The Grammar of English Grammars by Goold Brown (free ebook reader .txt) 📕

OBS. 16.—The government of possessives by "entire clauses" or "substantive phrases," as they are sometimes called, I am persuaded, may best be disposed of, in almost every instance, by charging the construction with impropriety or awkwardness, and substituting for it some better phraseology. For example, our grammars abound with sentences like the following, and call them good English: (1.) "So we may either say, 'I remember it being reckoned a great exploit;' or perhaps more elegantly, 'I remember its being reckoned a great exploit.'"—Priestley, Murray, and others. Here both modes are wrong; the latter, especially; because it violates a general rule of syntax, in regard to the case of the noun exploit. Say, "I remember it was reckoned a great exploit." Again: (2.) "We also properly say, 'This will be the effect of the pupil's composing frequently.'"—Murray's Gram., p. 179; and others. Better, "This will be the effect, if the pupil compose frequently." But this sentence is fictitious, and one may doubt whether good authors can be found who use compose or composing as being intransitive. (3.) "What can be the reason of the committee's having delayed this business?"—Murray's Key, p. 223. Say, "Why have the committee delayed this business?" (4.) "What can be the cause of the parliament's neglecting so important a business?"—Ib., p. 195. Say, "Why does the parliament neglect so important a business?" (5.) "The time of William's making the experiment, at length arrived."—Ib., p. 195. Say, "The time for William to make the experiment, at length arrived." (6.) "I hope this is the last time of my acting so imprudently."—Ib., p. 263. Say, "I hope I shall never again act so imprudently." (7.) "If I were to give a reason for their looking so well, it would be, that they rise early."—Ib., p. 263. Say, "I should attribute their healthful appearance to their early rising." (8.) "The tutor said, that diligence and application to study were necessary to our becoming good scholars."—Cooper's Gram., p. 145. Here is an anomaly in the construction of the noun scholars. Say, "The tutor said, that diligent application to study was necessary to our success in learning." (9.) "The reason of his having acted in the manner he did, was not fully explained."—Murray's Key, p. 263. This author has a very singular mode of giving "STRENGTH" to weak sentences. The faulty text here was. "The reason why he acted in the manner he did, was not fully explained."—Murray's Exercises, p. 131. This is much better than the other, but I should choose to say. "The reason of his conduct was not fully explained." For, surely, the "one idea or circumstance" of his "having acted in the manner in which he did act," may be quite as forcibly named by the one word conduct, as by all this verbiage, this "substantive phrase," or "entire clause," of such cumbrous length.

OBS. 17.—The foregoing observations tend to show, that the government of possessives by participles, is in general a construction little to be commended, if at all allowed. I thus narrow down the application of the principle, but do not hereby determine it to be altogether wrong. There are other arguments, both for and against the doctrine, which must be taken into the account, before we can fully decide the question. The double construction which may be given to infinitive verbs; the Greek idiom which allows to such verbs an article before them and an objective after them; the mixed character of the Latin gerund, part noun, part verb; the use or substitution of the participle in English for the gerund in Latin;—all these afford so many reasons by analogy, for allowing that our participle—except it be the perfect—since it participates the properties of a verb and a noun, as well as those of a verb and an adjective, may unite in itself a double construction, and be taken substantively in one relation, and participially in an other. Accordingly some grammarians so define it; and many writers so use it; both parties disregarding the distinction between the participle and the participial noun, and justifying the construction of the former, not only as a proper participle after its noun, and as a gerundive after its preposition; not only as a participial adjective before its noun, and as a participial noun, in the regular syntax of a noun; but also as a mixed term, in the double character of noun and participle at once. Nor are these its only uses; for, after an auxiliary, it is the main verb; and in a few instances, it passes into a preposition, an adverb, or something else. Thus have we from the verb a single derivative, which fairly ranks with about half the different parts of speech, and takes distinct constructions even more numerous; and yet these authors scruple not to make of it a hybridous thing, neither participle nor noun, but constructively both. "But this," says Lowth, "is inconsistent; let it be either the one or the other, and abide by its proper construction."—Gram., p. 82. And so say I—as asserting the general principle, and leaving the reader to judge of its exceptions. Because, without this mongrel character, the participle in our language has a multiplicity of uses unparalleled in any other; and because it seldom happens that the idea intended by this double construction may not be otherwise expressed more elegantly. But if it sometimes seem proper that the gerundive participle should be allowed to govern the possessive case, no exception to my rule is needed for the parsing of such possessive; because whatever is invested with such government, whether rightly or wrongly, is assumed as "the name of something possessed."

OBS. 18.—The reader may have observed, that in the use of participial nouns, the distinction of voice in the participle is sometimes disregarded. Thus, "Against the day of my burying," means, "Against the day of my being buried." But in this instance the usual noun burial or funeral would have been better than either: "Against the day of my burial." I. e., "In diem funerationis meæ."—Beza. "In diem sepulturæ meæ."—Leusden. "[Greek: 'Eis t`æn hæméran toû entaphiasmoû mou.]"—John, xii, 7. In an other text, this noun is very properly used for the Greek infinitive, and the Latin gerund; as, "For my burial."—Matt., xxvi, 12. "Ad funerandum me."—Beza. "Ad sepeliendum me."—Leusden. Literally: "For burying me." "[Greek: Pròs tò entaphiásai me.]" Nearly: "For to have me buried." Not all that is allowable, is commendable; and if either of the uncompounded terms be found a fit substitute for the compound participial noun, it is better to dispense with the latter, on account of its dissimilarity to other nouns: as, "Which only proceed upon the question's being begged."—Barclay's Works, Vol. iii, p. 361. Better, "Which only proceed upon a begging of the question." "The king's having conquered in the battle, established his throne."—Nixon's Parser, p. 128. Better, "The king's conquering in the battle;" for, in the participial noun, the distinction of tense, or of previous completion, is as needless as that of voice. "The fleet's having sailed prevented mutiny."—Ib., p. 78. Better, "The sailing of the fleet,"—or, "The fleet's sailing" &c. "The prince's being murdered excited their pity."—Ibid. Better, "The prince's murder excited their indignation."

