gance; and therefore, a multitude of thefe paflionate particles will generally, at least on common occafions, favour more of levity than of dignity; of want of thought, than of keen fenfation. In common difcourfe this holds, as well as in writing. They who wish to speak often, and have little to fay, abound in interjections, wonderful, amazing, prodigious, fy fy, O dear, Dear me, hum, hah, indeed, Good life, Good Lord, and the like and hence, the too frequent ufe of fuch words tends to breed a fufpicion, that one labours under a fcantinefs of ideas. In poetry, certain fuperfluities of language are more allowable than in profe; yet fome elegant English poets are at pains to avoid interjections. Tragick writers are often intemperate in the ufe of them. We meet with entire lines of interjections in the Greek plays. But it is yet more provoking to fee an English tragedian endeavour to work upon the human heart by fuch profane expletives, as Flames and furies! Damnation! Heaven and earth! not to mention others of ftill greater folemnity. If the poet has no other way to make up his verse, or to fhow that his hero is in earnest, I would recommend to him the more harmless phrafeology of Fielding's Tom Thumb,

Confufion! horror! murder! guts! and death!

Interjections denoting imprecation, and those in which the Divine Name is irreverently mentioned, are always offenfive to a pious mind: and the writer or fpeaker, who contracts a habit of introducing them, may without breach of charity be fufpected of profanenefs. To fay, with a devout mind, God bless me, can never be improper but to make thofe folemn words a familiar interjection

interjection expreflive of furprise or peevishness, is, to fay the leaft of it, very indecent.

As to common oaths and curfes, I need not fay any thing to convince my reader, that they are utterly unlawful, and a proof that the speaker has at one time or other kept bad company. For to the honour of the age let it be mentioned, that profane fwearing is now more generally exploded in polite fociety, than it ufed to be in former times. In this refpect, as in many others, the wits of Charles the second's reign were most infamous. Queen Elizabeth was addicted to fwearing and most of our old kings and barons are faid to have distinguished themselves by the use of some one particular oath, which was in their mouths continually. There is a great deal of this ribaldry in the poems of Chaucer.

In the antient Grammars we have adverbs of fwearing, and interjections of imprecation: nay, I think I have been told formerly, that in Latin, and in Greek too perhaps, there are oaths for men, and oaths for women; and that if either sex invade the privilege of the other in this matter, it is a violation of the laws of fwearing, and of grammar. Swearing feems to have been more frequent in the Grecian dialogue, than in the Roman. Almost every affirmation in Plato may be faid to be depofed upon oath.

ter.

One interjection, we are told, expreffes laughBut it is rather a mark in difcourfe, to denote, that the speaker is fuppofed to laugh in that place. For if, inftead of the inarticulate convul

fion which we call laughter, one were to pronounce those three articulate fyllables, ba ha he, the effect would be ridiculous. Laughter is no part of fpeech, but a natural agitation, common to all mankind, and univerfally understood.

It is needless to fubjoin a lift of interjections, as they are but few, and may be seen in any common grammar.

CHAP.

CHA P. IV.

OF CONNECTIVES AND ARTICLES.

E

VERY individual word, which is com

prehended under the feveral fpecies hitherto mentioned, conveys fome idea to the mind, even when pronounced feparate. Thus love, the noun, lovely, the adjective, lovest, the verb, loving, the participle, lovingly, the adverb; thus the pronouns I, thou, he, that, this, she, they, &c. and thus the interjections, alas, fy, Strange !—have, each of them, fome meaning.

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But fome forts of words there are, which, like ciphers in arithmetick, have no fignificancy when feparate, though when joined to other words they are very fignificant. Thus, from, in, and, with, the, convey no idea. But when I fay, "He came from London, in the chariot, with a friend and fervant," the fenfe is compleat; and is made fo by thefe little words; which are now fo important, that, if we leave them out, and say, "He came London the chariot a friend fervant," we speak nonfenfe.

It may be observed, that there are in this fentence two other little words, that of themselves mean nothing, a and the, but which, when con

nected,

nected, as above, are found to be useful, though not abfolutely necessary. For, if we fay, "He "came from London in chariot with friend and "fervant," there is a meaning; which, though awkwardly expreffed, according to the idiom of our tongue, may however be gueffed at; and which, rendered literally into Latin, Venit Londino in curru cum amico et fervo, is neither awkward nor ungrammatical.

Those words, therefore, which become fignificant by being connected with other words, may be divided into two claffes; the Neceffary and the Ufeful. The former we call Connectives; the latter Articles. Of which in their order.

SECT