twenty, or more.”  Such looseness comported well enough with his particular purpose; because he meant to teach the derivation of words, and not to meddle at all with their construction.  But who does not see that it is impossible to lay down rules for the construction of words, without first dividing them into the classes to which such rules apply?  For example:  if a man means to teach, that, “A verb must agree with its subject, or nominative, in person and number,” must he not first show the learner what words are verbs? and ought he not to see in this rule a reason for not calling the participle a verb?  Let the careless followers of Lowth and Priestley answer.  Tooke did not care to preserve any parts of speech at all.  His work is not a system of grammar; nor can it be made the basis of any regular scheme of grammatical instruction.  He who will not grant that the same words may possibly be used as different parts of speech, must make his parts of speech either very few or very many.  This author says, “I do not allow that any words change their nature in this manner, so as to belong sometimes to one part of speech, and sometimes to another, from the different ways of using them.  I never could perceive any such fluctuation in any word whatever.”—­Diversions of Purley, Vol. i, p. 68.

12.  From his own positive language, I imagine this ingenious author never well considered what constitutes the sameness of words, or wherein lies the difference of the parts of speech; and, without understanding these things, a grammarian cannot but fall into errors, unless he will follow somebody that knows them.  But Tooke confessedly contradicts, and outfaces “all other Grammarians” in the passage just cited.  Yet it is plain, that the whole science of grammar—­or at least the whole of etymology and syntax, which are its two principal parts—­is based upon a division of words into the parts of speech; a division which necessarily refers, in many instances, the same words to different sections according to the manner in which they are used.  “Certains mots repondent, ainsi au meme temps, a diverses parties d’oraison selon que la grammaire les emploie diversement.”—­Buffier, Art. 150.  “Some words, from the different ways in which they are used, belong sometimes to one part of speech, sometimes to another.”—­M’Culloch’s Gram., p. 37.  “And so say all other Grammarians.”—­Tooke, as above.

13.  The history of Dr. Webster, as a grammarian, is singular.  He is remarkable for his changeableness, yet always positive; for his inconsistency, yet very learned; for his zeal “to correct popular errors,” yet often himself erroneous; for his fertility in resources, yet sometimes meagre; for his success as an author, yet never satisfied; for his boldness of innovation, yet fond of appealing to antiquity.  His grammars are the least judicious, and at present the least popular, of his works.  They consist of four or