MANUAL OF PARSING:

INCLUDING ALSO

A SYNOPTICAL TABLE OF THE SYSTEM;

A FULL ELUCIDATION OF ENGLISH IDIOMS;
A DISCUSSION ON WORDS DIFFICULT TO CLASSIFY;
AND A GLOSSARY OF GRAMMATICAL TERMS.

MANCHESTER: JOHN HEYWOOD, 141 AND 143, DEANSGATE;
EDUCATIONAL DEPARTMENT, 141, DEANSGate.

LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, AND Co.; J. C. TACEY.

302. g. 175.

PREFACE.

Of all the exercises the student of grammar is expected to perform, none can compete in utility with parsing, as a means of bestowing a clear insight into the peculiar structure of a language, and a firm mastery over its principles. Accordingly, the vast importance of this exercise is universally admitted.

To be effective, however, the parsing must be conducted on a system at once simple, complete, and consistent. The common grammars usually fail in every one of these respects. The methods they furnish are too complicated to be readily grasped and retained by the mind; or, they are so inconsistent and contradictory, as to produce inevitable confusion, instead of that order and clearness to which a proper course of grammatical study should accustom the learner. Moreover, in almost every instance, the application of the methods proposed is only exemplified in the case of very easy sentences, the student being left to his own resources for grappling with the real difficulties that continually arise. In the English language, composite as it is, the number of idioms is exceptionally large, and the obstacles to gaining a correct knowledge of its grammatical structure consequently numerous. writers on grammar shirk the task of explaining the idiomatic usages of the language, and make no effort to remove the obstacles that present themselves, so that many an enterprising pupil is often tempted to quit the study in despair.

Most

The want of a clear and concise system of parsing, capable of ready application, not only to the easy selected examples, but to hard sentences, has been long felt. To supply this want, the following pages have been carefully compiled from the best sources, the examples being mainly from classical English writers, and they embody the results of many years' practical experience on the part of the authors.