How to parse. ...

258

OBJECT CLAUSES. [Par. 451, 452.

(2) " We did not know but that (to the contrary of
the knowledge that) he might come."
Here " but" was originally a Preposition having
for its Object the sentence following it.
45I Sometimes " what" is used for " that":(8) " Not but what he meant mischief," i.e. " I do not
admit, however, any thing to the contrary of his
meaning to do mischief."
This may possibly be a confusion arising from the grammatical constructions:(4) "He says nothing but what is true."
(5) "Not a man (was there) but what cried shame."
(6) "Not a tree but what has suffered from the frost."
From these uses, " not but what" perhaps came to be
used ungrammatically to mean " without any exception,"
" without any doubt;" but I have been unable to trace
this construction. Yet it seems to be illustrated by the
clhange from the Relative " that" in " For all that you did,"
to the Conjunctive "that" in "For all that you tried so
hard." See Par. 475.
452 In time the " that" was omitted for brevity; and
then "but" (though really a Preposition with the
meaning of " prevention") appeared to be an ordinary Conjunction -
(6) "Not but there are who merit other palms."P(PE.
which originally would have meant, "I do not say
any thing but (i.e. to the contrary) that there are,"
&c., but it gradually came to mean " I deny it not;