Chizzle the Marble."--Ib., p. 353. "I would not be understood, in what I have said, to undervalue Experiment."--Ib., p. 352. "How therefore is it that they approach nearly to Non-Entity's?"--Ib., p. 431. "Gluttonise, modernise, epitomise, barbarise, tyranise."--Churchill's Gram., pp. 31 and 42. "Now fair befal thee and thy noble house!"--SHAK.: ib., p. 241. "Nor do I think the error above-mentioned would have been so long indulged," &c.--Ash's Gram., p. 4. "The editor of the two editions above mentioned was pleased to give this little manuel to the public," &c.--Ib., p. 7. "A Note of Admiration denotes a modelation of the voice suited to the expression."--Ib., p. 16. "It always has some respect to the power of the agent; and is therefore properly stiled the potential mode."--Ib., p. 29. "Both these are supposed to be synonomous expressions."--Ib., p. 105. "An expence beyond what my circumstances admit."--DODDRIDGE: ib., p. 138. "There are four of them: the Full-Point, or Period; the Colon; the Semi-Colon; the Comma."--Cobbett's E. Gram., N. Y., 1818, p. 77. "There are many men, who have been at Latin-Schools for years, and who, at last, cannot write six sentences in English correctly."--Ib., p. 39. "But, figures of rhetorick are edge tools, and two edge tools too."--Ib., p. 182. "The horse-chesnut grows into a goodly standard."--MORTIMER: Johnson's Dict. "Whereever if is to be used."--O. B. Peirce's Gram., p. 175.

"Peel'd, patch'd, and pyebald, linsey-woolsey brothers." --POPE: Joh. Dict., w., Mummer.

"Peel'd, patch'd, and piebald, linsey-woolsey brothers." --ID.: ib., w. Piebald.

EXERCISE VI.--MIXED ERRORS.

"Pied, adj. [from pie.] Variegated; partycoloured."--Johnson's Dict. "Pie, [pica, Lat.] A magpie; a party-coloured bird."--Ib. "Gluy, adj. [from glue.] Viscous; tenacious; glutinous."--Ib. "Gluey, a. Viscous, glutinous. Glueyness. n. The quality of being gluey."--Webster's Dict. "Old Euclio, seeing a crow-scrat[129] upon the muck-hill, returned in all haste, taking it for an ill sign."--BURTON: Johnson's Dict. "Wars are begun by hairbrained[130] dissolute captains."--ID.: ib. "A carot is a well known garden root."--Red Book, p. 60. "Natural philosophy, metaphysicks, ethicks, history, theology, and politicks, were familiar to him."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 209. "The words in Italicks and capitals, are emphatick."--Ib., p. 210. "It is still more exceptionable; Candles, Cherrys, Figs, and other sorts of Plumbs, being sold by Weight, and being Plurals."--Johnson's Gram. Com., p. 135. "If the End of Grammar be not to save that Trouble, and Expence of Time, I know not what it is good for."--Ib., p. 161. "Caulce, Sheep Penns, or the like, has no Singular, according to Charisius."--Ib., p. 194. "These busibodies are like to such as reade bookes with intent onely to spie out the faults thereof"--Perkins's Works, p. 741. "I think it every man's indispensible duty, to do all the service he can to his country."--Locke, on Ed., p. 4. "Either fretting it self into a troublesome Excess, or flaging into a downright want of Appetite."--Ib., p. 23. "And nobody would have a child cramed at breakfast."--Ib., p. 23. "Judgeship and judgment, lodgable and alledgeable, alledgement and abridgment, lodgment and infringement, enlargement and acknowledgment."--Webster's Dict., 8vo. "Huckster, n. s. One who sells goods by retail, or in small quantities; a pedler."--Johnson's Dict.

"He seeks bye-streets, and saves th' expensive coach." --GAY: ib., w. Mortgage.

"He seeks by-streets, and saves th' expensive coach." --GAY: ib., w. By-street.

EXERCISE VII.--MIXED ERRORS.

"Boys like a warm fire in a wintry day."--Webster's El. Spelling-Book, p. 62. "The lilly is a very pretty flower."--Ib., p. 62. "The potatoe is a native plant of America."--Ib., p. 60. "An anglicism is a peculiar mode of speech among the English."--Ib., p. 136. "Black berries and raspberries grow on briars."--Ib., p. 150. "You can broil a beef steak over the coals of fire."--Ib., p. 38. "Beef'-steak, n. A steak or slice of beef for broiling."--Webster's Dict. "Beef'steak, s. a slice of beef for broiling."--Treasury of Knowledge. "As he must suffer in case of the fall of merchandize, he is entitled to the corresponding gain if merchandize rises."--Wayland's Moral Science, p. 258. "He is the worshipper of an hour, but the worldling for life."--Maturin's Sermons, p. 424. "Slyly hinting something to the disadvantage of great and honest men."--Webster's Essays, p. 329. "'Tis by this therefore that I Define the Verb; namely, that it is a Part of Speech, by which something is apply'd to another, as to its Subject."--Johnson's Gram. Com., p. 255. "It may sometimes throw a passing cloud over the bright hour of gaiety."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 178. "To criticize, is to discover errors; and to crystalize implies to freeze or congele."--Red Book, p. 68. "The affectation of using the preterite instead of the participle, is peculiarly aukward; as, he has came."--Priestley's Grammar, p. 125. "They are moraly responsible for their individual conduct."--Cardell's El. Gram., p. 21. "An engine of sixty horse power, is deemed of equal force with a team of sixty horses."--Red Book, p. 113. "This, at fourpence per ounce, is two shillings and fourpence a week, or six pounds, one shining and four pence a year."--Ib., p. 122. "The tru meening of parliament iz a meeting of barons or peers."--Webster's Essays, p. 276. "Several authorities seem at leest to favor this opinion."--Ib., p. 277. "That iz, az I hav explained the tru primitiv meening of the word."--Ib., p. 276. "The lords are peers of the relm; that iz, the ancient prescriptiv judges or barons."--Ib., p. 274.

