V. Pronounce every word consisting of more than one syllable with its proper accent.

VI. In every sentence distinguish the more significant words by a natural, forcible and varied emphasis.

VII. Acquire a just variety of pause & cadence. VIII. Accompany the emotions and passions which your words express, by correspondent tones, looks and gestures. GRAMMAR.

Q. What is Grammar ?*

A. Grammar is the art of rightly expressing our thoughts by words.

Q. How many sorts of words are there?

A. Nine: First, the article (a); Second, Noun (b); Third, Pronoun (c); Fourth, Adjective (d); Fifth, Verb (e); Sixth, Adverb (f); Seventh, Preposition (g); Eighth, Conjunction (h); Ninth, Interjection (i).

* From the Greek word Gramma, a letter.

a From the Latin word articulus, a joint or small part. b From nomen, a name; it expresses the name of any person, place or thing: as John, London, Goodness.

c From pro for, and nomen, a noun, from its being used instead of a noun, to avoid the too frequent repetition of the same word.

d From ad to, and jacio, to put ; and signifies the quality of any person, place or thing; as a good man, a great city, a fine horse.

e From verbum, a word: a verb being the principal word in a sentence.

fFrom ad, to, and verbum, a verb, and expresses the quality of a verb.

g From prae, before, and pono, to place, from its being set before nouns or pronouns.

From con, with, and jungo, to join, is a part of speech that joins words or sentences together.

¿ From inter, between and jacin, to throw, is a word that expresses any sudden motion of the mind,

D

These

These are commonly called parts of speech. Q. What are the rules of grammar?

A. In living languages, as the English, French, Italian, &c. use is the best rule; in the dead languages, as the Latin, Greek, &c. the rules are fixed.

Q. Is the study of the grammar of one's own country necessary ?

A. Most certainly it is; for a competent grammatical knowledge of our own language is the true foundation upon which all literature, properly so called, ought to be raised; ignorant of the principles of grammar, we should be entire strangers to the delicacies of the language of our own country, and unable to express ourselves on the most trifling occasions properly, correctly or politely.

Q What is punctuation?

A. Punctuation is the art of making in writing the several pauses or rests between sentences, and the parts of sentences, according to their proper quantity, or proportion, as they are expressed in a just and accurate pronunciation.

Q. What are the marks used for this purpose
A. The period

The colon

The semicolon

The comma

The interrogation
The exclamation
The parenthesis

221

Thus marked.

LESSON X.

LESSON X..

OF POETRY.

WHAT is poetry?

A. A speaking picture, which represents, in verse, the life and actions of a person. Q. What is a poem ?

A. A complete and finished piece of poetry. Q. What sort of verses are chiefly used in our poetry?

A. Those of ten, eight, and seven syllables. Q. Give me an example of each?

A. First of ten, which is the common measure of heroic and tragic poetry.

Think of my father and his face behold;
See him in me, as helpless and as old!/
Tho' not so wretched: there he yields to me,
The first of men in sov'reign misery.

Thus forc'd to kneel; thus grov'ling to embrace
The scourge and ruin of my realm and race,
Suppliant my children's murd'rer to implore,
And kiss those hands yet reeking with their gore.

Second, of eight, which is the usual measure for short poems.

And may at last my weary age,
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy gown, and mossy cell,
Where I may sit, and nightly spell
O'er ev'ry star the sky does shew,
And ev'ry herb that sips the dew.

Third, of seven, called Anacreontic, from Anacreon, a Greek poet who wrote in verse of

this measure.

Fairest piece of well-form'd earth,
Wrge not thus your haughty birth.

Q. Which

Q. Which are the kinds of poetry most in use? A. The kinds of poetry are various; the most considerable sorts are,

I. Pastoral, that describes the shepherd's life, or that of rural nymphs and swains.

II. Elegy, is a mournful poem, or a funeral song.

III. Lyric Poetry, is generally used in composition of songs and odes.

IV. Pindaric ode, (so called from its inventor Pindar) is a sort of Poetry which consists of loose and free numbers and unequal measures.

V. Satire, is a free, jocose, witty and sharp poem, severely inveighing against vice and all corrupt manners and persons.

VI. Comedy, is an agreeable imitation of the actions, humors and customs of common life. VII. Tragedy, in which the calamities of illustrious men are represented and acted over again.

VIII. Epic or Heroic Poem is a poetical narration in verse of some illustrious and important actions of the hero celebrated in the poem: as the great exploits of Achilles in the Iliad of Homer.

IX. Epigram, is an inferior sort of poem, whose peculiar character is brevity, beauty and sharp turn of wit at the end.

As to the Acrostic, Rondeau, Echo, &c. they are such trifling pieces of art, that scarce any poet, but in a merry vein, or on some jocose occasion, will ever use them.

THE LANGUAGES.

Q. What is language?

A. Language is a set or collection of sounds or notes made use of by any nation or people

to

to express the ideas of their minds, and by this means to render their thoughts intelligible to each other; and this communication of our sentiments to others, is called speech or speaking.. Q. Whence comes the great number and diversity of languages?

A. From the building of the Tower of Babel, Genesis, chap. ii.

Q. How many original languages, or, as they are commonly called, mother tongues, are there in the world?

A. 1, The Hebrew; 2, the Greek; 3, the Latin; 4, the old Gothic.

Q. What are the properties of the Hebrew ?* A. The chief properties of the Hebrew are, I. That its letters are twenty two. Of these letters five are vowels, all the rest are consonants.

II. That many words occur without any of the vowels, which may be pronounced as if a short a ore stood between the consonants.

III. That the verbs have only two tenses, past and future, and two genders, masculine and feminine. IV. That Hebrew is read from the right hand to the left, and not from the left to the right, as the English and other western nations.

V. That from the Hebrew sprang the Chaldee, the Syriac, the Arabic, the Samaritan, and the Ethiopic. The Arabic, is the most copious, having a thousand different words for a sword; five hundred for a lion, and two hundred for a serpent.

Q. What are the properties of the Greek lan·guage? A. First, * The different alphabets are here purposely omitted, as they are in the hands of every school boy.