When you decline quis quæ quid, beware of any temptation to indulge in dirty habits. Eschew pig-tail instead of chewing it. Never have any quid in your mouth, but a quid pro quo.
OF A VERB.
A verb is the chief word in every sentence, as Suspendatur per collum, let him be hanged by the neck.
It expresses the action or being of a thing. Ego sum sapiens, I am a wise man. Tu es stultus, thou art a fool. Non hic amice, pernoctas, you don’t lodge here, Mr. Ferguson.
Verbs have two voices, like the gentleman who was singing, a short time since, at the St. James’s Theatre.
The active ending in o—as amo, I love.
The passive ending in or—as amor, I am loved.
In these two words is contained the terrestrial summum bonum—In short, love beats everything—cock-fighting not excepted. Amo! amor! How happy every human being, from the peer to the pot-boy, from the duchess to the dairy-maid, would be to be able to say so.
They would conjugate immediately. Except, however, certain modern political economists of the Malthusian school, who, albeit they are great advocates for the diffusion of learning, are violently opposed to unlimited conjugations.