"Falshood is folly, and 'tis just to own The fault committed; this was mine alone." --Pope, Odys., B. xxii, l. 168.

EXERCISE VIII--MIXED ERRORS.

"A second verb so nearly synonimous with the first, is at best superfluous."--Churchill's Gram., p. 332. "Indicate it, by some mark opposite [to] the word misspelt."--Abbott's Teacher, p. 74. "And succesfully controling the tendencies of mind."--Ib., p. 24. "It [the Monastick Life] looks very like what we call Childrens-Play."--[LESLIE'S] Right of Tythes, p. 236. "It seems rather lik Playing of Booty, to Please those Fools and Knaves."--Ib., Pref., p. vi. "And first I Name Milton, only for his Name, lest the Party should say, that I had not Cousider'd his Performance against Tythes."--Ib., p. iv. "His Fancy was too Predominant for his Judgment. His Talent lay so much in Satyr that he hated Reasoning."--Ib., p. iv. "He has thrown away some of his Railery against Tythes, and the Church then underfoot."--Ib., p. v. "They Vey'd with one another in these things."--Ib., p. 220. "Epamanondas was far the most accomplished of the Thebans."--Cooper's New Gram., p. 27. "Whoever and Whichever, are thus declined. Sing. and Plur. nom. whoever, poss. whoseever, obj. whomever. Sing. and Plu. nom. whichever, poss. whoseever, obj. whichever."--Ib., p. 38. "WHEREEVER, adv. [where and ever.] At whatever place."--Webster's Dict. "They at length took possession of all the country south of the Welch mountains."--Dobson's Comp. Gram., p. 7. "Those Britains, who refused to submit to the foreign yoke, retired into Wales."--Ib., p. 6. "Religion is the most chearful thing in the world."--Ib., p. 43. "Two means the number two compleatly, whereas second means only the last of two, and so of all the rest."--Ib., p. 44. "Now send men to Joppa, and call for one Simon, whose sirname is Peter."--Ib., p. 96. (See Acts, x, 5.) "In French words, we use enter instead of inter; as, entertain, enterlace, enterprize."--Ib., p. 101. "Amphiology, i. e. a speech of uncertain or doubtful meaning."--Ib., p. 103. "Surprize; as, hah! hey day! what! strange!"--Ib., p. 109. "Names of the letters: ai bee see dee ee ef jee aitch eye jay kay el em en o pee cue ar ess tee you voe double u eks wi zed."--Rev. W. Allen's Gram., p. 3.

"I, O, and U, at th' End of Words require, The silent (e), the same do's (va) desire." --Brightland's Gram., p. 15.

EXERCISE IX.--MIXED ERRORS.

"And is written for eacend, adding, ekeing."--Dr. Murray's Hist. of Europ. Lang., Vol. i, p. 222. "The Hindus have changed ai into e, sounded like e in where."--Ib., Vol. ii, p. 121. "And therefor I would rather see the cruelest usurper than the mildest despot."-- Philological Museum, Vol. i, p. 430. "Sufficiently distinct to prevent our marveling."--Ib., i, 477. "Possessed of this preheminence he disregarded the clamours of the people."--Smollett's England, Vol. iii, p. 222. "He himself, having communicated, administered the sacrament to some of the bye-standers."--Ib., p. 222. "The high fed astrology which it nurtured, is reduced to a skeleton on the leaf of an almanac."--Cardell's Gram., p. 6. "Fulton was an eminent engineer: he invented steam boats."--Ib., p. 30. "Then, in comes the benign latitude of the doctrine of goodwill."--SOUTH: in Johnson's Dict. "Being very lucky in a pair of long lanthorn-jaws, he wrung his face into a hideous grimace."--SPECTATOR: ib. "Who had lived almost four-and-twenty years under so politick a king as his father."--BACON: ib., w. Lowness. "The children will answer; John's, or William's, or whose ever it may be."--Infant School Gram., p. 32. "It is found tolerably easy to apply them, by practising a little guess work."--Cardell's Gram., p. 91. "For between which two links could speech makers draw the division line?"--Ib., p. 50. "The wonderful activity of the rope dancer who stands on his head."--Ib., p. 56. "The brilliancy which the sun displays on its own disk, is sun shine."--Ib., p. 63. "A word of three syllables is termed a trisyllable."--Murray's Gram., p. 23; Coar's, 17; Jaudon's, 13; Comly's, 8; Cooper's, New Gr., 8; Kirkham's, 20; Picket's, 10; Alger's, 12; Blair's, 1; Guy's, 2; Bolles's Spelling-Book, 161. See Johnson's Dict. "A word of three syllables is termed a trissyllable."--British Gram., p. 33; Comprehensive Gram., 23; Bicknell's, 17; Allen's, 31; John Peirce's, 149; Lennie's, 5; Maltby's, 8; Ingersoll's, 7; Bradley's, 66; Davenport's, 7; Bucke's, 16; Bolles's Spelling-Book, 91. See Littleton's Lat. Dict. (1.) "Will, in the first Persons, promises or threatens: But in the second and third Persons, it barely foretells."--British Gram., p. 132. (2.) "Will, in the first Persons, promises or threatens; but in the second and third Persons, it barely foretells."--Buchanan's Gram., p. 41. (3.) "Will, in the first person, promises, engages, or threatens. In the second and third persons, it merely foretels."--Jaudon's Gram., p. 59. (4.) "Will, in the first person singular and plural, promises or threatens; in the second and third persons, only foretells."--Lowth's Gram., p. 41. (5.) "Will, in the first person singular and plural, intimates resolution and promising; in the second and third person, only foretels."--Murray's Gram., p. 88; Ingersoll's, 136; Fisk's, 78; A. Flint's, 42; Bullions's, 32; Hamlin's, 41; Cooper's Murray, 50. [Fist] Murray's Second Edition has it "foretells." (6.) "Will, in the first person singular and plural, expresses resolution and promising. In the second and third persons it only foretells."--Comly's Gram., p. 38; E. Devis's, 51; Lennie's, 22. (7.) "Will, in the first person, promises. In the second and third persons, it simply foretels."--Maltby's Gram., p. 24. (8.) "Will, in the first person implies resolution and promising; in the second and third, it foretells."--Cooper's New Gram., p. 51. (9.) "Will, in the first person singular and plural, promises or threatens; in the second and third persons, only foretels: shall, on the contrary, in the first person, simply foretels; in the second and third persons, promises, commands, or threatens."--Adam's Lat. and Eng. Gram., p. 83. (10.) "In the first person shall foretels, and will promises or threatens; but in the second and third persons will foretels, and shall promises or threatens."--Blair's Gram., p. 65.

