action which I wish John to perform, and affirmation is the
_inferential_ meaning.

The verb in the infinitive, as well as in the imperative mood, is
divested of its affirmative or verbal force. In both these moods, it
is always presented in its _noun-state_.

If, after dinner, I say to a servant, "_Wine,"_ he infers, that I
wish him to bring me wine; but all this is not said. If I say,
_Bring_ some _wine_, he, in like manner, understands, that I wish
him to bring me wine; but all that is expressed, is the _name_ of
the action, and of the object of the action. In fact, as much is
done by _inference_, as by actual expression, in every branch of
language, for thought is too quick to be wholly transmitted by
words.

It is generally conceded, that the termination of our verbs, _est,
eth, s, ed_, and, also, of the other parts of speech, were
originally separate words of distinct meaning; and that, although
they have been contracted, and, by the refinement of language, have
been made to coalesce with the words in connexion with which they
are employed, yet, in their present character of terminations, they
retain their primitive meaning and force. To denote that a verbal
name was employed as a verb, the Saxons affixed to it a verbalizing
adjunct; thus, _the_ (to take, hold) was the noun-state of the verb;
and when they used it as a verb, they added the termination _an_;
thus, the_an_. The termination added, was a sign that _affirmation_
was intended. The same procedure has been adopted, and, in many
instances, is still practised, in our language. _An_, originally
affixed to our verbs, in the progress of refinement, was changed to
en, and finally dropped. A few centuries ago, the plural number of
our verbs was denoted by the termination, _en_; thus, they _weren_,
they _loven_; but, as these terminations do not supersede the
necessity of expressing the _subject_ of affirmation, as is the case
in the Latin and Greek verbs, they have been laid aside, as
unnecessary excrescences. For the same reason, we might, without any
disparagement to the language, dispense with the terminations of our
verbs in the singular.

In support of the position, that these terminations were once
separate words, we can trace many of them to their origin. To denote
the feminine gender of some nouns, we af