1^9^. grammatical disquisitioTts. ji^ 



have ,been separated from other words, and clafsed' 

 by themselves, in modern languages, under the name 

 of articles ; bnt a much greater number of them 

 have been pufhed into other clafses, without order or 

 discretion, which has occasioned a confusion in gram- 

 mer that requires to be rectified. 



Definitives, as their name imports, are all such 

 words as, without convening an idea 0/" any peculiarity 

 inherent in the object itself, to which they refer, serve 

 merely to separate it from others. of the same kind y so 

 as to distinguijh it from them. 



The words of course can only re'^er to nouns : • 

 and so intimate is their connection -with that clafs of 

 words, that they can on no occasion appear in lan- 

 guage without a noun, whose more general meaning 

 they serve to li?mt and define ; and so intimately do 

 they unite with that noun, as both together to stand ' 

 only as one proper name. 



Definitives, considered as a distirct clafs of words, , 

 are formed by derivation from words of almost eve- 

 ry other clafs : from nouns, pronouns, adjectives, . 

 verbs, sometimes with, and sometimes without any 

 variation of the original word*. - 



They are, in all languages, a very numerous clafs 

 of words, and of very common use ; every particular 



• Definitives from nouns, with alterations, JameCi, JViHiam's, DavtiTs 

 >— without change, hand-gun, miil-nvheel, horse-mill, rr.i//-bor it , arm-fiff 

 hair-breadth, Uraw-hreadth, iron-mallet, foiuder-Lorn, 'wbe'l-iarrmv;— 

 fiom psoaouns, my, thy, cur, ycur, his, her, its, their, Sec; — from adjec- 

 tives, red-head, grey-beard, green-bank, trui'Tisan; — fiom verbs, ma\» er 

 ^ack'tr, turrfirf bek'er. 



