; yet we sometimes meet with them: as, _hard-heartedness_,
for hardness of heart, or cruelty; _quick-sightedness_, for quickness of
sight, or perspicacity; _worldly-mindedness_, for devotion to the world, or
love of gain; _heavenly-mindedness_, for the love of God, or true piety. In
speaking of ancestors or descendants, we take the noun, _father, mother,
son, daughter_, or _child_; prefix the adjective _grand_; for the second
generation; _great_, for the, third; and then, sometimes, repeat the same,
for degrees more remote: as, _father, grandfather, great-grandfather,
great-great-grandfather_. "What would my _great-grandmother_ say, thought
I, could she know that thou art to be chopped up for fuel to warm the
frigid fingers of her _great-great-great-granddaughters_!"--_T. H.
Bayley_.

MODIFICATIONS.

Adjectives have, commonly, no modifications but the forms of _comparison_.
Comparison is a variation of the adjective, to express quality in different
degrees: as, _hard, harder, hardest; soft, softer, softest._

There are three degrees of comparison; the _positive_, the _comparative_,
and the _superlative_.

The _positive degree_ is that which is expressed by the adjective in its
simple form: as, "An elephant is _large_; a mouse, _small_; a lion,
_fierce, active, bold_, and _strong_."

The _comparative degree_ is that which is _more_ or _less_ than something
contrasted with it: as, "A whale is _larger_ than an elephant; a mouse is a
much _smaller_ animal than a rat."

The _superlative degree_ is that which is _most_ or _least_ of all included
with it: as, "The whale is the _largest_ of the animals that inhabit this
globe; the mouse is the _smallest_ of all beasts."--_Dr. Johnson._

Those adjectives whose signification does not admit of different degrees,
cannot be compared; as, _two, second, all, every, immortal, infinite._

Those adjectives which may be varied in sense, but not in form, are
compared by means of adverbs; as, fruitful, _more_ fruitful, _most_
fruitful--fruitful, _less_ fruitful, _least_ fruitful.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.--"Some scruple to call the positive a degree of comparison; on the
ground, that it does not imply either comparison, or degree. But no quality
can exist, without existing in some degree: and, though the positive is
very frequently used without reference to any other degree; as it is _the
standard_, with which other degrees of the quality are compared, it is
certainly an essent