The Subject of a Proposition, in the Active Voice, which is the Typical or Direct Expression of Action, is the AGENT or _Actor_ in the performance of the given Action. To be an agent is _to act_; and _to act_ is to exhibit an effect, the _Cause_ of which resides in the Agent. _Agent_ and _Cause_ are thus identified. In other words, the Nominative Case, in the Active Transitive Locution, is the type and illustration of the Sub-Category, _Cause_, in the Group of Relation, as conceived by the great German metaphysician. His Correlative Sub-Category, _Dependence_, is the Action itself, resulting from the Activity of the Agent, and expressed by the Verb and _its_ dependencies. _The Cause_ and _Dependence_ of Kant, as a Sub-Group of Relation, are therefore, when translated into their typical expression in Language, simply _The Nominative_ and _The Verb_; and belong to the Domain of Movement, and hence to that of Time. It is only, however, when the Verb is Active that the Nominative is Agent or Cause. In the Passive Locution or Voice, a Conversion into Opposites occurs;--the Direct is exchanged for the Inverse Order of the Action. The Nominative then names the Object which receives, suffers, or endures the _force of the Action_, and the Agent is then thrown into the Category of an Accident, and expressed in an Oblique Case; thus, _Charles is struck by John_. The term _Subject_, applied to the Nominative Case, is made, by a happy _equivoque_, to cover both these aspects; that in which the Nominative is Agent or Cause, and that in which it is not so. It is only in the latter instance that it is really or literally a _subject_, that is to say, subjected to, or made to suffer the force of the action of the Verb; but _action_ is a _reaction_ from such invasion or infliction of suffering or impression upon the person (or thing); and the term _Subject_, changing its meaning, accompanies the person _nominated_ or named by the Nominative Case over into this new positive relation to the action. It is interesting to observe that precisely the same doubleness of meaning arises, in the same way, in respect to the word _Passion_, from Latin _patior_, to suffer. When we speak of the _passion_ of Christ, we retain the primitive and etymological meaning of the word; but, ordinarily, _passion_ means just the opposite; that violent _reaction_ of the feeling side of the mind from _Impression_ (or passion in the first sense), which is nearly allied to _Rage_. Intermediate between the Active and the Passive Locutions is a compound Active and Reactive state--the action put forth by the agent, and yet terminating upon himself--which is expressed lingually by what is appropriately called in Greek the Middle Voice (Sanscrit, _At mane pada_), and in our modern Grammars, as the French, The Reflective Verb.