{LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.* 
 
 I i 
 
 J UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, f 
 
— 
 
A TRACTATE 
 
 LANGUAGE 
 
 OBSERVATIONS ON THE FRENCH TONGUE, EASTERN TONGUES 
 AND TIMES, 
 
 AND CHAPTERS OX 
 
 LITERAL SYMBOLS, PHILOLOGY AND LETTERS, FIGURES 
 OF SPEECH, RHYME, TIME, AND LONGEVITY. 
 
 GORDON WILLOUGHBY JAMES GYLE, ESQ. 
 
 OF WEATSBUEY, BUCKS. 
 MEMBER OF THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
 
 SECOND EDITION, AUGMENTED AND REVISED. 
 
 Grammar is refined Logic. 
 
 Dr. Blair. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR, BY 
 
 HENEY a. BOIIN, YOEK STEEET, COVENT GARDEN. 
 1860. 
 
 ■ 
 

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 Although the writer of this Tractate should consider 
 the preface already prefixed to the first edition of the 
 work sufficient, yet on the appearance of a second edition, 
 some reason might be expected why material changes have 
 been made. 
 
 The author admits with regret that the first edition 
 was not so aptly or uniformly adjusted in all its parts as 
 consists with such a subject, and he felt he was capable of 
 imparting to it that lucidus ordo, which a too hasty publi- 
 cation had prevented, although the manuscripts had lain 
 by him for many years. 
 
 He has deemed it expedient to recast entirely the 
 grammatical sections, and having so done, he commits 
 them to the press in the hopeful assurance they may prove 
 acceptable to the reader of a composition which includes 
 a congeries of philosophical and grammatical observa- 
 tions. 
 
 The general principles, which are nearly the same as in the 
 former edition, have been further illustrated by the help 
 of some authority from comparatively recent publications, 
 but which had been only cursorily perused by the author 
 of the Tractate, viz. Welsford and Prichard. 
 
 Opinions advanced have been fortified, or addenda sup- 
 plied, which might well find a niche in a treatise on gram- 
 matical phenomena. 
 
 What the author has derived from the above cited writers 
 relates chiefly to the Sanskrit, and its affinity with the 
 
 A 2 
 
IV PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 Celtic race, an Eastern tribe and kindred with those nations 
 who dwell in India, emigrants to the north and south of 
 Europe, and from other tongues flowing from that source ; 
 and wherever he may have been defective in judgment or 
 in aught essential to the enucleation of his subject, he 
 has availed himself of casual suggestions, and has duly ac- 
 knowledged his tributaries in this work. 
 
 A learned author thought it vain to look beyond Gothic 
 for the origin of our language, but had he written in the 
 present age of lingual scrutiny, he had admitted also an 
 oriental fountain. 
 
 This work has been styled a Tractate, as being in the 
 author's estimation less than an elaborate treatise on lan- 
 guage, and more than an essay. Still, it contains all that 
 is essential to realize the character and object of a book on 
 this extensive theme. With this view it has been entirely 
 remodelled, and some Chapters have been expanded to 
 impart additional interest to what per se may be deemed 
 unalluring and arid. 
 
 He trusts then that the supplementary matter will not 
 be unacceptable, as bearing due reference to the principal 
 aim of the publication. 
 
 The power of Literal Symbols being a constituent part 
 of the wide arch of the ranged empire of language, he has 
 much augmented this section, deducing proofs and illustra- 
 tions from medals, inscriptions, synoptical tables, and also 
 from a rare publication known as the Pcecilographia Grseca, 
 a production on Greek contractions published in 1807, 
 and mainly derived from the Palseographia Grseca of Mont- 
 faucon, which was given to the world in 1708. See page 
 215 of the Tractate. This he trusts will be useful to the 
 Student and Philologer. 
 
 The Chapters on Fragmentary observations on the 
 French tongue, and on Eastern tongues and times, are 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. V 
 
 both germane to the subject of language. These he has 
 revised and augmented. 
 
 The paper on Figures of Speech has increased a little in 
 bulk, but it has been greatly improved in arrangement and 
 exposition, and he trusts also in validity and importance ; 
 uniting phenomena of grammar with the graces of diction, 
 both ancillary to the study of rhetoric. 
 
 The Essay on Rhyme is reprinted with a few addenda 
 only, and this the writer thinks may be perused with ad- 
 vantage and profit by those who take interest in rhyming 
 poetry, the offspring of a Gothic parent. 
 
 Two short tracts on Time and Longevity, are again an- 
 nexed, and although the subjects can not be said strictly 
 to belong to Language, yet the author deems it not irre- 
 levant to have them appended to his brief essay on Tongues 
 and Times. 
 
 That on Time gives a precis only of some prominent 
 events in bygone ages, and on St. Peter's patrimony at 
 Rome, whilst that on Longevity refers to the duration 
 of life, (both comprising tellus et humanum genus) and 
 especially adverting to the ages of learned men and those 
 dedicated to literary and scientific professions. 
 
 As far as regards the purely grammatical part which ter- 
 minates with the chapter on Comparison, all the author 
 solicits is an ingenuous consideration of the principles and 
 evidences advanced, every one of which he feels can be 
 amply established, and if grammarians do not concur wholly 
 in the conclusions, he thinks they can not overthrow them. 
 As they have been considered and matured, he hopes readers 
 will judge for themselves, and not merely endorse the 
 opinions of routineer proxies. In this conviction the 
 writer desires neither to repeal nor modify them. The 
 character of this work being illustrative, he relies on 
 the verdict of sterling judgment for justification in the 
 necessity for the frequent citations made and testimonies 
 adduced to support positions. 
 
VI PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 Although some opinions may be considered theories or 
 speculations, yet in a country where erudition is cherished 
 it was not consistent with equity or delicacy that they 
 should have been encountered with a savage phrenzy, such 
 as is rarely displayed in a critical Review, on the first 
 edition, whose general reputation is that its moving prin- 
 ciple seems to be to endeavour to subvert or discourage 
 literature ; teeming with poor (but innocuous) animadver- 
 sions in which it delights, having neither inclination, 
 power nor magnanimity to suggest improvement, or recog- 
 nize merit, humble or exalted. 
 
 But while such reviews indulge thus indiscriminately, 
 pourtraying sheer obliquity of mind and judgment in lieu 
 of that manly acumen to which they pretend, the critics 
 must perceive how much below the dignity of the criticised 
 it is to evince either uneasiness or resentment — both as 
 easily ec shaken off as dewdrops from the lion's mane." 
 
 These labours and excogitations are again confidently 
 delivered to the world, and may it not be considered pre- 
 sumptuous in the author to close his preface in similar 
 sentiments with those which animated one whose analogous 
 yet higher labours were roughly handled in his time, and 
 yet withstood the ordeal, and feeling that in this Tractate 
 something is contributed to language and philology, he 
 dismisses the work with a becoming and dignified tran- 
 quillity, " having little to fear or hope from censure or 
 from praise." 
 
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
 
 In offering the miscellaneous observations contained in 
 the accompanying Tractate, it may be expedient to preface 
 them with only a few lines ; and, in adverting to what 
 first led to the investigations of the subject, the author 
 desires to avow that his intention has not been to derogate 
 from others, who have been his pioneers in this path of 
 literature, but to record his own opinions and conclusions, 
 so that if in his humble endeavours a minimum of good is 
 discerned, it may not be lost. 
 
 His studious tendencies have been much directed to the 
 pursuit of language ; and when he was a member of the 
 University of Oxford he formed an accquaintance with a 
 gentleman of considerable erudition, but not of either 
 University, who had made the English tongue his peculiar 
 care. 
 
 For the idea of prosecuting an inquiry and for valuable 
 suggestions on this subject, the author is indebted to this 
 friend of philological literature, who imbued him with a 
 like predilection. The investigations then and subsequently 
 made were diligently considered and matured ; and in the 
 course of many verbal and grammatical analyses, he thought 
 (perhaps immaturely) that some occult treasures and re- 
 condite truths in philology and grammar were eliminated, 
 and were worthy public consideration. 
 
 With diffidence then this work is delivered to the Press, 
 as the result of some research and much solicitude, in 
 which it is endeavoured to point out whence may arise 
 peculiarities and the sources of language, and the rules of 
 grammar. 
 
 The author has not attempted largely to dilate on what 
 has been so often before the public ; but he has merely 
 
arranged under heads, with examples, what he considered 
 apposite to the subject, without ulterior pretensions. 
 
 Nor does he offer this compilation as a derivative 
 treatise on language, which copious subject has been 
 recently undertaken and expounded in profound and labo- 
 rious works to the satisfaction of the erudite, deducing 
 most of the European tongues and their congeners from a 
 common fons et origo, the Celtic ; while the Sanscrit has 
 been sifted and winnowed, its arcana unfolded, and a close 
 analogy, for the scheme of language is analogical and con- 
 vertible, and an affinity in case, gender and structure, are 
 shewn to exist in all the dialects spoken in many provinces 
 from bound to bound, and from Asia Minor " to the ut- 
 most Indian isle Taprobane." 
 
 Perhaps these dead languages, Sanscrit or Hebrew, like 
 the first parents, maybe styled fons omnium viventium, and 
 to it the antique Celtic owes its origin, and its cognates also 
 may be comprised within the Indo-European stock, as shewn 
 by synoptical tables of ancient and modern alphabets. 
 ** It is chiefly with the English that this tractate is con- 
 cerned, and in it the author adverts with deference to 
 certain laws and canons which have been ruled by some 
 who have obtained eminence for their several disquisitions 
 on our mother tongue. 
 
 The author trusts to obtain indulgence if he has ven- 
 tured on extraneous matter in a theme so unattractive, 
 and that the contents bear relation to the subject. 
 
 A brief Chapter on the Computation of time since the 
 Christian era has been inserted, which apparently holds 
 little analogy with language, but as numeration was in- 
 dicated by letters anterior to the adoption of Arabic 
 numerals, it was not deemed irrelevant to notice this use of 
 them, or to advert to a singular application of a certain 
 number which also implies an appellative. 
 
 This led to a digression on the mysterious number in 
 the Apocalypse, and proceeds to question and impugn an 
 
assertion made by a sect of Christians styled Roman Ca- 
 tholics, as alien from genuine historical fact. 
 
 It is also hoped that the Chapters on Figures of Speech 
 and Rhyme, so amply elucidated by Professor Blair, are 
 not misplaced, tending to appreciate and illustrate our 
 national bards, models of poesy and reason, who knew no 
 concord of sweet sounds half so melodious as common 
 sense, and that language and words are the chief creatures 
 of men, and the keys of knowledge. 
 
 Verbal philosophy is generally held to be hard and dry 
 as dust ; yet in these days of the wide diffusion of polite 
 literature it is not without its intrinsic value. 
 
 As in religion what is bones to philosophy is milk to 
 faith ; so in philological truths ; " and truth like the sun 
 has enlightened human intelligence through every age, and 
 saved it from the darkness both of sophistry and error." 
 
 If in some of his etyma or applications the writer may 
 differ from his predecessors in this track of verbal indaga- 
 tion, he feels that good reasons can be assigned for the 
 opinions enunciated, and that in them affiance may be 
 reposed, notwithstanding the objections which may rea- 
 sonably arise, when submitted to the mental crucible. 
 
 He hopes that typographical errata alone may be found. 
 According to modern synthetical and analytical principles 
 there may be advanced what has not been fully considered, 
 so a space is assigned to substituenda, which will comprise 
 remarks, and such errors of press, and omissions, and heed- 
 less mistakes as shall have eluded circumspection. 
 
 Should the miscellany contribute anything to lingual 
 literature, the author will rejoice ; and he trusts as a firm 
 friend and attached to science, and as a member of the 
 Royal Institution of Great Britain, he may say without 
 hyperbole or reproof — 
 
 J'ai fait un peu de bicn, c'cst mon meilleur ouvrage. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 1. 
 
 Preface to the Seconc 
 
 
 19. 
 
 Prepositions . 
 
 112 
 
 
 Edition 
 
 iii 
 
 20. 
 
 Nouns . 
 
 119 
 
 2. 
 
 Preface to the Firsl 
 Edition 
 
 vii 
 
 21. 
 
 Adjectives 
 
 126 
 
 
 
 
 22. 
 
 Cases . 
 
 132 
 
 3. 
 
 Introductory Observa 
 tions 
 
 1 
 
 23. 
 
 Comparison . 
 
 138 
 
 4, 
 
 Canons 
 
 5 
 
 24. 
 
 Miscellaneous matter 
 
 152 
 
 5. 
 
 Verbs . 
 
 15' 
 
 25. 
 
 On Languages . 
 
 181 
 
 G. 
 
 Copnla — Esse . 
 Tenses 
 
 21- 
 
 26. 
 
 On the power of Lite- 
 
 
 7. 
 
 26- 
 
 
 ral Symbols . 
 
 199 
 
 8. 
 
 Perfect Tense . 
 
 39 
 
 27. 
 
 On the power of Con- 
 sonants 
 
 210 
 
 9. 
 
 Moods . 
 
 41 
 
 28. 
 
 Letters representing 
 
 
 10. 
 
 Subjunctive Mood 
 
 . 43 
 
 
 Numerals 
 
 230 
 
 11. 
 
 Gerunds, Supines, Par 
 
 
 29. 
 
 Anomalies 
 
 233 
 
 
 ticiples 
 
 52 
 
 30. 
 
 Philology and Letters 
 
 246 
 
 12. 
 
 Aorists and Infinitive 
 
 5 58 
 
 31. 
 
 Fragmentary Observa- 
 
 
 13. 
 
 To and Do . 
 
 .- 66 
 
 
 tions on the French 
 
 
 14 
 
 Have and Of . 
 
 74 
 
 
 language 
 
 264 
 
 15. 
 
 Articles A and The 
 
 . 80 
 
 32. 
 
 On Eastern tongues 
 
 
 1G. 
 
 Pronouns . 
 
 . 86 
 
 
 and times 
 
 275 
 
 17. 
 
 Who, Which; Eela 
 
 
 33. 
 
 On Figures of Speech 
 
 297 
 
 
 tives and Antece 
 
 
 34. 
 
 On Ehyme 
 
 333 
 
 
 dents . 
 
 . 95 
 
 35. 
 
 On the computation of 
 
 
 is. 
 
 Conjunctions, Parti 
 
 
 
 Time 
 
 364 
 
 
 ciples, Indeclinable 
 
 i 105 
 
 36. 
 
 On Longevity 
 
 381 
 
/>t 
 

 ERRATA. 
 
 i*age 24, line 9, runs for uns. 
 
 „ 24, 
 
 , 4, had for has. 
 
 „ 39, 
 
 , 27, participle comes in before past. 
 
 „ 42, 
 
 , 3 & 4, proposition for preposition. 
 
 „ 54, , 
 
 , 13, dispensable for indispensable. 
 
 „ 54, 
 
 , 25, a comma after itnr. 
 
 „ 62, 
 
 , 10, rus for us. 
 
 „ 63, 
 
 , 30, ? to come out, and a comma substituted 
 
 „ 79, 
 
 , 21, after Eegi a semicolon. 
 
 „ 117, 
 
 , 9, no for no\v. 
 
 „ 141, 
 
 ,, 30, more for there. 
 
 „ 247, 
 
 , 1, vowels for verbs. 
 
 „ 247, 
 
 „ 2, prie je for prie je. 
 
 „ 255, 
 
 „ 18, and S for as Z. 
 
 „ 278, 
 
 , 4, tenth for sixteenth. 
 
 „ 288, 
 
 , 31, word of omitted. 
 
 „ 319, 
 
 , 7, Hyperbaton for Hyberbation. 
 
 „ 387, 
 
 „ 3, Llano ver for Lanover. 
 
matter. If the mute arts like sculpture and painting 
 address themselves to us, how much more wonderful must 
 be the effects of speech, that medium of eloquence, which 
 is the queen of the universe, and the mistress of our way- 
 ward affections ; it lends beauty to the sublime, which 
 Longinus defines, an image reflected from the inward 
 greatness of the soul. 
 
 Sanskrit, the great source of Oriental literature, especially 
 of the Vedic age, is the parent of almost every dialect from 
 the Persian gulf to the China seas, and is the cradle of 
 human speech, that is, of inflected language, or diction 
 inverted by transposing the prefix ; and from it sprung 
 immediately Greek, Latin and Keltic — Sanskrit is the 
 refined, whilst Prakrit is the natural or unsifted language. 
 
 A general collective designation for the Germanic tongues 
 is Gothic, of which all the northern tongues are ramifica- 
 tions. The Frisian is thought to hold the same relation 
 to Dutch that the Anglo-Saxon does to modern English, 
 which it resembles more than any other, and was the lan- 
 guage of the Chauci, who dwelt in the extreme north of 
 Germany. Mceso-gothic was the language of the ancient 
 invaders of Rome, and the subjects of Alaric and Totila, 
 duo fulmina belli ; the Goths settled in Mcesia temp. Valens 
 about the 4th century, and were converted to Christianity 
 when the Bible was translated into their dialect by Bp. 
 Ulphilas. 
 
 The present Jutlanders are held for Danes and not 
 Germans, for in the days of Venerable Bede, who died 735 
 of our sera, they were the same as the British and the 
 Gaelic. 
 
 Galatia is called KtXrtKi?, hence these names are synony- 
 mous, and the proper names, 2kv0tjc, T^rrjg, TorOog, 
 2»«ju€/>ot, and Cimbri are identical. The modern Galacz on 
 the Danube stream, may be the old Kallatis, as much like 
 Kelt as Galacz is to Galatse. The Gallic speaking Gothini 
 
who dwelt contiguous to Sarmatia are described as Kelts 
 and Galatae, while St. Jerome says the language of Galatse 
 was the same as that of Treves in France. 
 
 The etymology may be yaXa lac, milk, and the Arabic 
 Mat life, implying a pastoral life. These people were also 
 called Kymeri, Cimmerii, Cimbri. 
 
 The British language in Caesar's time was also Gallic. 
 Proximi Gallis et similes sunt. Sermo haud multum di- 
 versus. Tacitus, Agrieola. C. xi. 
 
 The similitude between Gallic and Latin is shewn in 
 Leo's work, where centenaries of words are given alike in 
 form and meaning. 
 
 The Manks is a dialect of Keltic, and is considered to 
 be the purest existing modification of that venerable 
 language, which is scarcely more artificial than the Malay, 
 or those rude languages of the Indian ocean, whose people 
 have no other expedient for expressing plurality than by 
 reduplication of a syllable, denoting excess. 
 
 Canons respecting Grammatical Construction. 
 1. It is not true that vowels do not sometimes assume 
 the power of consonants, as y and i lapse into conso- 
 nants, when they impel another vowel, and so become 
 virtually consonants. 
 Although I have treated of vowels under the chapter on 
 the power of literal symbols, I shall remark here that all 
 vowels are interchangeable. The variety of sounds, which 
 we consider as different from the original sound, is merely 
 a modification of the first oral a, for with a, we can sound 
 all the vowels, voices or vocal sounds. 
 
 All vowels are alike, as will be shewn in the chapter on 
 Philology and letters, but with divers variations for the 
 sake of sound which forms dialects. 
 
 In symbolical signification, the letter O, (which seems to 
 be the first vowel from which all others spring, being a 
 
circle produced by the earliest form of the mouth when 
 any utterance is given) means individual or whole. 
 
 A is a symbol implying motive, and is a diphthong, com- 
 pounded of o and i, at least in form. The same may be 
 said of e, whose symbolical significance denotes energy, and 
 is a compound of a and i, while u is also a compounded 
 letter. 
 
 2. It is not true that consonants are without sound, 
 for they sound by themselves, as vowels do, and not 
 as their name implies con-sonans or 2v/*-$wva. 
 
 3. Or that consonants are interceptions of vowels. The 
 distinction of vowel and consonant is a mere gramma- 
 tical fiction. In Hebrew and Chinese all words 
 begin with a consonant. The sounding of a conso- 
 nant does not intercept the voice. 
 
 Walker defines a consonant to be an interruption or in- 
 terception of the effusion of the vocal sound, arising from 
 the application of the organs of speech to each other. 
 They are styled elements, as every articulation derives 
 from them, and in combination they produce words and 
 sentences, the constituents of discourse or aToix^ta, 
 elements, from which arise words, and to which are all 
 words reduced. Language is composed of matter and form, 
 the matter being articulate, while the form is its meaning. 
 Hence it is a picture of the universe, where words are as 
 the figure or images of all particulars. The elementary 
 sounds, the origin of all language, are winged as thought, 
 and so are justly styled inta irTzpoivra. 
 
 4. It is not true, that the article in Greek has affinity 
 to the definite article the in English. The Greek 
 article denotes only the gender, and the English 
 article is the same as the relatives, who, that, which, 
 and are all synonymous. 
 
 5. Or that the Latin tongue banished the article, or has 
 no article as Hermes asserts. The Latins affixed it to 
 
the noun as Domin-us, which termination is the same 
 as oq, the article and relative also. In fact, all words 
 ending in as, es, is, os, us, urn, are the same, mere 
 dialectical varieties. (See Richardson's Dictionary, 
 Section 3,) answering to 6c, V) o. Hence Dominus 
 is not a pure substantive, but a concrete, because it 
 coalesces with the article og, which gives it meaning. 
 The article the is also the relative as the man, or man 
 whoj and was used for it. Ex. : St. Paul was the highest 
 preacher the was in holy Church. St. Paul the is the 
 highest Lehrer the we habbeth inne haelig kirk. Ealle 
 tha the hyt gehyrden — all they who heard it. Fader ure 
 thu the in heofunum eart. Rushworth's Lord's Prayer, 
 a,d. 900. Thaem the scyldigat with us — them who tres- 
 pass against us. In Gothic, edited by Junius — atta unser 
 thu in himinam. In Saxon by Marshall — Feeder ure thu 
 the eart on heofenum. — In all these instances the is the 
 relative who, and is used for the Saxon thaet or tha, 
 
 6. It is not true that the article always precedes the 
 subject. Ex. : Virtue is its own reward. Man that is 
 born of a woman. But the subject of a proposition in 
 Greek, is always that to which the article is prefixed ; 
 but there are propositions in which no article is in- 
 troduced. 
 
 7. Or that the euphonic article an may not be applied to 
 a word beginning with H aspirated, as an Historian — 
 or may not precede the power of diphthongal ?/, which is 
 ewe, as an European ; or the h aspirated preceded by w, 
 as an wholesome root. 
 
 8. Or that the English enunciate the h before the w, 
 as in what, when. Dr. Lowth observes we ought to 
 sound h before the w, which is not true. The aspirate 
 should be sunk, and the words wet and whet be 
 similarly enunciated; but we do not preserve that 
 pronunciation, which gives h a power before the w \ 
 
8 
 
 9. Or that the English genitive s is derived from the 
 Saxon is; or that the s is a contraction of her or his. 
 Es may be a contraction of is or us, formerly used for 
 plurals, which was eth pluralised. Penelope her web 
 was wove by herself. This is the Greek genitive case, 
 which agrees with the Saxon genitive in three of its 
 declensions. It is adopted in modern English, which 
 is a dialect of Saxon, its symbolical signification and 
 notes the efficient cause. The symbol e is the origin 
 of all inflection in Greek, Latin and English. 
 
 10. Or that he, she, his, her, him, who, whom, whose, 
 ' were originally confined to rational existences or 
 
 creation. They were mere attributes of distinction 
 and refer to inanimate objects, and are therefore not 
 masculine nor feminine. 
 
 11. Or that when applied to irrational objects they 
 personify these objects. The pronoun its is not found 
 in either Testament, instead of the possessive its, his 
 and her were used. These words applied to inanimate 
 nature are properties of poetry and rhetoric, and not 
 of grammatical art, as He that pricketh the heart, 
 maketh it to shew her knowledge. 
 
 12. Or that all nouns are of the third person, except 
 when they are in the apostrophic or vocative case. 
 
 13. It is false doctrine to assert that when the person is 
 expressed, the verb is of necessity inflected. It is not 
 so, unless the sentence be emphatic. Non far quello 
 in Italian, do not that. Sic et tu facere, do thou 
 likewise. Hermes injudiciously asserts that cases 
 are not derived from prepositions understood, but 
 from the verb's essence, which is not the fact, because 
 no verb can govern a case — all regimen is in the pre- 
 position. A nominative can not be called a case — it 
 is the substantive uninfected, and may be used with- 
 out a verb. Ex. : The prophets ? where are they ? 
 
The Lord — he is God. In all inflected languages, 
 personality is determined by the termination, but in 
 a natural language like English, personality is sym- 
 bolised by its own attribute of specification, and 
 rejects every other. 
 
 14. It is not true that a change of person is inadmissible 
 in one and the same period. Ex. : Paradise Lost, IV. 
 v. 724. " Thou also mad'st the night, 
 
 Maker omnipotent, and thou the day," 
 &c. and the following lines. 
 
 Virgil uses this license, Eneid 10. Having employed 
 nefas in the accusative, he then proceeds to use the nomi- 
 native without any interval, 
 
 " Csesa manus juvenum fsede, thalamique cruenti." 
 
 The Greeks did the same as is found in Aristotle, Rhe- 
 toric, avayica ayaOa dvai radej in the accusative, and 
 immediately after evSaifjiovia, &c. in the nominative. 
 
 The power of speech is a faculty peculiar to man, but 
 how often do we pervert it : grammarians say we supplies 
 the place of men. This is not so, it illustrates this rule. 
 It is a figure of rhetoric, a change of person which has a 
 peculiar effect in this passage. 
 
 Again in Virgil, " Terra tremit, fugere ferae." 
 
 A11 instance in Spenser reinforces also. He hath his 
 shield redeemed, and forth his sword he draws; where 
 two different tenses are comprised in one sentence. 
 
 15. It is unfounded to say that a double nominative 
 is ungrammatical or inelegant, on the contrary it is 
 according to the occasion, which calls the second 
 nominative into being elegant and rhetorical. Some- 
 times in imitation of other languages the pronoun is 
 suppressed, as, Forasmuch as it hath pleased God, &c. 
 and hath preserved you, &c. Where he is omitted 
 with elegance, although the antecedent God, is in 
 the oblique case. This omission abounds in Latin — 
 
10, 
 
 Ain 'tu te illius invenisse filiam ? Inveni et domi est. 
 Plautus Epidicus A. v. sc. 2. 
 
 16. It is not true that interrogatories are always ade- 
 quate to ascertain the nominative case, or the subject 
 of a proposition. Sometimes infinitives understood 
 supply the place of the nominative. Misled by this 
 false principle, grammarians have erred. In the natural 
 order of elocution the subject precedes the copula, but 
 when the proposition is interrogative, hypothetical, ex- 
 clamative or imperative, the subject follows the copula. 
 Authors even in declarative propositions, frequently 
 transpose the subject to diversify the style, which is 
 allowable, provided no ambiguity or obscurity arise 
 from it ; but this transposition requires judgment. 
 
 17. It is not true that whom always follows than, where 
 the personal pronoun, if substituted, would be in the 
 nominative case, or that than always follows the com- 
 parative. Ex. : I am more contented without them. 
 Have you more besides these ? I am less deceived 
 besides her. See under Comparisons. 
 
 18. Or that lesser and worser were originally compara- 
 tive : they were employed for less and worse positively, 
 and were used for much and very ; as more braver for 
 much braver. 
 
 " The Duke of Milan, 
 And his more braver daughter." 
 Here more is not comparative, but positive. 
 
 19. Or that the comparative degree is restricted to two 
 persons ; as, more than us all. 
 
 20. Or that the positive is not a degree as well as the 
 comparative and superlative, as Hermes asserts. It is 
 applied when equality or inequality are expressed; 
 as, He is as learned as you are. 
 
 21. Or that the adjective is improperly termed noun 
 adjective. This term is more philosophical than Dr. 
 
11 
 
 Lowth will admit ; and owes its application to the 
 juxta-position of two substantives: as ox-stall. 
 
 22. It is not true that the adjective is of necessity con- 
 verted into the adverb when it may with more ele- 
 gance be referred to the subject or object of the pro- 
 position, or modify the subject or object. Two 
 adjectives are superior to one, and equivalent to any 
 adverb ; as, He was a veray parfit gentil knight. — 
 Chaucer. 
 
 23. Or that is, was, doth, does, and similar termina- 
 tions were originally restricted to the singular num- 
 ber : as, my people is foolish, which is written for are 
 foolish. Th was not confined to singularity, which 
 Dr. Lowth does not seem to recognise ; as, All joy, 
 tranquillity and peace, even for ever, doth dwell. 
 
 24. It is erroneous that the termination eth is restricted 
 exclusively to the solemn style. It is common in old 
 writers passim for singular and plural. 
 
 25. It is notorious that be and were are not appropriated 
 exclusively to the so-called subjunctive mood. Ex. : 
 If there be but one body of legislators, &c. If there 
 are only two, these will want a casting voice. — A d- 
 dison. Here be and are are reconcileable, and be is 
 not in the subjunctive mood ; it is the indicative, and is 
 used for variety only. Again, " So much she fears — she 
 dare not mourn." — Prior. Her eyes in heaven would 
 through the airy region, &c. j that birds would sing 
 and think it were not night. — Shahspeare. Here dare 
 and were are indicative, and not subjunctive. 
 
 26. Or that be, were, wert, either are or were ever con- 
 fined to the pretended subjunctive mood, or arc al- 
 ways applied subjunctivcly. 
 
 27- That it is notorious that the English has no moods. 
 Are there any moods in any language ? Dr. Lowth 
 says the form constitutes the distinction of moods, and 
 
12 
 
 that in English there is no distinction, which implies 
 there is no mood in English. Time is not inherent in 
 the verb, and consequently would and should with 
 all verbs, without exception, might be similarly ap- 
 plied to present and future, as well as to past time. 
 Mood, time, number, person, are no parts of the 
 verbs any more than case, gender, number, person, 
 are parts of the noun. They are the signs of relative 
 ideas made absolute by their application. So are par- 
 ticles. Aristotle says the verb is made significant 
 with time, prifxa lari to irpovrifiaivov xpovov. Now 
 time is not an essential appendage to the verb. 
 
 28. It is notorious, and ought to be inculcated that 
 the verb is, and ever was, restricted by philosophers 
 to. the infinitive, and that it is, and has been, allowed 
 to be the first substantive. That there is no more 
 than one part of speech, and not eight parts, as is 
 taught in elementary books. Esse is the only part of 
 speech, and is a substantive. The infinitive is used 
 substantively in all languages, the fons et origo lin- 
 guarum, and is styled the verbal noun. Existence is a 
 universal genus, to which all things at all times may 
 be referred, and the copula expresses the general genus, 
 and so is termed a verb substantive. 
 
 29. It is notoriety that the present and imperfect tenses 
 are convertible, and by consequence that originally 
 the first form of the verb answered every purpose of 
 communication; and this is found in Greek writers, 
 All difference in tenses is philosophical or imaginary ; 
 as I eat, or was eating, love or did love. 
 
 30. It is obvious that all the variety of tenses in Greek 
 and all other languages is nothing more than a refine- 
 ment and modification of the first and primitive form 
 of the verb, invented for the sake of discrimination, 
 although unnecessary in the philosophy of language. 
 
13 
 
 Every grammatical accident may be converted into 
 another, and the sense preserved. The mode of ex- 
 pression depends on the will of the writer. 
 
 31. It is untrue that tense and time are synonymous, 
 tense being only the con traction of a phrase ; it is a 
 concrete, having subject, copula, and predicate. 
 
 32. So is it that the designation of time is, or ever was, 
 involved in the verb or participle. Time is and ever 
 has been expressed by a noun or adverb. Time is 
 not an essential appendage to the verb. 
 
 33. It is notoriety that the term aorist or indefinite 
 never meant tense that could be applied to, or accom- 
 panied with the precise time of the energy, its real 
 signification being unlimited and unrestricted in ap- 
 plication. Aorists may be applied to any period, pre- 
 sent, past, or future, without the designation of time. 
 
 34. It is not true that the conjunction disjunctive 
 (disjunctions, while they connect sentences, disjoin 
 the meaning or set them in opposition) has always 
 an effect contrary to the conjunction copulative. 
 Ex. : u The King nor the Queen were not at all 
 deceived." — Clarendon, 
 
 35. It is untrue that it is contrary to English analogy 
 to join have and be to the second, or even the first 
 form of the verb : that is, the present and imperfect 
 tenses in English, which correspond to the historical 
 tenses of other languages and to the two aorists of 
 the Greek ; as, I have him see. Have to bin, is an- 
 cient usage. Have I not be ? That I may gone. — 
 Romance of K. Arthur. Gif I had go — for if I had 
 gone — and now my face may bin hid. — Gower.Conf. 
 Amantis, B. v. Be and do were formerly used as parti- 
 ciples. For what fyre is such love I can not sene, or 
 where becometh it when it is go. Here go is used 
 for gone. 
 
14 
 
 Trust wel that al the conclusions that have be 
 founden. — Chaucer. 
 
 36. It is a mistake or a misprision of terms to say, that 
 to placed before the verb is an exclusive sign of the 
 infinitive mood, philosophically speaking. It is found 
 before the adjective verbs (bid, dare, read, make, see, 
 hear, feel, act, &c, are so styled). 
 
 These verbs are often used without to ; as dare, defy, 
 swear, go, &c. Bid him run — in every mood, which no 
 grammarian or philosopher can deny. Ex, : I do or 
 to love, and so through the tense. Do and to are 
 identical, for a solution of which see chapter on Do. 
 I dare love, means I dare to love. Hence it is the 
 infinitive mood. The particle to, now written too, is 
 found in to lost ; been to hard. 
 
 37. The primary verbs, as do, dare, &c, can be omitted 
 before the infinitive mood. Ex. : He not denies it — 
 which they not feel — I hope I not offend. 
 
 38. It is not true that two negatives are equivalent to 
 an affirmative. Two negatives affirm with decision, 
 and strengthen the affirmative in Greek and French. 
 The words used elliptically for negations in French 
 are pas and point, but they are not so, deriving from 
 passus and punctum. Old writers used a double ne- 
 gation; as, Ne appear eth not to hem. — Sir J. Man- 
 deville. And Milton says, "Nor did they fierce pains 
 not feel. Ne notes the absence of that to which it 
 refers, which abstracted or taken away nothing re- 
 mains. Not in the least — not at all, are simultaneous 
 phrases. 
 
 Negatives cannot express any abstract idea of non- 
 entity, because no such power of abstraction extends 
 to the human mind. 
 
 39. It is erroneous that the subject of a proposition, 
 when transposed, becomes the predicate, as Hermes 
 
15 
 
 alleges, to support which position is to maintain that 
 a part contains the whole. The predicate and sub- 
 ject are occasionally inverted, but Mr. Harris thought 
 in his Hermes that the predicate is the converse of the • 
 subject by such an inversion, which doctrine is un- 
 true, and has been subverted by Aristotle. 
 40. Verbs termed neuter, impersonal, or intransitive, do 
 not really exist in language. Omnis motus, actio aut 
 passio, nihil est medium. All verbs are active, even 
 Esse, which implies motion. Neuter verbs had cases 
 after them, but now they are elegantly suppressed. 
 As I sat me down. Je me tiens debout. If the energy 
 is confined to the subject, the subject only is ex- 
 pressed, as, I sit, I sleep. All intransitive verbs are 
 neuter, but neuter means neither active nor passive, 
 and if English has no passive, where is the neuter 
 verb ? The fact is, verbs are neither active nor pas- 
 sive, but are in a state of rest ; and voices import no 
 more than the natural and inverted form of the sub- 
 ject and object for variety. 
 
 Abstract ideas, the shadows of reality, are unphi- 
 
 losophical, while signs of tenses may be dispensed 
 
 with, as hostile to nature and analogy. 
 
 The positions advanced in these canons are repeated in 
 
 the tractate, and are evolved in the chapters assigned to 
 
 their consideration, to which the reader is referred. 
 
 On Verbs. 
 
 Verbs for convenience have been grammatically me- 
 thodized under four species, substantives, attributes, defi- 
 nitives, and connectives. 
 
 A verb expresses energy, and all energies are attributes, 
 when the energy is contingent, and not confined to the 
 subject. The third person is not varied, but depends on a 
 verb or participle understood. When we speak intensively, 
 the verb is varied, as Go, Let him go ; but when the verb 
 
16 
 
 is not varied in the third person singular, it is to be con- 
 sidered of the infinitive mood, and governed by a verb un- 
 derstood. Ex. : Unless he wash my feet, he hath no part 
 with me ; that is, unless he doth wash. 
 
 The three forms of a verb are radical, the particle, as 
 loving, and participle past, as loved. The conjunctive 
 form of a verb. Ex. : "Were these letters to fail — perhaps 
 it were to be wished. It is used for the auxiliary ; as 
 What a school has been opened. They affirmed it were an 
 injustice. 
 
 The auxiliary is joined, with other verbs, as may, can, 
 &c. The verbs bid, dare, read, make, see, feel, &c. are 
 similarly used, and are styled adjective-verbs. 
 
 The substantive-verb is, to be, Esse, to which all are 
 reduced. Verbs, and, of course, all parts of speech, are 
 formed out of nouns, and were nothing but nouns, as the 
 Hebrew evinces, the rudest of all written languages, where 
 the verb has a pronominal termination, which was itself a 
 mere noun. In Armenian the substantive love is ser, 
 which, combined with the verb, iem, I am, makes ser-iam, 
 I love or am loving. E or est is like the est in Latin 
 and Greek. 
 
 In the Arabic family verbs are composed of a root of 
 two or three letters and a personal pronoun. In the San- 
 skrit there is a verbal root joined to the substantive- verb. 
 A verb, after all, is only a noun combined with a pronoun. 
 The ancient form is thought to be in m, but some think o. 
 Eo or ego is the suffix. 
 
 In all Oriental tongues this is the case; and in the 
 learned languages, which derive so immediately from 
 Keltic and Sanskrit, in Dr. Prichard's view of it. 
 
 Grammarians say, mixed words, their meaning termi- 
 nating in themselves, include both action and passion, and 
 admit no object after them, as he stands, sleeps, subsists, 
 &c. ; but a verb active must have an agent to act, and an 
 object on which to act. We can not say the house is 
 
17 
 
 building, or the street is watering, as Doth house and 
 street are incapable of acting, and must have agents to 
 build and water. 
 
 The verb to love has been injudiciously introduced as a 
 model of conjugation; being a mental affection, it will not 
 admit all varieties of expression given by grammarians. 
 
 Primary verbs, that is, the auxiliary placed before the 
 invariable mood, or participles, mark the tense ; as, I do 
 love — did — am teaching. The antecedents mark some- 
 times a whole sentence ; as, I came in time, which is the 
 main business. 
 
 Personality is the index of the subject, all other words 
 are accessories ; it is the type of the real substance, and 
 other terms are properties belonging to it. 
 
 The designation of time is not in the province of verbs. 
 
 Some verbs are said to be neuter, signifying no sort of 
 action, as sedet; intransitive, signifying action, but such as 
 do not pass from the agent to any other thing, as prandere, 
 to dine, and these become transitive, and as such are not 
 distinguished from active verbs. 
 
 Verbs deponent have no active signification, and are 
 taken passively. 
 
 A verb is intransitive when the agent and object coin- 
 cide ; as, he walks, &c. 
 
 Dr. Lowth styles all intransitives neuter verbs, but 
 neuter means neither active nor passive. In this phrase 
 A loves B, we have the energiser, the energy, and the sub- 
 ject, and sometimes the energy keeps within the energiser, 
 and passes to no extraneous subject ; as A walks. 
 
 It is not infrequently that an intransitive verb assumes 
 the power and activity of transitive, when it admits the 
 same syntax and acquires the same power of government. 
 Virgil applies the verbs trepidare and ardere in this light, 
 and Horace uses sudare causas. 
 
 We are taught that active verbs require an accusative 
 
 c 
 
18 
 
 case, while neuters require none. Now transitive verbs 
 have both an active and passive signification, as Scipio con- 
 quered Hannibal; that is, Hannibal was conquered by 
 Scipio. 
 
 The former is the natural order, and corresponds to the 
 active .voice of the Latin ; the latter is an inversion, and 
 answers to the passive. 
 
 Transitives may become intransitive verbs, but intransi- 
 tives can never become transitives, or be used intran- 
 sitively. 
 
 The English has no passive verb; where then is the 
 neuter? Verbs are neither active nor passive; they are 
 in a state of rest. 
 
 Sum and sim were used by the Latins as formatives of 
 the passive voice, joined to the participle past, the tense in 
 the active voice deriving from eo — poss — sum. 
 
 Most of the Greek verbs had a neutral as well as an 
 active and passive sense, which is oftener expressed by the 
 active than the passive voice. 
 
 The Greek middle voice was intended to express parti- 
 cular meaning. Doing anything generally was expressed 
 by the active voice, but the middle was used with a dis- 
 tinct reference to the agent. 
 
 In fact, what is meant by all these voices is a mere 
 grammatical fiction, importing no more than the natural 
 and inverted form of the subject and object, introduced 
 for the sake of variety. This remark extends from the 
 primeval languages of man to every dialect spoken to this 
 period. 
 
 Active verbs are said to become neuter by Hermes ; as 
 A knows not how to read, implying deficient energy or 
 attribute. 
 
