All Verbs denote action.
By action, we mean not only perceivable motion, but an inherent tendency to change, or resist action. It matters not whether we speak of animals possessed of the power of locomotion; of vegetables, which send forth their branches, leaves, blossoms, and fruits; or of minerals, which retain their forms, positions, and properties. The same principles are concerned, the same laws exist, and should be observed in all our attempts to understand their operations, or employ them in the promotion of human good. Every thing acts according to the ability it possesses; from the small particle of sand, which occupies its place upon the sea shore, up thro the various gradation of being, to the tall archangel, who bows and worships before the throne of the uncreated Cause of all things and actions which exist thro out his vast dominions.
As all actions presuppose an actor, so every action must result on some object. No effect can exist without an efficient cause to produce it; and no cause can exist without a corresponding effect resulting from it. These mutual relations, helps, and dependencies, are manifest in all creation. Philosophy, religion, the arts, and all science, serve only to develope these primary laws of nature, which unite and strengthen, combine and regulate, preserve and guide the whole. From the Eternal I AM, the uncreated, self-existent, self-sustaining Cause of all things, down to the minutest particle of dust, evidences may be traced of the existence and influence of these laws, in themselves irresistible, exceptionless, and immutable. Every thing has a place and a duty assigned it; and harmony, peace, and perfection are the results of a careful and judicious observance of the laws given for its regulation. Any infringement of these laws will produce disorder, confusion, and distraction.
Man is made a little lower than the angels, possessed of a mind capable of reason, improvement, and happiness; an intellectual soul inhabiting a mortal body, the connecting link between earth and heaven—the material and spiritual world. As a physical being, he is subject, in common with other things, to the laws which regulate matter: as an intellectual being, he is governed by the laws which regulate mind: as possessed of both a body and mind, a code of moral laws demand his observance in all the social relations and duties of life. Obedience to these laws is the certain source of health of body, and peace of mind. An infringement of them will as certainly be attended with disease and suffering to the one, and sorrow and anguish to the other.
Lower grades of animals partake of many qualities in common with man. In some they are deficient; in others they are superior. Some animals are possessed of all but reason, and even in that, the highest of them come very little short of the lowest of the human species. If they have not reason, they possess an instinct which nearly approaches it. These qualities dwindle down gradually thro the various orders and varieties of animated nature, to the lowest grade of animalculæ, a multitude of which may inhabit a single drop of water; or to the zoophytes and lythophytes, which form the connecting link between the animal and vegetable kingdom; as the star-fish, the polypus, and spunges. Then strike off into another kingdom, and observe the laws vegetable life. Mark the tall pine which has grown from a small seed which sent forth its root downwards and its trunk upwards, drawing nourishment from earth, air, and water, till it now waves its top to the passing breeze, a hundred feet above this dirty earth: or the oak or olive, which have maintained their respective positions a dozen centuries despite the operations of wind and weather, and have shed their foliage and their seeds to propagate their species and extend their kinds to different places. While a hundred generations have lived and died, and the country often changed masters, they resist oppression, scorn misrule, and retain rights and privileges which are slowly encroached upon by the inroads of time, which will one day triumph over them, and they fall helpless to the earth, to submit to the chemical operations which shall dissolve their very being and cause them to mingle with the common dust, yielding their strength to give life and power to other vegetables which shall occupy their places.[10] Or mark the living principle in the "sensitive plant," which withers at every touch, and suffers long ere it regains its former vigor.
Descend from thence, down thro the various gradations of vegetable life, till you pass the narrow border and enter the mineral world. Here you will see displayed the same sublime principle, tho in a modified degree. Minerals assume different shapes, hues and relations; they increase and diminish, attach and divide under various circumstances, all the while retaining their identity and properties, and exerting their abilities according to the means they possess, till compelled to yield to a superior power, and learn to submit to the laws which operate in every department of this mutable world.
Every thing acts according to the ability God has bestowed upon it; and man can do no more. He has authority over all things on earth, and yet he is made to depend upon all. His authority extends no farther than a privilege, under wholesome restrictions, of making the whole subservient to his real good. When he goes beyond this, he usurps a power which belongs not to him, and the destruction of his happiness pays the forfeit of his imprudence. The injured power rises triumphant over the aggressor, and the glory of God's government, in the righteous and immediate execution of his laws, is clearly revealed. So long as man obeys the laws which regulate health, observes temperance in all things, uses the things of this world as not abusing them, he is at rest, he is blessed, he is happy: but no sooner has he violated heaven's law than he becomes the slave, and the servant assumes the master. But I am digressing. I would gladly follow this subject further, but I shall go beyond my limits, and, it may be, your patience.
I would insist, however, on the facts to which your attention has been given, for it is impossible, as I have before contended, to use language correctly without a knowledge of the things and ideas it is employed to represent.
Grovelling, indeed, must be the mind which will not trace the sublime exhibitions of Divine power and skill in all the operations of nature; and false must be that theory which teaches the young mind to think and speak of neutrality as attached to things which do exist. As low and debasing as the speculations of the schoolmen were, they gave to things which they conceived to be incapable of action, a principle which they called "vis inertiæ," or, power to lie still. Shall our systems of instruction descend below them, throw an insurmountable barrier in the way of human improvement, and teach the false principles that actions can exist without an effect, or that there is a class of words which "express neither action or passion." Such a theory is at war with the first principles of philosophy, and denies that "like causes produce like effects."
The ablest minds have never been able to explain the foundation of a "neuter verb," or to find a single word, with a solitary exception, which does not, in certain conditions, express a positive action, and terminate on a definite object; and that exception we shall see refers to a verb which expresses the highest degree of conceivable action. Still they have insisted on three and some on four kinds of verbs, one expressing action, another passion or suffering, and the third neutrality. We propose to offer a brief review of these distinctions, which have so long perplexed, not only learners, but teachers themselves, and been the fruitful source of much dissention among grammarians.