necessarily deprives it of its regimen.  Whether participles are worthy to form an exception to my rule or not, this palpable contradiction is one of the gravest faults of L. Murray’s code of syntax.  After copying from Lowth the doctrine that a participle with an article before it becomes a noun, and must drop the government and adjuncts of a participle, this author informs us, that the same principles are applicable to the pronoun and participle:  as, “Much depends on their observing of the rule, and error will be the consequence of their neglecting of it;” in stead of, “their observing the rule,” and “their neglecting it.”  And this doctrine he applies, with yet more positiveness, to the noun and participle; as if the error were still more glaring, to make an active participle govern a possessive noun; saying, “We shall perceive this more clearly, if we substitute a noun for the pronoun:  as, ’Much depends upon Tyro’s observing of the rule,’ &c.; which is the same as, ’Much depends on Tyro’s observance of the rule.’  But, as this construction sounds rather harshly, it would, in general, be better to express the sentiment in the following, or some other form:  ’Much depends on the rule’s being observed; and error will be the consequence of its being neglected? or—­’on observing the rule; and—­of neglecting it.’”—­Murray’s Gram., 8vo, p. 193; Ingersoll’s, 199; and others.

OBS. 6.—­Here it is assumed, that “their observing the rule,” or “Tyro’s observing the rule,” is an ungrammatical phrase; and, several different methods being suggested for its correction, a preference is at length given to what is perhaps not less objectionable than the original phrase itself.  The last form offered, “on observing the rule,” &c., is indeed correct enough in itself; but, as a substitute for the other, it is both inaccurate and insufficient.  It merely omits the possessive case, and leaves the action of the participle undetermined in respect to the agent.  For the possessive case before a real participle, denotes not the possessor of something, as in other instances, but the agent of the action, or the subject of the being or passion; and the simple question here is, whether this extraordinary use of the possessive case is, or is not, such an idiom of our language as ought to be justified.  Participles may become nouns, if we choose to use them substantively; but can they govern the possessive case before them, while they govern also the objective after them, or while they have a participial meaning which is qualified by adverbs?  If they can, Lowth, Murray, and others, are wrong in supposing the foregoing phrases to be ungrammatical, and in teaching that the possessive case before a participle converts it into a noun; and if they cannot, Priestley, Murray, Hiley, Wells, Weld, and others, are wrong in supposing that a participle, or a phrase beginning with a participle, may properly govern the possessive case.  Compare Murray’s seventh note under his Rule 10th, with the second under his Rule 14th.  The same contradiction is taught by many other compilers.  See Smith’s New Grammar, pp. 152 and 162; Comly’s Gram., 91 and 108; Ingersoll’s, 180 and 199.