Of the connectives employed in combining the sentences in a discourse.

sentiments with those contained in the examples produced.

BUT may not the subordinate part connected with the additional particle, properly constitute one sentence, and the declaration another? Impossible. Every sentence must contain the enunciation of some proposition distinctly intelligible by itself, and expressive of some judgment, desire, or purpose of the speaker. But what only points to the motive or condition of something yet untold, answers none of these ends. Thus the words, "Unless ye repent," enunciate nothing, and therefore convey to the hearer no information of judgment, purpose, or desire. They give indeed the expectation of such information, and thereby keep up the attention, till we hear what follows. No sooner are the words "ye shall perish" added, than we have the explicit declaration of a certain judgment or sentiment of the speaker. For this reason grammarians have justly remarked, that in every sentence there must be a verb in the indicative mood either expressed or implied. In all the three' examples above given, we have it expressed in the second clause of their original form; the verb in the hypothetical part, and in that which marks the intention, is properly in the subjunctive or potential. It matters not whether the mood be distinguished by inflection, arrangement, or particles. In commands, interrogations, and wishes, the indicative is not expressed, but implied, and by the idiom of the tongue sug

Sect. II.

Observations on the use of connectives in combining sentences.

gested to the understanding with sufficient clearness. The interrogative, and the optative, as well as the imperative, are, in respect of sense, totally distinct from the two moods abovementioned; though in most languages distinguished only by particles or arrangement *. Thus though in these three sentences,

Go away;" "Will ye go away?" and, "O that ye "would go away;" there is properly no indicative expressed, yet it is so manifestly implied, that none who understands the language can be at a loss to perceive, that each of them fully enunciates a certain affection of the speaker, a command, request, or wish. They signify neither more nor less than "I command you to go away;" "I desire to be informed whether ye will go away;" and, "I wish that ye would go a“way."

66

WHAT hath been said of the conditional and intentional particles, holds still more evidently of the comparative particle than, which as frequently it doth not even need to be followed by a verb in any mood, so it can never begin the sentence without a manifest hyperbaton. The particle as is sometimes strictly a comparative conjunction. Such it is in these words: "As your father did, so do ye." In this case it falls under the same predicament with the conditional connectives. Sometimes it is equivalent to thus, and may be still called a comparative particle, as it intimates

*Hermes, B. I. chap. viii.

Of the connectives employed în combining the sentences in a discourse.

some resemblance in that which follows, to that which preceded. But this is also effected by the copulatives likewise, and in like manner. Such it is in the beginning of this similitude,

As when an angel by divine command *.

In this case it evidently connects sentences. Again, the illative is perfectly adapted for connecting sentences. The inference itself may very properly be expressed in a proposition distinctly enunciated, and therefore independently intelligible. The conjunction serves only to intimate, that the reason or evidence of this judgment, which may also be a distinct proposition, was assigned in the words immediately preceding. This reasoning holds in like manner with regard to the causal conjunction. The relation between the sentences is the same; the order only is inverted; as we have here the consequence before the cause. And I suppose it is too clear to need illustration, that there is nothing in the import of the words to hinder copulatives and disjunctives from connecting sentences as well as members, and members as well as sentences. Yet even among those that are alike fitted for both purposes, there is some difference in point of strength. From their very nature they do not all unite the parts with equal closeness. They are like cements which differ in their degrees of tenacity. Thus the Illative conjunctions and the causal

* Addison's Compaign.

Sect. II. Observations on the use of connectives in combining sentences.

constitute a more intimate union, than the adversative and the copulative. Again, that formed by demonstrative pronouns seems weaker than that effected by conjunctions. So much for the natural difference in the connectives resulting from the different import of the words.

THAT there is also a great, though arbitrary difference arising from idiom is unquestionable. In the best authors of antiquity we often meet with sentences that begin with a relative pronoun, answering to our who, whom, or which. By all the most eminent writers among the moderns, not only in English, but in other European tongues, this practice is now, I think, carefully avoided. It is custom only that makes this difference. When the cause is purely natural, the effect will be found the same in all languages. Accordingly, what was observed above concerning the conditional, intentional, and comparative conjunctions, is equally applicable to every tongue. And if we consider abstractly the effect of the relatives, we - shall find, that what follows the who, whom, or which, is often the enunciation of some judgment, purpose, or desire, which, as it may constitute a separate sentence, serves to vindicate from the charge, of impropriety, the usage of the ancients. Yet there is some reason also on the side of the moderns. The personal pronouns do but presuppose the subject, whether person or thing, to be known, and consequently do no more than supersede the repetition of the name, VOL. II. A a

Of the connectives employed in combining the sentences in a discourse.

There can be therefore no doubt of the propriety of beginning sentences with these. Whereas the relatives not only refer to something immediately said, that we may know the subject of discourse, but seem so closely to connect the part which follows with that which precedes, that the one makes, as it were, the description of either the nominative, or the regimen of the verb, in the other. In this view they may be said to create a union too close to subsist conveniently between different sentences. There is at least a risk, that they will give such an ambiguous appearance to the second, as to render it doubtful, whether it be a separate sentence, or a member of the foregoing. For this reason, the illative wherefore, as it includes power of the pronoun which, doth not seem to be so analogically used by our writers, in connecting sentences, as in connecting members.

the

AGAIN, as an irrefragable evidence that there is a difference in connectives arising purely from idiom, let it be observed, that we find it sometimes taking place among conjunctions of the same order. The causal because, forms too close a union to subsist between two separate sentences. The case is different with the causal for, though in every other respect synonymous. This latter particle is not adapted for uniting clauses which must necessarily be included in the same sentence. As an evidence that this distinction can be attributed only to custom, we may remark, that it is variable, differing in different ages.