 The Welsh is said to have a passive voice, and Grimm 
 says that the Mceso-Gothic alone of the Teutonic tongues 
 preserves any remains of a passive or middle voice. 
 
19 
 
 We think that verbs auxiliary, neuter, and impersonal, are 
 improper appellations, and hostile to common sense. All 
 verbs vulgarly termed neuter have been, and are still, 
 when occasion requires, used in an active signification. 
 Abstract ideas are improperly so named, and many words 
 are barbarous appellations, alien to nature and analogy. 
 Even signs of tenses ought to be exploded, and verbs im- 
 personal put into the same category with verbs neuter. 
 
 Injuria factum itur, an injury is about to be done, says 
 A. Gellius, B. x. c. 14, and B. viii. c. 1. This is styled a 
 neuter passive. Again, Vapulant pueri a prseceptore. The 
 word vapulo derives from a-rroWvu) — pereo, and it means 
 also doleo-ploro. The v is only the digamma, yawoXu. 
 
 We conclude, therefore, that there are no neuter verbs 
 in any language, all are active, even Esse. Neuters had 
 cases after them, but now they are elegantly suppressed, 
 as, K I sat me down and wept." s< He laid him down the 
 lubber fiend.' 5 — Milton. Je me leve ; je me tient debout. 
 
 Away then with verbs neuter, which have for ages lulled 
 the sleeping tribe. 
 
 iC Omnis motus actio aut passio, nihil est medium." 
 
 Verbs neuter never existed in any language any more 
 than verbs impersonal, which have their nominatives, as 
 Non te hsec pudent — Quern neque pudent quicquam. And 
 in the phrase Poenitet me fratris, it is only Poena fratris 
 habet me. The same in French, Pai honte de mon frere, 
 that is, La honte de mon frere me fait peine. 
 
 The verb impersonal is thought to have no nominative 
 before it or him, and the word it, or there is, is commonly 
 his sign, as decet, it behoves — oportet aliquem, there must 
 be somebody. Should it have neither of these words 
 before him or it, then the words which seem to be the nomi- 
 native case shall be such case as the verb impersonal will 
 have after him or it, as me oportet, mihi licet. Est adolescen- 
 tis. Statur a me, qui agitur, qui or quomodo vales ? How 
 
 c 2 
 
20 
 
 do you ? The nominative follows the verb to be, but when 
 impersonal the oblique case, as mihi licet. 
 
 Every word in a proposition is a distinct noun, and a 
 common affix in one language is frequently a common 
 prefix in another. The arrangement which constitutes 
 the agent in one language, will cause the noun to be 
 patient in another, and on occasions the connection is 
 supplied by the mind, as Est adolescentis, adolescenti. 
 Statur ab adolescente, poenitet adolescentem, &c. 
 
 <( For him, thus prostrate at thy feet I lay." Here Dr. 
 Lowth says, it is used for lie, and it is so, and classically 
 used. Dr. Beattie considers it a barbarism by Pope, who, 
 he says, confounds the neuter verb to lie, and the active 
 to lay. 
 
 When the subject and object are the same person, the 
 object is elegantly suppressed, as Move nurse — -lay down 
 dog — for lay thee down. Hence the object maybe expressed 
 or suppressed at will, or necessity. Sit thee down, lie 
 thee down, are common in English and French — assied- 
 toi — coucbe-toi — they say also, asseyez P enfant. 
 
 Words then in effect have no government, the construc- 
 tion of words being entirely dependent on national com- 
 pact, or the custom of the learned, to whom we are in- 
 debted for every excellence in diction. These examples 
 reinforce the position. 
 
 The rules of our holy religion, from which we are 
 infinitely swerved. — Tillotson. 
 
 Was entered in a conspiracy. — Addison. 
 
 To vie charities and erect the reputation of one man on 
 another. — A tterbury. 
 
 To agree the sacred with the profane Chronology. — 
 Temple. 
 
 How would the God my toils succeed. — Pope, 
 
 I must premise with these three circumstances. — Swift. 
 
 Dr. Lowth objects to all these sentences, but what such 
 
21 
 
 authorities have established, becomes the language of the 
 country — and language is no more than compact. 
 
 On the Copula or Verb Esse. 
 
 Sum and dfit are the universal copula of all verbs and are 
 equivalent to yaw, the root of yivofiai, yiu), yivu), yaho/mai, 
 &c. To be is called the substantive-verb, it is existence, 
 the universal genus to which all things at all times may be 
 referred, for the copula expresses the general genus, and 
 hence its name verb-substantive. 
 
 This copula sometimes refers to several subjects taken 
 individually, then the copula may be singular, but taken 
 collectively it should be plural ; also when one of the sub- 
 jects is plural, it must be plural. 
 
 When several subjects are enumerated copulatively or 
 disjunctively, the copula and the relative must be plural. 
 This essential in composition has been misrepresented by 
 our writers of elements, hence the errors which pervade our 
 Greek and Latin institutes. 
 
 Words which have not bent to our grammatical laws 
 are termed irregular and anomalous, quae ab analogia 
 prorsus recedunt; but how is that possible when they 
 existed before the law from which they are said to recede ? 
 The verb being on a noun with a pronoun affixed, in- 
 cluding in it a connecting preposition, constitutes the real 
 copula between the subject and the attribute. Doctrina mei, 
 the teaching of me, includes the proposition Ego doceo. The 
 personal pronoun is in the oblique case at the close of the 
 verb. The nominal subject is a mere accident and agrees 
 with personality, and the combined proposition shews 
 whether the energy is dividual or individual. 
 
 The union of the personal subject with the copula and 
 predicate expresses a proposition, or forms a real proposi- 
 tion, and by this union the subject is put in possession of 
 an individual energy. 
 
22 
 
 This union was dictated by nature, for the copula and 
 predicate are properties of the subject and constitute 
 part of its character. The copula is attracted by the index 
 of personality or agrees with it. A substantive, infinitive 
 mood or sentence are sometimes expressed without the 
 person, and in such case the student is counselled to 
 resort to the person which always attracts the copula, the 
 rest being in apposition with the person — a tree is known 
 by its fruit ; they are in this room with the doors shut, 
 clausis foribus nobis non obstantibus. 
 
 Universal language contains but one copula, and that 
 one imparts motion ; whether it be applied to the noun or 
 the verb its essence is motion, and that motion is govern- 
 ment, sometimes implied, and sometimes expressed by a 
 preposition. He loves me — he is fond of me. Universal 
 copula unites two terms, as John's father. The general 
 essence may be omitted, as I go — John's hat. 
 
 When the subject of the proposition is convertible into 
 he, she, it, the verb or copula must be singular, as the 
 assembly of the wicked has inclosed, and not have inclosed 
 me, as in the Psalm. The predicate is inclosed, but every 
 individual separately considered does not inclose me, but 
 the collective body, hence the verb ought to be singular. 
 "When the predicate of a proposition cannot be referred 
 to the several individuals virtually contained in a collective 
 term, the verb must be singular. 
 
 The verb indicates the energy, definite or indefinite, 
 complete or incomplete. 
 
 "When the predicate refers to the subject distributively 
 the copula must be plural and relative, but when the sub- 
 ject is singular in expression and singular in idea, the verb 
 (copula) and relative must be singular. Hence several in- 
 finitives are followed by a copula singular with singular 
 elegance. To visit the sick, to relieve the distressed, &c. 
 is a God-like employment. 
 
23 
 
 The verb l=rt, according to the Hebrew, is of both numbers* 
 and was so in English, as My people is foolish, they have 
 not known me. The wages of Sin is death. The lips is 
 parcel of the mind. Here wages is the nominative and the 
 subject— and people is not a collective general, for the 
 attribute foolish is applied to each member, and so requires 
 a plural verb. — It should be are. When two substantives 
 have the universal copula between, it is a maxim in Greek 
 that the substantive preceded by the article is the subject, 
 and the one without the article is the predicate, as the 
 wages of Sin is death. In Greek the article precedes 
 the wages, therefore wages is the subject, but there are 
 propositions where no article is introduced. Ta yap 
 oxpwvia rrjg a/uLapriag Oavarog. The predicate cannot 
 become the subject, the one being a part, the other the 
 whole. 
 
 After two substantives the verb may be either singular 
 or plural, as justice and bounty procures friends. Rage 
 and anger hurrieth on the mind. Honour, glory, immor- 
 tality is promised to virtue. The praise and glory of others 
 uses to be envied. 
 
 "When the energy is confined to the subject, the subject 
 only is expressed, as I sit, sleep, &c. To be and to 
 have, being essentially the same, both imply motion — as 
 I am at it — he is full aged — I have it — I have made it 
 clear. 
 
 In a language where personality is expressed always, as 
 I am, existence, individuality, the copula ought not to be 
 varied, and such is English ; but writers of elements not 
 considering the distinction between inflected and non -in- 
 flected tongues, and having been trained to inflection, have 
 erroneously supposed that language cannot subsist without 
 inflection. 
 
 In all inflected languages equality is determined by the 
 termination— hence the subject is justly and elegantly 
 
24 
 
 omitted, as amat (illam.) But in a natural language like 
 English, personality is symbolised by its own attribute of 
 specification, and rejects every other, as A loves B. Every 
 other has been redundant and unanalogical, adverse to 
 philosophy and hostile to common sense. 
 
 Logicians maintain that Esse is the only verb, and 
 that all other words, denominated verbs, by extension are 
 resolved by the same verb and participle of such word, as 
 Currit he was or is running. But such is not the fact ; 
 for we say not, she is loving — but she is in love. The verb 
 Sum expresses the time and not the participle. 
 
 If Esse affect not the subsecutive term how can any other 
 word, termed verb, possess such influence ? The verb esse 
 is frequently attended by different cases, according to 
 different views of the mind, as Rex erat iEneas. Vestrum 
 est dare, vincere nostrum. Boni judicis est facere con- 
 jecturam. Magni mihi erunt tuse liters© — of much account 
 will be, &c. Me nullius consilii fuisse confiteor — I con- 
 fess I formed no plan — Natura tu illi pater es, consilio ego 
 — Magnse mihi molestise fuit — it caused me much ennui 
 or annoy. 
 
 In these examples, erat does not affect iEneas. Bex 
 and iEneas are merely in apposition or concord. Nor has 
 est influence over dare, which latter is equivalent to a sub- 
 stantive, and is in apposition with nostrum. 
 
 In these examples, the cases are independent on the 
 verb esse. Then must all case be independent on other 
 words unphilosophically termed verbs. 
 
 Away then with the rule that esse has the same case 
 after it as before it, and has always a nominative after 
 it unless it be in the infinitive mood. These are instances 
 to the contrary. Woe is me — well is him — well is thee. 
 Dunelm X. Scriptores, vol. i. 35, writes, Wei his the — Bene 
 est tibi. Thou is modern compared to the, spelled thee, 
 to distinguish it from the article the, both having the same 
 
25 
 
 origin. Suffiseth to the, these trewe conclusions. Chaucer. 
 — Again, teach, the to worken. Priestley's Grammar 
 remarks, p. 104, the verb to be has always a nominative 
 after it. This refutes the assertion, " Ero tibi in patrem, 
 et tu eris mihi in filium.'^ Lond and the see hen of rounde 
 schapp and forme. — Sir J. Mandeville, 
 
 The verb to be, sum, is found in Persian and Sanskrit 
 and Keltic. As is the verbal root, whence asmi — esmi — 
 ilfii — esum — sum — ys in Keltic; from which the Greek 
 and Latin are obviously derived — as is seen by the accom- 
 panying paradigm. 
 
 Singular. Dual. Plural. 
 
 Sanskrit. Asmi, asi, asti, Srah, stah, sthah, Small, Stha Santi. 
 
 Greek tlfiif eig, lore, iarov, eaTov. kafxev, tare, siai. 
 
 Latin sum, es, est. sumus, estis, sunt. 
 
 Subjunctive Mood. 
 
 Sanskrit. Syam, syat, syavah. Syavah, syatam. Syama, syata, syati. 
 
 Greek. elrjv, tirjg, elrj. tirjrov, ur\Tt\v. eirjfisv,eir]TS, eirjuav. 
 
 Latin. Sim, sis, sit. „ Simus, sitis, sint. 
 
 Assam, aseet, aseet. „ Asma, asta, asan. 
 
 Essem, esses, esset. „ Essemus, essetis, essent. 
 
 In the Keltic or Gaelic language Taim is I am — 
 
 Ta me, I am, Ta sinn, We are 
 ta tu, „ ta sib, ye are 
 
 ta se, „ ta siad, they are. 
 
 In Sanskrit there are two verbs substantive, viz.: Asmi 
 which is esse, and is derived from, as its root, and another 
 word in Sanskrit whose root is Bhu — whence fuo in Latin 
 and (pvu), <pvvaL. Persian, whose ground- work is Sanskrit, 
 has budan and am, corresponding to asmi. These verbs 
 are defective, and it is singular that the substantive verb to 
 be, is irregular in all languages, or defective. 
 
 The Teutonic has ist and beon, hence to be. The Latin 
 esse is a combination of these two words, and all derived 
 from the Celtic bhu or budan, having its source from the 
 
26 
 
 Sanskrit ; and in these words are evinced the direct affinity 
 between Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Persian, Sclavonian, 
 Lithuanian and Moeso-Gothic. 
 
 Even the verb substantive in Welsh is cognate with the 
 Sanskrit Bhu, and the Persian budan, this verb in the 
 infinitive mood is Bod. The ending av in Welsh stands 
 for am in Erse — the v is equivalent to mh, or is a secondary 
 form of m. 
 
 The other tenses of the declaratory verb in Sanskrit are 
 inflected from the root B-hoo to be, in which tenses b-h 
 is changed into its cognate consonants f and v, and hence 
 the compound imitative Latin tenses — fui-fueram, fuissem, 
 fuero, as well as the infinitive form of the second Latin 
 declaratory verb fore, on whose root they are inflected. 
 Greece and Rome substituted lio for zlfii — sum and fui for 
 eo, the original form of verbs were in m as esum, inquam, 
 instead of eo. 
 
 The affinity between the Western and Eastern tongues 
 is such, that it is suggestive of the idea that an Indian 
 tribe in its extensive migratory deviations reached Italy, 
 and engrafted inflections on the Celtic, whence originated 
 Latin idioms — in the same manner as Sanskrit was trans- 
 formed into Bengalee, Latin into Italian, and Pictish into 
 Anglo-Saxon. 
 
 In German the declaratory verb to be has distinct radicals, 
 as ich bin, er ist, wir seyn. Ich war, ich werde, and in 
 English this verb contains as many radicals as inflections, 
 and it is singular that these very anomalies arise from a 
 studious care to prevent confusion. 
 
 On Tenses. 
 
 Tense is the contraction of a phrase and not time. It 
 
 is a concrete, containing subject, copula and predicate. 
 
 A term is a word which limits a combination of ideas to 
 
27 
 
 one substance. A termination is an adjunct which ex- 
 presses every particle and every accident or propriety in 
 human speech, it comprehends every nominal accident and 
 particle. 
 
 What have been termed nouns and verbs are in fact 
 conjugates. In artificial language no simple words are to 
 be found. There is an individual, a single, and a dividual 
 term, or one shared with another. Every inflection is the 
 form of a form, or the contraction of a phrase, and is 
 resolved by any language that has not adopted inflection, 
 for the essay is a phrase, and the tense by inflection is the 
 contraction of a phrase. 
 
 The earliest form of the Greek declaratory verb was 
 wholly active, as eo I go, and it is under this form that it 
 has lent its aid to all the active constructions of the verbal 
 system. Perhaps it was the want of a specific declaratory 
 form in the earlier periods of the Greek language that 
 provoked the adoption of numerous synonymes, and lastly 
 of eoj which added to a considerable affinity of meaning, a 
 degree of laconism which the other did not possess, and 
 hence it was adopted by the Greeks and imitated by the 
 Latins. 
 
 The first departure of language from its natural state 
 was the artificial but happy innovation by inflection, which 
 is the creature of institution, and was invented for variety 
 of sound, and more concise form of expression. In regard 
 of sound it may be so, but in the certainty of expressing 
 meaning, we do not acquiesce. So aware of this were the 
 Greeks, that they retained the preposition and neglected 
 the case, considering it no more than a termination. The 
 Romans took an opposite course, they slighted the preposi- 
 tion, and directed their attention to the case. Hence, 
 they were allowed the advantage of concinnity of execution ; 
 the Greeks the certainty of expressing the sense. 
 
 When a command is given or a request made, the radix 
 
28 
 
 of the verb is used, but the sentence is elliptical — Ex. : 
 Go thither immediately, is to say, I command you to go — 
 a request, as Come to-morrow, is, I entreat you come to- 
 morrow. 
 
 The requisite or imperative mood has no first person of 
 the singular, because it is absurd to give commands to one- 
 self — say Hermes. But if there be a third person, why not 
 a first ? As eamus — let we go, that is, sine ut eamus, 
 elliptically — as love we is now obsolete. 
 
 Is and has, hath, are continually used for plural and 
 singular, and are so used analogically, and like was and 
 were are employed for variety. Wast and wert are mere 
 technical inflections of two different radicals both in the 
 indicative mood. It were is employed for it is ; the root is 
 the Saxon worthan, as woe worth the day — woe be to the 
 day. The same is worden in German, and is used by 
 Chaucer. See Ezek. xxxv. 2. The trees hath leaves, 
 and thus is mankind or manbrode of matrimony sprung. 
 — P. Ploughman. Here hath and is are used plurally. 
 " Those who wish for distinction forsake the vulgar, 
 when the vulgar is right — the whole people is the vul- 
 gar." — Dr. Johnson. This people are descended of the 
 Chaldseans. 
 
 Innumerable instances occur in ancient and modern 
 works in which they are used as such. — The idea that 
 when two subjects coupled by and occur, they are applied 
 to one and understood to the other has been condemned 
 by grammarians. 
 
 In these phrases is ought to be are — not to believe rashly 
 is the sinews of wisdom. 
 
 To be content with what one has is the greatest and 
 most certain riches. 
 
 Mr. Harris asserts that the subject and predicate are 
 convertible — as there can be no intermediate opinion, and 
 it is obviously erroneous in application to each of the 
 
29 
 
 extremes, it must be erroneous of itself. A transposition of 
 terms is frequent, but tbe verb and subject on such 
 occasions must correspond in number. He reiterates an 
 assertion that the predicate becomes the subject by trans- 
 position which would lead the student into a labyrinth of 
 error. 
 
 Art and wert were wont to be written ared and wered. 
 Was and were are used plurally and for variety, and are 
 used in the singular number. So was also James and John 
 the sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Was 
 is now appropriated to the singular which was formerly 
 applied to the plural number. 
 
 As is in Hebrew is used singularly and plurally, may 
 not the Greeks take this authority from the Hebrew? 
 They apply the verb singular, the essential verb, to a 
 plural subject, and a plural verb to a singular subject, 
 which looks anomalous, but we have shewn that our an- 
 cestors used is and the terminations s and th singularly 
 and plurally, as these examples prove. 
 
 The sun beams do ripen all fruits and addeth to them a 
 sweetness or fulness. 
 
 When a warlike state grows soft and effeminate, they 
 may be sure of a war. 
 
 It is not true that was anciently said, a place sheweth 
 the war. 
 
 The sun beams tanneth the skin and in some places 
 turneth it black. 
 
 The heat or beams of the sun doth take away the smell 
 of flowers. 
 
 The syllepsis figure of speech, is when one is taken for 
 many or many for one. 
 
 The Greeks made the existence plural and the verb 
 singular. Until some of the learned can assign a sub- 
 stantial reason why the third person in the verb is varied, 
 as loves, and the rest not, one might plead for the second 
 
30 
 
 method, that is that there be no inflection. A little prac- 
 tice makes it familiar, and we should see analogy triumph 
 over absurd custom ; but analogy was not consulted when 
 the plural of verbs and nouns were made to terminate 
 differently. 
 
 Having made s or es, the symbol of plurality, was it 
 analogical to symbolise individuality or singularity in the 
 same way ? Poets frequently disregard inflection in order 
 to be natural and elegant ; this is visible in every language, 
 but no reason can be assigned for varying the third person 
 or the second person of verbs but tyrant custom, for 
 natural language rejects all inflection or concretion. 
 
 The apostrophic termination s is Hebrew, applicable to 
 either number, and was so used with us, as vulgarly, Where 
 is my boots ? 
 
 As it is knowe how meny maner peple beth in this ilonde, 
 there beth also of so meny peple longages and tonges. 
 — Higden, translated by John de Trevisa, 1385. 
 
 Th, and s are continually used for plurality, as bulls and 
 goats sanctified to the purifying — Great pains hath been 
 taken. — Pope. I am the Lord that maketh all things, that 
 spreadeth the heavens by myself. Here maketh is singular 
 and agrees with I. 
 
 Did St. Luke, viii. 45, express himself in English as 
 he does in Greek ol o^Ach avvixovai ere icat airoOXifiovai, 
 &c. The multitude throng thee and press thee and sayest 
 thou, &c. — there would be no need of collective sense. 
 
 The Hebrew and Asiatic tongues allow no present or 
 imperfect tenses, only the preterite and the future, and 
 this is the case with all Shemitic tongues. In Hebrew there 
 is but one conjugation, which is divided into seven voices or 
 moods. It says not, He learns, but is learning. The 
 particle wa gives the verb future time, characteristic with 
 the Greek aorists or time indefinite. 
 
 Primitive language had no present or imperfect, but 
 
31 
 
 used the preterperfect and preterpluperfect, formed on the 
 same principles in Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, and Teutonic. 
 
 A partial repetition of the verbal root d added to the 
 preterit, is only the verb do according to the learned 
 Grimm. See chapter on Do, 
 
 The present and preterperfect are equal to any pair of 
 tenses — IlsTroima and liroifoa. I have done it, or I did it. 
 iojpaKa and a$ov. I have just seen and I saw it once. 
 When you have seen or done you can do no more ; what 
 difference is there then except philosophical or imaginary ? 
 
 There is no difference between ire and esse. Amare is 
 substitute for amasse, amavisse, ama-ire, or the aoristus 
 seolicus and the aorists — the shadow of a shade. 
 
 In the eight tenses, the present and imperfect express 
 every thing. Do you go to-morrow ? The Hebrews use the 
 preterperfect and pluperfect where the moderns use the 
 present and imperfect. They considered time as on the 
 wing, and passing while one talks of it, 
 
 Dum loquimur, fugit invida 
 ^Etas 
 
 The tenses go in pairs. Present and imperfect, perfect 
 and preterperfect ; two aorists, two futures. The passive 
 is put sometimes for the active, as sKoviro for hove, IpiZerai 
 for IpiZeig, and inversely the active for the passive, as 
 €ov\evelv for tsovXevivOai, and many others. 
 
 The Greek structure is very various, being partly San- 
 skrit, Hebrew, and probably Egyptian, as an Egyptian 
 colony settled in Greece, and took with them the owl, the 
 symbol of wisdom, which became the armorial ensign of 
 Athens. 
 
 All Greek and Latin inflection depend on one symbol. It 
 would appear that the transformations in language are in- 
 credible, for almost every number, case, tense, degree, mood, 
 each is used for the other in prose and verse. Plural for 
 singular, substantive for adjective, comparative for positive 
 
32 
 
 and superlative ; dual for plural, and vice versa, and case 
 for case — relative for reciprocal and inversely. Passive for 
 active — indicative for optative mood, while the infinitives 
 as well as the aorists were used for all times and tenses — 
 genders were commutable, the antecedent and relative in 
 some cases by attraction. In fine, every grammatical acci- 
 dent may be converted into another , and the sense pre- 
 served, number for number, case for case, gender for 
 gender, as miser animi, animo, animum are all equivalent. 
 The mode of expression depends on the will of the writer. 
 Ex.: Inmentemand in mentevary only inform, inurbem, 
 and in urbe, &c. So that the application of the accidents 
 depends solely on the taste of the author. This is styled 
 Enallage, which changes the voice, word, and tense, and 
 proves that the meaning of words is not affected by techni- 
 cality. Virgil uses the present and past in horret and 
 refugit for refugit. Hence substantives are put for adjec- 
 tives, denominatives for primitives, verbs for nouns, voice 
 for voice active or passive or middle — tense for tense, per- 
 son for person, all such varieties are found in the best 
 authors, and confirm the Horatian canon, "usus quern 
 penes/' &c. 
 
 The Latins copied nearly all the syntax of the Greeks — 
 the language is almost CEolic Greek, so that in general 
 structure they coincide. 
 
 Plautus has vivimus vita/em sevum. Caesar in Anticato, 
 Unius superbise dominatuque. Cicero has Equites vero da- 
 turos illius dies poenas. Vix decima parte die reliqua. Id 
 genus alia, and ejus generis alia are equivalent. Si adsis 
 aliter, for si adesses aliter sentires. Sto or statur a me. Pars 
 abiit for abiere. Uterque deluditur or deluduntur. Scio 
 uxorem datwm. Hanc rem tibi ov&tum esse a nobis volo. 
 Ubi est ilk scetus, &c. Volo esse clemens ; utor libris 
 quibus habeo. This is more Grsecorum. 
 
 In plurals, es, eth, or s was affixed as in verbs, applicable 
 
33 
 
 to all persons, as says I or sayeth I— greeteth I— greeteth 
 Mary, or I do greet Mary, and this corresponds to the 
 Saxon of or to, (see chapter under these words.) Es can 
 not claim a third person any more than other persons. 
 Aristark, my ever Caytyf, (prisoner) greetith you wel. 
 WiclyfFs Bible. Colossians iv. 10. And wytethe wel — 
 you know well. — Sir Jo. Mandeville. 
 
 Analogically speaking, as our nouns end plurally in s, 
 so should the plural of verbs, but custom has determined 
 otherwise, because the concurrence of ss is unpleasant. 
 The horses runs — hence in runs s was suppressed and made 
 more agreeable to the auricular organ. 
 
 " Mercii that beeth men of middel Engoland understock- 
 ed." Here we see that eth or ith was common to every 
 person, singular or plural, even in the imperative mood. 
 Elfric, Abbot, greeteth Sigeferth freondlice. After all the 
 rules that can be given the student must be directed by 
 custom, on which composition depends, and not on gram- 
 matical rules — there is not so great a discrepance in com- 
 position as is imagined — it is on the surface, for the accord, 
 like truth, lies in the well. 
 
 For some usith — John de Trevisa — and in Douglas B. ii. 
 p. 59, the word seis is written for seith, sees. |C Quhare 
 towris thou seis fall down." So written because the pronoun 
 thou is expressed . He uses doith as rt my muse shal now be 
 clene contemplative and solitaire as doith the bird in a cage," 
 and he terminates the plural and genitive in is, as on 
 Virgilis post I fix for ever more. Again : Ye writaris al 
 and gentil readeris eik. 
 
 The letters tk, which is only the verb do, are found in 
 many nouns like birth, warmth, depth— and again without 
 the h, as frost, lost. These letters are used in Hebrew and 
 the Shemitic languages with or without a vowel termina- 
 tion. — See Notes and Queries. 
 
 When language is defective in variety it is injudicious 
 
34 
 
 to resign any mode of expression transmitted to us by our 
 eminent writers. Some are condemned as obsolete, but 
 we must be careful of tbis condemnation and ultimate 
 loss, if tbe terms are justified by autbority, and sucb was 
 the practice of the ancients. 
 
 Wherever more ways than one present themselves to 
 convey the same idea, the Greek and Latin authors avail 
 themselves of them, and that for variety which is ever 
 pleasing. 
 
 Ex.: Scio quod films meus amet, for filium meum amare. 
 Probabo quod non sit pudica, for Illam non esse 
 
 pudicam. 
 Misit certos qui classem arcesserent, vel, ut, quod, 
 
 cum, quum. 
 Classem arcessendi causa, vel ergo, vel classis ar- 
 
 cessendse causa. 
 Ad classem arcessendum or arcessendam, vel accer- 
 situm classem, vel classem arcessiturus. 
 Again : Nostri et Vestri is elliptical for nostri generis. 
 Vestri ordinis aut aliquid simile. Est mihi ludere ; c'est a moi 
 a jouer. All verbs apud antiquos admitted an accusative 
 case, as Mea utuntur bona, fungor officium — Potior urbem 
 — Misereor vicem tui. Omnia quae curant Senes memine- 
 runt. Grammatical rules do not always reject the accusa- 
 tive case ; parco is said to govern the dative, but this does 
 not exclude the accusative, as omnia parcunt seni. Csetera 
 quae volumus uti, grseca mercemur fide ; here quae and not 
 quibus is used. 
 
 Sometimes the cause is omitted and sometimes the effect, 
 as in these coincident terms, Sinite illas gloria frui. 
 iEsopus finxit consolandi gratia. Veniente, Pluto avertit 
 oculos. Opes invisse sunt forti viro. Evasit puteo. Abiit 
 Roma, &c. 
 
 Inversion should be studied and observed ; all connexion 
 depends on the agency of the mind, as Certi certius est, it 
 
35 
 
 is certain as can be. Veniam quam citissimum, I will come 
 with all speed. Officiis certare— to strain courtesies. 
 
 The verb may be applied in various ways as avertit se — 
 ilium — avertit — avertitur — avertitur a me, se, illis — sacri- 
 ficatur hostia, the victim is sacrificing. Nox precipitat, 
 prsecipitatur ; and this view of the verb resolves many seem- 
 ing difficulties in the verbal construction of both the 
 learned tongues. 
 
 Had H. Tooke adverted to the official terms, shall, 
 ought, may, instead of the ambiguous terms " to be and 
 about to be," he had not made these interrogations. What 
 is looser or more awkward than our about to be, about to 
 come, to do, &c, or our equivocal is to be, come, do— for 
 futurus, venturus, facturus? Now these expressions are 
 equivalent to doit etre — venir — faire. 
 
 Anciently audiam, transiam, sciam, &c. were written 
 audibo, scibo, &c. So of capiam, capiem, and of all verbs 
 of the third conjugation wherein the i is not found before 
 the termination am or em, — it being suppressed euphonies 
 gratia. 
 
 Facies ne hoc, facies hoc ? Volo. I will. We say so 
 also, elliptically, without adding a verb, as I will — for I 
 will do it. 
 
 Knowledge of the future comes from that of the past, 
 and that again from the present which is the lowest 
 species of knowledge, the first in perception but common 
 to all animated beings. 
 
 I shall go, means I ought to go ; but if I should go, 
 means if it happen that I go. Now in I should go an 
 ellipsis occurs and would otherwise be incorrect. I should 
 go involves, if I acted as I ought. If I should go is, in 
 genuine English, if I go, I will inform you. Should one 
 say, if I should go, the sentence strictly speaking should 
 be, if I should go, I would inform you of it, for should and 
 will may correspond according to universal analogy, the 
 
 d 2 
 
36 
 
 terms being indefinite or equivalent to the aorist in Greek, 
 as the name implies. 
 
 Dr. Lowth says it is confounding the tenses, but he 
 seems to have pretermitted the aorists, in his inquiries, 
 which as the term imports may be applied to any period, 
 present, past, future, without the designation of time. 
 
 In both the learned languages cases and tenses are far 
 from uniform ; the same may be predicated of all gram- 
 matical accidents, which shews that a technicality changes 
 not the word, as all languages evince. 
 
 Construction is divided into regular and irregular ; the 
 former when all meant is expressed, the latter when less 
 is expressed than implied, and this is the law of every 
 learned production. 
 
 Expression may vary and the tense and sense be pre- 
 served, because technicality should have no influence on 
 an author's meaning. Every writer has a style of his 
 own, for language is the character of the author and his 
 age too, and conveys his meaning in different words ; yet 
 in the meaning all styles coincide, although a word some- 
 times changed for another may alter the intention. 
 
 Composition is universal ; words depend on usage and 
 forms vary, but the sense is immutable. 
 
 Eo domum, I go home. Amo proximum, I love my 
 neighbour. Here the idea of motion is the same in both. 
 Language is arbitrary or all languages would coincide, 
 and much connection in discourse depends on particles 
 expressed or understood, as in eo domum, the preposition 
 ad is understood. Scio iilam velle benefacere in future. 
 
 The word ibo says H. Tooke consists of three words, viz. 
 two verbs and a pronoun Hie, go, wol, or will, ich, I. Iboul, 
 ibou, ibo, for Iw, eljua. 
 
 Now iturum is composed of the symbol of motion E re- 
 peated — ire, ire — so ibo, to be consistent with its roots 
 should be compounded of ire and vadere, written badere, 
 
37 
 
 whence the initials of these two terms of motion with the 
 first vowel of ego, constitute the verb ibo. 
 
 This word is not properly and radically translated I 
 shall or will go, but as in French Je vais aller, literally 
 going to go, as legam, audiam, I am about to read, hear. 
 
 The termination am, which is Celtic, being correspondent 
 to the Greek a^i, abbreviated into a/x, or if repetition of 
 the motion is desired we might say le-gam, audi-am, are 
 compounded of legere and ambulo and should be written 
 lectum ambulo, eo ambulatum, I go a walking, which is a 
 natural expression. 
 
 In Welsh there is no present tense in attributive verbs ; 
 the want is supplied as in Greek, by circumlocution, e. g. 
 ElfjiX lv Ti$ $i\uv, I am loving. The paragogic particle 0t 
 is thought to be a corruption of the dative case in &rj0e. 
 Hence the word in Latin vis, strength— f becoming 0; the 
 modern Greeks end words in <[>g as ^cktiXs^q for ^acriXtve. 
 
 The Latin future in bo is derived from the verb sub- 
 stantive and is analogous to the Anglo-Saxon beo 9 bys, 
 byth, which gives no future tense but by convention. 
 
 Aristarchus avows he could not find a future tense in 
 any language, because one can not act before the time of 
 acting arrives, and there is a contingency in all futures. 
 All time is present, for the past is gone, and the future 
 uncertain. 
 
 The present and past time are commutable, as J'ai bientot 
 fait, for j'aurai bientot fait, and j'aurais is the contraction of 
 a phrase as we have remarked, and so are all tenses. 
 
 The future tenses are wanting in all Teutonic languages, 
 and Dr. Prichard observes there is a first or perfect future 
 and also a second future in Sanskrit. 
 
 In Greek the present is used for the future tense by 
 poets, and that is only a mere change in the accent or 
 emphasis of the present ; and the future in Greek is only 
 a first future a little varied, and that the sense does not 
 differ in the two said futures. 
 
Damm thought the neutral sense in Greek verbs was the 
 same as the active, except that the pronoun or substantive 
 was understood, which may account for almost any verb 
 having a neutral as well as an active or passive sense. 
 
 Many facts have been overlooked, have been deemed 
 ambiguous or not understood, and the science of language 
 and its intricacies unexplored. Had this science been 
 duly cherished, we had not been involved in the darkness 
 of error, for in some particulars generations have retro- 
 graded by reason of the incompetence of those who never 
 learned the sound and sterling principles of even their 
 predecessors. 
 
 There are ambiguities of expression in these phrases. 
 
 I can not find one of my books, which may mean one 
 particular book, or all together; to understand which a cer- 
 tain definite expression of the tone of voice should be 
 employed — many such difficulties arise, and on this recourse 
 is to be had to some similar proposition by which this 
 ambiguity may be avoided, as one of my books I can not 
 find— one is missing. 
 
 Again : The eagle killed the hen and eat her in her own 
 nest. He sent him to kill his own father. Cepi columbam 
 in nido suo, ejus, illius, ipsius. 
 
 These and many such, the learned Valla thought to be 
 sophistical. Quis not intelligat tua Salute continere sua? 
 Salute tua is here taken actively. An vero hoc pronihilo 
 putas? In quo quidem pro amicitia tua jure dolere soleo. 
 Here amicitia tua is taken passively ; Valla wished to read 
 it amicitia tui, but it is Greek idiom. 
 
 In ambiguous phrases the sense determines the meaning, 
 which in all languages induced the use of pronouns reci- 
 procal and consequently the passive voice, but wherever 
 there is a periphrasis or perplexed meaning with the 
 reciprocal it ought to be reduced to its natural order to see 
 which is the nominative to the verb. 
 
 Dr. Priestley's apology for a verb singular where the 
 
39 
 
 terms contain kindred ideas is inadmissible; for they 
 enfeeble style and are avoided by writers of elegance or 
 precision. If used, they ought to conform to the general 
 laws of syntax and are not one word, because they contain 
 kindred ideas — any one might equally say, that the sons 
 of the king are one and the same person, because they 
 are brothers. 
 
 By a simple conversion we can convey the most complex 
 ideas which perpetually recur in inflected language. Such 
 advantages ought not to be relinquished, as it is said the 
 Sublime Being being the subject, the auxiliary may is 
 suppressed in the phrase, The Lord bless thee and keep 
 thee — but the phrase with the pronoun is obsolete. 
 Again : Unto which he vouchsafed to bring us all, or rather 
 vouchsafe he to bring us all. 
 
 This is a beauty not to be surpassed, perhaps paralleled 
 in any language; it is agreeable to analogy, and can not 
 be sacrificed without detriment to the most simple and 
 elegant of all modern languages, the British. 
 
 Op the Perfect Tense. 
 
 Our ancestors indulged in pretention in lieu of the 
 participle past, which is very elegant diction — He has rode 
 a race — has wrote well — They were all smote seriously — 
 He has writ it — Some ill has befell him — Greatly mistook 
 the affair — The pleader has spoke — Has forgot his shame 
 — The dog has bit him — Has strove to surpass him — Has 
 drove them out. There is scarce a verb where the perfect 
 tense can not be used in lieu of the past for variety — and 
 to deprive the student of universal composition is to 
 withhold from him one object of his literary pursuits. In 
 Latin vixit which ought to mean he lived, implies the con- 
 trary, he is dead, which is a completive power of the 
 tense. Periods of nature and human affairs are maintained 
 by reciprocal successions of contraries, as calm with tcm- 
 
40 
 
 pest — day and night- — hence the completion of one con- 
 trary is put for the commencement of another, as fuit 
 means he is dead. 
 
 Our elegant writers preferred the second form of the verb, 
 that is the perfect to the past participle, and in that they 
 evinced taste and j udgment . In this the Latin was followed, 
 which seems to have escaped Dr. Lowth, who criticises 
 pretention, and gravitates towards pedantry. Sometimes 
 the imperfect is used for the perfect, as Iwoiu for ewoivcrs, 
 faciebat for fecit, which is very graceful and indicative of 
 modesty. 
 
 Dr. Priestley thought there was an ambiguity in the use of 
 the preterite, as the same word may express a thing either 
 doing or done. Ex. : I went to see the child dressed, that 
 is dressed or dressing — It should be to see the child 
 dressing — if the dressing were completed, it should then be 
 dressed. He criticises this pretention, " if some events had 
 not fell out." But this diction is analogically correct, and 
 was the ancient form of expression and so has descended to 
 our day. He adds, Lord Bolingbroke seems to affect a 
 variety in the participles of the same verbs, when they 
 came too near together, as He will endeavour to write as 
 the ancient author would have wrote had he writ in the same 
 language. Despite of this the Dr. remarks that one of the 
 defects in our language is the paucity of inflection. Why 
 then deny it to Lord Bolingbroke, who has accommodated 
 the Dr. with the very variety he advocated, shewing that 
 we should avail ourselves of every grammatical mutation ? 
 This was the original analogy in English, and should not 
 have been changed ; the adoption of the participle instead 
 of the perfect originated rather in ignorance and introduced 
 anomaly in our construction uncongenial with its primeval 
 simplicity. 
 
 The perfect of read was once written red, and so 'Lord 
 Bolingbroke wrote it, hence the pronunciation. Wolde 
 God that lay peple, &c. for ccrtes red y never in no mannys 
 
41 
 
 writingis. — Pecock's Book of Faith, 1450. So it was in 
 heard — written herd — and ledde for lead. The usage of 
 axe for asked is Saxon. Tha axede him an Vair Cniht. 
 They asked him as very Knight. — Layamon ; and, Axeth 
 wreche, and though his sister lacke speech. — Conf. Amantis, 
 B. v. It has been asked if Scripserim, legerim, venerim, &c. 
 are of the preterit or future tense or both ? 
 
 The perfect tense in Asiatic tongues is the only simple 
 form of the verb, the present and future action being made 
 in a declaratory manner in Persian, Hebrew, and Arabic — 
 and in Virgil, the present and perfect tenses are common 
 in one and the same sentence. 
 
 The English have availed themselves of every beauty 
 and turn of speech in the learned languages, and so we 
 account for the boundless variety which characterises our 
 language, and entitles it to become a universal language, 
 towards which it is progressing by reason of its extensive 
 commerce, arts and literature, and religion as found in 
 Holy writ, and not out of it, or in pretended traditions. 
 
 Set is a contraction of seated, as He is sat on the right 
 hand, &c. Laid down and was lain are precisely the same, 
 however grammarians may diversify identity. 
 
 Found and have found have precisely the same mean- 
 ing. •' Hence the propriety of these lines. 
 
 Some who the depths of eloquence have found, 
 
 In that unnavigable stream were drowned. — Dryden. 
 
 Words being arbitrary owe their power to association, 
 having only the influence which custom has given them. 
 
 On Moods. 
 Mood is the various manner in which the being, action 
 and passion are expressed or represented — and is an in- 
 flection in grammar, winch means any deviation from the 
 primary, styled Conjugation in verbs, and Declension in 
 adjectives and substantives. 
 
