NEUTER verbs have no such regimen as has been now described. Hence some have assumed this as a mark of distinction betwixt them and active verbs. It did not how ever escape observation, that some verbs which do not go vern any noun signify action, and that therefore the term neuter, as implying the absence of active power, did not apply to them. For this reason these have been retained in the list of active verbs, but distinguished from verbs of regimen by the additional epithet intransitive. Their pe culiar character has been generally represented as arising from this peculiarity in the nature of the actions signified, that they do not affect any ulterior object. But this is not true in point of fact. The transitive or intransitive nature of verbs of action depends solely on the occasions of man kind in making use of language. Transitive verbs are those which express actions when we have occasion instant ly to mention an object acted on. Intransitive verbs des cribe actions when we are satisfied with stating the connec tion betwixt the action and the agent. Verbs which admit of no direct regimen, and therefore are termed intransitive, may introduce other ideas, expressed by nouns, through the medium of prepositions. The verb " to strike" is transitive, while the verb " to walk" is called intransitive ; and yet it is evident that in the act of' walking one or more objects are acted on as much as in the act of striking. Only it happens that when we speak of striking, it is gene rally of importance to point out the object that is struck ; but, when we speak of walking, our attention is chiefly di rected to the act as connected with the agent. In walking, however, a man walks upon some object which supports him; he walks from some place, and to some other. Each of the phrases " I strike my horse," and " I walk upon the ground," expresses, in a manner equally explicit, a par ticular act, together with an object affected. The inter vention of a preposition in the one case, and the absence of one in the other, imply no difference in the energy of the act related, but only the different degrees of interest excit ed in the connection of it with the object affected. It might naturally be expected, from the numerous and vari ed occasions which we have for the relation of events, that, even in describing the same sort of action, we should sometimes have a motive for mentioning an object affected, and sometimes not. For this reason some verbs differ
from each other only in their transitive or intransitive appli cation, of which we have already given an instance in the difference betwixt the verbs " to speak" and " to say." In other instances the same verb is used either transitively or intransitively. \Ve may say at one time, " a miller grinds corn;" in this sentence, corn is the object affected by the act ; at another time we may speak of the same act as characteristic of the situation and employment of an indi vidual ; as in the sentence, " two women were grinding at the mill, the one was taken and the other left." Here no for mentioning any object on which the act of grinding exerted. These however are not two dif ferent meaning-, given to the verb. In both cases it is used in its full inea-sing, that of describing a species of ac tion. Whether we to introduce or omit the name of the thing acted on, on the design which we have in forming our discourse. It in or may not be of use to add this circumstance to the description. It makes no a more difference in the original meaning of the word, than the introduction of a second sentence in elucidation of the subject would affect the meaning of the words in the sen tence first employed.
Sometimes verbs which are originally intransitive, and evidently not intended to have nouns subjoined to them, except through the medium of prepositions, are afterwards applied as active verbs governing the accusative, in conse quence of the. familiarity which the expression of particular kinds of connection acquires from habit. The verb " es cape" originally required the preposition " from" to ex press a certain sort of connection betwixt the act and other objects. Yet we not only say " a prisoner escaped from prison," but, speaking of our own memory, we may say that " names and dates escape us." Fug-ere, in Latin, is a verb of the same kind, and the corresponding phrase me fugit is used in that language. lile later is of a similar nature. .4rdere is transitive, or perhaps ought rather to be called neuter, yet it is made to govern the accusative : Formosunz pastor Corydon ARDEBAT AteXin.