"Now morn, her rosy steps in th' eastern clime

Advancing-"

"The north-east spends his rage."

Milton, P. L. b. 5.

Thomson.

CASE.

Case in grammar denotes a variation of words to express the relation of things to each other. In English, most of the relations are expressed by separate words; but the relation of property, ownership or possession, is expressed by adding s to a name, with an apostrophy; thus, John's book; which words are equivalent to "the book of John.”

This

is called the Possessive Case. In English therefore names have two cases only, the nominative or simple name, and the possessive. The nominative before a verb, and the objective after a verb, are not distinguished by inflections, and are to be known only by position or the sense of the passage.

When the letter s, added as the sign of the possessive, will coalesce with the name, it is pronounced in the same syllable; as, John's. But if it will not coalesce, it adds a syllable to the word; as, Thomas's bravery, pronounced as if written Thomasis-the church's prosperity, churchis prosperity. These examples show the impropriety of retrenching the vowel; but it occasions no inconvenience to natives.

When words end in es or ss, the apostrophy is added without e; as, on eagles' wings; for righteousness' sake.

PRONOUNS OR SUBSTITUTES.

Substitutes or pronouns are of two kinds; those which are used in the place of the names of persons only, and may be called personal; and those which represent names, attributes, a sentence or part of a sentence, or a series of propositions.

The pronouns which are appropriate to persons, are, I, thou, you, he, she, we, ye, and who.

I is used by a speaker to denote himself, and is called the first person of the singular number.

When a speaker includes others with himself, he uses we. This is the first person of the plural number.

Thou and you represent the person addressed-thou in solemn discourse, and you, in common language.* These are the second person. In the plural, ye is used in solemn style, and you in familiar language.

He represents the name of a male, and she, that of a female, who is the subject of discourse, but not directly addressed. These are called the third person.

*As you was originally in the plural number, grammarians insist that it must still be restricted to that number. But national usage rejects the arbitrary principle. The true principle, on which all language is built, rejects it. What fundamental rule have we to dispose of words, but this, that when a word signifies one, or unity, it belongs to the singular number? If a word, once exclusively plural, becomes, by universal use, the sign of individuality, it must take its place in the singular number. That this is a fact with you, is proved by national usage. To assign the substitute to its verb, is to invert the order of things. The verb must follow its nominative-if that denotes unity, so does the verb.

"When you was at Athens, you attended the schools of the philosophers."-Cicero, Tusc. Quest. Trans. b. 2.

"On that happy day when you was given to the world.”—Dodd's Massillon, Serm. 1.

"Unless you was ill.”—Boswell's Life of J. Æ. 68.

"You was on the spot where your enemy was found killed.”—Guthrie's Quinctilian, b. 2.

"You was in hopes to have succeeded to the inheritance."-Ibm. b. 5. "When you was here comforting me "-Pope's Let.

"I am as well as when you was here."-Gay's Let to Swift.

"Why was you glad?"-Boswell's Life of Johnson.

These writers did not commit mistakes in the use of the verb after you -they wrote the language as established by national usage-the foundation of all language. So is the practice in the United States-not merely popular usage, though this, when general, is respectable authority; but the practice of men of letters.

"Where was you standing during the transaction ?" "How far was you from the defendant?"

"How far was you from the parties?"-Judge Parker. Selfridge, p. 58.

Trial of

"Was you acquainted with the defendant at college?"-Mr. Dexter. Ibm. p. 60.

"Was you there when the pistol was fired?"-Mr. Gore. Ibm. 60. "Was you in the office?"-Att. Gen. Ibm. 68.*

* This use of was is from the Gothic dialect; but it is primitive and

correct.

It is a substitute for the name of any thing of the neuter gender in the third person, and for a sentence.

They is a substitute for the names of persons or things, and forms the third person of the plural number.

Who is a relative or a personal pronoun, used to introduce a new clause or affirmation into a sentence, which clause has an immediate dependence on the preceding one.* Who is also used to ask questions, and hence it is called an interrogative.

Which is also a relative, but is of neuter gender. It is also interrogative.

These pronouns have two cases; the nominative which precedes a verb, and the objective which follows it. are inflected in the following manner:

Sing. Plu.

Nominative It we

They

NOTE.-Mine, thine, his, hers, yours and theirs, are usually considered as the possessive case. But the three first are either attributes, and used with nouns, or they are substitutes. The three last are always substitutes, used in the place of names which are understood, as may seen in the note below.‡

*

be

Who is called a relative, because it relates to an antecedent. But this is also true of he, she, they, and most of the substitutes. They all relate to the words which they represent.

Me is also used in the nominative, in popular practice-it is me. This is condemned as bad English; but in reality is an original idiom of the language, received from the primitive Celtic inhabitants of England and France, in whose language mi was the nominative case of the first personal pronoun. The French language retains the same word, from the same original, in the phrase c'est moi-it is I.

