The Grammar of English Grammars Part 293

[260] "The substantive form, or, as it is commonly termed, _infinitive mood_, contains at the same time the essence of verbal meaning, and the literal ROOT on which all inflections of the verb are to be grafted. This character being common to the infinitive in all languages, it [this mood]

ought to precede the [other] moods of verbs, instead of being made to follow them, as is absurdly practised in almost all grammatical systems."--_Enclytica_, p. 14.

[261] By this, I mean, that the verb in all the persons, both singular and plural, is _the same in form_. But Lindley Murray, when he speaks of _not varying_ or _not changing_ the termination of the verb, most absurdly means by it, that the verb _is inflected_, just as it is in the indicative or the potential mood; and when he speaks of _changes_ or _variations_ of termination, he means, that the verb _remains the same_ as in the first person singular! For example: "The second person singular of the imperfect tense in the subjunctive mood, is also _very frequently varied in its termination_: as, 'If thou _loved_ him truly, thou wouldst obey him.'"--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 209. "The auxiliaries of the potential mood, when applied to the subjunctive, _do not change_ the termination of the second person singular; as, 'If thou _mayst_ or _canst_ go.'"--_Ib._, p. 210. "Some authors think, that the termination of these auxiliaries _should be varied_: as, I advise thee, that thou _may_ beware."--_Ib._, p.

210. "When the circ.u.mstances of contingency and futurity concur, it is proper _to vary_ the terminations of the second and third persons singular."--_Ib._, 210. "It may be considered as a rule, that _the changes_ of termination _are necessary_, when these two circ.u.mstances concur."--_Ib._, p. 207. "It may be considered as a rule, that _no changes_ of termination _are necessary_, when these two circ.u.mstances concur."--_Ingersoll's Gram._, p. 264. Now Murray and Ingersoll here _mean_ precisely the same thing! Whose fault is that? If Murray's, he has committed many such. But, in this matter, he is contradicted not only by Ingersoll, but, on one occasion, by himself. For he declares it to be an opinion in which he concurs. "That the definition and nature of the subjunctive mood, have _no reference_ to change of termination."--_Murray's Gram._, 8vo, p. 211. And yet, amidst his strange blunders, he seems to have ascribed the _meaning_ which a verb has in this mood, _to the inflections_ which it receives _in the indicative_: saying. "That part of the verb which grammarians call the present tense of the subjunctive mood, has a future signification. _This_ is effected by _varying the terminations_ of the second and third persons singular of _the indicative_!"--_Ib._, p. 207. But the absurdity which he really means to teach, is, that the subjunctive mood _is derived from the indicative_,--the primitive or radical verb, _from it's derivatives or branches_!

[262] _Wert_ is sometimes used in lieu of _wast_; and, in such instances, both by authority and by a.n.a.logy, it appears to belong here, if anywhere.

See OBS. 2d and 3d, below.

[263] Some grammarians, regardless of the general usage of authors, prefer _was_ to _were_ in the singular number of this tense of the subjunctive mood. In the following remark, the tense is named "_present_" and this preference is urged with some critical extravagance: "_Was_, though the past tense of the indicative mood, expresses the _present_ of the hypothetical; as, 'I wish that I _was_ well.' _The use of this hypothetical form_ of the subjunctive mood, _has given rise to_ a form of expression _wholly unwarranted by the rules of grammar_. When the verb _was_ is to be used in the _present tense singular_, in this form of the subjunctive mood, the ear is often pained with a _plural were_, as, '_Were I_ your master'--'_Were he_ compelled to do it,' &c. This has become so common that some of the best grammars of the language furnish authority for the barbarism, and even in the second person supply _wert_, as a convenient accompaniment. If such a conjugation is admitted, we may expect to see Shakspeare's '_thou beest_' in full use."--_Chandler's Gram._, Ed. of 1821, p. 55. In "_Chandler's Common School Grammar_," of 1847, the language of this paragraph is somewhat softened, but the substance is still retained.

See the latter work, p. 80.

[264] "If I were, If _thou were_. If he were."--_Harrison's Gram._, p. 31.

"If, or though, I were loved. If, or though, _thou were_, or _wert_ loved.

