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ON THE SUBJUNCTIVE MOOD.

Letter from Dr. Parr to Professor Pillans.

Our grammars speak of words, which indefinite posita subjunctivum postulant. But they give very scanty information for the guidance of boys. We have no evolution of the principle, and I hardly know any teacher who understands it. My way of stating it to my boys was this: Qualis, quotus, quantus, quis, quam, with an adjective, as magnus or parvus, ut in the sense of quomodo or quemadmodum, may be used interrogatively; and when the interrogation is real and unqualified, the verb must be in the indicative, and that is only one enunciation, Quis est vir iste? Qualis est Scipio? Quantus fuit Alexander? Quam magnus fuit orator Cicero? &c. But all these words may be used indefinitely; and then one part of the enunciation depends on the other, and the subjunctive mood is employed at the close. The preceding word may be a verb, as Scio qualis fuerit Cicero. Nescio quam magnus orator fuerit. Or it may be an adjective, as nescius, ignarus; and in either of these cases we must have the subjunctive. If there be a verb, then there may be only one enunciation, Nescio qualis fuerit Cicero. If there be a participle, or an adjective, then there must be two parts in the enunciation, as Incertus quid agam for one part, and huc venio for another; Certior factus quid agere debeam for one part, ad te veni for the other. The rule applies to quam joined with an adjective, and to ut in the sense of quomodo or quemadmodum, followed by a verb; and great care should be taken by a teacher, when it is so used, not to let his boys render it by the word that, when it ought to be rendered ut, how. My meaning will be clear by instances. Namque canebat uti magnum per inane coacta

Semina, terrarumque, animæque, marisque fuissent,
Et liquidi simul ignis: ut his exordia primis
Omnia, et ipse tener mundi concreverit orbis.

Virg. Eclog. vi. v. 31.

Mr. Pillans will have no difficulty in adjusting_utrum and an to the rule, and in adjusting ne with an or necne. Utrum interrogative: utrum hoc fecit Cicero, an Catilina? Utrum hoc Cicero fecerit, an Catilina, nemini dubium esse potest. Tune id fecisti, an alius? Tune id feceris, an alius, nemini dubium esse potest. Cicero hoc fecit, necne? Cicero hoc fecerit, necne, nemini dubium esse potest. And pray observe that, as only the article necne is expressed, another particle, such as num, must be previously understood. Again, pray take notice, that utrum is frequently understood as the first part of the sentence.

Ne perconteris, fundus meus, optime Quincti,
Arvo pascat herum, an baccis opulentet olivæ.

Here you must supply utrum before pascat.

Hor. lib. i. ep. 16.

Cum tu inter scabiem tantam et contagia lucri
Nil parvum sapias, et adhuc sublimia cures ;-
Quæ mare compescant causæ ; quid temperet annum ;
Stellæ sponte sua, jussæne, vagentur et errent ;
Quid premat obscurum Lunæ, quid proferat orbem;
Quid velit et possit rerum concordia discors :
Empedocles, an Stertinium deliret acumen.

Hor. lib. i. ep. 12.

Here you see cures precedes several indefinite words followed by a subjunctive. Before Empedocles we must understand utrum; and let me, in transitu, remind and inform you, that Stertinii, which occurs in the common editions, is wrong; for no poets before the Augustan age, and in the Augustan age none before Ovid, used the genitive ii from nominatives in ius or ium. Thus Mercuri, not Mercurii; consili, not consilii; and this was a notable discovery of Dr. Bentley. Mr. Pillans, I must stop a little to clear up a passage which, in my hearing, has been once or twice alleged about an :

Debes hoc etiam rescribere, si tibi curæ,

Quantæ conveniat, Munatius: an male sarta

Gratia nequicquam coit, et rescinditur.--Lib. i. epist. iii. v. 30.

The verb which should follow si is omitted; that verb is sit. The construction is, debes rescribere, si Munatius tibi curæ sit; and si, thus indefinite, means whether, as thus :

Quæ si sit Danais reddenda, vel Hectora fratrem,

Vel cum Deiphobo Polydamanta roga.—Ovid.

