ENGLISH GRAMMAR ENGLISH ORTHOGRAPHY. LETTERS. 1 Orthography teaches the nature and powers of letters, and the just method of spelling words. A letter is the first principle, or least part, of a word. The letters of the English language, called the English Alphabet, are twenty-six in number. These letters are the representatives of certain articulate, sounds SYLLABLES. A syllable is a sound either simple or compounded, pronounced by a single impulse of the voice, and constituting a word, or part of a word; as, a, an, ant. Spelling is the art of rightly dividing words into their syllables; or of expressing a word by its proper letters.* WORDS. Words are articulate sounds, used by common consent, as signs of our ideas. A word of one syllable is termed a monosylla ble; a word of two syllables, a dissyllable; a word of three syllables, a trisyllable; and a word of four or more syllables, a polysyllable. All words are either primitive or derivative. A primitive word is that which cannot be reduced to any simpler word in the language; as, man, good, content. A derivative word is that which may be reduced to another word in English of greater simplicity; as, manful, goodness, contentment, Yorkshire. ETYMOLOGY. THE second part of Grammar is Etymology; There are in English nine sorts of words, or, as they are commonly called, Parts of speech; namely, the ARTICLE, the SUBSTantive or noun, the ADJECTIVE, the PRONOUN, the VERB, the AdVERB, the PREPOSITION, the CONJUNCTION, and the INTERJECTION. 1. An article is a word prefixed to substantives, to point them out, and to show how far their signification extends; as, a garden, an eagle, the woman. 2. A Substantive or noun is the name of any thing that exists, or of which we have as, London, man, virtue. any notion ; A substantive may, in general, be distinguished by its taking an article before it, or by its making sense of itself; as, a book, the sun, an apple; temperance, industry, shastity. 3. An Adjective is a word added to a substantive, to express its quality; as, an industrious man, a virtuous woman. An adjective may be known by its making sense with the addition of the word thing; as, a good thing, a bad thing; or of any particular substantive; as, a sweet apple, a pleasant prospect. 4. A Pronoun is a word used instead of a noun, to avoid the too frequent repetition of the same word; as, the man is happy; he is benevolent ; he is useful. 5. A Verb is a word which signifies to BE, to DO, or to SUFFER; as, “I am, I rule, I am ruled." A verb may generally be distinguished by its making sense with any of the personal pronouns, or the word before it: as I ass verb, an adjective, and sometimes to another adverb, to express some quality or circumstance respecting it; as, he reads well; a truly good man; he writes very correctly. An adverb may be generally known, by its answering to the question, How? How much? When? or Where? as, in the phrase, "He reads correctly," the answer to the question, How does he read? is, correctly. 7. Prepositions serve to connect words with one another, and to show the relation between them; as, "He went from London to York ;" "she is above disguise" "They are supported. by industry." A preposition may be known by its admitting after it a personal pronoun in the objective case; as, with, for, to, &c. will allow the objective case after them; with him, for her, to them, &c. 8. A Conjunction is a part of speech that is chiefly used to connect sentences; so as, out of two or more sentences, to make but one; it sometimes connects only words; as, “ Thou and he "Two and are happy, because you are good." three are five." 9. Interjections are words thrown in between the parts of a sentence, to express the passions or "O virtue! how emotions of the speaker; as, amiable thou art!" ARTICLE. An Article is a word prefixed to substantives, to show how far their sig. silent h; as, an acorn, an hour. But if the h be sounded, the a only is to be used; as a hand, a heart, a highway. A or an is styled the indefinite article; it is used in a vague sense, to point out one single thing of the kind, in other respects indetermina nate; as, "Give me a book;" "Bring me an apple." The is called the definite article, because it ascertains what particular thing or things are meant; as, "Give me the book :" "Bring me the apples;" meaning some book, or apples, referred to. A substantive, without any article to limit it, is generally taken in its widest sense; as, "A candid temper is proper for man ;" that is, for all mankind. SUBSTANTIVE.* A Substantive or noun is the name of any thing that exists, or of which we have any notion ; as, London, man, virtue. Substantives are either proper or common. * As soon as the learner has committed to memory the definitions of the article and substantive, he should be employed in parsing these parts of speech, as they are arranged in the correspondent Exercises in the Appendix. The learner should proceed in this manner, through all the definitions and rules, regularly turning to, and parsing the exercises of one definition or rule, before he proceeds to another. In the same order, he should be taught to correct the erroneous. |