If, or though, he were loved."--_Bicknell's Gram._, Part i, p. 69. "If, though, &c. I were burned, _thou were_ burned or you were burned, he were burned."--_Buchanan's Gram._, p. 53. "Though _thou were_. Some say, 'though thou _wert_.'"--_Mackintosh's Gram._, p. 178. "If or though I were. If or though _thou were_. If or though he were."--_St. Quentin's General Gram._, p. 86. "If I was, Thou wast, or You was or were, He was. Or thus: If I were, Thou wert, or you was or were, He were."--_Webster's Philosophical Gram._, p. 95; _Improved Gram._, p. 64. "PRESENT TENSE. Before, &c. I _be_; thou _beest_, or you _be_; he, she, or it, _be_: We, you or ye, they, _be_.

PAST TENSE. Before, &c. I _were_; thou _wert_, or you _were_; he, she, or it, _were_; We, you or ye, they, _were_."--WHITE, _on the English Verb_, p.

52.

[265] The text in Acts, xxii, 20th, "I also _was standing_ by, and _consenting_ unto his death," ought rather to be, "I also _stood_ by, and _consented_ to his death;" but the present reading is, thus far, a literal version from the Greek, though the verb "_kept_," that follows, is not.

Monta.n.u.s renders it literally: "Et ipse _eram astans, et consentiens_ interemptioni ejus, et _custodiens_ vestimenta interficientium illum." Beza makes it better Latin thus: "Ego quoque _adstabam_, et una _a.s.sentiebar_ caedi ipsius, et _custodiebam_ pallia eorum qui interimebant eum." Other examples of a questionable or improper use of the progressive form may occasionally be found in good authors; as, "A promising boy of six years of age, _was missing_ by his parents."--_Whittier, Stranger in Lowell_, p.

100. _Missing, wanting_, and _willing_, after the verb to be, are commonly reckoned participial _adjectives_; but here "_was missing_" is made a pa.s.sive verb, equivalent to _was missed_, which, perhaps, would better express the meaning. _To miss_, to perceive the absence of, is such an act of the mind, as seems unsuited to the compound form, _to be missing_; and, if we cannot say, "The mother _was missing_ her son," I think we ought not to use the same form pa.s.sively, as above.

[266] Some grammarians, contrary to the common opinion, suppose the verbs here spoken of, to have, not a _pa.s.sive_, but a _neuter_ signification.

Thus, Joseph Guy, Jun., of London: "Active verbs often take a _neuter_ sense; as, A house is building; here, is _building_ is used in a _neuter_ signification, because it has no object after it. By this rule are explained such sentences as, Application is wanting; The grammar is printing; The lottery is drawing; It is flying, &c."--_Guy's English Gram._, p. 21. "_Neuter_," here, as in many other places, is meant to include the _active-intransitives_. "_Is flying_" is of this cla.s.s; and "_is wanting_," corresponding to the Latin _caret_, appears to be neuter; hut the rest seem rather to be pa.s.sives. Tried, however, by the usual criterion,--the naming of the "_agent_" which, it is said, "a verb pa.s.sive necessarily implies,"--what may at first seem progressive pa.s.sives, may not always be found such. "_Most_ verbs signifying _action_" says Dr. Johnson, "may likewise signify _condition_, or _habit_, and become _neuters_, [i. e.

_active-intransitives_;] as _I love_, I am in love; _I strike_, I am now striking."--_Gram. before Quarto Dict._, p. 7. So _sell, form, make_, and many others, usually transitive, have sometimes an active-intransitive sense which nearly approaches the pa.s.sive, and of which _are selling, is forming, are making_, and the like, may be only equivalent expressions. For example: "It is cold, and ice _forms_ rapidly--is _forming_ rapidly--or _is formed_ rapidly."--Here, with little difference of meaning, is the appearance of both voices, the Active and the Pa.s.sive; while "_is forming_," which some will have for an example of "the _Middle_ voice," may be referred to either. If the following pa.s.sive construction is right, _is wanting_ or _are wanting_ may be a verb of three or four different sorts: "Reflections that may drive away despair, _cannot be wanting by him_, who considers," &c.--_Johnson's Rambler_, No. 129: _Wright's Gram._, p. 196.

[267] Dr. Bullions, in his grammar of 1849, says, "n.o.body would think of saying, 'He is being loved'--'This result is being desired.'"--_a.n.a.lyt. and Pract. Gram._, p. 237. But, according to J. W. Wright, whose superiority in grammar has sixty-two t.i.tled vouchers, this unheard-of barbarism is, for the present pa.s.sive, precisely and solely what one _ought_ to say! Nor is it, in fact, any more barbarous, or more foreign from usage, than the spurious example which the Doctor himself takes for a model in the active voice: "I _am loving_. Thou _art loving_, &c; I _have been loving_, Thou _hast been loving_, &c."--_A. and P. Gr._, p. 92. So: "James _is loving_ me."--_Ib._, p 235.