42 
 
 The primary moods are indicative and imperative. The 
 secondary are such as when the copula is affected with any 
 of them and make the sentence a modal preposition. This 
 modal preposition is when the matter in discourse, the being, 
 doing or suffering of a thing is considered not simply by 
 itself, but gradually in its causes from which it proceeds, 
 either contingently or necessarily. Contingent or possibly 
 as by can, could — may, might — will, would— shall, should 
 — must, ought, &c. 
 
 These are grammatical fictions, however, for there are 
 really no moods in language. The participle is a mere 
 mode of the verb, having the energy and force of every 
 accident. The termination draws the mind to the accident 
 and was invented for a more elegant construction. All 
 signs of the potential mood denoting possibility and con- 
 tingence are virtually in the indicative, which denotes 
 simply or is declarative, and the infinitive and imperatives 
 (implying to order) were originally one and the same. 
 
 II serait a desirer, a souhaiter — it were to be wished, is 
 a more polite expression than it is to be wished — je 
 voudrois avoir mieux employe le temps — Vellem melius 
 usus fuisse temporis — changer de condition is elliptic 
 diction. 
 
 Time must be present, past, or future. Action or exis- 
 tence may be imperfect, time can not be so — when we say, 
 I am writing, he is working, time is evidently present, but 
 the action is imperfect. The imperfect participle should 
 not be subjoined to the auxiliary verb to le when it indi- 
 cates an affection of the mind, as I am loving, I shall be 
 loving, are incorrect, and should be, I love, I shall love. 
 
 Time may be divided into present absolute, as I often do 
 it, and present progressive, I am doing it. Imperfect ab- 
 solute, as I did it formerly — and imperfect progressive, I 
 have been doing it — pluperfect absolute, as I had done it 
 —pluperfect progressive, I had been doing it. 
 
43 
 
 Grammarians have divided time into definite and in- 
 definite — now I love, is as much definite as I am doing, I 
 was and I shall be doing — we say not, I am or was loving, 
 but I love and I loved. Verbs indicating affection of the 
 mind as love, abhor, &c. admit no progressive time. 
 
 Verbs expressing a sudden act which is capable of pro- 
 gression never admit the progressive state. It is not 
 strictly grammatical to say, I am loving her — He is 
 dwelling in London — Your friends are abounding in 
 wealth. 
 
 Neither do verbs which denote progression, or presuppose 
 a fixed conclusion of the action or affection, admit a pro- 
 gressive state — for some verbs never admit the progressive 
 time, it being inconsistent with their import. 
 
 Verbs and participles and particles are nothing but 
 names. Tooke discovered they were fragments of words, 
 names of ideas, of which right they had been dispos- 
 sessed by grammarians and philosophers, ignorant of their 
 roots. Every word, signifying aught, signifies something 
 per se } says Vossius, not a noun only is significant. A word 
 is not a sound even until it is put in motion by the organs 
 of speech and encounters the air, a sentence is a com- 
 pound quantity of sound significant, of which certain parts 
 are themselves also significant, as the sun shines, &c. 
 Harris says that words imply a meaning not divisible, 
 hence words are the smallest parts of speech, and every 
 sentence must be of assertion or volition, according to the 
 powers of the soul which are perception and volition, — 
 comprising will, memory and understanding. 
 
 Subjunctive Mood. 
 
 Subjunctive implies subjoined, and is indicative of an 
 end or final cause, which is however contingent, yet really 
 there is no subjunctive in the English language, it is a non- 
 
44 
 
 entity. All arts owe their origin to nature ; despite this 
 essential truth grammarians have invented a system of 
 verbal policy to which they would make all language sub- 
 ordinate. 
 
 Plato erroneously asserted that language originated in 
 deep meditation and reflection *. now it arose in simplicity, 
 but it was complicated by thought. The oldest tongues 
 are the simplest, and the language of Paradise must have 
 been simplicity itself. 
 
 Mr. Harris says the verb has no variation for words, 
 hence there cannot be a subjunctive mood, as Dr. Lowth 
 asserted, for variation is a distinction and an inflection ; 
 many nations contrive to express their sentiments without 
 the aid of a subjunctive mood as well as the English. 
 
 When the verb has an affix as doeth, doth, it is said to 
 be indicative, that is, indicative of its being a verb. But 
 when the affix is absent, the verb is in its radical form or 
 in the infinitive mood. This is the whole mystery — See the 
 examples. 
 
 Thou, thus range the camp alone. — Pope. 
 
 For thee, that evevfelt another's woe. — Pope, 
 
 O thou Supreme, high thronedj all heights above, 
 
 Thou first great Cause, least understood, who all my 
 sense confined* 
 
 But thou false Arcite never shall obtain. 
 
 Faultless thou dropt from his unerring skill. 
 
 And wheresoever thou cast thy view. — Cowley, 
 
 This is English diction passim, natural and elegant, un- 
 paralleled in any inflected language whatever, and yet Dr. 
 Lowth condemns it as contrary to grammar, though he 
 does not say it is contrary to usage or custom, on which 
 all elegance or propriety of composition depend. 
 
 It is not marvellous that this diction should pervade our 
 classical authors, when we consider that doest contains 
 does, and the termination t, which is equivalent to thou. 
 
45 
 
 If it be required why we do not vary the verb in the 
 subjunctive mood, we answer, that when we place do before 
 the verb we omit the termination th, being the aspiration 
 of d or t, for these two are letters of the same power. This 
 established, we can not with propriety use the termination 
 th or s, when we have prefixed do in any mode whatever. 
 
 It has perplexed grammarians to discover why the sub- 
 junctive mood is not varied, and they said it was owing to 
 the absence of the auxiliary ; but the reason is, it is owing 
 to the absence of do or its equivalents, tho, an, if, gyf, 
 gyn, &c. 
 
 Now if these particles, an, if, tho, be equivalent to 
 do, the subjunctive mood (if there must be one, which I 
 deny) remains unvaried in the English language. 
 
 It may be objected, however, that some authors do vary 
 the verb in the so-called subjunctive. This is true; but, 
 be it recollected, that this is done by way of enforcement 
 or emphasis of expression, which pleonastic form is, for the 
 very same reason, common to other languages. Hence 
 the futility of any arguments in favour of a different 
 system. 
 
 The business of criticism is to detect, expose, and exter- 
 minate living and triumphant errors, which have been 
 long embalmed and canonised in the sanctuary of science. 
 
 Principal verbs are sometimes implied only ; as, unless 
 he (do) wash his feet — I fear lest he (should) come. 
 
 When we speak hypothetically, we use the second in- 
 definite to convey a present perception ; as, I would do it 
 if I could. But more elegantly, Could I do it, I would — 
 Did I act wrong, I would acknowledge my fault — Could I 
 but see him, I would rejoice — Were I there, I would re- 
 prove him — Had I been there, I had reproved him. Do is 
 enforcive ; as, Though he does slay me. It is equivalent 
 to shall and will. Does is also used for should. 
 
 " Though heaven's King ride on thy wings." Before 
 
46 
 
 ride, doth is understood, and in the expression, " Draw'st his 
 triumphant wheels," dost is implied ; so ride is defensible 
 for ridest in Milton. 
 
 Were has been used as the second indefinite, but in that 
 sense it is disused, was and were being appropriated to dif- 
 ferent purposes and services ; was denoting a past event, 
 and were hypothetically a present event. Ex. : Were I in 
 your place. 
 
 When languages became objects of taste and refine- 
 ment, the learned applied the exuberance of diction to the 
 purposes of elegance, variety, and discrimination. 
 
 All inflection or concretion was invented for the same 
 end, the creature of convenience and fancy, not essential 
 to language. Hence the frequent recurrence of writers to 
 the language of nature, which disdains restraint, for all 
 inflected speech, not being natural, contains the elements 
 of its own destruction. Hence modern languages shook 
 off many of the cumbrous honours of the parent, which re- 
 tained much primitive diction also ; as Terence says, Hue 
 cum adveni nulla erat. 
 
 Dixerat — et fugit ceu fumus in auras — He spoke and 
 incontinently vanished like smoke. 
 
 English is so little inflected, that its writers convert that 
 little to purposes of variety. Does, doth, hath, and all 
 similar terminations, suit every variety of style, and are 
 pleasing changes. The termination dropped ; as, range for 
 rangeth, denotes style natural, but when it is used it is 
 artificial, for when writers neglect inflection they recur to 
 the language of nature, or adopt rational principles often 
 unknown to grammarians. 
 
 When the person is expressed the termination is ele- 
 gantly suppressed. Ex. : 
 
 <c Oh, thou my voice inspire, 
 Who touched Isaiah's hallowed lips with fire." 
 
 This is very elegant diction, although Lowth and some 
 
47 
 
 tasteless critics have condemned it. Hundreds of citations 
 come to the rescue and reinforce the practice. 
 
 Dr. Lowth says the form constitutes the distinction of 
 moods, and that in English there is no distinction. Hence 
 there is no mood in English. 
 
 Now be and were are the indicative. Ex. : u Be ye 
 come out as against a thief." Rebekah took goodly rai- 
 ment of her son's, which were with her, and put them on 
 Jacob, &c. Dr. Lowth remarks also, it is not easy to give 
 particular rules for the management of the moods and 
 times of verbs — he should have said tenses, not times. We 
 must take as the best of rules what the sense necessarily 
 requires. 
 
 In the phrase of Prior — 
 
 "So much she fears for William's life 
 That Mary's fate she dare not mourn," 
 there is no more evidence of a subjunctive mood than if 
 it had been dares ; for whenever an adjective-verb like 
 dare is unvaried in the second or third person, the varia- 
 tions of the verb do are suppressed, either for the sake of 
 measure or at the discretion of the writer. 
 
 We be twelve brethren — though he were divinely in- 
 spired — though he was rich, he became poor. Nor does 
 Addison confound the indicative and subjunctive moods in 
 " If there be but one body, it is no more than a tyranny ; if 
 there are more than two, there will want a casting voice." 
 
 Here two different sorts of the essential verb are used 
 for variety, and these two forms were hitherto used pro- 
 miscuously. 
 
 There is no subjunctive mood in English or Hebrew, and 
 many Oriental tongues—' 4 And the third part of the stars, 
 &c. was smitten, so that the third part of them was dark- 
 ened." — Rev. viii. 12. 
 
 Ay sud eat more cheese gyn ay hadct. 
 Chud eat more cheese an chad it. 
 
48 
 
 I would eat more cheese, if I had it. 
 
 Rd. Verstegan, p. 195. 
 These three modes of expression are according to locality. 
 Were and wert are used instead of should, would, &c. by 
 an idiom peculiar to the English, and express a condition; 
 as, if thou wert there (now) thou wouldest find how many 
 they are. Verbs of wishing are succeeded by another verb 
 in the so-called subjunctive mood. Ex. : Would all my 
 pains were gone — You would suppose I had rather not — If 
 he but touch the hills — If thou be the Son of God (Matth. 
 xxvii. 40). It is in the indicative mood, el vlbg el rov 
 
 0£OU. 
 
 Whether I or they preach, it is the same doctrine. As 
 " Now we know that God heareth not sinners, but if any 
 man he a worshipper of God, and doeth his will, him he 
 heareth." Be and doeth here are evidently in the same 
 mood, not subjunctive, but indicative. 
 
 Terms implying action, existence, acquisition, possession, 
 desire, power, duty, possibility, being in continual use, 
 grammarians inadvertently pronounce them mere auxilia- 
 ries in the communication of ideas. Hence do, be, get, 
 have, will, can, shall, may, &c, are supposed to be certain 
 little words by the help of which are formed moods and 
 tenses ; but, in truth, no words in the language are more 
 deservedly termed principal words. 
 
 Will is desire — I will do it. Shall, is obligation ; as, I 
 shall write. May, is permission — I may go. Can, is 
 power ; as, I can come. Must, is necessity ; as, I must 
 work. Have, is possession ; as, I have it. Be, is exist- 
 ence ; as, I am. One is an existence, un etre. One or 
 Being is the germ, and is no other than the generic of all 
 existence, the radical of all mathematical science. 
 
 Tenses do not signify time (although all motion is in 
 time, and time is a concomitant, so does all rest imply 
 time), yet they are but contractions of propositions, so that 
 
49 
 
 every verb finite is resolvable into a declaration of a mode 
 of being. I teach; that is, I am teaching. Time is 
 always expressed by an adverb or substantive. I do it 
 now, then, hereafter. 
 
 Tenses are frequently used for one another, on account 
 of variety. St. Paul says that I may know him, if by any 
 means I might attain, &c. What wilt thou that I should 
 do unto thee ? That I might receive my sight. Should 
 and would express the future tense as well as the present 
 and past. That he shoidd or would come to-morrow, as 
 well as it was my desire he should or would come yester- 
 day. This application of the verbs, in which are included 
 the participles, extends to every verb in human speech. 
 Energy resides in the agent, as also power, will, &c. When 
 we do a thing it is because we will, can, ought, must. 
 Hence all the faculties being implied, a single symbol is 
 sufficient to express the act. 
 
 Ought and should, will and would, are synonymous with 
 intend and intended ; as, I intended to have written, which 
 is synonymous with I would have written. Ought and 
 should are synonymous and equivalent. 
 
 The words may, might, can, would, should, are all incon- 
 trovertible proofs that the past tense of the subjunctive 
 mood is as much declinable as the past tense of the indi- 
 cative, in mightest, canst, &c. 
 
 Would resembles will, to express past time ; as, I would 
 do it if I could — I thought it would rain — We would go if 
 we might. 
 
 Would is used elliptically, conveying a pathetic form of 
 wishing ; as, Would he were not dead, which is, I wish he 
 were not dead, if the ellipsis were supplied ; but if so, 
 these expressions would lose their strength and beauty. 
 
 Can and could denote the power of doing a thing ; as, 
 I can do it now — could do it at once. 
 
 May and might indicate liberty and permission, and 
 
50 
 
 sometimes express possibility ; as, I may do it, possibly, 
 and shall do it. May expresses wish or prayer ; as, Mayest 
 thou protect us. This is, however, elliptical — we entreat 
 being understood. 
 
 When the absolute form of the verb precedes, it must be 
 followed by the absolute ; as, I can do it if I will — I may, 
 I would do it, if I chose. May denotes legal, can denotes 
 natural power. 
 
 Can, canne, canst — Cucle for could. How came the I in 
 couldst, which is obvious in would and should ? 
 
 Will and would indicate volition ; will absolutely, and 
 would conditionally. 
 
 Should, following a conjunction, implies uncertainty, as 
 I will stay, lest they should come when I am gone. 
 
 How should my brother know that circumstance ? It is 
 sometimes used for ought, but differs from it, as ought is 
 followed by to, before the infinitive mood, and should 
 never is, Ex. : We should love our enemies. Ought, how- 
 ever, conveys the same idea, and so there is no use of 
 should. 
 
 In many cases to is preferable to may or might, and 
 more agreeable to English analogy. It is Greek idiom, 
 and is recommended for its intrinsic elegance. 
 
 I shall have it finished, or I shall have finished it, are 
 synonymous. 
 
 When there is a danger of mistaking the cause or agent, 
 the latter mode is preferable. 
 
 I do something because I can, may, will, shall. Hence, 
 the Greeks and Latins dispensed with the use of these 
 words, and substituted a term in which they were implied, 
 may you one ? I can, I shall one. 
 
 The conditional present, might, could, should, would, 
 may be connected with the absolute may, can, shall, will, 
 with propriety. It is irregular or figurative, not capricious 
 but appositely, from some latent impulse — Ex. : 
 
 
51 
 
 What, know you not, being mechanical, 
 You ought not walk upon a labouring day 
 Without the sign of your profession. — Julius Caesar. 
 
 Here, ought and should are synonymous, and ought as 
 well as should are not improperly used before the verb 
 following each. The auxiliary verb has nothing to do 
 with the construction. 
 
 Shall in the first person marks a future event, as I shall 
 do it ; thou shalt not kill. Shall is an interrogative sen- 
 tence, and used in the first and third person consults the 
 will of another, as shall I, shall we go ? Shall } notes moral 
 obligation, hence, the accent should be on " shalt not kill n 
 in the Decalogue, and not on the negative, although it is a 
 negative precept. Garrick so accented it, and Dr. John- 
 son did not, who was very deficient in taste, as his Lives of 
 the Poets evince. Must denotes natural obligation. 
 
 Will in the first person, conveys a promise or threat, 
 as I will see him — we will set off. Will implies in the 
 2nd person, intention — as wilt thou do it ? 
 
 Will is never used interrogatively in the 1st person, as 
 Fi/ZIdo? iraZwedoit? 
 
 Shall is substituted instead, because circumstances de- 
 pend on our own will, and are known only to ourselves. 
 
 Shall as connected with hope is now written will. Ex. : 
 I hope if you have occasion to use me for your own turne, 
 you shall find me yare." It is the effect of habit that we 
 attach the idea of futurity to shall and will. 
 
 Many have thought that there were no moods except 
 those which are derived from adverbs, whose office it is to 
 determine the signification of the verb, as bene, male, &c. 
 like time, which is and ever has been expressed by a noun 
 or adverb. Tenses of the subjunctive and indicative are 
 indiscriminately taken for one and the other. Subjunctive 
 partakes of the future, as Hoc Ithacus velit ; which latter 
 denotes time future, wc can say, Si amera or amabo. The 
 
 e 2 
 
52 
 
 imperative is used for the future, and we can only com- 
 mand in regard to time to come. We say non occides, 
 thou shalt not kill. 
 
 The potential is resolved into the indicative or subjunc- 
 tive, and all into the indicative, as Dr. Beattie admits in 
 his Theory of Language. 
 
 Gerunds, Supines, Participles. 
 
 The Verb names the energy. Gerunds and Supines 
 have both active and passive significations, in which Latin 
 and English coincide. 
 
 Teaching, hearing, building, &c. are gerunds, that is the 
 appropriate name, and are used actively and passively as 
 in English ; which terms are merely nominal, not real ; for 
 no distinction exists between the two forms as to their 
 signification in early writers. 
 
 In the phrase, " by continual mortifying our corrupt 
 affections," the is not required before the gerund — this is 
 primitive diction. In Pope we have " In mumbling of 
 the game." 
 
 When the participle refers to the subject or object of 
 the proposition, it is not convertible into a substantive, as 
 I am accused of betraying my friend. 
 
 When the word which modifies the action or attribute 
 can be referred with propriety to the subject or to the object 
 of the proposition, it remains invariable, as I have sent you 
 a letter agreeable to your wishes. According to his proposal 
 I immediately dispatched the messenger. 
 
 When the action represented by the participle, can be 
 legitimately referred to the subject or agent, use the par- 
 ticiple, Ex. : I censure you for doing so. 
 
 When the subject or agent can be referred to the par- 
 ticiple, it must not be converted into a substantive. Ex. : 
 He was distinguished by nominating him to that post. 
 When the participle has no reference to the subject or 
 object of the proposition, it may be converted into a sub- 
 
53 
 
 stantive, as His memory was perpetuated by the building of 
 a church. 
 
 The participle imperfect should not be used in a passive 
 sense, as The book is printing. Participles are improperly 
 termed present, past, and future, for they all without 
 distinction apply to these times respectively. Where is 
 the participle in dedi, steti? Yet we say, I have stood. 
 Perhaps this suggests the adoption of the preterite in pre- 
 ference to that of the participle, as I have run a race — 
 hence it is that we have remarked that inflection, being 
 the creature of convenience, may be used or not at discre- 
 tion. Participles may be taken for all times and become 
 nouns, as Pompeius discedens erat suos adhortatur, it means 
 cum discederet, in the present, but venies judicans, it is the 
 future, for it means venies et judicabis. Participles in the 
 preterite and aorist are rendered by the present and par- 
 ticiples also denote a future at hand — like jueXAwv in Greek ; 
 the first future participle is often rendered by the present 
 in Latin — as Sine videamus an veniat Elias liberans eum. 
 
 The book is printing, the house is building, money is 
 coining — all these expressions are a difficulty with 
 foreigners. This is to be found in their ignorance of the 
 termination ing } which means continuation, progress, and 
 possesses a laconism unknown to modern tongues, and ren- 
 ders the true meaning of the Latin passive inflection, as 
 Domus sedificatur, cuditur liber, the book is printing or in 
 the press. 
 
 There is another manner of using the active participle, 
 which gives it a passive signification, as the book is now 
 printing, a phrase probably corrupted from a phrase more 
 pure and now obsolete, viz. the book is a printing — a 
 being properly at, and printing a verbal noun signifying 
 action, according to the analogy of this language. 13ut 
 who acts ? the book ? Is that which is inanimate capable 
 of action ? The printer prints the book, and not the book 
 the printer, much less itself. 
 
54 
 
 Time present, Domus sedificatur — aedifi cabatur. The 
 house was in building, denoting imperfect action of time 
 past. "Without such construction, the Latin and Greek 
 passive could not be rendered into English — that the pas- 
 sive voice was a subsequent refinement is evinced by the 
 imperfect state in which some of the Greek and Latin 
 tenses are left. In these they adhered to the originally 
 substantive form, because they found that many of their 
 combinations were too prolix to be used without injustice 
 to that euphony which they were intended to improve. 
 
 The passive voice and reciprocity were adopted to avoid 
 ambiguity. Where no danger of ambiguity exists, they 
 are indispensable. As far as the meaning is concerned, a 
 technicality can not affect it. This remark extends to all 
 words and languages. Whether we say miser animi, animo, 
 animum, the sense is the same. All cases, tenses, words, 
 are commutable by enallage. All discord comes under 
 this figure, so much used in Latin and Greek. Laudant 
 alius alium, " Quae quum arti serviendum et figurata quam 
 regulari Syntaxi utendum esse, si vis loqui et scribere 
 pereleganter." Supines are verbal nouns used in every case, 
 and sometimes they have plurals, but as supines are sub- 
 stantives they do not change gender, as Vitam ire perdi- 
 tum. Supines are either active or passive. In the phrase 
 contumelia quae mihi factum itur. Contumelia is the no- 
 minative to itur. 
 
 The union of the verb esse in the passive voice, as Mo- 
 nitus sim vel fuerim, &c, rendered all particles superfluous, 
 and enabled writers to communicate their ideas with 
 supreme elegance. 
 
 Now the whole of the Greek passive voice is formed 
 
 from the passive inflections of the substantive verb to be ; 
 
 the present and future from its futures, the preterits from 
 
 its plusquam perfectum, and its aorists from its imperfect. 
 
 The middle voice follows the same construction, its dif- 
 
55 
 
 ference from the passive consisting in radical rather than 
 terminal inflection. It is said to be extended and passing, 
 but it is a grammatical speculation. In fact, the distinc- 
 tion between voices is merely nominal. The writers in the 
 Attic dialect, which was not however the parent one, used 
 the passive, where in the other dialects the active was ap- 
 plied. Ex. : ru7rijjut or rwirsofjiaij the active form used in a 
 passive sense. See P. Knight's Alphabet, p. 106. 
 
 Hence the English is consistent with the most elegant 
 of the dialects of Greece. The passive tenses in Greek are 
 partly inflected and partly circumlocutory, which latter 
 mode was adopted when many European tongues divested 
 themselves of their cumbrous honours, in order to return 
 to their native simplicity. 
 
 Dr. Priestley remarks that in some very familiar forms 
 of speech the active seems to be put for the passive form 
 of verbs and participles ; as, I will teach you all what's 
 owing to your Queen. The brass is forging ; the books 
 are selling or on the sale ; binding or are to bind. He may be 
 still to seek for a thing. This application of the verbs, in 
 which are included participles, extends to every verb in 
 human speech, and the expressions are all true and ge-- 
 nuine English. 
 
 There is a relation between the Latin and Celtic verbs, 
 and also the Greek, in the defective state of persons in the 
 passive tenses, and the distinction of active and passive 
 verbs is not so clearly marked in Greek as in Latin. 
 
 In the phrase, " You are too much mistaken in this 
 King." I surmise that here the termination en is nothing 
 but the preposition in which occurs so frequently in the 
 English participle perfect. Mistaken is in a mistake. The 
 estate is dipped, and is eating out with usury. This is the 
 gerund which renders the true meaning of the passive in- 
 flection. 
 
 The gerund for the participle is observed in u They 
 
56 
 
 were beholding to the clemency of the Romans for their 
 preservation. We are beholding to the bounty of God for 
 all we enjoy. Adjectives of possession are prefixed to 
 the participle in ing ; as, from my having received let- 
 ters. This mode of writing obtains among the learned. 
 Again, the participle frequently, perhaps improperly, fol- 
 lows the possessive case ; as " Much depends on the rules 
 being observed." But it should be grammatically on the 
 observing of the rule. 
 
 Ing denotes continuance of energy; as loving. Ed 
 completion of the energy ; as loved. 
 
 Ad internecionem mihi persequendus est — I will punish 
 him to the death. 
 
 Our early writers delighted much in the gerund; as 
 doing, sending, which not only contributes to the varying 
 of the diction, but happily applied, it strengthens and beau- 
 tifies the expression. Modern grammarians often accom- 
 modate their ideas of propriety to the laws of inflection, 
 and reject the language 0f nature. 
 
 The participle ing has the construction of a verb when 
 the sentence is definite. Ex. : These are the rules, by ob- 
 serving which you may avoid mistakes. The same as en, 
 " In one accorden. — P. Ploughman, 
 
 It has also the construction of a substantive when the 
 sentence is definite ; as, By the observing of which you 
 may, &c. Ing involves being ; and in patronymics means 
 son; as Elising,.Elisha's son — Atheling, of the race or 
 son of a noble — Gillingham in Kent, is equivalent to the 
 home of the family of Gill or Gyll ; for this orthography 
 is varied at all times. Hem in German is heim ; as Arn- 
 hera, Arnheim. 
 
 The preposition is retained at the end of verbs in Latin, 
 and in fact in all languages of Europe, and to it are 
 referable ed } eth, ing. 
 
 Some are led by this untutored derivation to the syno- 
 
57 
 
 nymes, to engage, engaging, &c. Now the Italian termi- 
 nation ando is only endo, a preposition used as a verb ; 
 while eth and ed, the same in purport, are used for discri- 
 mination ; as moveth, moved. Hence the commutability 
 of tenses varying the meaning, which is common to all 
 tongues, the present tense and participle involving the 
 present, past, and future time, or, in other words, every 
 tense, how complicated soever it may be. 
 
 Wachter says ing is formed from ig, habens — eig — en, 
 habere, to have, owe, hold, think, thine, ing, ung, Thinc- 
 ung, the act of thinking. Sam-lung, auc-lung, &c. 
 
 An, with the additional termination ed, forms by con- 
 traction and, and the as, a participial termination, for 
 which we now use ing. 
 
 The terminations ed and en are the Saxon ad and en, and 
 are synonymous with our to {see under To), and with in 
 and ing. The participle in, ing, is improperly preceded 
 by the pronominal adjectives, my, thy, &c, and sometimes 
 the possessive case of nouns. Ex. : As to my loving that. 
 "What is the meaning of the lady's holding up her train ? 
 The participle imperfect does not grammatically admit the 
 possessive case before it ; as, I do not think it right the 
 King's going there. 
 
 The Hebrew participle is a pure radical, and its inflec- 
 tions are made by cementing with its roots the pronouns, 
 as, We are visiting. The Persian and Arabic follow the 
 same construction in their infinitive. And Chaucer, Troilus 
 B. iii. v. 1254, (i Lo, who corny th here now ride" — for 
 riding. 
 
 The participle past ends in ed and en ; as, u In the 
 foughten field." By deluges o'crthrown — With castcd 
 slough and fresh celerity — splitted for split— as splittedthc 
 heart — shaked for shook. u Grease that sweaten from the 
 murthcrer's gibbet throw." — Shahspeare. 
 
58 
 
 Aorists and Infinitives. 
 
 Grammarians should have placed the infinitive mood at 
 the beginning instead of the end of the moods. 
 
 The French begin with the infinitive, and then the 
 gerund, improperly termed the participle. The gerund 
 and infinitive in English are the same ; the infinitive is 
 termed the fountain, because from it flows the manner of 
 signifying in every known language. 
 
 The Stoics thought the infinitive to be the only part of 
 speech or word, pure and uncombined, because it performs 
 the office of all moods and tenses like the aorists, and their 
 derivate names both imply, and as an abstract noun of all 
 cases ; but it is no mood, as it implies no mental energy 
 or intention. 
 
 To eat, is only do eat. To eat stands alone, no person 
 or substance can be prefixed, so the verb becomes a real 
 substantive, and is known as the verbal noun. 
 
 Infinitive is not confined to number ; it is used abso- 
 lutely, without reference to accidents, as doctum esse, per- 
 fect and pluperfect, amatum esse, or fuisse, to have been 
 loved — the infinitive future tense, amatum iri, about to be 
 loved. 
 
 The simple infinitive expresses an action subsequent to 
 that of the preceding mood ; as, He is better than I ex- 
 pected to find him. 
 
 The compound infinitive expresses an action prior to 
 that of the preceding mood. The compound of the inva- 
 riable mood, esse, indicates action completed prior to the 
 time of the first verb ; as, He seems to be a scholar. 
 
 The infinitive in the active is often used for the infinitive 
 mood, passive voice, but improperly ; as, They are to blame, 
 for to be blamed — I sent my book to bind, for to be bound. 
 
 Here are instances of the divers, uses of the infinitive : — 
 Asa nominative case, Mentiri non est meum ; as a geni- 
 
59 
 
 tive, Virtus est vitiam fugere, for fuga vitii, est virtus ; as 
 a dative, Magis paratus servire quam imperare, for magis 
 paratur servituti quam imperio ; as an accusative, Non- 
 tanto emo poenitere, for poenitentiam ; as an ablative, Dignus 
 legi, for lectione or lectu — in dignus amari, is for dignus 
 amoris, amori, amorem, amore. "We find in Plautus, a 
 good authority, dignus ad earn formam, aliquid — contentus 
 aliquid. 
 
 The infinitive is impersonal, having no person nor num- 
 ber, and is no mood at all, being indefinite in regard to 
 tenses, and is even used for the future, in eras mihi dare 
 licet, for daturum : and Virgil uses duci in the future 
 tense. 
 
 Grammarians say the infinitive has no future, excepting 
 sum, which they allege has fore, from 0uw, fuere fore by 
 syncope, but infinitive is rtomen verbi, and is used for all 
 cases, and is governed by a preposition, the only instru- 
 ment of government, as Canes venandum, where the prepo- 
 sition is omitted ; and it is so especially when the infinitive 
 mood is added to the substantive, as celer irasci, for irascen- 
 dum ; and in the supine the preposition is left out, as eo 
 visum,which is only videre. Scaliger admitted no impersonal 
 verb but the infinitive, because the so-called impersonal 
 may have a third personal, but the infinitive has no per- 
 son whatever. 
 
 The verb -substantive is followed by an accusative, even 
 with the preposition expressed ; as, est ad crudum alvum. 
 It is used for the participle, in Ne desine me am are, for 
 amans ; for the indicative, in Omnes omnia bona dicerc, for 
 dicebant ; for the imperative, in Sic et tu facere, for facito, 
 and in Homer, A. v. 53, rag §iair£p<jai ; for the subjunctive, 
 in Te valere gaudeo, for quod valeas. 
 
 .The infinitive depends on the preposition, and of course 
 the accusative after it. When we speak positively, we use 
 the indicative, otherwise the subjunctive; the infinitive 
 
60 
 
 being an abstract noun and the first substantive, because 
 videre ipsum was used before vita ipsa. 
 
 All parts of verbs are resolvable into the infinitive, and 
 if you remove attributes, nothing is left but the bare in- 
 finitive. 
 
 When two or many infinitives, connected or not by and, 
 are one part of the proposition, and a singular term the 
 other part, place the word it before the verb, and make it 
 singular ; as, It is the prerogative of virtue to dread no 
 eye and to suspect no tongue. 
 
 We have shewn that this mood is invariable, and repre- 
 sents every case and mood ; as, Dicere Dei, voluisse Dei, 
 says Eucherius, Bishop of Lyons; and in this place no 
 word is understood any more than xpv is sa id by gramma- 
 rians to be understood in that noble aphorism, iC Ahv 
 apiGTsvEiv kcu virdpoypv ijxjjizvai aXXwv" It stands on its 
 own basis, and is primitive diction, which some empty cri- 
 tics ignore. It is recognised in, To err is human, to for- 
 give divine, where the infinitive is employed substantively ; 
 and in Italian, Questo dire e superfluo ; and in German, Das 
 essen. Should two or more infinitives precede the sentence, 
 the verb must be plural. The infinitive naturally coalesces 
 with desire, volition, &c. ; as, I will, want, desire to do, &c. 
 
 Under verbs common A. Gellius quotes Cicero, where 
 the perfect infinitive is not varied on account of person ; 
 as, Quos non est veritum — ponere id — who have not been 
 afraid to set, &c. ; and this structure is confirmed by 
 Plautus in Justam rem esse oratum volo. 
 
 Hence indeclinability is not confined to what is vulgarly 
 taken for the future ; futurum, or fore to be, or about to 
 be, is obvious, and so of all verbs. But essem and esse, 
 for em and fore, are evidently imperfect of the infinitive. 
 
 As we speak not, and can not speak in the future, so -no 
 language can possess a future tense, nor is it philosophical 
 to assert the contrary. 
 
61 
 
 The Sanskrit asmi, to be, has no future, and Grimm has 
 shewn that the Teutonic dialects have no simple future. 
 The Welsh grammarians give the termination of a future 
 to a particular form of the verb, which is used with both a 
 future and a present signification. 
 
 In the phrase, Non tarn hebes ut ista dicam, it is not 
 translated with a subjunctive, but an infinitive mood ; as, I 
 am not so dull as to say so, which suggests that the sub- 
 junctive mood does not exist in English. 
 
 He can not abide to take pains is either a rule in gram- 
 mar or used in it, but this construction has not been ob- 
 served by grammarians. English writers avail themselves 
 of every kind of diction, ancient and modern, now adopt- 
 ing, now rejecting inflection to write naturally, for writing 
 grammatically or elegantly may be different. Gramma- 
 rians, at a loss for English construction, appeal to learned 
 languages, and if they are against them they say those 
 languages have nothing to do with English, and they in- 
 sist on analogy in opposition to foreign and domestic 
 authority. 
 
 To continue our observations on the infinitive, the pre- 
 position to governs the infinitive mood, except where it 
 implies do, as I do love — is to love — in which case it is not 
 an exclusive sign of this mood (see page 14), but all other 
 prepositions govern the participle. The prepositions to, of, 
 for, by, with, are connecting media in sentences. 
 
 The primary or adjective verbs as bid, dare, make, &c. 
 are used without the sign to, as I dare defy, swear, mount, 
 go, &c. Bid him wrestle with affliction— She not denies it 
 — Which they not feel — but the radical form of a verb is 
 to follow the participle or preposition to, as to write, do 
 write. 
 
 To prefixed to a noun invests it with a verbal character, 
 and was used to distinguish the infinitive from the 
 noun after the infinitive had a distinguishing termination. 
 
62 
 
 We used to write from to die, for to come, and in 
 Gower's fifth book, Confessio Amantis, " In all hast made 
 hir yare, Toward hir sister for to fare." This is Greek 
 construction. The infinitives and the imperatives were 
 originally the same, and Re at the termination of Latin 
 infinitives may be the word re in reality. 
 
 In Danish er is equivalent to am, and is the infinitive 
 corresponding to res, or thing. The old form as dicier is 
 an inversion, though it is thought by Welsford to be the 
 Coptic er, meaning to be and do, as all words ending in us 
 and ris, as familiaris, primarius, and the future in rus, cor- 
 responding to our ary, ery, ory, ury. 
 
 Sometimes this particle was united to the accompanying 
 verb, — as T'accomplish, and this is found in Chaucer, who 
 preserves or sinks the sounds of his syllables arbitrarily to 
 suit convenience. The reader can not at a glance discover 
 his scheme of harmony, and it is difficult to do justice to 
 the poet's versification in the art of reading poetry aloud 
 to an auditory. 
 
 All our poets retain or dismiss termination at will, be- 
 cause it is not essential, for when used, the diction is ar- 
 tificial, when omitted it is inartificial or natural. Chaucer, 
 writing intensively or imperatively uses termination, and 
 neglects it when he speaks positively or indieatively, and 
 this shews that inflection is the creature of convenience, 
 and that it is not necessarily appended to words, and 
 that natural language may and does reject inflection at 
 will. 
 
 The preposition to has a very extensive power (as shewn 
 in the Chapter on Do and To,) and may elegantly supply 
 the place of may, can, will, shall, might, could, would, &c. 
 — as, He has nothing to comfort him, where all these verbs 
 may be applied, as may, &c. — The Son of man has not 
 where he shall rest his head — that is where to rest his 
 head. 
 
63 
 
 To, again, between verbs is often suppressed, as "Etherial 
 trumpet from onhigh/gan (to) blow." When the adjective 
 was introduced into language the system was changed. 
 Now the Chinese have no adjectives, and so the infinitive 
 mood became an adjective, and invested with that character 
 it became possessed of all the power of the infinitive or 
 more, for amans is one who loves, and yet the infinitive 
 never had this power. 
 
 The Chinese adjective, like our own, is not varied ; the 
 same unchangeable monosyllable acts the part of noun, 
 verb, and participle, according to its allocation in a sen- 
 tence. 
 
 We add here, what should have found a place in the 
 last chapter, that this power is not confined to the present 
 participle, but extends to all the rest ; for the participle 
 unites in itself all the properties of the noun and verb — of 
 the noun in amans, of the verb in amans virtutem, 
 docturus disciplinam, Ad accusandos homines, legendse 
 epistolse, Epidico quserendo, for Epidicum. 
 
 In Hebrew and Arabic and some other Oriental tongues 
 the participles have no gender. What we style verb is only 
 a noun-substantive, and its terminations are pronouns, or 
 the article which gives gender to them, hence the verb is 
 said to have gender. 
 
 What is the participle in modern language but the 
 gerund, as standing, end, endo ? Did the Normans intro- 
 duce their nasal ing for the Saxon end, ind — ? In fine, 
 does not the participle or gerund assume the power of a 
 mood as in Illo praesente, me absente, praesente nobis for 
 me, absente vobis for tc ? where it renders superfluous the 
 conjunctions when, while, or rather the adverb used con- 
 junctively? Nothing can exceed in elegance this con- 
 struction. 
 
 A finite mood varies, and ha3 two tenses, absolute and 
 perfect ; the absolute applies to present, past and future. 
 
64 
 
 A. Gellius remarks, Ci Immobilis est infinitus, necnon et 
 gerundium et supinum, nisi suam respuant naturam aut in 
 nomine migrant." 
 
 In Homer is such simplicity found that the same verb 
 served for past present and future-— now an aorist is so ap- 
 plied, termed the first and second indefinite, because it 
 implies the three denominations of time — for an illustration 
 of this see Odyssey, £5. v. 425, 
 
 Ko*//£ o ava<jypfizvoQ ayjZyTri SpvoQ, r)v \iirz Keiwv — 
 Percussit autem in altum tollens quern liquit profectus 
 stipite querno. — 
 
 It is thought the infinitive in Greek was tvtttev, but Lord 
 Monboddo says ru7rr£/x£vcu was contracted through prolix 
 variations to tvtttuv and tvtttzv. 
 
 The perfect participle passive ought to signify that 
 which has been done ; TirekevfjLivov Igtcll means not, shall 
 have been finished, but shall be finished completely ; and Dr. 
 Clarke calls the preterperfect the present perfect, while 
 Lord Monboddo turns the past perfects into aorists. 
 
 Now an aorist means a tense unlimited in its operations, 
 and which may be applied to present past and future time, 
 expressed or implied — and the Greeks support this view of 
 an aorist , and it is used by them as its meaning implies, 
 a, ojooc, infinite in time and tense. 
 
 The Latins style verbs inceptive or inchoative, as caleo, 
 calesco, which termination is only ew tw, Ioko), to be or be- 
 come, as 7ra£w, 7raw, pasco-paesco. The Latins have nothing 
 analogous to an aorist, but in Homer the present and 
 perfect tenses are similarly employed, and so with the Attic 
 poets, which evinces the universality of its use. 
 
 Harris in Hermes says that jue'XXw ypafeiv is the inceptive 
 present, but uv is really the same as the aorist. The first 
 conception of an aorist has not been given by any gram- 
 marian that I have read. Now el$bv, I saw, is an aorist and 
 indefinite, and is so if it stand alone and is unapplied, but 
 
65 
 
 not so if the time of the action is specified, as I saw it 
 yesterday; because to apply an indefinite tense to a definite 
 time would be an impropriety. 
 
 We have but two tenses in English which correspond to 
 the aorists in Greek, properly termed the first and second 
 indefinite or indeterminate time, that is present and im- 
 perfect; first preterit or imperfect, second preterit or aorist, 
 as I loved, or should love, because they are applicable to 
 present past and future without distinction. They are 
 also convertible, so are all the tenses in Greek ; for inflec- 
 tion was adopted partly to diversify expression and partly 
 to avoid ambiguity, for the theory of speech or systematic 
 grammar was not considered a science till the days of 
 w Philip's waxlike son," when Greece had one standard, the 
 Attic, which was not originally the purest dialect. 
 
