TENSES.

Tenses are those modifications of the verb, which distinguish time.

There are six tenses; the Present, the Imperfect, the Perfect, the Pluperfect, the First-future, and the Secondfuture.

The Present tense is that which expresses what now exists or is taking place: as, "I hear a noise; somebody is coming."

The Imperfect tense is that which expresses what took place, within some period of time fully past: as, "We him last week; I admired his behaviour."

saw

The Perfect tense is that which expresses what has taken place, within some period of time not yet fully past : as, "I have seen him to-day."

The Pluperfect tense is that which expresses what had taken place at some past time mentioned: as, “I had seen him, when I met you."

The First-future tense is that which expresses what will take place hereafter: as, "I shall see him again.” The Second-future tense is that which expresses what will have taken place, at some future time mentioned: as, "I shall have seen him by to-morrow noon."

OBS. 1.-The terms here defined are the names usually given to those parts of the verb to which they are in this work applied; and though some of them are not so strictly appropriate as scientific names ought to be, we think it inexpedient to change them.

bounds than he ought, and argues against, If thou loved, If thou knew, &c. he gives this mood not only the last five tenses of the indicative, but also all those of the potential; alleging, "that as the indicative mood is converted into the subjunctive, by the expression of a condition, motive, wish, supposition, &c. being superadded to it, so the potential mood may, in like manner, be turned into the subjunctive."-Mur. Gr. Oct. p. 82. According to this, the subjunctive mood of every regular verb embraces, in one voice, as many as one hundred and thirty-eight different expressions; and it may happen that in one single tense a verb shall have no fewer than fifteen different forms in each person and number. Six times fifteen are ninety; and so many are the several phrases which now compose Murray's pluperfect tense of the subjunctive mood of the verb to strow-a tense which most grammarians very properly reject as needless! But this is not all. The scheme not only confounds the moods, and overwhelms the learner with its multiplicity, but condemns as bad English what the author himself once adopted as the imperfect subjunctive, "If thou loved," &c. wherein he was sustained by Dr. Priestley and others of high authority. Dr. Johnson, indeed, made the preterit subjunctive like the indicative; and this may have induced the author to change his plan, and inflect this part of the verb with st. But Dr. Alexander Murray very positively declares this to be wrong: "When such words as if, though, unless, except, whether, and the like, are used before verbs, they lose their terminations of est, eth, and s, in those persons which commonly have them. No speaker of good English, expressing himself conditionally, says, Though thou fallest, or Though he falls, but, Though thou fall, and Though he fall; nor Though thou camest but Though, or although, thou came."-Hist. Europ. Lang. i. p. 55.)

OBS. 2.-The tenses do not all express time with equal precision. Those of the indicative mood, are the most definite. The time expressed by the same tenses in the other moods, is frequently relative, and sometimes indefinite.

OBS. 3. The present tense, in the indicative mood, expresses general truths, and customary actions; as, "Vice produces misery? "She often visits us." We also use it in speaking of persons who are dead, but whose works remain; as, "Seneca reasons well.'

OBS. 4. The present tense in the subjunctive mood, and in the other moods when preceded by as soon as, after, before, till, or when, is generally used with reference to future time; as, "If he ask a fish, will he serpent ?"-Matt. vii. 10. "When he arrives, I will send for you.'

give him

a

OBS. 5.-In animated narrative, the present tense is sometimes substituted (by the figure enallage) for the imperfect; as, "As he lay indulging himself in state, he sees let down from the ceiling a glittering sword, hung by a single hair."-Tr. of Cicero. "Ulysses wakes, not knowing where he was."Pope.

OBS. 6.-The present infinitive can scarcely be said to express any particular time. It is usually dependent on an other verb, and, therefore, relative in time. It may be connected with any tense of any mood; as, "I intend to do it, I intended to do it, I have intended to do it;" &c. It is often used to express futurity; as, "The time to come."-"The world to come."'Rapture yet to be."

