Correct.

Yes. Rien, jamais, pas, etc. all work as the "second half" of negation.

yes, in a regular, fully grammatical phrase a negative would be 'n'est pas' = is not. n'est rien = is nothing (thing how that is a different negative, that stemmed from 'is no thing' two words). n'est jamais = is never (is not ever). n'est que = is only (this IS a type of negative, where it rejects everything except the subject). n'est personne = is no one (no person). n'est aucun = is not any. 'n'est _ ni __' = is neither nor.

these negatives come in pairs/sets, called 'circumfixes' or 'circumflexes' (type of affix). BUT because they ARE separate words, they can be arranged in different ways around the verb/sentence for different types of, hence, idiomatic inflection or emphasis.

Nice and useful words.. Thanks

In English, there is no double negation, but in French double negation is everywhere (there may be few exceptions in both languages). Where just one word ("no", "never", "nothing" etc.) is enough in English, French needs "ne" + something ("pas", "jamais", "rien" etc). When you translate negatives, don't forget that except for the most basic situations the English word translate to two words in French. So the literal translation is not "Nothing is not eternal", but "Nothing is eternal" (btw. the second is accepted)..

Of course it's not an exact translation. That's why it's called an idiom. Those vary from language to language.

Just seconding Carla May's good information, and adding to it a bit.

From the online version of French for Dummies - the section on building negative sentences:

Rien (nothing) and personne (nobody) can sometimes be the subject of the verb, like in English. In that case, start the sentence with either one of those words and proceed regularly with ne in front of the conjugated verb.

For example:

Rien n’est important (Nothing is important)

Personne ne fait la vaisselle (Nobody does the dishes).

Here’s the formula:
Rien or Personne + ne + verb.

Can you give post an example of a sentence of 'ne personne' and 'personne ne'

This is exactly what the comments section should be about though! People discussing and learning things. I always look in here if I get something wrong and I'm not sure why, or if I'm just curious about a bit of language and want to see if anyone's explained it - and generally they have!

Believe me, it's a lot better than endless comments like 'I said this answer and got it right'

Négation. This is somewhat similar to other constructions you may have seen: « ne pas, ne plus » but closer to « ne jamais ». « Je ne sais rien », « Je ne vais jamais là »… In everyday chitchat, it may be omitted, but not in writing.

Yes, you do.

Same here. It had endless and eternal as definitions of the word!

Because that would translate into Nothing is not eternal. There is one negation too many, you have to choose between Ne ... rien which mean Nothing and Ne ... pas which mean Not.

No, because here the negation is formed with "rien" and "n'".

The negation with "pas" can be used in sentences like: "Ce n'est pas éternel." (which translates to "It is not eternal" or "It does not last forever.")

If you do the random 'strengthen my skills' activity it has a tendency to pick a handful of phrases and make you do all the variations of them, yeah. Translate to French! Translate to English! Type what you hear! Type again with some pictures!

It might happen with some of the earlier lessons too, where you only get a few phrases or words to learn, but it happens less as you open up the tree a bit. Still happens though...

de rien is more like " it's nothing" meaning "you're welcome."

Please read the posts above about how negative words are used in pairs in French.

It is not a word-for-word translation. It is an expression in French (rien n'est éternel) which is literally "nothing is eternal". The English equivalent of this expression is "nothing lasts forever".