, the degrees must be formed
by the use of _more_ and _most_. We may say, _tenderer_ and _tenderest,
pleasanter_ and _pleasantest, prettier_ and _prettiest_; but who could
endure _delicater_ and _delicatest_?"--_Cobbett's E. Gram._, p. 81. _Quiet,
bitter, clever, sober_, and perhaps some others like them, are still
regularly compared; but such words as _secretest, famousest, virtuousest,
powerfullest_, which were used by Milton, have gone out of fashion. The
following, though not very commonly used, are perhaps allowable. "Yet these
are the two _commonest_ occupations of mankind."--_Philological Museum_, i,
431. "Their _pleasantest_ walks throughout life must be guarded by armed
men."--_Ib._, i, 437. "Franklin possessed the rare talent of drawing useful
lessons from the _commonest_ occurrences."--_Murray's Sequel_, p. 323.
"Unbidden guests are often _welcomest_ when they are gone."--SHAK.: _in
Joh. Dict._

"There was a lad, th' _unluckiest_ of his crew,
Was still contriving something bad, but new."--KING: _ib._

OBS. 2.--I make a distinction between the regular comparison by _er_ and
_est_, and the comparison by adverbs; because, in a grammatical point of
view, these two methods are totally different: the meaning, though the
same, being expressed in the one case, by an inflection of the adjective;
and in the other, by a phrase consisting of two different parts of speech.
If the placing of an adverb before an adjective is to be called a
grammatical modification or variation of the latter word, we shall have
many other degrees than those which are enumerated above. The words may
with much more propriety be parsed separately, the degree being ascribed to
the adverb--or, if you please, to both words, for both are varied in sense
by the inflection of the former. The degrees in which qualities may exist
in nature, are infinitely various; but the only degrees with which the
grammarian is concerned, are those which our variation of the adjective or
adverb enables us to express--including, as of course we must, the state or
sense of the primitive word, as one. The reasoning which would make the
positive degree to be no degree, would also make the nominative case, or
the _casus rectus_ of the Latins, to be no case.

OBS. 3.--Whenever the adjective itself denotes these degrees, and is duly
varied in form to express them, they properly belong to it; as, _worthy,
worthier, worthiest_. (Though no apology can be made for the f