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mark the nounal group, we should just notice that there is not in thought the same adjectival character in the numeral as there is in the nounal group. If I say bright stars, fabled graces, uncertain seas, receptive senses, these adjectives have the same relation to their substantives, whether those substantives be taken in the plural or in the singular. Whereas the numerals two, three, four, five, belong to their substantives only conjointly and not severally. It may have been a dim sense of this difference that caused the vacillation which has appeared in language about the adjectival declension of numerals. In Saxon the first three numerals were declined. Thus, preora is genitive of preo: 'pis is þæra preora hida land gemære,' &c. 'This is the land-meer of the three hides,' &c. (A.D. 974.)

Adverbial numerals are such as once, twice, thrice, four times, &c., where it is to be observed that the difference of adverbial form between the first three numerals and their successors is of a piece with the fact that these three were declined, and the others were not, at least not within recorded memory. The adverbs once, twice, thrice, are in fact old genitives which have been disfigured by a frenchified orthography. In the Ormulum they are spelt thus: aness, twizess, thrizess.

This group is exceedingly retentive of antiquity. Not only is there a radical identity in the numerals of the Gothic family, but these again are identical with the numerals of other families of languages. This indicates a very high antiquity. It will be as well to illustrate this fact by comparative tables. First, we will compare the different forms assumed by the numerals in some of the various branches of our own Gothic family, and then we will pass beyond that limit and take into our comparison some of the most illustrious languages of the Indo-European stock.

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In consequence of the luxuriant declension of the numerals in Sanskrit, I have followed the authority of Bopp's Grammar for the 'theme' in each case, that is to say, the part of the word which is present or implied in each of the various forms under which it appears in literature.

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The numerals have been inserted in this place as a sort of appendix to the nounal group, because of the manifest affinity of their form and their use to that group. At the same time enough has been said to indicate that they have a distinct character of their own, and that it would be unphilological to let them be absorbed into any class of words whatever. Their assimilation to the nounal group is less now than it was in ancient times; that is to say, the modern languages permit their distinctive character to be more apparent than the ancient languages did.

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That this is the proper place for the numerals we conclude not only from their assimilation to the nounal group on the one hand, but also from certain traces of affinity which they bear to the pronouns, and on which we shall have to touch in the next chapter.

P.S. By an oversight, which it is now too late to correct in its proper place, the Ordinal numbers have been omitted. It is in these that the numeral more particularly assumes an adjectival character. We retain all the ordinals in the Saxon form except two, namely, first and second. First rose into its place from the dialects; but second was borrowed from the French-a solitary instance among the numerals, properly so called. The Saxon word in its place was other, a word which has now a pronominal value only.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE PRONOUN GROUP.

We now cross the greatest chasm in language—the chasm which separates the presentives from the symbolics. So profoundly has this separation been felt by philologers, that some would even regard these two spheres of speech as radically and originally distinct from each other. The consideration of this theory would lead us beyond the track of the present treatise. It is only introduced here as a testimony to the greatness of the distinction between nouns and pronouns. Bopp, in his Comparative Grammar, § 105, taught that in Sanskrit and the kindred languages (which include English) there are two classes of roots, the one of verbs and nouns, the other of 'pronouns, all original prepositions, conjunctions, and particles.' The former he calls Verbal Roots, the latter Pronominal Roots.

On the other hand, we find Professor Max Müller at different periods holding different views as to the derivation of aham, the Sanskrit ego; and at one time he proposed to derive it from a Sanskrit verb ah to breathe, to speak. He has in his Lectures (Second Series, 1864) given up this view without joining the ranks of those who have assigned to it a pronominal root. He gives us moreover an excellently

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