"If Mævius scribble in Apollo's spight, There are who judge still worse than he can write."--Pope.

EXERCISE X.--MIXED ERRORS.

"I am liable to be charged that I latinize too much."--DRYDEN: in Johnson's Dict. "To mould him platonically to his own idea."--WOTTON: ib. "I will marry a wife as beautiful as the houries, and as wise as Zobeide."--Murray's E. Reader, p. 148. "I will marry a wife, beautiful as the Houries."--Wilcox's Gram., p. 65. "The words in italics are all in the imperative mood."--Maltby's Gram., p. 71. "Words Italicised, are emphatick, in various degrees."--Kirkham's Elocution, p. 173. "Wherever two gg's come together, they are both hard."--Buchanan's Gram., p. 5. "But these are rather silent (o)'s than obscure (u)'s."--Brightland's Gram., p. 19. "That can be Guest at by us, only from the Consequences."--Right of Tythes, p. viii. "He says he was glad that he had Baptized so few; And asks them, Were ye Baptised in the Name of Paul?"--Ib., p. ix. "Therefor he Charg'd the Clergy with the Name of Hirelings."--Ib., p. viii. "On the fourth day before the first second day in each month."--The Friend, Vol. vii, p. 230. "We are not bound to adhere for ever to the terms, or to the meaning of terms, which were established by our ancestors."--Murray's Gram., p. 140. "O! learn from him to station quick eyed Prudence at the helm."--Frosts El. of Gram., p. 104. "It pourtrays the serene landscape of a retired village."--Music of Nature, p. 421. "By stating the fact, in a circumlocutary manner."--Booth's Introd. to Dict., p. 33. "Time as an abstract being is a non-entity."--Ib., p. 29. "From the difficulty of analysing the multiplied combinations of words."--Ib., p. 19. "Drop those letters that are superfluous, as: handful, foretel."--Cooper's Plain & Pract. Gram., p. 10. "Shall, in the first person, simply foretells."--Ib., p. 51. "And the latter must evidently be so too, or, at least, cotemporary, with the act."--Ib., p. 60. "The man has been traveling for five years."--Ib., p. 77. "I shall not take up time in combatting their scruples."--Blair's Rhet., p. 320. "In several of the chorusses of Euripides and Sophocles, we have the same kind of lyric poetry as in Pindar."--Ib., p. 398. "Until the Statesman and Divine shall unite their efforts in forming the human mind, rather than in loping its excressences, after it has been neglected."--Webster's Essays, p. 26. "Where conviction could be followed only by a bigotted persistence in error."--Ib., p. 78. "All the barons were entitled to a seet in the national council, in right of their baronys."--Ib., p. 260. "Some knowledge of arithmetic is necessary for every lady."--Ib., p. 29. "Upon this, [the system of chivalry,] were founded those romances of night-errantry."--Blair's Rhet., p. 374. "The subject is, the atchievements of Charlemagne and his Peers, or Paladins."--Ib., p. 374. "Aye, aye; this slice to be sure outweighs the other."--Blair's Reader, p. 31. "In the common phrase, good-bye, bye signifies passing, going. The phrase signifies, a good going, a prosperous passage, and is equivalent to farewell."--Webster's Dict. "Good-by, adv.--a contraction of good be with you--a familiar way of bidding farewell."--See Chalmers's Dict. "Off he sprung, and did not so much as stop to say good bye to you."--Blair's Reader, p. 16. "It no longer recals the notion of the action."--Barnard's Gram., p. 69.

