It is true that many of these adjectives still hold their ground; but it is curious to note how the roots which sustain even these are being gradually cut away from beneath them. Thus ‘brazen’ might at first sight seem as strongly established in the language as ever; it is far from so being; its supports are being cut from beneath it. Even now it only lives in a tropical and secondary sense, as ‘a _brazen_ face’; or if in a literal, in poetic diction or in the consecrated language of Scripture, as ‘the _brazen_ serpent’; otherwise we say ‘a _brass_ farthing’, ‘a _brass_ candlestick’. It is the same with ‘oaten’, ‘birchen’, ‘beechen’, ‘strawen’, and many more, whereof some are obsolescent, some obsolete, the language manifestly tending now, as it has tended for a long time past, to the getting quit of these, and to the satisfying of itself with an adjectival apposition of the substantive in their stead. {Sidenote: _Weak and Strong Præterites_} Let me illustrate by another example the way in which a language, as it travels onward, simplifies itself, approaches more and more to a grammatical and logical uniformity, seeks to do the same thing always in the same manner; where it has two or three ways of conducting a single operation, lets all of them go but one; and thus becomes, no doubt, easier to be mastered, more handy, more manageable; for its very riches were to many an embarrassment and a perplexity; but at the same time imposes limits and restraints on its own freedom of action, and is in danger of forfeiting elements of strength, variety and beauty, which it once possessed. I refer to the tendency of our verbs to let go their strong præterites, and to substitute weak ones in their room; or, where they have two or three præterites, to retain only one of them, and that invariably the weak one. Though many of us no doubt are familiar with the terms ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ præterites, which in all our better grammars have put out of use the wholly misleading terms, ‘irregular’ and ‘regular’, I may perhaps as well remind you of the exact meaning of the terms. A strong præterite is one formed by an internal vowel change; for instance the verb ‘to _drive_’ forms the præterite ‘_drove_’ by an internal change of the vowel ‘i’ into ‘o’. But why, it may be asked, called ‘strong’? In respect of the vigour and indwelling energy in the word, enabling it to form its past tense from its own resources, and with no calling in of help from without. On the other hand ‘lift’ forms its præterite ‘lift_ed_’, not by any internal change, but by the addition of ‘ed’; ‘grieve’ in like manner has ‘griev_ed_’. Here are weak tenses; as strength was ascribed to the other verbs, so weakness to these, which can form their præterites only by external aid and addition. You will see at once that these strong præterites, while they witness to a vital energy in the words which are able to put them forth, do also, as must be allowed by all, contribute much to the variety and