in making them a separate class.
Besides, the definition of an irregular verb, as given in any of our
grammars, seems to exclude all such as _may_ form the preterit and the
perfect participle by assuming _d_ or _ed_.

OBS. 4.--In most grammars and dictionaries, verbs are divided, with respect
to their signification, into three classes only; _active, passive_, and
_neuter_. In such a division, the class of _active_ verbs includes those
only which are _active-transitive_, and all the _active-intransitive_ verbs
are called _neuter_. But, in the division adopted above,
_active-intransitive_ verbs are made a distinct class; and those only are
regarded as neuter, which imply a state of existence without action. When,
therefore, we speak of verbs without reference to their regimen, we may, if
we please, apply the simple term active to all those which express
_action_, whether _transitive_ or _intransitive_. "We _act_ whenever we
_do_ any thing; but we _may act_ without _doing_ any thing."--_Crabb's
Synonymes_.

OBS. 5.--Among the many English grammars in which verbs are divided, as
above mentioned, into _active, passive_, and _neuter_, only, are those of
the following writers: Lowth, Murray, Ainsworth, Alden, Allen, Alger,
Bacon, Bicknell, Blair, Bullions, (at first,) Charles Adams, Bucke,
Cobbett, Cobbin, Dilworth, A. Flint, Frost, (at first,) Greenleaf, Hall,
Johnson,[223] Lennie, Picket, Pond, Sanborn, R. C. Smith, Rev. T. Smith,
and Wright. These authors, and many more, agree, that, "A _verb neuter_
expresses neither action nor passion, but being, or a state of being."--_L.
Murray_. Yet, according to their scheme, such words as _walk, run, fly,
strive, struggle, wrestle, contend_, are verbs _neuter_. In view of this
palpable absurdity, I cannot but think it was a useful improvement upon the
once popular scheme of English grammar, to make active-intransitive verbs a
distinct class, and to apply the term _neuter_ to those few only which
accord with the foregoing definition. This had been done before the days of
Lindley Murray, as may be seen in Buchanan's English Syntax, p. 56, and in
the old British Grammar, p. 153, each published many years before the
appearance of his work;[224] and it has often been done since, and is
preferred even by many of the professed admirers and followers of Murray;
as may be seen in the grammars of Comly, Fisk, Merchant, Kirkham, and
others.

OBS. 6.--Murray himself quotes this improved distri