[268] "The predicate in the form, '_The house is being built_,' would be, according to our view, 'BEING BEING _built_,' which is manifestly an absurd tautology."--_Mulligan's Gram._, 1852, p. 151.

[269] "Suppose a criminal to be _enduring_ the operation of binding:--Shall we say, with Mr. Murray,--'The criminal is binding?' If so, HE MUST BE BINDING SOMETHING,--a circ.u.mstance, in effect, quite opposed to the fact presented. Shall we then say, as he does, in the _present tense_ conjugation of his pa.s.sive verb,--'The criminal is bound?' If so, the _action_ of binding, which the criminal is suffering, will be represented as completed, --a position which the _action its self_ will palpably deny."

See _Wright's Phil. Gram._, p. 102. It is folly for a man to puzzle himself or others thus, with _fict.i.tious examples_, imagined on purpose to make _good usage seem wrong_. There is bad grammar enough, for all useful purposes, in the actual writings of valued authors; but who can show, by any proofs, that the English language, as heretofore written, is so miserably inadequate to our wants, that we need use the strange neologism, "The criminal _is being bound_," or any thing similar?

[270] It is a very strange event in the history of English grammar, that such a controversy as this should have arisen; but a stranger one still, that, after all that has been said, more argument is needed. Some men, who hope to be valued as scholars, yet stickle for an odd phrase, which critics have denounced as follows: "But the history of the language scarcely affords a parallel to the innovation, at once unphilosophical and hypercritical, pedantic and illiterate, which has lately appeared in the excruciating refinement '_is being_' and its unmerciful variations. We hope, and indeed believe, that it has not received the sanction of any grammar adopted in our popular education, as it certainly never will of any writer of just pretensions to scholars.h.i.+p."--_The True Sun_. N. Y., April 16, 1846.

[271] Education is a work of continuance, yet completed, like many others, as fast as it goes on. It is not, like the act of loving or hating, so complete at the first moment as not to admit the progressive form of the verb; for one may say of a lad, "I _am educating_ him for the law;" and possibly, "He _is educating_ for the law;" though not so well as, "He _is to be educated_ for the law." But, to suppose that "_is educated_" or "_are educated_" implies unnecessarily a _cessation of the educating_ is a mistake. That conception is right, only when _educated_ is taken adjectively. The phrase, "those who _are educated_ in our seminaries,"

hardly includes such as _have been educated_ there in times past: much less does it apply to these exclusively, as some seem to think. "_Being_," as inserted by Southey, is therefore quite _needless_: so it is _often_, in this new phraseology, the best correction being its mere omission.

[272] Worcester has also this citation: "The Eclectic Review remarks, 'That a need of this phrase, or an equivalent one, is felt, is sufficiently proved by the extent to which it is used by educated persons and respectable writers.'"--_Gram. before Dict._, p. xlvi. Sundry phrases, equivalent in sense to this new voice, have long been in use, and are, of course, still needed; something from among them being always, by every accurate writer, still preferred. But this awkward innovation, use it who will, can no more be justified by a plea of "_need_," than can every other hackneyed solecism extant. Even the Archbishop, if quoted right by Worcester, has descended to "uncouth English," without either necessity or propriety, having thereby only mis.e.xpounded a very common Greek word--a "perfect or pluperfect" participle, which means "_beaten, struck_, or _having been beaten_"--G. Brown.

[273] Wells has also the following citations, which most probably accord with his own opinions, though the first is rather extravagant: "The propriety of these _imperfect pa.s.sive tenses_ has been _doubted by almost all_ our grammarians; though I believe but few of them have written many pages without condescending to make use of them. Dr. Beattie says, 'One of the greatest defects of the English tongue, with regard to the verb, seems to be the want of an _imperfect pa.s.sive participle_.' And yet he uses the _imperfect participle_ in a _pa.s.sive sense_ as often as most writers."--_Pickbourn's Dissertation on the English Verb_.

"Several other expressions of this sort now and then occur, such as the new-fangled and most uncouth solecism, 'is being done,' for the good old English idiomatic expression, 'is doing,'--an absurd periphrasis, driving out a pointed and pithy turn of the English language."--_N. A. Review_. See _Wells's Grammar_, 1850, p. 161.

