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From the preceding remarks will appear the impropriety of saying, “Jacob loved Joseph more than all his children.”[38] Joseph being one of his children, the sentiment expressed involves an absurdity: it should be “more than all his other children.” “In the beginning of the 16th century, Spain is said to have possessed a thousand merchant ships, a number probably far superior to that of any nation in Europe in that age.” (Robertson’s America.) It should be, “that of any other nation in Europe:” for, Spain being one of the European nations, she could not possess a number superior to her own. The comparative required the terms to be contrasted by the word other.

“Adam

The comeliest of men since born

His sons. The fairest of her daughters Eve.”—Milton.

“Adam,” the antecedent subject of comparison, is here improperly referred to the aggregate of “men since born.” To this aggregate he cannot be said to belong, not having been “born,” nor being reducible to the class of “his own sons.” Eve also is referred to a species of which she was no part. In neither of these comparisons can the second term include the first; yet the preposition refers them to one class. Such phraseologies as these, though not ungrammatical, involve an absurdity, and should therefore be dismissed.