 Hermes criticises Milton unjustly in these lines — 
 " Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth 
 Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep." 
 
 Here walk means not they were walking at that instant 
 only, but aopto-rwc indefinitely ; but there the time is 
 positively determined by when. So it is contrary to the rule 
 Hermes wishes to establish, for we lay it down in canon 32, 
 page 13, that time is and ever has been expressed by a noun 
 or an adverb, for time is not an essential appendage to the 
 verb, though time is divisible and extended, and has a be- 
 ginning middle and end, and to indicate these points 
 tenses have been formed artificially, when aorists were 
 used for all times and tenses — and Hermes remarks, we 
 seldom hear of aorists in the future tense and still more 
 rarely in the present, yet this admits there are aorists 
 in these tenses. Though these forms are called second aorists 
 they have a future signification in early writers, as Hero- 
 dotus, B. I. c. 5. f £2c ctv /uirj KaraSrjXoc ytvrirai, and again, 
 C. 29, bpKioiai yap fjLzya\oi(Ti KarziyovTO. 
 
66 
 
 On the Words Do and To. 
 
 It may be deemed visionary to endeavour to shew an 
 identity between the words Do and To — but if the accom- 
 panying illustrations and citations bring not conviction to 
 the mind of the reader, the author is content to leave this 
 identity as a theory, although he can not see why this 
 identity should not exist ; for before words were multiplied 
 one and the same rejoiced in several applications, hence they 
 had many intentions, which on analysis were found to 
 possess little more meaning than their primaries. 
 
 It is a canon in etymology, that that language is its 
 parent, where the true signification can be found, and 
 where its use is common, accepted and familiar. 
 
 A word had one meaning and one meaning only 
 originally. I infer that to and do are identical, and this in- 
 trinsic meaning is to be found, and the cause of its different 
 application also, and in support of this conjecture, 1 refer 
 to Richardson's Dictionary, Section III. 
 
 Grammarians say, no two words are synonymous, not 
 because they are sure of this observation, but because it 
 ought to be so, for nature never adopts but what is suggested 
 by necessity. 
 
 The parent stock of synonymes is tropes and figures, 
 by which language becomes abstracted and refined, which 
 is the cause of adventitious and metaphorical senses, and 
 words of divers intentions and misprision of terms. Were 
 a redundance to pervade a language, we might be said to 
 speak, as Hudibras jocosely says of Cerberus, " a leash of 
 languages at once." 
 
 TO, prefixed to a noun invests it with a verbal character, 
 and DO is prefixed to other parts of the verb undistinguished 
 from the noun by termination, and to those parts only. 
 The radical form of a verb is to follow the particle to. 
 
67 
 
 According to the writer of the Diversions of Purley, 
 these words, which some would-be critics imagine are no 
 relation, are by him derived from very same root and stirps, 
 being perfectly identical. The difference between t and d 
 is very small, and in derivations it is hardly worth regard- 
 ing . To and do are rarely used by Chaucer, because the 
 do was implied in the termination ; so instead of saying, I 
 did love, I lov-ec? is used — the same if he doth love — he 
 loved, is used, because the do is an affix. 
 
 Now, do is a verbal sign, hence we see there is no 
 caprice in employing to and do so differently from the 
 practice of other languages, whereby we can use both the 
 termination and sign. If a distinguishing termination is 
 used, then do is omitted, the termination fulfilling the 
 office, hence, consisted for consists — the etli being in the 
 do, as he asketh : doth he ? In Gaelic, the words do and 
 to are the same, de and do being of, and to answering ours 
 in the dative case. 
 
 TO is the past tense of the Gothic verb tauyan to do, 
 says H. Tooke, which proves its identity. If this be 
 admitted by those puny intellects and contrary heads, who 
 have exposed in reviews their perversity and crass obstinacy 
 in denying it, by asking what does all this mean ? Let it 
 be proclaimed that to is no other than the very verb to do, 
 and as the foundation of all verbs is a substantive condition, 
 both do and to may be taken substantively. Hence, the 
 act, eat, eating, do eat and to eat are synonymous. This 
 same do is found at the end of words as endo in fact, for 
 info — inflammanc/o is inflaming, and is to and do inflame, 
 elliptically. 
 
 There is then no violence in inferring that the infinitive, 
 the participle and gerund are the same, and occasionally 
 both are used substantively, as in inuendo — the doing, 
 in which the learned languages agree, as endo urbc for in 
 urbe. See 12 Tables of Roman law. 
 
 p 2 
 
68 
 
 Non est solvendo (seri is understood) taken substantively 
 is, he is insolvent ; as radix est edendo, the root is for eating, 
 ergo, (which is the Greek Ipyto,) means it is edible. 
 
 Again, in the phrase, dictu quam re facilius, we have, 
 It is easier to say than to do, or in the doing. 
 
 Now the termination and means continuation, like 
 end, and was the termination of all our vulgarly termed 
 participles present, in reality corresponding to our Latin 
 gerunds, as rolling or rollend stone, volvendus lapis. 
 
 In the Persian word, hastan to be, we may recognise 
 haben to have, and so the terminations an and en, endo, 
 into. An is a verbal root of hast-an, and ast, means, he is. 
 
 The Arabic and Hebrew tongues follow the Persian 
 exactly in their verbal arrangement, and in the nature and 
 form of their inflections. There is only one word in Arabic, 
 for to be and to have; indeed it is rather have only. The 
 Arabic infinitive is a verbal noun substantive in the accu- 
 sative case, and corresponds to the gerund endo. 
 
 I cite here, from the Twelve Tables : Hominem mortuum 
 endo urbe, nei sepeleito, neive urito. 
 
 Endo fonere, tribos ricinieis, rica porporea, decemque 
 tibicinebos vestier licito, hoc pious nei facito. 
 
 Patri endo filium qui ex se matre que familias natus est, 
 vitai necisque potestad estod. 
 
 Endo gredi — ingredi — endo pedite, impedite, indupera- 
 tor, imperator are commonly found. 
 
 So we are led to the accusative case — Endo is equivalent 
 to indu, du and tu being alike and equivalent to to. And 
 this may assign a key, if not too far fetched, to the pro- 
 nunciation of tu and du in tutor and duty, for they have 
 the same sound in B. Jonson^s Sad Shepherd, act II. s. 1. 
 
 " Gang thy gait, and du thy turnes betimes ; or I'se 
 gar take thy new breikes fra thee and thy doublet tu. 3 ' 
 Gar means cause or prepare. 
 
 There are three words in Persian for to be. Sudan, 
 
69 
 
 hastan, and shadan — hence shum the Latin sum — sunt, they 
 are, is from the Sanskrit santi, and is also the Scythian 
 hwynt ; the pronoun they being at the end of the verb, as 
 I proved the article to be in both Latin and Greek, as 
 Xoyog — domin-us — a custom common in oriental tongues, 
 especially in Sanskrit, as Baan~oh arrow the. The same 
 in Persian, where the article i is used for a, and in the 
 plural ha is added, as Gul rose, Gul-i-a, roses. 
 
 To apply and to appreciate this secret is of infinite use 
 in grammatical analysis, why therefore are not terminations 
 of words made a part of instruction as distinct and impor- 
 tant words? A judicious arrangement of common ter- 
 minations in modern and unspoken tongues, with a short 
 syntax, would be of unequivocal service to students and do 
 honour to literature. A few pages would suffice to initiate 
 youth into some of the mysteries of speech ; and I here 
 again refer to the vocables do and to, whose extensive 
 applications in our tongue prove them to be the cardinal 
 words in primitive diction, for such there was, although 
 some overweening grammarians totally abjure it. 
 
 I do you to wit, means I give you to understand ; notum 
 vobis facimus, we do make known to you all. The same 
 to is found in to day ; to-morrow, to-night, data nocte. 
 
 If you do, is give that you do ; for da and do is included 
 in the if, written zif by antique scholars. So, is only 
 though, which is doch in German — and equivalent to do and 
 to. I will tho' — so pronounced, the French use it in oui 
 da — yes tho 3 , indeed. 
 
 To do means also to kill, and is the very same as duo in 
 Latin, and tuer in French. Duid, he kills, in the Twelve 
 Tables — hence, all its compounds perdo, perduo — from 
 which arises our dede to do ; the quick and the dede, cru- 
 cified, dede and buried. 
 
 We also say done to death — which is do, and down. It 
 is found in don, do on, and dofF, do, off. 
 
70 
 
 " He aras up and adun sat." Here to and down are the 
 same. Brut d'angleterre by Layamon, 12th century. 
 
 Do was ado ; human speech originated in popular sim- 
 plicity, and not in scholastic refinement to which it came 
 by time. Hence primordial diction became inflected, as 
 we find it in all grammatical accidents. 
 
 Is not ad the reverse of da or do and de ? Tooke de- 
 rives ed, the termination of our words as loved, from actum, 
 which is preposterous. In symbolical diction it is easily 
 understood, for a or e terminated by d the closer, or the 
 imperative do inverted — it is only do, the old German 
 tuon, and in the word Sohida, I sought, we find its so- 
 lution in, I seek, did. Sokcando — seeking, or in search. 
 
 If ed means up, de must be down — hence, symbolical 
 writing was originally conducted on the same principles 
 of simplicity and precision with the arithmetic art as X 
 means 10 and XI means 11. So the converse of X means 
 9, IX. One being placed before a greater number has a 
 power of abstraction, while I, placed after it, has an aug- 
 mentative influence. 
 
 Words are few in origin, and Adelung, in his Mith- 
 ridates, says that all radicals are but a few hundreds in 
 any language ; some 500 having been enumerated in Sans- 
 krit, some 1288 in Greek, and about 1000 in Latin. 
 
 It is incorrect to imagine that a letter possesses an essen- 
 tial power more than a figure. Its force when alone, and its 
 power in apposition, depend on convention ; as ad, to, up 
 — De, from, down — ad-scendo, de-scendo. One, is affirma- 
 tive, and the converse is negative, no. On this argument 
 depends the analysis of every conjunction, verb, preposi- 
 tion, in speech. 
 
 To and do signify the deed or act, which placed before 
 another noun expresses the energy. Does not the energy 
 reside in the agent ? Do not the terminations eth, ed, en, 
 point the energy or apprise us to what object it is to be 
 
71 
 
 transferred ? Looheth is equivalent to do or to look, some- 
 times expressed by an equivalent or synonymous term, 
 such as at, in, with ; as, he loveth her — that is, his love is 
 on, in, at, with her, &c. 
 
 Sometimes the energy is transferred to the object, when 
 the passage is not resolvable by on, in, &c. Do and undo, 
 on and in, are referable to the same source. See Grimm's 
 Grammar, vol. i. p. 1040. 
 
 In declarative propositions do is not used. Ex. : I know 
 it j but if we speak emphatically it is used : as, I do know 
 it — Do come. In negative and interrogative propositions 
 do is indispensable. Ex. : I do know it — Do I not 
 know it ? 
 
 Do, shall, will, may, &c. are sometimes omitted, which 
 has induced grammarians to suppose that we have a sub- 
 junctive mood in English, which I have combated; as, 
 Unless he wash my feet — If he but touch the mountain. 
 Here do is implied, which solves the construction. 
 
 I have nothing to cheer me, that is, might, may, could, 
 &c, so that the words do and to perform the office of all 
 the terms which have been mistakenly styled auxiliary 
 verbs. 
 
 Manners maketh men, that is, do make. Here lieth 
 the body of A B, that is, do lie — I am the Lord that 
 maketh — do make. Eth is an essential and independent 
 word, and constitutes no part of the word to which it is 
 joined. 
 
 II. Tooke says that do is only applied as the English 
 use it. He was not aware of the comprehensiveness of its 
 application, being one of the most universal vocables in 
 any tongue, and I reiterate it, a cardinal word. 
 
 Be and do by transposition supersede the use of con- 
 junctive particles, an elegance unknown in modern lan- 
 guages, and in our tongue all inflection is rendered unne- 
 cessary by position. How simple and how natural. Why 
 
72 
 
 is the verb without an inflection after a conjunction ? Be- 
 cause the conjunction is equivalent to the verb do ; conse- 
 quently the verb dependent on it cannot assume the 
 termination. We do not say Do loveth, but do love. 
 Thus : if though he read be equivalent to do he read, the 
 termination can not have place, which is another proof of 
 the extensive application of do and to. 
 
 The use of this significant monosyllable is not confined 
 to English; it is recognised in the learned tongues, but 
 being varied it does not strike the reader so forcibly. 
 
 The termination of the verb th is to be found in the 
 Saxon usitk, and is the initial of do. This th is sometimes 
 converted into s, which is no more than t aspirated ; hence 
 the variety resulting from the commutation of th and s. 
 We find an instance in quod:, quoth, written cwsed, quithan. 
 We say, Quoth he and never he quoth. 
 
 Go was written goo, and pronounced as do, written 
 adoe. " That longen folk to gon on pilgrimage " — go or 
 begone. 
 
 In the solemn style do is frequently used, particularly in 
 Scripture, and the omission of it is confined principally to 
 the familiar style of writing, when applied in an active 
 sense ; but when used passively its presence is indispensable; 
 as, I saw him do it. 
 
 Some words when used in active form are not followed. 
 by to ; but when used passively to can be suppressed ; as, 
 Our Saviour bids us offer our prayers in his name. 
 
 The sense requires no other mode in all our eminent 
 authors, possessing advantages not easily discriminated in 
 other languages, and these become laws in it. 
 
 In the phrase of Spenser, Bitter curses horrible to tell, 
 critics say it should be horrible to be told. Again : Did 
 quake to hear and nigh asunder brast. 
 
 Now here did and brast are in the same tense, which 
 justifies the following biblical translation — Did he not fear 
 
73 
 
 the Lord and besought the Lord, and the Lord repented 
 him of the evil which he had pronounced against him. 
 
 Here did and besought are in the same tense, and are 
 analogically expressed. It does not follow because did in 
 the former part of the period is expressed that it should in 
 the latter be understood. The interrogative and explica- 
 tive sentences are not confounded ; for the second and 
 third sentences are inferential, and not interrogative, as 
 Dr. Lowth supposes. 
 
 Besought is equivalent to did beseech, as brast is to did 
 burst ; and both are elegant instances of genuine eloquence 
 and afford a variety of diction, which enhance and give 
 change and charm to composition. 
 
 I have now advanced satis superque to prove that the 
 preposition to is identical with do, and in sustentation I 
 will cite this last evidence. We arrive to Exeter, a phrase 
 now obsolete or local, once common. It means obviously 
 I go, do go — extent Exeter — at, ad, both noting comple- 
 tion, in which the word do is not only implied, but is ac- 
 tually identical, and with affiance I aver (against all 
 critics and gainsayers, who have neither studied these 
 points nor care about them, but in reviews love to depreciate 
 rather than approve, and against whom it is below one's 
 dignity to shew uneasiness or resentment) that these cita- 
 tions and facts are, 
 
 The imputation and strong circumstance 
 Which lead directly to the door of truth ; 
 
 And that in these proofs adduced, the words Do and To are 
 one and the same, is a truth, which may be received by all 
 who philosophically cultivate science and appreciate the 
 phenomena of language — the agency by which we laud 
 our Creator, and declare the wonders that he docth for the 
 children of men. 
 
74 
 
 On Have and Of. 
 
 What I suggest here may be considered a speculation 
 and untenable, wanting in proof sufficient or verisimilitude 
 to command acquiescence, but as it bears on the preceding 
 chapter I introduce it to be held as a theory, until it be 
 subverted or confirmed by happier industry or future in- 
 formation. I solicit only that these chapters may be 
 ingenuously considered and not recklessly decried, as in an 
 inconsiderate review* of the first edition of this Tractate, 
 and then my conviction is that the affinities ascribed to the 
 particles and words will be fully established, regardless of 
 the petty cavils of petty minds. " Appensus fuisti lancibus 
 et inventus est minore pondere " may be applied to the 
 critic as well as the publicist. 
 
 There is much more unity in language than is supposed ; 
 the materies materia, if not reducible to one element, is 
 on analysis found to be so simple that one word is applica- 
 ble to many senses and employed in many intentions. 
 
 I think lingual affinities are perceptible between the 
 verb Have, and Of the preposition — as I thought to and 
 do to be the same word, so I find that of is akin to both 
 — all prepositions are reducible to these two prepositions, 
 of and to, as far as case is concerned. Of means father, 
 and is the general preposition, while to is the particular 
 preposition. 
 
 The efficient cause in English is expressed by of, from, 
 by, with, through, &c, which styled particles are no more 
 in derivation than these, viz. of is have ; from is the same 
 as frame, through is door, &c. ; now all prepositions alluding 
 to the ablative case are synonymous, as I die of, for, by, 
 
 * Saturday Review, 19 Nov. 1859. 
 
75 
 
 from, through, with hunger — so all prepositions have the 
 same import or are implied as connective particles, having 
 lost their primitive significations ; hence a particle is a 
 sign of a relative idea made absolute by its application. 
 
 The Latins neglected the prepositions and the Greeks 
 cultivated them and disregarded the case, for their pre- 
 positions applied to almost all cases, as Utor libris quibus 
 habeo. 
 
 I say with, assurance that all the cases in the learned 
 languages depend on the equivalents of and. to — and all the 
 compound tenses of verbs also depend on these prepositions, 
 as J'ai du, I owed him, or to him — here to and of are 
 blended and are significant. 
 
 The preterperfect in English means possession, as I 
 have done it, or possess it in fact ; done means in fact — 
 indeed — and inferentially is equivalent to have and of 
 which I do not scruple to derive from Ab, father in many 
 oriental tongues and dialects, as in composition ab-el, ab- 
 on, ab-or. It is found in the Greek cnro, and in the Welsh 
 ab, ap. Tad means father, and ab, ap, are used for son, Mab ; 
 as Owen ap Jenkin, the letter s is often affixed, as Jenkins, 
 which means out of existence — or kin to Jones, or John, 
 a very extensive praenomen, and is the same as Hanno in 
 Carthaginian ; Hanni-Bal, from Baal, means Lord John. 
 The Hebrew had Joannes, which name Bryant identifies 
 with Jonah — Berosus calls Noah Oannes — a dove, Ion — 
 and every language in Europe has John for Christian 
 name, under some form, as Giovanni, Jean, Johan, &c. 
 
 O in Welsh is out of — from — oc, odd. At, is preposition 
 for to ; Pappa and Pappus signify father in Egyptian, and 
 in Homer, Odyssey, Z. v. 57, Ilainra ^)tXf — is dear father — 
 cnriayii, is fatherland ; and the words have, had, hov, arc 
 only modifications of the same word of, implying to also. So 
 these two prepositions are found in haved, of, which is 
 another variety of ought, Eidhov in Celtic is my own, 
 
76 
 
 which hov is only have. In Gaelic de and do, which is of, 
 means also to. While da in Chaldaic means the — as 
 Demeter, Arjjurjr^ — the mother — Ceres. Mithyr in 
 Egypt is related to the ark, said to be mother of mankind 
 in Ethnic mythology. 
 
 A is for aught, na for naught, o is ought, no nought — 
 and not comes from nought, and all descend from owe. 
 Debeo is only De-habeo — and devoir in French but de- 
 avoir. Ought is the past tense of owe, which is of — and 
 discovered where it may be and disguised, it is but the old 
 dog in a new doublet ; ought is often written improperly 
 for aught, meaning anything — as for aught I know. 
 
 A and o may be abbreviations of aught and ought, being 
 written indiscriminately. Nay, naught, none, not one. — 
 The spelling, as in many words before orthography was 
 fixed, was arbitrary — indeed orthography may be said 
 never to be settled, but words like lands have a limit to 
 their right, and it is more politic to leave them, and pro- 
 nunciation also, vexata questiones, than disturb them after 
 a long possession. 
 
 A, an, ane, awen, o, on, oon, one, seem to be abbrevia- 
 tions, like act, ocht, aught, ought, odd, owed, owen, own, 
 one, all deducing from owe, which corresponds to the Latin, 
 ans, ens, and to the Greek wv, being fons et origo. 
 
 et A marchant man that he ought money to — that enquire 
 what him was best to do." — Off was written of, — auf, of, off, 
 and is equivalent to abi, begone, Via, via — allez vous en — 
 off with you — like too written to, as to lset for too late. 
 Saxon. 
 
 The modern Greeks do and probably the ancients did, 
 pronounce the genitive case of \6yog, Xoyov, as logof — 
 which of denotes possessive case or possession, the same 
 as have, when traced to its radix. 
 
 To have and to owe have been shewn to be identical, as 
 is evidenced in this phrase, The man who oweth this girdle, 
 
77 
 
 (Acts of Apostles) — is the same as hath it; and this etymo- 
 logy is reinforced in Phomme a qui est cette ceinture — 
 Virum cujus vel cui est zona hsec. 
 
 What you have of another is due, which points to the 
 identity of habeo and esse. They are equivalent, commu- 
 table and synonymous — Ex : Hast thou hunger then, for 
 art thou hungry ? — Milton. «Pai chand, I am warm, or 
 have warmth. II fait froid, it is cold ; il fait nuit, it is 
 night. All etymologists recognise the fact that one sim- 
 ple word supplies many meanings and shades of meaning — 
 which is shewn in the multitudinous forms of have, hab, 
 ab, of ought, debere, devoir, and when thus applied it is 
 styled primitive diction. 
 
 Such affinities are perfectly obvious in of and to, both 
 noting possession ; hence two apparently dissimilar terms 
 really and substantially are one and the same ; nor is it 
 surprising that these prepositions are synonymous and 
 analogical, when it is considered that cause and effect are 
 concomitant, and can not be separated even in imagina- 
 tion, for they are of such a nature that the latter derives 
 its existence from the former, so that the effect is the pro- 
 perty of the cause, as it is contained in it. We aver 
 again therefore, that IS, the universal copula, the substan- 
 tive verb to be, is the universal genus, to which all things 
 at all times may be referred, and so termed the general 
 genus, is used for have, and is equivalent to of or have, of 
 which it is the abbreviation. 
 
 We affirmed, despite the sneer which fell dead-born, of 
 one who derided this hypothesis in a newspaper, and who 
 undertook a task for which no one was so little qualified, and 
 we reiterate now, that TO is the reciprocal of du, or is 
 mutually interchangeable with it, and we adduce the phrase, 
 Qui doit faire cela? Who is to do that? which is equal in 
 word and meaning to who shall, will, ought to do that? and 
 so if I appreciate, or ('valuer an juste, my theory or rather 
 
78 
 
 proof, I may, without hyperbole, aver that these affinities 
 are obvious, but not to all, for who can expect it, that 
 those whom nature destined to be hewers of wood and 
 drawers of water can be philosophical inquirers, conversant 
 with language, the vehicle of thought, that great and 
 efficient instrument in meditation ? 
 
 Dr. Blair, a name worth shoals of such pretenders, the 
 fond few who dam up literature and try to repress rather 
 than incite to inquiry, remarks that the structure of lan- 
 guage is extremely artificial, but there are few sciences in 
 which a deeper and more refined logic is employed than in 
 grammar. 
 
 Of denotes the genitive case, which I surmise may be 
 found in the letter s, as mos, moris — of signifies author, 
 and moris may be a transposition of ex-more. So we get 
 to the root of s contracted for is, and which was wont to 
 be marked c on antique monuments. 
 
 Plurality is expressed by s, and in Chinese by en, as 
 muen, more. This termination in English added to words 
 notes addition, as, ox-en. Es, written also ec, notes ex- 
 tension, which is plurality, and may be traced to the He- 
 brew Issa vira, according to Bochart, signifying she-man 
 — and although our word woman could be derived from 
 of-man, by transposition — wo-ov, of, without violence, yet 
 its origin is admitted to be womb-man. 
 
 The particle ce } is the same as es. — Ex. : Onies, twies, 
 pennies, dice, mice, which es is synonymous like en, with 
 time, denoting extension ; as hous-en — wh-en— the-en — 
 theo-en. In the words length- en — leather-en — war-en 
 to make aware, and ent in monu-ment, en is the same. 
 So the an in partiz-an — in as matine — alexandrine, the 
 principle is the same. 
 
 The Romans continually prefixed s to Greek words, 
 which s is only out of, meaning existence ; as in as, es, is, 
 os, us, and is the possessive case of nouns, forming also 
 
79 
 
 the third person singular of verbs, and is equivalent to 
 the and. that. See Richardson's Dictionary, Section III. 
 
 Now es, ek, ex, issuing from the cause, is only plurality 
 expressed by s, when elocution requires it, whether we 
 consider the termination s as Keltic, Gothic, or Greek, it 
 imports but that it corresponds to the Saxon of or to. 
 Before the Trojan war s resembled a semicircle c, as found 
 on the Sigean monument, and this favours the idea that 
 to and of differing apparently, yet really agree. 
 
 Avowedly ec is es, which combination is equivalent to 
 our from, of, out, &c. as ec-fociant, fly off, for the Umbriau 
 and Tuscan u was not then adopted. This proves that 
 5 or ec is the preposition ec transposed and inverted, which 
 inversion constitutes what is termed case in artifical lan- 
 guage. 
 
 So convenient and general is the application of s or es — 
 that the English, who retain nothing but what is useful 
 in factitious language, can and do with this termination 
 express every casual relation of the most complicate 
 dialects — Ex. : Cujum pecus ? Regium vel Regis — Cui 
 pecus ? Regi, ad quern pecus ? ad Regem — a quo pecus ? a 
 Rege. So we say whose cattle ? the king's — &c. This 
 looks minute, but " les choses les plus petites deviennent 
 grandes, quand elles peuvent servir aux grandes." 
 
 The word had is used comprehensively for I would have, 
 and by some it has been thought a solecism or abnormal, 
 as I had rather not — but this sentence is elliptical and 
 hypothetical, and means I had rather not, were it left to 
 my choice. 
 
 The unlearned take their ideas from nature, and adopt 
 no expressions but such as necessity requires, and are often 
 right when the philosopher diverges. Some on encoun- 
 tering this difficulty place it beyond control, and give it 
 up, assigning it a metaphysical meaning, as many faint- 
 hearted wights throw up their cards on losing a trick. 
 
80 
 
 There are really no metaphysical ideas, for that logical term 
 means with nature, but posterior in the order of inquiry, 
 and not beyond or above nature. 
 
 I consider that any true philologer or ingenuous student, 
 who are not routineers by practice, but who cultivate philo- 
 sophical grammar, in the words of, to, and have, of so large 
 application, may discover the analysis of every case in lan- 
 guage j so will fly many difficulties in the career of litera- 
 ture, which is an increasing source of rational pleasure, for 
 language involves the most recondite mysteries of human 
 intercourse, and is the basis of every intellectual struc- 
 ture. 
 
 On the Articles The and A. 
 
 The is called the definite, and a the indefinite article — 
 but both the articles are definitive — although a is said to 
 leave the individual undetermined, and the fixes him. 
 
 H. Tooke derives THE from the Saxon verb Dean, which 
 means acquisition, and which may account for the omission 
 of the relatives who, which, Sfc. when the has been ex- 
 pressed. Ex. : The man I saw — the house I built — the 
 trees I sold; thus rendering its equivalents that, which, 
 who, whom, tautologous. 
 
 The article the is sometimes omitted, and may so be 
 with propriety, before superlatives, when they are used 
 in an eminent or emphatic sense and require a definite the 
 most. This fault is imputed to Scotch writers — but 
 natural language has privileges unknown to artificial. 
 
 In a direct address, or when the superlative is preceded 
 by a possessive term, the is inadmissible (but on other 
 occasions it should be used) as, He is my best friend ; you 
 are my son's sincerest friend. 
 
 The language of England is elliptical and beautifully 
 so in prose and rhyme, which renders it laconic and 
 energetic. At most, at least, at best, all these expressions 
 
81 
 
 are more energetic than if the were interposed — these are 
 ellipses, which are omissions either in a word or the in- 
 flections of a word. 
 
 The article the was sometimes prefixed to the pronoun 
 relatives. The which is used in the sacred roll, and that 
 the article the was used as a relative appears in the Lord's 
 Prayer, before that and who were adopted and preferred; 
 for when the was succeeded by that, its distinction was 
 changed — who has succeeded that and which. 
 
 Now the, that, which, a, an, one are all identical — as a 
 man, not two or anything else — this notes extraction, as 
 the thing extracted out of, &c. 
 
 H. Tooke admits all words to have a meaning: — and he 
 adds, Articles supply the place of words which are not in 
 the language ; and we may ask, can non-entity occupy 
 place, and what has no existence have a meaning ? 
 
 Rules are introduced to restrain the exuberance of 
 popular diction; they are rather to be read, not com- 
 mitted to memory to be learned by rote. 
 
 In many instances we find the is the article in English, 
 as the terminations in Greek and Latin nouns are the 
 articles — in fact this principle obtains in Sanskrit and 
 Persian also, supplying the place of an article by a ter- 
 mination of those nouns which they would indefinitely 
 particularise, as Baan-o^, arrow the, and in Gal a flower, 
 i is added. 
 
 When we say " St. Paul the is the highest preacher the 
 we habbeth in holy Kirk," it is obvious that the is the rela- 
 tive as well as the article in both these places ; and again, 
 the is the relative who, and represents the Saxon thaet, 
 that or who, which seems to derive from tha, the, signify- 
 ing the same. Ex. : Ealle tha the hyt gehyrden — all they 
 who it heard. Again, Our fader the in heofunum eart— 
 who —Them the scyldigat with us. Those who trespass, 
 against us. See page 7, Canon 5. 
 
 G 
 
82 
 
 Literal roots are usec^ prefixes and suffixes, as os, us, &c. 
 being article and relative too. They are even put in 
 medio, and are the elements of all words in all languages, 
 for each was used, and was an indivisible, intelligent sound 
 in its original intrinsic meaning. This is primitive diction, 
 or the primeval form of speech, the esoteric doctrine for 
 the scholar. 
 
 Articles supply the place of words not in the language, 
 although all words are significant. 
 
 The article a and the have not the affinity to the Greek 
 article which they are supposed to have. I believe that 
 the Greek article notes and distinguishes the gender only. 
 
 We distinguish gender by he and she, in which the 
 Greek and English coincide. It is abstract, noting ab- 
 sence of gender or indefinite without regard to sex, for we 
 can predicate he and she of it, but not of I, we, they. 
 
 Ille and iste ; hie and iste are said of one near, while 
 Me is said of one remote. Ipse is of all persons, but 
 generally joined with the primitives, as Ego ipse, me ipse 
 consolor. Hie liber est mei or meus, that is elliptical, mean- 
 ing mea interest causa ; to avoid ambiguity, Hie liber est 
 mei solius. 
 
 The Latin article does not mean the in hie labor, hoc 
 opus, but this the labour, this the work. So I surmise that 
 in both the learned languages the articles are only used to 
 shew the gender, and have no necessary affinity to the 
 English article. 
 
 The pronoun ille may be verbally and gracefully trans- 
 lated the; as Ille virhaud magna cum re, sedplenu* fidei.* 
 The man though poor, yet faithful. 
 
 Are we to omit the article in English if omitted in 
 Greek ? If so, what becomes of lv my 17/itv l\a\r\az ? 
 In (the) Son spake he to us. — We are not then to seek the 
 English article in Greek, they have no affinity. 
 
 In the sentence dg to ovo/ma, which means in the name, 
 
83 
 
 we have the article to imply the, which is taken for the 
 virtue and power of God, but it is not necessarily prefixed 
 to nouns. 
 
 Words should not be transposed if the sense may 
 be obscured, as The wages of sin is death. Hermes 
 says on this proposition, to which I have before adverted, 
 that death is the subject and wages is the predicate, and 
 Dr. Walker has copied this error under the word Predicate 
 in his Dictionary. 
 
 We have remarked that the article in Greek was used 
 to exhibit the gender before inflection was adopted. It 
 was afterwards transposed and made a termination, when 
 its former use was superfluous and ought to have been dis- 
 continued ; but it was retained like many other particles 
 for exuberance of sound, in which the Greek was pre- 
 eminent. Hence the impossibility of reducing it to rule 
 and determining its application; but we still think that its 
 origin and use are different from the English article. 
 
 Languages supposed to have no article use it in prefixes, 
 and in their terminations. The Mceso-gothic demonstra- 
 tive pronoun or article, is sa, so, thata, which is only 6g, 
 7), 6 ; said to be originally rbg, rrj, to — but some think it 
 was cog, a a, to, and so the etymon of the pronoun was 
 similar in Greek and Sanskrit — and the Latin iste is the 
 equivalent, being os, and is, with te added, and may be 
 derived from ta, te, tha, equivalent to der, diu, daz. Sec 
 Pritchard's Celtic Nations, p. 261. 
 
 The personal index thee is to be found with a single e in 
 old writers — and Love answered, I trust the without borrowe, 
 I wool none. Again, Wei his the, corresponding to bene 
 est tibi. Esther viii. 8. So that English government 
 regarding the article the and his, the symbol of possession, 
 lies here and can lie but here. This is the germ of meta- 
 physical syntax ; it consists of abstraction and is as 
 invisible as its divine original. 
 
 g2 
 
84 
 
 The is used emphatically in these examples — In that 
 quarrel use it to the death. I persecuted this way to the 
 death. This was the Son of God. Painted to the life. 
 
 The is used in a particular sense, and is agreeable to 
 the Greek. Dr. Lowth and his contemporaries were 
 ignorant of the relative article being annexed to nouns in 
 Greek and Latin. 
 
 When we say the twelve, we mean elliptically those who 
 go by that name ; as Paul the apostle, he who is so called 
 by eminence — the poet, one so styled. Hence, the, which, 
 what, that, are all identical and are correspondent to qui, 
 quse, quod — and 6c, v> 6. 
 
 I have never seen it advanced that the article and 
 relative are identical, but I suggest it for the consideration 
 of those who are friends to such inquiries, as well as the 
 opinion that the article in Greek expresses the gender 
 only, and does not correspond to our article. 
 
 The and thee have a common origin, the speaking only 
 determining the difference, as Unto the tel I my tale. 
 — Lawrence Minot's poem. 
 
 The throne of thee who art God is for ever and ever. 
 This is consonant with the Greek text. " Truly this was 
 the Son of God." Matth. xxvii. 54, and Mark xv. 39, 
 viog Oaou, a Son of God, or of a God. (Dr. Lowth.) But 
 the critic would not have objected to this version, God's 
 Son, which is correspondent with the original even to the 
 letter. 
 
 Possessives are frequently but improperly used for the 
 definite article; and the is sometimes incorporated with 
 the substantive, as Thenvoye of fortune. — Chaucer. 
 
 In English a change of article alters the sense, as 
 Nathan said unto David, Thou art the man — which could 
 not be a man. Minute changes may induce serious effects. 
 
 " Hse nugse seria ducunt, In mala." 
 
 Proper names, when they retain their nature, never ad- 
 mit the article before them, as Tout Rome, tout Paris — and 
 
85 
 
 a pleonastic form is used, when the French or Italians 
 say, The Malibran, or the Mercandotti, the Grisi, &c. 
 
 If the numerical article a is omitted in language it is 
 obvious, as it is in Algebra, the most perfect species of 
 written language from its extreme simplicity and precision. 
 A, an, one, are synonymous, and are used when we name an 
 existence with emphasis. Since every letter in the alphabet 
 is a part of it, so every word is apart of language. It is 
 not necessary to use an article in a definition, the subject 
 being divested of this essential appendage, according to 
 Aristotle. 
 
 A king, is every king — a man is bom to trouble, means 
 every man. God gives reason to a man. Now both a 
 and the are definite. No word can be more definite or 
 less indeterminate than one or unity. A n:ec.as being. 
 Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel. — Pope, 
 
 Dr. Lowth confounds the prepositive and the definite 
 articles. We have already said the former the in Greek 
 shews the gender only, and corresponds to he and she. 
 This was its original institution, which was found necessary 
 to distinguish the male from the female before inflection 
 took place, when it might have been omitted ; but the 
 Greeks were unwilling to surrender words once adopted, 
 and therefore they retained the use of it for the same pur- 
 poses, but particularly for one distinct end, to ascertain 
 the gender, for without it many languages are rendered 
 obscure. We are so accustomed to assume that an article 
 is used before nouns, that we do not easily induce our- 
 selves to think it can indicate the gender only. It appears 
 so to me, hence I have suggested it with deference. 
 
 It is a comparative form of expression where the is in- 
 troduced, as the more, the better, answering to the German 
 je besser — and indeed yea more, yea better, would be 
 correct ; the is not an article then here, but a corruption 
 of the German je, and ja — and being used as a compara- 
 tive conjunction, it signifies by how much, by so much. 
 
86 
 
 On Pronouns and Relatives. 
 
 Pronouns are various — indefinite as who, receptive as 
 whom, which ; personal as I } she, it, me, him, her ; possessive, 
 my, ours, they, his s theirs ; relative, who, which, whether ; 
 demonstrative as this, that, other, some. It is a neutral 
 demonstrative, as it was he. 
 
 A pronoun is not used instead of a noun, as grammarians 
 teach, but in preference to a noun, and the verb is virtually 
 implied in the pronoun or included in it. 
 
 An abstract term signifies the mode or quality of an 
 existence without regard to the subject in which it resides. 
 Ex. : Blacksmith, roundness, &c. 
 
 A concrete term always refers to some subject, as black, 
 round. 
 
 An attribute includes the relative and copula, when we 
 say a man, we mean an existence which is styled man ; so 
 good man, one so admitted to be. 
 
 In the Sanskrit syntax the personal and other pronouns 
 are often omitted, as are their nominatives in the Latin, 
 the termination of a word being a sufficient distinction. 
 Hence, inversely, English authors have elegantly 
 omitted the termination when the pronoun was expressed, 
 for inspired, we have 
 
 Ci Oh thou my voice inspire 
 Who touched Isaiah's hallowed lips with fire."— Pope. 
 
 Ascham in his Toxophilus says, " He that will write 
 well in any tongue must follow Aristotle's counsel : 
 Speak as the common people do, and think as wise men 
 do, so should every man understand him, and the judgment 
 of wise men allow him." 
 
 It is needless to add there are anomalies in pronouns as 
 well as in every other part of speech. The pronoun ich is 
 found united to the verb in German, as icham for I am — 
 Schabbe for I have — Ichot, I wot. Ich, Ig, I, are the same as 
 ego, and it is thought that iw, and esse are derived from ego. 
 
87 
 
 Identity as / is no more susceptible of multiplication than 
 unity. If we is the plural of I, it must mean two or more 
 selves. There is no radical identity to be found between the 
 first and second regular pronouns, and their pretended 
 plurals. There is a similarity in personal pronouns between 
 Sanskrit, Celtic, Gothic, Latin and English. In this 
 affirmation Prichard and "Welsford concur. 
 
 The Sanskrit aham, the pronoun for I, ego, consists of 
 two elements, viz. ah and am — but the latter is a termina- 
 tion only — ah being the root — which resolves itself into ih, 
 ik ego, being a guttural sound. From this the oblique 
 cases are formed as ma me. The plural nominative is Ve 
 prefixed to am. Asm an and amme, asme, umme, usme, 
 are the epenthesis of sma. 
 
 It is through numerals and pronouns and articles that 
 identity of language is established — and Sanskrit is the 
 cradle of human speech and the fountain of inflected diction. 
 To this parent language especially may the pronouns be 
 traced ; hence I have presumed to advert to it in this 
 Tractate continually, since recent inquiries have opened it 
 to etymologists, and all who take interest in philolo- 
 gical pursuits, which is to language what synthesis and 
 analysis is to chemistry. 
 
 To Sanskrit then may be traced the resemblance or 
 direct affinity between ng and m. Its accusative cases 
 ending in ing or ng, like the Latin m or ung. Ex. : ves- 
 pcrung for vesperum, as Fabius the Roman historian wrote 
 B.C. 200, in his wars about Hannibal. 
 
 This was emitted nasally, as the French do now, and 
 used to write un, ung. 
 
 Ego was originally engo, and from this proceeded the 
 irregularity in its cases, as mei, mihi, me. This again 
 leads to the first person of tenses ending in m, which m is 
 equivalent to ngo, or ego, as the Chinese express it. 
 
 The Latin is a refined Celtic, and the first person in 
 Celtic is me. They said me, for aham, I am — derivable 
 
from asmi, esse — tfifii, or tart, in which we identify the 
 Latin esum abbreviated into sum. 
 
 Me am, ahani, which has a point over the line denoting 
 nasality; the h is really redundant — agam is aham, and all 
 identical with ego, lyuv, Iwvya. 
 
 In English there was originally a nominative, as " Me 
 clupeth it Ludgate." — Drayton. 
 
 In Chinese, in a list which constitutes all the words in 
 that original tongue, ego is recognised in Ngeou, ngo, ni. 
 See Lewis le Conte's China, Lond. 1737. 
 
 Formerly the French used g after n, as ung je servirai, 
 and ung is the accusative case of Baan-arrow in Sanskrit, 
 where the article oh or the is a suffix, as observed page 81. 
 
