[440] "Oh is used to express the emotion of pain, sorrow, or surprise. O is used to express wishing, exclamation, or a direct address to a person."—Lennie's Gram., 12th Ed., p. 110. Of this distinction our grammarians in general seem to have no conception; and, in fact, it is so often disregarded by other authors, that the propriety of it may be disputed. Since O and oh are pronounced alike, or very nearly so, if there is no difference in their application, they are only different modes of writing the same word, and one or the other of them is useless. If there is a real difference, as I suppose there is, it ought to be better observed; and O me! and oh ye! which I believe are found only in grammars, should be regarded as bad English. Both O and oh, as well as ah, were used in Latin by Terence, who was reckoned an elegant writer; and his manner of applying them favours this distinction: and so do our own dictionaries, though Johnson and Walker do not draw it clearly, for oh is as much an "exclamation" as O. In the works of Virgil, Ovid, and Horace, we find O or o used frequently, but nowhere oh. Yet this is no evidence of their sameness, or of the uselessness of the latter; but rather of their difference, and of the impropriety of confounding them. O, oh, ho, and ah, are French words as well as English. Boyer, in his Quarto Dictionary, confounds them all; translating "O!" only by "Oh!" "OH! ou HO!" by "Ho! Oh!" and "AH!" by "Oh! alas! well-a-day! ough! A! ah! hah! ho!" He would have done better to have made each one explain itself; and especially, not to have set down "ough!" and "A!" as English words which correspond to the French ah!
[441] This silence is sufficiently accounted for by Murray's; of whose work, most of the authors who have any such rule, are either piddling modifiers or servile copyists. And Murray's silence on these matters, is in part attributable to the fact, that when he wrote his remark, his system of grammar denied that nouns have any first person, or any objective case. Of course he supposed that all nouns that were uttered after interjections, whether they were of the second person or of the third, were in the nominative case; for he gave to nouns two cases only, the nominative and the possessive. And when he afterwards admitted the objective case of nouns, he did not alter his remark, but left all his pupils ignorant of the case of any noun that is used in exclamation or invocation. In his doctrine of two cases, he followed Dr. Ash: from whom also he copied the rule which I am criticising: "The Interjections, O, Oh, and Ah, require the accusative case of a pronoun in the first Person: as, O me, Oh me, Ah me: But the Nominative in the second: as, O thou, O ye."—Ash's Gram., p. 60. Or perhaps he had Bicknell's book, which was later: "The interjections O, oh, and ah, require the accusative case of a pronoun in the first person after them; as, O, me! Oh, me! Ah, me! But the nominative case in the second person; as, O, thou that rulest! O, ye rulers of this land!"—The Grammatical Wreath, Part I, p. 105.
[442] See 2 Sam., xix, 4; also xviii, 33. Peirce has many times misquoted this text, or some part of it; and, what is remarkable, he nowhere agrees either with himself or with the Bible! "O! Absalom! my son!"—Gram., p. 283. "O Absalom! my son, my son! would to God I had died for thee."—Ib., p. 304. Pinneo also misquotes and perverts a part of it, thus: "Oh, Absalom! my son"—Primary Gram., Revised Ed., p. 57.
[443] Of this example, Professor Bullions says, "This will be allowed to be a correct English sentence, complete in itself, and requiring nothing to be supplied. The phrase, 'being an expert dancer,' is the subject of the verb 'does entitle;' but the word 'dancer' in that phrase is neither the subject of any verb, nor is governed by any word in the sentence."—Eng. Gram., p. 52. It is because this word cannot have any regular construction after the participle when the possessive case precedes, that I deny his first proposition, and declare the sentence not "to be correct English." But the Professor at length reasons himself into the notion, that this indeterminate "predicate," as he erroneously calls it, "is properly in the objective case, and in parsing, may correctly be called the objective indefinite;" of which case, he says, "The following are also examples: 'He had the honour of being a director for life.' 'By being a diligent student, he soon acquired eminence in his profession.'"—Ib., p. 83. But "director" and "student" are here manifestly in the nominative case: each agreeing with the pronoun he, which denotes the same person. In the latter sentence, there is a very obvious transposition of the first five words.
[444] Faulty as this example is, Dr. Blair says of it: "Nothing can be more elegant, or more finely turned, than this sentence. It is neat, clear, and musical. We could hardly alter one word, or disarrange one member, without spoiling it. Few sentences are to be found, more finished, or more happy."—Lecture XX, p. 201. See the six corrections suggested in my Key, and judge whether or not they spoil the sentence.—G. B.
[445] This Note, as well as all the others, will by-and-by be amply illustrated by citations from authors of sufficient repute to give it some value as a grammatical principle: but one cannot hope such language as is, in reality, incorrigibly bad, will always appear so to the generality of readers. Tastes, habits, principles, judgements, differ; and, where confidence is gained, many utterances are well received, that are neither well considered nor well understood. When a professed critic utters what is incorrect beyond amendment, the fault is the more noteworthy, as his professions are louder, or his standing is more eminent. In a recent preface, deliberately composed for a very comprehensive work on "English Grammar," and designed to allure both young and old to "a thorough and extensive acquaintance with their mother tongue,"—in the studied preface of a learned writer, who has aimed "to furnish not only a text-book for the higher institutions, but also a reference-book for teachers, which may give breadth and exactness to their views,"—I find a paragraph of which the following is a part: "Unless men, at least occasionally, bestow their attention upon the science and the laws of the language, they are in some danger, amid the excitements of professional life, of losing the delicacy of their taste and giving sanction to vulgarisms, or to what is worse. On this point, listen to the recent declarations of two leading men in the Senate of the United States, both of whom understand the use of the English language in its power: 'In truth, I must say that, in my opinion, the vernacular tongue of the country has become greatly vitiated, depraved, and corrupted by the style of our Congressional debates.' And the other, in courteous response remarked, 'There is such a thing as an English and a parliamentary vocabulary, and I have never heard a worse, when circumstances called it out, on this side [of] Billingsgate!'"—Fowler's E. Gram., 8vo. 1850, Pref., p. iv.
