Page:The grammar of English grammars.djvu/527

 Murray's examples, I would here observe, that the direct use of the infinitive for an objective noun is a manifest Grecism; as, "For to will is present with me; but to perform that which is good, I find not."--Octavo Gram., p. 184. That is, "the performance of that which is good, I find not." Or perhaps we may supply a noun after the verb, and take this text to mean, "But to perform that which is good, I find not the ability." Our Bible has it, "But how to perform that which is good. I find not;" as if the manner in which he might do good, was what the apostle found not: but Murray cites it differently, omitting the word how, as we see above. All active verbs to which something is subjoined by when, where, whence, how, or why, must be accounted intransitive, unless we suppose them to govern such nouns of time, place, degree, manner, or cause, as correspond to these connectives; as, "I know why she blushed." Here we might supply the noun reason, as, "I know the reason why she blushed;" but the word is needless, and I should rather parse know as being intransitive. As for "virtue in distress," if this is an "objective phrase," and not to be analyzed, we have millions of the same sort; but, if one should say, "Virtue in distress excites pity," the same phrase would demonstrate the absurdity of Murray's doctrine, because the two nouns here take two different cases.

OBS. 6.--The word that, which is often employed to introduce a dependent clause, is, by some grammarians, considered as a pronoun, representing the clause which follows it; as, "I know that Messias cometh."--John, iv, 25. This text they would explain to mean, "Messias cometh, I know that;" and their opinion seems to be warranted both by the origin and by the usual import of the particle. But, in conformity to general custom, and to his own views of the practical purposes of grammatical analysis, the author has ranked it with the conjunctions. And he thinks it better, to call those verbs intransitive, which are followed by that and a dependent clause, than to supply the very frequent ellipses which the other explanation supposes. To explain it as a conjunction, connecting an active-transitive verb and its object, as several respectable grammarians do, appears to involve some inconsistency. If that is a conjunction, it connects what precedes and what follows; but a transitive verb should exercise a direct government, without the intervention of a conjunction. On the other hand, the word that has not, in any such sentence, the inherent nature of a pronoun. The transposition above, makes it only a pronominal adjective; as, "Messias cometh, I know that fact." And in many instances such a solution is impracticable; as, "The people sought him, and came unto him, and stayed him, that he should not depart from them."--Luke, iv, 42. Here, to prove that to be a pronoun, the disciples of Tooke and Webster must resort to more than one imaginary ellipsis, and to such inversion as will scarcely leave the sense in sight.

OBS. 7.--In some instances the action of a transitive verb gives to its direct object an additional name, which is also in the objective case, the two words being in apposition; as, "Thy saints proclaim thee king."--Cowper. "And God called the firmament Heaven."--Bible. "Ordering them to make themselves masters of a certain steep eminence."--Rollin, ii, 67. And, in such a construction, the direct object is sometimes placed before the verb; though the name which results from the action, cannot be so placed: as, "And Simon he surnamed Peter."--Mark, iii, 15. "Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God."--Rev., iii, 12. Some grammarians seem not to have considered this phraseology as coming within the rule of apposition. Thus Webster: "We have some verbs which govern two words in the objective case; as,   'Did I request thee, maker, from my clay    To mold me man?'--Milton, 10, 744.