"Good-nature and good-sense must ever join; To err, is human; to forgive, divine."--Pope, Ess. on Crit.

EXERCISE XI.--MIXED ERRORS.

"The practices in the art of carpentry are called planeing, sawing, mortising, scribing, moulding, &c."--Blair's Reader, p. 118. "With her left hand, she guides the thread round the spindle, or rather round a spole which goes on the spindle."--Ib., p. 134. "Much suff'ring heroes next their honours claim."--POPE: Johnson's Dict., w. Much. "Vein healing verven, and head purging dill."--SPENSER: ib., w. Head. "An, in old English, signifies if; as, 'an it please your honor.'"--Webster's Dict. "What, then, was the moral worth of these renouned leaders?"--M'Ilvaine's Lect., p. 460. "Behold how every form of human misery is met by the self denying diligence of the benevolent."--Ib., p. 411. "Reptiles, bats, and doleful creatures--jackalls, hyenas, and lions--inhabit the holes, and caverns, and marshes of the desolate city."--Ib., p. 270. "ADAYS, adv. On or in days; as, in the phrase, now adays."--Webster's Dict. "REFEREE, one to whom a thing is referred; TRANSFERREE, the person to whom a transfer is made."--Ib. "The Hospitallers were an order of knights who built a hospital at Jerusalem for pilgrims."--Ib. "GERARD, Tom, or Tung, was the institutor and first grand master of the knights hospitalers: he died in 1120."--Biog. Dict. "I had a purpose now to lead our many to the holy land."--SHAK.: in Johnson's Dict. "He turned their heart to hate his people, to deal subtilly with his servants."--Psalms, cv, 25. "In Dryden's ode of Alexander's Feast, the line, 'Faln, faln, faln, faln,' represents a gradual sinking of the mind."--Kames, El. of Crit., Vol. ii, p. 71. "The first of these lines is marvelously nonsensical."--Jamieson's Rhet., p. 117. "We have the nicely chiseled forms of an Apollo and a Venus, but it is the same cold marble still."--Christian Spect., Vol. viii, p. 201. "Death waves his mighty wand and paralyses all."--Bucke's Gram., p. 35. "Fear God. Honor the patriot. Respect virtue."--Kirkham's Gram., p. 216. "Pontius Pilate being Governour of Judea, and Herod being Tetrarch of Galilee."--Ib., p. 189. See Luke, iii, 1. "AUCTIONEER, n. s. The person that manages an auction."--Johnson's Dict. "The earth put forth her primroses and days-eyes, to behold him."--HOWEL: ib. "Musselman, not being a compound of man, is musselmans in the plural."--Lennie's Gram., p. 9. "The absurdity of fatigueing them with a needless heap of grammar rules."--Burgh's Dignity, Vol. i, p. 147. "John was forced to sit with his arms a kimbo, to keep them asunder."--ARBUTHNOT: Joh. Dict. "To set the arms a kimbo, is to set the hands on the hips, with the elbows projecting outward."--Webster's Dict. "We almost uniformly confine the inflexion to the last or the latter noun."--Maunder's Gram., p. 2. "This is all souls day, fellows! Is it not?"--SHAK.: in Joh. Dict. "The english physicians make use of troy-weight."--Johnson's Dict. "There is a certain number of ranks allowed to dukes, marquisses, and earls."--PEACHAM: ib., w. Marquis.

"How could you chide the young good natur'd prince, And drive him from you with so stern an air." --ADDISON: ib., w. Good, 25.

EXERCISE XII.--MIXED ERRORS.

"In reading, every appearance of sing-song should be avoided."--Sanborn's Gram., p. 75. "If you are thoroughly acquainted with the inflexions of the verb."--Ib., p. 53. "The preterite of read is pronounced red."--Ib., p. 48. "Humility opens a high way to dignity."--Ib., p. 15. "What is intricate must be unraveled."--Ib., p. 275. "Roger Bacon invented gun powder, A. D. 1280."--Ib., p. 277. "On which ever word we lay the emphasis."--Murray's Gram., 8vo, p. 243; 12mo, p. 195. "Each of the leaders was apprized of the Roman invasion."--Nixon's Parser, p. 123. "If I say, 'I gallopped from Islington to Holloway;' the verb is intransitive: if, 'I gallopped my horse from Islington to Holloway;' it is transitive."--Churchill's Gram., p. 238. "The reasonableness of setting a part one day in seven."--The Friend, Vol. iv, p. 240. "The promoters of paper money making reprobated this act."--Webster's Essays, p. 196. "There are five compound personal pronouns, which are derived from the five simple personal pronouns by adding to some of their cases the syllable self; as, my-self, thy-self, him-self, her-self, it-self."--Perley's Gram., p. 16. "Possessives, my-own, thy-own, his-own, her-own, its-own, our-own, your-own, their-own."--Ib., Declensions. "Thy man servant and thy maid servant may rest, as well as thou."--Sanborn's Gram., p. 160. "How many right angles has an acute angled triangle?"--Ib., p. 220. "In the days of Jorum, king of Israel, flourished the prophet Elisha."--Ib., p. 148. "In the days of Jorum, king of Israel, Elisha, the prophet flourished."--Ib., p. 133. "Lodgable, a. Capable of affording a temporary abode."--Webster's Octavo Dict.--"Win me into the easy hearted man."--Johnson's Quarto Dict. "And then to end life, is the same as to dye."--Milnes's Greek Gram., p. 176. "Those usurping hectors who pretend to honour without religion, think the charge of a lie a blot not to be washed out but by blood."--SOUTH: Joh. Dict. "His gallies attending him, he pursues the unfortunate."--Nixon's Parser, p. 91. "This cannot fail to make us shyer of yielding our assent."--Campbell's Rhet., p. 117. "When he comes to the Italicised word, he should give it such a definition as its connection with the sentence may require."--Claggett's Expositor, p. vii. "Learn to distil from your lips all the honies of persuasion."--Adams's Rhetoric, Vol. i, p. 31. "To instill ideas of disgust and abhorrence against the Americans."--Ib., ii, 300. "Where prejudice has not acquired an uncontroled ascendency."--Ib., i, 31. "The uncontrolable propensity of his mind was undoubtedly to oratory."--Ib., i, 100. "The Brutus is a practical commentary upon the dialogues and the orator."--Ib., i, 120. "The oratorical partitions are a short elementary compendium."--Ib., i, 130. "You shall find hundreds of persons able to produce a crowd of good ideas upon any subject, for one that can marshall them to the best advantage."--Ib., i, 169. "In this lecture, you have the outline of all that the whole course will comprize."--Ib., i, 182. "He would have been stopped by a hint from the bench, that he was traveling out of the record."--Ib., i, 289. "To tell them that which should befal them in the last days."--Ib., ii, 308. "Where all is present, there is nothing past to recal."--Ib., ii, 358. "Whose due it is to drink the brimfull cup of God's eternal vengeance."--Law and Grace, p. 36.

