ENGLISH GRAMMA FOR THE USE OF SCHOOLS. BY WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY, PROFESSOR OF SANSKRIT AND COMPARATIVE PHILOLOGY AND INSTRUCTOR OF MODERN LANGU "LIFE AND GROWTH OF LANGUAGE," "ORIENTAL AND LINGUISTIC PREFACE. IN preparing the present work, my intention has be to make it fulfil strictly the promise of its title. I ha endeavored to put before the learner those matters whi are of most essential consequence to him, those whi will best serve him as preparation for further and deep knowledge of his own language, for the study of oth languages, and for that of language in general. That t leading object of the study of English grammar is teach the correct use of English is, in my view, an err and one which is gradually becoming removed, giving w to the sounder opinion that grammar is the reflective stu of language, for a variety of purposes, of which correctn in writing is only one, and a secondary or subordin one by no means unimportant, but best attained wh sought indirectly. It should be a pervading element the whole school and home training of the young, to ma them use their own tongue with accuracy and force; a along with any special drilling directed to this end, so of the rudimentary distinctions and rules of grammar conveniently taught; but that is not the study of gra mar, and it will not bear the intrusion of much form grammar without being spoiled for its own ends. It constant use and practice, under never-failing watch a correction, that makes good writers and speakers; application of direct authority is the most efficient corr plying the rules of grammar to what he said. To teach English grammar to an English speaker is, as it ms to me, to take advantage of the fact that the pupil ows the facts of the language, in order to turn his attenn to the underlying principles and relations, to the ilosophy of language as illustrated in his own use of it, a more effective manner than is otherwise possible. reign languages are generally acquired in an "artificial" y, the facts coming ticketed with certain grammatical els which the scholar learns as if they were part of the ts themselves; and the grammar part is apt to remain g a wholly artificial system to him. Almost every one remember the time when it first began to dawn upon his nd that the familiar terms and distinctions of grammar lly meant something. But this is partly because chilen are (and with good reason) set to learning foreign guages before their reflective powers are enough develed to make such things intelligible to them. If the pil is bright enough, his Latin grammar comes by dees to be to him something more than a heap of dry nes; and then he gets the benefit, in its application by alogy to other languages, his own included, of the hard rk he has done upon it. A real understanding of gramr, however, he can get sooner and more surely in conetion with his own tongue than anywhere else, if his ention is first directed to that which most needs to be rned, unencumbered with burdensome detail, and if a ar method is followed, with abundance of illustration. hese ends is successful, in the work here put forth. I have wished to give the main facts of the English lan uage just as they are in themselves, not importing int nem anything that belongs to other languages. With thi n view, certain subjects have been treated in a somewha ew way, but one which will, I hope, commend itsel o general approval by its reasonableness. The ordinar nethod with gender in nouns, for example, which wa eally an imposition upon English of a system of disting ions belonging elsewhere, has been abandoned in favo of one that is both truer and far simpler. The shar listinction, again, of the verb-phrases or compound form from the real verb-forms seems to me a matter of no smal importance, if the study of the construction of sentence is to be made a reality. It has been my constant endeavor to bear in mind th true position of the grammarian, as stated in the introduc tory chapter — that he is simply a recorder and arranger o the usages of language, and in no manner or degree a law giver; hardly even an arbiter or critic. Certainly, an ele mentary work is no place for dragging forward to attentio matters of disputed usage, nor are elementary pupils th persons before whom to discuss nice and difficult points Where reference has been made to any such subjects, i has been in order simply to set forth the facts of usage, a fairly and briefly as possible, or to state the principles tha should govern the case. Many grammars, of course, have been consulted in th preparation of this, and valuable hints have been de rived from one and another. But I do not feel that |