demonstrative function must be held to be the overruling consideration; the use of different words to point to individuals possessing the attribute of sex, is an entirely subordinate convenience.

PRONOUNS OF THE FIRST PERSON.

The ordinary uses of 'I' and 'we', as the singular and plural pronouns of the first person, would appear to be above all ambiguity, uncertainty, or dispute. Yet when we consider the force of the plural 'we', we are met with a contradiction; for, as a rule, only one person can speak at the same time to the same audience. It is only by some exceptional arrangement, or some latitude or license of expression, that several persons can be conjoint speakers. For example, a plurality may sing together in chorus, and may join in the responses at church, or in the simultaneous repetition of the Lord's Prayer or the Creed. Again, one person may be the authorised spokesman in delivering a judgment or opinion held by a number of persons in common. Finally, in written compositions, the 'we' is not unsuitable, because a plurality of persons may append their names to a document.

A speaker using 'we' may speak for himself and one or more others; commonly he stands forward as the representative of a class, more or less comprehensive. 'As soon

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as my companion and I had entered the field, we saw a man coming toward us'; we like our new curate'; 'you do us poets the greatest injustice'; 'we must see to the efficiency of our forces'. The widest use of the pronoun will be mentioned presently.

'We' is used for 'I' in the decrees of persons in authority; as when King Lear says—

'Know that we have divided

In three our kingdom'.

By the fiction of plurality a veil of modesty is thrown over the assumption of vast superiority over human beings generally. Or, 'we' may be regarded as an official form

whereby the speaker personally is magnified or enabled to rise to the dignity of the occasion.

The editorial 'we' is to be understood on the same principle. An author using 'we' appears as if he were not alone, but sharing with other persons the responsibility of his views.

This representative position is at its utmost stretch in the practice of using 'we' for human beings generally; as in discoursing on the laws of human nature. The preacher, the novelist, or the philosopher, in dwelling upon the peculiarity of our common constitution, being himself an example of what he is speaking of, associates the rest of mankind with him, and speaks collectively by means of 'we'. 'We are weak and fallible'; 'we are of yesterday'; doomed to dissolution'.

but we seek one to come'.

we are

'Here have we no continuing city,

It is not unfrequent to have in one sentence, or in close proximity, both the editorial and the representative meaning, the effect being ambiguity and confusion. 'Let us [the author] now consider why we [humanity generally] overrate distant good'. In such a case the author should fall back upon the singular for himself 'I will now consider-'. 'We [speaker] think we [himself and hearers together] should come to the conclusion'. Say either 'I think', or 'you would'.

The following extract from Butler exemplifies a similar confusion - Suppose we [representative] are capable of happiness and of misery in degrees equally intense and extreme, yet we [rep.] are capable of the latter for a much longer time, beyond all comparison. We [change of subject to a limited class] see men in the tortures of pain-. Such is our [back to representative] make that any thing may become the instrument of pain and sorrow to us'. The 'we' at the commencement of the second sentence-' We see men in the tortures'—could be advantageously changed to 'you', or the passive construction could be substituted; the remaining wes would then be consistently representative.

From the greater emphasis of singularity, energetic

speakers and writers sometimes use 'I' as representative of mankind at large. Thus: 'The current impressions received through the senses are not voluntary in origin. What I see in walking is seen because I have an organ of vision'. The question of general moral obligation is forcibly stated by Paley in the individual form, 'Why am I obliged to keep my word?' It is sometimes well to confine the attention of the hearer or reader to their own relation to the matter under consideration, more especially in difficult or non-popular argument or exposition. The speaker, by using 'I', does the action himself, or makes himself the example, the hearer being expected to put himself in the same position.

PRONOUNS OF THE SECOND PERSON.