OBS. 7.-The imperfect tense of the indicative mood, in its simple form, is called the preterit; as, loved, saw, was.

OBS. 8.-The perfect tense, like the present, is sometimes used with reference to future time; as, "He will be fatigued before he has walked a mile."

OBS. 9.-The pluperfect tense is often used conditionally, without a conjunction; as, "Had I seen you, I should have stopped."

PERSONS AND NUMBERS.

The person and number of a verb, are those modifications in which it agrees with its subject or nominative. In each number, there are three persons; and in each person, two numbers: thus,

OBS. 1.-Thus the verb in some of its parts, varies its termination to distinguish or agree with, the different persons and numbers. The change is, however, principally confined to the second and third persons singular of the present tense of the indicative mood, and to the auxiliaries hast and has of the perfect. In the ancient biblical style, now used only on solemn occasions, the second person singular is distinguished through all the tenses of the indicative and potential moods. And as the use of the pronoun thou is now mostly confined to the solemn style, the terminations of that style are retained in all our examples of the conjugation of verbs. In the plural number, there is no variation of ending, to denote the different persons; and the verb in the three persons plural, is the same as in the first person singular. As the verb is always attended by a noun or a pronoun, expressing the subject of the affirmation, no ambiguity

arises from the want of particular terminations in the verb to distinguish the different persons and numbers.

OBS. 2.-Persons in high stations, being usually surrounded by attendants, it became, many centuries ago, a species of court flattery, to address individuals of this class, in the plural number. And the practice extended, in time, to all ranks of society: so that, at present the customary mode of familiar as well as complimentary address, is altogether plural; both the verb and the pronoun being used in that form. This practice, which confounds one of the most important distinctions of the language, affords a striking instance of the power of fashion. The society of Friends or Quakers, however, continue to employ the singular number in familiar discourse; and custom, which has now destroyed the compliment of the plural, has placed the appropriate form, (at least as regards them,) on an equality with the plural in point of respect. The singular is universally employed in reference to the Supreme Being; and is generally preferred in poetry. It is the language of Scripture, and is consistently retained in all our grammars.

OBS. 3.-As most of the peculiar terminations by which the second person singular of verbs is properly distinguished in the solemn style, are not only difficult of utterance, but are quaint and formal in conversation; the preterits and auxiliaries are seldom varied in familiar discourse, and the present is generally simplified by, contraction. A distinction between the solemn and the familiar style, has long been admitted, in the pronunciation of the termination ed, and in the ending of the verb in the third person singular; and it is evidently according to good taste and the best usage, to admit such a distinction in the second person singular. In the familiar use of the second person singular, the verb is usually varied only in the present tense of the indicative mood, and in the auxiliary hast of the perfect. This method of varying the verb renders the second person singular analogous to the third, and accords with the practice of the most intelligent of those who retain the common use of this distinctive and consistent mode of address: It disencumbers their familiar dialect of a multitude of harsh and useless terminations, which serve only, when uttered, to give an uncouth prominency to words not often emphatic; and, without impairing the strength or per spicuity of the language, increases its harmony, and reduces the form of the verb in the second person singular nearly to the same simplicity as in the other persons and numbers.*

* The writings of the Friends being mostly of a grave cast, afford but few examples of their customary mode of forming the verb in connexion with the pronoun thou, in familiar discourse. The following may serve to illustrate it: "To devote all thou had to his service"-" If thou should come"-" What thou said"-"Thou kindly contributed"- "The Epistle which thou sent me "Thou would perhaps allow "-"If thou submitted"- "Since thou left""Should thou act"-"Thou may be ready' "That thou had met”That thou had intimated"-" Before thou puts" [putst]-"What thou meets [meetst]" If thou had made"-"I observed thou was "That thou might put thy trust"-"Thou had been at my house." J. KENDALL. Thou

