The present performance is, so far as the end could be reached, the fulfillment of a design, formed about twenty-seven years ago, of one day presenting to the world, if I might, something like a complete grammar of the English language;--not a mere work of criticism, nor yet a work too tame, indecisive, and uncritical; for, in books of either of these sorts, our libraries already abound;--not a mere philosophical investigation of what is general or universal in grammar, nor yet a minute detail of what forms only a part of our own philology; for either of these plans falls very far short of such a purpose;--not a.