 The Celto-Scythse comprised the whole of the north of 
 Europe and Asia, styled Scythia in Asia and Celt in Europe. 
 In the Celt tongue, the labio -nasal m is mutated to the 
 aspirated labials v and/ in Welsh, and pronounced v ; some 
 have the personal termination am, to av, af, as the word 
 camav, I love, in the Gypsey tongue. The Greek w is a 
 vocalised form of aw. Thus am, av, au, w. And here I 
 will add the Latin future tense audiam to compare it with 
 the Welsh, as I received it from Mr. W. R. Evans, one 
 versed in etymology. 
 
 Latin Audiam. 
 future. 
 
 audies. 
 
 audiet. audi. 
 
 eo. (eav. 
 
 earn.) 
 
 Welsh Credav. 
 
 cred. 
 
 av. I go. 
 
 eo. 
 
 
 future. Credi# 
 
 
 1. 
 
 is. 
 
 
 Creda. 
 
 
 a. 
 
 it. 
 
 
 Credwn. 
 
 * 
 
 awn. 
 
 imus. 
 
 
 Credwch. 
 
 
 ewch. 
 
 itis. 
 
 
 Credant. 
 
 
 ant. 
 
 eunt. 
 
 
 The Welsh credaf, I shall believe, and canaf I shall 
 sing, seem merely the pronoun fi. I or me — a mutation 
 of mi added to the root of the verb with a connecting 
 vowel to form the first person singular of the future tense. 
 
89 
 
 Tenses are an earlier development of language than 
 traceable composition, as amabo — may be ama, €aw ; €cu'vw, 
 €aa>, which is the Hebrew bo, to come and to go. 
 
 The Sanskrit accusative case (pronouns) is mam, com- 
 posed of m, enounced ma, and an enounced am. It 
 has the force of the reduplicated me, ma, as ego, met, 
 cyw, /x£, Se — and me too. 
 
 The Sanskrit pronoun of the third person is T'am — Tu 
 am, the 2nd person, composed of tu and am, in Latin tu 
 and met ; with the organised sound m arises the pro- 
 nominal me, and is the terminating syllable in p.i in Greek, 
 and am in Latin. 
 
 The Greek ajxa is the literal root m, as am-bire, am-plecti, 
 afKpi, and in Saxon embe. Now am is the radix, and (pi 
 is added, as in other Greek words, €<rj-0t. Am-te, is-te, 
 tu-te. See page 37. 
 
 Embe, ambe, ombe, yiju&e, from the roots m and b ; the 
 word afi<pLTp^ uv * s equivalent in Saxon to ymb — sern — 
 an. Am elfjn, is Saxon Hsem-ian, hiem, hem, ham, 
 home, with be added, which has the same force as ge, as ge- 
 haem, co-ire. 
 
 Am is found in various ways and in various tongues. 
 Am may be only ba inverted, as v, w, f, p, m, are only 
 derivates of b, and they are convertible as vado, bado, 
 vinum, winum, which is only otvov, and iin in Hebrew, 
 the first jod by repetition pronounced as v or w. Ba me, 
 is in Celtic, was I — and was may derive from the same 
 fountain, and is probably as old as the confusion of 
 tongues or even human speech. Ta me — Ta tu — Ta se — 
 Sin, sib, sind — this is Gaelic or Celtic. I, thou, he, we, 
 ye, they. 
 
 The form ys, i3 the real etymon, and is the root in Sans- 
 krit and other European languages. 
 
 The verb substantive in many tongues is also the adverb 
 of time or place, as I call=Calling my here. Prichard, Celtic 
 Nations, p. 335. 
 
90 
 
 The structure of inflections in the Celtic is similar to the 
 ground work of conjugations in other languages, especially 
 Sanskrit, but declensions do not, they are denoted by the 
 prepositions, and their dative plurals are the type of the 
 Latin abus and obus. 
 
 The origin of language is hard to define through so many 
 transmutations of age, country, caprice and law. We 
 do derive however much from Gothic and Celtic, as well 
 as from more modern dialects, and in some of our etymo- 
 logists derivatives have been injudiciously ventured, so as 
 to be considered by the prudent-overmuch to be sheer 
 phrensy, yet are there unexpected derivations, as jour from 
 dies. 
 
 The word ma in Islandic means might, pa, am — ajia — 
 afj.(()L — and m or mi mark the first person in Sanskrit verbs, 
 as m in Persian, fit or v converted from jx in Greek and 
 Latin. Again, am in Ethiopic means cum or with, a/xa. 
 Where are we to seek the Ethiopic and Amharic alphabets, 
 some account of which is found in Bruce's Travels with 
 the alphabetical characters ? 
 
 This tongue, apparently barbarous, seems as complex as 
 Sanskrit, and like the Hebrew has two tenses, a perfect and 
 a future. In it all verbs and all parts of speech were 
 originally nouns as in Hebrew, which goes to establish the 
 opinion in this tractate of only one part of speech. In 
 fact, Being is the source of existence and language also, 
 the ens or wv unity in every thing, number, substance, 
 colour, and \6yog meaning speech and reason evince their 
 close alliance. 
 
 The Ethiopic is recognised as of Shemitic descent, and is 
 a mere dialect of Hebrew — and even the term Chaldee has 
 been applied to this tongue. 
 
 The Geez is the oldest dialect of Arabic in existence, 
 which is spoken in Arabia Fselix; the Amharic or Ethiopic is 
 next in antiquity, and simpler than the Geez, and of much 
 wider range geographically. 
 
91 
 
 We say ego and tu, following the order and dignity of 
 the person in speaking or writing — and in French vous et 
 moi, lui et moi ; natural modesty not permitting oneself 
 to stand first in the address. In epistolary correspon- 
 dence the writer placed himself first, as we see in Cicero's 
 letters. Cicero Attico, Cicero Csesari Imperatori salu- 
 tem dat. Hence the Ego et Rex meus of Cardinal Wolsey. 
 
 Me and the, now written thee, are equal to I and you or 
 thou, being ancient nominatives. The in Gallic is no- 
 minative, and in modern English we have no accusative. 
 We have already observed how we used me for I, as in Me 
 clupeth it Ludgate. — Drayton. And in Layamon's Brut 
 d'angleterre we find, Me imatte a Sweuen — that is, I 
 dreamed a dream. Asweved for aswevened, being in a 
 dream. 
 
 In the Doric dialect no distinction is made between the 
 second person singular in the nominative and the accu- 
 sative — I gave it thee or them. Thou is modern compared 
 to the, spelt thee merely for distinction, both having the 
 same radix, and in fact are one. 
 
 Originally me, he, she, ye, were used obliquely, as To 
 poor we the enmity is most capital — Let thee and I the 
 battle try — The more shame for ye, holy men I thought 
 ye — I knew ye, as well as he that made ye — Pass ye 
 away, thou inhabitant of Saphir. 
 
 He, she, his, her, were formerly used in English as in 
 French, neither masculine nor feminine, but attributes of 
 distinction. She is not always pronominal, but a noun, 
 importing Lady — as Shakspere says, The Shees of Italy — 
 The cruellest She alive. 
 
 The Greeks had what they called uprightly accented pro- 
 nouns, in distinction to enclitics, which inclined to or from 
 the verb, as Give me content, where me is a perfect enclitic, 
 a leaning or inclining pronoun. 
 
 This people were adventurous — this people were under 
 regal government — were denominated Pelasgi and Argivcs, 
 
92 
 
 or Arkites, according to Jacob Bryant, for all foreigners 
 coming into the land of Javan were Pelasgians. 
 
 Plurality is not always employed, and this is because 
 the number preceding the substance determines the plu- 
 rality, as three milestone, handful, pound weight, stone 
 weight, pound sterling, brace of partridges, foot deep, pair 
 of gloves, couple of eggs, which usage is found in all our 
 eminent authors. 
 
 Shakspere uses this nineteen years. " I have not wept 
 this forty years." We do not say accurately this present 
 year^ the pronoun meaning present, or that past year. 
 Generally this and that are singular, these and those plural. 
 
 They who and them who are inadmissible, unless they 
 and them have a reference to the antecedent term ; as They 
 who were implicated ; those who humble themselves shall 
 be exalted — They and them refer to an antecedent, and 
 these and those to a subsequent term, as It was not they 
 that should speak, but the Spirit of the Father. They, 
 whom, them, are retrospective or respective, those, these and 
 who are prospective. It is better to fall among crows than 
 flatterers — those devour only the dead — these the living. 
 
 This is the record of John, &c. who art thou ? art thou 
 that prophet, and he answered No. This is the oriental 
 style, and gives a more animated representation than the 
 ordinary method of relating the substance of a conversa- 
 tion in the third person, as old words judiciously applied 
 give an air of grandeur to composition. 
 
 Our ancestors said, Give me them books, This books ; 
 adjectives undeclined, them and that, were plurals, as this 
 means, &c. The vulgar, apparently wrong, use primitive 
 diction, because their knowledge is oral and traditional. 
 Them that humble themselves, &c. Them was formerly 
 used for those before that was pluralised. They said, It is 
 not me he is in love with — it is him; which is pure English, 
 and not he, which is French idiom. Is that him in the 
 crowd ? it is her, and not she. They say also there is many 
 
93 
 
 persons when indefinite, but when positive or definite then 
 we say, nous sommes vingt a table — g'a ete avec lui-meme 
 que je vous ai vu. 
 
 The plural of that is those. Those the antecedent of who 
 or which always refers to a subsequent part of the sentence, 
 as : Let those who poetry in poems claim, 
 
 Read this, or only read to blame. 
 
 All the unities of voice, case- and number should be 
 preserved. 
 
 Each other, these reciprocal pronouns have reference to 
 two, as the two boys will hurt each other. One refers to 
 more than two, as hurt one another — it notes reciprocity. 
 Each means two taken separately, as I give each, that 
 is both one and the other, a guinea. Other is applied 
 when the substantive is expressed, as give me the other 
 pens ; when the substantive is implied. These are prefer- 
 able to others. 
 
 Each party is to pay their own costs. Each is impro- 
 perly used here for both. Both parties are to pay, &c. 
 Their could not be introduced in the former sentence with 
 grammatical propriety, the noun to which it refers being 
 singular. 
 
 Their was written hyr, as " The lutel foul hav hire wyl 
 on hyre lud to synge" — That is, the little fowl have their 
 will on their lay to sing. Lud is lied, in German, hence 
 our lay. 
 
 Both means two taken conjointly, as both shall go. — 
 Both, all, such, are accompanied by the article ; as both 
 the men, Such a man. The correspondent term of such 
 is as. Such a house as that. 
 
 Neither is applied to two and means not one, or the 
 other. He shall have neither — it is always followed by 
 nor, and sometimes preceded by not, as Love not the world, 
 neither the things that are of the world. 
 
 The distributive pronoun none is applied to more than 
 two, as he shall have none of such things, and is like this, 
 
94 
 
 undeclined, and not varied on account of number, because 
 it notes proximity. 
 
 That is ours is elliptic diction, for part of our property. 
 
 Am, em, im, and him is a contraction of He-im. Them 
 was written hem, and is a contraction of the-im, as whom is 
 of who-im. But im is equivalent to man, and hence is said 
 to come Homo, and not from humus, as the Latins thought. 
 
 The pronoun in Sanskrit has the force of I and me. Imna 
 in Gothic is him in English. 
 
 When two terms connected by and are the nominative 
 to the verb, they agree in case, as Scotland and thee, are 
 each in the other. We are alone. Here is none but thee 
 and I. Advert that in these citations it should be thou 
 not thee. 
 
 Sometimes in imitation of other languages, the pronoun 
 in English is suppressed, as Forasmuch as it hath pleased 
 Almighty God, and hath preserved you, &c. Where he is 
 omitted, although the antecedent God, is in the oblique case. 
 
 His is conjunctive and absolute. Her is conjunctive 
 and receptive. Where is his book ? This is his. Have 
 you seen her sister ? You is subjective and receptive, as 
 You were wrong, I saw you. 
 
 Her may be only a transposition of she. S and R 
 being convertible; the symbol of the former meaning 
 existence, and the latter meaning motion. 
 
 Si in Gothic and seo in Teutonic are her ; and in Egyp- 
 tian She means Woman. 
 
 Me, thee, him, us, always depend on a verb or preposi- 
 tion expressed or implied. Indeed the preposition expres- 
 sed or implied is the only characteristic of government ; 
 sometimes prefixed, sometimes affixed, nor is there need 
 of any other. 
 
 Latin pronouns ending in c, as istic, istuc, &c. are not 
 declined. IS in Latin was made im in the accusative case, 
 as Boni im miserantur. — Plautus. Suus, sis for seis ; sos 
 put for suos, and sas for suas, in antique authors. 
 
95 
 
 Who, Which, What, Relatives and Antecedents. 
 
 We have observed that this and that were not varied, 
 whence also the relative that, as well as the conjunction 
 that may be explained ; for let the denomination be what 
 it may it is only one and the same word. Were this 
 not granted, it is assumed that grammarians would be at a 
 loss to assign a reason for the use of that, when referred 
 to a plural term. 
 
 • That answering to quod is elegantly expressed by the 
 Evangelist, "We speak that we do know, and testify that we 
 have seen." " Again to consider advisedly of that is moved." 
 — Bacon . Do always that is lawful and right. By the inser- 
 tion of which after that } these beautiful sentences would lose 
 their energy. 
 
 Which is also elegantly suppressed after it ; and indeed 
 the suppression of definitives of every sort afford grace 
 and energy to composition, as that, who, which, &c. — for 
 sometimes the insertion renders the sentence tautologous 
 and should be omitted, provided the sense is not obscured 
 by the omission, or ambiguity ensue. The contrary prac- 
 tice, or redundance, enervates discourse, as a man who is 
 addicted to intemperance ; which is better without the who. 
 Note, the participle addicted is only applied in a bad sense; 
 we do not say addicted to virtue with grammatical pro- 
 priety. 
 
 Whom do you say that I am ? I am the person whom 
 you declare me to be, whom you mean. — This is an Atti- 
 cism, and appears in Latin, " At nesciebam id dicere illam." 
 — I did not know that meant her. 
 
 As these and similar expressions develope the mysteries 
 of human speech, the student would be little benefited 
 were he told that they arc inconsistent with philosophical 
 grammar. He should be rather taught that every mode 
 
96 
 
 of expression adopted by the learned is consonant to 
 utility, and that a true philosopher would never hazard 
 his reputation so capriciously as to render himself the 
 sport of pedantry. 
 
 Who, which, the, are relatives when they describe exis- 
 tence more particularly, as " I shall endeavour to promul- 
 gate the decrees of custom who has so long possessed, 
 whether by right or usurpation, the sovereignty of words." 
 In every language which has in any degree been cultivated, 
 there prevails a certain structure and analogy of parts which 
 gives foundation to the most reputable usage of speech,^ 
 and which in all cases when usage is loose and ambiguous 
 possesses considerable authority. 
 
 Beelzebub than who, 
 Satan except, none higher sat. — Milton. 
 
 Who and whom are applied to persons, which is applied 
 to things, and that to both. 
 
 His and whose were formerly applied to persons and 
 things, and were not considered male and female. 
 
 Which rule means as to which rule — and who, is as to 
 which person. 
 
 Daut, let that — though that — and that, used for instead 
 of, in order to, if followed by may or might. Whomsoever 
 you please to appoint, is to be resolved thus, Whom you so 
 please ever to appoint. 
 -* Whose, who, that, is the he, or genitive of whose, whom. 
 What is the it, or that, having the double possessive 
 whereof. Why is the accusative of whom, wherefore. W 
 in Scotland is converted into f — as fa, who—fan, when — 
 fat, what, fa, how or why. 
 
 Dr. Johnson writes The fowl whom nature has taught to 
 dip the wing in water, and Milton writes, Of that forbidden 
 tree, whose mortal taste, &c. Addison writes, I desired 
 they might go to the altar and (might) jointly return their 
 thanks to whom they were due. And Swift, In the posture 
 
97 
 
 I lay, for in which I lay. The article the of course in- 
 volves who, for which it was anciently used. 
 
 Such ellipses as these throw all the laws of Greek abs- 
 traction into the shade, and yet Dr. Lowth, too much im- 
 bued with a predilection for dead languages, censures them. 
 
 Who, indefinite., is invariable, as Whoever the King 
 favours, the Cardinal will find employment for. — Shahspere. 
 " Whoe'er I woo myself would be his wife." 
 
 When who is unaccompanied by an antecedent, it is not 
 a relative, as nescio quis, I know not who. He laid the 
 blame on somebody, I know not who of the company. 
 Again, Who should I meet but the Doctor. — Spectator, 32. 
 Here, and in many such phrases, Dr. Lowth says it ought 
 to be whom, and did not seem to know that who is indefi- 
 nite here and not relative. 
 
 When you have a relative transpose the terms of the 
 proposition, as Happy is the man who obeys his Creator ; 
 and when the relative follows two substantives, the one 
 respective, the other not, use the second form of possession. 
 
 The relative should be preceded by a stop, whether sub- 
 joined to a preposition or not — and the relative should not 
 be omitted if preceded by that. 
 
 Who is appropriated usually to the rational and which 
 to the irrational creation. 
 
 Who and which are elegantly omitted in the objective 
 case, but they can not be suppressed in the nominative, as 
 the man who was there. 
 
 They arc either at your service, they are neither. Whether 
 of the two is obsolete, it should be which of the two ; it 
 may be applied to persons or things, and may be extended 
 to any number. 
 
 Thought and language act and react on each other ; 
 sometimes a mist and indistinctness is unwarily thrown 
 over style, and the meaning is often known only from tho 
 context in all languages. 
 
 H 
 
98 
 
 The indefinite pronoun is not varied in the objective. 
 Ex. : Make who you will judge. For who love I so much. 
 Who is this for ? Who servest thou under ? We are still 
 at a loss who civil power belongs to. Who do you speak 
 to ? Again, who is for whom, in who have you seen ? and 
 who is omitted after the, as the person who I saw, may be, 
 the person I saw, because it is expressed in the, which as 
 before remarked is the same as the relative, and the no- 
 toriety of the fact obviates the necessity of quotation. 
 
 In the antique version of St. John, it is written, " He it 
 is that is to comynge after me which is maide before me 
 of whom I am not worthi that I unbynde the thwong of 
 his shoo.' 5 — John i. 27. 
 
 Eorsoothe a stronger than I shal come aftir me whos I 
 am not worth to unbynde the thwong of hese shoon. 
 
 Ov ovk si/uii iKavoQ ra viroSrumaTa jSaorao-at. Cujus non 
 sum idoneus calceamenta portare. — Matthew iii. 11. 
 
 Whose and of whom coincide in these versicles, and con- 
 fute argument on the subject of a genitive or possessive 
 case, while the Greek and Latin texts are in unison with 
 the English version. 
 
 Osiris, whom the Greeks style Dionysius, and is the 
 same with Bacchus, and who Mr. Bryant says is only 
 Noah. 
 
 Here who is elegantly suppressed in the second clause. 
 The remonstrance he received and was dispersed, &c. 
 Here which is omitted. These instances accord with 
 classical authority, and the Latin and English coincide, 
 which fact to know and remember facilitates the acquisi- 
 tion of Latin, a language remarkable for its concinnity, in 
 which it surpasses the Greek. 
 
 How is used for what, as How pleasant illumination of 
 mind. How useful directions of life. How sprightly in- 
 centives to virtue does the perusal of history afford. 
 
 Sometimes the relative has for antecedents the whole 
 
99 
 
 reason that goes before, in which case it is put in the neuter 
 gender and singular number, as In tempore veni, quod 
 rerum omnium est primum ; though prima res might have 
 been employed. 
 
 When a nominative comes between the relative and the 
 verb, the relative will be of the same case that the verb 
 would require after it — as Felix, quern faciunt aliena 
 pericula cautum. Quis was formerly written ques plurally, 
 while quae and quo were put for all genders. So was mi — 
 mi conjux — mi sidus. 
 
 What has been considered a contraction of that which, 
 but untruly. It corresponds to the Latin quod, and is 
 applied to both genders and ungeneric terms. Ex. : What 
 man, woman, tree, &c. What and that are perfectly 
 identical ; consider advisedly of that is moved. We speak 
 that we do know. So likewise the neuter it — a pronoun — 
 when it is that men may be said to be conquered. For this 
 submission is it (that which) implieth them all. — Hobbes. 
 
 He, she, which, who, and their obliques have not long 
 ceased to be applied to both existences. 
 
 'Tis me, His she, c'est moi, statur a we when personal. 
 We is used for I, which I savours of egotism, and you for 
 the third person. Roges for roget aliquis. It is reported 
 of Lord Erskine that he used the pronoun I so often and 
 egotistically in his speech, that the printers could not report 
 it for want of the /type. 
 
 They say, for it is said, is a mode of diction highly 
 appreciated and renders inflection of the verb unnecessary. 
 
 Some peculiarities in the French and English languages, 
 which once were the same, still remain as common to 
 both. Ex.: It is me he is in love with. He is in love with 
 me, that is it. It is those histories he speaks of— that is, 
 is understood. 
 
 When the expressions it is, was, &c. are used indefinitely 
 it seems improper to affix the nominative pronouns ; the 
 
 ii 2 
 
100 
 
 construction is Celtic and corresponds to the Saxon me- 
 thinks, methought (time was when well is him, her, them, 
 was in vogue) says I — this is cursory language, and s was 
 the termination of verbs singular and plural. " Methinks 
 I your tears survey •" that is, thing or think is to me, that I 
 your tears survey : these two words were the same formerly 
 in pronunciation and orthography. To do is to collect 
 things, hence to think is applied figuratively to the opera- 
 tions of the mind only. 
 
 Many tongues express the same idea personally. The 
 French and English, after the Celtic, reverse the expression 
 and affix the objective noun — c'est moi — it is me — and not 
 c'estje — oril. This is a mode of expression unwarranted in 
 every language, and is as barbarous as it would be in Latin 
 to say, taedet ego, tu, ille. 
 
 Dr. Lowth advocates this anomaly 3 but Dr. Priestley does 
 not (p. 100), and is right. In fact our approved classics 
 have adopted the just course, and this alone is sufficient 
 authority, without an appeal to any grammarian. 
 
 Though we now restrict I were, thou wert, &c. or were 
 I, on some occasions to an hypothesis, it was not so 
 anciently. It is a modern innovation, no more than 150 
 years old, testibus Addison, Swift, &c. As I know thou 
 wert not slow to hear.— Addison, All this thou wert. — 
 Pope. Thou, Stella, wert no longer young. — Swift. 
 
 For ever in this humble cell, 
 Let thee and I, my fair one, dwell. 
 That is, let us, who are I and thee. Again, which rule 
 if it had been observed, &c. Here which and it are in 
 apposition. 
 
 Time was when none would cry that oaf was me, 
 But now you strive about your pedigree. — Dry den. 
 
 To dine with her and come at three, 
 
 Impossible it can't be me.— Swift. 
 
101 
 
 The instances of this construction are innumerable in 
 the learned and modern tongues, by virtue of some term 
 implied on which depends the oblique case. 
 
 Coustruction is not limited to a particular language, its 
 power is universal, in whatever language it is found writers 
 are justified in the application. 
 
 The French say, Si j'etois de vous — were I you, or in 
 your place — Son grand benet de fils — this great booby of a 
 son. 
 
 That oaf was me, is, that oaf was that blockhead of me, 
 and is for it can not be me. Here be is the infinitive 
 mood. Be and do were formerly used as participles, so 
 was go for gone — as up is she go. — Sir Th. More. 
 
 In Milton — u But others to make such as I" 
 
 In Dryden — " That it has chose two such as you and me. 39 
 
 Here the first meant that we should understand am 
 after I — but the second, on the contrary, made you and me 
 coincide with two such, in the oblique case, which is per- 
 fectly in accordance with classical construction. 
 
 But as me slept — for I — 
 
 I am that I am — we speak that we do know — whether 
 it is easier to say thy sins, &c. — unto which he vouchsafed 
 to bring. To insert which or may in these phrases would 
 subvert their force, as the diction is perfect by their 
 omission. 
 
 I now come to the use of it — which represents time, 
 and elsewhere expands itself into multitudinous variety, 
 and is of singular application in English. 
 
 Ldndley Murray, who seems to have perpetuated explo- 
 ded errors, says our writers used the term means, as this 
 and that means in an individual sense, and of it and it was, 
 he remarks the terms are misused in, It is wonderful the 
 very few accidents which in several years happen from 
 this practice. 
 
 This sentence is elliptical— i* is wonderful how few arc 
 
102 
 
 the accidents which, &c. The is here applied in its ori- 
 ginal sense for how or what. How few, what few, and the 
 few being synonymous. The sentence should have been, 
 " How few accidents arise from this practice," rather than 
 happen. 
 
 In the phrase it is 200 years since the building of Rome, 
 the Latin and English dialects are coincident. In regard 
 to time and space, as it is 1000 years since "Romulus* 
 reign, the verb does not depend on the number but on the 
 word it, which is elegantly used for time. In C( Gibraltar is 
 4 leagues from Tangier," space is signified, and 4 leagues 
 depends on a preposition expressed or implied, hence mille 
 or 1000 is not the nominative case. 
 
 Ab urbe condita, post urbem conditam, urbis conditae, 
 anno urbis, are all equivalent expressions, and are used in- 
 differently, and so of all similar expressions ; the form and 
 signification may differ, but the sense remains the same. 
 This is of importance, for it may be inferred, the form al- 
 tered, that the sense is altered too. 
 
 Dr. Lowth says that the pronoun it is sometimes omitted 
 and understood, as we say, It appears, for as it appears, 
 but this is erroneous. As is a word equivalent to that or 
 which, and is resolved, which or that appears — we say 
 which or that. Particles supply a place, as I value it not 
 a farthing, here the ellipsis is that it means the worth of a 
 farthing. 
 
 As is sometimes used for if, as it were. Si me ames, as 
 you love me. 
 
 Si vivo, as I live — I love you as my own brother. Te in 
 germani fratris dilexi loco — I will be to you a father, and 
 you shall be to me a son — here as is omitted — Yes, and 
 please God, immo si Deo placet — Simul and withal — as in 
 German is used for that. 
 
 In Hebrew, Arabic, and all the cognate dialects of 
 "Western Asia, all that is ungeneric is placed under a femi- 
 
103 
 
 nine inflection, hence the propriety of this version from 
 the Hebrew : 
 
 " He that pricketh the heart, maketh it to shew her 
 knowledge." 
 
 In Henry VI. Shakspere — this passage may serve to 
 exemplify this peculiar demonstrative pronoun : 
 Oft have I seen a timely parted ghost 
 Of ashy semblance, meagre, pale, and bloodless. 
 Being all descended to the labouring heart, 
 Who in the conflict that it holds with death 
 Attracts the same for aidance 'gainst the enemy. 
 
 Here the word it is of no gender and means the named. 
 It derives from hight, and was so formerly spelled. The 
 word who also is here highly rhetorical, and is applicable 
 to both existences, animate or inanimate. 
 
 Where shall we sojourn till our coronation? 
 
 Where it thinks best unto your royal self. — Ric. III. 
 
 It is indisposed as is said of a child, when the sex is not 
 mentioned — as the name of a horse is applied to a mare. 
 
 Gender depends on custom, and can anything have gen- 
 der unless by consent ? It is divided into male and female, 
 " Which two great sexes animate the world." All genders 
 given to inanimate substances are merely casual, and only 
 appertain to words because they appertain to things. 
 
 The pronoun his is used for its, which latter word does 
 not occur once in either Testament. 
 
 If the salt has lost his savour — the table and his furni- 
 ture — the brazen altar and his gate of brass — look not on 
 the wine when it givcth his colour — he that pricketh the 
 heart maketh it to shew her knowledge. 
 
 The neuter pronoun of the 3d person, says Dr. Lowth, 
 had formerly no variation of case ; instead of the possessive 
 its they used his, and he might have added her also, which 
 is now appropriated to the masculine — Learning has his in- 
 fancy, when it is but beginning and amost childish — then 
 
104 
 
 Ms youth, when it is solid and reduced — and lastly his old 
 age, when it waxeth dry and exhaust. — Bacon, Essay 58. 
 Advert that, the d in participles preterit is sometimes 
 dropped, as in excommunicate, elevate, and in these ex- 
 amples. 
 
 To destruction sacred and devote. — Milton. 
 
 The alien compost is exhaust. — Philips, Cyder, 
 
 "Were incorporate with each other. — Milton, Eiconoclast, 
 
 17. 
 
 With the gold and silver he had dedicate of all nations 
 which he subdued. — 2 Sam. viii. 11. 
 
 According to the grammaire raisonnee of Arnaud, Les 
 genres ont ete inventes pour les terminaisons, but the 
 Port Royal grammarians find a different origin, and say 
 that the word arbor a tree is feminine, " parceque comme 
 une bonne mere elle porte du fruit " — miratur non sua 
 poma. This remark is utter nonsense. For in all lan- 
 guages all things and existences are of different genders. 
 In Greek and German, females are neuter, as Das Weib, a 
 woman, and to Kopaaiov, a girl, in Greek. Mr. Harris has 
 adopted this ineptie, and says the sun must be masculine 
 and the moon feminine, the contradiction being complete 
 in Greek, German, Arabic, &c. whether in sexes or inani- 
 mate objects. The sun is made feminine in P. Ploughman, 
 like the common mother earth, which teems and feeds all. 
 The sun lacked her light in her selfe 
 When she him suffer that sunne and sea made. 
 
 As, Whose seed was in itself after his kind, &c. where 
 his and her refer to inanimate objects, for how can sub- 
 stance or words have gender in them ? 
 
 They came unto the iron gate which opened of his own 
 accord. Love worketh no ill to his neighbours. 
 
 It and was can not be applied to the plural number. 
 It, when receptive, or having the quality of receiving what 
 is communicated, precedes the other receptive pronouns, 
 
105 
 
 but the noun is placed after the pronouns — Give it me — 
 Give him the book. 
 
 The receptive pronouns, whom and which, are elegantly 
 omitted in — the man I saw, the horse I sold. 
 
 Conjunctions, Particles, &c. Indeclinables. 
 
 Prepositions and conjunctions are Verbs, says H. 
 Tooke, hence they may be accompanied with any form of 
 substantive, as Between you and I or me. Here is none 
 hut me. Let thee and me, or I, my fair one, dwell. 
 Conjunctions do not require the same cases or the same 
 tenses before and after them ; connectives are sometimes 
 conjunctions, sometimes prepositions. 
 
 Adjectives and conjunctives frequently attract to the 
 subject, prepositions never — conjunctions do not connect 
 like cases and tenses, they depend on the different views 
 of the mind, as They be persuaded that John was a prophet- 
 
 "When that is used as a casual conjunction, and not as a 
 relative, it is always preceded by a comma; and the relative 
 should be preceded by a stop, whether subjoined to a 
 preposition or not, page 97- 
 
 A an and one, shew that the existence is to be taken 
 in its whole extension — a is always a conjunction, as I 
 have a house — an urn, &c. Have you one ? One is ab- 
 solute. These words convey similar ideas, however meta- 
 physical grammarians may diversify identity. Sir John 
 Mandeville writes, " Schcwethe in o contree, and schewe- 
 tlic not in another contree. " 
 
 As is conjunctive and absolute, as a, an, no, my, thy, &c. 
 I have a house, have you one. You have no hat, has he 
 none ? That is my purse. He is wholly thine. He is 
 no longer ours. Your's is lost, &c. 
 
 The conjunction and has many meanings unknown to 
 superficial inquirers. It means continuation, and is found 
 in end, endo, the termination of participles present. 
 
106 
 
 Atque in Virgil, Georg. I. v. 202, is immediately, and in 
 this verse of Ennius : 
 
 " Atque, atque ad muros properat Eomana juventus." 
 
 if is often improperly used instead of whether, which 
 latter is a conjunction dubitative, while if is always con- 
 ditional. I go, if you can or not. 
 
 It is said we want a conjunction adapted to familiar 
 style equivalent to notwithstanding. "We have although, 
 which has the import of notwithstanding, and is the proper 
 conjunction, a term answering to non obstante or notwith- 
 standing. 
 
 Neither and nor are often repeated for energy ; nor love, 
 nor hate ; neither in this world, neither in the world to 
 come — but sometimes neither is elegantly omitted, as 
 " Simois nor Xanthus shall be wanting there." When a 
 noun or a pronoun are connected by or or nor, and are the 
 subjects, the verb agrees with the nearer, as He or I am to 
 go — am to do that. That is ours, is elliptical. In German, 
 when the antecedent is the first or second person, the verb 
 following the relative may be in the third person, as I who is, 
 thou who is. This construction has been used in English. 
 
 Each, each other, either, neither, are applied to two ex- 
 istences. They are distributives. Either is often omitted 
 with elegance, and is derived from weder in German. 
 They crucified two others with him, on either side one — 
 but neither always followed by nor, must be invariably in- 
 serted, as neither A nor B ; whether is when, either, each, 
 ent weder, jeder. 
 
 Or is often omitted, as, it is practised in town or country. 
 
 " That nature, nor the engagement of words are not so 
 forcible as custom/' Here is an obvious contradiction of 
 the disjunctive conjunction having a contrary effect to the 
 conjunction copulative, as, The King nor the Queen were 
 not at all deceived; which shews that it is not true that 
 the disjunctive has always an effect contrary to the copula- 
 tive. See page 13, Canon 34. 
 
107 
 
 Pastors are obliged to watch over their flocks, neither 
 can they forsake it without a crime. Page 101. 
 
 Is there ever a ship ready to sail ? Is there never a man 
 to be found ? Never so great, in Latin, ut ut maximus. 
 He came never the sooner for that. 
 
 Ever is used for any, never for none — Though never so 
 infamous and shameful, there should be worse behind. 
 Hear the voice of the charmer, charm he never so wisely. 
 This is pure English, and means charm he so wisely as 
 never was before. Let our thoughts be never so strongly 
 attached to any particular place. Of this diction there are 
 boundless instances, but Dr. Lowth condemns it. 
 
 These forms of expression afford a pleasing variety, and 
 throw a light on their use in other languages, which is an 
 acquisition to the student in all literary pursuits. 
 
 However is used with adjectives, whatever with substan- 
 tives, as however great his riches — whatever riches he may 
 possess — let his wealth be ever so great. 
 
 There is none other but the house of God — which is put 
 for that and yet conjoins the two parts of the proposition, 
 and is more energetic than this is the house of God. 
 Again, It imports no more, but — to trust in Christ is no more 
 but — to acknowledge, &c. It could not be cured but by 
 amputation. The moon was no sooner up but he opened 
 the gates — but is praiter in Latin. 
 
 The suppression of definitives and insignificant particles 
 contributes greatly to the strength of composition, as I 
 must, however, be just to own, which is preferable to " so 
 just as to own," and so may frequently be omitted without 
 loss of sense. Without the figure ellipsis language would 
 lose its energy, and become languid and inadequate to 
 taste and judgment. The beautiful variety displayed in 
 English composition exceeds that of any other language. 
 
 There are adverbs of time as often ; of place as here; of 
 manner and quality, as happily ; adverbs modify verbs and 
 sometimes adjectives, implying intension and remission. 
 
108 
 
 At nondum etiam ? What not yet neither ? Ni moi non 
 plus, nor I neither. Ne quaquam, by no means — not at all. 
 
 Adverbs are sometimes inflected in Latin, Greek, and 
 English, as here, hither, hence, whence, where, whither — 
 soon, sooner — well, better, best, there, thither, 8fc. 
 
 Sei sit nox — (12 tables)— is si sit nox, it is not put for 
 noctu. We can say sei sit nox or noctu existente — quam or 
 quod vales gaudeo, since or so long as you are well, I rejoice. 
 Si vales, ego autem valeo, is a Ciceronian compliment. 
 
 Quod, at, quum, are relative and depend on the preposi- 
 tion ad, ubicumque reperiantur. Occasionally in Latin, 
 loquitur rarissimus for rarissime is used. Tacet multus for 
 multo, and here is an analogy between English and Latin, a 
 refined Celtic, which language or dialect prevailed in Europe 
 before the Greek and Roman invasions, and divers immi- 
 grations carried their tongue into foreign countries, and 
 supplanted or altered the apparently aboriginal languages. 
 
 The doctrine that Khetia was Tuscan and Etruria was 
 Rhetia is affirmed to be sound ; if so they were Kelts and 
 consanguineous with the Gauls or a Celtic colony. 
 
 It is impossible not to be struck with the number of 
 Latin roots that are contained in the pure dialect of the 
 Celtic, as shewn by Leo in the Mahlberg glosses, where 
 hundred of words between the languages are identical (see 
 page 5). This primeval tongue exhibits a specimen of 
 Milesian, of which the Latin tongues spoken in the 
 Valteline are modulated forms, while its state of utmost 
 refinement is exhibited in the Latin. 
 
 Ad nihil, ad multum, ad plus, ad magis, nimis, nimium, 
 satis are according to rule, but custom is more prevalent 
 and elegant. Nimium legis nee tamen totum — you read 
 too much, yet not all. Some, says Swift, learn so quickly, 
 that they learn nothing. He means but the inexorable 
 logic of facts. 
 
 Negatives express no abstract idea of nonentity, because 
 no such power of abstraction extends to the mind of man. 
 
109 
 
 The French tongue has no double negatives. Ne is the 
 converse of en or in, as in-nocent ; and em and im is the 
 same in un- import ant. So ig, il, in ignorant and illegitimate. 
 One word can not be the negative of another, because the 
 want of energy would divest it of its verbal nature ; the 
 abstractive article therefore can represent no more than 
 contrariety or opposition. 
 
 Non habeo quid tibi dem, I have not the wherewithal 
 to give, — in which all verbs, unphilosophically termed 
 auxiliaries, are included. 
 
 Quin is qui-ne. " Curiosus nemo est quin sit malevolus," 
 only an evil disposed man is malevolent. Two negatives 
 are equivalent to an affirmative, say some ; if so they are 
 superfluous, but they are not so, for they make the expres- 
 sion emphatic and decisive. In French this construction 
 is perpetually used, but pas and point are not negatives. 
 Two negatives enforce as : — 
 
 Nor did they fierce pains not feel. — Milton, 
 
 Nor let no comforter approach mine ear. — Shakspere. 
 
 Nor is danger apprehended, no more than we commonly 
 apprehend danger from thunder or earthquakes. Neither 
 is a question made by the adverb how, added to the adverb 
 often. It is an exclamation, and no mark of interrogation 
 is admissible where no answer is expressed or implied. 
 
 No wonder. No doubt. Happy who ere long if so, if 
 not. All these are instances of ellipses, and apposite too : 
 as, it is stuff, that is but stuff; hence many obvious words 
 are elegantly omitted, I can no more ; shall, must, no more. 
 
 No is used instead of not, as, you must whether or no. 
 
 The Italians like the French use a negation for an affirma- 
 tive enforcement, as, 
 Estimo chc la statuaria sia di piu dignita che non e la pittura. 
 
 I n'ame (ne am) but a lewd compilatour, &c, and with 
 this swerde shal I sley ne envy. — Chaucer. An adverb is a 
 word added to a word, and so contains more than one word, 
 in which sense it may be considered a circumstantial ex- 
 
110 
 
 pression, and may be analysed. Now the word notwith- 
 standing is neither a preposition nor a conjunction. But 
 all words were originally the same. 
 
 Particles are small portions of words used variously. 
 Can participle and particle be the same, as in this con- 
 struction the word murdering is evidently a particle of an 
 active verb ? says Dr. Priestley. 
 
 Prepositions are particles, and admit oblique cases after 
 them. To, the sign of the infinitive mood, is a particle. 
 
 Displeased with redundancy of particles in Greek, Dr. 
 Lowth remarks, that the Latins extended their displeasure 
 to the article, which they totally banished. But this is not 
 true. Was it not to tear away the cloth with the lace, as 
 Swift represents in the Tale of the Tub ? 
 
 Now the Romans did not banish the article, but finding 
 it separated from the noun they transposed it (as I have 
 already observed, Canon 5), so in Chinese, Persian, and 
 Sanskrit, page 81 ; and instead of tearing away the cloth 
 with the lace, they cemented or made a consutile texture, 
 and thus attained the proudest boast of literary composition. 
 For the prefix in natural language becomes the affix in arti- 
 ficial language, as the us in Dominus, and og in \6yog are 
 the articles at the end, and hence are perfectly synonymous. 
 This, in the analysis of tongues, is a gain to know, and 
 facilitates the knowledge of language and logic, for Dr. 
 Blair remarks, the structure of language is extremely arti- 
 ficial, and there are few sciences in which a deeper or more 
 refined logic is employed than in grammar. 
 
 Indeclinable parts of speech are properly particles, and 
 seem to be the offscourings of language, like the Parias 
 among the Indians, to fill up vacuums, and interstitial 
 spaces, and do low work, serving to link signification and 
 no-signification. 
 
 Interjections coincide with no part of speech, but are 
 adventitious, mere impulses of nature and not of art. 
 
 Locke complains that more than enough has been ad- 
 
Ill 
 
 vanced on other parts of speech, but that particles have 
 not had justice done them, and H. Tooke admits they are 
 fragments of substantives, while Dr. Johnson assigns the 
 properties of three different parts of speech to the vocable 
 enough, viz. substantive, adjective, and adverb, and exempli- 
 fies it in seven different ways. 
 
