le:--

"Death _goeth_ about the field, rejoicing mickle
To see a sword that so surpass'd his sickle."
_Harrington's Ariosto_, B. xiii:
see _Singer's Shak._, Vol. ii, p. 296.

[253] The second person singular of the simple verb _do_, is now usually
written _dost_, and read _dust_; being permanently contracted in
orthography, as well as in pronunciation. And perhaps the compounds may
follow; as, Thou _undost, outdost, misdost, overdost_, &c. But exceptions
to exceptions are puzzling, even when they conform to the general rule. The
Bible has _dost_ and _doth_ for auxilliaries, and _doest_ and _doeth_ for
principal verbs.

[254] N. Butler avers, "The only regular terminations added to verbs are
_est, s, ed, edst_, and _ing_."--_Butler's Practical Gram._, p. 81. But he
adds, in a marginal note, this information: "The third person singular of
the present formerly ended in _eth_. This termination is still sometimes
used in the solemn style. Contractions sometimes take place; as, _sayst_
for _sayest_."--_Ibid._ This statement not only imposes a vast deal of
_needless irregularity_ upon the few inflections admitted by the English
verb, but is, so far as it disagrees with mine, a causeless innovation. The
terminations rejected, or here regarded as _irregular_, are _d, st_, _es,
th_, and _eth_; while _edst_, which is plainly a combination of _ed_ and
_st_,--the past ending of the verb with the personal inflection,--is
assumed to be one single and regular termination which I had overlooked! It
has long been an almost universal doctrine of our grammarians, that regular
verbs form their preterits and perfect participles by adding _d_ to final
_e_, and _ed_ to any other radical ending. Such is the teaching of Blair,
Brightland, Bullions, Churchill, Coar, Comly, Cooper, Fowle, Frazee,
Ingersoll, Kirkham, Lennie, Murray, Weld, Wells, Sanborn, and others, a
great multitude. But this author alleges, that, "_Loved_ is not formed by
adding _d_ to _love_, but by adding _ed_, and dropping _e_ from
_love_."--_Butler's Answer to Brown_. Any one is at liberty to think this,
if he will. But I see not the use of playing thus with _mute Ees_, adding
one to drop an other, and often pretending to drop two under one
apostrophe, as in _lov'd, lov'st_! To suppose that the second person of the
regular preterit, as _lovedst_, is not formed by adding _st_ to the first
person, is contrary to the analogy of other verbs, and is someth