nouns. We have examples in smallcraft, blackberry, blackbird, white. lead, whitewash, &c.]

(28) The functions of participles are the same as those of descriptive adjectives. We subjoin a few examples for analysis. We mark, as usual, the words which the learner should now be able to analyze.

EXERCISE I.- Wise men profit by the sad experience of fools. Idle boys seldom become useful men. The white rose was the emblem of the house of York. The red rose was the emblem of the house of Lancas

ter.

"Our dying friends come o'er us like a cloud

To damp our brainless ardors."-Young.

"Now morn, her rosy steps in the eastern clime

Advancing, sowed the earth with orient pearl.-Milt.

EXERCISES II., III., &c.—A given number of propositions containing examples of descriptive adjectives.

§ 87. (1) We have already had occasion to notice incidentally that adjectives are frequently employed substantively; we must here bring this fact more directly under the consideration of the learner. (2) The largest class of adjectives substantively employed, are those with which the noun men, or persons, &c., is implied. (3) Such are the rich, the poor, the wise, the learned, the rude, the vulgar, the noble, the good, the virtuous, the vicious, the just, the pious, &c., &c., equivalent to rich men, poor men, &c. (4) No other noun is suppressed with such words except men or persons, and hence, by conventional usage, they serve the double function of denoting objects, and, at the same time, qualifying them, or, in other words, they signify objects with an accompanying and distinguishing property. (5) In such cases the property, or qualification, is that which is most important-that which is intended to be expressed with emphasis. (6) Such terms are all concrete, they are used to denote substances, not abstract properties.

(28) What is said of the functions of participles, or verbal adjectives?

§ 87. (1) To what fact is the attention of the learner here called? (2) What is said of the largest class of adjectives employed substantively? (3) Mention a number of examples. (4) What noun is always suppressed after adjectives thus employed? And what double function do these adjectives serve? (5) What is remarked of the qualification expressed by the adjective in such contracted forms of expression? (6) To which class of nouns do such terms belong?

NOTE. In languages which have distinct inflected forms of the adjective to be applied to nouns of different genders, adjectives can be employed as substantives to a much greater extent than in English, without any sacrifice of perspicuity. For example, the adjective bonus used alone in the Latin language, clearly indicates a good man, bonum, a good thing; the plural boni, good men, or the good, and bona, good things, and hence, goods, effects. Sometimes, also, the feminine forms of certain adjectives are used to denote females possessed of the property indicated by the adjective. A great number of the Latin adjectives are thus used with the suppression of a word-person or persons, thing or things, thus representing two distinct nouns in both numbers, whilst we are necessarily confined by the nature of our language, which has no inflexion of adjectives to denote gender, to the expression of one noun, and that only in the plural. Thing or things we cannot indicate in this way. Whereas, the Latin language always indicates thing, singular and plural, in its most common use as employed in company with an adjective by the adjective alone. In fact, there is no word in the Latin language which answers to our word thing, used as above described. There is no need for such a word. The neuter forms of the adjectives supply its place. We must not omit to remark here, that numerous instances of adjectives used substantively, a singular noun being suppressed, may be found in the authorized version of the Scriptures. Take the following as examples: "So the poor hath hope." "The wicked borroweth and payeth not again; but the righteous sheweth mercy, and giveth," &c. Here the singular noun man, is obviously to be supplied. This employment of descriptive adjectives to represent singular, as well as plural, concrete nouns is rarely, if ever, to be found in modern writers. It has very properly fallen into disuse, since it would necessarily create ambiguity, especially when such adjectives happen to serve as the subject nouns of verbs in any other than the indefinite tense, and when they are employed as complementary nouns. For example, "The righteous shall inherit the land; The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom." It is only by the context that we ascertain that "the righteous" here represents an individual. Ambiguity in such cases is, however, of little importance, as there is no material difference in the sense, whether we consider the word singular or plural.

(7) There is another class of adjectives substantively employed, which, unlike those already mentioned, are singular nouns. They are also entitled to be classed as abstract nouns, since they do not denote substances, but properties or attributes contemplated separately from the objects or substances with which they co-exist. (8) We subjoin examples: The sublime, the beautiful, the infinite, the finite, the ridiculous, the pathetic, the vast, the profound, &c. (9) These are generally philosophical terms.

(7) In what two respects does another class of adjectives substantively employed differ from those just considered? (8) Give examples. (9) Repeat the remark under No. 9.

(10) It will be observed that with these, as with the class already considered, the determinative THE is invariably employed. (11) This is essential in the employment of all adjectives in either of these ways in English.

(12) Should the same adjective happen to be used in both these ways, as a concrete plural noun, and as an abstract singular noun, it would create ambiguity. The adjective beautiful, is very commonly used in the latter way, and sometimes, we think, the beautiful is used in the first way to mean persons possessed of beauty. This use of the word is rare, and it seldom happens that of the aujectives used as abstract singular nouns are the same which are used as concrete plurals.

any

(14) In analysis the concretes may be treated as adjectives, the learner supplying the suppressed noun, or, more briefly, they may be classed as adjectives substantively used-concrete plurals. (15) The abstracts must be treated as adjectives used as abstract nouns, since, in their case, there is really no original suppression of a noun. They are adjectives employed to express a new abstract conception, which had no previous name. It would generally prove a vain search to attempt to find a suppressed noun.

