Words formerly called “prepositions,” admit of comparison, as I have before observed.  “Benhadad fled into an inner chamber.”  The in_ner_ temple.  The in_most_ recesses of the heart.  The out fit of a squadron.  The out_er_ coating of a vessel, or house.  The ut_most_ reach of grammar.  The up and down hill side of a field.  The up_per_ end of the lot.  The upper_most_ seats.  A part of the book.  Take it farther off.  The off cast.  India beyond the Ganges.  Far beyond the boundaries of the nation.  I shall go to the city.  I am near to the town. Near does not qualify the verb, for it has nothing to do with it.  I can exist in one place as well as another.  It is below the surface; very far below it.  It is above the earth—­“high above all height.”

Such expressions frequently occur in the expression of ideas, and are correctly understood; as difficult as it may have been to describe them with the theories learned in the books—­sometimes calling them one thing, sometimes another—­when their character and meaning was unchanged, or, according to old systems, had “no meaning at all of their own!”

But I fear I have gone far beyond your patience, and, perhaps, entered deeper into this subject than was necessary, to enable you to discover my meaning.  I desired to make the subject as distinct as possible, that all might see the important improvement suggested.  I am apprehensive even now, that some will be compelled to think many profound thoughts before they will see the end of the obscurity under which they have long been shrouded, in reference to the false rules which they have been taught.  But we have one consolation—­those who are not bewildered by the grammars they have tried in vain to understand, will not be very likely to make a wrong use of adjectives, especially if they have ideas to express; for there is no more danger of mistaking an adjective for a noun, or verb, than there is of mistaking a horse chestnut for a chestnut horse.

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In our next we shall commence the consideration of Verbs, the most important department in the science of language, and particularly so in the system we are defending.  I hope you have not been uninterested thus far in the prosecution of the subject of language, and I am confident you will not be in what remains to be said upon it.  The science, so long regarded dry and uninteresting, becomes delightful and easy; new and valuable truths burst upon us at each advancing step, and we feel to bless God for the ample means afforded us for obtaining knowledge from, and communicating it to others, on the most important affairs of time and eternity.

LECTURE VIII.

ON VERBS.