The term, "_imperfect pa.s.sive tenses_," seems not a very accurate one; because the present, the perfect, &c., are included. Pickbourn applies it to any pa.s.sive tenses formed from the simple "imperfect participle;" but the phrase, "_pa.s.sive verbs in the progressive form_," would better express the meaning. The term, "_compound pa.s.sive participle_," which Wells applies above to "_being built_," "_being printed_," and the like, is also both unusual and inaccurate. Most readers would sooner understand by it the form, _having been built, having been printed_, &c. This author's mode of naming participles is always either very awkward or not distinctive. His scheme makes it necessary to add here, for each of these forms, a third epithet, referring to his main distinction of "_imperfect_ and _perfect_;"

as, "the compound _imperfect_ participle pa.s.sive," and "the compound _perfect_ participle pa.s.sive." What is "_being builded_" or "_being printed_," but "an _imperfect pa.s.sive participle_?" Was this, or something else, the desideratum of Beattie?

[274] _Borne_ usually signifies _carried_; _born_ signifies _brought forth_. J. K. Worcester, the lexicographer, speaks of these two participles thus: "[Fist] The participle _born_ is used in the pa.s.sive form, and _borne_ in the active form, [with reference to birth]; as, 'He was _born_ blind,' _John_ ix.; 'The barren hath _borne_ seven,' I _Sam_. ii. This distinction between _born_ and _borne_, though not recognized by grammars, is in accordance with common usage, at least in this country. In many editions of the Bible it is recognized; and in many it is not. It seems to have been more commonly recognized in American, than in English, editions."--_Worcester's Universal and Critical Dict., w. Bear_. In five, out of seven good American editions of the Bible among my books, the latter text is, "The barren hath _born_ seven;" in two, it is as above, "hath _borne_." In Johnson's Quarto Dictionary, the perfect participle of _bear_ is given erroneously, "_bore_, or _born_;" and that of _forbear_, which should be _forborne_, is found, both in his columns and in his preface, "_forborn_."

[275] According to Murray, Lennie, Bullions, and some others, to use _begun_ for _began_ or _run_ for _ran_, is improper; but Webster gives _run_ as well as _ran_ for the preterit, and _begun_ may be used in like manner, on the authority of Dryden, Pope, and Parnell.

[276] "And they shall pa.s.s through it, hardly _bestead_, and hungry."--_Isaiah_, viii, 21.

[277] "_Brake_ [for the preterit of _Break_] seems now obsolescent."--_Dr.

Crombie, Etymol. and Syntax_, p. 193. Some recent grammarians, however, retain it; among whom are Bullions and M'Culloch. Wells retains it, but marks it as, "_Obsolete_;" as he does also the preterits _bare, clave, drove, gat, slang, spake, span, spat, sware, tare, writ_; and the participles _hoven, loaden, rid_ from _ride, spitten, stricken, and writ_.

In this he is not altogether consistent. Forms really obsolete belong not to any modern list of irregular verbs; and even such as are archaic and obsolescent, it is sometimes better to omit. If "_loaden_," for example, is now out of use, why should "_load, unload_, and _overload_," be placed, as they are by this author, among "irregular verbs;" while _freight_ and _distract_, in spite of _fraught_ and _distraught_, are reckoned regular?

"_Rid_," for _rode_ or _ridden_, though admitted by Worcester, appears to me a low vulgarism.

[278] _Cleave_, to split, is most commonly, if not always, irregular, as above; _cleave_, to stick, or adhere, is usually considered regular, but _clave_ was formerly used in the preterit, and _clove_ still may be: as, "The men of Judah _clave_ unto their king."--_Samuel_. "The tongue of the public prosecutor _clove_ to the roof of his mouth."--_Boston Atlas_, 1855.

[279] Respecting the preterit and the perfect participle of this verb, _drink_, our grammarians are greatly at variance. Dr. Johnson says, "preter. _drank_ or _drunk_; part. pa.s.s, _drunk_ or _drunken_." Dr.

Webster: "pret. and pp. _drank_. Old pret. and pp. _drunk_; pp. _drunken_."