"There, from the dead, centurions see him rise, See, but struck down with horrible surprize!"--Savage.

"With seed of woes my heart brimful is charged."--SIDNEY: Joh. Dict.

"Our legions are brimful, our cause is ripe."--SHAKSPEARE: ib.

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II. ETYMOLOGY

ETYMOLOGY treats of the different parts of speech, with their classes and modifications.

The Parts of Speech are the several kinds, or principal classes, into which words are divided by grammarians.

Classes, under the parts of speech, are the particular sorts into which the several kinds of words are subdivided.

Modifications are inflections, or changes, in the terminations, forms, or senses, of some kinds of words.

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I. PARTS OF SPEECH

The Parts of Speech, or sorts of words, in English, are ten; namely, the Article, the Noun, the Adjective, the Pronoun, the Verb, the Participle, the Adverb, the Conjunction, the Preposition, and the Interjection.

1. THE ARTICLE.

An Article is the word the, an, or a, which we put before nouns to limit their signification: as, The air, the stars; an island, a ship.

2. THE NOUN.

A Noun is the name of any person, place, or thing, that can be known or mentioned: as, George, York, man, apple, truth.

3. THE ADJECTIVE.

An Adjective is a word added to a noun or pronoun, and generally expresses quality: as, A wise man; a new book. You two are diligent.

4. THE PRONOUN.

A Pronoun is a word used in stead of a noun: as, The boy loves his book; he has long lessons, and he learns them well.

5. THE VERB.

A Verb is a word that signifies to be, to act, or to be acted upon: as, I am, I rule, I am ruled; I love, thou lovest, he loves.

6. THE PARTICIPLE.

A Participle is a word derived from a verb, participating the properties of a verb, and of an adjective or a noun; and is generally formed by adding ing, d, or ed, to the verb: thus, from the verb rule, are formed three participles, two simple and one compound; as, 1. ruling, 2. ruled, 3. having ruled.

7. THE ADVERB.

An Adverb is a word added to a verb, a participle, an adjective, or an other adverb; and generally expresses time, place, degree, or manner: as, They are now here, studying very diligently.

8. THE CONJUNCTION.

A Conjunction is a word used to connect words or sentences in construction, and to show the dependence of the terms so connected: as, "Thou and he are happy, because you are good."--L. Murray.

9. THE PREPOSITION.

A Preposition is a word used to express some relation of different things or thoughts to each other, and is generally placed before a noun or a pronoun; as, The paper lies before me on the desk.

10. THE INTERJECTION.

An Interjection is a word that is uttered merely to indicate some strong or sudden emotion of the mind: as, Oh! alas! ah! poh! pshaw! avaunt! aha! hurrah!

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--The first thing to be learned in the study of this the second part of grammar, is the distribution of the words of the language into those principal sorts, or classes, which are denominated the Parts of Speech. This is a matter of some difficulty. And as no scheme which can be adopted, will be in all cases so plain that young beginners will not occasionally falter in its application, the teacher may sometimes find it expedient to refer his pupils to the following simple explanations, which are designed to aid their first and most difficult steps.

How can we know to what class, or part of speech, any word belongs? By learning the definitions of the ten parts of speech, and then observing how the word is written, and in what sense it is used. It is necessary also to observe, so far as we can, with what other words each particular one is capable of making sense.

1. Is it easy to distinguish an ARTICLE? If not always easy, it is generally so: the, an, and a, are the only English words called articles, and these are rarely any thing else. Because an and a have the same import, and are supposed to have the same origin, the articles are commonly reckoned two, but some count them as three.