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may be plundered". "That thou may feel"-" Though thou waited long, and sought him"-"I hope thou will bear my style ""Thou also knows [knowst] -"Thou grew up"-"I wish thou would yet take my counsel." S. CRISP. "Thou manifested thy tender regard, stretched forth thy delivering hand, and fed and sustained us." S. FOTHERGILL. The writer has met with thousands that used the second person singular in conversation, but never with one that employed, on ordinary occasions, all the regular endings of the solemn style. The simplification of the second person singular, which, to a greater or less extent, is everywhere adopted by the Friends, and which is here defined and explained, removes from each verb eighteen of these peculiar terminations; and, (if the number of English verbs be, as stated by several grammarians, 8000,) disburdens their familiar dialect of 144,000 of these awkward

Where the verb is varied, the second person singular is regu larly formed by adding st or est to the first person; and the third person singular, in like manner, by adding s or es; as, I see, thou seest, he sees; I give, tou givest, he gives; I go, thou goest, he goes; I fly, thou fliest, he flies; I vex, thou vexest, he vexes; I lose, thou losest, he loses.

OBS. 1.-In the solemn style, (except in Poetry, which usually contracts* these forms,) the second person singular of the present indicative, and that of

and useless appendages. This simplification is supported by usage as extensive as the familiar use of the pronoun thou; and is also in accordance with the canons of criticism. "All words and phrases which are remarkably harsh and unharmonious, and not absolutely necessary, should be rejected."-Campbell's Philosophy of Rhetoric, Sec. 2, Canon First. With the subject of this note, those who put you for thou, can have no concern; and many may think it unworthy of notice, because Murray has said nothing about it. We write not for or against any sect, or any man; but to teach all who desire to know the grammar of our tongue. And who is he that will pretend that the solemn style of the Bible may be used in familiar discourse, without a mouthing affectation? In preaching, the ancient terminations of est for the second person singular and eth for the third, as well as ed pronounced as a separate syllable for the preterit, are admitted to be in better taste than the smoother forms of the familiar style; because the latter, though now frequently heard in religious assemblies, are not so well suited to the dignity and gravity of a sermon or a prayer. In grave poetry also, especially when it treats of scriptural subjects, to which you put for thou is obviously unsuitable, the personal terminations of the verb, which from the earliest times to the present day have usual ly been contracted and often omitted by the poets, ought perhaps still to be insisted on, agreeably to the notion of our tuneless critics. The critical objection to their elision, however, can have no very firm foundation while it is admitted by the objectors themselves, that," Writers generally have recourse to this mode of expression, that they may avoid harsh terminations."-Irving's El. Eng. Composition, p. 12. But if writers of good authority, such as Pope, Swift, and Pollok, have sometimes had recourse to this method of simplifying the verb, even in the solemn style, the elision may, with tenfold stronger reason, be admitted in familiar writing or discourse, on the authority of general custom among those who choose to employ the pronoun thou in conversation.

Some of the Friends (perhaps from an idea that it is less formal) misemploy thee for thou, and often join it to the third person of the verb in stead of the second. Such expressions as, tnee does, thee is, thee has, thee thinks, &c. are double solecisms; they set all grammar at defiance. Many persons who are not ignorant of grammar, and who employ the pronoun aright, sometimes improperly sacrifice concord to a slight improvement in sound, and give to the verb the ending of the third person for that of the second. Three instances of this occur in the examples quoted in the preceding paragraph. See also the following, and many more, in the works of the poet Burns; who says of himself, "Though it cost the schoolmaster some thrashings, I made an excellent English scholar; and, by the time I was ten or eleven years of age, I was a critic in substantives, verbs, and particles :"-" But when thou pours""There thou shines chief". "Thou clears the head"-" Thou strings the nerves"-" Thou brightens black despair" "Thou comes"-"Thou travels far"-"Thou paints' -"Unseen thou lurks”—“ O thou pale orb that silent shines." This mode of simplifying the verb confounds the persons; and as it has little advantage in sound, over the regular contracted form of the second person, it ought to be avoided. It is too frequently used by the poets.

