The Loom Of Language

Syntax — The Traffic Rules of Language 147

person To use tables on pages 126, 127., 331, 332, 363, 369, 372 cor-
rectly it is important to remember this. The equivalents for thou and
you respectively correspond to (a) singular and intonate address,
(6) formal or plural address according to current usage

We use one class of English pronouns in two situations for which
some languages require different words The English pronouns himself,

according

one argument
OL WdUcuia
&&3Zpt to save life

is put here

m

With ordinary

onazc&iwt of

the fact that many

diagrams
to iismavfc doubt

choice

FIG 25 —NOTE CUR DIRECTIVE aganist
OFTf-N MEANS THE SAME AS towards
THE ONE ILLUSTRATED ABOVE IS ITS
CHARACTERISTIC MEANING
yourselves^ etc, may give emphasis* as m / myself would never do it) or
be reflexive., i e indicate self-imposed action^ as in she does not give
herself the credit When an action is commonly reflexive in this sense
we nearly always omit it We assume that washing, shaving, or bathing
are personal affairs unless otherwise stated People who speak other
Teutonic languages, or any Romance language,, never omit the reflexive
pronoun, and some verbs which do not imply a self-imposed action
have also appropriated one Thus the French verb se repentir, like its
Swedish equivalent dngra sig = to repent^ to rue, always keeps company
with a reflexive pronoun Dictionaries usually print such verbs with the
reflexive pronoun, and the two should go together tn a word-list*