2. How can we distinguish a NOUN? By means of the article before it, if there is one; as, the house, an apple, a book; or, by adding it to the phrase, "I mentioned;" as, "I mentioned peace;"--"I mentioned war;"--"I mentioned slumber." Any word which thus makes complete sense, is, in that sense, a noun; because a noun is the name of any thing which can thus be mentioned by a name. Of English nouns, there are said to be as many as twenty-five or thirty thousand.

3. How can we distinguish an ADJECTIVE? By putting a noun after it, to see if the phrase will be sense. The noun thing, or its plural things, will suit almost any adjective; as, A good thing--A bad thing--A little thing--A great thing--Few things--Many things--Some things--Fifty things. Of adjectives, there are perhaps nine or ten thousand.

4. How can we distinguish a PRONOUN? By observing that its noun repeated makes the same sense. Thus, the example of the pronoun above, "The boy loves his book; he has long lessons, and he learns them well,"--very clearly means, "The boy loves the boy's book; the boy has long lessons, and the boy learns those lessons well." Here then, by a disagreeable repetition of two nouns, we have the same sense without any pronoun; but it is obvious that the pronouns form a better mode of expression, because they prevent this awkward repetition. The different pronouns in English are twenty-four; and their variations in declension are thirty-two: so that the number of words of this class, is fifty-six.

5. How can we distinguish a VERB? By observing that it is usually the principal word in the sentence, and that without it there would be no assertion. It is the word which expresses what is affirmed or said of the person or thing mentioned; as, "Jesus wept."--"Felix trembled."--"The just shall live by faith." It will make sense when inflected with the pronouns; as, I write, thou writ'st, he writes; we write, you write, they write.--I walk, thou walkst, he walks; we walk, you walk, they walk. Of English verbs, some recent grammarians compute the number at eight thousand; others formerly reckoned them to be no more than four thousand three hundred.[131]

6. How can we distinguish a PARTICIPLE? By observing its derivation from the verb, and then placing it after to be or having; as, To be writing, Having written--To be walking, Having walked--To be weeping, Having wept--To be studying, Having studied. Of simple participles, there are twice as many as there are of simple or radical verbs; and the possible compounds are not less numerous than the simples, but they are much less frequently used.

7. How can we distinguish an ADVERB? By observing that it answers to the question, When? Where? How much? or How?--or serves to ask it; as, "He spoke fluently." How did he speak? Fluently. This word fluently is therefore an adverb: it tells how he spoke. Of adverbs, there are about two thousand six hundred; and four fifths of them end in ly.

8. How can we distinguish a CONJUNCTION? By observing what words or terms it joins together, or to what other conjunction it corresponds; as, "Neither wealth nor honor can heal a wounded conscience."--Dillwyn's Ref., p. 16. Or, it may be well to learn the whole list at once: And, as, both, because, even, for, if, that, then, since, seeing, so: Or, nor, either, neither, than, though, although, yet, but, except, whether, lest, unless, save, provided, notwithstanding, whereas. Of conjunctions, there are these twenty-nine in common use, and a few others now obsolete.

9. How can we distinguish a PREPOSITION? By observing that it will govern the pronoun them, and is not a verb or a participle; as, About them--above them--across them--after them--against them--amidst them--among them--around them--at them--Before them--behind them--below them--beneath them--beside them--between them--beyond them--by them--For them--from them--In them--into them, &c. Of the prepositions, there are about sixty now in common use.

10. How can we distinguish an INTERJECTION? By observing that it is an independent word or sound, uttered earnestly, and very often written with the note of exclamation; as Lo! behold! look! see! hark! hush! hist! mum! Of interjections, there are sixty or seventy in common use, some of which are seldom found in books.

OBS. 2.--An accurate knowledge of words, and of their changes, is indispensable to a clear discernment of their proper combinations in sentences, according to the usage of the learned. Etymology, therefore, should be taught before syntax; but it should be chiefly taught by a direct analysis of entire sentences, and those so plainly written that the particular effect of every word may be clearly distinguished, and the meaning, whether intrinsic or relative, be discovered with precision. The parts of speech are usually named and defined with reference to the use of words in sentences; and, as the same word not unfrequently stands for several different parts of speech, the learner should be early taught to make for himself the proper application of the foregoing distribution, without recurrence to a dictionary, and without aid from his teacher. He who is endeavouring to acquaint himself with the grammar of a language which he can already read and understand, is placed in circumstances very different from those which attend the school-boy who is just beginning to construe some sentences of a foreign tongue. A frequent use of the dictionary may facilitate the progress of the one, while it delays that of the other. English grammar, it is hoped, may be learned directly from this book alone, with better success than can be expected when the attention of the learner is divided among several or many different works.

OBS. 3.--Dr. James P. Wilson, in speaking of the classification of words, observes, "The names of the distributive parts should either express, distinctly, the influence, which each class produces on sentences; or some other characteristic trait, by which the respective species of words may be distinguished, without danger of confusion. It is at least probable, that no distribution, sufficiently minute, can ever be made, of the parts of speech, which shall be wholly free from all objection. Hasty innovations, therefore, and crude conjectures, should not be permitted to disturb that course of grammatical instruction, which has been advancing in melioration, by the unremitting labours of thousands, through a series of ages."--Wilson's Essay on Gram., p. 66. Again: "The number of the parts of speech may be reduced, or enlarged, at pleasure; and the rules of syntax may be accommodated to such new arrangement. The best grammarians find it difficult, in practice, to distinguish, in some instances, adverbs, prepositions, and conjunctions; yet their effects are generally distinct. This inconvenience should be submitted to, since a less comprehensive distribution would be very unfavourable to a rational investigation of the meaning of English sentences."--Ib., p. 68. Again: "As and so have been also deemed substitutes, and resolved into other words. But if all abbreviations are to be restored to their primitive parts of speech, there will be a general revolution in the present systems of grammar; and the various improvements, which have sprung from convenience, or necessity, and been sanctioned by the usage of ancient times, must be retrenched, and anarchy in letters universally prevail."--Ib., p. 114.

