An English Grammar

Chapter 58

293. In parsing adverbs, give--

(1) The cla.s.s, according to meaning and also use.

(2) Degree of comparison, if the word is compared.

(3) What word or word group it modifies.

Exercise.

Pa.r.s.e all the adverbs in the following sentences:--

1. Now the earth is so full that a drop overfills it.

2. The higher we rise in the scale of being, the more certainly we quit the region of the brilliant eccentricities and dazzling contrasts which belong to a vulgar greatness.

3. We sit in the warm shade and feel right well How the sap creeps up and blossoms swell.

4. Meanwhile the Protestants believed somewhat doubtfully that he was theirs.

5. Whence else could arise the bruises which I had received, but from my fall?

6. We somehow greedily gobble down all stories in which the characters of our friends are chopped up.

7. How carefully that blessed day is marked in their little calendars!

8. But a few steps farther on, at the regular wine-shop, the Madonna is in great glory.

9. The foolish and the dead alone never change their opinion.

10. It is the Cross that is first seen, and always, burning in the center of the temple.

11. For the impracticable, however theoretically enticing, is always politically unwise.

12. Whence come you? and whither are you bound?

13. How comes it that the evil which men say spreads so widely and lasts so long, whilst our good kind words don"t seem somehow to take root and blossom?

14. At these carousals Alexander drank deep.

15. Perhaps he has been getting up a little architecture on the road from Florence.

16. It is left you to find out why your ears are boxed.

17. Thither we went, and sate down on the steps of a house.

18. He could never fix which side of the garden walk would suit him best, but continually shifted.

19. But now the wind rose again, and the stern drifted in toward the bank.

20. He caught the scent of wild thyme in the air, and found room to wonder how it could have got there.

21. They were soon launched on the princely bosom of the Thames, upon which the sun now shone forth.

22. Why should we suppose that conscientious motives, feeble as they are constantly found to be in a good cause, should be omnipotent for evil?

24. It was pretty bad after that, and but for Polly"s outdoor exercise, she would undoubtedly have succ.u.mbed.

CONJUNCTIONS.

294. Unlike adverbs, conjunctions do not modify: they are used solely for the purpose of connecting.

Examples of the use of conjunctions:--

[Sidenote: _They connect_ words.]

(1) _Connecting words_: "It is the very necessity _and_ condition of existence;" "What a simple _but_ exquisite ill.u.s.tration!"

[Sidenote: Word groups: _Phrases._]

[Sidenote: _Clauses._]

(2) _Connecting word groups_: "Hitherto the two systems have existed in different States, _but_ side by side within the American Union;"

"This has happened _because_ the Union is a confederation of States."

[Sidenote: _Sentences._]

(3) _Connecting sentences_: "Unanimity in this case can mean only a very large majority. _But_ even unanimity itself is far from indicating the voice of G.o.d."

[Sidenote: _Paragraphs._]

(4) _Connecting sentence groups_: Paragraphs would be too long to quote here, but the student will readily find them, in which the writer connects the divisions of narration or argument by such words as _but_, _however_, _hence_, _nor_, _then_, _therefore_, etc.

[Sidenote: _Definition._]

295. A conjunction is a linking word, connecting words, word groups, sentences, or sentence groups.

[Sidenote: _Cla.s.ses of conjunctions._]

296. Conjunctions have two princ.i.p.al divisions:--

(1) Coordinate, joining words, word groups, etc., of the _same rank_.