OUTLINE OF ANALYSIS.

364. In analyzing simple sentences, give—

(1) The predicate. If it is an incomplete verb, give the complement (Secs. 344 and 350) and its modifiers (Sec. 351).

(2) The object of the verb (Sec. 349).

(3) Modifiers of the object (Sec. 351).

(4) Modifiers of the predicate (Sec. 352).

(5) The subject (Sec. 347).

(6) Modifiers of the subject (Sec. 351).

(7) Independent elements (Sec. 355).

This is not the same order that the parts of the sentence usually have; but it is believed that the student will proceed more easily by finding the predicate with its modifiers, object, etc., and then finding the subject by placing the question who or what before it.

Exercise in Analyzing Simple Sentences.

Analyze the following according to the directions given:—

1. Our life is March weather, savage and serene in one hour.

2. I will try to keep the balance true.

3. The questions of Whence? What? and Whither? and the solution of these, must be in a life, not in a book.

4. The ward meetings on election days are not softened by any misgiving of the value of these ballotings.

5. Our English Bible is a wonderful specimen of the strength and music of the English language.

6. Through the years and the centuries, through evil agents, through toys and atoms, a great and beneficent tendency irresistibly streams.

7. To be hurried away by every event, is to have no political system at all.

8. This mysticism the ancients called ecstasy,—a getting-out of their bodies to think.

9. He risked everything, and spared nothing, neither ammunition, nor money, nor troops, nor generals, nor himself.

10. We are always in peril, always in a bad plight, just on the edge of destruction, and only to be saved by invention and courage.

11. His opinion is always original, and to the purpose.

12. To these gifts of nature, Napoleon added the advantage of having been born to a private and humble fortune.

13.

The water, like a witch's oils,
Burnt green and blue and white.

14. We one day descried some shapeless object floating at a distance.

15.

Old Adam, the carrion crow,
The old crow of Cairo;
He sat in the shower, and let it flow
Under his tail and over his crest.

16. It costs no more for a wise soul to convey his quality to other men.

17. It is easy to sugar to be sweet.

18. At times the black volume of clouds overhead seemed rent asunder by flashes of lightning.

19. The whole figure and air, good and amiable otherwise, might be called flabby and irresolute.

20. I have heard Coleridge talk, with eager energy, two stricken hours, and communicate no meaning whatsoever to any individual.

21. The word conscience has become almost confined, in popular use, to the moral sphere.

22. You may ramble a whole day together, and every moment discover something new.

23. She had grown up amidst the liberal culture of Henry's court a bold horsewoman, a good shot, a graceful dancer, a skilled musician, an accomplished scholar.

24. Her aims were simple and obvious,—to preserve her throne, to keep England out of war, to restore civil and religious order.

25.

Fair name might he have handed down,
Effacing many a stain of former crime.

26. Of the same grandeur, in less heroic and poetic form, was the patriotism of Peel in recent history.

27. Oxford, ancient mother! hoary with ancestral honors, time-honored, and, haply, time-shattered power—I owe thee nothing!

28. The villain, I hate him and myself, to be a reproach to such goodness.

29. I dare this, upon my own ground, and in my own garden, to bid you leave the place now and forever.

30. Upon this shore stood, ready to receive her, in front of all this mighty crowd, the prime minister of Spain, the same Condé Olivarez.

31. Great was their surprise to see a young officer in uniform stretched within the bushes upon the ground.

32. She had made a two days' march, baggage far in the rear, and no provisions but wild berries.

33. This amiable relative, an elderly man, had but one foible, or perhaps one virtue, in this world.

34. Now, it would not have been filial or ladylike.

35. Supposing this computation to be correct, it must have been in the latitude of Boston, the present capital of New England.

36. The cry, "A strange vessel close aboard the frigate!" having already flown down the hatches, the ship was in an uproar.

37.

But yield, proud foe, thy fleet
With the crews at England's feet.

38. Few in number, and that number rapidly perishing away through sickness and hardships; surrounded by a howling wilderness and savage tribes; exposed to the rigors of an almost arctic winter,—their minds were filled with doleful forebodings.

39. List to the mournful tradition still sung by the pines of the forest.

40.

In the Acadian land, on the shores of the Basin of Minas,
Distant, secluded, still, the little village of Grand-Pré
Lay in the fruitful valley.

41. Must we in all things look for the how, and the why, and the wherefore?

CONTRACTED SENTENCES.

Words left out after than or as.

365. Some sentences look like simple ones in form, but have an essential part omitted that is so readily supplied by the mind as not to need expressing. Such are the following:—

"There is no country more worthy of our study than England [is worthy of our study]."

"The distinctions between them do not seem to be so marked as [they are marked] in the cities."

To show that these words are really omitted, compare with them the two following:—

"The nobility and gentry are more popular among the inferior orders than they are in any other country."

"This is not so universally the case at present as it was formerly."

Sentences with like.

366. As shown in Part I. (Sec. 333). the expressions of manner introduced by like, though often treated as phrases, are really contracted clauses; but, if they were expanded, as would be the connective instead of like; thus,—

"They'll shine o'er her sleep, like [as] a smile from the west [would shine].
From her own loved island of sorrow."

This must, however, be carefully discriminated from cases where like is an adjective complement; as,—

"She is like some tender tree, the pride and beauty of the grove;" "The ruby seemed like a spark of fire burning upon her white bosom."

Such contracted sentences form a connecting link between our study of simple and complex sentences.

COMPLEX SENTENCES.

The simple sentence the basis.

367. Our investigations have now included all the machinery of the simple sentence, which is the unit of speech.

Our further study will be in sentences which are combinations of simple sentences, made merely for convenience and smoothness, to avoid the tiresome repetition of short ones of monotonous similarity.

Next to the simple sentence stands the complex sentence. The basis of it is two or more simple sentences, which are so united that one member is the main one,—the backbone,—the other members subordinate to it, or dependent on it; as in this sentence,—

"When such a spirit breaks forth into complaint, we are aware how great must be the suffering that extorts the murmur."

The relation of the parts is as follows:—

This arrangement shows to the eye the picture that the sentence forms in the mind,—how the first clause is held in suspense by the mind till the second, we are aware, is taken in; then we recognize this as the main statement; and the next one, how great ... suffering, drops into its place as subordinate to we are aware; and the last, that ... murmur, logically depends on suffering.

Hence the following definition:—

Definition.

368. A complex sentence is one containing one main or independent clause (also called the principal proposition or clause), and one or more subordinate or dependent clauses.

369. The elements of a complex sentence are the same as those of the simple sentence; that is, each clause has its subject, predicate, object, complements, modifiers, etc.

But there is this difference: whereas the simple sentence always has a word or a phrase for subject, object, complement, and modifier, the complex sentence has statements or clauses for these places.