Читать книгу The Grammar of English Grammars - Goold Brown - Страница 278

OBS. 1.—The word for which a pronoun stands, is called its antecedent, because it usually precedes the pronoun. But some have limited the term antecedent to the word represented by a relative pronoun. There can be no propriety in this, unless we will have every pronoun to be a relative, when it stands for a noun which precedes it; and, if so, it should be called something else, when the noun is to be found elsewhere. In the example above, his and he represent boy, and them represents lessons; and these nouns are as truly the antecedents to the pronouns, as any can be. Yet his, he, and them, in our most approved grammars, are not called relative pronouns, but personal.

OBS. 2.—Every pronoun may be explained as standing for the name of something, for the thing itself unnamed, or for a former pronoun; and, with the noun, pronoun, or thing, for which it stands, every pronoun must agree in person, number, and gender. The exceptions to this, whether apparent or real, are very few; and, as their occurrence is unfrequent, there will be little occasion to notice them till we come to syntax. But if the student will observe the use and import of pronouns, he may easily see, that some of them are put substantively, for nouns not previously introduced; some, relatively, for nouns or pronouns going before; some, adjectively, for nouns that must follow them in any explanation which can be made of the sense. These three modes of substitution, are very different, each from the others. Yet they do not serve for an accurate division of the pronouns; because it often happens, that a substitute which commonly represents the noun in one of these ways, will sometimes represent it in an other.

OBS. 3.—The pronouns I and thou, in their different modifications, stand immediately for persons that are, in general, sufficiently known without being named; (I meaning the speaker, and thou, the hearer;) their antecedents, or nouns, are therefore generally understood. The other personal pronouns, also, are sometimes taken in a general and demonstrative sense, to denote persons or things not previously mentioned; as, "He that hath knowledge, spareth his words."—Bible. Here he is equivalent to the man, or the person. "The care of posterity is most in them that have no posterity."—Bacon. Here them is equivalent to those persons. "How far do you call it to such a place?"—Priestley's Gram., p. 85. Here it, according to Priestley, is put for the distance. "For the priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth."—Malachi, ii, 7. Here they is put indefinitely for men or people. So who and which, though called relatives, do not always relate to a noun or pronoun going before them; for who may be a direct substitute for what person; and which may mean which person, or which thing: as, "And he that was healed, wist not who it was."—John, v, 13. That is, "The man who was healed, knew not what person it was." "I care not which you take; they are so much alike, one cannot tell which is which."

OBS. 4.—A pronoun with which a question is asked, usually stands for some person or thing unknown to the speaker; the noun, therefore, cannot occur before it, but may be used after it or in place of it. Examples: "In the grave, who shall give thee thanks?"—Ps., vi, 5. Here the word who is equivalent to what person, taken interrogatively. "Which of you convinceth me of sin?"—John, viii, 46. That is, "Which man of you?" "Master, what shall we do?"—Luke, iii, 12. That is, "What act, or thing?" These solutions, however, convert which and what into adjectives: and, in fact, as they have no inflections for the numbers and cases, there is reason to think them at all times essentially such. We call them pronouns, to avoid the inconvenience of supposing and supplying an infinite multitude of ellipses. But who, though often equivalent (as above) to an adjective and a noun, is never itself used adjectively; it is always a pronoun.

OBS. 5.—In respect to who or whom, it sometimes makes little or no difference to the sense, whether we take it as a demonstrative pronoun equivalent to what person, or suppose it to relate to an antecedent understood before it: as, "Even so the Son quickeneth whom he will."—John, v, 21. That is—"what persons he will," or, "those persons whom he will;" for the Greek word for whom, is, in this instance, plural. The former is a shorter explanation of the meaning, but the latter I take to be the true account of the construction; for, by the other, we make whom a double relative, and the object of two governing words at once. So, perhaps, of the following example, which Dr. Johnson cites under the word who, to show what he calls its "disjunctive sense:"—

"There thou tellst of kings, and who aspire; Who fall, who rise, who triumph, who do moan."—Daniel.

OBS. 6.—It sometimes happens that the real antecedent, or the term which in the order of the sense must stand before the pronoun, is not placed antecedently to it, in the order given to the words: as, "It is written, To whom he was not spoken of, they shall see; and they that have not heard, shall understand."—Romans, xv, 21. Here the sense is, "They to whom he was not spoken of, shall see." Whoever takes the passage otherwise, totally misunderstands it. And yet the same order of the words might be used to signify, "They shall see to whom (that is, to what persons) he was not spoken of." Transpositions of this kind, as well as of every other, occur most frequently in poetry. The following example is from an Essay on Satire, printed with Pope's Works, but written by one of his friends:—

"Whose is the crime, the scandal too be theirs; The knave and fool are their own libellers."—J. Brown.

OBS. 7.—The personal and the interrogative pronouns often stand in construction as the antecedents to other pronouns: as, "He also that is slothful in his work, is brother to him that is a great waster."—Prov., xviii. 9. Here he and him are each equivalent to the man, and each is taken as the antecedent to the relative which follows it. "For both he that sanctifieth, and they who are sanctified, are all of one: for which cause, he is not ashamed to call them brethren."—Heb., ii, 11. Here he and they may be considered the antecedents to that and who, of the first clause, and also to he and them, of the second. So the interrogative who may be the antecedent to the relative that; as, "Who that has any moral sense, dares tell lies?" Here who, being equivalent to what person, is the term with which the other pronoun agrees. Nay, an interrogative pronoun, (or the noun which is implied in it,) may be the antecedent to a personal pronoun; as, "Who hath first given to Him, and it shall be recompensed to him again?"—Romans, xi, 35. Here the idea is, "What person hath first given any thing to the Lord, so that it ought to be repaid him?" that is, "so that the gift ought to be recompensed from Heaven to the giver?" In the following example, the first pronoun is the antecedent to all the rest:—

"And he that never doubted of his state, He may perhaps—perhaps he may—too late."—Cowper.

OBS. 8.—So the personal pronouns of the possessive case, (which some call adjectives,) are sometimes represented by relatives, though less frequently than their primitives: as, "How different, O Ortogrul, is thy condition, who art doomed to the perpetual torments of unsatisfied desire!"—Dr. Johnson. Here who is of the second person, singular, masculine; and represents the antecedent pronoun thy: for thy is a pronoun, and not (as some writers will have it) an adjective. Examples like this, disprove the doctrine of those grammarians who say that my, thy, his, her, its, and their plurals, our, your, their, are adjectives. For, if they were mere adjectives, they could not thus be made antecedents. Examples of this construction are sufficiently common, and sufficiently clear, to settle that point, unless they can be better explained in some other way. Take an instance or two more: "And they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come."—1 Cor., x, 11.

"Be thou the first true merit to befriend; His praise is lost, who stays till all commend."—Pope.