---
title: I know no higher duty than this, and if God thinks fit to strike me… — Legends of the conquest of Spain · tree and pragmatics
description: I know no higher duty than this, and if God thinks fit to strike me dead in the performance of it, his sovereign will be done!” Who acts: I, God. A sentence of «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Chapter XIV., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Legends of the conquest of Spain, Chapter XIV., sentence 34

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I know no higher duty than this, and if God thinks fit to strike me dead in the performance of it, his sovereign will be done!”

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**Who acts:** I, God · **What happens:** know, think, fit, strike, do, perform · **To what, where:** higher duty, me, performance, sovereign

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This is a sentence of «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Chapter XIV.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, God), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg77685:15:34
# text = I know no higher duty than this, and if God thinks fit to strike me dead in the performance of it, his sovereign will be done!”
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	know	know	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	5	det	_	_
4	higher	high	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	5	amod	_	_
5	duty	duty	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
6	than	than	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
10	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
11	God	God	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
12	thinks	think	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	13	advcl	_	_
13	fit	fit	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
14	to	to	PART	TO	_	15	mark	_	_
15	strike	strike	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	xcomp	_	_
16	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	_
17	dead	dead	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	xcomp	_	_
18	in	in	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	performance	performance	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
21	of	of	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
24	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	25	nmod:poss	_	_
25	sovereign	sovereign	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	nsubj	_	_
26	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
27	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	28	aux:pass	_	_
28	done	do	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	2	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	28	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	28	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **know** | present | I | no higher duty |  |  |  | than this | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer duty=Stimulus |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* *a condition, not said to happen* | present | God |  |  |  |  |  | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **fit** | present | I *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **strike** | to-infinitive | I *not said here* | me |  | the performance of performance |  | dead *property* | vn hit-18.1-1 «NP V NP PP»: agent=Agent i=Instrument |
| 5 | **do** | future · passive |  | God's sovereign |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Eventuality |
| 6 | **perform** |  |  | performance |  |  |  |  | nom performance «communication transitive»: of=patient |

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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:** «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Project Gutenberg book 77685 (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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- ↑ back to [Chapter XIV.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg77685/15/)