ELEMENTS OF THE SIMPLE SENTENCE.

 

342.All the elements of the simple sentence are as follows:—

 

(1) The subject.

 

(2) The predicate.

 

(3) The object.

 

(4) The complements.

 

(5) Modifiers.

 

(6) Independent elements.

 

The subject and predicate have been discussed.

 

343.The object may be of two kinds:—

 

Definitions. Direct Object.

 

(1) The DIRECT OBJECT is that word or expression which answers the question who or what placed after the verb; or the direct object names that toward which the action of the predicate is directed. It must be remembered that any verbal may have an object; but for the present we speak of the object of the verb, and by object we mean the direct object.

 

Indirect object.

 

(2) The INDIRECT OBJECT is a noun or its equivalent used as the modifier of a verb or verbal to name the person or thing for whose benefit an action is performed.

Examples of direct and indirect objects are, direct, "She seldom saw her course at a glance;" indirect, "I give thee this to wear at the collar."

 

Complement:- A complement is a word added to a verb of incomplete predication to complete its meaning. Notice that a verb of incomplete predication may be of two kinds,—transitive and intransitive.

 

Of a transitive verb.

 

The transitive verb often requires, in addition to the object, a word to define fully the action that is exerted upon the object; for example, "Ye call me chief." Here the verb call has an object me (if we leave out chief), and means summoned; but chief belongs to the verb, and me here is not the object simply of call, but of call chief, just as if to say, "Ye honor me." This word completing a transitive verb is sometimes called a factitive object, or second object, but it is a true complement.

 

The fact that this is a complement can be more clearly seen when the verb is in the passive. See sentence 19, in exercise following Sec. 364.

 

Complement of an intransitive verb.

 

An intransitive verb, especially the forms of be, seem, appear, taste, feel, become, etc., must often have a word to complete the meaning: as, for instance, "Brow and head were round, and of massive weight;" "The good man, he was now getting old, above sixty;" "Nothing could be more copious than his talk;" "But in general he seemed deficient in laughter."

 

All these complete intransitive verbs. The following are examples of complements of transitive verbs: "Hope deferred maketh the heart sick;" "He was termed Thomas, or, more familiarly, Thom of the Gills;" "A plentiful fortune is reckoned necessary, in the popular judgment, to the completion of this man of the world."

 

345.The modifiers and independent elements will be discussed in detail in Secs. 351, 352, 355.

 

Phrases.

 

346.A phrase is a group of words, not containing a verb, but used as a single modifier.

 

As to form, phrases are of three kinds:—

 

Three kinds.

 

(1) PREPOSITIONAL, introduced by a preposition: for example, "Such a convulsion is the struggle of gradual suffocation, as in drowning; and, in the original Opium Confessions, I mentioned a case of that nature."

 

(2) PARTICIPIAL, consisting of a participle and the words dependent on it. The following are examples: "Then retreating into the warm house, and barring the door, she sat down to undress the two youngest children."

 

(3) INFINITIVE, consisting of an infinitive and the words dependent upon it; as in the sentence, "She left her home forever in order to present herself at the Dauphin's court."

 

Things used as Subject.

 

347.The subject of a simple sentence may be—

 

(1) Noun: "There seems to be no interval between greatness and meanness." Also an expression used as a noun; as, "A cheery, 'Ay, ay, sir!' rang out in response."

 

(2) Pronoun: "We are fortified by every heroic anecdote."

 

(3) Infinitive phrase: "To enumerate and analyze these relations is to teach the science of method."

 

(4) Gerund: "There will be sleeping enough in the grave;" "What signifies wishing and hoping for better things?"

 

(5) Adjective used as noun: "The good are befriended even by weakness and defect;" "The dead are there."

 

(6) Adverb: "Then is the moment for the humming bird to secure the insects."

 

348.The subject is often found after the verb—

 

(1) By simple inversion: as, "Therein has been, and ever will be, my deficiency,—the talent of starting the game;" "Never, from their lips, was heard one syllable to justify," etc.

 

(2) In interrogative sentences, for which see Sec. 341.

 

(3) After "it introductory:" "It ought not to need to print in a reading room a caution not to read aloud."

 

In this sentence, it stands in the position of a grammatical subject; but the real or logical subject is to print, etc. It merely serves to throw the subject after a verb.

 

Disguised infinitive subject.

 

There is one kind of expression that is really an infinitive, though disguised as a prepositional phrase: "It is hard for honest men to separate their country from their party, or their religion from their sect."

 

The for did not belong there originally, but obscures the real subject,—the infinitive phrase. Compare Chaucer: "No wonder is a lewed man to ruste" (No wonder [it] is [for] a common man to rust).

 

(4) After "there introductory," which has the same office as it in reversing the order (see Sec. 292): "There was a description of the destructive operations of time;" "There are asking eyes, asserting eyes, prowling eyes."

 

Things used as Direct Object.

 

349.The words used as direct object are mainly the same as those used for subject, but they will be given in detail here, for the sake of presenting examples:—

 

(1) Noun: "Each man has his own vocation." Also expressions used as nouns: for example, "'By God, and by Saint George!' said the King."

 

(2) Pronoun: "Memory greets them with the ghost of a smile."

 

(3) Infinitive: "We like to see everything do its office."

 

(4) Gerund: "She heard that sobbing of litanies, or the thundering of organs."

 

(5) Adjective used as a noun: "For seventy leagues through the mighty cathedral, I saw the quick and the dead."

 

Things used as Complement.

Complement: Of an intransitive verb.

350.As complement of an intransitive verb,—

 

(1) Noun: "She had been an ardent patriot."

 

(2) Pronoun: "Who is she in bloody coronation robes from Rheims?" "This is she, the shepherd girl."

 

(3) Adjective: "Innocence is ever simple and credulous."

 

(4) Infinitive: "To enumerate and analyze these relations is to teach the science of method."

 

(5) Gerund: "Life is a pitching of this penny,—heads or tails;" "Serving others is serving us."

 

(6) A prepositional phrase: "His frame is on a larger scale;" "The marks were of a kind not to be mistaken."

 

It will be noticed that all these complements have a double office,—completing the predicate, and explaining or modifying the subject.

 

Of a transitive verb.

As complement of a transitive verb,—

 

(1) Noun: "I will not call you cowards."

 

(2) Adjective: "Manners make beauty superfluous and ugly;" "Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic tribulation." In this last sentence, the object is made the subject by being passive, and the words italicized are still complements. Like all the complements in this list, they are adjuncts of the object, and, at the same time, complements of the predicate.

 

(3) Infinitive, or infinitive phrase: "That cry which made me look a thousand ways;" "I hear the echoes throng."

 

(4) Participle, or participial phrase: "I can imagine him pushing firmly on, trusting the hearts of his countrymen."

 

(5) Prepositional phrase: "My antagonist would render my poniard and my speed of no use to me."