Plain English

by Marian Wharton

LIMITING ADJECTIVES

249. Limiting adjectives are also divided into classes, the numerals, the demonstratives and the articles.

Numeral Adjectives

250. Numeral adjectives are those which limit nouns as to number or order. They are such adjectives as one, two, three, four, etc., and first, second and third, etc., as for example:

• Three men applied for work.
• The train ran at the rate of forty miles an hour.
• There have always been two classes in the world.
• The first martyr to anti-militarism was Jaures.
• The eighteenth day of March is the anniversary of the Paris Commune.

In these sentences the adjectives three, forty, two, first and eighteenth are all numeral adjectives. They limit the nouns which they modify as to number or order.

Adjectives that limit nouns as to number or order are called numeral adjectives. Numeral adjectives answer the question how many or in what order.

Demonstratives

251. We have also a class of adjectives which are used to point out some particular person or thing. These are called demonstrative adjectives. Demonstrate means literally to point out. So these adjectives point out from a number of things, one particular thing to our attention. These demonstrative adjectives are this, that, those, these, yonder, former, latter and same.

These and those are the plural forms of this and that. This and these are used to point out things near at hand. That and those are used to point out things more distant, as This is my book. These are my papers, meaning this book or these papers, close to me. By, That is my pencil and Those are my letters, I mean that pencil, and those letters, which are farther away from me.

Former and latter are used to show which of two things already mentioned is referred to, and to point out things in point of time, not of place. For example, we may say:

• We no longer observe the former customs, but rather prefer the latter.
• He did not like his former job but this latter job pleases him.

You understand from this that we have been discussing and describing two kinds of work, and that the first in point of time was unpleasant and the second pleasant.

The demonstrative adjective same refers to something of which we have just spoken, as for example, He has gone to work, I must do the same thing. These demonstrative adjectives answer the question which, so when you wish to discover a demonstrative in a sentence, ask the question which, and the answer will be the demonstrative adjective.