Anomalous usages have sprung up in connection with these pronouns also. The plural form has almost wholly superseded the singular; a usage more than five centuries old.*

The motive is courtesy.. The singling out of one person for address is supposed to be a liberty or an excess of familiarity; and the effect is softened or diluted by the fiction of taking in others. If our address is uncomplimentary, the sting is lessened by the plural form; and if the reverse, the shock to modesty is not so great. This is a refinement that was unknown to the ancient languages. The orators of Greece delighted in the strong, pointed, personal appeal implied in the singular 'thou'. In modern German, 'thou' (du) is the address of familiarity and intimacy; while the ordinary pronoun is the curiously indirect 'they' (Sie). On solemn occasions, we may revert to 'thou'. Cato, in his meditative soliloquy on reading Plato's views on the immortality of the soul before killing himself, saysPlato, thou reasonest well'. So in the Commandments, 'thou' addresses to each individual an unavoidable appeal: 'Thou shalt not-'. But our ordinary means of making the personal appeal is, 'you, sir', 'you, madam', 'my Lord, you', &c.; we reserve thou' for the special case of ad

The use of the plural for the singular was established as early as the beginning of the 14th century.'-Morris, p. 118, § 153.

dressing the Deity. The application of the motive of courtesy is here reversed; it would be irreverent to merge this vast personality in a promiscuous assemblage.

In vituperation or contempt, the force of thou' was at one time strongly marked. Sir Edward Coke, the king's attorney, addressed Sir Walter Raleigh at his trial thus: 'All that he (Lord Cobham) did was by thy instigation, thou viper; for I THOU thee, thou traitor'. So Faithful's judge in the Pilgrim's Progress addresses him thou runagate, heretic, &c'. Sir Toby Belch (Twelfth Night, iii. 2) instructs his friend Sir Andrew Aguecheek in the composition of a chalIf thou thou'st him some thrice, it shall not be Petruchio's vehement outburst upon the tailor is a notable example (Taming of the Shrew, iv. 3).

lenge: amiss'.

'You' is not unfrequently employed, like 'we', as a representative pronoun. The action is represented with great vividness, when the person or persons addressed may be put forward as the performers: There is such an echo among the old ruins and vaults, that if you stamp a little louder than ordinary, you hear the sound repeated'; 'Some practice is required to see these animals in the thick forest, even when you hear them close by you'.

There should not be a mixture of thou' and 'you' in the same passage. Thus, Thackeray (Adventures of Philip) 'So, as thy sun rises, friend, over the humble housetops round about your home, shall you wake many and many a day to duty and labour'. So, Cooper (Waterwitch): Thou hast both master and mistress? You have told us of the latter, but we would know something of the former. Who is thy master?' Shakespeare, Scott, and others might also be quoted.

'Ye' and 'you' were at one time strictly distinguished as different cases; 'ye' was nominative, 'you' objective (dative or accusative). But the Elizabethan dramatists confounded the forms irredeemably; and 'you' has gradually ousted 'ye' from ordinary use. 'Ye' is restricted to the expression of strong feeling, and in this employment occurs chiefly in the poets.

DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS.

These pronouns, formerly called pronouns of the Third Person-he, she, it, they '-merit a large share of attention. The clearness of composition is more dependent upon them than upon any single matter coming within the scope of grammar.

Our language is at a great disadvantage in having but one demonstrative pronoun; the four forms being merely the varieties for gender and number. We are thus without the power of keeping distinct two antecedents, if they are of the same gender and number-two men, two women, two things, two plurals of any gender. The Latin language is profuse in varieties of the demonstrative-hic, ille, iste, is, ipse, se; and so can manage with ease two or even three concurring subjects. Our weakness may be seen from the following passage in our translation of the New Testament (Luke xviii. 15, 16): 'And they (the people: no pronoun in Greek,—verb in 3rd plural) brought unto him also infants (Tà ẞpépn) that he would touch them (avrá, the infants); but when his disciples saw it, they (the disciples) rebuked them (avroîs the people or the infants). But Jesus called them (avra, the infants) unto him, and said, Suffer little children (τà #aidía) to come unto me and forbid them (avrá, the little children) not.' In the Vulgate, by means of the pronouns illos and eos, two of the subjects are kept distinct, and the narrative freed from ambiguity. Our resource in such a case would be to repeat the antecedents in the parts where the collision is worst; but when his disciples saw it, they rebuked the people (or the infants). But Jesus called the infants to him '.

It will be afterwards seen that this defect is to some extent supplied by certain adjectives-including the demonstratives, 'this' and 'that'. In the present connexion, we shall advert to the rules for guiding us in referring a pronoun to its antecedent. These rules are common to all the four forms he, she, it, they'; and they keep us right in a great number of cases where there are apparently more than one