The foregoing development of the character of verbs, is deemed sufficiently critical for practical purposes; but if we dip a little deeper into the verbal fountain, we shall discover qualities which do not appear on its surface.  If we throw aside the veil which art has drawn over the real structure of speech, we shall find, that almost every verb has either a personal or a verbal object, expressed or implied.  Verbal objects, which are the effects or productions resulting from the actions, being necessarily implied, are seldom expressed.

The fire burns.  If the fire burns, it must burn wood, coal, tallow, or some other combustible substance.  The man laughs.  Laughs what?  Laughs laughter or laugh.  They walk; that is, They walk or take walks.  Rivers flow (move or roll them-selves or their waters) into the ocean.

    “I sing the shady regions of the west.”

    “And smile the wrinkles from the brow of age.”

The child wept itself sick; and then, by taking (or sleeping) a short nap, it slept itself quiet and well again.  “He will soon sleep his everlasting sleep"; that is, “He will sleep the sleep of death.”

Thinkers think thoughts; Talkers talk or employ words, talk, or speeches; The rain rains rain.  “Upon Sodom and Gomorrah the Lord rained fire and brimstone.”  “I must go the whole length.”  “I shall soon go the way of all the earth.”

Now please to turn back again, and peruse this lecture attentively; after which you may parse, systematically, the following exercises containing nouns in the three cases, and active-transitive verbs.

    The printer prints books.

Prints is a verb, a word that signifies to do—­active, it expresses action—­transitive, the action passes over from the nominative “printer” to the object “books”—­third pers. sing. numb. because the nominative printer is with which it agrees.

RULE 4. The verb must agree with its nominative case in number and person.

Declined—­1. pers. sing.  I print, 2. pers. thou printest, 3. pers. he prints, or the printer prints, and so on.

Books is a noun, the name of a thing—­common, the name of a sort of things,—­neut. gend. it denotes a thing without sex—­third pers. spoken of—­plur. num. it implies more than one—­and in the objective case, it is the object of the action, expressed by the active-transitive verb “prints,” and is governed by it according to

RULE 20. Active-transitive verbs govern the objective case.

The noun books is thus declined—­Sing. nom. book, poss. book’s, obj. book—­Plur. nom. books, poss. books’, obj. books.