Part 61 (2/2)
”'So I believ'd'--No, Abel! to thy grief, So thou _relinquish'd_ all that was belief”
--_Crabbe, Borough_, p 279
OBS 27--L Murray, and his nuersoll, Greenleaf, Kirkhah they insist on it, that the _st_ of the second person can never be dispensed with, except in the imperative ether insensible of that uage So the auxiliaries _dost_ and _didst_: as _dost burst_, for _burstest; didst check_, for _checkedst_ This recommendation proceeds on the supposition that _dost_ and _didst_ are smoother syllables than _est_ and _edst_; which is not true: _didst learn_ is harsher than either _learnedst_ or _learntest_; and all three of they_, or _positiveness_,” which grammarians ascribe to these auxiliaries, always appropriate Except in a question, _dost_ and _didst_, like _do, does_, and _did_, are usually signs of _emphasis_; and therefore unfit to be substituted for the _st, est_, or _edst_, of an uneraces his Elocution with such unutterable things, as ”_prob'dst, hurl'dst, arm'dst, want'dst, burn'dst, bark'dst, bubbl'dst, troubbl'dst_,” attributes the use of the plural for the singular, to a design of avoiding the raggedness of the latter ”In order to avoid the disagreeable harshness of sound, occasioned by the frequent recurrence of the termination _est, edst_, in the adaptation of our verbs to the nominative _thou_, a _modern innovation_ which substitutes _you_ for _thou_, in faenerally been adopted This innovation contributes greatly to the harmony of our colloquial style
_You_ was formerly restricted to the plural nuular or a plural noun”--_Kirkham's Gram_, p
99 A modern innovation, forsooth! Does not every body knoas current four hundred years ago, or more? Certainly, both _ye_ and _you_ were applied in this reat, as early as the fourteenth century
Chaucer sometimes used them so, and he died in 1400 Sir T More uses them so, in a piece dated 1503
”O dere cosyn, Dan Johan, she sayde, What eyleth _you_ so rathe to aryse?”--_Chaucer_
Shakspeare most commonly uses _thou_, but he sometimes has _you_ in stead of it Thus, he makes Portia say to Brutus:
”_You_ suddenly arose, and walk'd about, Musing, and sighing, with _your_ arms across; And when I ask'd _you_ what the entle looks”--_J Caesar_, Act ii, Sc 2
OBS 28--”There is a natural tendency in all languages to throw out the rugged parts which improper consonants produce, and to preserve those which are reeable to the ear”--_Gardiner's Music of Nature_, p
29 ”The English tongue, so rereat variety of dull un terminations Mr Sheridan attributes this defect, to an utter inattention to what is easy to the organs of speech and agreeable to the ear; and further adds, that, 'the French having been adopted as the language of the court, no notice was taken, of the spelling or pronunciation of our words, until the reign of queen Anne' So little was spelling attended to in the time of Elizabeth, that Dr Johnson infor to Shakspeare's will, to determine how his name was spelt, he was found to have written it himself [in] no _less_ [fewer] than three different ways”--_Ib_, p 477 In old books, our participial or verbal termination _ed_, is found written in about a dozen different ways; as, _ed, de, d, t, id, it, yd, yt, ede, od, ud_ For _est_ and _eth_, we find sometimes the consonants only; sometimes, _ist_ or _yst, ith_ or _yth_; someti was o for verbs of the third person plural, as well as for those of the third person singular;[249] and, in the iular and plural: as,
”_Demith_ thyself, that demist other's dede; And trouthe the shall deliver, it's no drede”--_Chaucer_
OBS 29--It must be obvious to every one who has e, that this part of its grammar has always been quite as unsettled as it is now; and, however we may wish to establish its principles, it is idle to teach for absolute certainty that which every e ation as sure as those of other tongues, study to exemplify in their own practice what tends to uniforrae, as it has been, and as it is; pointing out to the learner what is reeable If by these e of writers and speakers cannot be fixed to what is fittest for their occasions, and therefore rammar no remedy for their inaccuracies; as there is none for the blunders of dull opinionists, none for the absurdities of Ignorance stalled in the seats of Learning Soular verb is like the present, it should take _edst_ for the second person singular This rule, (which is adopted by Walker, in his Principles, No 372,) gives us such words as _cast-edst, cost-edst, bid-dedst, burst-edst, cut-tedst, hit-tedst, let-tedst, put-tedst, hurt-edst, rid-dedst, shed-dedst_, &c But the rule is groundless The few exas, in support of this principle, are undoubtedly forular preterits now obsolete; and if this were not the case, no person of taste could think of e, on any occasion, derivatives so uncouth Dr Johnson has justly reedness and asperity” And this defect, as so reular terular is added to our preterits
