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Ebook has 270 lines and 33206 words, and 6 pages

Release date: December 30, 2023

Original publication: London: J. Hughs, 1762

A SHORT INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH GRAMMAR: WITH CRITICAL NOTES.

CICERO.

LONDON: Printed by J. HUGHS; For A. MILLAR in the Strand; And R. and J. DODSLEY in Pall-mall. 1762.

PREFACE

A SHORT INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH GRAMMAR.

GRAMMAR.

Grammar is the Art of rightly expressing our thoughts by Words.

Grammar in general, or Universal Grammar, explains the Principles which are common to all languages.

The Grammar of any particular Language, as the English Grammar, applies those common principles to that particular language, according to the established usage and custom of it.

Grammar treats of Sentences, and the several parts of which they are compounded.

Sentences consist of Words; Words, of one or more Syllables; Syllables, of one or more Letters.

So that Letters, Syllables, Words, and Sentences, make up the whole subject of Grammar.

LETTERS.

A Letter is the first Principle, or least part of a Word.

An Articulate Sound is the sound of the human voice, formed by the organs of speech.

A Vowel is a simple articulate sound, formed by the impulse of the voice, and by the opening only of the mouth in a particular manner.

A Consonant cannot be perfectly sounded by itself; but joined with a vowel forms a compound articulate sound, by a particular motion or contact of the parts of the mouth.

A Diphthong, or Double Vowel, is the union of two or more vowels pronounced by a single impulse of the voice.

In English there are twenty-six Letters:

A, a; B, b; C, c; D, d; E, e; F, f; G, g; H, h; I, i; J, j; K, k; L, l; M, m; N, n; O, o; P, p; Q, q; R, r; S, s; T, t; U, u; V, v; W, w; X, x; Y, y; Z, z.

The English Alphabet, like most others, is both deficient and redundant; in some cases, the same letters expressing different sounds, and different letters expressing the same sounds.

SYLLABLES.

A Syllable is a sound either simple or compounded, pronounced by a single impulse of the voice, and constituting a word, or part of a word.

Spelling is the art of reading by naming the letters singly, and rightly dividing words into their syllables. Or, in writing, it is the expressing of a word by its proper letters.

But the best and only sure rule for dividing the syllables in spelling, is to divide them as they are naturally divided in a right pronunciation.

WORDS.

Words are articulate sounds, used by common consent as signs of ideas, or notions.

There are in English nine Sorts of Words, or, as they are commonly called, Parts of Speech.

EXAMPLE.

ARTICLE.

The Article is a word prefixed to substantives, to point them out, and to shew how far their signification extends.

"The proper study of mankind is man:"

POPE.

SHAKESPEAR.

DRYDEN.

SUBSTANTIVE.

A Substantive, or Noun, is the Name of a thing; of whatever we conceive in any way to subsist, or of which we have any notion.

Whatever is spoken of is represented as one, or more, in Number: these two manners of representation in respect of number are called the Singular, and the Plural, Number.

The English in its Substantives has but two different terminations for Cases; that of the Nominative, which simply expresses the Name of the thing, and that of the Possessive Case.

Things are frequently considered with relation to the distinction of Sex or Gender; as being Male, or Female, or Neither the one, nor the other. Hence Substantives are of the Masculine, or Feminine, or Neuter, that is, Neither, Gender: which latter is only the exclusion of all consideration of Gender.

The English Language, with singular propriety, following nature alone, applies the distinction of Masculine and Feminine only to the names of Animals; all the rest are Neuter: except when by a Poetical or Rhetorical fiction things inanimate and Qualities are exhibited as Persons, and consequently become either Male or Female. And this gives the English an advantage above most other languages in the Poetical and Rhetorical Style: for when Nouns naturally Neuter are converted into Masculine and Feminine, the Personification is more distinctly and forcibly marked.

The chief use of Gender in English is in the Pronoun of the Third Person, which must agree in that respect with the Noun for which it stands.

PRONOUN.

A Pronoun is a word standing instead of a Noun, as its Substitute or Representative.

In the Pronoun are to be considered the Person, Number, Gender and Case.

There are Three Persons which may be the Subject of any discourse: first, the Person who speaks may speak of himself; secondly, he may speak of the Person to whom he addresses himself; thirdly, he may speak of some other Person.

Pronouns have Three Cases; the Nominative; the Genitive, or Possessive; like Nouns; and moreover a Case, which follows the Verb Active, or the Preposition, expressing the Object of an Action, or of a Relation. It answers to the Oblique Cases in Latin; and may be properly enough called the Objective Case.

PRONOUNS;

according to their Persons, Numbers, Cases, and Genders.

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