SECTION II. THEORY AND HISTORY OF VERB-ADVERB COMBINATION 1. Verbs with inseparable and separable particles. 2. Development of each type in English. 3. Literal adverbial modification. 4. Development from figurative usage. 5. Attitude of recent critics and writers. 1. Transformation of intransitives into transitives. 2. Transformation of transitives into intransitives. 3. Change in the character of the object governed by the verb. 1. Mere adverbial modification of the meaning of the verb. 2. Intensification or extension of the meaning of the verb. 4. Mere repetition of an idea implied in the simple verb. 5. Development of special meanings and uses. SECTION V. PECULIARITIES OF COMBINATION. BEGINNINGS AND CAUSES OF COMBINATION. b. Desire for variation in expression. 1. Multiplication of meanings for the same combination. 2. Multiplication of combinations for the same, meaning 3. Loss of simple verbs of specialized meaning. SECTION VIII. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS 2. A native, Teutonic, process. 3. A lessening of the vocabulary to be memorized. 4. A more picturesque, more highly figurative, usage. 5. A continuation of an already well established tendency size syntactical combination in English. 6. A tendency to weaken the individuality of verbs. 7. Increased possibilities of confusion and misunderstandi 8. Lessening of the capacity for precision. 9. Encouraging of linguistic slovenliness. APPENDIX I. NOUNS MADE FROM VERB-ADVERB COMBINATIO APPENDIX II. ADJECTIVES MADE FROM VERB-ADVERB COMBIN The following study has been undertaken with a view to the presentation in a fairly detailed and definite manner of a phase of linguistic development which has been the subject of not a little protest and controversy on the part of those who are accustomed to watch with jealous care the use of their mother tongue. Most of the adverse criticism of the verbadverb combination has contented itself with attempting to show either that certain combinations are colloquialisms not yet justified by general usage, or else that in certain cases the adverbial particle is unnecessary or, as one critic has termed it, a parasitical preposition. I planned at one time to collect and print, in so far as I might be able, all the combinations of verb and prepositional-adverb which I might come across, and under each a list of the meanings of which it might be susceptible. But as my study of the subject has progressed, I have found such a plan impracticable for several reasons. In the first place, one is not dealing with a fixed category of English speech, but with a changing, growing tendency in language which throws up over night, as it were, new combinations, and new meanings, so that an absolute and complete list would be impossible of realization. Moreover, the greatest portion of these combinations has been well illustrated in Webster's New International Dictionary and in The New English Dictionary.. And, finally, if the list were even approximately complete and properly illustrated, it would fill more printed pages than such a study would seem to warrant. So I have had to content myself with gathering, zealously and carefully, as extensive a collection of combinations and meanings as possible, and after a thorogoing examination of the collection, publishing the summaries and conclusions deduced therefrom. I have endeavored to avoid, wherever it might be possible, duplication or repetition, and by so doing I have utilized at one time or another large part of my material, which comprises over nine hundred different combinations, representing several thousand distinct meanings. My illustrative matter has been collected from various types of literature. The average college freshman theme, of course, abounds in colloquial combinations of the verb and prepositional-adverb. Such works as O. Henry's Sixes and Sevens and Chester's Wallingford stories teem with them. The juvenile book of recent coinage and such technical works as the medical or the engineering treatise furnish many illustrations. Any volume of current literature is sure to illustrate this combining tendency in English, and almost any lecture or conversation will likewise supply mate |