STUDY OF CONDITIONAL SENTENCES
222. There are three kinds of conditional sentences:--
[Sidenote: _Real or true._]
(1) Those in which an assumed or admitted fact is placed before the
mind in the form of a condition (see Sec. 215, 2); for example,--
If they _were_ unacquainted with the works of philosophers and
poets, they were deeply read in the oracles of God. If their
names _were not found_ in the registers of heralds, they were
recorded in the Book of Life.--MACAULAY.
[Sidenote: _Ideal,--may or may not be true._]
(2) Those in which the condition depends on something uncertain, and _may or may not be regarded true, or be fulfilled_; as,--
If, in our case, the representative system ultimately _fail_,
popular government must be pronounced impossible.
--D. WEBSTER.
If this _be_ the glory of Julius, the first great founder of the
Empire, so it is also the glory of Charlemagne, the second
founder.--BRYCE.
If any man _consider_ the present aspects of what is called by
distinction society, he will see the need of these ethics.
--EMERSON.
[Sidenote: _Unreal--cannot be true._]
(3) Suppositions _contrary to fact_, which cannot be true, or
conditions that cannot be fulfilled, but are presented only in order
to suggest what _might be_ or _might have been_ true; thus,--
If these things _were_ true, society could not hold together.
--LOWELL.
_Did not_ my writings _produce_ me some solid pudding, the great deficiency of praise would have quite discouraged me.--FRANKLIN.
_Had_ he for once _cast_ all such feelings aside, and _striven_
energetically to save Ney, it _would have cast_ such an enhancing light over all his glories, that we cannot but regret its
absence.--BAYNE.
NOTE.--Conditional sentences are usually introduced by _if_,
_though_, _except_, _unless_, etc.; but when the verb precedes
the subject, the conjunction is often omitted: for example,
"_Were I bidden_ to say how the highest genius could be most
advantageously employed," etc.
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