EXERCISES IN PARSING.
Joseph and his brother reside in New York. The Sun, moon, and stars, admonish us of a superior and superintending Power. I respect my friend, because he is upright and obliging. Henry and William, who obey their teacher, improve rapidly. Henry or William, who obeys his teacher, improves very fast. Neither rank nor possession makes the guilty mind happy. Wisdom, virtue, and meekness, form the good man's happiness and interest: they support him in adversity, and comfort him in prosperity. Man is a little lower than the angels. The United States, as justly as Great Britain, can now boast of their literary institutions.
NOTE. The verb form is plural, and agrees with three nouns singular, connected by copulative conjunctions, according to RULE 8. The verb comfort agrees with they for its nominative. It is connected to support by the conjunction and, agreeably to RULE 34. Angels is nom. to are understood, and Great Britain is nom. to can boast understood, according to RULE 35.
REMARKS ON CONJUNCTIONS AND PREPOSITIONS.
The same word is occasionally employed, either as a conjunction, an adverb, or a preposition. "I submitted, for it was in vain to resist;" in this example, for is a conjunction, because it connects the two members of a compound sentence. In the next it is a preposition, and governs victory in the objective case: "He contended for victory only."
In the first of the following sentences, since is a conjunction; in the second, it is a preposition, and in the third, an adverb; "Since we must part, let us do it peaceably; I have not seen him since that time; Our friendship commenced long since."
"He will repent before he dies; Stand before me; Why did you not return before" [that or this time;] in the first of these three examples, before is an adverbial conjunction, because it expresses time and connects; and in the second and third, it is a preposition.
As the words of a sentence are often transposed, so are also its members. Without attending to this circumstance, the learner may sometimes be at a loss to perceive the connecting power of a preposition or conjunction, for every preposition and every conjunction connects either words or phrases, sentences or members of sentences. Whenever a sentence begins with a preposition or conjunction, its members are transposed; as, "In the days of Joram, king of Israel, flourished the prophet Elisha;" "If thou seek the Lord, he will be found of thee; but, if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever."
That the words in, if, and when, in these examples, connect the members of the respective sentences to which they are attached, will obviously appear if we restore these sentences to their natural order, and bring these particles between the members which they connect: thus, "Elisha the prophet flourished in the days of Joram, king of Israel;" "The Lord will be found of thee if thou seek him; but he will cast thee off for ever if thou forsake him:"
As an exercise on this lecture, you may now answer these