t_ participle is always compound; as,
_having seen, having written_;"--and that the simple word, _seen_ or
_written_, had originally, and still ought to have, only a passive
construction. For such views, they find authorities. Hence, in lieu of the
common phrases, "_had we seen_," "_we have written_," they adopt such
English as this; "_Had we having seen_ you, we should have stopped."--"_We
have having written_ but just now, to our correspondent." Now, "_We are
being smitten_," is no better grammar than this;--and no worse: "The idea
intended" is in no great jeopardy in either case.

OBS. 20.--J. R. Chandler, of Philadelphia, in his Common School Grammar of
1847, has earnestly undertaken the _defence_ of this new and much-mooted
passive expression: which he calls "_the Definite Passive Voice_," or "_the
Passive Voice of the Definite Form_." He admits it, however, to be a form
that "does not _sound well_,"--a "_novelty_ that strikes the ear
unpleasantly;" but he will have the defect to be, not in the tautologous
conceit of "_is being_," "_was being_," "_has been being_," and the like,
but in everybody's organ of hearing,--supposing all ears corrupted, "from
infancy," to a distaste for correct speech, by "the habit of _hearing_ and
using words _ungrammatically_!"--See p. 89. Claiming this new form as "_the
true passive_," in just contrast with the progressive active, he not only
rebukes all attempts "to evade" the use of it, "by some real or supposed
_equivalent_," but also declares, that, "The attempt to deprive the
transitive definite verb of [this] _its passive voice_, is _to strike at
the foundation of the language_, and _to strip it of one of its most
important qualities_; that of making both actor and sufferer, each in turn
and at pleasure, the subject of conversation."--_Ibid._ Concerning
_equivalents_, he evidently argues fallaciously; for he urges, that the
using of them "_does not dispense with the necessity of the definite
passive voice_."--P. 88. But it is plain, that, of the many fair
substitutes which may in most cases be found, if any one is preferred, this
form, and all the rest, are of course rejected for the time.

OBS. 21.--By Chandler, as well as others, this new passive form is
justified only on the supposition, that the simple participle in _ing_ can
never with propriety be used passively. No plausible argument, indeed, can
be framed for it, without the assumption, that the simpler form, when used
in