Part 47 (2/2)

_2nd Term_ (_for the plural number_)

Nom _Ye_ Acc _You_ Form in _r_--_Your_, _yours_

-- 298 _We_ and _me_ have been dealt with as distinct words But it is only for practical purposes that they can be considered to be thus separate; since the sounds of _ular form _ma_=_I_ is looked upon as part of the same ith _vayam_=_we_

The same is the case with the Greek [Greek: me] (_me_), and the plural form [Greek: hemeis] (_haemeis_)=_we_

_You_--As far as the practice of the present mode of speech {245} is concerned, the word _you_ is a _no_, _you were speaking_

Why should it not be treated as such? There is no absolute reason why it should not All that can be said is, that the historical reason and the logical reason are at variance The Anglo-Saxon forn of case at all, so that, form for form, they are equally and indifferently noe ical to say that a certain form (_you_) is used _either_ as a nominative or accusative, than to say that the accusative case is used instead of a nominative It is clear that _you_ can be used instead of _ye_ only so far as it is nominative in power

_Ye_--As far as the evidence of such expressions as _get on with ye_ is concerned, the word _ye_ is an accusative form The reasons why it should or should not be treated as such are involved in the previous paragraph

_Me_--Carrying out the views just laid down, and ad _you_ to be a nominative, or _quasi_-no to the word _me_, and call it also a secondary nominative; inasmuch as such phrases as _it is me_=_it is I_ are colish is to assume the point No one says that _c'est ood The fact is, that the whole question is a question of degree Has or has not the custom been sufficiently prevalent to have transferred the forms _me_, _ye_, and _you_ from one case to another, as it is admitted to have done with the forms _him_ and _whom_, once dative, but now accusative?

_Observe_--That the expression _it is me_=_it is I_ will not justify the use of _it is him_, _it is her_=_it is he_ and _it is she_ _Me_, _ye_, _you_, are what may be called _indifferent_ forms, _i e_ nominative as much as accusative, and accusative as much as nominative _Him_ and _her_, on the other hand, are not indifferent The _-ns of cases other than the noain: the reasons which allow the form _you_ to be {246} considered as a no used for _ye_, will not allow it to be considered a no used for _thou_ It is sub_, &c, even when applied to a single individual, the idea is really plural; in other words, that the courtesy consists in treating _one_ person as _ hiular sense It is certain that, grammatically considered, _you_=_thou_ is a plural, since the verb hich it agrees is plural:--_you are speaking_, not _you art speaking_

{247}

CHAPTER VI

ON THE TRUE REFLECTIVE pronOUN IN THE GOTHIC LANGUAGES, AND ON ITS ABSENCE IN ENGLISH

-- 299 A true reflective pronoun is wanting in English In other words, there are no equivalents to the Latin pronominal forms _sui_, _sibi_, _se_

Nor yet are there any equivalents in English to the so-called adjectival forms _suus_, _sua_, _suum_: since _his_ and _her_ are the equivalents to _ejus_ and _illius_, and are not adjectives but genitive cases

At the first view, this last sentence seeht seem superfluous to state, that, if there were no such primitive form as _se_ (or its equivalent), there could be no such secondary form as _suus_ (or its equivalent)

Such, however, is not the case _Suus_ e, and yet _se_ be absent; in other words, the derivative forinal one had become extinct

Such is really the case with the _Old_ Frisian The reflective personal form, the equivalent to _se_, is lost, whilst the reflective possessive form, the equivalent to _suus_, is found In the _Modern_ Frisian, however, both forlish

The history of the reflective pronoun in the Gothic tongues is as follows:--

_In Moeso-Gothic_--Found in three cases, _seina_, _sis_, _sik_=_sui_, _sibi_, _se_

_In Old Norse_--Ditto _Sin_, _ser_, _sik_=_sui_, _sibi_, _se_

_In Old High Ger no such word as _sir_=_sis_=_sibi_ Besides this, the genitive {248} or possessive forenders

_In Old Frisian_--As stated above, there is here no equivalent to _se_; whilst there _is_ the form _sin_=_suus_

_In Old Saxon_--The equivalent to _se_, _sibi_, and _sui_ very rare The equivalent to _suus_ not colo-Saxon_--No instance of the equivalent to _se_ at all The forms _sinne_=_suum_, and _sinum_=_suo_, occur in Beowulf In Caedmon cases of _sin_=_suus_ are more frequent Still the usual form is _his_=_ejus_

In the Dutch, Danish, and Swedish, the true reflectives, both personal and possessive, occur; so that the lish stand alone in respect to the entire absence of them--Deutsche Grammatik, iv 321-348