_The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars. Dear Brutus_ serves only to
arrest attention, and is independent by address.
_Poor man! he never came back again. Poor man_ is independent by
exclamation.
_Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me_. _Rod_ and _staff_ simply call
attention to the objects before anything is said of them, and are
independent by pleonasm--a construction used sometimes for rhetorical
effect, but out of place in ordinary speech.
_His master being absent, the business was neglected. His master being
absent_ logically modifies the verb _was neglected_ by assigning the cause,
but the phrase has no connective expressed or understood, and is therefore
grammatically independent. This is called the _absolute phrase_. An
_absolute phrase_ consists of a noun or a pronoun used independently with a
modifying participle.
_His conduct, generally speaking, was honorable. Speaking_ is a participle
without connection, and with the adverb _generally_ forms an independent
phrase.
_To confess the truth, I was wrong._ The infinitive phrase is independent.
The adverbs _well, now, why, there_ are sometimes independent; as, _Well_,
life is an enigma; _Now_, that is strange; _Why_, it is already noon;
_There_ are pitch-pine Yankees and white-pine Yankees.
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