A COPIOUS LATIN GRAMMAR, BY I. J. G. SCHELLER, TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN, WITH ALTERATIONS, NOTES AND ADDITIONS, BY GEORGE WALKER, M.A. LATE FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE; HEAD MASTER OF THE IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE-STREET. 1825. TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. THE following Translation, whatever may be its merits or defects, has arisen from the desire of being useful. The Translator, in common with many other teachers, often found the want of a copious Grammar to which he might refer advanced students. The Port-Royal Latin Grammar, which is generally used for this purpose, though in many respects excellent, is also as frequently and greatly defective, particularly in the arrangement and illustration of the Syntax. From the Preface to Matthiæ's valuable Greek Grammar, the Translator became acquainted with Scheller's Latin Grammar, as the model by which the former was executed. Upon procuring and examining it, he was persuaded that it was calculated to remove a great deficiency, and therefore induced to attempt the translation. It has been necessary to make many alterations of the original, to accommodate it to the difference between the German and English languages. But these are not the only changes. The Author's style is exceedingly heavy; and from a strange supposition that a work of this kind could be put into the hands of beginners, he often enters into superfluous and tiresome repetitions: as, therefore, this is not a work of imagination or taste, the style has been freely re-modelled, and all those parts which seemed useless have been suppressed; the translation, though still long, has been thus reduced by as many as a hundred pages. For the same reason the Author's Prefaces have been omitted, as they merely contain remarks upon the necessity of clearly explaining the principles and terms of Grammar, and its object and extent, which are repeated in the body of the work. The Index has also been retrenched of all those particulars which could as well be learnt from the table of Contents. To make this Grammar as complete and useful as possible, the Translator has inserted some valuable Lists from the Port-Royal Grammar and Seyer on the Latin Verb and to supply some defects in the remarks on Prosody, he has added Bentley's important Inquiries on the Metres of Terence and Horace. For these additions no apology can be necessary. But he is also responsible for Notes and Additions, in which he has endeavoured to remove some defects in the theory of grammar, and its peculiar application to the Latin language. He here particularly refers to the remarks on pronunciation and on the order of construing; and to an account of the Verb, which he believes is the most complete attempt, hitherto made, to define the parts of the verb, and explain their use, and the fullest account and comparison of the English, Latin and Greek verb, extant in any similar work. open He is sensible that he has here laid himself to the charge of novelty, both of divisions and terms; but conscious that his reverence for received opinions would induce him to retain whatever is sanctioned by usage, unless manifestly wrong and capable of improvement, he feels persuaded that candid and competent judges will think this part of his labour neither rash nor unimportant. To execute the Translation, and conduct it |