n Verbi_, the Name of
the Verb.[408] If we appeal to reasons, there are more also of these;--or
at least as many, and most of them better: as, 1. That the infinitive is
often transitive; 2. That it has tenses; 3. That it is qualified by
adverbs, rather than by adjectives; 4. That it is never declined like a
noun; 5. That the action or state expressed by it, is not commonly
abstract, though it may be so sometimes; 6. That in some languages it is
_the root_ from which all other parts of the verb are derived, as it is in
English.

OBS. 21.--So far as I know, it has not yet been denied, that _to_ before a
_participle_ is a preposition, or that a preposition before a participle
_governs_ it; though there are not a few who erroneously suppose that
participles, by virtue of such government, are necessarily converted into
_nouns_. Against this latter idea, there are many sufficient reasons; but
let them now pass, because they belong not here. I am only going to prove,
in this place, that _to_ before the infinitive is _just such a word_ as it
is before the participle; and this can be done, call either of them what
you will. It is plain, that if the infinitive and the participle are ever
_equivalent to each other_, the same word _to_ before them both must needs
be equivalent _to itself_. Now I imagine there are some examples of each
equivalence; as, "When we are habituated _to doing_ [or _to do_] any thing
wrong, we become blinded by it."--_Young Christian_, p. 326. "The lyre, or
harp, was best adapted _to accompanying_ [or _to accompany_] their
declamations."--_Music of Nature_, p. 336. "The new beginner should be
accustomed _to giving_ [or _to give_] all the reasons for each part of
speech."--_Nutting's Gram._, p. 88. "Which, from infecting our religion and
morals, fell _to corrupt_ [say, _to corrupting_] our language."--SWIFT:
_Blair's Rhet._, p. 108. Besides these instances of _sameness in the
particle_, there are some cases of _constructional ambiguity_, the noun and
the verb having the same form, and the _to_ not determining which is meant:
as, "He was inclined _to sleep_."--"It must be a bitter experience, to be
more accustomed _to hate_ than _to love_." Here are _double_ doubts for the
discriminators: their "_sign of the infinitive_" fails, or becomes
uncertain; _because they do not know it from a preposition_. Cannot my
opponents see in these examples an argument against the distinction which
they attempt to draw between