oken of, or
described, and supposed to be _absent_; as, _That Thomas is a good man_.
And in the same manner the plural pronouns are used, when more than one are
spoken of."--_Bicknell's Grammatical Wreath_, p. 50. "The person speaking
is the first person; the person spoken to, the second; and the person
spoken of, the third."--_Russell's Gram._, p. 16. "The first person is the
speaker."--_Parker & Fox's Gram._, Part i, p. 6. "Person is that, which
distinguishes a noun, that speaks, one spoken to, or one spoken
about."--_S. B. Hall's Gram._, p. 6. "A noun that speaks!" A noun "spoken
to!" If ever one of Father Hall's nouns shall speak for itself, or answer
when "spoken to," will it not reprove him? And how can the _first person_
be "the _person_ WHO _speaks_," when every word of this phrase is of the
_third_ person? Most certainly, _it is not_ HE, nor any one of his sort. If
any body can boast of being "_the first person in grammar_," I pray, _Who_
is it? Is it not _I_, even _I_? Many grammarians say so. But nay: such
authors know not what the first person in grammar is. The Rev. Charles
Adams, with infinite absurdity, makes the three persons in grammar to be
never any thing but _three nouns_, which hold a confabulation thus: "Person
is defined to be _that_ which distinguishes a _noun that speaks, one spoken
to, or one spoken of_. The _noun_ that speaks [,] is the first person; as,
_I, James_, was present. The _noun_ that is spoken to, is the second
person; as, _James_, were you present? The _noun_ that is spoken of is the
third person; as, _James_ was present."--_Adams's System of English Gram._,
p. 9. What can be a greater blunder, than to call the first person of a
verb, of a pronoun, or even of a noun, "_the noun that speaks?_" What can
be more absurd than are the following assertions? "_Nouns_ are _in_ the
first person when _speaking_. Nouns are _of_ the second person when
_addressed_ or _spoken to_."--_O. C. Felton's Gram._, p. 9.

OBS. 4.--An other error, scarcely less gross than that which has just been
noticed, is the very common one of identifying the three grammatical
persons with certain _words_, called personal pronouns: as, "_I_ is the
first person, _thou_ the second, _he, she_ or _it_, the third."--_Smith's
Productive Gram._, p. 53. "_I_ is the first person, singular. _Thou_ is the
second person, singular. _He, she_, or _it_, is the third person, singular.
_We_ is the first person, plural. _Ye_ or _you_ is t