For the same admission must be made with respect to the definitions and rules of every practical science in the world; and the technology of grammar is even more essential to a true knowledge of the subject, than that of almost any other art.

"To proceed upon principles at first," says Dr.Barrow, "is the most compendious method of attaining every branch of knowledge; and the truths impressed upon the mind in the years of childhood, are ever afterwards the most firmly remembered, and the most readily applied."-- _Essays_, p.84.Reading, as I have said, is a part of grammar; and it is a part which must of course precede what is commonly called in the schools the study of grammar.

Any person who can read, can learn from a book such simple facts as are within his comprehension; and we have it on the authority of Dr.Adam, that, "The principles of grammar are the first abstract truths which a young mind can comprehend."-- _Pref.

to Lat.

Gram._, p.