Now of these "two leading men," the former was Daniel Webster, who, in a senatorial speech, in the spring of 1850, made such a remark concerning the style of oratory used in Congress. But who replied, or what idea the "courteous response," as here given, can be said to convey, I do not know. The language seems to me both unintelligible and solecistical; and, therefore, but a fair sample of the Incorrigible. Some intelligent persons, whom I have asked to interpret it, think, as Webster had accused our Congress of corrupting the English language, the respondent meant to accuse the British Parliament of doing the same thing in a greater degree,—of descending yet lower into the vileness of slang. But this is hardly a probable conjecture. Webster might be right in acknowledging a very depraving abuse of the tongue in the two Houses of Congress; but could it be "courteous," or proper, for the answerer to jump the Atlantic, and pounce upon the English Lords and Commons, as a set of worse corrupters?
The gentleman begins with saying, "There is such a thing"—as if he meant to describe some one thing; and proceeds with saying, "as an English and a parliamentary vocabulary," in which phrase, by repeating the article, he speaks of two "things"—two vocabularies; then goes on, "and I have never heard a worse!" A worse what? Does he mean "a worse vocabulary?" If so, what sense has "vocabulary?" And, again, "a worse" than what? Where and what is this "thing" which is so bad that the leading Senator has "never heard a worse?" Is it some "vocabulary" both "English and parliamentary?" If so, whose? If not, what else is it? Lest the wisdom of this oraculous "declaration" be lost to the public through the defects of its syntax,—and lest more than one rhetorical critic seem hereby "in some danger" of "giving sanction to" nonsense,—it may be well for Professor Fowler, in his next edition, to present some elucidation of this short but remarkable passage, which he values so highly!
An other example, in several respects still more remarkable,—a shorter one, into which an equally successful professor of grammar has condensed a much greater number and variety of faults,—is seen in the following citation: "The verb is so called, because it means word; and as there can be no sentence without it, it is called, emphatically, the word."—Pinneo's Analytical Gram., p. 14. This sentence, in which, perhaps, most readers will discover no error, has in fact faults of so many different kinds, that a critic must pause to determine under which of more than half a dozen different heads of false syntax it might most fitly be presented for correction or criticism. (1.) It might be set down under my Note 5th to Rule 10th; for, in one or two instances out of the three, if not in all, the pronoun "it" gives not the same idea as its antecedent. The faults coming under this head might be obviated by three changes, made thus: "The verb is so called, because verb means word; and, as there can be no sentence without a verb, this part of speech is called, emphatically, the word." Cobbett wisely says, "Never put an it upon paper without thinking well of what you are about."—E. Gram., ¶ 196. But (2.) the erroneous text, and this partial correction of it too, might be put under my Critical Note 5th, among Falsities; for, in either form, each member affirms what is manifestly untrue. The term "word" has many meanings; but no usage ever makes it, "emphatically" or otherwise, a name for one of the classes called "parts of speech;" nor is there nowadays any current usage in which "verb means word." (3.) This text might be put under Critical Note 6th, among Absurdities; for whoever will read it, as in fairness he should, taking the pronoun "it" in the exact sense of its antecedent "the verb," will see that the import of each part is absurd—the whole, a two-fold absurdity. (4.) It might be put under Critical Note 7th, among Self-Contradictions; for, to teach at once that "the verb is so called," and "is called, emphatically," otherwise,—namely, "the word,"—is, to contradict one's self. (5.) It might be set down under Critical Note 9th, among examples of Words Needless; for the author's question is, "Why is the verb so called?" and this may be much better answered in fewer words, thus: "THE VERB is so called, because in French it is called le verbe and in Latin, verbum, which means word." (6.) It might be put under Critical Note 10th, as an example of Improper Omissions; for it may be greatly bettered by the addition of some words, thus: "The verb is so called, because [in French] it [is called le verbe, and in Latin, verbum, which] means word: as there can be no sentence without a verb, this [most important part of speech] is called, emphatically, [the verb,—q.d.,] the word." (7.) It might be put under Critical Note 11th, among Literary Blunders; for there is at least one blunder in each of its members. (8.) It might be set down under Critical Note 13th, as an example of Awkwardness; for it is but clumsy work, to teach grammar after this sort. (9.) It might be given under Critical Note 16th, as a sample of the Incorrigible; for it is scarcely possible to eliminate all its defects and retain its essentials.
These instances may suffice to show, that even gross errors of grammar may lurk where they are least to be expected, in the didactic phraseology of professed masters of style or oratory, and may abound where common readers or the generality of hearers will discover nothing amiss.