That mine, thine, his, yours, hers and theirs, do not constitute a possessive case, is demonstrable; for they are constantly used as the nominatives to verbs, and as the objectives after verbs and prepositions, as in

Its and whose have a better claim to be considered as a possessive case; but as they equally well fall under the denomination of attributes, I have, for the sake of uniformity, assigned them a place with that part of speech.

But it must be observed, that although it and who are real substitutes, never united to names, like attributes-it day-who man; yet its and whose cannot be detached from a name expressed or implied; as, its shape-its figure-whose face-whose works-whose are they? that is, whose works? These are therefore real attributes.

In the use of substitutes, it is to be remarked, that I, thou, you, ye and we are generally employed without an antecedent name. "When I and the name of the person are both employed, as they are in formal writings, oaths and the like,

the following passages: "Whether it could perform its operations of thinking and memory out of a body organized as ours is.-Locke, b. 2. 27. "In referring our ideas to those of other men called by the same name, ours may be false."-" It is for no other reason but that his agrees not with our ideas."-Ibm. ch. 32. 9 and 10.

"You may imagine what kind of faith theirs was."-Bacon. Unity in Religion.

"He ran headlong into his own ruin whilst he endeavored to precipitate ours."-Bolingbroke. Let. to Windham.

"The reason is, that his subject is generally things; theirs, on the contrary, is persons." Camp. Rhet. b. I. ch. 10.

"Yours of the 26th Oct. I have received, as I have always done yours, with no little satisfaction."-Wycherley to Pope.

"Therefore leave your forest of beasts for ours of brutes, called men." -Ibm.

"These return so much better out of your hands than they went from mine."-Ibm.

"Your letter of the 20th of this month, like the rest of yours-tells me with so much more wit, sense and kindness than mine can express," &c.-Ibm.

"Having good works enough of your own besides to ensure yours and their immortality."-Ibm.

"The omission of repetitions is but one, and the easiest part of yours and of my design."-Pope to Wycherley.

"My sword and yours are kin."-Shakspeare.

It is needless to multiply proofs. We observe these pretended possessives uniformly used as nominatives or objectives. To say that, in these passages, ours, yours, theirs, and mine form a possessive case, is to make the possessive perform the office of a nominative case to verbs, and an objective case after verbs and prepositions-a manifest solecism. Should it be said that a noun is understood; I reply, this cannot be true, in regard to the grammatical construction: for supply the noun for which the word is a substitute, and the pronoun must be changed into

the pronouns precede the name; as, "I, Richard Roe, of Boston." In similar language, you and we also.precede the name; as, "You, John Doe, of New York." "We, Richard Roe, and John Doe, of Philadelphia."

You is used by writers very indefinitely, as a substitute for any person who may read the work-the mind of the writer imagining a person addressed.

He and they are used in the same indefinite manner; as, "He seldom lives frugally, who lives by chance.'

ed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted."

"Bless

He and they, in such sentences, represent any persons who fall within the subsequent description.

Who and whom are always substitutes for persons, and never for things or brutes. Whose is equally applicable to persons as to things.†

an adjective." Yours of the 26th of October," becomes your letter— "he endeavored to precipitate ours," becomes our ruin. This shows that the words are real substitutes, like others, where it stands for other men or things.

Besides, in three passages, just quoted, the word yours is joined by a connective to a name in the same case: "To ensure yours and their immortality." "The easiest part of yours and of my design." "My sword and yours are kin." Will any person pretend that the connective here joins different cases?

Another consideration is equally decisive of this question. If yours, ours, &c. are real possessives, then the same word admits of two different signs of the case; for we say correctly," an acquaintance of yours, ours, or theirs"—of being the sign of the possessive; but if the words in themselves are possessives, then there must be two signs of the same case, which is absurd.*

Compare these words with a name in the possessive case-"My house is on a hill; my father's is on a plain." Here father's is a real possessive case; the word house being understood; and the addition of the noun makes no alteration in the word father's ; 'my father's is," or my father's house is.”

*This case does not compare with that of names. We say, a soldier of the king's"'-or a soldier of the king's soldiers-but we cannot say, "an acquaintance of your's acquaintance."

"Whose is rather the poetical, than the regular genitive of which." -Johnson. Lowth also condemns the use of whose, in the neuter gender, citing, at the same time, the most respectable authorities for this use-Dryden, Milton and Addison. "The question whose solution I require"" the tree whose mortal taste."-But these critics seem not to have penetrated to the bottom of this usage. The truth is, who and its inflections are a part of the primitive language. The Latin qui, cui, quo, qua, are the English who-quem and quod are whom and what-cujus is whose. The Scots formerly wrote quha, quhat; the Saxons, hwa.-