PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

HAVING now had a year to test the practical utility of the Method of Analysis here proposed, as well as to discover its deficiencies, I am enabled to offer to the public a second edition, revised throughout, and partly re-written.

First of all, it will be seen that I have furnished a series of Exercises upon every important point, and given hints by means of which the intelligent teacher may increase them to any extent. These Exercises are numbered continuously throughout the book, by the Arabic figures, so as to form a regular system of lessons, by which the pupil may become well grounded in all the principles explained in the text.

Secondly, I have added several sections to illustrate those points which I have found by experience to present the greatest difficulties. Sections xvi. and xxxvii. may be taken as examples of these.

Thirdly, I have re-modelled the whole of the third part; partly by suppressing matter which I found to be of comparatively little practical utility in Schools; and partly by developing more fully the exposition of the laws of Syntax, so as to exhibit an improved method of parsing, based upon the nature and structure of the sentence.

Fourthly, I have added tive fundamenta, rutes of punctuation; which from their great simplicity will in found excellent guides in aiding the pupil to parcel out the members of every sentence, he writes, rorrectly.

I have now only to recommend both teachers and pupils to be very careful in using a clear and uniform phraseology. The term “sentenci” had better always he employed wherever the member we are speaking of contains a finite verb: the term “ adjuna” will generally be found the most suitable in all other cases.

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bOWLON, NEAR MANCHESTER,

March, 1858.

INTRODUCTION.

§ I.

LANGUAGE is the utterance of our thoughts in words. The complete utterance of a single thought is called A Sentence.

§ II.

The thought, we utter, may take the form of an Assertive, an Interrogative, an Imperative, an Optative, or an Exclamatory expression.

The grammatical construction in all these cases is precisely similar, though the order of the words in the sentences may differ, as in the following:

The first part treats of the elements which enter into the simple sentence. The methods in which the essential parts of the sentence may be expanded are here classified, and the mode of analysing them illustrated by examples. The second part treats of the complex and compound sentence, embracing their various contractions, and also exhibiting, by further examples, the most convenient methods of analysis. The third part treats of the logical analysis of sentences, and shews in what way the fundamental rules of Syntax may be deduced from it.

The pupil who goes systematically through the course thus pointed out, with copious examples and exercises, judiciously selected, will realise the same kind of mental discipline as we generally expect to derive from the study of the ancient languages. I do not mean that the discipline will be by any means equally complete or valuable with that which is derived from classical culture: but the necessity of gaining some insight into the structure of sentences, and the laws of thought there involved (which are the main advantages of studying the ancient languages) is here, to some extent, provided for, without departing from the usages and idiom of our own tongue.

The method of analysis I have adopted is that which has been applied to the German language with so much advantage by Dr. Karl Ferdinand Becker. Since the publication of his celebrated grammar in Germany, every enlightened teacher in that country has seen the advantage of proceeding upon the principles there inculcated. In addition to this, however, I have also compared the plans of several other school