where mankind and man may change places without making any alteration in the sense. A man means fome one or other of that kind, indefinitely; the man means, definitely, that particular man, who is spoken of the former therefore is called the Indefinite, the latter the Definite, Article [3].

[3] "And I perfecuted this way unto the death." ZЯts xxii. 4. The Apoftle does not mean any particular fort of death, but death in general: the Definite Article therefore is improperly ufed. It ought to be unto death, without any Article: agreeably to the OrigiJavale.

nal, axp

"Thofe that determine of the world's end, and other fuch the points of Prophecy." Hobbs, Human Nature, Chap. x. 9. It ought to have been expreffed indefinitely, without the Article.

"When He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, he will guide you into all Truth." John xvi. 13. That is, according to this Tranflation, into all Truth whatsoever, into Truth of all kinds: very different from the meaning of the Evangelift, and from the Original, es aca Tav aħnlaev, into all the Truth; that is, into all Evangelical Truth.

"Truly this was the Son of God." Matt. xxvii.

54.

and Mark xv. 39. This Tranflation fuppofes, that the Roman Centurion had a proper and adequate notion

Example:

Example: "Man was made for fociety, and ought to extend his good-will to all

of the character of Jefus, as the Son of God in a peculiar and incommunicable fenfe: whereas, it is probable, both from the circumftances of the Hiftory, and from the expreffion of the Original, (o; e, a Son of God, or, of a God, not vio, the Son) that he only meant to acknowledge him to be an extraordinary perfon, and more than a mere man; according to his own notion of Sons of Gods in the Pagan Theology. This is alfo · more agreeable to St. Luke's account of the fame confeffion of the Centurion: " Certainly this was dialog, a righteous man," not Aixa, the Juft One. The fame may be obferved of Nebuchadnezzar's words, Dan. iii. 25.-"And the form of the fourth is like the Son of God:" it ought to be by the Indefinite Article, .... like a Son of God: vie, as Theodotion very properly renders it: that is, like an Angel; according to Nebuchadnezzar's own account of it in the 28th verfe: "Blessed be God, who hath sent his Angel, and delivered his fervants." See alfo Luke xix. 9.

"Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?

Pope.

It ought to be the wheel; used as an inftrument for the particular purpose of torturing Criminals as Shakespear;

"Let them pull all about mine ears; prefent me
Death on the wheel, or at wild horses heels.”

men: but a man will naturally entertain a more particular kindness for the men, with whom he has the most frequent intercourse; and enter into a ftill clofer union with the man, whose temper and difpofition fuit beft with his own."

It is of the nature of both the Articles to determine or limit the thing spoken of: e determines it to be one fingle thing of the kind, leaving it ftill uncertain which; the determines which it is, or of many which they are. The first therefore can only be joined to Subftantives in the fin

"God Almighty hath given reason to a man to be a light unto him." Hobbs, Elements of Law, Part I. Ch. v. 12. It should rather be, "to man," in general.

Thefe Remarks may ferve to fhew the great importance of the proper ufe of the Article; the near affinity there is between the Greek Article, and the English Definite Article; and the excellence of the English Language in this respect, which by means of its two Articles does most precifely determine the extent of fignification of Common Names: whereas the Greek has only one Article, and it has puzzled all the Grammarians to reduce the ufe of that to any clear and certain rules.

gular

19 gular number [4]; the last may also be joined to plurals.

There is a remarkable exception to this rule in the use of the Adjectives few and many, (the latter chiefly with the word great before it) which, though joined with plural Subftantives, yet admit of the fingular Article a: as, a few men, a great many

men;

"Told of a many thousand warlike French :' "A care-craz'd mother of a many children." Shakespear. The reafon of it is manifest from the effect which the article has in these phrases: it means a fmall or great number collectively taken, and therefore gives the idea of 2 Whole, that is, of Unity [5]. Thus like

[4] "A good character should not be rested in as an end, but employed as a means of doing still farther good." Atterbury's Sermons. Ought it not to be a mean? I have read an author of this tafte, that com pares a ragged coin to a tattered colours." Addison, on Medals.

[5] Thus the word many is taken collectively as a Subftantive:

wife a hundred, a thoufand, is one whole number, an aggregate of many collectively taken; and therefore ftill retains the Article a, though joined as an Adjective to plural Subftantive: as, a hundred years [6];

For harbour at a thousand doors they knock'd; "Not one of all the thousand, but was lock'd." I Dryden.

"O Thou fond Many! with what loud applaufe Didft thou beat heav'n with bleffing Bolingbroke, Before he was what thou wouldst have him be?" Shakespear, 2 Hen. IV. But it will be hard to reconcile to any Grammatical propriety the following phrafe: "Many one there be, that fay of my foul; There is no help for him in his God.” Pfal. iii. 2.

[6] "There were flain of them upon a three thoufand men:” that is, to the number of three thousand.

1 Macc. iv. 15. "About an eight days :" that is, a fpace of eight days. Luke ix. 28. But the expreffion is.obfolete, or at least vulgar; and we may add likewife improper for neither of thefe numbers has been reduced by ufe and convenience into one collective and compact idea, like a hundred, and a thousand; each of which, like a dozen, or a score, we are accuftomed equally to confider on certain occafions as a fimple Unity.

The