 In the words instanced by Welsford under particles, viz. 
 enough, among, how, like, not one but has its own obvious 
 and current meaning and no other, as on analysis is evident. 
 Whiles is the genitive case like certes, of a certainty ; of a 
 while, and it means a turn, and time metaphorically. 
 
 All particles are significant somehow, as are all proper 
 names of persons and places, implying some attribute 
 comprised in them, as Albert, all-bright ; London is Llan 
 Dian ; temple of Diana, as I have read. Wherever the 
 evident meaning and origin of the particles of a language 
 are to be found, there is the certain origin of the whole. 
 Adverbs exist no more without verbs, than a verb without 
 a substantive, which proves there can be but one part of 
 speech, and the verb is no part of speech, while esse is the 
 verbal noun, or the only substantive philosophically con- 
 sidered. Canon 28. 
 
 The Latins used for exclamations the words en and ecce, 
 usually followed by an accusative case as in Greek l$e,l§bv; 
 but which are really imperatives of the second aorist of 
 aSw, to see and know. They said, O miserum, which is 
 elliptic for fateor ; or Me miserum, vides understood — 
 and like Hei and Vae, are indications of mental emotions, 
 and are plaintive particles. Imperative is only elliptical, 
 as Go thou, that is, I command you to go. 
 
 Indeclinable parts of speech are properly particles, and 
 the almost imperceptible nicety with which they were used 
 in the structure and connection of the sentences renders it 
 frequently impossible to decide whether they might or 
 might not be introduced. 
 
 Hermes says the Greeks filled their works with, particles 
 
112 
 
 and conjunctions ; the moderns do not so, and he asks, Is 
 it where there is meaning there must be words to connect ? 
 
 The reason why the Greeks used particles was for 
 euphony, surcharging their clauses with particles and ex- 
 pletivesj which signify next to nothing ; but the English 
 have a more finished tongue, and prefer real energy to any 
 such capricious jingling. Composition depends on concep- 
 tion and feeling, and what we conceive strongly and clearly 
 we must express in an appreciable and corresponding way, 
 for language is the dress of thought— 
 
 Verbaque, promisam rem, non invita sequent ur. 
 
 In the sentence, " sub eas literas statim recitatse sunt 
 tuse." — Cicero. Immediately after those letters, yours 
 were read. This corroborates the idea 5 that when the verb 
 is not repeated, a term may have a different construction — 
 as You will go before me — he is to come after me. In these 
 phrases, you will go, means before I go — and after I come. 
 
 No one would hesitate to prefer the former to the latter 
 mode of expression. The connection between the conjunc- 
 tion and. preposition is too nearly allied to doubt its propriety. 
 
 At often answers to the Latin ex — as ex animo illam 
 amavit — He loved her at heart. Ex intervallo — at some 
 distance. Ex insperato — at unawares. 
 
 In Hebrew there is no affirmative answering to yes — it 
 is supplied by periphrasis — and the Latins said for yes, 
 ita, etiam, maxime — which are elliptical circumlocutions. 
 
 When verbs are used indefinitely they are followed by 
 a case depending on a preposition. In fact a preposition 
 is the only governing power in language, to whose con- 
 sideration I proceed. 
 
 On Prepositions. 
 
 All regimen depends on the preposition, or all relation 
 of words to one another depends on prepositions expressed 
 or suppressed. If the former, it is regular construction, 
 
113 
 
 if the latter, it is irregular, figurative or elliptical construc- 
 tion. Nevertheless there are anomalies in the application 
 of this part of speech, for incoherency is common to all 
 languages and people. 
 
 All prepositions have the same import or are implied as 
 connective particles, having lost their primitive destination, 
 hence a particle is the sign of a relative idea made absolute 
 by its application — as " a me virgo est," she is a virgin 
 for me. 
 
 Dr. Hill, in his Latin synonymes called f ' The Philosophy 
 of Prepositions," had tried to establish many of his deduc- 
 tions on the principles of quiescence and motion, and he 
 has failed exactly as Mr. Harris has done in his Hermes, 
 by giving a preposition the meaning of some other word in 
 the sentence cited for illustration. 
 
 Now the preposition is the only symbol of government, 
 and it is frequently and elegantly omitted. Substantives, 
 adjectives, verbs, adverbs, conjunctions, and interjections 
 never govern ; government should be discerned by the 
 mind, and should be so perspicuous and easy as to be level 
 to any understanding. The motives to action are twofold, 
 final and efficient. 
 
 The preposition is a noun not placed before of necessity, 
 because it is often the converse in English. — " They have 
 of late," says Lord Shaftesbury, " His true reformed in some 
 measure the gouty joints and work of thereunto, whereby, 
 thereof, therewith, and the rest of this kind, by which com- 
 plicated periods are so curiously strung or hooked on to 
 one another after the longspun manner of the bar or pulpit." 
 
 But in these words we see nothing more than a transpo- 
 sition, the preposition being affixed according to the genius 
 of some inflected languages, as in Aoyoc, Dominus, &c. 
 where the article is a suffix, as observed, page 7, by 
 which contrivance two or more words become one or united, 
 which mav serve as a clue to the student, to unravel the 
 
114 
 
 mysteries of artificial speech, wanting the knowledge of 
 which he is left to grope his way in the dark without 
 attaining the object of his toil in the pursuit of grammatical 
 science. Many and extensive readers too have but a faint 
 conception of the nature and excellence of artificial speech, 
 comprising energy of expression, vivacity, in fine every 
 thing valuable in rhetorical and poetical composition. 
 
 Prepositions also form a great part of the prefixes of the 
 English language — as fro-ward, to-ward, in-come, down- 
 wards, off-spring, by-word, be-cause, be-ware, of-fer, for-bid, 
 out-let, over-land, with-draw. 
 
 Most prepositions may be used one for the other, and are 
 nearly synonymous, as the efficient cause is expressed by 
 of, by, from, through, with — as he died of hunger may be 
 predicated also of all these particles. And in the words 
 before, behind, below, above, the essence is virtually con- 
 tained in the preposition. 
 
 Sometimes a preposition is omitted, as in the old work 
 styled "Prikke of Conscience" — Allemaner [of] friendship 
 that may be — and again, Alle manere [of] grace ; and after 
 verbs, as it is more graceful to say approve anything, than 
 approve of any thing — this diction is as old as Queen 
 Elizabeth. 
 
 The efficient cause is expressed by the genitive case in 
 Greek and by the ablative in Latin, and by either in 
 English — the final cause is expressed by the dative in 
 Greek, and by the accusative in Latin, and in English by 
 the preposition to, expressed or implied, as God's grace, 
 give it to John, give it him, go to John. So in Latin, the 
 efficient cause or motive, the final cause or end, are ex- 
 pressed by words of motion equivalent to the prepositions 
 from and to in English — in old diction we said, that master 
 of him, that wretch of you, and master mine, as we now say 
 my Lord. The French say, mon Prince, for your Highness. 
 
 For directs to the final cause or motive, as to work for 
 —inconvenient for, condemned, hated, substitute, plead 
 
115 
 
 for — To be for, hired for, Sec. This word by implication is 
 against, as for-give, for-sake, bear, swear, close. H. Tooke 
 has not adverted to this preposition in these senses. 
 
 By is the proper term when a material or an immaterial 
 existence is to be personified, or when the cause of an 
 effect is to be expressed — Ex. : He was killed by lightning, 
 which is more intelligible and correct than he was killed 
 with lightning. 
 
 When rules are various and inadequate, no wonder that 
 custom and grammar are discrepant. It is a Saxon struc- 
 ture to end a sentence with a preposition, but it does not 
 sound so classical, because it separates the preposition and 
 its object too far, as whom do you speak of? Change the verb 
 if such an union of prepositions is threatened. By a parity 
 of propriety we should avoid a concurrence of prepositions 
 in varying the phrase — Ex. : This house is to be disposed 
 of by private contract — where we might substitute, This is 
 to be sold by private coDtract ; and in common parlance, 
 the money he did him out of; of which he defrauded him. 
 Of the prepositions from, before, whence, thence, through : 
 whence means from what place ; thence from that place ; 
 and so from may be omitted as redundant, and one word 
 only employed, as whence, thence. 
 
 The application of some prepositions is disused, though 
 we can say with equal propriety, averse to, and averse/rom 
 — and accused for, betraying of, &c. " The mind, which 
 has feasted on the luxurious wonders of fiction, has no taste 
 of the insipidity of truth." 
 
 We pronounce the name of Cato, but we think on 
 Addison. 
 
 The doctor's cap depends from the nail, the cage depends 
 from the roof, is metaphorical diction. We say depend 
 on, independent of 
 
 Dr. Warburton has a name sufficient to confer celebrity 
 to those who could exalt themselves into his antagonists. 
 
 i 2 
 
116 
 
 H. Tooke says he had no knowledge or skill to account 
 for the words in, out, on, of, to ; and declares they were 
 lost in profound antiquity. For the prepositions of and to 
 we may refer to the Chapters on these interesting particles, 
 perhaps the most cardinal words in our language. 
 
 Of, for, before, ere, are all one word. The tone and the 
 sense are often synonymous, hence the tone between com- 
 pounds, for the tone alone can convey the sense ; and thus 
 all words, like the physical elements and numbers, are 
 reduced to unity. 
 
 Or it was day, ere it was day, before day began, Sec. from 
 the morning. He expownede witnessyng the kyngdom of 
 God fro the morowe till to eventyde. — Dedis. Acts xxviii. 
 23. 
 
 Prepositions indicate the point or tendency of the action, 
 as throw up, come down; and words of the same origin 
 require the same prepositions after them, on, open, not 
 concealed. 
 
 Id, at, to, are kindred words ; and in composition ad is 
 convertible into ac, af, al, an, ap, or, as, at, and termina- 
 tions in ack, ick, eke, denote action or energy. 
 
 " Sine veste Dianam agrees better with Li via, who had 
 the fame of chastity, than with either of the Livias who 
 were both noted of incontinence." 
 
 The Latins converted en into in ; seeing the affinity 
 between i and e, it may be ascribed to this or the figure 
 metonomy rather than an abuse of the words. But in 
 Greek, French, and Saxon, it remains in its integrity, as, 
 en ami, enclos, lv lfio\, iv viy. 
 
 En in final syllables, as oxen, brazen, &c. is not the Se- 
 mitic genitive case, as is averred in Welsford's Mithridates. 
 It is the preposition en corrupted by the Latins into in, 
 and preserved by French and Greeks. Endo, written into, 
 which is agreeable to its primitive application, is used for 
 absolute rest and motion completed. The French use en, 
 
117 
 
 as, etre en France ; aller en. It also forms the accusative 
 case in em, used for rest and motion. See pp. 55, 57- 
 
 At and out are synonymous, and were used so by our 
 Saxon ancestors indiscriminately a, an, o, on. Ex.: 
 One o' clock, now a days, nunc dierum. 
 
 To strain at or out, against a gnat. Oust, out, agere in 
 exilium — to out-law. 
 
 To, into, endo unto, indo, undo, certus eundi, resolved 
 of going, or to go, which is now other than do go. See Do 
 and To Chapters. 
 
 The word Form, assumes various shapes in fra, frame, 
 fro, from, form by metathesis, and is the same perhaps in 
 fra Arabic, Phra Egyptian ; Pharaoh, for Phre means sun, 
 hence metaphorically the head of a family. The scarabseus 
 in Egypt is denominated <{>opu, or phre the sun, of which 
 it is a vocalised expansion, for the circle of the holy Scara- 
 baeus symbolically indicates the apparent course of that 
 luminary in the heavens. 
 
 From and of are synonymous, as Fra sche (of she or her) 
 thir word had sayd, Gavin Douglas En. x. With means 
 to bind — withen ; and in its purport implies concomitancy, 
 as he shot himself with a pistol, struggle with, dally with, 
 partake with. Come speedily, or with speed, strive eagerly 
 or with eagerness. Have interest in, with, and from, as 
 with hunger, from hunger, &c. all prepositions have the 
 same import or are implied as connective particles, though 
 of is the general and to the particular preposition. See p. 74. 
 
 In German, with, is wider against, as with-hold, stand, 
 draw, &c. and our against may be an abbreviation of gain- 
 said, gegen, sagt. 
 
 When and with arc also synonymous if applied to 
 actions, as two actions arc simultaneous, the one happens 
 when the other does ; so with each other, as I arrived when 
 you were writing. 
 
 The word until, though an adverb has the attributes of a 
 preposition and means unto. — Till means the whole extent. 
 
118 
 
 Down till hell — ascended till heaven, and Mr. Tooke says 
 till means time, and should be opposed to from, and that 
 it is composed of to and while, which also means time. 
 
 Stay while evening. But it is really applied to time, 
 place, person, thing. Till her honour. Forgive us our 
 debts as we forgive till our debtors. It means towards 
 also, as Hastened them until, towards them. 
 
 This word means also toil, for till the ground is only 
 toil it. Manufacturers talk of tilled fabrics, as silk, cloth, 
 &c. which is perhaps telum, and twilled may be a derivative. 
 
 The import of the preposition for is omitted occasionally 
 in old diction as (for) What does me Esop, but away to the 
 market. — Shakspere says, 
 
 The skilful shepherd peeled (for) me certain wands. 
 
 Sometimes, as in German, prepositions are remitted to 
 the end of sentences, as what did you that for ? See p. 115. 
 
 Milton says : Thou my shade, 
 
 Inseparable, must with me along. 
 
 Sometimes a cluster of prepositions meet, but not ele- 
 gantly, as Looking in from under the gallery. 
 
 Spenser and old writers used two prepositions together 
 more Grsecorum, as from to die; for to come, &c. The 
 word for is said to be a conjunction, combining preposi- 
 tive qualities. Ex.: In whose hand is wickedness, and 
 (for) their right hand is full of gifts. 
 
 In Latin too, Audieras et fama fuit. " For there was a 
 common bruit," noting power and possibility. 
 
 In Gower's Confessio Amantis, B. v. We have for used 
 with the preposition to, equivalent to do. Page 62. 
 They take their leave and forth they fare, — 
 And in all hast made hir yare 
 Towards hir sister for to fare. 
 
 Let me advert here to this singular vocable fare, the 
 parent of many words in English and German. 
 
 Leave thy nice fare, or simple behaviour. The fare of me, 
 How I do. Made fare, or much ado. Fsera, is Gothic, hence 
 
119 
 
 ferry. How fare you ? take a fare. Fiord, ford, fort, forth 
 — as Frankfort — all which mean but fahr en to go in the Ger- 
 man tongue, to which stock the English owes its substratum. 
 We derive our tongue, our spirit and constitution from 
 the Saxons, who are perhaps the most singular race in the 
 world, and indeed without hyperbole may be styled the 
 hands and eyes of mankind, Our Saxon patience, endur- 
 ance, skill, industiy, give us a supreme eye to facts ; a 
 logic that brings salt to soup, hammer to nails, oar to 
 boats, and such like appurtenances, says Emerson in his 
 English traits — in fact, we may add, a logic superinduced 
 on all things indispensable to man's general and particular 
 felicity. 
 
 On Nouns. 
 
 A noun is a mere name, and is that which names, defines 
 or qualifies the thing — all nouns are substantives, and all 
 verbs attributives. 
 
 Adam gave names to all things according to their nature, 
 and names once established descended to future genera- 
 tions consonant to the various customs of the human race. 
 For although languages differ, yet they are composed of 
 the same elements differently modified, like the natural 
 elements of creation, all proceeding from one species of 
 matter probably — as gas or something more attenuated, 
 for there is one God, one law, one element. Like numbers 
 matter may be reduced to unity, so words or names are 
 mere instruments of conventionality, and mutual com- 
 munication, admirably adapted to every emergence and 
 every clime, for nothing is so ductile, pliant and obsequious 
 as language. 
 
 Thought and spirit were given from above, so was speech, 
 though Plato averred that language originated in deep 
 meditation and reflection. It arose, however, in simplicity, 
 and was complicated by thought. Orators and gram- 
 marians have composed all these multitudinous inflections 
 
120 
 
 found in grammars for the sake of sound and variety, which 
 have oftener obscured than illustrated. 
 
 Speech, originally all plainness, is yet almost entirely 
 composed of figure and metaphor. Abstract thoughts are 
 the shadows of reality, and in time suggestion became 
 opinion, and opinions- were held for facts. " Opinion is an 
 omnipotence, whose veil mantles the earth with darkness/' 
 until submitted to the mental crucible which tries their 
 worth, like 
 
 " The fond shekels of the tested gold, 
 Or stones, whose rates are either rich or poor, 
 As fancy values them/' — Measure for Measure. 
 
 The gender, number, article, and preposition are in- 
 volved in the noun, and the union of the noun with the 
 relative and its variations expresses every vocal and nomi- 
 nal accident, and renders particles and conjunctive pre- 
 positions superfluous. 
 
 The prefix in natural language becomes the affix in 
 artificial, as we have explained in the canons of this 
 Tractate, page J. 
 
 If the primary language of mankind was monosyllabic, 
 all words of more than one syllable are rather like sentences 
 than words. There is not a single root lost bat must be 
 concealed in some tongue or dialect. The three modes of 
 verbal alteration are prefix, infix, and suffix. Now be is 
 a common prefix used before words at pleasure and some- 
 times put into the middle of words. Ge is the same as be. 
 It implies repetition, as ge-birge, ge-rassel, rustle, ge- 
 rumple, crumple. In the figure Epenthesis is found the 
 word, eke, augere, increase, which is in eak, ac. Ce is the 
 same and found in ce-lutch, clutch. These reduplications 
 are common also in both the learned tongues. 
 
 Words were constantly used with a prefix of a or b — as 
 a-bide, a-do, bc-take, &c, but the moderns reject both 
 generally, though particular cases remain. A and the, pre- 
 
121 
 
 positive terms, correspondent in English to a, and de in 
 Latin correspondent to of. Some Continental tongues, as 
 Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian, when they abandoned 
 Latin declensions took the Latin ablative for a nominative 
 case, and the English took the sign of the ablative. Lan- 
 guage was not created but given, and as necessities arose 
 new terms were employed, till after the confusion (for 
 prior to that marvellous event, all the world was of one 
 speech and language, not even a dialect) when dialects arose, 
 and were so diversified by time and distance as to be scarce 
 recognisable by the most astute etymological or ethnological 
 indagator. There never was any origin of words beyond 
 this source, although etymologies are found and deriva- 
 tions assigned to a primitive diction which never existed. 
 At the confusion of tongues every body could express his 
 ideas on ordinary matters as clearly as if no such confusion 
 had eventuated. From what philologists say, it would be 
 supposed that mankind lisped like babes, and could not 
 express their wants. 
 
 The original language once altered, it declined so 
 materially in the lapse of ages, and by neglect, that each 
 tongue seemed an original, and etymologists have made 
 confusion more confounded by deducing language from a 
 few mean words and narrow ideas. 
 
 It would be hard to assign the order or precedence in 
 difficulties, but the Greek is complex, the Basque worse, 
 then comes Sanskrit the complex tongue of the simple 
 Prakrit, and lastly Chinese, whose complicity is almost 
 invincible even to such men as Pascal and Scaliger, who 
 never forgot what they saw, heard, or read. Yet this land 
 of boasted antiquity must be still in its grammatical in- 
 fancy, for it has not yet even formed an alphabet. 
 
 A Dictionary, however, says Morrison, was compiled by 
 Pa-out-shc, B.C. 1100, containing 40,000 words, a sort of 
 hieroglyphic, more resembling the signs of the Zodiac. 
 
122 
 
 The present book in use is styled the Imperial Diction- 
 ary, one Kanghi arranging the language under 214 radi- 
 cals, elementary keys, or formatives. 
 
 Each order of keys containing more strokes up to 17, 
 each again containing 206 characters which must be learned 
 memoriter, and also how to write them, and " then in the 
 endless labour die." This tongue has its esoteric and 
 exoteric doctrines and uses for the scholar and the peasant; 
 it is only more difficult from its rudeness, says Dr. John- 
 son, as there is more labour in hewing down a tree with a 
 stone than with an axe. 
 
 But to revert to the noun, which is the only part of 
 speech, comprising essentially the verbs substantive, so 
 that Esse is styled the verb substantive, and we find the 
 same in French and Latin where etre is the Being, and 
 posse comitates, the power of the country, the infinitive 
 used for the noun, of which more is said (page 12). A 
 noun is the fulcrum of a sentence, and is inadequate if it 
 requires an adjective to explain it, while an adjective added 
 to an adjective increases or decreases its significance, as, 
 A very perfect gentle knight. — Chaucer. 
 
 A participle or gerund peforms the office of a noun, as 
 By the sending of the light of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Nouns of multitude admit either singular or plural 
 number, as army, party, flock, mob, &c, being collective, 
 so one, which under a singular termination, conveys a plural 
 idea. 
 
 Substantives taken in the largest and most unlimited 
 sense do not admit the article before them, as adjectives 
 can not so gracefully form adverbs in ly ; holily, masterly. 
 It were better to use synonymous expression. Ex.: in a 
 holy manner. Substantives may become adjectives and are 
 used as such, as Populum late regem, for regnantem. 
 
 To convert a general quality into a particular attribute 
 is the office of the adjective. Substantives as distinguished 
 
123 
 
 from adjectives are names of qualities, abstracted from the 
 consideration of their existence in any particular subject. 
 
 In the order of reasoning we begin with generals and 
 descend to particulars, contrary to the received notion of 
 the progress of the intellect which is supposed to rise from 
 particulars to generals. 
 
 Do not all the objects in nature offer themselves first to 
 our view in the aggregate ? When a rainbow appears we 
 see it in its entirety and pass to the examination of its 
 colours. This is applicable to all complex ideas resolvable 
 into sentiments, such as love, hate, fear, hope, &c. 
 
 The term Noun adjective is more philosophical than Dr. 
 Lowth will admit, for they are not the names of things he 
 remarks. It owes its application, however, to the juxta- 
 position of two substantives, which is very common in 
 English, as city-gates, sea-shore, forest-tree, ox-stall, and 
 being so compounded these words do not change, nor do the 
 leading substantives vary on account of number, and at 
 the same time supersede the necessity of case, which does 
 not exist, so to say, in our language. This is a laconism 
 not to be found in other tongues, except, perhaps, Chinese, 
 which on account of its antiquity has many striking 
 features deemed exclusively our own. 
 
 In the Universal Grammar is this observation, <f II a fallu 
 necessairement quetous les autres motsvinssent desnoms. 
 II n'est aucun mot de quelqu' espece que ce soit et dans 
 quelque langue que ce soit, qui ne descende d'un nom." 
 This recognises but one part of speech. Verbs all derive 
 from nouns, and particles arc mere fragments of nouns. The 
 very termination of nouns is articular, as og in Xoyoc, and 
 all endings in as, cs, is, os, us, um — and that of verbs is 
 pronominal — nouns and verbs have neither gender, number, 
 nor case. Puer, puerus, and puera — as pueros meos, my 
 children — adolcsccns, homo, &c. not being confined to 
 gender, can other words have gender, for it is a singular 
 
124 
 
 anomaly and a deviation from the order of nature to have 
 genders in nouns ? See Dr. Beattie, Theory of Language, 
 p. 137, who quotes Dr. Clarke on it, who gives a variety 
 of examples from Homer. In this respect some Oriental 
 tongues, as Persian, resemble the English. The Latins said 
 hominem malam, and Cicero, Tullia homo nata est, and 
 Virum me natarri esse vellem ; and Plautus has Fures estis 
 ambce, quis ea est? Some nouns are of both genders, 
 while some nouns are joined to one gender first, and then 
 to another in the same sentence, as (( Specus asper et 
 adeunda" in Ovid, and Epicaene — or Supercommune — as 
 timidi damse — usually applied to animals and insects. 
 
 The ancients represented the same Deity masculine and 
 feminine, as Lunus, Luna. Janus, Jana, which is Diana- 
 De- Jana. Juno is lona, lo, Iona, and even Venus is called 
 Venus Junonia. 
 
 In Latin, Greek, and Hebrew many nouns substantive 
 take the plural peculiar to them, and do not submit to the 
 English signs of plurality, as phenomena — seraph-phim, 
 cherub -in, genius-ii, radius-ii — but words which are na- 
 turalised should bend to the genius of the language, as it 
 causes great discrepance if they are inflected. 
 
 Some words have diverse meanings styled intentions, 
 and are very comprehensive. Ex.: Extension is either 
 length,- height, depth — of these length strikes the least — 
 as " A 100 yards of even ground will never work such an 
 effect as a tower of 100 yards high, or a rock or mountain 
 of such altitude/' 
 
 Some words are misspelled as height for hight, the e be- 
 ing superfluous coming from high, so with sleight for slight 
 — vitiated might be written vitiated, as deriving from vice. 
 Words vary their meaning sometimes according to 
 accent only, as gallant, and gallant, and assume a significa- 
 tion according to situation, which, when they stand alone, 
 they do not signify. 
 
125 
 
 Some words have even quite opposite significations, like 
 stand as opposed to fall, and stand as opposed to fly. Also 
 the word let means permission and hindrance too. Let 
 me do so without let or hindrance. 
 
 " I will make a ghost of him that lets me." — Hamlet. 
 
 The vocable cleave is in this category, as cleave to, 
 means adhere, as cleave to his wife, and in the sense of 
 division, it means separate from, as cleave a tree with an 
 axe. There are not many examples of such words having 
 a directly opposite meaning, and when this is the case 
 generally they derive from a different radix. 
 
 Tell me what state, what dignity, what honour, 
 Canst thou demise to any child of mine ? — Shakspere. 
 
 Dr. Johnson thought devise should be written for de- 
 mise, but this is a common law term as well as demise ; 
 which derives from demittere, and means a death or a 
 grant on death, by will or legal instrument. 
 
 Many significations per se, depend on the sense and 
 not on the strict rules of art. Advert also that authors 
 in their compositions are guided by the sense and not 
 always by adopted phraseology or artificial rules, which 
 is a proof that writing has its foundation in nature, 
 and depends on the faculty of the human mind, for 
 do we not read that the power of speech is a faculty 
 peculiar to man, and was bestowed for the best of 
 uses ? Artificial rules seldom make good poets or orators 
 if they possess not the necessary qualities, the divine 
 energy of genius, which, as a superior illumination, is 
 derived from an invisible source to further great results. 
 u Spirits are not finely touched, save to fine issues." 
 
 And that issue is the perfection of beauty and happiness, 
 for the moral instinct of man and his exertions in this his 
 sublunary state is to advance that truth which is to lessen 
 his weight of evil and augment his sum of good. 
 
126 
 
 On Adjectives. 
 
 Adjective is the name of a quality, and the adverb is an 
 adjective or a comparison of qualities; but philosophically 
 considered the separation of quality from substance 
 involves a contradiction. 
 
 Grammarians say a noun is the name of a thing, and an 
 adjective shews the quality of a thing; but adjectives 
 qualify adjectives, substantives, and adverbs, while adverbs 
 modify verbs and sometimes adjectives, as extreme elabo- 
 rate, marvellous graceful, extraordinary rare, and we say 
 not a verily honest man, but a very honest man, where 
 very is an adjective, as in Very God of very God — Verus 
 Deus ex Vero Deo. This adjective is compared, as Verier, 
 veriest. 
 
 " Was not my Lord the verier wag of the two V s — 
 
 Winter's Tale. 
 
 We can put two adjectives together and that correctly 
 too, a diction elegant in which our progenitors delighted, 
 and we sustain a grammatical loss, by neglecting or repudi- 
 ating the practice, for certainly two adjectives impart more 
 force than the adverb, as in these proofs, — He was extreme 
 vain, — amazing clever, — exceeding uncommon. He said po- 
 sitive he would not write, — agreeable to promise. He said 
 express he would. I can not think so mean of him. Some 
 write softer than others — fine and soft. Locke writes, 
 Many reason exceeding clear, who know not how to make 
 a syllogism. I have cited these examples to revive remem- 
 brance of what, although fallen into desuetude, is still 
 the language of nature in which our eminent authors 
 delighted. 
 
 The adjective with us is unchangeable in respect of 
 number or sex, like the Persian it has no numerical or 
 sexual variation, but in inflected tongues it agrees with the 
 subject, and occasionally takes three genders, as the Latin 
 par, concors, &c. — although no words of necessity agree 
 
127 
 
 with others, any more than two words can be properly said 
 to govern, all construction depending on custom or the 
 natural order of reasoning incident to the mind. We may 
 reason clear enough without the adjunct of logical canons, 
 for logic is virtually in the sense and conception. 
 
 To make the adjective accord with the subject or object 
 forms a closer connection than the adverb, as He behaved 
 himself conformable to that example; — He lived suitable 
 to one in his station, where he and suitable agree. So in, 
 Bees construct their cells according to the nicest rules of 
 art, where according is an adjective or participle and agrees 
 with bees. 
 
 " Conscience will preserve you from error provided you 
 attend to its suggestions," where provided is a participle 
 and forms a postulate with the word that implied, and is 
 equivalent to an ablative absolute. 
 
 We are sometimes redundant and use adjectives with- 
 out occasion, as in good health, which denotes freedom 
 from pain and disorder, where health does not require the 
 epithet good which is superfluous. 
 
 In substantives are mostly comprised the adjectives, and 
 in the adjective is implied the relative, as a man, that is 
 one man, or of the men. 
 
 The adjective frequently follows the verb attracted by 
 the subject or object, hence it is that the adverb can not 
 modify the adjective, for the adjective is more elegantly 
 applied to the subject than the same adverbialised to 
 modify the verb. A repetition of the adjective to denote 
 excess is better than the adverb, as 
 
 u Sedate and silent move the numerous bands." 
 " Swift down the steep of heaven the chariot rolls." 
 
 Now it is patent that these adjectives have more energy 
 than adverbs could have, for they qualify their respective 
 substantives, and supply us with a variety of expression. 
 
 Sometimes a substantive is used adjectively which should 
 be written as an adjective, as extempore for extemporary — 
 
128 
 
 All the theatres, mysteries, and moralities have had their 
 origin in a kind of extempore farce. 
 
 Mr. Chambaud, who wrote a French grammar, expected 
 nothing less than immortality for changing the word ad- 
 jective into ad-noun, but this term was used long before 
 by Richard Johnson, the grammarian. 
 
 Adjective means to lay alongside indefinitely, but ad- 
 noun properly restricts the attributes to its noun, although 
 of this there may be doubt. 
 
 Some adjectives are used substantively in a collective 
 sense, as few, many, all, &c. as Some say, few like it. Many 
 approve the doctrine— all concur : And Shakspere, in whose 
 pages all the grandeur of sentiment and eccentricity of 
 diction are to be found, has, " O thou fond many." 
 
 Some and same, from so, are synonymous, and mean 
 quantity in opposition to none, while many has a reference 
 to number, much to quantity, as You do not gain so much 
 as him ; but much is also used for number, as Much peo- 
 ple, much grass in the place. 
 
 " How many a message would he send." Many was for- 
 merly written men-ye, manya. Orthography was taken 
 from the sound and not the latter from the former. Our 
 ancestors used a for he and she, as o was employed for one 
 and omitted by abbreviation for of also ; and a may be the 
 precursor of he and she, for in the description of Falstaff's 
 death this appears, A made a finer end and went away an 
 it had been any christom child — a parted, &c. and a 
 babbled o' green fields— many times — many a time and 
 oft. Magnus eorum numerus est occisus — A good many 
 were slain. 
 
 Adjectives ending in ly do not admit an additional ly to 
 adverbialise them. Ly has two meanings, one is like the 
 German gleich ; and one means icay, and are two distinct 
 words, the latter derives from leag a field, liggan to lie, so 
 we get lee or lea from ley, lee, lay, and these correspond 
 
129 
 
 in Greek to 6$oq, as Kvvr]dbv doggedly, and in Latin to iter, 
 way, felic-iter, happi-ly. 
 
 This was done wisely, means in a wise way ; so of daily, 
 and in English goodly and early are adjectives and adverbs 
 too. " The whole design must refer to the golden age which 
 it lively represents." 
 
 The way or manner in which an action or attribute exists 
 is to be specified, and ly is annexed to the word, modifying 
 the action or attribute, as, He is extremely rich; wisely 
 done. 
 
 But if the word modifying action or attribute can be 
 referred to the subject or object of the proposition, it must 
 be omitted. 
 
 The necessity of an adjective may be removed by con- 
 verting it into a substantive, and the less we use adjectives 
 the better, as, A swift dog, may be changed into a dog of 
 swiftness. 
 
 For the powerful use to be made of adjectives see a quo- 
 tation from Pope's lines on an unfortunate Lady cited in 
 the Figures of Speech in this tractate, which addenda I 
 give to illustrate grammar as well as poetic ideas replete 
 with those elevated thoughts which produce correspondent 
 diction. 
 
 I have remarked, page 63, that when the adjective was 
 introduced into language the system was changed. The 
 Chinese really had no adjective, and it appears that the 
 infinitive mood became an adjective, which is a larger 
 power than any infinitive had before ; and if the Chinese 
 lingual necessities can be represented by this infinitive, it 
 is tantamount to its having no adjective at all, properly so 
 called, if it is served by a substitute. 
 
 In North America, one of the many tongues spoken in 
 New England is the Muh-he-ka-heow or Mohcgan ; and a 
 translation of the Bible into it was effected by one Mr. 
 Elliot, a missionary, in which he shows that nouns adjective^ 
 
 K 
 
130 
 
 or nouns are the origin of adjectives, as they enumerate or 
 recapitulate the qualities of nouns. 
 
 Compound epithets are used in all savage tongues as 
 well as in more plastic and refined, especially in Greek, which 
 the jocose critics style long-tailed epithets; and although 
 we can compound as well as the Greeks and Germans, the 
 genius of our tongue admits these indulgencies but sparingly 
 in comparison of what have been drawn from the storehouse 
 of antiquity. 
 
 The adjective own is generally prefixed to the word self, 
 so I have adverted to these words here instead of under 
 nouns. This self is, however, a noun, and should be de- 
 tached from him, her, them, one, &c. Former writers 
 were wont to separate seZfand selves from their adjectives, 
 leaving no doubt as to which class they belong. 
 
 Dr. Lowth and others call myself &c. reciprocal pronouns 
 where agent and object are the same. There can be no 
 reciprocity of action, however, where one person only is 
 concerned. These pronouns are reflected in the cases men- 
 tioned, because the impression of the verb is reflected on 
 the agent. 
 
 Own and self This is said to be an adname derived from 
 eigen in German ; or eidho, own in Celtic, eidhor, my own 
 ■ — and is so far from possessing any pronominal power, that 
 like its synonyme it requires the aid either of a substantive 
 or a pronoun to impart to it any meaning. 
 
 Self may derive from Saul, soul — as " Juravi per animam, 
 meam," I have sworn by myself. The word silba in Gothic 
 is sylph, spirit — and in Flemish self has the same significa- 
 tion. 
 
 Self is a name, the synonyme of individuality — self and 
 soul are then equivalent, all the powers of the mind and 
 soul, perception and volition, or will, memory and under- 
 standing being comprised. 
 
 The word in Sanskrit corresponding to self and soul and 
 
131 
 
 life are identical. Atmd, says Dr. Miiller, may be ahma, 
 derived from a -ham, ad-am, ego, or I. 
 
 The phrase I have sworn by myself means by essence, 
 spirit, origin, and is equipollent to the phrase in the Bible, 
 " / am hath sent you" — Source of all things, from which 
 by analogy it may be deduced, that spirit or esse must be 
 the only part of speech. For there is unity in language, 
 numbers and matter, all substance whatever deriving from 
 one fountain, whether it be gas, geist, or peradventure a 
 subtler form of matter. Electricity is a form of matter, 
 for it has been held to be the pervading material principle 
 of the universe, and hence celestial regions are like the 
 planets obnoxious to the general laws of matter ; matter 
 may be undulatory like fire and light, whose recondite 
 properties are the cherished objects of natural philosophers 
 to detect and evolve, " looking from nature up to nature's 
 God ;" for nature begins from causes and descends to 
 effects, while human perceptions first open on effects, and 
 by slow degrees ascend to causes. In fact every organ in 
 life has a specific plan and action, perfect, but bearing 
 relation to other orders and functions, all united to one 
 life and subserving one soul. 
 
 The Latin solus, seul, seul-meme, from medessimo and 
 mismo in Italian, from which language the French is im- 
 mediately derived, and mediately from the Latin, a refined 
 Keltic, where we find mcmet for self. 
 
 There are many adjectives in ive, which termination 
 means desire, as sport-ive, plaint-ive, restiff, — restive, and it 
 is equivalent to ing. The termination ess is properly sub- 
 joined to nouns of the feminine gender, as Heir-ess, govern- 
 ess, Princ-ess, Duch-ess. Moderns have converted the old 
 Marquis into Marqu-ess — but why ? for surely it is better 
 to retain its proper ending, which is correspondent to 
 the French, and which was always so spelled in English, 
 than give to a masculine noun a feminine termination, by 
 
 k 2 
 
132 
 
 changing i into e and geminating the 5. It is " giving to 
 Titus old Vespasian's due." 
 
 We think then that self may be found in soul, and own 
 is palpably derived from owe, which is the same as one (see 
 under Have and Of) hence wv Being. It can be so rendered, 
 as in Cicero's boastful assertion, Dixi med unius opera rem- 
 publicam esse salvam. I avowed by my own exertion (of 
 myself) the Commonwealth was secured. Self means same 
 also, as, 
 
 " At that self moment enters Palamon." 
 
 Knight's Tale, Chaucer. 
 
 " To shoot another arrow that self way 
 Which you did shoot the first." — Merchant of Venice, 
 
 On Cases. 
 
 In all inflected tongues cases must be used, and case 
 means accident, and accident proceeds from necessity. 
 But case once adopted the inventors found more than they 
 expected. 
 
 Whatever case you give to the noun the meaning con- 
 tinues the same, it is identical, and can not be different 
 even in imagination. 
 
 Cases are taken actively and passively — moods and tenses 
 may be so applied. In Latin and English the active and 
 passive are promiscuously applied. Whether the case be 
 the accusative or ablative after the preposition, the meaning 
 remains the same, as, " ad dimidiam partem, vel ex dimidia 
 parte unum idem que significant." 
 
 A case is not appropriated to one precise idea, it is best 
 understood in a language in which the preposition does all, 
 and to which, as to the English, the case is unknown. 
 
 Case, says Lord Bacon, de Augm. vi. 1, is the language 
 of philosophers and not of necessity, or of an assurance 
 
133 
 
 that the genius of ancient days was more acute than that 
 of modern times. We have done as much without their 
 inflection, and without their obscurity too. 
 
 The Latins express the prepositions by cases generally, 
 but the Greeks to be perspicuous adhere more to the pre- 
 positions ; where the sense is endangered the Latins have 
 recourse to the preposition, as, Liber a virtute — liber in 
 ipsa servitute. 
 
 Cases, indeed all cases may so be, are put absolute, and 
 so may be said to be when the preposition is not expressed, 
 and words when the principal is omitted. An instance of 
 an absolute accusative in 
 
 Quern non super (stitem or stantem) occupat Hisbo, 
 Ille quidem hoc sperans. — Virgil, 2En. 10, v. 385. 
 
 Nouns denoting or betokening part of time are commonly 
 put absolutely, but those betokening a continual term of 
 time without ceasing or intermission are commonly put in 
 the accusative. 
 
 The genitive case is sometimes made absolute, which 
 happens also to the accusative and ablative. See Port 
 Royal Greek Grammar. Ex. : Tlapayovra rov Irjarov, Jesus 
 passed thence. Matt. ix. 
 
 " But Yulcanus of whom I spoke, he was a shrew in all 
 his youth." Whether we consider Vulcanus as forming a 
 case absolute with but or otherwise, the phrase is a perfect 
 facsimile of the Latin. 
 
 Me Consule id feci, or Ego consul feci, or, Feci consul 
 ego, or purely Feci consul. In fact, graphic construction 
 is not confined to a particular tongue, its influence extends 
 universally, and the English, by adopting universal con- 
 struction, have shewn the extent of their learning, and have 
 risen superior in the art of composition, or at least equal 
 to any civilised nation. 
 
 In French and English the preposition is suppressed by 
 
134 
 
 way of elegance, this is termed absolute, as La bataille 
 rangee l'ennemi abandonna le camp — Elle lui parla ; Les 
 Gueux sont baignes de larmes. Is not every case absolute 
 in inflected languages ? In English the genitive is in needs, 
 certes, that is of need, of a certainty. Absolute means no 
 more than the omission of a preposition or the ellipsis of 
 any other word. 
 
 Cases are termed oblique and objective ; the latter is the 
 accusative case only, while the oblique are genitive, dative, 
 and ablative cases. 
 
 A nominative can not be called a case — it is the substan- 
 tive uninflected, and may be used without a verb, as The 
 prophets, where are they ? My banks, they are covered 
 with bees. The Lord, he is God. 
 
 The genitive case is styled the possessive or apostrophic 
 case in the nomenclature of grammar, and is the only one 
 in English which is said to be inflected or subject to ellipsis, 
 which is an omission of either a letter, or a word in a 
 sentence. 
 