(16) Both these forms of expression are often employed both as subject nouns of propositions, and to perform some of the modifying functions.

We subjoin a few examples for analysis.

EXERCISE I.-To despise the poor becomes not the rich. The proud are hated by their fellow men. The vain are despised by the wise. "He taketh the wise in their own craftiness; the counsel of the froward is carried headlong." The simple are the prey of the crafty. "The prudent are crowned with knowledge." "The light of the righteous rejoiceth; the lamp of the wicked shall be put out." There is but a single step from the sublime to the ridiculous. The finite cannot comprehend the infinite. "To the sublime in building, greatness of dimen

(10) In what are these words like the last class? (11) And what is essential to adjectives employed in both ways?

(12) What would happen were the same adjective employed in both ways? (13) Name an adjective perhaps used both ways.

(14) How may the concrete class of these words be treated in analysis? (15) How must the abstracts be treated? and assign the reasons.

(16) How are both kinds of words employed?

sions seems requisite." "The ideas of the sublime and the beautiful stand on foundations so different," &c.

EXERCISE II., III., &c.-Form propositions having their subjects completed by descriptive adjectives. IV., V., &c. Having objective modifications, and other modifications, consisting of nouns completed by descriptive adjectives.

§ 88. 2d. We now proceed to consider the second general function of descriptive adjectives, namely, that of completing verbs. (1) We may call this the predicative use of the adjective.* (2) This

*It must not be inferred, from the fact that we treat this use of the descriptive adjectives after the attributive use, that we agree with the grammarians who consider this use as posterior in origin, or as in all cases resolvable into the attributive use. On the contrary, we are inclined to think that adjectives (we do not say all adjectives) were employed to complete the predicate (especially with the verb TO BE) earlier than to modify the subject. In the nascent state of human society, men would likely need adjectives for the purpose of declaring to one another the properties of the objects around them, before they needed them as modifications of subject nouns. We think, for example, that men would sooner need to make such assertions in their interchange of thought as, The weather is cold, The river is deep, or dangerous, &c., than they would need to make some assertion in regard to cold weather, or a deep or dangerous river. The use of attributive words to express more exactly a complex conception, we look on as a refinement in language, required only after a step had been taken towards philosophical thinking, however rude. The purpose of modifying the subject was, we think, most likely first attempted by the addition of a proposition to the subject noun. Indeed the descriptive adjective modification may be considered as a species of latent or implied predication. For example, The good man is loved, is equivalent to The man who is good is loved. Here the proposition who is good, expresses what is, in the present improved state of language, generally expressed in the more compressed form by the adjective applied as an attributive to the subject noun. (See § 111.)

Remember, we do not say that all adjectives were invented for the purpose of being employed to complete the predicate. If such a step as we have described has really been taken in language, it must have preceded the origin of many of the adjectives now in use. Many of these have manifestly been designed from the beginning, exclusively for the purpose of modifying nouns, and not for the purpose of completing the predicate. In this class we may include all the determinative adjectives, and many of the

88. (1) What may the second function of adjectives be called? (2) To what is this

function of the descriptive adjective, is exactly similar to that of the noun complementary of the verb. (3) Like the noun complementary, the adjective is attached to neuter and to active and to passive verbs. (4) If the learner bears in mind what has been said of the noun complementary of the neuter and active verbs, it will assist him much in comprehending what we shall say in reference to adjectives employed to complete verbs; that is, to complete the part of the predicate expressed in the verbs. (5) For it will be remeinbered that, as in the case of all other complements of verbs, it is not the verb as an assertive word, but the verb as expressing (what it always does) the leading part of the predicate which is affected by the complement. (6) In other words, it is not the copula, but the predicate, which in all cases is affected by n.odification. (7) Hence, as we have before said, verbal nouns and verbal adjectives take the same complements or modifications as the verb or assertive word itself.

(8) To mark the close analogy between the descriptive adjective, used to complete the predicate, and the noun employed for the same purpose, and at the same time to assist the memory of the learner, by introducing as much simplicity and clearness as possible in classification and in nomenclature, we give names to these adjective modifications of the verb, exactly similar to those which we gave to nouns used to complete verbs. (9) We call them THE ADJECTIVE COMPLEMENTARY, OF THE NEUTER VERB, THE ADJECTIVE descriptive. As, for example, those which express the material of which a thing is made, such as golden, brazen, wooden, &c. These are not now employed to complete the predicate, and perhaps never were so employed. They have been adopted as now used, for the express purpose of modifying nouns, not verbs. But the use of determinatives must be looked on as a refinement introduced later than descriptive adjectives in the progress of language; and such descriptive adjectives as those mentioned above, have about them the indications of modern introduction.

function of the descriptive adjective similar? (3) In what is it like the noun complementary? (4) Repeat the suggestion to the learner. (5) What is it in the verb that is affected by this and by other complements? (6) Express the same thing in other words. (7) What follows from this in reference to verbal nouns and verbal adjectives?

(8) Repeat substantially the motives which have influenced us in choosing a name for this species of modification. (9) What is the name by which we distinguish this kind of modifications in reference to the classes of verbs to which they are applied?