OBS. 19.—In some instances, as it appears, not a little difficulty is experienced by our grammarians, respecting the addition or the omission of the possessive sign, the terminational apostrophic s, which in nouns is the ordinary index of the possessive case. Let it be remembered that every possessive is governed, or ought to be governed, by some noun expressed or understood, except such as (without the possessive sign) are put in apposition with others so governed; and for every possessive termination there must be a separate governing word, which, if it is not expressed, is shown by the possessive sign to be understood. The possessive sign itself may and must be omitted in certain cases; but, because it can never be inserted or discarded without suggesting or discarding a governing noun, it is never omitted by ellipsis, as Buchanan, Murray, Nixon, and many others, erroneously teach. The four lines of Note 2d below, are sufficient to show, in every instance, when it must be used, and when omitted; but Murray, after as many octavo pages on the point, still leaves it perplexed and undetermined. If a person knows what he means to say, let him express it according to the Note, and he will not fail to use just as many apostrophes and Esses as he ought. How absurd then is that common doctrine of ignorance, which Nixon has gathered from Allen and Murray, his chief oracles! "If several nouns in the genitive case, are immediately connected by a conjunction, the apostrophic s is annexed to the last, but understood to the rest; as, Neither John (i. e. John's) nor Eliza's books."—English Parser, p. 115. The author gives fifteen other examples like this, all of them bad English, or at any rate, not adapted to the sense which he intends!

OBS. 20.—The possessive case generally comes immediately before the governing noun, expressed or understood; as, "All nature's difference keeps all nature's peace."—Pope. "Lady! be thine (i. e., thy walk) the Christian's walk."—Chr. Observer. "Some of Æschylus's [plays] and Euripides's plays are opened in this manner."—Blair's Rhet., p. 459. And in this order one possessive sometimes governs an other: as, "Peter's wife's mother;"—"Paul's sister's son."—Bible. But, to this general principle of arrangement, there are some exceptions: as,

1. When the governing noun has an adjective, this may intervene; as, "Flora's earliest smells."—Milton. "Of man's first disobedience."—Id. In the following phrase from the Spectator, "Of Will's last night's lecture," it is not very clear, whether Will's is governed by night's or by lecture; yet it violates a general principle of our grammar, to suppose the latter; because, on this supposition, two possessives, each having the sign, will be governed by one noun.

2. When the possessive is affirmed or denied; as, "The book is mine, and not John's." But here the governing noun may be supplied in its proper place; and, in some such instances, it must be, else a pronoun or the verb will be the only governing word: as, "Ye are Christ's [disciples, or people]; and Christ is God's" [son].—St. Paul. Whether this phraseology is thus elliptical or not, is questionable. See Obs. 4th, in this series.

3. When the case occurs without the sign, either by apposition or by connexion; as, "In her brother Absalom's house."—Bible. "David and Jonathan's friendship."—Allen. "Adam and Eve's morning hymn."—Dr. Ash. "Behold the heaven, and the heaven of heavens, is the Lord's thy God."—Deut.,, x, 14. "For peace and quiet's sake."—Cowper. "To the beginning of King James the First's reign."—Bolingbroke, on Hist., p. 32.

OBS. 21—The possessive case is in general (though not always) equivalent to the preposition of and the objective; as, "Of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son."—John, xiii, 2. "To Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon."—Ib., xiii, 26. On account of this one-sided equivalence, many grammarians erroneously reckon the latter to be a "genitive case" as well as the former. But they ought to remember, that the preposition is used more frequently than the possessive, and in a variety of senses that cannot be interpreted by this case; as, "Of some of the books of each of these classes of literature, a catalogue will be given at the end of the work."—L. Murray's Gram., p. 178. Murray calls this a "laborious mode of expression," and doubtless it might be a little improved by substituting in for the third of; but my argument is, that the meaning conveyed cannot be expressed by possessives. The notion that of forms a genitive case, led Priestley to suggest, that our language admits a "double genitive;" as, "This book of my friend's."—Priestley's Gram., p. 71. "It is a discovery of Sir Isaac Newton's."—Ib., p. 72. "This exactness of his."—STERNE: ib. The doctrine has since passed into nearly all our grammars; yet is there no double case here, as I shall presently show.

OBS. 22.—Where the governing noun cannot be easily mistaken, it is often omitted by ellipsis: as, "At the alderman's" [house];—"St. Paul's" [church];—"A book of my brother's" [books];—"A subject of the emperor's" [subjects];—"A friend of mine;" i. e., one of my friends. "Shall we say that Sacrificing was a pure invention of Adam's, or of Cain or Abel's?"—Leslie, on Tythes, p. 93. That is—of Adam's inventions, or of Cain or Abel's inventions. The Rev. David Blair, unable to resolve this phraseology to his own satisfaction, absurdly sets it down among what he calls "ERRONEOUS OR VULGAR PHRASES." His examples are these: "A poem of Pope's;"—"A soldier of the king's;"—"That is a horse of my father's."—Blair's Practical Gram., p. 110, 111.