Higher Lessons in English: A work on English grammar and composition

by Alonzo Reed; Brainerd Kellogg

revolves
/——————
moon | / '
======|== and'
| \ '
\ ' keeps | side
\———————-

9. The moon revolves, and keeps the same side toward us. 10. Hunger rings the bell, and orders up coals in the shape of bread and butter, beef and bacon, pies and puddings. 11. The history of the Trojan war rests on the authority of Homer, and forms the subject of the noblest poem of antiquity. 12. Every stalk, bud, flower, and seed displays a figure, a proportion, a harmony, beyond the reach of art. 13. The natives of Ceylon build houses of the trunk, and thatch roofs with the leaves, of the cocoa-nut palm. 14. Richelieu exiled the mother, oppressed the wife, degraded the brother, and banished the confessor, of the king. 15. James and John study and recite grammar and arithmetic.

James study grammar
=========\ /===========\ /===============
' \ | / ' \ | / '
'and ==|== and' ===== and'
John ' / | \ ' recite / \ ' arithmetic
=========/ \===========/ \===============

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LESSON 29.

NOUNS AND ADJECTIVES AS ATTRIBUTE COMPLEMENTS.

+Introductory Hints+.—The subject presents one idea; the predicate presents another, and asserts it of the first. Corn is growing presents the idea of the thing, corn, and the idea of the act, growing, and asserts the act of the thing. Corn growing lacks the asserting word, and Corn is lacks the word denoting the idea to be asserted.

In logic, the asserting word is called the copula—it shows that the two ideas are coupled into a thought—and the word expressing the idea asserted is called the predicate. But, as one word often performs both offices, e. g., Corn grows, and, as it is disputed whether any word can assert without expressing something of the idea asserted, we pass this distinction by as not essential in grammar, and call both that which asserts and that which expresses the idea asserted, by one name—the predicate. [Footnote: We may call the verb the predicate; but, when it is followed by a complement, it is an incomplete predicate.]

The maple leaves become. The verb become does not make a complete predicate; it does not fully express the idea to be asserted. The idea may be completely expressed by adding the adjective red, denoting the quality we wish to assert of leaves, or attribute to them—The maple leaves become red.

Lizards are reptiles. The noun reptiles, naming the class of the animals called lizards, performs a like office for the asserting word are. Rolfe's wife was Pocahontas. Pocahontas completes the predicate by presenting a second idea, which was asserts to be identical with that of the subject.