OBS. 4.--I have elsewhere sufficiently shown why ten parts of speech are to be preferred to any other number, in English; and whatever diversity of opinion there may be, respecting the class to which some particular words ought to be referred, I trust to make it obvious to good sense, that I have seldom erred from the course which is most expedient. 1. Articles are used with appellative nouns, sometimes to denote emphatically the species, but generally to designate individuals. 2. Nouns stand in discourse for persons, things, or abstract qualities. 3. Adjectives commonly express the concrete qualities of persons or things; but sometimes, their situation or number. 4. Pronouns are substitutes for names, or nouns; but they sometimes represent sentences. 5. Verbs assert, ask, or say something; and, for the most part, express action or motion. 6. Participles contain the essential meaning of their verbs, and commonly denote action, and imply time; but, apart from auxiliaries, they express that meaning either adjectively or substantively, and not with assertion. 7. Adverbs express the circumstances of time, of place, of degree, and of manner; the when, the where, the how much, and the how. 8. Conjunctions connect, sometimes words, and sometimes sentences, rarely phrases; and always show, either the manner in which one sentence or one phrase depends upon an other, or what connexion there is between two words that refer to a third. 9. Prepositions express the correspondent relations of things to things, of thoughts to thoughts, or of words to words; for these, if we speak truly, must be all the same in expression. 10. Interjections are either natural sounds or exclamatory words, used independently, and serving briefly to indicate the wishes or feelings of the speaker.

OBS. 5.--In the following passage, all the parts of speech are exemplified, and each is pointed out by the figure placed over the word:--

1 2 9 2 5 1 2 3 9 2 1 2 6 "The power of speech is a faculty peculiar to man; a faculty bestowed 9 4 9 4 3 2 9 1 3 8 7 3 on him by his beneficent Creator, for the greatest and most excellent 2 8 10 7 7 5 4 5 4 9 1 3 9 uses; but, alas! how often do we pervert it to the worst of 2 purposes!"--See Lowth's Gram., p. 1.

In this sentence, which has been adopted by Murray, Churchill, and others, we have the following parts of speech: 1. The words the, a, and an, are articles. 2. The words power, speech, faculty, man, faculty, Creator, uses, and purposes, are nouns. 3. The words peculiar, beneficent, greatest, excellent, and worst, are adjectives. 4. The words him, his, we, and it, are pronouns. 5. The words is, do, and pervert, are verbs. 6. The word bestowed is a participle. 7. The words most, how, and often, are adverbs. 8. The words and and but are conjunctions. 9. The words of, on, to, by, for, to, and of, are prepositions. 10. The word alas! is an interjection.

OBS. 6.--In speaking or writing, we of course bring together the different parts of speech just as they happen to be needed. Though a sentence of ordinary length usually embraces more than one half of them, it is not often that we find them all in so small a compass. Sentences sometimes abound in words of a particular kind, and are quite destitute of those of some other sort. The following examples will illustrate these remarks. (1) ARTICLES: "A square is less beautiful than a circle; and the reason seems to be, that the attention is divided among the sides and angles of a square, whereas the circumference of a circle, being a single object, makes one entire impression."--Kames, Elements of Criticism, Vol. i, p. 175. (2.) NOUNS: "A number of things destined for the same use, such as windows, chairs, spoons, buttons, cannot be too uniform; for, supposing their figure to be good, utility requires uniformity."--Ib., i, 176. (3.) ADJECTIVES: "Hence nothing just, proper, decent, beautiful, proportioned, or grand, is risible."--Ib., i, 229. (4.) PRONOUNS: "I must entreat the courteous reader to suspend his curiosity, and rather to consider what is written than who they are that write it."--Addison, Spect., No. 556. (5.) VERBS: "The least consideration will inform us how easy it is to put an ill-natured construction upon a word; and what perverse turns and expressions spring from an evil temper. Nothing can be explained to him who will not understand, nor will any thing appear right to the unreasonable."--Cecil. (6.) PARTICIPLES: "The Scriptures are an authoritative voice, reproving, instructing, and warning the world; and declaring the only means ordained and provided for escaping the awful penalties of sin."--G. B. (7.) ADVERBS: "The light of Scripture shines steadily, purely, benignly, certainly, superlatively."--Dr. S. H. Cox. (8.) CONJUNCTIONS: "Quietness and silence both become and befriend religious exercises. Clamour and violence often hinder, but never further, the work of God."--Henry's Exposition. (9.) PREPOSITIONS: "He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our legislatures."--Dec. of Indep. (10.) INTERJECTIONS: "Oh, my dear strong-box! Oh, my lost guineas! Oh, poor, ruined, beggared old man! Boo! hoo! hoo!"--MOLIERE: Burgh's Art of Speaking, p. 266.

EXAMPLES FOR PARSING.

