Tworek 4 Just a handful of texts such as these clearly illustrate the identity crisis scholars inflicted on the subjunctive mood during Early Modern English. The debate is made evident, but none thus far allude to any developing resolution. However, one of the more compelling observations of this era comes from Joseph Priestly. In 1761, long before the other previously noted grammarians, he published The Rudiments of English Grammar (Millward 244). In this descriptive approach, Priestly notes: “This form of the conjunctive subjunctive tenses is very little used by some writers of the present age; though our forefathers paid a very strict and scrupulous regard to it. It seems to be used with propriety only when there is implied some doubt or hesitation.”
He continues on with a “familiar example”: We shall overtake him though he run, to be used when it is not known whether he did run or not. However upon seeing him run, Priestly points out that “we should say, We shall overtake him though he runneth…” Priestly then comments on the irregularity of the word run in the former example: “may we not suppose that the word run is in the radical form [infinitive] requiring regularly to be preceded by another verb expressing doubt or uncertainty, and the intire sentence to be, We shall overtake him though he should run?
Priestly’s observations are interesting because they are the first to allude to the modal quality of the subjunctive mood, the focus of current debate. The development and popularity of modals came about during the Middle English period, the same time the subjunctive verb form was losing ground due to lost inflection. Some scholars, such as Roberts, deny any affiliation between the two whatsoever, stating that modals “do not…even generally express subjunctive ideas” (cited in Cannon 12). However, most are willing