Owen — Revision of Pronouns. 127 



as standing for that other. Such laborious circumlocutions, 

 too, as "your humble servant," "your prospective fellow-trav- 

 eler," etc., are felt to be at best extremely clumsy substitutes. 

 If any of these words or phrases shall be reckoned as taking an- 

 other's place, it can hardly be the "I," but rather my name or 

 any circumlocution. To rank the "I" as a verbal deputy is, 

 then, to misconceive the procedure of speech completely. 



The fact that a genuine personal is occasionally used with 

 added vicarious value, does not justify the inference that every 

 personal is a pronoun. Though Democrats are sometimes Bap- 

 tists, I may not therefore rank the former as a sub-class of 

 the latter. So also, though personals be sometimes further 

 used vicariously, that is, as pronouns, it is only their vicarious 

 usage that admits them to pronominal rank. As merely per- 

 sonal, as egocentrics, that is, of the colloquial type, they are 

 not also vicarious ; that is, by the definition of Grammar itself, 

 they are not pronouns. Per contra, when they are not only per- 

 sonal but also vicarious, their personality ranks, in a strict pro- 

 nominal classification, as merely a lexical accident. 



