791
verts; for which reason, I dismiss the subject, without citing or answering them.
OBS. 19.--In old books, we sometimes find the word I written for the adverb ay, yes: as, "To dye, to sleepe; To sleepe, perchance to dreame; I, there's the rub."--_Shakspeare, Old Copies_. The British Grammar, printed in 1784, and the Grammar of Murray the schoolmaster, published some years earlier than Lindley Murray's, say: "We use I as an Answer, in a familiar, careless, or merry Way; as, 'I, I, Sir, I, I;' but to use ay, is accounted rude, especially to our Betters." See _Brit. Gram._, p. 198. The age of this rudeness, or incivility, if it ever existed, has long passed away; and the fashion seems to be so changed, that to write or utter I for ay, would now in its turn be "accounted _rude_"--the rudeness of ignorance--a false orthography, or a false pronunciation. In the word ay, the two sounds of _ah-ee_ are plainly heard; in the sound of I, the same elements are more quickly blended. (See a note at the foot of page 162.) When this sound is suddenly repeated, some writers make a new word of it, which must be called an _interjection_: as, "'Pray, answer me a question or two.' '_Ey, ey_, as many as you please, cousin Bridget, an they be not too hard.'"--_Burgh's Speaker_, p. 99. "_Ey, ey_, 'tis so; she's out of her head, poor thing."--_Ib._, p. 100. This is probably a corruption of ay, which is often doubled in the same manner: thus,
"_Ay, ay_, Antipholus, look strange, and frown."--Shakspeare.
OBS. 20.--The common fashion of address being nowadays altogether in the plural form, the pronouns _thou, thy, thine, thee_, and thyself, have become unfamiliar to most people, especially to the vulgar and uneducated. These words are now confined almost exclusively to the writings of the poets, to the language of the Friends, to the Holy Scriptures, and to the solemn services of religion. They are, however, the