In the worst volume of elder date, the historian may find something to assist or direct his enquiries; the antiquarian, something to elucidate what requires illustration; the philologist, something to insert in the margin of his dictionary.
Though many writers constantly punctuate contracted sentences in this way, it is well not to insert the comma when the meaning is equally clear without it. It is unnecessary in the following sentence:
Saul hath slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands.
XIII. Words placed out of their natural position in the sentence are often followed by a comma.
(1) The object is usually placed after the verb; when placed at the beginning of the sentence, it should be separated from the subject by a comma, unless the meaning would otherwise be perfectly clear and be readily seized.
The proportions of belief and of unbelief in the human mind in such cases, no human judgment can determine.
There is the same reason for inserting the comma in such cases as there is for inserting it after a long subject. Moreover, there is often need of some device to remove the ambiguities that are caused by inversion. In English, the meaning of words is so greatly determined by their position that, in altering the usual arrangement of a sentence, there is risk of being misunderstood. The danger of inserting the point in this case is that the object may be read with the words going before, and not with its own verb. If there is a possibility of this, the point should not be used.
Of course no point should be placed after the object in such a sentence as the following:—"One I love, and the other I hate."
(2) An adverbial phrase, that is a phrase used as an adverb, is usually placed after the verb; when it begins the sentence, a comma follows it unless it is very short.
From the ridge a little way to the east, one can easily trace the windings of the river.