But the power of rescribere goes no further. We have a colon or full stop at Munatius, and then begins a new sentence in an interrogative form, an gratia male sarta coit? This I mention, because I have known persons, who supposed rescribere to act onwards, and an to be subjoined to it with coit in the indicative; but this is grossly erroneous. I shall now go to Mr. Carson's useful book.

de

Mr. Carson has done well, in his remarks on est qui and sunt qui, followed by subjunctives, and he will be glad to find that his judgment is confirmed by Scheller in Præcepta Styli bene Latini; and as you may not have the book, I will give Scheller's words: "Qui, quæ, quod, quo, in libellis grammaticis, vulgo parum accurate traditur, et cujus tamen usus in primis ob brevitatem commendandus est, sæpissime conjunctivum postulat post esse, reperiri, inveniri, et similia, si hæc verba prædicati personam induunt; atque ita qui cum sua enuntiatione subjecti vim habet; videlicet, Est qui dicat, maledicit. Sunt qui dicant, narrent, dixerint, &c. Male dicunt, narrant, dixerunt. Fuerunt qui dicerent; erunt qui dicant; reperti sunt qui confirmarent, &c. Male dixerunt, dicunt, confirmarunt. Sic Inveniuntur, reperiuntur qui dicant; inventi, reperti, sunt qui dicerent.”—Scheller, p. 161.

I pass an unequivocal and unqualified interdict in prose against the use of est qui, or sunt qui, with an indicative; but I find that the poets are not quite uniform. In the very first ode of Horace,

Sunt quos curriculo pulverem Olympicum

Collegisse juvat.

Est qui nec veteris pocula Massici,

Nec partem solido demere de die,
Spernit.

All the Mss. give juvat and spernit, and the reading must not be disturbed; and yet the propositions are general, and do not refer definitively to any particular person. Pray attend to the following note from Bentley:

66

'(Sunt quibus in satira videar.)

altera videar. Utrumque probum; ut Carm. i. 7:

Dimidia fere codicum pars videor,

Sunt quibus unum opus est intactæ Palladis urbem

et Carm. i. 1:

et

Sunt quos curriculo pulverem Olympicum

Collegisse juvat.

Quod sunt, quos genus hoc minime juvat.-Serm. i. 4, 24.

Seneca, Controv. 16. Sunt qui castra timeant; sunt qui cicatricibus gaudent.' Et alii passim. Quare videar, quod hactenus editores occupavit, possessione sua depellere et iniquum foret et inutile."

The metre will not allow us to say opus sit, though in all the other poetical instances the metre does allow us to use the indicative or subjunctive, promit, promat, moratur, moretur, &c. I shall now establish my position, that the poets do not uniformly keep the rule.

The examples will now be produced, and it will be found that they are poetical;

O Romule, Romule, dic 0,

Qualem te patriai custodem Di genuerunt.-Ennii Annales, lib. ii. Genuerunt according to the rule would be genuerint.

Misimus et Sparten. Sparte quoque nescia veri,
Quas habitas terras, aut ubi lentus abes.

Ovid. Epist, Penel. Ulyss. v. 65.

The punctuation depends merely on a conjecture of Burman. But such interrogation would be very abrupt and inelegant. The sentence is continued throughout the two lines in almost all editions, and then we must read habites and agas. I produce these two lines because they may offer exceptions to the general rule, and such they would be if the common reading were followed. But the common reading is wrong, and the note of Heinsius is perfectly right. Lentus agas in Chartaceo Scriverii, quod placet præ vulgato, si habites quoque reponatur, ut in uno Mediceo extat. Vulgata scriptura minus Latina

est.

Quis justius induit arma

Scire nefas.-Lucan, lib. i. v. 126.

This I consider is the true reading; there is root, indeed, for evasion, by putting a mark of interrogation at arma. But there is another passage in Lucan, which plainly shows that he did not adhere strictly to the rule.

Quære quid est virtus, et posce exemplar honesti.

Lucan, lib. ix. v. 563.

I ought to notice that Burman states, on the first cited passage from Lucan, a conjectural reading, induat for induit, and a conjectural punctuation which puts an interrogative at arma. I agree with Burman in rejecting both. I hold that Lucan has in two instances deviated from the common rule. But let us hear what Burman says: "Nunquam potui mihi persuadere, poëtas ita servire ludimagistrorum canonibus, ut non sæpius hoc obsequium librariis, quam ipsis scriptoribus sit adtribuendum." The poets, I not only grant but contend, did in some instances neglect the rule; and I shall produce all the instances in which this neglect appears in hexameters and pentameters. He quotes from Lucan, lib. viii. v. 644:

Nescis, crudelis, ubi ipsa

Viscera sunt Magni.