 The English possessive case resembles the ancient Saxon, 
 and is confined to the singular number, as John's hat — 
 This book is Mary's, or this book is hers — "William his book, 
 that is, is his book. But this case should not extend 
 properly to nouns denoting things without life. It is said, 
 but with doubtful propriety, for righteousness' sake, though 
 it were better said for the sake of righteousness ; and in 
 all cases where two s' collide, a single s should be used, as 
 Moses' son. If several nouns come together in this case 
 the apostrophe with s is annexed to the last noun only, as 
 this was my father, mother, uncle's advice. 
 
 S is beautifully omitted in many instances, especially 
 after s or x in prose and poetry ; and though chiefly admis- 
 sible and used in poetry, yet it should be extended to prose 
 always as more euphonious and equally explicative. Ex. : 
 Moses' minister, Achilles' wrath, Phoenix' daughter, Ajax' 
 
135 
 
 arms. This remark should extend to all cases where con- 
 sonants collide with s. In the Semitic languages it is ex- 
 pressed by the termination of the prior word, and not by 
 of ] as with us. 
 
 The double genitive is of great service in English to 
 avoid ambiguity, as John and William are friends ; John 
 goes into the country and desires William to see his (John's) 
 house in town. This refers to John ; his own house would 
 have referred to William. 
 
 When the possessor, to whom another is said to belong, 
 is expressed by many terms, this genitive cas'e ought not 
 to be used, hence we should not say, The Emperor of 
 Germany's armies ; but reversing the words the expression 
 then becomes more agreeable to the ear ; of such conse- 
 quence is correct speech. 
 
 The Saxons had no genitive case which terminated in is. 
 Es may be a contraction of is or us formerly used for plurals, 
 as was eth — hence it is used in English ; its symbolical 
 signification, and notes the efficient cause. See pages 33, 78. 
 
 Felix' mahogany book case, or have you seen EehV 
 ebony inkstand ? This phrase contains every case to be 
 found in every inflected language ; and in Greek or Latin 
 would require four different cases. 
 
 The learned shewed great ingenuity in their formation 
 of cases which they effected by varying the form of a single 
 symbol e, for this is the origin of all inflection in Greek, 
 Latin, and English, and thus rendering the use of preposi- 
 tions superfluous ; and this extends also to their verbal 
 terminations with personality added. Were not all the 
 varieties of tense expressed originally by the first or present 
 tense ? 
 
 A modal proposition depends on some verb implied, or 
 is expressed by a termination which is equivalent to it ; to 
 any verb or word which may be implied. 
 
 In composition all connection is supplied by the mind. 
 
136 
 
 Versus inopes rerum nugseque canorse. — Horace on impure 
 
 verses. 
 Veteres avias tibi de pulmone revello — I pluck from your 
 heart early prejudices. — Persius, Sat. v. 92. 
 
 The genitive case is formed into a dative occasionally, as 
 immitis Achilli, for Achillis, which proves that these cases, 
 though they differ in form, agree in signification. Virgil 
 connects a genitive epithet with a dative substantive. 
 
 The termination of the genitive case was no other than 
 the preposition ex affixed, the dative eni abbreviated. The 
 i subscript in Greek is only evl. The Latins ended all their 
 datives in i, till they found it redundant, and gained in con- 
 cinnity of expression what the Greeks enjoyed in certainty 
 of expression. 
 
 Dies and. fades were originally the genitive case of the 
 fifth declension. The Latins disliked the letter s and em- 
 ployed the dative for it, as Herculi for Herculis. 
 
 Ulyxi for Ulyxis or Ulyssis, making the adjective in the 
 genitive agree with the substantive in the dative, and re- 
 jecting the sibilant s. Fami was adopted for famis, and 
 Aristoteli for the genitive also in Pliny, also nulli and 
 nemini. fC Tu frugi bonae es," in the Casina of Plautus for 
 frugis ; translated in French, Pour peu que tu sois brave, 
 Should you manage well, alluding to his being an efficient 
 husband. — See AinswortVs Dictionary, generally an excel- 
 lent authority. 
 
 The genitive and indeed all possessives have both an 
 active and passive signification. Hence many words are 
 taken in both these senses, as formidolosus, dreaded or to 
 be dreaded, suspiciosus, &c. Such is inherent in speech. 
 
 The substantive verb esse and the verb in motion ire are 
 identical, so admit an accusative as the object of that motion. 
 
 We are prepared to receive the possessives in combination 
 with the genitive, as Dixi mea unius opera, I said by my 
 own toil. 
 
137 
 
 Tuum hominis simplicis pectus vidimus. 
 Meum solius peccatum corrigi non potest. 
 In sua cujusque laude prsestantior. 
 Nostra omnium memoria. 
 
 The Greeks may have borrowed some of their roots from 
 the Chinese — that tongue has no ablative case, it is formed 
 by the use of particles, and the Greek has none. The Port 
 Royal grammarians thought there -was an ablative in Greek, 
 but that it always resembled andwasidenticalwith the dative, 
 and where an ablative is governed in Latin, the same may 
 be in Greek, unless drawn to the genitive by a preposition. 
 
 The dative supplies the place of an ablative in Celtic, 
 Greek, and Chinese, so the Greek dative with equal pro- 
 priety might be made to agree with the Latin ablative. 
 
 The genitive in Greek is the constant equivalent in Latin 
 to the ablative. The final en as golden-ring was thought 
 to be a mark of the genitive by Mithridates minor, but it 
 is only the preposition in corrupted into en. Page 55. 
 
 Case is an indeterminate relation, and is best understood 
 when translated into a language which has no case, for 
 artificial languages to be understood must be referred to a 
 natural one, like English, an universal grammatical solvent, 
 the most learned and simplest of all, naturally becomes the 
 analysis of inflected speech. The Hebrew is very simple, 
 but complex compared to ours. Of all the ancient lan- 
 guages extant, says Dr. Lowth, that is the most simple 
 which is undoubtedly the most ancient, but even that lan- 
 guage itself docs not equal the English in simplicity. 
 
 The cases in Hebrew are formed at the beginning of the 
 noun, and not by inflection as in some languages, with a 
 preposition prefixed as, Melcch-King, Lcmelcch to a King, 
 Mimelcch from a King. A language like English, where 
 the words are distinct and separate, must be more per- 
 spicuous than any inflected contrivances, each word having 
 its own peculiar weight and significance. 
 
138 
 
 On Comparison. 
 
 Antithesis or opposition is a figure whereby things dif- 
 ferent or contrary are compared, and placed near, that they 
 may set off and illustrate each other. 
 
 In logic comparatives, superlatives, and adverbs of quality 
 are termed modes of moods ; and mood is a legitimate de- 
 termination of propositions according to their quantity 
 and quality. 
 
 When different persons are compared, the terms of com- 
 parison must correspond to each other, as He is as learned 
 as she, I loved him as well as her, You are wiser than I, 
 I admire her more than him. 
 
 Dr. Hickes in his Saxon grammar remarks that compara- 
 tives among the Anglo-Saxons terminate indifferently in 
 ar, cer, ir, or, ur ; superlatives in ast, est, &c. ; participles 
 in and and end; and preterites in ad, ed } &c, by which it 
 is obvious that all the variety of vocal exhibitions are mere 
 modifications of the first letter — a, ma, me, &c, running 
 into the subdivisions. 
 
 The modern English retains much of the Old Saxon, for 
 the casual particles, terminations of cases, conjugations, 
 verbs, passive voice, prepositions, and the peculiarity of 
 the Saxon of that day is the language of England. 
 
 Priority of motion is evidenced by r or er, when nature 
 or analogy require it, but prime or terminated motion is 
 expressed by st or est on similar occasions. 
 
 The comparative degree relates to two, the superlative to 
 more than two, yet the comparative is not restricted to two 
 persons or things. The comparative is put for the positive, 
 as Tristior solito, somewhat sorrowful. 
 
 The force of the comparison is included in the particle. 
 In the French by que, and the Hebrews, who have no com- 
 
139 
 
 parative degree, use min, the Greeks use rj, Latins quam, 
 prse and pro, and the Spanish mas. 
 
 Comparisons are made by as, which H. Tooke affirms to 
 be an article, and means the same as it, that, which. In 
 German it is written es, and does not derive from als, but 
 answers to wg, on, at. " I had such a son as or that, all men 
 hailed me happy " The word so means also it and that. 
 Ex. : Swift as darts, means that swiftness with which darts 
 
 fly- 
 
 In a negative proposition so and as are correctives, as 
 Pompey was not so fortunate as Csesar, Nothing is so 
 amiable as Virtue, Not so fair as the day — hence as is 
 preceded by so in a negative proposition. 
 
 In an affirmative proposition the comparison is made by 
 as and as repeated — he is as young as you. "When a com- 
 parison is made between two, they must agree in denomi- 
 nation, as I love her more than him. 
 
 The positive degree is applied when equality or inequality 
 is expressed, as he is as learned as you. When a conse- 
 quence is expressed so is followed by as to, or that, as, 
 She was so enraged as to strike him. 
 
 So in comparison never admits the qualifying adverbs 
 between itself and the adjective, as and so being comparative 
 terms render unnecessary the words more and less, as 
 William is not so learned as John, is equivalent to is less 
 learned than John. In comparison the two terms must 
 coincide — I see her better than he. 
 
 When the symbol e passes into other symbols they are 
 but different modifications of the symbol e — all vowels are 
 but varieties of the first sound. 
 
 When we observe the nature of comparison made by as, 
 which signifies according to, in proportion to, we shall not 
 be at a loss to account for the oblique pronoun following it, 
 As one is to two, so is two to four ; as one-half is to one, so 
 is one to two. 
 
140 
 
 The word as is continually repeated, as firm as faith ; 
 but the efficacy of the phrase would not be diminished if 
 the first as were omitted. Ex. : He is great as his master, 
 &c. ; and so may be substituted as, so great, &c. 
 
 When as answers to such ought it not to be termed a 
 relative, and has it uot a claim equal with who and which 
 to that appellation ? 
 
 The word as in Latin is the same as u g one, and not only 
 signifies a piece of money, but any integer. So from it 
 derives our word ace, a unit or point on card or dice. 
 Miser seque atque ego, as miserable as I. Nunquam adeo 
 fcedus. Juvenal, B. viii. v. 183. Never so foul. 
 
 The Hebrew and Arabic have no comparative inflections. 
 The former does not distinguish between a relative and 
 an absolute superlative ; and in it there are three genders 
 and three numbers. The cases are distinguished by par- 
 ticles prefixed as in English. 
 
 The Hebrew has also three degrees of comparison — two 
 degrees formed by placing min after the positive, and the 
 third by placing meod before the positive, as too good, meod 
 tob, very or most good. But the superlative is generally 
 shewn by the repetition or re-iteration to the sign, as tob, 
 tob, good, good. 
 
 A plural neuter subject as Ilavra is joined to a verb 
 singular, as Ion. Since the plural verb may do the office of 
 the dual number, so may the plural comparative and super- 
 lative discharge the function of the dual or comparative. 
 
 In the 118th Psalm the Greek is positive and the English 
 is comparative. 
 
 ^AyaObv weiroLdivai, kir\ Kvpiov rj TTETroOivai i7r' avOpwirov. 
 'AyaOhv Wttl^uv liri Kvpiov ?'/ IXiriZuv lir apyovvi. 
 It is better to trust in the Lord than to put any confidence 
 
 in mau. 
 It is better to trust in the Lord than to put any confidence 
 
 in princes. 
 
141 
 
 The Hebrew comparative is not by inflection bnt by a 
 preposition, as, Wisdom is good above rubies ; and the super- 
 lative is, good above tbem all — for better than them all. 
 
 Dr. Watts in his Logic says, that the comparative degree 
 does not always imply the positive, and to prove the position 
 give us this sentence— A fool is better than a knave. 
 
 This he says does not affirm that folly is good, but that 
 it is less than knavery. Perhaps the sentence were better 
 thus, A fool is not so bad as a knave, which means a knave 
 is worse than a fool — but thought and language act and 
 re-act on each other mutually. 
 
 Every art, says Dr. Johnson, is obscure to those that 
 have not learned it. This uncertainty of terms and com- 
 mixture of ideas is well known to those who have joined 
 philosophy to grammar ; for orthography and etymology, 
 though imperfect, are not so from want of care, but because 
 care will not always be successful, and recollection and 
 information come too late for use. Philosophy is the 
 hypothesis or system on which natural effects are explained. 
 
 We use the adverb than after a comparative adjective, 
 which word is the same as then. Denn in German is 
 synonymous with also, and is used as such, signifying then 
 than, prse, before, ere. Canon \*J, p. 10. 
 
 The comparative involves the positive and the superla- 
 tive both, as genus does species, and sometimes er and erst 
 are used in comparison in lieu of more and most. Ex. : 
 Sceptre and power I gladlier shall resign. Er and erst 
 note priority and proximity of motion applicable to adverbs 
 also. Er is the same as ere, which is before. Wiser ere 
 he — wise erst all. There and most were anciently used for 
 the modern much and very, as more for much braver. The 
 Duke of Milan and his more braver daughter. See Canon 
 18, p. 10. Now more here is not comparative ; it is 
 positive — most and very obedient are decidedly the same — 
 " A dreadful quiet felt and trorser far than arms/' 
 
142 
 
 "Well expressed by Socratesbutmuchbetterby Solomon/ 5 
 The Hebrews do not distinguish between a relative and an 
 absolute superlative. More means large — in Celtic maur — 
 as Malcolm Can-maur or more — large head. More means 
 a heap ; as is mow, a barley mow, which is what is mowed. 
 So is mathj after-math. H. Tooke says these comparatives, 
 much, more, most, have exceedingly gravelled all our ety- 
 mologists, and they touch them as tenderly as they can. 
 
 Much is from the same source with ch, like heap. The 
 Chinese ch is compounded with who, and so, which and 
 such. " Then found Sir Bevis more greater defence ;" and 
 much greater is used. Much and more are used by Spenser 
 for a very great number. " The commodities doth not 
 countervail the discommodities, for the inconveniences 
 which thereby doth arise, are much, more, many" 
 
 Worser and lesser were in good use in the days of 
 Dry den and Addison, (Canon 18, p. 10), yet Dr. Lowth 
 censures this and some of the cardinal beauties of English 
 as adopted by our early classics, as : 
 
 The use of me in lieu of I, as greater than me ; suffers 
 more than me, which is Celtic diction. We say more than 
 us. Mightier than him. So eminent an author as him. 
 Stone and sand are weighty, but a fool's wrath is heavier 
 than them both. 
 
 There is not an English prose or poetic author who does 
 not use this diction, despite Dr. Lowtlr's effete criticism. 
 Then finish, dear Chloe, this pastoral war, 
 
 And let us like Horace and Lydia agree. 
 Eor thou art a girl as much brighter than her, 
 As he was a poet sublimer than me. 
 
 Despite the critique of the Bishop of London, who 
 seems not to have been so good an English scholar, as a 
 Hebrew, Latin, and Greek one, these citations bring evi- 
 dence to the correspondence between Celtic, Latin and 
 English, the more valuable as it exhibits the analogy 
 
143 
 
 between these tongues. Our early writers use most for 
 very, as the very least, the very last, best, &c. which is now 
 used also. The Celtic differs from the learned languages 
 in having no case to the nouns, or passive verbs in the 
 common use of auxiliary verbs, &c. 
 
 Hermes says that two persons or things compared, er is 
 always used, as wiser than thou; if more by est. Is it 
 improper then to say, wiser than all ? Quoting Faith, hope 
 and charity, these three, but the greatest of these is 
 charity. It is remarkable that in the Greek, however, the 
 comparative is used ; Nuiu ^£ julva -kigtiq, IXttIq, aycnrr), 
 ra rpta ravra, fjL£i%u)v Ss tovtwv 17 aycnrr). 1 Corinth, xiii. 
 13. The Latins occasionally adopt this diction. 
 
 The figure ellipsis is frequent in these instances of com- 
 parison, as, He is a greater loser by her death than me, 
 that is in comparison of me. She is fairer than him, that 
 is ere him, before him, fairer, then comes Mm. He steps 
 me a little higher, that is he steps a little higher before 
 me. I follow me close, which is I keep myself to the 
 point. Again, He is none like him, that is not like him — 
 like him in no respects. 
 
 In Latin, as far as regards comparison, the termination 
 was originally used, and also the preposition, as Prse ceteris 
 feris mitior cerva. But prce was discontinued when or its 
 synonyme was adopted. On this principle the oblique 
 pronouns, as used by the best writers, may and ought in 
 comparison to be substituted for their nominatives — Miser 
 aut major est prse me — altcro me — secundo me, that is 
 ab altero. Modestior nunc est prse ut dudum fuit — more 
 modest compared to what he was. 
 
 Mulo perspicacior, more obstinate than a mule. The 
 Germans use also which means else, but it is not as. Pisce 
 sanior, pluma levior. Domus celebratior ita cum maxime, 
 famed as much as ever — curres quam maxime poteris. 
 Dicam quanta maxime brevitate potcro — I will speak with 
 
144 
 
 all possible speed. Termination is the creature of con- 
 venience, and when convenience requires it not, it may be 
 dismissed or disused. 
 
 More than me, him, &c. is me dimisso — greater fortune 
 than her, is ilia dimissa, pluma levior is prce understood. 
 In French we say, " Je ne suis pas si benSt que de me fier a 
 un ennemi reconcilie." This word Benet, is our Bennet and 
 Benedict, made to apply to a simpleton, as the Germans 
 style a blockhead, a Hanswurst or Jack-pudding. We say 
 Simple Simon. Such is usage on which so much depends. 
 
 It is said that than always follows the comparative, by 
 Dr. Lowth, which is not so, as I am more contented with- 
 out them. Have you more besides those? I am less 
 deceived besides her. Canon 17 5 p. 10. 
 
 To compel the writer to use than, and than only after 
 the comparative, is to deprive the author of the great variety 
 of expression afforded by the learned languages, in which 
 we find ante, supra, prce, prater, applied severally to the 
 three degrees of comparison, and would render us poor in 
 composition. 
 
 Let me remark that there is no more difference between 
 when and then than there is between where and there, 
 who or that, but in their application, the sense being one 
 and the same. The fact is that grammarians have taken 
 too narrow a view of them, by applying it only to com- 
 parative classes, for the words, than, then, when, are 
 synonymous, and this citation reinforces the allegation. 
 
 " Scarce had he received the homage of the new Pontiff, 
 than, then, when John the 12th had the courage," &c. 
 
 The same remark extends to every case in which modern 
 writers differ in the application of words from their prede- 
 cessors. " Facies non omnibus una, nee diversa tamen" — 
 how variously soever metaphysical authors may diversify 
 identity. 
 
 Comparisons are made with but — as There were no more 
 
145 
 
 but five — which is prater ea — as praeter solitum ; solito, 
 ultra solitum. "Crucem statui jussit prseter cseteras 
 altiorem." This is none other but the house of God. 
 Trust in Christ is no more but to acknowledge him for God. 
 
 The word rather is of doubtful application to express a 
 small degree or excess of quality. Ex. : She is rather 
 profuse ; which should be she is too profuse in expences. 
 Rath, rather, rathest, means counsel ; rathsel in German 
 is our riddle. 
 
 If you can convert rather into sooner the term will be 
 properly applied, but if it will not admit the conversion, 
 the use of it should be rejected. I would rather die than 
 submit. 
 
 The adverb far is compared, and perhaps further might 
 imply procession, and farther, retrocession. 
 
 To the mutations of language I have before adverted, 
 and have adduced instances of anomalies under the figure 
 of enallage, and here I remind the reader how we can 
 benefit, as do the learned languages, by the same figure. 
 Page 32. 
 
 We can substitute of for the relative of possession; we 
 can substitute the specific for the plural term, and the 
 conjunctive for the absolute possessive. We can put be 
 for were, was for were, and is for was, which was not an 
 uncommon practice. Hence the critique of Dr. Lowth on 
 you was must be abandoned, as his reasoning proceeds on 
 a mistake in supposing was always to be singular. It 
 served instead of were even in the miscalled subjunctive 
 mood by Lord Bolingbroke, as " Would to heaven you was 
 with me." If you was here ; and this subverts the hypcr- 
 criticism of the Bishop of London. Sometimes are is 
 used for is, as in this example from the Spectator, No. 66. 
 
 Aristotle tells us, u That the world is a copy or transcript 
 of those ideas which arc in the mind of the first Being, 
 and that those ideas which are in the mind of man are a 
 
 L 
 
146 
 
 transcript of the world. To this we may add that words 
 are the transcript of those ideas which are in the mind of 
 man, and that writing and printing are the transcript of 
 words." Peradventure correct writing would require is 
 and not are the transcript of words. 
 
 Advert that we can also omit the personal terminations 
 of the verb, and omit the comparative and superlative 
 terminations, and compare with as and so for er and est. 
 
 We may neglect the adverb of manner and substitute 
 the adjective, making it agree with the subject or object 
 of the proposition according to the exigence. 
 
 The repetition of the positive is the natural superlative 
 as true true, means as true as truth ; as the dial to the 
 sun — or with different adjectives, as wondrous wise, 
 indifferent honest, passing rich, all most graceful and 
 pertinent expressions, whatever captious critics may object. 
 Page 126. 
 
 In Hebrew tob tob means good repeated, and in Tartary 
 they say black black for intensity of colour, and even the 
 proper name Caucasus is no other than the word koh koh, 
 meaning hill, reiterated. In fact we deal greatly in super- 
 latives in all desultory discourse which may be said to 
 wound either truth or prudence, for we scruple not to say 
 in a comparatively small matter, It is the worst thing ever 
 done ; the best ever seen, &c. 
 
 Let us come now in this chapter on comparisons to the 
 last, called the superlative degree, expressed by est, most, 
 as " "Which is the most noble employment of a rational being, 
 love or friendship? Friendship is the child of reason, 
 Love is the fondling of the passions." 
 
 The superlative does not form a comparison, this being 
 proper to the comparative, neither does superlative always 
 express supreme degree. 
 
 The most highest means no more than the very highest, 
 beyond compare, as the chiefest, extremest is only the very 
 
147 
 
 chief. " The most principal and mightiest in the dwellings 
 of Ham." 
 
 Negative and superlative terms are not properly so to 
 speak, compared, although instances exist in our best 
 authors to the contrary. It is supposed they neither 
 admit intension nor remission. 
 
 The Psalms have most highest, and Milton says wisest, 
 discreetest, virtuosest, best. 
 
 It has been asserted by some that the English has no 
 connection with Latin and Greek, if so we shall have not 
 much to boast as far as occasional structure is concerned, 
 as in this phrase : 
 
 Adam the goodliest of men since born 
 His sons ; the fairest of her daughters Eve. 
 
 Shallow censurers, Newspaper critics, have said Adam 
 must be supposed to be one of his own sons, and Eve one of 
 her own daughters, but how patent it is that in comparison 
 is meant need not be hinted, much less explicated. The 
 language of England is elliptical and beautifully so in 
 prose and rhyme which render it laconic and energetic. 
 If we do not observe these powers our language may lapse 
 into rapid decline, and its native and original laconism 
 and energy yielding daily to nerveless verbosity will leave 
 it like a rope of sand, or a house of cards, without strength 
 and without cohesion. 
 
 The decadence of language is attributed to hasty trans- 
 lators, to ignorant and overweening grammarians, and to 
 negligence in cursory speech in those who instead of con- 
 sulting its genius and structure conveyed to us by eminent 
 authority, which adorned the classic page, have induced a 
 system of verbal policy based on external laws to which 
 even common sense is subordinate. Now the aim of a 
 good grammarian or author, whether a standard author or 
 a mere publicist, should be to uphold the edifice toppling 
 through neglect, or misuse or misprision of terms or canons, 
 
 l 2 
 
148 
 
 and to retard at least, if they can not prevent its succumbing 
 to unworthy fate, as in many instances is shewn in America, 
 where abuse and absence of taste have deteriorated the 
 language of Britain, although very many of our transat- 
 lantic brethren, like Prescott and Longfellow, have rivalled 
 their predecessors this side the watery main, in eloquence 
 and poetry. 
 
 But to revert to a phrase, "Most straitest of my sect," 
 for very straitest ; here most straitest is not superlative. 
 
 So in this passage, Of all the Emperors who preceded 
 me, I Trajan was the mildest to my subjects, that is, was 
 in comparison the mildest. He writes fairest of all. I like 
 the least of any, means in comparison of any, or less than 
 any. 
 
 It is a canon in criticism not to use two words when one 
 will suffice, if they be equally expressive; as, The assertions 
 of that author are easier detected, that is with superior 
 ease and proves that comparisons are used adverbially. 
 
 "We adverted to the repetition of tob, meaning good in 
 Hebrew, analogical with the Chinese ty or tai, which with 
 them signify excess, and is similar to the ra of the Greeks, 
 which repeated is superlative. They transferred its itera- 
 tion to the sign of superlative. The plural of nouns in 
 Chinese is formed by adding men, mueng, teng. 
 
 In Persian the adjective adds terin as Khub,fair, Khub- 
 ter, fairer, Khub-terin, fairest, resembling the Tzp, rtpog 
 of Greek. 
 
 The original Chinese language was hieroglyphic, which 
 is the second stage in representative language, the mere 
 and bare pictorial form taking precedence, of which the 
 hieroglyphic is an abridgment. 
 
 Every monosyllable began with a consonant, and might 
 be expressed in 330 words, which were swelled by accent 
 and intonation to about some 1300 vocables, each repre- 
 senting 32 characters. 
 
149 
 
 The Missionaries wrote that there are two spoken 
 languages in China, almost unintelligible to each other. 
 Others again aver that the language of this primeval 
 people has remained unchanged for 40 centuries, while in 
 Europe no tongue is older than 1000 years. 
 
 The 214 elements or keys of Chinese are divided into 
 17 strokes ; so if a word is to be sought in the dictionary 
 it is traced to one of these numerical divisions, although 
 the spoken language has not proceeded beyond the original 
 meagre and inflexible monosyllable. 
 
 This people cultivate the voice to excess, and have the 
 primordial characters of a language, which stands in lieu 
 of ah alphabet. 
 
 They invented radical characters to represent the sounds 
 prefixed and subjoined to words in popular use. The 
 word Po conveys eleven distinct, unconnected ideas, ac- 
 cording to the elevation or depressions of the voice, as we 
 do in conjure and conjure, incense and incense, &c, and 
 about 40,000 distinct characters are represented by some 
 1300 monosyllabic sounds. The language of the literati 
 is styled Haypian, and is comprised in 90,000 folio volumes, 
 and he must be a Helluo librorum who can digest even a 
 moderate quota. 
 
 Their grammar is not less singular, and as I have ad- 
 verted to that of the learned tongues, with that of the 
 Oriental, also including Hebrew, I have digressed a little 
 in this compendium on the almost unknown tongue in use 
 by those who may be styled by us, what the Romans said 
 of the Britons, " toto divisos orbe Chineses" — their lan- 
 guage would seem to have more learning in it from the 
 immense number of these characters. 
 
 In elevated composition, the Chinese decline no noun, 
 and conjugate no verb, and the same word serves for a 
 noun, verb or adverb, the varieties of its meaning being 
 indicated by its position. 
 
 The personal pronouns arc Ngo, me ; Ni, thee j Ta, him ; 
 
150 
 
 and these are converted into plural by annexing en or 
 men. Page 87. 
 
 And such is the primitive condition of their speech that 
 one word is even used for noun, verb, preposition, adverb, 
 and conjunction, and this is a primordial diction — many- 
 words and usages in our tongue note also this primeval 
 state as shewn under TO and DO. 
 
 The only tenses of the verb necessary to be distinguished 
 are the present, past, and future, and they partake of 
 the aoristic or indefinite forms, as the three tenses in the 
 learned tongues which denote time absolute, while the 
 other nine tenses in Greek and Latin denote time definitely 
 under its respective distinctions. 
 
 Let me add a remark of Hermes, despite the dozen 
 tenses of which he speaks. He says it fares with tenses 
 as with other affections of speech, be the language on the 
 whole ever so perfect, much must be left in defiance of all 
 analogy to the harsh laws of mere authority and chance. 
 
 All conjugations are effected by auxiliary verbs, the 
 letter y forming the third person of the future in Hebrew 
 and Arabic, and the Chinese ta which is he or him, and 
 resembles the Latin sum, es, est — amo, as, at. 
 
 The Chinese genitive case is distinguished by the par- 
 ticle ty and tchy, as Gin-ti of mankind, this looks like de y 
 of in Latin, and wonderful analogies and radices have 
 been detected between Sanskrit, Latin, Greek, and Eng- 
 lish, as well as occasional affinities in Chinese. 
 
 The dative case is marked by the particle yu and y 
 which precede the substantive but are often omitted. 
 
 The Greek ablative is omitted, and perhaps derives from 
 the Chinese for 2vv Gcq, is equivalent to the Chinese 
 dative governed by the preposition. This may decide 
 whether the Greeks had an ablative, but it does not 
 seem to require one, as the genitive and dative were good 
 substitutes. The vocative and ablative in Chinese like the 
 genitive are formed by particles, and to add to the gram- 
 
151 
 
 matical peculiarities, like our own, no adjectives are varied. 
 There are no variations in form, such as are made by con- 
 jugation and declension in the learned tongues, but by 
 position their character and uses vary. 
 
 There is a work to which the name of Crestomathy 
 (xpyvrog, useful) is given, whereby the Chinese tongue may 
 be fully acquired through dialogues and extracts from the 
 literature which extends over 2300 years consecutively. 
 The Yi King is the oldest production, and it is written on 
 general philosophy as taught by Fohi, or Noah, B.C. 1766, 
 in the Shang dynasty. 
 
 As much has been said, and much must be said in 
 treatises on language, it is just to advert to the nature of 
 analogy, for all figures of speech are reducible to it, and 
 indeed so may all human science be reduced to analogy, 
 which is a resemblance in certain particulars, and in 
 philosophy a certain relation and agreement between several 
 things which differ in others. I believe it is admitted by 
 all philosophers that the Treatise on Analogy by Dr. Butler 
 is a masterpiece of the application of this mode of reason- 
 ing, for he does not only base Scripture truths on analogy 
 as the fittest proof, but he avails himself of this expedient, 
 as the most perfect method of reasoning, whereby objec- 
 tions and controversies regarding other truths which have 
 other evidence, may be rebutted. 
 
 The greater disparity between things compared the 
 weaker are analogical arguments, as in comparing body 
 and mind. The resemblance between sensations is physi- 
 cal, but between perceptions the resemblance is moral — 
 the first an equality, the second an identity, so that physi- 
 cal resemblance is to the senses what analogy is to the 
 understanding. The sum and substance however of all 
 reasoning is only addition and subtraction, while the four 
 philosophical causes are the efficient, formal, material and 
 final ; an ancient division in perfect keeping with a system, 
 which held a soul of the world as the prime mover of 
 
152 
 
 efficient causes. Causation is a subject on which there is 
 discrepance between past and present philosophers, but 
 which Mr. Baden Powell thought might be discovered, 
 and that the physical or vital principle of life would be 
 known as the principle of respiration or the circulation of 
 the blood, a connection between life and the simplest me- 
 chanical or chemical laws, all being a component part of 
 the vast chain of physical causation, whose strength lies in 
 universal continuity. 
 
 Miscellaneous Matter. 
 
 In the course of this philological and grammatical mis- 
 cellany several examples and notices on words or language 
 have been omitted, which may suitably be introduced 
 here, without clogging the order or affecting the symmetry 
 of the chapters. 
 
 Occasional repetitions may occur for which some apology 
 is due, but if they tend to instruction, or generate ideas, 
 or serve to utility, extenuation may be pleaded. An im- 
 portant or isolated fact is sometimes better seen and 
 appreciated than when it is comprised or enveloped in 
 heterogeneous matter, coming under the generic term v\rj, 
 silva, or wood, for even letters and syllables, words and 
 propositions were so styled. 
 
 The Stoics held every thing that was out of their power, 
 as life, death, &c. to be v\rj, or materials of virtue or 
 moral goodness, and Ben Jonson calls his discoveries on 
 men and matter Timber. 
 
 I do not think it impertinent to say that the subject of 
 this Tractate has occupied some years of labour, and if 
 therefore there be speculations, let them so remain in 
 bondage, till truth can set them free, and their real worth 
 be estimated, but I hope there is no position laid down 
 that can not be established. I will not say I defy criti- 
 cism, which is a standard of judging well, but I do not 
 
153 
 
 deprecate it ; and if I am not invulnerable any more than 
 my neighbours, I trust there is little to which objections 
 can be substantially raised, and that all my assertions and 
 principles have reasonable or plausible ground for credit. 
 But let the work be tested by true grammarians and not 
 by mere routiners fresh from Colleges, who consider all 
 chargeable with heretical pravity who deviate from the 
 wonted or prescribed track. Why it is this very deviation 
 which directs us to valuable novelties, and shews how time 
 and analysis convert current trifles into bullion. 
 
 To me labor ipse Voluptas, as I feel that the power of 
 exercising the faculties of the mind is among the best 
 gifts of heaven. Learning is to the intellectual what love 
 is to the sensitive, the sun of the human heart without 
 which it is joyless and arid ; still the most intellectual feel 
 that la main oVoeuvre, the operative power is often want- 
 ing ; but every one must take nature on the terms it is 
 given him, and be content to do his best, and each do well 
 in his degree without desponding, and have a care in his 
 own person not to reinforce the observation, that half of 
 human life is past in giving ourselves wounds, and the 
 other half in trying to heal them ; men die for want of 
 cheerfulness, as plants from want of light. Happy he, if in 
 addition, his mind can cheerfully energise to thought, for 
 felicity is a certain energy to which it imparts perfection, 
 and as a morose spirit is an anomaly in Christianity, so 
 should cheerfulness be the fittest hymn to the Creator. 
 
 There is a very close junction between knowledge and 
 felicity, obtainable by even moderate exertion, hence we 
 see how man was born for employment. This may be 
 even predicated of angels, some actively, some passively, 
 (i for they also minister who only stand and wait." 
 
 And so essential is occupation that malefactors con- 
 fined in dungeons crave for employment, that they may 
 not lose their reason, without which we are pictures or 
 mere beasts. So that occupation is essential to prevent 
 
154 
 
 the mind preying on itself, and man, the paragon of 
 animals, becoming the cannibal of his own heart, body, and 
 soul. This is that intellectual virtue which imports our 
 duty to man, as religion imports our duty to God. 
 
 With respect to literature, if allowance be made for the 
 taste of different ages, the want of variety of expression 
 or metrical necessity, we shall have more to admire than 
 to censure in our classical authors. It would not be 
 difficult to prove that sundry errors are attributable to 
 inattention or the press, for who can suppose that any one 
 would attempt to write without an extensive knowledge of 
 his matricular tongue, especially the English, the simplest 
 of languages and the least subject to inflection. There is 
 no doubt much in the standard grammars of our vernacu- 
 lar tongue which will not bear the test of genuine criti- 
 cism, and had elementary writers considered their subject 
 with due attention they had not involved themselves or 
 readers in confusion or doubt. 
 
 Although English is one of the most copious languages, 
 comprising some 80,000 words, yet it were a pity that 
 any should become obsolete, as occasions may be found 
 for their use, and the riches of our vocabulary be sustained, 
 for there are very nice distinctions in words, as Calumny 
 is a true libel, and slander a false libel. Many most 
 effective words have lapsed into desuetude, and very many 
 are of curious extraction, as Coke says of copyholds, 
 "though meanly descended they come of an ancient house." 
 
 Having made copious collections of derivations during 
 my lingual pursuits I have not deemed it irrelevant to 
 introduce some as an appropriate pendant to this Tractate. 
 
 I will premise with a remark that in the time of King 
 Henry VIII. one grammar (Lily) was the standard for 
 all England, which was taught in all our seminaries to 
 prevent loss to the student if he changed his school, which 
 grammar has its excellencies for all elementary purposes. 
 
 But grammarians are usurpers like other tyrants, for all 
 
155 
 
 construction depends on custom — when once a language 
 is established it can not be sensibly altered without danger 
 to the community of letters. Words may fall into desue- 
 tude to make room for others according to the caprice of 
 mankind, but a radical or even appreciable change of 
 language is a serious consideration, and I think we may 
 add pronunciation too, which if too distorted would render 
 a new orthography expedient. 
 
 The question so often agitated whether it be not more 
 philosophical as well as convenient to reduce all written 
 orthographies into exact union with the oral tongues 
 resolves itself into another much more easy to be answered. 
 For were a fixed consecrated standard of language to bow 
 compliantly to capricious innovations in a tongue exposed 
 to daily adulteration, it would soon cease to be a determi- 
 nate language, and letters instead of operating as a check 
 on the evil would so greatly facilitate its progress that an 
 existing age would require the help of grammar and dic- 
 tionary to understand the records of our immediate pre- 
 decessors. 
 
 But grammarians should explain what grammar is and 
 what it might be incidentally, for language is enveloped 
 in profound obscurity and so altered since the world was 
 one speech and their words few, that all the researches of 
 the learned and curious after a parent language seem 
 fruitless and abortive. Yet there is a greater approxima- 
 tion to identity of tongue, and the sources whence our 
 language is derived by the close analysis of Celtic and 
 Sanskrit made by many foreign etymological philologues, 
 the results of which have added considerably to our know- 
 ledge of all European and Oriental tongues and dialects. 
 
 We derive from the Celts, and they from Eastern sources. 
 Now the Celts occupied all Europe, and came from the 
 populous regions of the north, that, officina gentium, which 
 people had first emigrated from Asia, the original seat of 
 human habitation. 
 
156 
 
 The word Kelt seems to have been a generic term for 
 all European people from the north to Sclavonia, and in 
 it we recognise Galli, Galatse, Gallicia, Gallo-grsecia, Gaul, 
 Gael and Wales, by no violent transformation. The word 
 Britain is of some etymological dubiety, and may be 
 detected in Brutti, Prussi — Po-russi — which latter proper 
 name is doubtless another form of Roxolani — Russi, the 
 double s being equivalent to x. 
 
 Perhaps one of the most difficult efforts of philology is 
 to give a satisfactory definition. It is either too long or 
 too loose. The author of Almce matres remarks that a 
 definition is a sort of mental mince pie, which besides the 
 common ingredients must have proper seasoning, and be 
 compounded in a compact edible and digestible form. 
 
 Some of the definitions of our great lexicographer, (and 
 had Scaliger lived to witness the Dictionary production 
 he had never considered lexicography the lowest abyss of 
 literary misery,) have yet the appearance of enigmas — defi- 
 nitions by rotular process, ignotum per ignotius, resembling 
 the occasional superfetation of nature, which is strangled 
 with her waste fertility. 
 
 It is proper to mark the figurative application of a popular 
 term for the benefit even of a native ; the correspondent 
 term for a foreigner is best sought in his own tongue. 
 
 There are many and diffusive definitions in this Dic- 
 tionary by Dr. Johnson, distinctions without differences, 
 and some dozen or more employed on the word nothing, a 
 word of which it is not true to say ex nihilo nihil fit, and 
 on which the celebrated Rochester wrote a poem, which 
 Dr. Johnson avers is the strongest of his muse ; and as the 
 Doctor's remarks comprise some verbal criticism I will 
 transcribe a portion. — Nothing must be considered by 
 having not only a negative but a positive signification, as 
 I need not fear thieves. I have nothing, and nothing is a 
 powerful protector, in which the word is used positively 
 and negatively. 
 
157 
 
 In one of Boileau's lines it was a question -whether he 
 should use a rien faire or a ne rien faire, and the first was 
 preferred because it gave rien a sort of positive sense. 
 
 Nothing can be a subject only in its positive sense, and 
 such a sense is given in the first line — " Nothing ; thou 
 elder brother even to shade." But though the two senses, 
 positive and negative, are generally preserved, they are 
 occasionally blended. A French author, one Passerat, has 
 also written on this barren topic, and he confounds the two 
 senses worse than Rochester in a Latin poem of seventy 
 hexameter verses. 
 
 Dr. Johnson's Dictionary, in which is discerned wild 
 blunders and a few risible absurdities, is stigmatised by 
 H. Tooke, being as much the language of Hottentots as 
 English ; and he adds, if the Spectator of Addison were 
 translated into the Doctors phraseology it would not be 
 intelligible. It is said, had the Doctor lived to publish 
 another edition of his Dictionary that he would have 
 adopted many of the etyma of his rival who wrote the 
 Diversions of Purley, a work which has also been severely 
 handled hy critics, and one censurer perhaps hyper critically, 
 Mr. "Wedgwood, absolutely denies him a tittle of praise in 
 his work on curious English Etymologies. 
 
 Fame in writers is like a theory in philosophy, only good 
 and pertinent till it is upset by another, and that again, 
 clearly open to refutation, in its turn falls. 
 Critics I saw that other names deface 
 And fix their own with labour in their place, 
 Their own like others soon their place resigned 
 Or disappeared, and left the first behind. 
 
 Pope's Temple of Fame. 
 Dr. Johnson was aware of its infirmities, and pathetically 
 closes his admirable preface thus. — "When it is found that 
 much is omitted let it not be forgotten that much is per- 
 formed—compiled without favour from the great, amidst 
 inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and sorrow — I 
 
158 
 
 therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to 
 fear or hope from censure or from praise. 
 
 All ingenuous critics, however, admit it to be one of the 
 most stupendous literary accomplishments of a single man. 
 ei Pelion on Ossa noble words to pile." 
 
