may be found in the above characters."

The steps by which we are to reach a mighty secret like this, are
given by our author in great detail; for, as he candidly observes--

"Though my discoveries are mostly about as evident as any thing
in Euclid, still, as they are new to the world, and require,
previous to their being received as truths, the disagreeable
admission that we have been hitherto in error; some art, besides
down-right logical persuasion, will be necessary towards bringing
the mind friendly to them."

The first discovery Mr Kavanagh seems to have made is, that he knew
nothing of grammar; and had he stopped here, he would have been
entitled to no small praise for discernment. But this was but a
stepping-stone to greater things.

Mr Kavanagh seems by and by to have found out that "there are no such
words as substantives or nouns; that is to say, words standing for
substances, or representing substances in any manner." He discovered
that such words, and indeed all words, are, whether it be true or not,
sounds to our ears not altogether new. We had a notion that, at least,
the term _noun_, _nom_, and _nomen_, meant properly a _name_, but of
course Mr Kavanagh must know better. We must decline, however, to
follow him through his explanation on this footing of the real
presence.

But then comes an announcement of undoubted originality, "that all
words called substantives are but names _in the fourth degree of
comparison_; that is to say, in a degree above the one commonly called
the superlative." We durst not doubt that Mr Kavanagh is here right;
but, for persons of slow perception like ourselves, we should have
liked to see a little more fully explained what are the first, second,
and third degrees of comparison of those names, of which _hat_,
_stick_, _thing_, _hand_, _foot_, &c., are the fourth degrees.
Discoverers should bear a little with beginners; and we suggest that,
in a second edition, a full table should be given of what we
desiderate.

The view thus taken of nouns, leads, it seems, to important results,
and, in particular, enables us to explain what Mr Kavanagh had been
puzzling himself about for half his lifetime--the meaning of the
expressions, "This is John's book," and "this is a book of John's." We
had always thought that the first of these phrases was plain sailing,
and that the second meant, "this a book of John's books--or, one of
John's books," _e