ge of things! or else, what a _mistake_!

"Then the Lord said unto Moses, behold, I will _rain_ bread for you from
heaven."

"Then the _Lord rained_ down, upon Sodom and Gomorrah, _brimstone_ and
_fire_, from the Lord out of heaven."--_Bible._

_The fire burns._

The fire _burns_ the wood, the coal, or the peat. The great fire in
New-York _burned_ the buildings which covered fifty-two acres of ground.
Mr. Experiment _burns_ coal in preference to wood. His new grate _burns
it_ very finely. Red ash coal _burns_ the best; it _makes_ the fewest
_ashes_, and hence _is_ the most convenient. The cook _burns_ too much
fuel. The house took fire and _burned_ up. _Burned what_ up? Burn is an
intransitive verb. It would not trouble the unfortunate tenant to know
that there must be an _object burned_, or what _it_ was. He would find
it far more difficult to rebuild his _house_. Do you suppose fires never
burn any thing belonging to neuter verb folks? Then they never need pay
away insurance money. With the solitary exception I have mentioned--the
burning bush--this verb can not be intransitive.

_The sun shines._

This is an intransitive verb if there ever was one, because the object
is not often expressed after it. But if the sun _emits_ no _rays_ of
light, how shall it be known whether it shines or not? "The _radiance_
of the sun's bright beaming" is produced by the _exhibition_ of
_itself_, when it _brightens_ the objects exposed to its _rays_ or
_radiance_. We talk of _sun shine_ and moon shine, but if these bodies
never produce _effects_ how shall it be known whether such things are
real? _Sun shine_ is the direct effect of the sun's _shining_. But
clouds sometimes intervene and prevent the rays from extending to the
earth; but _then_ we do not say "the sun _shines_." You see at once,
that all we know or can know of the fact we state as truth, is derived
from a knowledge of the very _effects_ which our grammars tell us do not
exist. Strange logic indeed! It is a mark of a wiser man, and a better
scholar, not to know the popular grammars, than it is to profess any
degree of proficiency in them!

_To smile._

The _smiles_ of the morning, the _smiles_ of affection, a _smile_ of
kindness, are only produced by the appearance of something that _smiles_
upon us. _Smiles_ are the direct consequence of _smiling_. If a person
should _smile_ ever so _sweetly_ and yet present no _smiles_, they
might, for aught we could know to the