Let thee and I, my fair one, dwell.”
The second line of the couplet is ungrammatical, the conjunction connecting an objective with a nominative case, or, to speak more correctly, the pronoun of the first person, which should be a regimen to the verb understood, being here in the nominative case. Thus, “let thee,” and, “let I, my fair one, dwell,” instead of “let thee, and let me.”
“Let us make a covenant, I and thou.”—Bible. The error here, though similar, does not come under precisely the same predicament with the former. The pronoun us is very properly in the objective case, after the verb let; I and thou should therefore be in the same case, according to Rule vii. of Syntax. The expression is in fact elliptical, and when completed proceeds thus, “Let us make a covenant: let me and thee make.”
“Though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered.” The first clause is intended to express a fact, not a hypothesis; the verb, therefore, should be in the indicative mood. Conjunctions have no government, either of cases or moods.
IMPROPRIETY.
“If in case he come, all will be well.” If and in case are synonymous, the one meaning “suppose,” and the other, “on the supposition.” One of them, therefore, is redundant.
“The reason of my desiring to see you was, because I wanted to talk with you.” Because means “by reason;” the expression, therefore, is chargeable with redundancy. It should be, “that I wanted to talk with you.”
“No sooner was the cry of the infant heard, but the old gentleman rushed into the room.”—Martinus Scrib. The comparative is here improperly followed by but, instead of than.
“Scarce had the Spirit of Laws made its appearance, than it was attacked.” Than is employed after comparatives only, and the word other. It ought to be “scarce,” or, for reasons formerly given, “scarcely had the Spirit of Laws made its appearance, when it was attacked,” or “no sooner—than.”
“The resolution was not the less fixed, that the secret was as yet communicated to very few, either in the French or English court.” This passage from Hume I have not been able to find. Priestley observes, that it involves a Gallicism, the word that being used instead of as. If the meaning intended be, that some circumstances, previously mentioned, had not shaken the resolution, because the secret was as yet known to few, then Priestley’s observation was correct, and the word as should be substituted for that, to express the cause of the firmness. But, if the author intended to say, that the very partial discovery of the secret had not shaken the resolution, the clause is then perfectly correct. According to the former phraseology, the circumstance subjoined operated as a cause, preventing the resolution from being shaken: according to the latter, it had no effect, or produced no change of the previous determination. In other words, “the less fixed that,” implies that the subject of the following clause did not affect that of the preceding; “the less fixed as” denotes, that the latter circumstance contributed to the production of the former. As it is obvious, that, in such examples, the definite article may refer either to the antecedent or the subsequent clause, the distinction, here specified, should, for the sake of perspicuity, be carefully observed[148].