Lowth: "pret. _drank_; part, _drunk_ or _drunken_." So Stamford. Webber, and others. Murray has it: "Imperf. _drank_, Perf. Part, _drunk_." So Comly, Lennie, Bullions, Blair, Butler. Frost, Felton, Goldsbury, and many others. Churchill cites the text, "Serve me till I have eaten and _drunken_;" and observes, "_Drunken_ is now used only as an adjective. The impropriety of using the preterimperfect [_drank_] for the participle of this verb is very common."--_New Gram._, p. 261. Sanborn gives both forms for the participle, preferring _drank_ to _drunk_. Kirkham prefers _drunk_ to _drank_; but contradicts himself in a note, by unconsciously making _drunk_ an adjective: "The men were _drunk_; i. e. inebriated. The toasts were _drank_."--_Gram._, p. 140. Cardell, in his Grammar, gives, "_drink, drank, drunk_;" but in his story of Jack Halyard, on page 59, he wrote, "had _drinked_:" and this, according to Fowle's True English Grammar, is not incorrect. The preponderance of authority is yet in favour of saying, "had _drunk_;" but _drank_ seems to be a word of greater delicacy, and perhaps it is sufficiently authorized. A hundred late writers may be quoted for it, and some that were popular in the days of Johnson. "In the choice of what is fit to be eaten and _drank_."--_Beattie's Moral Science_, Vol.

1, p. 51. "Which I had no sooner _drank_."--_Addison, Tattler_, No. 131.

"Thy brother's blood the thirsty earth hath drank, Broach'd with the steely point of Clifford's lance."--_Shakspeare_.

[280] "_Holden_ is not in general use; and is chiefly employed by attorneys."--_Crombie, on Etymology and Synt._, p. 190. Wells marks this word as, "Obsolescent."--_School Gram._, p. 103. L. Murray rejected it; but Lowth gave it alone, as a participle, and _held_ only as a preterit.

[281] "I have been found guilty of killing cats I never _hurted_."--_Roderick Random_, Vol. i, p. 8.

[282] "They _keeped_ aloof as they pa.s.sed her bye."--_J. Hogg, Pilgrims of the Sun_, p. 19.

[283] _Lie_, to be at rest, is irregular, as above; but _lie_, to utter falsehood, is regular, as follows: _lie, lied, lying, lied_.

"Thus said, at least, my mountain guide, Though deep, perchance, the villain _lied_."

--_Scott's Lady of the Lake_.

[284] Perhaps there is authority sufficient to place the verb _rend_ among those which are redundant.

"Where'er its cloudy veil was _rended_."

--_Whittier's Moll Pitcher_.

"Mortal, my message is for thee; thy chain to earth is _rended_; I bear thee to eternity; prepare! thy course is ended."

--_The Amulet_.

"Come as the winds come, when forests are _rended_."

--_Sir W. Scott_.

"The hunger pangs her sons which rended."

--NEW QUARTERLY REVIEW: _Examiner_, No. 119.

[285] We find now and then an instance in which _gainsay_ is made regular: as, "It can neither be _rivalled_ nor _gainsayed_."--_Chapman's Sermons to Presbyterians_, p. 36. Perhaps it would be as well to follow Webster here, in writing _rivaled_ with one _l_: and the a.n.a.logy of the simple verb _say_, in forming this compound irregularly, _gainsaid_. Usage warrants the latter, however, better than the former.

[286] "Shoe, _shoed_ or shod, shoeing, _shoed_ or shod."--_Old Gram., by W.

Ward_, p. 64; and _Fowle's True English Gram._, p. 46.

[287] "A. Murray has rejected _sung_ as the _Preterite_, and L. Murray has rejected _sang_. Each _Preterite_, however, rests on good authority. The same observation may be made, respecting _sank_ and _sunk_. Respecting the _preterites_ which have _a_ or _u_, as _slang_, or _slung, sank_, or _sunk_, it would be better were the former only to be used, as the _Preterite_ and Participle would thus be discriminated."--_Dr. Crombie, on Etymology and Syntax_, p. 199. The _preterits_ which this critic thus prefers, are _rang, sang, stung, sprang, sw.a.n.g, sank, shrank, slank, stank, swam_, and _span_ for _spun_. In respect to them all, I think he makes an ill choice. According to his own showing, _fling, string_, and _sting_, always make the preterit and the participle alike; and this is the obvious tendency of the language, in all these words. I reject _slang_ and _span_, as derivatives from _sling_ and _spin_; because, in such a sense, they are obsolete, and the words have other uses. Lindley Murray, _in his early editions_, rejected _sang, sank, slang, sw.a.n.g, shrank, slank, stank_, and _span_; and, at the same time, preferred _rang, sprang_, and _swam_, to _rung, sprung_, and _swum_. In his later copies, he gave the preference to the _u_, in all these words; but restored _sang_ and _sank_, which Crombie names above, still omitting the other six, which did not happen to be mentioned to him.