But the grammar of the highly inflected Latin, with its large syntax dependent on inflection, proved to be a gigantic mould for the vigorous English which had cast off most of the old Anglo-Saxon inflections and agreements, thus making its word relations mostly logical, rather than dependent on grammatical forms. It is little wonder that the later history of English grammar has presented many phases and has had curious reactions, both in its aim and in the methods by which it has been pursued.

Most famous among the grammars of England during this Latin-English period, was that of William Lily, the first high master of St. Paul's School. Parts of this grammar were written expressly for use in this school and so gained the name of “Paul's Accidence. Lily died of the plague in 1522, and his grammatical writings were not published in collected form until twenty years later. About 1543, by order of King Henry the Eighth, Lily's book was put into final shape and ordered to be the standard book on grammar in the English kingdom. It soon became known as the grammar of King Henry the Eighth, though Erasmus and other scholars took part in the revised work and John Colet wrote for it an introduction which was the first attempt to write a formal treatise on English grammar. The author treated English as in all respects like Latin or Greek, with no laws of its own. This famous grammar of William Lily or King Henry the Eighth, was written in English, but applied directly to the Latin tongue,

and was intended as a general work on the science of grammar. It named eight parts of speech, though not precisely the same ones that are recognized to-day. For two hundred years Lily's grammar was a standard text-book in England.

Another interesting ancient grammar was Palsgreve's remarkable French grammar, composed for the use of the Princess Mary, and printed in 1530. It contained a French Accidence and Syntax, with idioms and vocabulary. The book was written in English and it illustrated the French by comparison with English; so it has been of high value in showing the authorized forms of English of that date.

Colet's Introduction to Lily's Latin Grammar is now recognized by scholars as the first genuinely English grammar. Yet this honor was claimed for that of William Bullokar, who published in 1586 A Bref Grammar for English, which he declared was "The first grammar for English that ever waz except my grammar at large." Of the "Grammar at large," no trace can now be found. After this, various grammars of English were prepared, though some of these were still written in Latin, like that of John Wallis, in the time of William and Mary.

Among the eighteenth century grammar makers we find the names of Sir Richard Steele and Dr. Samuel Johnson. In Steele's grammar, which was published in 1712, the distinguished author tried to make his subject more interesting to pupils by putting many of his rules and principles into verse, a device which has

been adopted by many later writers on the dry subject

of grammar.

Thus Steele wrote:

Grammar do's all the arts and knowledge teach

According to the Use of every speech,

How we our Thoughts most justly may express
In Words together joined in Sentences.

One of the most important text-books of the eighteenth century was Dr. Robert Lowth's Short Introduction to English Grammar, published in 1763. It had a wide use and is recognized as having been the chief model for the still more famous Lindley Murray's grammar a generation later. In issuing his grammar near the close of the eighteenth century, Murray acknowledges for his materials books by Harris, Johnson, Lowth, Priestley, Beattie, Sheridan, Walker, and Coote. Several other English grammars that were issued previous to Murray's are not included in this list.

The most interesting and curious of eighteenth century books on English grammar is that of John Horne Tooke, who published in 1786 his famous Epea Pteroenta, or Diversions of Purley, in which, under the form of dialogue, he advances various ingenious grammatical theories; such as, that all the little connecting words (or particles) of language are relics of once active nouns or verbs. Horne Tooke made many mistakes and was a most imperfect guide, yet his astute discussions are still read with some interest by students, and throw considerable light,

not so much on the facts of grammar, as on the varied history through which the science has passed.

But among the names of English grammarians before the nineteenth century, there is none that can rank in point of popular favor and influence with that of Lindley Murray. He was a Pennsylvanian Quaker, who, removing to England, published about 1790 the first of the many school-books which have borne his name. The multiplied copies of these books are said to have reached a sale of five millions or more in England and America.

Murray's grammar was professedly a compilation and has been criticised by Goold Brown and others as not being a work of original scholarly research. But while other grammatical treatises may have been more profound and original, the work of putting into popular form the approved thought of the age on a subject of universal interest is not one to be treated with light appreciation. It was Lindley Murray's grammar more than any other influence, perhaps, that has fixed the form and nomenclature of modern English grammar.

From the time of Ben Jonson until a few years ago the text-books in grammar included five stereotyped divisions: Orthoepy, Orthography, Etymology, Syntax, and Prosody. But modern thinking has considerably reduced the range of the subject, and only a part of Etymology (dealing with grammatical inflections) and Syntax, are now usually reckoned as legitimate parts of grammar.

III

GRAMMAR IN AMERICA AND REACTIONS AGAINST FORMAL GRAMMAR

The varietie of teaching is divers yet and always will be for that every schole maister liketh that he knoweth and seeth not the use of that he knoweth not.-GRAMMAR OF KING HENRY THE EIGHTH.

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Two generations ago the watchwords of the parties into which the educational world was divided were 'Grammar thorough and systematic," and "No teaching of grammar in the schools."-F. H. DALE.

It is only too easy to overdo the teaching of formal grammar.-LEWIS.

The uselessness of "make-believe grammar" was responsible for a marked reaction against all formal teaching of English grammar, which was very noticeable for a time.A. H. TOLMAN.

Sir, the English language has no grammar at all.DR. JOHNSON.

The well-known facts brought out by R. G. White and others do not show that English is a grammarless tongue; but only, so to speak, a concordless tongue. The objection holds good against the old conception of grammar, but has no weight against the modern conception of grammar.CARPENTER BAKER, AND SCOTT.

Near the close of the eighteenth century an impulse to grammatical activity began to show itself in America as well as in England. In some old libraries may be