Parsing is the resolving or explaining of a sentence, or of some related word or words, according to the definitions and rules of grammar. Parsing is to grammar what ciphering is to arithmetic.

A Praxis is a method of exercise, or a form of grammatical resolution, showing the learner how to proceed. The word is Greek, and literally signifies action, doing, practice, or formal use.

PRAXIS I--ETYMOLOGICAL.

_In the first Praxis, it is required of the pupil--merely to distinguish and define the different parts of speech.

The definitions to be given in the First Praxis, are one, and only one, for each word, or part of speech. Thus_:--

EXAMPLE PARSED.

"The patient ox submits to the yoke, and meekly performs the labour required of him."

The is an article. 1.[132] An article is the word the, an, or a, which we put before nouns to limit their signification.

Patient is an adjective. 1. An adjective is a word added to a noun or pronoun, and generally expresses quality.

Ox is a noun. 1. A noun is the name of any person, place, or thing, that can be known or mentioned.

Submits is a verb. 1. A verb is a word that signifies to be, to act, or to be acted upon.

To is a preposition. 1. A preposition is a word used to express some relation of different things or thoughts to each other, and is generally placed before a noun or a pronoun.

The is an article. 1. An article is the word the, an, or a, which we put before nouns to limit their signification.

Yoke is a noun. 1. A noun is the name of any person, place, or thing, that can be known or mentioned.

And is a conjunction. 1. A conjunction is a word used to connect words or sentences in construction, and to show the dependence of the terms so connected.

Meekly is an adverb. 1. An adverb is a word added to a verb, a participle, an adjective, or an other adverb; and generally expresses time, place, degree, or manner.

Performs is a verb. 1. A verb is a word that signifies to be, to act, or to be acted upon.

The is an article. 1. An article is the word the, an, or a, which we put before nouns to limit their signification.

Labour is a noun. 1. A noun is the name of any person, place, or thing, that can be known or mentioned.

Required is a participle. 1. A participle is a word derived from a verb, participating the properties of a verb, and of an adjective or a noun; and is generally formed by adding ing, d, or ed, to the verb.

Of is a preposition. 1. A preposition is a word used to express some relation of different things or thoughts to each other, and is generally placed before a noun or a pronoun.

Him is a pronoun. 1. A pronoun is a word used instead of a noun.

LESSON I.--PARSING.

"A nimble tongue often trips. The rule of the tongue is a great attainment. The language of truth is direct and plain. Truth is never evasive. Flattery is the food of vanity. A virtuous mind loathes flattery. Vain persons are an easy prey to parasites. Vanity easily mistakes sneers for smiles. The smiles of the world are deceitful. True friendship hath eternal views. A faithful friend is invaluable. Constancy in friendship denotes a generous mind. Adversity is the criterion of friendship. Love and fidelity are inseparable. Few know the value of a friend till they lose him. Justice is the first of all moral virtues. Let justice hold, and mercy turn, the scale. A judge is guilty who connives at guilt. Justice delayed is little better than justice denied. Vice is the deformity of man. Virtue is a source of constant cheerfulness. One vice is more expensive than many virtues. Wisdom, though serious, is never sullen. Youth is the season of improvement."--Dillwyn's Reflections, pp. 4-27.

"Oh! my ill-chang'd condition! oh, my fate! Did I lose heaven for this?"--Cowley's Davideis.

LESSON II.--PARSING.

"So prone is man to society, and so happy in it, that, to relish perpetual solitude, one must be an angel or a brute. In a solitary state, no creature is more timid than man; in society, none more bold. The number of offenders lessens the disgrace of the crime; for a common reproach is no reproach. A man is more unhappy in reproaching himself when guilty, than in being reproached by others when innocent. The pains of the mind are harder to bear than those of the body. Hope, in this mixed state of good and ill, is a blessing from heaven: the gift of prescience would be a curse. The first step towards vice, is to make a mystery of what is innocent: whoever loves to hide, will soon or late have reason to hide. A man who gives his children a habit of industry, provides for them better than by giving them a stock of money. Our good and evil proceed from ourselves: death appeared terrible to Cicero, indifferent to Socrates, desirable to Cato."--Home's Art of Thinking, pp. 26-53.

"O thou most high transcendent gift of age! Youth from its folly thus to disengage."--Denham's Age.

LESSON III.--PARSING.

"Calm was the day, and the scene, delightful. We may expect a calm after a storm. To prevent passion is easier than to calm it."--Murray's Ex., p. 5. "Better is a little with content, than a great deal with anxiety. A little attention will rectify some errors. Unthinking persons care little for the future."--See ib. "Still waters are commonly deepest. He laboured to still the tumult. Though he is out of danger, he is still afraid."--Ib. "Damp air is unwholesome. Guilt often casts a damp over our sprightliest hours. Soft bodies damp the sound much more than hard ones."--Ib. "The hail was very destructive. Hail, virtue! source of every good. We hail you as friends."--Ib., p. 6. "Much money makes no man happy. Think much, and speak little. He has seen much of the world."--See ib. "Every being loves its like. We must make a like space between the lines. Behave like men. We are apt to like pernicious company."--Ib. "Give me more love, or more disdain."--Carew. "He loved Rachel more than Leah."--Genesis. "But how much that more is; he hath no distinct notion."--Locke.

"And my more having would be as a sauce To make me hunger more."--Shakspeare.

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