RULE X.—­PRONOUNS.

A Pronoun must agree with its antecedent, or the noun or pronoun which it represents, in person, number, and gender:[379] as, “This is the friend of whom I spoke; he has just arrived.”—­“This is the book which I bought; it is an excellent work.”—­“Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons to love it too.”—­Cowper.

   “Speak thou, whose thoughts at humble peace repine,
    Shall Wolsey’s wealth with Wolsey’s end be thine?”—­Dr. Johnson.

EXCEPTION FIRST.

When a pronoun stands for some person or thing indefinite, or unknown to the speaker, this rule is not strictly applicable; because the person, number, and gender, are rather assumed in the pronoun, than regulated by an antecedent:  as, “I do not care who knows it.”—­Steele. “Who touched me?  Tell me who it was.”—­“We have no knowledge how, or by whom, it is inhabited.”—­ABBOT:  Joh.  Dict.

EXCEPTION SECOND.

The neuter pronoun it may be applied to a young child, or to other creatures masculine or feminine by nature, when they are not obviously distinguishable with regard to sex; as, “Which is the real friend to the child, the person who gives it the sweetmeats, or the person who, considering only its health, resists its importunities?”—­Opis. “He loads the animal he is showing me, with so many trappings and collars, that I cannot distinctly view it”—­Murray’s Gram., p. 301.  “The nightingale sings most sweetly when it sings in the night.”—­Bucke’s Gram., p. 52.

EXCEPTION THIRD.

The pronoun it is often used without a definite reference to any antecedent, and is sometimes a mere expletive, and sometimes the representative of an action expressed afterwards by a verb; as, “Whether she grapple it with the pride of philosophy.”—­Chalmers. “Seeking to lord it over God’s heritage.”—­The Friend, vii, 253. “It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine, nor for princes strong drink.”—­Prov., xxxi, 4.  “Having no temptation to it, God cannot act unjustly without defiling his nature.”—­Brown’s Divinity, p. 11.

   “Come, and trip it as you go, On the light fantastic toe.”—­Milton.

EXCEPTION FOURTH.

A singular antecedent with the adjective many, sometimes admits a plural pronoun, but never in the same clause; as, “Hard has been the fate of many a great genius, that while they have conferred immortality on others, they have wanted themselves some friend to embalm their names to posterity.”—­Welwood’s Pref. to Rowe’s Lucan.