*The second person singular may be contracted, whenever the verb ends in a sound which will unite with that of st. The poets generally employ the contracted forms, but they seem not to have adopted a uniform and consistent method of writing them. Some insert the apostrophe, and, after a single vowel, double the final consonant before st; as, hold'st, bidd'st, said'st, ledd'st, may'st, might'st, &c.: others add st only, and form permanent contractions;

the irregular preterits,* commonly end in est, pronounced as a separate syllable. But as the termination ed, in solemn discourse, constitutes a syllable, the regular preterits form the second person singular, by adding st, without further increase of syllables; as, loved, lovedst-not lovedest. Dost and hust, and the irregular preterits wast, didst, and hadst, are permanently contracted. The auxiliaries shall and will, change the final 1 to t. To the auxiliaries may, can, might, could, would, and should, the termination est was formerly added; but they are now generally written with st only, and pronounced as monosyllables, even in solemn discourse.

OBS. 2.-The third person singular was anciently formed by adding th to verbs ending in e, and eth to all others. This method of forming the third person singular, almost always adds a syllable to the verb. It is now confined to the solemn style, and is little used. Doth, hath, and saith, are contractions of verbs thus formed.

OBS. 3.-When the second person singular is employed in familiar discourse, it is usually formed in a manner strictly analogous to that which is now adopted in the third person singular. When the verb ends in a sound which will unite with that of st or s, the second person singular is formed by adding st only, and the third, by adding s only; and the number of syllables is not increased: as, I read, thou readst, he reads; I know, thou knowst, he knows; I take, thou takest, he takes. For when the verb ends in mute e, no termination renders this e vocal in the familiar style, if a synæresis can take place.

OBS. 4.-But when the verb ends in a sound which will not unite with that of st or s, st and s are added to final e, and est and es to other terminations; and the verb acquires an additional syllable: as, I trace, thou tracest, he traces; I pass, thou passest, he passes; I fix, thou fixest, he fixes. But verbs ending in o or y preceded by a consonant, do not exactly follow this rule in these, y is changed into i; and to both o and i, est and es are added

as, holdst, bidst, saidst, ledst, mayst, mightst, &c. Some retain the vowel in the termination of certain words, and suppress a preceding one; as, quick'nest, happ'nest, scatt'rest, slumb'rest, slumb'redst: others contract the termination of such words, and insert the apostrophe; as, quicken'st, happen'st, scatter'st, slumber'st, slumber'dst. The nature of our language, the accent and pronunciation of it, incline us to contract even all our regular verbs; so as to avoid, if possible, an increase of syllables in the inflection of them. Accordingly, several terminations which formerly constituted distinct syllables, have been either wholly dropped, or blended with the final syllables of the verbs to which they are added. Thus the plural termination en has become entirely obsolete; th or eth is no longer in common use; ed is contracted in pronunciation; the ancient ys or is, of the third person singular, is changed to s or es, and is usually added without increase of syllables; and st or est has, in part, adopted the analogy. So that the proper mode of forming these contractions of the second person singular, seems to be, to add st only, and to insert the apostrophe, when a vowel is suppressed from the verb to which this termination is added; as, thinkst, sayst, bidst, lov'st, lov'dst, slumberst, slumber'dst.

Some grammarians say, that, whenever the preterit is like the present, it should take edst for the second person singular. This rule gives us such words as cast-edst, cost-edst, bid-dedst, burst-edst, cut-tedst, hit-tedst, let-tedst, put-tedst, hurt-edst, rid-dedst, shed-dedst, &c. The few examples which may be adduced from ancient writings, in support of this rule, are undoubtedly formed in the usual manner from regular preterits now obsolete; and if this were not the case, no person of taste could think of employing derivatives so uncouth. Dr. Johnson has justly remarked, that "the chief defect of our language, is ruggedness and asperity." And this defect is peculiarly obvious, when even the regular termination of the second person singular is added to our preterits. Accordingly we find numerous instances among the poets, both ancient and modern, in which that termination is omitted.-[See Percy's Reliques of Ancient Poetry, everywhere.]