AN ENGLISH GRAMMAR, BY MATTHIAS GREEN: GIVEN IN THE SIMPLEST AND MOST ATTRACTIVE WITH COPIOUS EXAMPLES AND EXERCISES, Particularly well adapted to Schools. A NEW AND REVISED EDITION, LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, SON, & MARSTON, MILTON HOUSE, LUDGATE HILL. PREFACE. ENGLISH GRAMMAR is a necessary means of general education it furnishes at once a basis and a key to other sciences. By the learned, its importance is acknowledged; and those who are ignorant of its principles, need not be told of the inconvenience and mortification which they experience, from their incapacity to hold general commerce with society. But a very small portion of the people know any thing of it: they speak from imitation merely. Happily, the great body of the community, are, in this generation, taught to read their own language, although they know little or nothing of it grammatically; but it is important, it is for their happiness, and for the benefit of society at large, that they should be able to read and write it grammatically. An endeavour is made in this work to simplify the subject, so that all who read may learn. The chief impediments, that have hitherto existed, with both children and adults, to the attainment of this science, are the crowd of terms introduced at the commencement of grammars. The pupil's mental vision is confused with numerous technicalities concerning the accidents of words, before he knows how to distinguish the parts of speech; and the consequence is, that unless he has the advantage of a judicious teacher at his elbow, to explain and illustrate as he proceeds, he is bewildered with the terms singular and plural numbers; masculine, feminine, and neuter genders; nominative, possessive, and objective cases; first, second, and third persons; positive state, comparative and superlative degrees; and all the varieties of moods and tenses; and other names too numerous to mention, before he is able to distinguish a verb from a noun, or to understand the nature and use of the parts of speech in their radical forms.-This is wrong. And although grammars are |