[§ 446]. The inflection of pronouns has its natural peculiarities in language; it has also its natural difficulties in philology. These occur not in one language in particular, but in all generally. The most common peculiarity in the grammar of pronouns is the fact of what may be called their convertibility. Of this convertibility the following statements serve as illustration:—
1. Of case.—In our own language the words my and thy, although at present possessives, were previously datives, and, earlier still, accusatives. Again, the accusative you replaces the nominative ye, and vice versâ.
2. Of number.—The words thou and thee are, except in the mouths of Quakers, obsolete. The plural forms, ye and you, have replaced them.
3. Of person.—Laying aside the habit of the Germans and other nations, of using the third person plural for the second singular (as in expressions like wie befinden sie sich = how do they find themselves? instead of how do you find yourself?) the Greek language gives us examples of interchange in the way of persons in the promiscuous use of νιν, μιν, σφε, and ἑαυτοῦ; whilst sich and sik are used with a similar latitude in the Middle High German and Scandinavian.
4. Of class.—The demonstrative pronouns become
a. Personal pronouns.
b. Relative pronouns.
c. Articles.
The reflective pronoun often becomes reciprocal.