Who does not perceive what flagrant violations of grammar rules are committed every day, and every hour, and in almost every sentence that is framed to express our knowledge of facts.
This verb is the same in character with the two just noticed. It expresses the act of raising each foot alternately, and usually implies that the body is, by that means, conveyed from one place to another. But as people step their feet and not their hands, or any thing else, it is entirely useless to mention the object; for generally, that can not be mistaken any more than in the case of the gloves, boots, and hat. But it would be bad philosophy to teach children that there is no objective word after it, because it is not written out and placed before their eyes. They will find such teaching contradicted at every step they take. Let a believer in intransitive verbs step on a red hot iron; he will soon find to his sorrow, that he was mistaken when he thought that he could step without stepping any thing. It would be well for grammar, as well as many other things, to have more practice and less theory. The thief was detected by his steps. Step softly; put your feet down carefully.
Birds fly.
We learned from our primers, that
"The eagle's flight
Is out of sight,"
How did the eagle succeed in producing a flight? I suppose he flew it. And if birds ever fly, they must produce a flight. Such being the fact, it is needless to supply the object. But the action does not terminate solely on the flight produced, for that is only the name given to the action itself. The expression conveys to the mind the obvious fact, that, by strong muscular energy, by the aid of feathers, and the atmosphere, the bird carries itself thro the air, and changes its being from one place to another. As birds rarely fly a race, or any thing but themselves and a flight, it is not necessary to suffix the object.
It rains.
This verb is insisted on as the strongest proof of intransitive action; with what propriety, we will now inquire. It will serve as a clear elucidation of the whole theory of intransitive verbs.
What does the expression signify? It simply declares the fact, that water is shed down from the clouds. But is there no object after rains? There is none expressed. Is there nothing rained? no effect produced? If not, there can be no water fallen, and our cisterns would be as empty, our streams as low, and fields as parched, after a rain as before it! But who that has common sense, and has never been blinded by the false rules of grammar, does not know that when it rains, it never fails to rain rain, water, or rain-water, unless you have one of the paddy's dry rains? When it hails, it hails hail, hail-stones, or frozen rain. When it snows, it snows snow, sometimes two feet of it, sometimes less. I should think teachers in our northern countries would find it exceeding difficult to convince their readers that snow is an intransitive verb—that it snows nothing. And yet so it is; people will remain wedded to their old systems, and refuse to open their eyes and behold the evidences every where around them. Teachers themselves, the guides of the young—and I blush to say it, for I was long among the number—have, with their scholars, labored all the morning, breaking roads, shovelling snow, and clearing paths, to get to the school-house, and then set down and taught them that to snow is an intransitive verb. What nonsense; nay, worse, what falsehoods have been instilled into the youthful mind in the name of grammar! Can we be surprised that people have not understood grammar? that it is a dry, cold, and lifeless business?