GRAMMAR AND ANALYSIS. THE NOUN. I. Remarks on the Classes of Nouns. §(1) (a) Proper, Common, and Abstract Nouns. A Proper Noun is a Noun which distinguishes one particular individual from the rest of the individuals of the same kind or class, as,-James, London. A Common Noun is a Noun which is applied to all the individuals of a kind or class, as,-boy, man, dog. An Abstract Noun is the name of anything which can only be conceived of in the mind as having a separate independent existence, as,―humility, virtue, wickedness. NOTE.-James is a Proper Noun because all individuals have not this name; but boy is a Common Noun because all boys are called by that name, the name is common to them all. Several persons have the name of "James," it is true, and there is a London in America as well as in England, but still these are proper names or Proper Nouns because the former is not common to all men, nor the latter to all towns. The word proper comes from the Latin proprius, one's own; so that a Proper Noun is, in reality, a name which is exclusively the property of a particular individual. Abstract Nouns are generally the names of qualities. Now these qualities belong to individuals or things. But when we wish to consider them apart from the individuals or things to which they belong, and draw them away, as it were, from these, regarding them as having a separate independent existence, and make use of names by which to designate them, these names are called Abstract Nouns. Abstract Nouns are, in reality, a class of Common Nouns. § (2) (b) Collective Nouns and Nouns of Multitude. A Collective Noun is the name of a number of individuals viewed as one object, as,— These persons are called, when spoken of in a body, the ministry." A A Noun of Multitude is the name of a number of individuals each of which is viewed as a separate unit, as, "The clergy were called together by order of the bishop." NOTE. A Collective Noun takes a Verb in the singular number; a Noun of Multitude a Verb in the plural number. This distinction between a Collective Noun and a Noun of Multitude is not generally recognised. All Nouns denoting a collection of individuals, whether viewed as a whole or as separate objects, are, as a rule, called Collective Nouns. But the distinction above drawn will be found to be convenient, inasmuch as it lessens the difficulty of determining the number of the verb to which these Nouns are nominative. Regarding all these Nouns as Collective, the rule with reference to the verb is, "that it is singular or plural according as the predominant idea in the mind is the unity of the multitude or the multitude of the units." The same Noun may be used as a Collective Noun and as a Noun of Multitude; for instance, The multitude was dispersed" (Collective). "The multitude were of different dispositions" (Multitude). § (3) (c) Verbal Nouns or Gerunds. A Verbal Noun, or, as it is frequently called, a Gerund, is a word which is partly a Verb and partly a Noun, as,— "Reading is a most agreeable occupation." Beginners have often much difficulty in distinguishing between a Verbal Noun and a participle, but if they will bear in mind that a Verbal Noun is always either in the nominative case, subject of a Verb, or in the objective case, governed by a Transitive Verb or a Preposition, this difficulty will disappear. Verbal Nouns may be in the nominative case, and at the same time govern a Noun or Pronoun in the objective case; or they may be in the objective case, and at the same time govern a Noun or Pronoun in the objective case, as, 66 (1) Hunting the hare is good sport." In (1) Hunting is nominative case, subject of the Verb is. hare is objective case, governed by the Verbal Noun hunting. In (2) hunting is objective case, governed by the Preposition of. is objective case, governed by the Verbal Noun hares hunting. |