Accordingly, we find nu the poets, both ancient and modern, in which that termination is omitted See Percy's Reliques of Ancient Poetry, everywhere
”Thou, who of old the prophet's eye _unsealed_”--_Pollok_
”Thou _saw_ the fields laid bare and waste”--_Burns_[250]
OBS 30--With the faular, those who constantly put _you_ for _thou_ can have no concern; and many may think it unworthy of notice, because Murray has said nothing about it: others will hastily pronounce it bad English, because they have learned at school some sche It is this partial learning which makes so much explanation here necessary The formation of this part of speech, forrae can never entirely drop the pronoun _thou_, and its derivatives, _thy, thine, thee, thyself_, without great injury, especially to its poetry Nor can the distinct syllabic utterance of the terenerally practised, except in solemn prose It is therefore better, not to insist on those old verbal forainst which there are so many objections, than to exclude the pronoun of the second person singular froe, whether familiar or poetical, as will not admit them It is true that on most occasions _you_ may be substituted for _thou_, without much inconvenience; and so may _we_ be substituted for _I_, with just as e ”is not to be encouraged”--_Gras and e _we_ for _I_ their most common mode of expression They renounce their individuality to avoid egotise, the fault indeed will be banished, or o an other sixth part of every English conjugation The pronouns in the following couplet are put for the first person singular, the second person singular, and the second person plural; yet nobody will understand theht trusty, and so forth--_we_ let _you_ to know _We_ are very ill used by _you mortals_ below”--_Swift_
OBS 31--It is reular in the second person, adopt it without scruple, in the first The figure is the same in both; and in both, sufficiently coeneral than it now is If _thou_ should not be totally sacrificed to as once a vain compliment, neither should _I_, to what is now an occasional, and perhaps a vain assumption
Lindley Murray, who does not appear to have used _you_ for _thou_, and as soularly careful to periphrase [sic--KTH] and avoid the latter, nowhere in his graular He is often ”the _Coenerally, ”We:” as, ”_We_ have distributed these parts of graible”--_Octavo Gram_, p 58 ”_We_ shall not pursue this subject any further”--_Ib_, p 62 ”_We_ shall close these remarks on the tenses”--_Ib_, p 76 ”_We_ presume no solid objection can be made”--_Ib_, p 78 ”The observations which _we_ have made”--_Ib_, p 100 ”_We_ shall produce a remarkable example of this beauty froiven sufficient openings into this subject”--_Ib_, p 334 This usage has authority enough; for it was not uncorammarians; but he must be a slender scholar, who thinks the pronoun _we_ thereby becoe or fitness there is in thus putting _we_ for _I_, the reader e Dr Blair did not hesitate to use _I_, as often as ho had occasion; neither did Lowth, or Johnson, or Walker, or Webster: as, ”_I_ shall produce a remarkable example of this beauty froiven sufficient openings into this subject”--_Ib_, p 131 So in Lowth's Preface: ”_I_ believe,”--”_I_ am persuaded,”--”_I_ am sure,”--”_I_ think,”--”_I_ am afraid,”--”_I_ will not take upon _ to be critical without hostility, and explicit without partiality, I write not for or against any sect, or any raue The student must distinctly understand, that it is necessary to speak and write differently, according to the different circu Who is he that will pretend that the solemn style of the Bibleaffectation? In preaching, or in praying, the ancient terular and _eth_ for the third, as well as _ed_ pronounced as a separate syllable for the preterit, are adenerally in better taste than the sh now frequently heard in religious asseravity of a serrave poetry also, especially when it treats of scriptural subjects, to which _you_ put for _thou_ is obviously unsuitable, the personal terh from the earliest times to the present day they have usually been contracted and often orareeably to the notion of our tuneless critics The critical objection to their elision, however, can have no very firm foundation while it is adenerally_ have recourse to this mode of expression, that they lish Coood authority, such as Pope, Byron, and Pollok, have so the verb, even in corave cast, the elision er reason, be adeneral custo those who choose to employ the pronoun _thou_ in conversation
”But thou, false Arcite, never _shall_ obtain,” &c
--_Dryden, Fables_
”These goods _thyself can_ on thyself bestow”
--_Id, in Joh Dict_
”What I show, _thy self may_ freely on thyself bestow”
--_Id, Lowth's Grae”
--_Prior_
”Of all thou ever _conquered_, none was left”
--_Pollok_, B vii, l 760
”And touch , as thou _touched_ the man,” &c