A Grammar of the Classical Arabic Language

affliction to the Arabs of the old school ; aria the lira 'Ali conceived the idea of endeavouring to star rhem by the publication of the rules governing the constrution) of the classical language. [...] By this time the corruption of the spoken language had begun to endanger the purity of the Sacred Text ; and Ziyffd Ibn who was then Govenor of the two 'Irrdss 3 suggested to Abu-lAswad the composition of a work that should serve as a standard for the people and maintain the knowledge of the Word of God. [...] incik3ntal Tb the patristic government of the early Khass who confided the administration of the terrtories won by their arms to venerable but illiterate Companions of the Apostle was a statesman of powerful and cultivated mind fully able to appreciate the politcal and literary importance of preserving the purity of the national language. [...] He devoted himself exclusively to grammar and the cognate branches of philology ; and with the conceit common in a specialist was wont to disparage the attainments of his 2 predecessors saying that Ibn Aliäjib had taken his grammar from the Author of the Mu/am; and that the grammar of the Author of the Malawi was very small things ". He was profounly versed in the gur'lla and in traditio [...] The sentetious phrases of the Kriliga and the jingling rhymes of the AlJiya were designed by their authors as aids to the memory of the pupil to whom they recalled not only the bare rules of his text-hook but the ample comments I The last Professor that practised this method of instruction was Zajjiiji who died hi :339.