Page:The grammar of English grammars.djvu/328

 them."--English Parser'', p. 43. This doctrine gives us a form of declension that is both complex and deficient. It is therefore more objectionable than almost any of those which are criticised above. The arguments and authorities on which the author rests his position, are not thought likely to gain many converts; for which reason, I dismiss the subject, without citing or answering them.

OBS. 19.--In old books, we sometimes find the word I written for the adverb ay, yes: as, "To dye, to sleepe; To sleepe, perchance to dreame; I, there's the rub."--Shakspeare, Old Copies. The British Grammar, printed in 1784, and the Grammar of Murray the schoolmaster, published some years earlier than Lindley Murray's, say: "We use I as an Answer, in a familiar, careless, or merry Way; as, 'I, I, Sir, I, I;' but to use ay, is accounted rude, especially to our Betters." See ''Brit. Gram.'', p. 198. The age of this rudeness, or incivility, if it ever existed, has long passed away; and the fashion seems to be so changed, that to write or utter I for ay, would now in its turn be "accounted rude"--the rudeness of ignorance--a false orthography, or a false pronunciation. In the word ay, the two sounds of ah-ee are plainly heard; in the sound of I, the same elements are more quickly blended. (See a note at the foot of page 162.) When this sound is suddenly repeated, some writers make a new word of it, which must be called an interjection: as, "'Pray, answer me a question or two.' 'Ey, ey, as many as you please, cousin Bridget, an they be not too hard.'"--Burgh's Speaker, p. 99. "Ey, ey, 'tis so; she's out of her head, poor thing."--Ib., p. 100. This is probably a corruption of ay, which is often doubled in the same manner: thus,

"Ay, ay, Antipholus, look strange, and frown."--Shakspeare.

OBS. 20.--The common fashion of address being nowadays altogether in the plural form, the pronouns thou, thy, thine, thee, and thyself, have become unfamiliar to most people, especially to the vulgar and uneducated. These words are now confined almost exclusively to the writings of the poets, to the language of the Friends, to the Holy Scriptures, and to the solemn services of religion. They are, however, the only genuine representatives of the second person singular, in English; and to displace them from that rank in grammar, or to present you, your, and yours, as being literally singular, though countenanced by several late writers, is a useless and pernicious innovation. It is sufficient for the information of the learner, and far more consistent with learning and taste, to say, that the plural is fashionably used for the singular, by a figure of syntax; for, in all correct usage of this sort, the verb is plural, as well as the pronoun--Dr. Webster's fourteen authorities to the contrary notwithstanding. For, surely, "You was" cannot be considered good English, merely because that number of respectable writers have happened, on some particular occasions, to adopt the phrase; and even if we must needs concede this point, and grant to the Doctor and his converts, that "You was is primitive and correct," the example no more proves that you is singular, than that was is plural. And what is one singular irregular preterit, compared with all the verbs in the language?

OBS. 21.--In our present authorized version of the Bible, the numbers and cases of the second person are kept remarkably distinct,[211] the pronouns being always used in the following manner: thou for the nominative, thy or thine for the possessive, and thee for the objective, singular; ye for the nominative, your or yours for the possessive, and you for the objective, plural. Yet, before that version was made, fashionable usage had commonly substituted you for ye, making the former word nominative as well as objective, and applying it to one hearer as well as to more. And subsequently, as it appears, the religious sect that entertained a scruple about applying you to an individual, fell for the most part into an ungrammatical practice of putting thee for thou; making, in like manner, the objective pronoun to be both nominative and objective; or, at least, using it very commonly so in their conversation. Their manner of speaking, however, was not--or, certainly, with the present generation of their successors, is not--as some grammarians represent it to be, that formal and antique phraseology which we call the solemn style.[212] They make no more use of the pronoun ye, or of the verbal termination eth, than do people of fashion; nor do they, in using the pronoun thou, or their improper nominative thee, ordinarily inflect with st or est the preterits or the auxiliaries of the accompanying verbs, as is done in the solemn style. Indeed, to use the solemn style familiarly, would be, to turn it into burlesque; as when Peter Pindar "telleth what he troweth." [213] And let those who think with Murray, that our present version