will go, I shall stop at home, there is nothing positively asserted. I do not positively assert that he will go, nor do I assert positively that I shall stop at home. But when I say, "I shall go, or send my son," I positively assert one of two things; that is, that I shall go, or send my son. Each of the other links may be defined from the effect it has on the sentences which it connects. ON THE EXCLAMATION, OR INTERJECTION. The exclamation is a word by which the speaker intimates that affection of his mind or feelings which arises from some circumstance or event; as, O! what shall become of me!" "Alas! fortune is not happi ness. O, in the first example, is used to intimate the speaker's dread of what shall become of him. Alas, in the second example, is used to intimate the speaker's desponding regret that fortune is not happiness. The questions after the assertive ought to be here renewed, and the following new questions added: 75. What is a sentence descriptive? 76. Why adopt the name sentence descriptive, and reject the old name adverb? 77. What is a requisite link? 78. Why adopt the name requisite link, and reject the old name preposition? 79. What difference is there between a sentence descriptive and a requisite link? 80. What is a link? 81. Why adopt the name link, and reject the old name conjunction? 82. What difference is there between a link and a requisite link? 83. What is an exclamation? 84. Why adopt the name exclamation, and reject the old name interjection? 85. What difference is there between an exclamation and a sentence descriptive? 86. What difference is there between an exclamation and a name descriptive? 87. What is a name? 88. Why reject the old name substantive or noun? 89. What is a name substitute? 90. Why reject the old name pronoun? 91. How many kinds of name substitutes? 92. What is a personal substitute? 93. What substitutes indicate sex? 94. Why do not substitutes of the first or second person, or plural substitutes of the third person, indicate sex? 95. What is sex? 96. How many sexes are there? Almost all our English grammatical writers inform us there are three genders, and that gender is the distinction of nouns with regard to sex. 97. If gender is the distinction of nouns with regard to sex, how can there be three distinctions, that is, three genders, when there are only two things to be distinguished? 98, What name descriptives can be varied? 99. What name descriptives can be varied by a change of termination? 100. What name descriptives can be varied in signification by prefixing the word more or most? 101. What name descriptives are invariable in termination, and do not take more or most before them? 102. What is a mutable descriptive? 103. What is an immutable descriptive? 104. Why not class the links? 105. Why not class the requisite links? 106. Why not admit articles in the English language? 107. Why not admit, or rather why have not we adjective pronouns, pronominal adjectives, adverbial conjunctions, or conjunctional adverbs in English? 108. Why reject the singular number? 109. What necessity is there to consider, and distinguish the person of every name, and name substitute? 110. How many persons are there according to the grammatical acceptation of the term person? 111. What is the grammatical acceptation of the term person? 112. What is a subject? 113. What is a requisite? 114. How are we to know the form of the assertive that coincides with any subject, time, or transit? ANSWERS TO THE PRECEDING QUESTIONS. 75. See the definition of a sentence descriptive. 76. Because the name sentence descriptive, is expressive of the actual use made of the word. We reject the word adverb, because there is no relation between it and the use we make of it. We have shown it is occasionally added to each of the different kinds of words. If it is called an adverb because it is added to a verb, consequently, we can with equal propriety, call it an ad-adjective when added to an adjective, and an ad-preposition, when added to a preposition, etc. 77. See the definition of the requisite link. 78. Because the name, requisite link, is expressive of the use made of the word employed, and we reject the name preposition, because there is no relation between it and the use we make of it. 79. The difference may be easily inferred by reading the definition of each. 80. See the definition of the link. 81. Because the word link is shorter and a more simple and familiar expression than the word conjunction 82. The requisite link joins an explanatory requisite or an explanatory object to a simple sentence, but the link connects two sentences. 83. See the definition of the exclamation. 84. Because it is more appropriate, general, and familiar than the word interjection, of which the meaning is entirely confined to grammarians. 85. An exclamation intimates the effect which the thing asserted has produced on the speaker; but the sentence descriptive is explanatory of the assertion. 86. Repeat the definition of the exclamation and name descriptive, and their difference appears. 87. See the definition of a name. 88. Because the word name is more simple, familiar, and comprehensive than the word substantive or noun. If you ask a hundred persons who speak and write English, but who are not grammarians, what is substantive or noun, ninety-nine of them will tell you, that a substantive is anything having substance; the entire of them will tell you, that they do not know what a noun is. 89. See the definition of a name substitute. 90. For the same reason that we reject substantive or noun. 91. There are two kinds of substitutes; namely, the personal and the name substitute. See the definition of each. 92. See the definition of a personal substitute. 93. He, him, she, and her. 94. Because these substitutes have no forms to denote sex. 95. See the definition of sex. 96. Two sexes. 97. As there are only two sexes, therefore every living thing must be either male or female: that is, in living things there are only two distinctions with regard to sex; namely, male and female. To consider sex where it is not, that is, in inanimate objects, is too absurd. 98. Mutable name descriptives. 99. Mutable name descriptives of one syllable. See the exceptions under the mutable descriptives. 100. Mutable descriptives of two or more syllables. See the exceptions under the mutable descriptives. 101. Immutable name descriptives. 102. A mutable name descriptive is that of which the meaning is variable. 103. An immutable name descriptive is that of which the meaning is invariable. 104. Because the classification is no advantage to the pupil, and renders parsing both tedious and complex. 105. Because there is no diversity in the use we make of them. 106. Why should we admit that which does not exist in the language? If a or an is an article, why is not one an article? If the is an article, why is not this, that, these, those, or same, an article? 107. Because every word in a sentence belongs to some one of the classes into which the words of the language are divided, and cannot belong to two of them at the same time. If we admit pronominal adjectives, adjective pronouns, adverbial conjunctions, etc., we cannot say, that we have only eight or nine different kinds of words in the language; because a person admitting this cannot deny that there is a difference between an adjective and an adjective pronoun, between an adjective and a pronominal adjective, and between an adjective pronoun and a pronominal adjective. If this grammatical chymistry is admitted, we have, instead of eight or nine kinds of words, at least forty; to define each of which, and in parsing to distinguish them one from the other, has discouraged thousands of learners, and given them a fatal dislike to grammar, which can be seldom removed. 108. Because no number can be singular. One of any kind cannot make a number of that kind. If a man has but one horse, he cannot say, that he has a number of horses; if he has only one sovereign, how can he in truth say that he has a number of sovereigns? No less than two can form a collec |