, perhaps more frequently, to evade
the charge of egotism; for this modest assumption of plurality seems most
common with those who have something else to assume: as, "And so lately as
1809, Pope Pius VII, in excommunicating his 'own dear son,' Napoleon, whom
he crowned and blessed, says: '_We_, unworthy as _we_ are, represent the
God of peace.'"--_Dr. Brownlee_. "The coat fits _us_ as well as if _we_ had
been melted and poured into it."--_Prentice_. Monarchs sometimes prefer
_we_ to _I_, in immediate connexion with a singular noun; as, "_We
Alexander_, Autocrat of all the Russias."--"_We the Emperor_ of China,"
&c.--_Economy of Human Life_, p. vi. They also employ the anomalous
compound _ourself_, which is not often used by other people; as, "Witness
_ourself_ at Westminster, 28 day of April, in the tenth year of _our_
reign. CHARLES."

"_Caes._ What touches _us ourself_, shall be last serv'd."
--_Shak., J. C._, Act iii, Sc. 1.

"_Ourself_ to hoary Nestor will repair."
--_Pope, Iliad_, B. x, l. 65.

OBS. 3.--The pronoun _you_, though originally and properly plural, is now
generally applied alike to one person or to more. Several observations upon
this fashionable substitution of the plural number for the singular, will
be found in the fifth and sixth chapters of Etymology. This usage, however
it may seem to involve a solecism, is established by that authority against
which the mere grammarian has scarcely a right to remonstrate. Alexander
Murray, the schoolmaster, observes, "When language was plain and simple,
the English always said _thou_, when speaking to a single person. But when
an affected politeness, and a fondness for continental manners and customs
began to take place, persons of rank and fashion said _you_ in stead of
_thou_. The innovation gained ground, and custom gave sanction to the
change, and stamped it with the authority of law."--_English Gram._, Third
Edition, 1793, p. 107. This respectable grammarian acknowledged both _thou_
and _you_ to be of the second person singular. I do not, however, think it
necessary or advisable to do this, or to encumber the conjugations, as some
have done, by introducing the latter pronoun, and the corresponding form of
the verb, as singular.[381] It is manifestly better to say, that the plural
is used _for the singular_, by the figure _Enallage_. For if _you_ has
literally become singular by virtue of this substitution, _we_ also is
singular for