But sint is the true reading, and is properly adopted by Oudendorp, who notices, but does not admit, the various lection of sunt in the edition of Hortensius. Burman thinks that the prose writers neglected the rule; but he is mistaken, and his reading of Cicero in Orat. pro Murena of Nescio quo pacto hoc fit is not to the purpose; for the construction is, Hoc fit, nescio quo pacto. And I shall have occasion to resume this observation, when I come to the comic writers. Burman has accumulated instances, nescio quid, adde quod, &c. but they are nothing to the purpose. I am fixedly of opinion, that the comic writers frequently neglect the rule, and I admit all the instances which Burman has quoted from Terence. I shall produce three myself, and I shall add several from Plautus. But I must take notice, that the instances in Burman's note, where an precedes an indicative, are beside the purpose; and I shall also have occasion to notice a great peculiarity in the Latin poets, where video precedes. Haud scio an, nescio an, are phrases sui generis, but followed by a subjunctive: more of this by and by. I must here state what is said by Vossius, who, together with Burman, admits what I deny, that in prose the rule is neglected; and who maintains with Burman, what I admit, that the comic writers do not uniformly observe the rule. Vossius, De Constructione, cap. 62, writes thus: "Volunt particulæ interrogandi, si interrogative sumantur, indicativo jungi; si indefinite, subjunctivo: itaque dici, Ubi degit? Dic, ubi degat. Quo it? Scio quo eat. Unde venit? Nescio unde veniat. Cur negas? Video cur neges. Verum hoc perpetuum non est." From Plautus he quotes the following instances, every one of which must be admitted:

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Neu persentiscit, aurum ubi est absconditum.

All these are real exceptions. But Vossius unaccountably quotes a passage, which, instead of being an exception to the general rule, is an instance of it:

Nimis hercle in ortus abeo, si quid agam, scio.

Idem in Aulularia.

The passage which Vossius quotes next from the Aulularia is nothing to the purpose.

Vossius goes on to Cicero; and I maintain that the readings which he produces, in every passage, are incorrect. Putas should be putes, est should be sit, habet should be habeat, even though video precedes; for with video the prose writers do not take the same liberties as the poets do. Faciendum est should be faciendum sit, ignoro. I wish Mr. Pillans and his excellent undermaster to read both what is written by Burman and by Vossius: but I oppose both. I say broadly that in Cicero there is no one exception to the rule. I shall now adduce from the Roman poets other passages in which the rule is entirely neglected.

Nec tibi quid liceat, sed quid fecisse decebit.

Claudian de Quart. Consul. Honor. v. 267.

There is an instance in the Epigrams ascribed to Claudian:

Heu! miser ignorans quam grave crimen erat!

Deprecatio ad Alethium.

On which Burman says in the note, "Indicativus modus, ut hic in verbo erat, etiam optima ætate invenitur." Vid. id. viii. 267.

These words, optima ætate, must be understood with many restrictions, for Catullus furnishes one example only; but Lucretius, Horace, Virgil, Ovid, and Tibullus, do not furnish any exception to the general rule. If we consider the use of video as a peculiarity, is there no writer, then, optimæ ætatis, in whose works an exception can be found? Yes, there is one writer, and but one, Propertius. In that one writer the exceptions we find in two passages; and it deserves particularly to be remarked, that in both these passages the indicative mood and the subjunctive mood follow an indefinite word:

A. ce quid donis Eriphyla invenit amaris;
serit et quantis nupta Creusa malis.

Propert. lib. ii. eleg. xiii. v. 29.

Here we have invenit and arserit in the same sentence after aspice quid.

Non rursus licet Ætoli referas Acheloi,
Fluxerit ut magno fractus amore liquor;

Atque etiam ut Phrygio fallax Mæandria campo
Errat, et ipsa suas decipit unda vias;

Qualis et Adrasti fuerit vocalis Arion,

Tristis ad Archemori funera victor equus.

Here we have referas ut, with the power of quemadmodum, and flux. erit, and referas ut errat, and referas ut decipit, and referas qualis fuerit. There are no more instances in Propertius. I come next to Persius, from whom I shall quote two passages; and in one of them, as in Propertius, we shall find both the indicative and the subjunctive:

Discite,1 O miseri, et causas cognoscite rerum,
Quid sumus, et quidnam victuri gignimur: ordo
Quis datus ; aut metæ quam mollis flexus, ut undæ :
Quis modus argento: quid fas optare: quid asper
Utile nummus habet: patriæ carisque propinquis,
Quantum elargire deceat: quem te Deus esse
Jussit, et humana qua parte locatus es in re.

Here we have discite followed by quid sumus, quidnam victuri gignimur, quid nummus habet, quantum deceat, quem jussit, and qua parte locatus es.

Persius seems to follow the rule or neglect it, as the metre required. The second instance from Persius is this,

Hic ego centenas ausim deposcere voces,

Ut, quantum mihi te sinuoso in pectore fixi,
Voce traham pura.-Ibid. Sat. v. 26.

If the rule were here followed, fixi would be fixerim. Burman, in

1 Some editions have disciteque, and et unde. Perhaps quare agite, for discite, would be too bold a conjecture.-ED.

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