As mind is superior to matter, and the Creator is the highest mental existence, so the idea is the ". most sublime which the mind can conceive.

Man, general and absolute name of the human

Universe, most complex of all ideas, including all objects, qualities, and relations, as a collective whole. Structure, attendant circumstance of matter. Souls, mental object.

Gratitude, mental affection, or attendant circum

stance.

Admiration, attendant circumstance of mind. Author, relative name, applied here to the Crea

tor.

Wisdom and goodness, mental qualities.

330. "These our actors,

(As I foretold you) were all spirits, and
Are melted into ayre, into thin ayre;
And, like the baselesse fabricke of this vision,
The clowd-capt towres, the gorgeous pallaces,
The solemne temples, the great globe itselfe,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolue,

And, like this insubstantiall pageant faded, Leaue not a racke behind."--Shakspeare. Tempest, page 15, vol. 1.

Philosophic parsing of the nouns in the foregoing paragraph. The words in this exercise are to be taken in their literal meaning.

Actors, relative name of persons.

Spirits, mental object.

Ayre, air is matter and therefore a sensible object, though not, in its pure form, directly obvious.

Fabric, sensible object, but relative, as being made or fabricated.

Vision, attendant circumstance of matter.
Towers, sensible object.

Palaces, sensible object.

Temples, sensible object, but including the relative idea of their design and use.

Globe, sensible object with the relative idea of form.

Pageant, name of a sensible object, but relatively applied.

Racke, rack is from the verb to reek or smoke, and means a steam, mist or vapor. It is an attendant circumstance of matter; because it denotes no particular substance; but an appearance capable of being assumed by the exhalation of most fluid bodies.

331. "It fortuned, faire Venus having lost Her little sonne, the winged god of Love, Who for some light displeasure, which him crost, Was from her fled, as flit as ayery dove, And left her blissful bowre of joy above; (So from her often he had fled away, When she for ought him did reprove,)

And wandered in the world in strawnge array,

Disguised in thousand shapes, that none might him bewray

Him for to seeke, she left her heavenly hous,

The hous of goodly forms and faire aspect.

And searched everie way, through which his wings
Had borne him, or his tract she mote detect;
First she him sought in court, where most he us'd
Whylome to haunt, but there she found him not;
But many there she found which sore accus'd
His falshood, and with fowle infamous blot
His cruell deedes and wicked wyles did spot:

Ladies and lordes she every where mote heare
Complayning, how with his empoysned shot
Their woful hearts he wounded had whyleare,
And so had left them languishing twixt hope and feare."
Spencer's "Faerie Queene."

332. Examples of the conditional or suppositive past tense.

I was to pass the river tomorrow; but the bridge is carried away.

I should cross the river tomorrow, but the bridge is carried away.

If I had passed the river yesterday, I could not

now return.

If I was on the other side, I could not get back.

The logic concealed under this form of expression is the most subtle and ingenious, which is to be found, in the essential structure of speech; and yet, it is one of the broadest general principles of language. Probably no single rule has more completely escaped detection, or done more to mislead the entire body of grammatical writers. After all, however, this ingenious mental expedient becomes very clear, when devested of the disguise which has been cast over it by a mistaken theory of instrucion.

The verbs printed in italics, in all the above examples, depend on a common principle. In each of the sentences, two actions are principally referred to, one depending on the other. In each a certain fact is alluded to, as being known, or assumed, by the speaker and hearer; and the pre-admission, or conditional assertion, of this fact is denoted, by putting the verb in the past tense.

I was to pass the river tomorrow; but I am not to pass tomorrow; because that the condition of

things on which the determination to pass depended, has become changed, by one of the numerous casualties on which the actions of man so generally depend.

I should cross, &c.
I shall not cross.

The idea here is a pre-existing obligation, from which the actor is released, by an unexpected change of circumstances, which has increased the difficulty, or prevented the possibility of fulfilment.

These few hints will be sufficient to enable the intelligent scholar to make the application of this principle, in its very extensive use; and to adapt it to any language with which he may be familiar. It is one of the striking instances of that rational logic which the Author of our being has firmly fixed in the intellect of man; for, it will be seen, that, in the most rapid utterance, the mind, consistent with itself and with the nature of things, will habitually represent the proper class of actions in the past tense. This is done, not only without the help of formal teaching, but in opposition to all scholastic rules and mistaken attempts at explanation. If then it should be asked whether it is, in part, the design of this train of reasoning to degrade the instruction of the schools; nothing is farther from it but if the splendid universities of Europe have done so much for human improvement, under a theory of teaching which is radically bad; what might they not do, with their rich endowments, their learning and talents, their zeal, enterprise, and philanthropy, if they would consent to adopt a system of inculcation in language, accordant with facts, worthy of their character, and of the cause which their ample resources are calculated to promote?

The very extensive rule above alluded to, and which exists alike in language, in the mind, and in the nature of things, removes at once all the perplexing contradictions of an imaginary conjunctive mood, and obviates the necessity of all minor explanations and exceptions.

333. Ambiguity from wrong collocation. Harry. "Nothing is better, Peter, than roast beef."

Peter. "I ask your pardon, friend Harry, I think roast beef is better than nothing.”

I saw a ship gliding under full sail through a spy glass.

A man may see how the world goes with half an eye.