If we go through this old declension word by word, seeking in each case the modern equivalent, we find that only three of its members are still perfectly living. They are those which are marked with an asterisk. I call a given word living, not when the mere form is extant, but when that forms retains its old animating function. In such a comparison we need not notice the changes of shape, when a word is known to be the same. Thus the difference of spelling between hire and her is insignificant. But the difference of function must be rigorously weighed, or we shall let the most important distinctions slip unvalued through our fingers. For this reason I have excluded the genitive case singular, both feminine and neuter, as being now dead to us. The neuter his no longer exists except in old literature. It has entirely disappeared, and does not even remain in the discharge of any partial or local function. Instances of its use are abundant in Shakspeare (412) and our Bible :

They came vnto the yron gate that leadeth vnto the citie, which opened to them of his owne accord.-Acts xii. 10.

Equally extinct is him, the dative neuter. I have marked those words with a dagger in the declension, which have a partial continuity with the present English. The his of the genitive masculine is superseded by of him except in emphatic positions. The his and her with which we are most familiar are no longer genitive cases of a substantival pronoun; they have long ago become adjectival words, and they are called Possessives. As to the two dative forms, which are marked as partially surviving in our modern speech,

their thread of identical vitality is very attenuated. Not once in a thousand times when him or her appear as substantivepronouns, are they to be identified with this dative. We have it in such a rare instance as this:

So they sadled him the asse.-1 Kings xiii. 13.

And this is not modern English :. we should now say 'they saddled for him.' The sort of instance in which the dative him or her is still in familiar use, is such as this: 'I gave him or her sixpence.'

Here, as in other cases, the influence of the little words of and to have come in, through imitation of the French, to give quite a new character to our declension of the pronoun.

469. The Reflexive Pronoun.

There was an old Reflexive Pronoun which in Mosogothic was sik and sis; in Icelandic is sik and ser; both radically identical with the Latin se, sui, sibi. This pronoun remains in full activity in German in the form sich; and yet it is almost entirely lost on the Low Dutch side of the Teutonic family. There is no relic of it in Anglo-Saxon1, nor has it ever cropped up at any later stage of our language, as it has, rather remarkably, in the modern Dutch zich.

We now supply the place of it by self, selves; as, myself, thyself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves. This has the advantage of being equally applicable to all varieties of person, whereas sich is of the third person only.

Jesus sah Nathanael zu sich kommen.—Luther's Version.
Jesus saw Nathaneel comming to him.—John i. 47.

Although this reflex Personal pronoun is not found at any stage of our insular branch, yet its possessive sîn, equivalent to the Latin suus, is found in the early Saxon poetry.

Here we have to call attention to the fact that the Objective Case of the pronoun performed for a long period the double office of direct and reflex pronoun for all the three Persons. We have now lost this faculty: and we can no longer say, 'Ye clothe you,' as in Haggai i.6, but you clothe yourselves.'

And Elisha said vnto him, Take bowe and arrowes. And he tooke vnto him bowe and arrowes.-2 Kings xiii. 15.

If we compare the Dutch version we shall find a distinction where our version has unto him in different senses :

Ende Elisa seyde tot hem: Neemt eenen boge ende pijlen: ende hy nam tot sich eenen boge ende pijlen.

In the following verses we have them reflexively :

:

And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the Lord their God, and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city.

And they set them vp images and groues in euery high hill, and vnder euery greene tree.—2 Kings xvii. 9, 10.

Later in the same chapter we find themselves:—

So they feared the Lord, and made vnto themselues of the lowest of them priests of the high places, which sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places. ver. 32.

Thus, in the sermon preached at the funeral of Bishop Andrewes, we read

The unjust judge righted the importunate widow but out of compassion to relieve him.—Library of Anglo-Catholic Theology, Andrewes, v. 274.

The last word corresponds, not to the Latin eum, but to se, and the modern rendering of the passage would be 'The unjust judge righted the importunate widow only out of compassion to (relieve) himself.'

The -self form has gradually gained upon the reflex usage of him, her, them, and the next quotation exhibits a practical reason why it should have done so, for we see it was found necessary to distinguish by a variation of type the reflex

pronoun from the direct personal pronouns of the same form:

Men look with an evil Eye upon the Good that is in others, and think that their Reputation obscures them, and that their commendable Qualities do stand in their Light; and therefore they do what they can to cast a Cloud over them, that the bright shining of their Virtues may not scorch them.-John Tillotson, Against Evil-speaking (ed. 1728).

This manner of expressing the reflex pronoun is now only poetical:

Mark ye, how close she veils her round.

Christian Year, Fourth Sunday in Lent.

470. We will close the subject of the personal pronouns with a brief conspectus of these pronouns as they appear before verbs in some of the most important sister-languages:

The pronoun of the second person singular is lost in Dutch; it is reserved for intimacy and devotion in German;-in English it is used only towards God. The Germans share this dignified use of the pronoun with us, as a result of religious conditions which have affected both languages alike. The two great Bible-translating nations have naturally, in their veneration for the words of Scripture, made this Hebrew idiom their own. It is only to be wondered at how the Dutch should have done otherwise.

The natural tendency of the western civilization, apart from other influences, would be to shrink from such a use of thou. The French have been led by this feeling, and in all addresses to God they use vous. It is not, therefore, from any radical difference, but only from the effect of circumstances, that the western languages are divided in this particular. A sensitiveness as to the social use of the second pronoun is common to all the nations of the West, but it exhibits itself in unequal degrees. We are influenced by it less than any of the other great languages. We have indeed dropped thou, but we remain tolerably satisfied with you, except when we wish to shew reverence. At such times we are sensible of a void in our speech, unless the personage has a title, as your Lordship. Here it is that the pronominal use of Monsieur and Madame in the French language is felt to be so admirable a contrivance. The substitution of any third-person formula meets the difficulty. In one way or another most of the great languages have done this. The German has done it in the directest manner by simply putting sie they, for ihr you. Not more direct, but much drier, is the (now I imagine rather obsolete) Danish fashion of calling a man to his face han he, as a polite substitute for the second person:—it is common in Holberg's plays. In Italian an abstract feminine substantive takes the place of the pronoun of the second person. But the most ceremonious of all in this matter is the great language of chivalry. The philologer who goes no deeper into Spanish, must at least acquaint himself with the formula which it substitutes for the second person. To say vos you, is with them a great familiarity, or even an insult. At least, in the short form of os it is so. Something like this exists in Devonshire and Somersetshire, as regards the use of the second person Singular. 'He thou'd me and he thee'd me' is in Somer