“Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
    Had left the flushing in her galled eyes.”—­Shak.

OBS. 10.—­Comparison must not be considered a general property of adjectives.  It belongs chiefly to the class which I call common adjectives, and is by no means applicable to all of these. Common adjectives, or epithets denoting quality, are perhaps more numerous than all the other classes put together.  Many of these, and a few that are pronominal, may be varied by comparison; and some participial adjectives may be compared by means of the adverbs.  But adjectives formed from proper names, all the numerals, and most of the compounds, are in no way susceptible of comparison.  All nouns used adjectively, as an iron bar, an evening school, a mahogany chair, a South-Sea dream, are also incapable of comparison.  In the title of “His Most Christian Majesty,” the superlative adverb is applied to a proper adjective; but who will pretend that we ought to understand by it “the highest degree” of Christian attainment?  It might seem uncourtly to suggest that this is “an abuse of the king’s English,” I shall therefore say no such thing.  Pope compares the word Christian, in the following couplet:—­

   “Go, purified by flames ascend the sky,
    My better and more Christian progeny.”—­Dunciad, B. i, l. 227.

IRREGULAR COMPARISON.

The following adjectives are compared irregularly:  good, better, best; bad, evil, or ill, worse, worst; little, less, least; much, more, most; many, more, most.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.—­In English, and also in Latin, most adjectives that denote place or situation, not only form the superlative irregularly, but are also either defective or redundant in comparison.  Thus: 

I. The following nine have more than one superlative:  far, farther, farthest, farmost, or farthermost; near, nearer, nearest or next; fore, former, foremost or first; hind, hinder, hindmost or hindermost; in, inner, inmost or innermost; out, outer, or utter, outmost or utmost, outermost or uttermost; up, upper, upmost or uppermost; low, lower, lowest or lowermost; late, later or latter, latest or last.

II.  The following five want the positive:  [aft, adv.,] after, aftmost or aftermost; [forth, adv., formerly furth,[180]] further, furthest or furthermost; hither, hithermost; nether, nethermost; under, undermost.

III.  The following want the comparative:  front, frontmost; rear, rearmost; head, headmost; end, endmost; top, topmost; bottom, bottommost; mid or middle, midst,[181] midmost or middlemost; north, northmost; south, southmost; east, eastmost; west, westmost; northern, northernmost; southern, southernmost; eastern, easternmost; western, westernmost.