except his, vary their terminations; as, this hat is mine, and the other is thine; those trinkets are hers; this house is ours, and that is yours; theirs is more commodious than ours"--Ib., p. 40. Thus all his personal pronouns of the possessive case, he then made to be inflections of pronouns of a different class! What are they now? Seek the answer under the head of that gross solecism, "Adjective Pronouns." You may find it in one half of our English grammars.
OBS. 8.--Any considerable error in the classing of words, does not stand alone; it naturally brings others in its train. Murray's "Adjective Pronouns," (which he now subdivides into four little classes, possessive, distributive, demonstrative, and indefinite,) being all of them misnamed and misplaced in his etymology, have led both him and many others into strange errors in syntax. The possessives only are "pronouns;" and these are pronouns of the possessive case. As such, they agree with the antecedent nouns for which they stand, in person, number, and gender; and are governed, like all other possessives, by the nouns which follow them. The rest are not pronouns, but pronominal adjectives; and, as such, they relate to nouns expressed or understood after them. Accordingly, they have none of the above-mentioned qualities, except that the words this and that form the plurals these and those. Or, if we choose to ascribe to a pronominal adjective all the properties of the noun understood, it is merely for the sake of brevity in parsing. The difference, then, between a "pronominal adjective" and an "adjective pronoun," should seem to be this; that the one is an adjective, and the other a pronoun: it is like the difference between a horserace and a racehorse. What can be hoped from the grammarian who cannot discern it? And what can be made of rules and examples like the following? "Adjective pronouns must agree, in number, with their substantives: as, 'This book, these books; that sort, those sorts; another road, other roads.'"--Murray's Gram., Rule viii, Late Editions; Alger's Murray, p. 56; Alden's, 85; Bacon's, 48; Maltby's, 59; Miller's, 66; Merchant's, 81; S. Putnam's, 10; and others. "Pronominal adjectives must agree with their nouns in gender, number, and person; thus, 'My son, hear the instructions of thy father.' 'Call the labourers, and give them their hire.'"--Maunder's Gram., Rule xvii. Here Murray gives a rule for pronouns, and illustrates it by adjectives; and Maunder, as ingeniously blunders in reverse: he gives a rule for adjectives, and illustrates it by pronouns. But what do they mean by "their substantives," or "their nouns?" As applicable to pronouns, the phrase should mean nouns antecedent; as applicable to adjectives, it should mean nouns subsequent. Both these rules are therefore false, and fit only to bewilder; and the examples to both are totally inapplicable. Murray's was once essentially right, but he afterwards corrupted it, and a multitude of his admirers have since copied the perversion. It formerly stood thus: "The pronominal adjectives this and that, &c. and the numbers[209] one, two, &c., must agree in number with their substantives: as, 'This book, these books; that sort, those sorts; one girl, ten girls; another road, other roads.' "--Murray's Gram., Rule viii, 2d Ed., 1796.
OBS. 9.--Among our grammarians, some of considerable note have contended, that the personal pronouns have but two cases, the nominative and the objective. Of this class, may be reckoned Brightland, Dr. Johnson, Fisher, Mennye, Cardell, Cooper, Dr. Jas. P. Wilson, W. B. Fowle. and, according to his late grammars, Dr. Webster. But, in contriving what to make of my or mine, our or ours, thy or thine, your or yours, his, her or hers, its, and their or theirs, they are as far from any agreement, or even from self-consistency, as the cleverest of them could ever imagine. To the person, the number, the gender, and the case, of each of these words, they either profess themselves to be total strangers, or else prove themselves so, by the absurdities they teach. Brightland calls them "Possessive Qualities, or Qualities of Possession;" in which class he also embraces all nouns of the possessive case. Johnson calls them pronouns; and then says of them, "The possessive pronouns, like other adjectives, are without cases or change of termination."--Gram., p. 6. Fisher calls them "Personal Possessive Qualities;" admits the person of my, our, &c.; but supposes mine, ours, &c. to supply the place of the nouns which govern them! Mennye makes them one of his three classes of pronouns, "personal, possessive, and relative;" giving to both forms the rank which Murray once gave, and which Allen now gives, to the first form only. Cardell places them among his "defining adjectives." With Fowle, these, and all other possessives, are "possessive adjectives." Cooper, in his grammar of 1828. copies the last scheme of Murray: in that of 1831, he avers that the personal pronouns "want the possessive case." Now, like Webster and Wilson, he will have mine, thine, hers, ours, yours, and theirs, to be pronouns of the nominative or the objective case. Dividing the pronouns into six general classes, he makes these the fifth; calling them "Possessive Pronouns," but preferring in a note the monstrous name, "Possessive Pronouns Substitute." His sixth class are what he calls, "The Possessive Pronominal Adjectives;" namely, "my, thy, his, her, our, your, their, its, own, and sometimes mine and thine."--Cooper's Pl. and Pr. Gram., p. 43. But all these he has, unquestionably, either misplaced or misnamed; while he tells us, that, "Simplicity of arrangement should be the object of every compiler."--Ib., p. 33. Dr. Perley, (in whose scheme of grammar all the pronouns are nouns,) will have my, thy, his, her, its, our, your, and their, to be in the possessive case; but of mine, thine, hers, ours, yours, and theirs, he says, "These may be called Desiderative Personal Pronouns."--Perley's Gram., p. 15.
OBS. 10.--Kirkham, though he professes to follow Murray, declines the simple personal pronouns as I have declined them; and argues admirably, that my, thy, his, &c., are pronouns of the possessive case, because, "They always stand for nouns in the possessive case." But he afterwards contradicts both himself and the common opinion of all former grammarians, in referring mi
