---
title: And that was the way he learned that the wizard had spoken truly whe… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: And that was the way he learned that the wizard had spoken truly when he said, ‘Blindness is man’s highest good.’ Who acts: that, sun. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Young Man Who Would Have His Eyes Opened, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Young Man Who Would Have His Eyes Opened, sentence 47

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
And that was the way he learned that the wizard had spoken truly when he said, ‘Blindness is man’s highest good.’

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**Who acts:** that, sun · **What happens:** be, learn, speak, say · **To what, where:** way, wizard · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Young Man Who Would Have His Eyes Opened. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (that, sun), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg641:34:47
# text = And that was the way he learned that the wizard had spoken truly when he said, ‘Blindness is man’s highest good.’
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl:unmarked	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	learned	learn	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	wizard	wizard	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj:pass	_	_
11	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
12	spoken	speak	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	16	advcl	_	_
13	truly	truly	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
14	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	16	advmod	_	_
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
18	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	Blindness	blindness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	compound	_	_
20	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	21	cop	_	_
21	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	’s	's	PART	POS	_	21	case	_	_
23	highest	high	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	21	conj	_	_
24	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past | that | the way |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **learn** | past | sun |  |  |  |  |  | vn learn-14-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **speak** *speech: other* | past · perfect · passive |  | the wizard |  |  |  | truly *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | sun |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **is** | present |  |  |  |  |  | 's Blindness man | tree rules |
| 6 | **be** |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Text:** «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 641 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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