f a declarative sentence, "That house is whose house?"

[360] 1: In Latin, the accusative case is used after such a verb, because
an other word in the same case is understood before it; as, "Facere quae
libet, ID est [_hominem_] esse _regem_."--SALLUST. "To do what he pleases,
THAT is [for a _man_] to be a _king_." If Professor Bullions had understood
Latin, or Greek, or English, as well as his commenders imagine, he might
have discovered what construction of cases we have in the following
instances: "It is an honour [for a _man_] to be the _author_ of such a
work."--_Bullions's Eng. Gram._, p. 82. "To be _surety_ for a stranger [,]
is dangerous."--_Ib._ "Not to know what happened before you were born, is
to be always a _child_."--_Ib._ "Nescire quid acciderit antequam natus es,
est semper esse _puerum_."--_Ib._ "[Greek: Esti tion aischron ...topon, hon
haemen pote kurioi phainesthai proiemenous]." "It is a shame to be seen
giving up countries of which we were once masters."--DEMOSTHENES: _ib._
What support these examples give to this grammarian's new notion of "_the
objective indefinite_" or to his still later seizure of Greene's doctrine
of "_the predicate-nominative_" the learned reader may judge. All the Latin
and Greek grammarians suppose an _ellipsis_, in such instances; but some
moderns are careless enough of that, and of the analogy of General Grammar
in this case, to have seconded the Doctor in his absurdity. See _Farnum's
Practical Gram._, p. 23; and _S. W. Clark's_, p. 149.

2. Professor Hart has an indecisive remark on this construction, as
follows: "Sometimes a verb in the infinitive mood has a noun after it
without any other noun before it; as, 'To be a good _man_, is not so easy a
thing as many people imagine.' Here '_man_' may be parsed as used
_indefinitely_ after the verb _to be_. It is not easy to say in what _case_
the noun is in such sentences. The analogy of the Latin would seem to
indicate the _objective_.--Thus, 'Not to know what happened in past years,
is to be always a _child_,' Latin, 'semper esse puerum.' _In like manner_,
in English, we may say, '_Its_ being _me, need_ make no change in your
determination.'"--_Hart's English Gram._, p. 127.

3. These learned authors thus differ about what certainly admits of no
other solution than that which is given in the Observation above. To parse
the nouns in question, "_as used indefinitely_," without case, and to call
them "_objectives indefinite_," w