English Grammar

<p>The true or regular syntax of the <em>English Participl</em>e as a part of speech distinct from the verb and not converted into a noun or an adjective is twofold; being sometimes that of simple relation to a noun or a pronoun that precedes it and sometimes that of government or the state of being governed by a preposition.</p><p> </p><p>In the former construction the participle resembles an adjective; in the latter it is more like a noun or like the infinitive mood: for the participle after a preposition is governed as a participle and not as a case.</p><p> </p><p>To these two constructions some add three others less regular using the participle sometimes as the subject of a finite verb sometimes as the object of a transitive verb and sometimes as a nominative after a neuter verb. Of these five constructions the first two are the legitimate uses of this part of speech; the others are occasional modern and of doubtful propriety.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The syntax of an Adverb consists in its simple relation to a verb a participle an adjective or whatever else it qualifies; just as the syntax of an English Adjective (except in a few instances) consists in its simple relation to a noun or a pronoun.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The syntax of Conjunctions consists not (as L. Murray and others erroneously teach) in their power of determining the mood of verbs or the cases of nouns and pronouns but in the simple fact that they link together such and such terms and thus mark the connexions of human thought.-Beattie.</p><p> </p>