First Greek Grammar

This Grammar has been revised and in part re-written, but the general arrangement remains as it was. To change this might have done away with something that commended it to teachers; for the success of a school-book is often due to the fortunate accident of one man’s work happening to meet the views of the majority.

If the book is larger, it is not that I have abandoned the idea from which it first sprang, namely, that the part of an elementary grammar is to state rules and leave exceptions out; but in response to the criticism of many who have used the book, the presentment of the matter has been made more clear and attractive by printing on two pages what before was printed on one. Indeed far from relinquishing the first idea I have carried it out more faithfully, omitting such forms as occur seldom and selecting as examples of inflexion the most common words that I could find. As the grammar was written when men had but begun to urge the views to which it was meant to give shape, I was glad of an opportunity of incorporating in a new edition the latest results of the free discussion of the last ten or twelve years. And such an opportunity came when it was proposed to publish a Greek Course of which this First Greek Grammar should be the starting point.