nerally, do well to study the arrangement of their lines before they give them to the world; for the purpose of chusing that which is most perspicuous and harmonious.

The place of a noun, whether it be in the nominative, accusative, or any other case, may be supplied by any number of words which we can conceive to be united, so as to denote a single real or imaginary being. Thus we may say :

The inevitable lot of all mankind is to die."' Lot, with its adjective inevitable, is the nominative, mankind is the genitive, and to die is the infinitive of a verb. It expresses the state of this 'Lot of mankind,' and is equivalent to the substantive death. We have said before that Infinitives do not differ from Nouns; and to die, for death, was once the usual mode of writing. So in Ben Jonson:

"And sculpture that can keepe thee from to dye."

And in Spenser:

"For not to have been dipp'd in Lethe's lake

Could save the son of Thetis from to dye.” These seem, in our day, to be peculiar applications of the verb; but such phrases as He deserves death,' and 'He deserves to die,' are of common occurrence and are accounted synonym

ous.

The profound respect [which] I bear to the gracious Prince who governs this country, with no less honour to himself than with satisfaction to his subjects, and who restores you to your rank under his standard, will save you from a multitude of reproaches." Junius.

The nominative of the verb will save' is 'respect,' but it is respect of a particular kind, modified by the half-narrative which precedes the verb, and which might, if we pleased, be included in a parenthesis. You is the accusative, or person saved; and the dative, or thing from which he is saved, is a multitude of reproaches. In a few words:

Respect for my Sovereign will save you from a multitude of reproaches.'

When two, or more, simple sentences belong to one consequence, so as not to be separable without disjointing the general idea, and thereby rendering the subject incomplete, these subordinate assertions are conjoined into one COMPOUND SENTENCE. Thus:

'Peter loves Mary,'-and
'Mary is beautiful,'

are simple sentences; but:

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Peter loves Mary because she is beautiful,'

is a compound of both sentences; and, in consequence of the conjunction because, expresses

F

something which, in a separate state, they are unable to do.

Similar to the above are such sentences as the following; in which the members, although of themselves separate assertions, are so necessarily connected that they form one individual whole:

"It is with diseases of the mind as with dis

eases of the body; we are half dead before we understand our disorder, and half cured when we do."-Lacon.

"The day of the christening being come, and the house filled with Gossips, the levity of whose conversation suited but ill with the gravity of Dr. Cornelius, he cast about how to pass this day more agreeably to his character; that is to say, not without some profitable conference, nor wholly without observance of some ancient custom."-Martinus Scriblerus.

But, besides these and such like sentences, there are others where the connecting tie is less strong; and which, in the hands of some writers, are divided into simple sentences. The following, from Colton's Lacon, may be taken as an example:

"Death is the liberator of him whom freedom cannot release; the physician of him whom medicine cannot cure; and the comforter of him whom time cannot console."

This sentence is easily divisible into three sentences that are quite disconnected with each other.

Death is the liberator of him whom freedom cannot release."

"Death is the physician of him whom medicine cannot cure."

"Death is the comforter of him whom time cannot console."

The separated parts remain; but the building is disjointed, and the symmetry of the architecture is gone.

A judicious intermixture of simple and of compounded thoughts is the style most adapted to modern times. The unlinked succession of ́short sentences, (like a string of proverbs,) seems to carry us back to the origin of writing; when objects were placed separately and nakedly before our eyes;—ere man had learned to classify his ideas, and to clothe them with foliage.

CHAPTER VII.

CONSTRUCTION OF SENTENCES continued. COMPARISON WITH THE ARRANGEMENT

OTHER LANGUAGES.

OF.

We have repeatedly spoken of the arrangement of words and clauses, and of the power of transposing any particular arrangement: Let us now endeavour to discover whether or not there is any natural order; and, if there is, to what extent our language admits of inversion.

A simple thought appears to us to be instantaneously acquired. Our feelings are affected, or our will is exerted, with the rapidity of lightening. But when we endeavour to communicate this thought to another person, it does not seem to be so easy of acquisition. He is not acted upon by the mysterious machinery of nature, but gathers the thought, by separate portions, as artificial language is able to impart: we say artificial, because there is also a natural language which expresses, with energetic swiftness, the feelings of the human heart:

"A single look more marks th' internal wo

Than all the windings of the lengthen'd Oh!

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