Having thus explained the several parts of a rational grammar, it now
remains only to lay down some general rules for their construction,
into simple and compound sentences, according to their natural concord,
government, and arrangement.
All the parts of speech, which were originally only particles of one
or two letters, having naturally coalesced and united, in more complex
names, and words or propositions, without the assistance of art, so
in all languages, like the English, in which respect both the simple
and complex names still retain their primitive state, without any loss
of their natural powers of construction, by any arbitrary addition or
combination of artificial signs or modes of concord, like the Greek and
Latin, the parts both simple and complex being precisely understood,
will still be governed by their meaning, and naturally coincide in
sentences, in the same manner as the ideas of a person unacquainted
with the artificial rules of logick, are by their natural relation
logically connected and formed into regular thesises, hypothesises and
synthesises. As for instance; a person, who perfectly knows the meaning
of the parts, can in his mind form and express the following sentences;
two and two of any thing are, _is_ or is to be sounded four, and not
three; and should they happen to be horses, whether with or without
shoes, they must be the horses of some man, rather than those of a cow;
but if they are delivered, in whatever place they stand, it must be to
and from some place, and by and to some body, or if they should only be
called, it ought to be done by their right names. Or; supposing Adam,
_i_, or any one know myself or himself to be the first man, inhabiting
space, and that his length and breadth of extension, was at all times or
upon all motions, and as much more, as he or i might by the extension of
the arms acquire, without dispossessing another, were our own property,
i might, as the first existence and proprietor here of the kind, call
myself the first, one, or i. If I had a wife and a son, who had a wife
and a son, and had been taught to tell seven in English, with their
precise meaning, I might as my next relation, as well as the second
person in existence, name my wife two or thou, my son, as the third in
being and possession, I might name he, him, or three, which make up the
number of the singular stock; and as to the plural number or stock, the
first and second person of the singular, and the son which sprung from
them, with his son being four in number, and the first spring of the
second stock might be named _we_, as the first person plural; the two
wives _ye_, the second persons plural of the kind or genders; and all
other persons excepting those of the singular number, as the grandson
and his offspring, the sixth person from the first or the third in the
second generation or plural number, _they_. Then if the first man or any
other perfectly understood the meaning of all other names and energies,
which appear to be as equally related to the nature of things as these,
he could have no difficulty of putting them together according to true
concord, as the meaning and signification would not permit him to err;
nor indeed is the English to be taught by any other significant rules.
The parts of speech being precisely understood, the best way then of
acquiring the right English construction, is carefully to observe the
manner and style of the best English writers, and to procure an habit
thereof by reading and writing, rather than be perplexed by innumerable
tedious and unmeaning rules of phrases, sentences, distinctions, and
variations of names, from their natural order; for which there is no sort
of foundation in the English, or any other language of nature.
But since the English language is that here proposed as an universal one,
it may not however be improper to take some little farther notice of the
rules of English Syntax. In all languages to form a right sentence the
words must agree in construction with one another, as to case, number,
gender, and person, either according to the natural order of things, or
some arbitrary mode of concord and government, by a variation of the
terminations substituted in lieu thereof in particular languages. But the
English doth so only from the sense of the words, without any variation
of terminations, except that es or s signifying the feminine gender,
is sometimes added to form the plural number of substantives, and the
substantive verb _is_, or the pronouns _it_, _with_ its inflections, to
form the third person singular of verbs, and as and es in some instances,
to express the masculine and feminine genders.
And though it has no other case but the nominative, or any variation
of cases at all, yet all English verbs agree with the substantives in
number and person, without any exception; and the state or situation of
substantives are expressed by prepositions set in apposition thereto in
the same manner as the articles; nor have the adjectives any variations,
besides the degrees of comparison; and yet both they and participles
agree with the substantives in gender, number and case; and when two
substantives of different sorts of things come together, the place,
state, or case of the last is expressed by the preposition _of_ or-’s,
signifying _of his_; unless the latter substantive is of the same sort
with, or explains the former; in which case they are both of the same
case, state, or situation. Conjunctions, adverbs, and relatives, serve to
connect sentences, as prepositions do words. The relatives _who_, _what_,
and _which_, and all other English names as well as things, must agree
with the antecedents as their originals, whether persons, actions, or
substantives. When two verbs come together, the latter is to be in the
infinitive mode.