^4^ on personal pronouns. Oct. l*}* 



We have already seen, however, that the word 

 hii is obliged to perform the double ofiice of defini- 

 tive and pofsefsive, thus, 



" His house !S better uhtn hers., but hers is finer thin his," 



In which example, the first his, stands as a defini- 

 tive, and as such requires to be joined with the noun 

 it defines ; and the last his, stands as a pofsefsive, and 

 requires not the noun to be added. 



In like manner, fhould we attempt to exprefs the 

 meaning of this sentence, by repeating the names of 

 the persons, without using any pronomial word what- 

 ever, we ftiall find that these genitives, as they have, 

 been called, may be in all cases applied equally in 

 place-of the definitives, my, thy, &c. and the pofsef- 

 sives, mine thine^ &.C. like the word his, without any 

 change. Thus, the sentence, 



•' James^ housih hetterthan John's, h\i\. John's is finer than James's." 



is equivalent to 



" My houfi: s better rh'.n/>?j, hut his is finer 'h?n mine or mt house." 



Here the word fames^s performs alike the part of 

 my, and of mine. For, similar lo mine, we say as a- 

 bove, famei^s, or similar to my house, we might 

 •equally say, " finer than fames^s house." In like 

 manner we may either say, as above, " better than 

 yohn^-i," or at pleasure, " better than ^o^n'j house;" 

 the word house, or the noun explained by the defini- 

 tive being in all cases of this sort, either added or. 

 supprefsed at the pleasure of the composer, which 

 -cannot be done either with the words mine or hers. 

 To render this still more plain, I (hall vary this sen- 

 tence in many diflferent ways, as in the table annexed. 