 I shall now advert to some words of peculiar import and 
 use, and will shew their varieties, to be followed or eschewed 
 as taste or necessity prevail. 
 
 In modern parlance, the word cut figures in court and 
 cottage, being rather energetic than elegant, and is used 
 offensively as well as innocently — as cut a friend — a joke, 
 figure, or appearance, when the substitutes make appearance, 
 pass a joke or point one are preferable, and indicate collo- 
 quial propriety. I believe the term cut is a nautical meta- 
 phor, taken from cutting the rope of a boat. Horace 
 Walpole, who succeeded late in life to family honours as 
 Earl of Orford, and who loved a joke, and like Falstaff was 
 witty himself and the cause of wit in others, was wont to say, 
 time and claim giving him a title, that it was calling him 
 names in his old age, and used to style cutting, shedding 
 his friends — which is not an unapt metaphor from trees — 
 and in it there is wit too, which is true reasoning, for Porson 
 thought it truth and the first sense in the world, concurring 
 with Pope, that true wit is reason to advantage dressed. 
 The art of cutting was first exposed in a comedy publicly 
 acted by the students of St. John's College, Cambridge, in 
 1606, entitled, The return from Parnassus; but the term 
 is modern if not the gracious act, which is to look an old 
 friend in the face, and gratuitously wound his feelings by 
 affecting not to know him, exemplifying the Christian 
 precept — " Love one another." 
 
 We employ the word catch, which when applied to a cold 
 may be rendered more elegantly take cold ; and perhaps the 
 vocable hang looks better if applied to any thing to be 
 hung up, as linen hung up, than to a man hung, which 
 should be rather a man is hanged. 
 
159 
 
 Another curious household word is get, used in various 
 ways, and although a long sentence may be couched in 
 excellent English with this word in all its applications, it 
 is better to vary it for elegance and strength. Aristarchus 
 has these applications of it in this unique epistle : 
 
 "Igot your letter, within ten minutes after I got shaved ; 
 I got to Canterbury, where I got such a cold as I shall not 
 get rid of. I got the secret of getting a memorial, but I 
 could not get an answer, yet I got intelligence from the 
 messenger that I should get one next morning. I got back 
 to supper, and got to bed and then got to sleep. I have 
 got nothing further to say." 
 
 It may not be irrelevant here to add that the ancients 
 wrote with great care. The history of Thucydides occupied 
 thirty years of his life, which the famous Demosthenes 
 transcribed eight times, in which however it has been re- 
 marked there is more said than done. 
 
 Virgil, dissatisfied with the iEneid on which he employed 
 eleven years of his useful existence, Krrifxa eg ltd — like that 
 of Thucydides, requested it should be destroyed after his 
 death, according to Aulus Gellius, B. xvii. c. 10, and Pliny, 
 L. viii. c. 30. A good genius however interposed, and saved 
 the Latin epopee for a wondering posterity, verifying the ap- 
 posite remark of Shakspere, that epitome of human wisdom, 
 We ignorant of ourselves 
 Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers 
 Deny us for our good ; so find we profit 
 By losing of our prayers. — Ant hong andCleopatra,\\. 1. 
 
 Horace, whose writings are so high and lovely and care- 
 less, says he composed his Odes " per plurimitm laborem" 
 and he oracularly required a work to be under the anvil 
 for nine long years ere it was published, which would not 
 suit these rail-road times. This was the lima* labor rule, 
 hence a published work was f actus ad unguem, which means 
 a perfect composition, being a metaphor taken from passing 
 the finger-nail over the superficies of statuary marble to 
 
160 
 
 detect an abrasion. We are much indebted to metaphors, 
 terms which throw gracefulness and lustre on discourse and 
 composition, besides imparting illustration. 
 
 Each eminent author has. an innate evidence in his style 
 and execution. Milton was chaste, Rochester profligate, 
 Dryden strong, Swift coarse and occasionally loathsome to a 
 degree, and perhaps he has offended modesty even more 
 than Martial, though in a different form ; Pope is polished, 
 Addison is the Raphael of easy writers, while Walpole is 
 agile and loquacious; Johnson though lofty is stiff and 
 sturdy — reading his Rambler is like moving in a waggon ; 
 Hume is acute and replete with careless beauties ; Gibbon's 
 writing is gorgeous as a pageant, and his conversations were 
 like the procession of a Roman ovation, exhibiting pomp, 
 power and riches at every step; while Cobbetthas an English 
 growl, yet is master of a simple, sterling Saxon ; Byron is 
 wayward and misanthropic, and his poetical contemporary 
 Shelley is as fanciful as Pindar ; Scott is delineative and 
 Coleridge philosophical ; Dugald Stewart neglected style for 
 matter, being very metaphysical and logical. In France 
 every writer has appeared from the original Voltaire, the 
 magic of whose style has never been surpassed, to the trans- 
 lations of Madame Dacier, the famed daughter of Tanaquil 
 Eaber, also a distinguished litter aire. The name of this lady 
 has been justly raised to a high standard, who conjointly 
 with her husband Dacier, astonished Europe with their just 
 version of Homer. The marriage of these literary celebrities 
 c has been styled the union of Latin and Greek. In a world 
 whose characteristic is endless variety we observe that great 
 mental power, like longevity, is often hereditary. It is 
 found in the families of Scaliger, pere et fils, Buxtorf, Gro- 
 novius, Vossius, Heinsius, and Disraeli, &c. These worthies 
 being the aristocracy of intellect, which is true nobility, 
 Whose derivation is from ancestors, 
 Which stood equivalent to mighty kings. 
 They deserve honour, if the real genuine claim to honour 
 
161 
 
 be virtue and public service, and this can be the only true 
 unadulterated origin of nobility, superior to accident or 
 custom— men whose business has been freely to investigate 
 man, and expound the secret of nature's laws, for nature is 
 the domain of liberty. 
 
 There is in all ' languages a great tendency to shorten 
 pronunciation in cursory discourse, especially by peasants 
 and artisans, and the use of this figure of speech is styled 
 syncope, which has contributed to corrupt language, so 
 that etymologists have been almost nonplussed by it. Cor- 
 ruption is busiest with words most in use, which is natural, 
 for communication of ideas comes first, and then this 
 communication with the utmost despatch ; words of hourly 
 occurrence, household words, contract into something less, 
 and two or more vocables occasionally blend and incorporate 
 into one, as don't, can't, cum multis aliis. So I shall cite 
 some proper names. Anstruther into Anster; Arbuthnot, 
 Arnot; Auchinleck in Scotland to Affleck; Brighthelm- 
 stone, Brighton ; Barnadiston, Barnston, Bramstom ; Bene- 
 dict, Bennet ; Cirencester, Cicester ; Cholmondely, Chum- 
 ley ; Charteris, Charters ; Daventry, Daintry ; Glammis, 
 Glamms ; Rutherglen, Euglen ; Utoxeter, Utcheter ; 
 Wemys, Weyms; Win dleshore, Windsor; Wyrardisbury, 
 Wraysbury. In Greek and Latin the same disposition pre- 
 vailed — from Demetrius came Dama ; Menidorus, Menas ; 
 and Theodorus formed Theudas. 
 
 In passing to a few flying etymologies, some of which I 
 have taken from i( Notes and Queries/' I preface them by 
 these glowing lines of Virgil, of which 1 venture a translation. 
 "Ferte citi flammas, date vela, impellite remos 
 
 Infclix Dido." 
 Quick, snatch the brands, set sail, impetuous row, 
 Lost, lost Eliza. 
 
 Ay means fear, hence ag-ue is a shivering fit. 
 
 Aye expresses action, agere, and is used for time; as 
 
 M 
 
162 
 
 non-age, dotage, wharfage, breakage, pontage. The com- 
 mercial word agio, is from agium, agere, a charge or deduc- 
 tion ; ate is variation of action, hence atory, &c. 
 
 Albion. The etymology has been variously given. I 
 add that of Dr. Meyer, who derives it from Alani, whose 
 God was alw ; the island uov being added, hence Alw-ion, 
 Albion by an easy transition. The JEdui had also a God ; 
 Aed, don, Eiddyn, from which Eding-burgh may derive; 
 while Briton may be deduced from their God Bryd or 
 Pryd-ynys, Prydain, Great Britain — but of this word there 
 is no end of fanciful etymologies. See page 156. 
 
 Art in German means kind, slug-gard, cow-ard. 
 
 Aye may be the initial syllable of <e-ternitas; atwv, 
 se-vum, the digamma interposed j aiv, aiva, aye, ever, and 
 aon is Hebrew for strength, and Mat the Arabic for life, 
 state, &c, in which the termination as in seternitas may 
 be found. Does not the termination express every absolute 
 and relative category of Aristotle ? 
 
 Bacon derives from bucon, beech mast, with which 
 swine are fattened. Leaves of beech in which linen was 
 soaked in a solution of wood ashes, buck ashes, buck basket. 
 
 Barbecue, means from head to tail. Barbe and cu, meat 
 barbecued, is done whole — an holocaust or entire sacrifice. 
 
 Bear, Bruin, derives from pero, pir-inn. 
 
 Bear. This word is of large significance and extension, 
 found in bore, bear, birth, brat, bairn, for children because 
 borne. " That such a barne was borne in Bethlem's city." 
 — P. Ploughman. Berth, board, burden — for sea room. 
 
 Beignets aux pommes, apple fritters, and so called because 
 bathed in hot melted butter. Beignets souffles were in- 
 vented by nuns, who blew on them through a tube, like 
 omelette soufflee. This last word comes from animellae, 
 the sweat bread in a hog. 
 
 Belfry is belfredus, in French beffroi, turris bellifera. 
 
 Believe. We have before remarked, page 120, about 
 
163 
 
 the prefixes a and b. This word means to live by, or abide 
 by, direct life by. Hence it comes to mean think, judge, 
 give credit to, and was written leve — be-leve. Be gives what 
 are called neuter verbs an active sense, as gan, go, be-gan. 
 
 Be-ware, is by-ware, be- cause, by-cause, sit causa. Black 
 is be-lack, block, be-lock. Brim, be-rim. Ge is another 
 particle prefixed to words, and generally has a collective 
 sense, ge-denken. Ge is turned into be in ge-ond, beyond. 
 
 Bombast answers to the French ampoule, turgid, bom- 
 bastic ; ampulla, a flask metaphorically. So this is a meta- 
 phor from the Latin word Bombyx, a silk worm, bombicis, 
 bombazine, any thing stuffed out. 
 
 Boudin, pudding, is the Latin botellus, which means a 
 small sausage. 
 
 Bread making is very old, and the Hebrews called it 
 behem, the Greeks aprog, and the Gauls and Celts bar, 
 hence, bar-ley. Buckwheat is called sarrasin in France. 
 Sweat bread is pancreas, ris de veau, wag Kokag. 
 
 Bridegroom, brauti-gam, Guma, man, Man-sin, man eid- 
 oath, man-sworn or perjury. The word wer (fir) was used 
 by the Saxons for man, and it resembles vir in Latin, which 
 is aor in Celtic and Scythian. The Scythians call the 
 Amazons Oiorpata, man-slayers. — Herod. Melpomene, c. 1 10. 
 
 Brindis, Spanish, and far brindisi in Italian, means 
 drink a health; and may be from bring dirs in German; 
 but it is as doubtful as the word Carouse, which is thought 
 to be a corruption of gar-ous — quite out. 
 
 Bubula. Bouilli in French boiled, pronounced boui, the 
 liquid // being melted away. 
 
 Bugle and Bvfle is bubulus, buculus, buirculus, bos, 
 tovg, ox — worshipped in Egypt as the type of agriculture. 
 
 Bidled or boiled is only once used in the Bible ; but it 
 finds a place in Chaucer, and it means bolged or bulge — 
 swollen, and means in full seed, full blown ; " And hang 
 the bulled nosegays 'bove their heads." — Sad Shepherd, 
 Act 1, sc. 2. 
 
 fil 2 
 
164 
 
 Butter is supposed to be of modern invention. Beurre, 
 butyrus, the general agent in culinary mysteries, like onion. 
 "It is every coofs opinion, nothing's savoury without 
 onion." Butter was styled the oil of milk (See Pliny II. 41) . 
 The Jews called it Chameah, or pinguedo lactis — oil of 
 milk. 
 
 Can, canne, canst. "Alle gentlemens chyldren beth 
 ytaught for to speke frensche fro the tyme that thei beth 
 rokked in their cradel and kunneth speke and play." — John 
 de Trevisa. This shews that can comes from kennen to 
 know, cunning. 
 
 Canard, French for duck and for a hoax, is derived from 
 Xnv, duck, pronounced cane. Mallard and duck are canard 
 and cane in French. N^o-o-a, from veoj to swim, means 
 duck, from it comes anas. Gos, gandra, goose, gander, 
 and anetrekho, enterich, antrech, is the origin of our word 
 drake. 
 
 Caviare, the roe of the sturgeon, known to the Romans 
 under the word garum, which is its origin, and it is one of 
 the indispensable seasonings of Turkish pilau or pilaf. 
 " 'Twas caviare to the general/ 5 — Hamlet. 
 
 Charavari,is a contraction of Che arie varie ? a compound 
 of odd varieties. — The French Punch. 
 
 Char cutier, usually applied to a pork butcher, is derived 
 from chair, flesh, caro. 
 
 Cheese is deduced from case or form. Caseus, casa, the 
 figure in which this concretion of milk is made. Frommage, 
 its French and Italian name, is only the word form ; and 
 Grotius says, Forma formaginem vocat. It was known to 
 the Hebrews and styled Sheboth, 2 Sam. xvii. 19; and in 
 Job, x. 10. Ghebinah, which word answers to gibbosus, 
 and Sheboth to eminens, round or pyramidal shape. 
 
 Chief is caput, as mis-chief, ker-chief, which is a con- 
 traction of cover for the head. 
 
 Churl. This word derives from Ceorl or Churls, who 
 
165 
 
 held land in villenage, contradistinguished from Eorl, Earl. 
 Cotsela a cottarii were cottagers, theoves or serfs. In old 
 Saxon theowas, servants. 
 
 Claret, is claretum, clear, a liquor composed of wine and 
 honey clarified by decoction or boiling ; styled also Hippo- 
 eras, vinum Hippocratis. 
 
 Cleave, cleofan, cleave, split ; Clifian, cleave, adhere. Page 
 125. 
 
 Coffin, derives from ko^ivoq, which means basket, cited 
 in the New Testament under the miracle of the 12 baskets. 
 Cook. It is said the origin of Cook is unknown, and has 
 been the torment of etymologists, and is not mentioned in 
 the Diversions of Purley, that rich repository of philological 
 lore, but like the sources of the father of plenty, Nilus' 
 stream, that majestic flood which feeds the Egyptian sands, 
 the etymon is doubtful or yet enveloped in obscurity. In 
 Rome there was a Coquinum forum, where cooks were to 
 be hired. 
 
 Corner. Kantle, cant, canton, cantonments, corners of 
 land ; soldiers go into cantonments. Canton in heraldry 
 means a corner. 
 
 Cowardice is derived from Culverteyne. Dove is derived 
 from Columba, Culufre. 
 
 Curmudgeon, a word at which Dr. Johnson " tried his 
 prenticed hand," and made nothing of it, which is a con- 
 traction of care-much-ane, too much care. 
 
 Cushion, written quisson, is derived from cuisse, a rest 
 for the thigh. 
 
 Dinner, Diner, has been derived from de ccenare, or from 
 desinere, desist from eating; as dejeuner. 
 
 Dout, do out, do up, dup, do on, don, doff, douse, do 
 out in nautical dialect, douse the glimms, put out the light. 
 Tuer la chandelle. See To and Do. 
 
 Doom or dom, is judgments, kingdom; Rcgnum ubi 
 Rex jus aut scntcntiam dicit. Thum in German, wis-dom. 
 
166 
 
 Domesday hook is the book of the house, domus. The 
 ancient Britons had their Brawd-Lyfe, or Domesday-book, 
 wherein their laws and statutes were recorded, since quite 
 lost, compiled by order of their Prince Howel Dda, Howel 
 the Good, circa 940, a. d. 
 
 Drum is deduced from dreman, jubilare, de and hrem, an, 
 clam are. 
 
 Earth derives from ere, ear. In Sanscrit Dhar, terra. 
 Eld, palsied eld, eld, yld, is human being. 
 Ell is synonymous with arm ; ell, a measure, and ell- 
 bow. Ell, ind, ette, oon ; ball, balloon, salle, salloon. 
 
 Endeavour derives from ende haben, have a motive or 
 end. 
 
 Enormous means ex norma, out of law ; while abnormis 
 is without any standard at all; abnormis sapiens, wise 
 without instruction. 
 
 Er is to advance, and may be found in re, as, ama-re ; 
 which means also res or thing, reality. The letter R is 
 often transposed, as sceptre, nitre; and in iron, always 
 pronounced turn and never i-ron ; apron, saffron, citron, 
 and even children and hundred partake of this pronuncia- 
 tion. In fact it is very common in English to transpose 
 the letter r, as brent, burnt ; brast, burst ; Thorpe, Thrope ; 
 Bird, bryd ; curdle, cruddle ; gers, gras ; kers, kress ; whence 
 the phrase not worth a cress, as it should be, not curse. 
 
 Er is a common termination in English, er, or, doctor, 
 spinster, baker, cutler, &c. ; eur, our, or, as am-or, sail-or ; 
 en and ed are not distinguishable, melted, molten, which 
 gets into t, mixt, spilt ; and id again into morbid. Huliwr, 
 pronounced hillier, tiler a slater ; children is a double 
 plural of er and en. 
 
 Eye means islets, isle, eyt, isles ; Guerns-ey, Orkn-ey, 
 and is the Norse for isle. 
 
 Fear is to fare, see page 118 ; feran to go, fly, fahren. 
 Fari to speak; hence fatum, a thing said or fate — "and 
 
167 
 
 what I will is fate." — Milton. Fate is like chance, direction 
 which we can not see. 
 
 Freundj freundin, friend ; fuchs, fiichs-in, hence vixen, 
 the female of a fox, fox, fyxen. 
 
 Furlough, permission of leave, lauben, lough, leave, ver- 
 lough. 
 
 Ght, brohte, brought, bringen. G is interchangeable 
 with w, as ward, guard, guichet, wicket, guile, wile, guise, 
 wise, Gaul, Walloon, Guarth, Warwick, and Rurrick. 
 
 Haberdashery berd dash ; tache, loop, or neckloth for the 
 beard. The ha is thought to be only a the article attached 
 to the noun, as the is occasionally, as in t'accomplish. 
 
 Hackney, a horse, is said to be derived from the village 
 near London, but Shakspere uses the phrase for an im- 
 pure woman ; and it applies to anything hired, as hackney 
 horse, author, maid, &c. Some think our word nag is 
 found in the ney, and that hack implies a half gelding horse. 
 
 Hag is not German or Anglo-Saxon, but a Druidical 
 Celtic root. Hag and hac means serpent. 
 
 Hac-pen, head of the serpent at Stonehenge, which is 
 Stone-hang, one stone hanging on the other without cement, 
 as close as the stones of the Pyramid between which a pen- 
 knife can scarce be inserted. The Serpent or Python was 
 the oracular agent of divination, and a sorceress is styled a 
 hag. The compound word hagworm is not obsolete, and 
 into such snakes does Milton transform Satan and his 
 infernal crew : 
 
 " He would have spoke, 
 
 But hiss for hiss returned with forked tongue 
 To forked tongue, for now were all transformed 
 Alike to Serpents all, as accessories 
 To his bold riot."— Par, Lost, x. v. 517. 
 
 Harry, harass, hergian, heeren, to waste. 
 
 Hearse is the ornamental part of a funeral, and hurst, a 
 
168 
 
 place ornamented with trees; hyrstan to adorn, Chisle- 
 hurst, &c. 
 
 Henchman is not an uncommon patronymic, and is the 
 same as haunch-man, or one used for a servant who wore 
 a cutlass — derivable from coustill, coutille, coste, cote. 
 The name of Cotterell is the same. 
 
 Hoche-pot, a dish, and also a clause introduced into set- 
 tlements, &c. by lawyers, all implying a mixture, a sort of 
 ollapodrida, Spanish, which latter is pot-pourri, olla putrida. 
 This is derived from hoc her, to shake, and it originates in the 
 reiterated shaking of a vessel by the cook's hand to prevent 
 the adhesion of its contents, or any undue stagnation. 
 
 Hus, haus, huys, huissier, userfa, vessier, ursers, uisers. 
 Hus came into huis, entrance of a door, so huissier, and 
 our word usher. Parler au Suisse or Suivre have nothing 
 to do with the porter of a gate, but it means speak to the 
 usher or conductor. 
 
 Id is the same as ed, morbid ; ad and ade is heap, arc- 
 ade, canon-ade, bastinade, repetition of beating. 
 
 Ism is equivalent to g, and y is copia or abundance. G, 
 Y, W, are interchangeable in northern dialects ; morgen is 
 morrow, sorge, sorrow, talg, tallow. 
 
 Kid is the young of man or beast. Cid means shoot in 
 Saxon. Kidde, kith, kin, kennan, hence kindle. The word 
 deer, now applied to one animal, is only the generic name 
 thier, deor, beast. 
 
 Lease means glean, lesan, lisan, hence lease contract ; let, 
 lassan, laisser. 
 
 Leasing, lies, seek after lesynges — " with his chere and 
 his lesynges." — Chaucer. Leasunge, lying. 
 
 Let means little, a hamlet, home, rivulet, a diminutive. 
 
 Lief, leof, lufian to love ; " I had as lief not be, as live 
 to be in awe." — J. Casar. Shakspere. 
 
 Loan. The modern system or tenancy seems to have had 
 its rise in leases for life, or the shorter periods called lse-an, 
 
169 
 
 loan ; in the freemen, the free occupants of the lse-an, land, 
 types of our present free labourers and tenantry, as in the 
 Thanes of Marks and Lords of Hundreds, one form of that 
 English rural gentry which struggled for existence with the 
 Norman power, and partially survived. The word Used, 
 re-leased, means else, als ; how else, what else, this and all 
 else ; alessen, to loosen. 
 
 Lobster is the distortion of locusta, locust, a crustaceous 
 fish of as great research among Gourmand and Gourmets, 
 as John Dory supposed to be a corruption of janitore or 
 poisson de Pierre ; some call it Jaune Dore, Auratus Zeus, 
 and it had the reputation of bearing the palm of delicacy 
 even over the turbot. 
 
 Luncheon, is corruption of noon cheon, a repast taken at 
 noon. 
 
 Marshal, mearh, horse, scale, schalk, rogue, like knabe 
 — boy or knave. Our night mare is connected with this 
 word mearh, mare. 
 
 Mass. The origin of the word has been disputed. Ite, 
 missa est. Go, the commission is sent to heaven ; or the 
 people are dismissed. Csetus dimittur, church is over. It 
 bears the name of mass in English, messe in France, and 
 missa in Spanish and Italian. 
 
 Ment, from moneo, regi-men, monu-ment. Mony is the 
 same in matri-mony and ali-mony. 
 
 Mercy derives from merx, merces, a merchant. Mercy 
 means subject to a tax, hence amerce, whilst remission of 
 merx or tax is mercy. " Virtutis gloria merces/' the family 
 motto of the author of this work, where merces means re- 
 ward. 
 
 Mis in Latin answers to me in French ; mistake, me- 
 prendre, me-content. 
 
 Mustard, called by the ancients sinapi ; fc fletum factura 
 sinapi/' tear-eliciting mustard. There is a curious deriva- 
 tion assigned to mustard from old French, moult me tardc, 
 I long ardently ; multum ardct is its theme. 
 
170 
 
 Nectarine is a bastard peach, persicum malum ; while 
 apricot is malus aprica, as being a tenant of a sunny wall, 
 which apricus means. The French say a I'abri, that which 
 is out of the sun, or under cover, under a helmet, from 
 hullen to cover. The word espalier is a wall exposed to 
 the meridian sun ; palum a prop for vines. 
 
 Nemo is non-nemo — supposed to be nemo or homo. 
 To look for an impossibility, the Romans said jocosely — 
 Nodum in scirpo quserere, to find a knot in a bulrush ; and 
 one of our poets not less jocosely writes, 
 
 See gudgeons graze on grass. 
 
 Page, pagan, paynim, pagina, a square of land, all from 
 pagus a village; pagare to pay, meant originally, field 
 service. 
 
 Palus meant formerly a spade, and being set upright, it 
 came to mean a pale. Pale in heraldry means arms divided 
 by a pale, as those of husband and wife. Quarterings are 
 a congeries of arms brought in by heiresses only ; in some 
 families there are more than 1000 quarterings, as in the 
 Duke of Buckingham. 
 
 Palladium and Pallas may be Palet or Phalet, which 
 indicates escape. Beth Phalet is the Booth or house of 
 Phalet ; according to Lycophron the Palladium was not a 
 Grecian Deity, but was borrowed from Palestine, and 
 Cassandra calls Ulysses the stealer of the Phoenician god- 
 dess; " icXw7ra ^oLVLKtigOeag"' — Cassandra, v. 658. Pallas 
 was worshipped at Corinth as a Phoenician goddess, says 
 Tzetzes, the scoliast of Lycophron. 
 
 Parricide. This word in Latin is derived from par and 
 csedo, not pater ; and duid is for dem to kill, to do — hence 
 tuer in French. See under Do and To. " Si quis hemonem 
 leiberum sciens duid, parricidad estod." Twelve Tables, 
 which were adopted by Rome from Greece about 450 b.c, 
 and which became the foundation or as great an adjunct 
 to the Roman laws, as the Greek language was to the 
 Roman speech. 
 
 
171 
 
 Plagiarist is of singular import, implying a slave abduc- 
 ted for the purpose of sale, hence metaphorically, theft ; 
 nXayiog means oblique, and the Greeks called their cases 
 7r\ayiog, oblique. 
 
 Poach is derived from poche, pocket, the yoke of the egg 
 being inclosed in the albumen or white, as if in a pocket or 
 poke ; oeuf en chemise, pig in a pocket, or poke or bag. 
 
 Poach, game, is only to put it in a bag. 
 
 Porridge is derived from porrus a leek, with which 
 porridge was flavoured. 
 
 Queen, cwen queen-bee, queen-fowl, coinne and quean is 
 woman in Norse ; is a corruption of konigin from king, 
 which is thought to be from ken to see, kennen to know, 
 and may be identical with the Chinese gyn, which means 
 king and man. The word quean is the same as queen used 
 in a bad sense ; could ywrj be the feminine of gyn ? 
 
 Quilt is only the Latin culcita, and means anything 
 stuffed with feathers, a cushion. 
 
 Re means reverse, as re-tract, retro-active to undo, while 
 ER means advance. It is symbolical of motion either way. 
 Page 166. 
 
 Reek means steam, reechy, steamy kisses. — Shakspere. 
 
 Revenue is re-venir, and is mispronounced reven' r -nue, 
 Shakspere says in metre, Who no revenue has : but that 
 does not justify this pronunciation in prose ; if so, what is 
 to become of parvenu, avenue, and retinue ? Mr. Pitt first 
 set this affected example in the House of Commons. 
 Rob, reave, rauben, be-reafian. 
 
 Sad means settled ; a sad stone says WiclifF, is a set 
 stone. " The sadness of your bileve," means, the steadfast- 
 ness of your belief, ssed, seated. Secede is sine cedo, as 
 sedulo, sincerely, is sine dolo, and securus, sine cura. 
 Scold, bescylding, schelden. 
 
 Ship is hood or head, and means kind or species ; ship, 
 shop, shape ; kind means substance, and person means 
 
172 
 
 kind in the Athanasian creed ; kin-lamb, kin — and tude 
 means kind, altitude, which is breadth and depth also. 
 
 Shrowd, wrapping for the dead, and also for vessels, de- 
 rives from scrud, meaning clothing. 
 
 Skate, the fish, is a corruption of squattina, hence squat, 
 the natural position of this and similar fish, lying flat at 
 the bottom of the sea ; plat, flat, platitude, a dull flat ex- 
 pression. 
 
 Sleight should be written slight, from schlichten to slight, 
 or throw away ; hence slay, sly, sleyed silk, a weaver's slay, 
 sleight of hand; as "The rogues slighted me into the 
 river." — Shakspere. Height should be written hight from 
 high, also, Milton wrote it heighth. 
 
 Smattering, comes from smack, taste. Syr op, sherbet, 
 shrub, from the Arabic sib. 
 
 Soare, a three-year-old deer; sorrel. 
 Some, sum, means quantity, in opposition to none, from 
 so; see page 128. 
 
 Spinach comes from Spain, epinard. This olus resembles 
 a thorn, or the head of an arrow. 
 
 Tellan to tell, told, tale, to sell by tale or numeration, 
 and not by weight, but by telling ; to tell off soldiers, 
 means to number off. Toll, thol, tituli fiscales, hence the 
 German Zoll, Zollverein, union in one toll or tax. 
 
 Truffle, a fungus which grows underground in subterra- 
 neous cradles. A few crevices in the tophus, or sandy 
 ground, are the only indications, and through them the per- 
 fume of the truffle betrays the secret to animals schooled 
 to hunt for them, as dogs and pigs. The origin of the word 
 is subter topho, from which the Italians made tertuffo, 
 tertuffalo, truffle. 
 
 Vavasor, a title next in dignity below a Baron, the same 
 as Vaywode. The word varo means man, as Baron and 
 femme, man and wife in law. Baron, tear eKoxrjv pre-emi- 
 nently a man, hence a Peer. 
 
173 
 
 Yeoman j yeman, gemein, common ; y is frequently su- 
 perseded by g, as yate, gate. 
 
 Wall-nut is Walsh-nut. Wala means foreign in Old 
 Saxon. They called all foreigners Wall or Welsh, es- 
 pecially French and Italian. Wall-fahrt, foreign journey, 
 pilgrimage. Bryd Walena, Welshman, or Briton. 
 
 Whilk, quhilk, ilk, means like. The Scotch say of that 
 ilk, meaning of that same place and name. 
 
 Witena-g emote. Parliament or meet of the wits. 
 
 World. Ur denotes origin. We-or-uld is contracted 
 into world. Rum is land, hence room. 
 
 Wormwood, were-muth, which is mood, hence courage. 
 
 Worship, weord-shippe, means virtue, or manhood. 
 Please your Worship — with my body I thee worship, or do 
 reverence. 
 
 Wassaile. Waes heal hlaford cyning, be of health Lord 
 King. 
 
 These etymologies may be unimportant, but they are 
 curious, and I remember a remark, that there is no con- 
 tribution to knowledge which is not also a contribution to 
 civilization, to progress, to religion, and to all for which 
 we ought to hope and pray. 
 
 The Romans have a saying, Nullam mentem animi habet, 
 — he is an idiot, presuming he had no mind's eye — for the 
 eyes give light to the body, and are said to be u fenestra? 
 animse," windows of the soul; sight, that most pure spirit 
 of sense, the only one of all the senses which requires no 
 apparent contact. Now all the senses are mere modifica- 
 tions of touch, an illustration of which is to be found in 
 Dr. Collier's excellent translation of Aristotle's treatise, 
 
 All the five senses are reducible to one — touch, which is 
 common to all ; they are but modifications of this indispen- 
 sable sense. It has a wider range of perception than any 
 other, and is not restricted like other senses to a definite 
 
174 
 
 organism, and one mode of impression. Touch is extended 
 over all the body, and all senses are subsidiary to it, being 
 superior to and more influential than the rest. Cuvier 
 thought that man has the most perfect sense of touch of 
 all the vertebrata, and it is either the origin of or coeval 
 with animal existence, being a primal or elementary sense. 
 
 Aristotle again thought touch was distinctive of animal 
 in contrast with vegetable existence. It is the cause of 
 appetite, as appetite is of motion, and it exists indepen- 
 dently of the other senses. A rudder directing a vessel 
 represents the stomach, which converts the ingesta into 
 nourishment, and the sensibility which gives power to the 
 stomach represents the hand which through the rudder 
 directs the vessel. The latter is analogous to the body, 
 which is nourished. 
 
 Aristotle refused sensibility to the brain, because it did 
 not impart sensation when touched. Democritus thought it 
 the seat of sensibility, while Plato conceived the seat of 
 the senses to be in the liver and heart, and did not concur 
 with Aristotle, that the brain was continuous with the 
 spinal cord, and to be the source of the intellectual facul- 
 ties. But the Stagyrite was generally superior to Plato 
 his master, and had this advantage more over, that his 
 father was a physician, and Aristotle followed also that 
 profession, which enabled him to infer that the vital prin- 
 ciple exists innately in the body in what is termed logi- 
 cally, 'potentiality, but which under genial circumstances 
 is to be acted on and made a reality or hriXex^a- Thus 
 the power which impels may itself be at rest. 
 
 There seems to be a unity in all matter ; perhaps the 
 number of colours may be reduced to unity, I have much 
 faith in unity, and believe all things are reducible to it, 
 which is simplicity (page 131). There is but one God, one 
 trial, one tribunal, one salvation, and but one wisdom, all 
 else is but error of various degrees and divers colours. 
 
175 
 
 Physically speaking the seven primordial rays of light and 
 colour are reduced to the red, which are heating, and the 
 violet, which are chemical rays, may not these be reduced 
 to unity ? 
 
 Language has been always chosen as the healthiest 
 vehicle for training, at least at some Universities, and in 
 grammar is implied logic. The Greeks did not go to any 
 dead language, and so concentrated their minds on less 
 than we do ; they progressed from grammar to logic, which 
 is the mathematics of language. They were bent on 
 philosophy, which is the gymnastics of the mind, and they 
 knew that to define a subject is to enumerate the ideas, 
 which constitutes its nominal essence. As the ideas which 
 constitute the nominal essence of many subjects are too 
 numerous to admit detail, philologers have abbreviated the 
 descriptions by comprehending a multitude of ideas under 
 general and specific terms. 
 
 The force of a term being proportionate to the number 
 of ideas for which it is the constituted symbol, it is obvious 
 that the progress of power is from the genus to the indi- 
 vidual ; in other words, the ideas contained in the gen as 
 are fewer than the species, and fewer in the species than 
 in the individual. 
 
 A creature possessed of blood, veins, heart, lungs, and 
 locomotive powers, with particulars necessary to animal life 
 is denominated an animal, which philologers make a genus 
 or general term in their definitions. 
 
 An animal clad in feathers, and capable of exercising its 
 locomotive powers above the surface of the earth is termed 
 a bird, which philologers make a genus or general term in 
 their definitions. 
 
 A bird of superior magnitude, variegated plumage, and 
 fond of solitude is denominated an eagle, and possesses all 
 the ideas affixed to a bird, and so of an animal, and contains 
 more ideas than the genus animal. 
 
176 
 
 Genus implies a continuous series of individuals, having 
 a like species of form, so that the genus may be predicated 
 of a man, so long as there is continuous generation of 
 human beings. 
 
 Species implies the mode of being of the individual 
 together with the essence, and as the matter constitutive 
 of the genus is in the species, so species may be regarded 
 as part of the genus. 
 
 The two terms, essentially logical, are potentiality, and 
 entelechy, and imply, the former the innate hidden power 
 of any thing; as seed of fruit, and egg of life ; the latter, is 
 reality, matter is potentiality, and species is reality. The 
 quintessence or fifth essence implies the sap and marrow. 
 
 Arguments are termed, a priori, and, a posteriori — the 
 former from cause to effect, the latterly conversely, from 
 effect to cause — they are distinguished by the terms syn- 
 thesis and analysis, the doing and the undoing. In fact, 
 the whole art of logical demonstration consists in proceed- 
 ing from identical proposition to identical proposition till 
 we come to the conclusion, and logic uses certain subsidi- 
 ary aids for this end, in the ten categories, according to the 
 emergence, temporal, local, positive, and habitual category 
 of Aristotle, for it is through them that premises signify- 
 either individual, quantity or quality. 
 
 The ancients generally were materialists, and thought 
 matter eternal, but whether they went so far as Bishop 
 Berkeley who undertook to prove there was no such thing 
 as matter I do not remember. Perhaps it did not occur to 
 them that our senses can not prove the existence of matter, 
 because our sensations have no resemblance with their 
 causes, and it is impossible to conceive any thing like the 
 sensations of our minds, but the sensations of other minds. 
 We have but a belief of the existence of matter, a belief 
 inseparable from the constitution of our nature, so we can 
 not doubt, if we would. 
 
177 
 
 Sensation implies present existence, memory its past. 
 The first principles of every thing are given us by nature, 
 and are of equal authority with the faculty itself, which is 
 also the gift of nature. The conclusions of reason are all 
 built upon first principles, and can have no other founda- 
 tion — and these first principles must be granted — our 
 sensations and our thoughts suggest the notion of a mind, 
 and a belief of its existence and of its relations to our 
 thoughts. 
 
 The mind can not be rendered more capacious by genus 
 and species, because they constitute an uncertain division 
 of unknown objects. 
 
 We have remarked (page 14) that Harris in his Hermes 
 avers that the article in Greek always precedes the subject, 
 and that the subject when transposed becomes the predicate. 
 This is not so, for one is the whole, the other only a part. 
 It has also been injudiciously declared that the genus in- 
 cludes the species, and that every word is significant by itself, 
 says H. Tooke, and yet he remarks that the article supplies 
 the place of words which are not in our language. Page 8 1 . 
 
 Subject and predicate are sometimes inverted, but the 
 predicate is not the converse of the proposition by such 
 inversion, unless Hermes would stagger the stout Stagy- 
 rite, who subverts that doctrine, for it is not true in a 
 definition by genus. Ex.: Every dog is an animal, but 
 the converse is not true. It is not true in a definition by 
 species, as every hawk is a bird, but the terms are not 
 convertible, for every bird is not a hawk. 
 
 Neither is it true in a definition of an individual, as 
 Westminster Abbey is a venerable structure, but such a 
 structure by necessity of nature is not Westminster 
 Abbey. 
 
 It is not true in a definition by nominal essence, to 
 prove which take Plato's definition of a man, an animal 
 
 N 
 
178 
 
 with two legs without feathers; the rebuff of Diogenes 
 perhaps disconcerted the sublime philosopher when he 
 plucked a bird, and said, Behold Plato's man. 
 
 1. The genus animal is included in the dog, therefore 
 dog is more known than animal. 
 
 2. The terms of the second definition are not conver- 
 tible, for the species bird is included in the hawk, there- 
 fore, hawk is more known than bird. 
 
 3. In a definition by nominal essence the converse is 
 not true, for it is impossible to enumerate any particular 
 with that precision which will justify an inversion of 
 terms. 
 
 Lord Monboddo advocated the opinion that the genus 
 includes the species, which is no more so than another 
 curious conceit he is said to have maintained with 
 gravity, that men were born with tails. 
 
 Opinions are sometimes so deeply struck into the mind 
 that prejudice overlaps intelligence, and the mind of which 
 reason is the light, like the feeble eye, the more light 
 thrown on it the more it contracts. 
 
 The fact is there is nothing but individuals in the world. 
 Genus and species exist not really ; they are nothing but 
 human classifications. A general proposition has no real 
 existence ; it is only a phantasm, for philosophers have in- 
 vented terms to express general ideas which have no real 
 existence. 
 
 The assertions are proved by Aristotle, one among the 
 prodigies of genius, nature's minion, who largely benefited 
 mankind by disseminating philosophy, for he wrote on 
 every subject with a matchless accuracy and skill, so that 
 posterity knows not which most to admire, the penetration 
 or extent of his mind, which embraced the whole orb of 
 existence. Voltaire and many others have thought that 
 Newton was the largest minded man that ever existed, and 
 
179 
 
 some have deemed Plato to be the omnis homo, but the 
 Stagyrite has transmitted works on every subject — logic, 
 poetry, ethics, natural history, astronomy, and metaphysics 
 with equal strength and precision. Who therefore can be 
 placed in competition with this son of science ? He had 
 genius and talent, those donatives of nature, the former 
 being more internal, possessing the power of invention, the 
 latter more external and capable of execution. 
 
 One of the efforts of Aristotle was to demonstrate that 
 ens and bonum are one and the same thing — Ato koXuq 
 cnr£(j)r)vavTO r'ayaQov, ov iravra icpiirai. The good is that 
 which all desire ; and moral evil, of all God's permissive 
 works, the more we know the less we profit. Page 131. 
 
 Ergo ens est bonum, unum est ens, unum est bonum — 
 so every thing centres in unity, and unity in the good ; 
 there is one God, one law, one matter: and this taught 
 Aristotle, that there is more difference between something 
 and nothing than between something and any definite 
 number whatever. 
 
 The first cause is not being, but is the author of being 
 — for being is a creation. 
 
 The first cause is superessential, not a being, but above 
 all being, for being implies externality or something deri- 
 vate. Existence according to the ancients implied essence, 
 and the ideal world was deemed superessential. 
 
 Much has been said about the \6yog of Plato (see Cory's 
 Ancient Fragments), but the word used by him and St. 
 John has two very distinct significations. By one reason 
 in general is implied, whereas the Evangelist uses it as a 
 translation of the word dbr, signifying a thing or person 
 revealed, and if at all in the sense of reason, not for reason 
 in general, but for the particular faculty so called. Dr. 
 Morgan refuted this error, which some fathers of the church 
 originated. Patristic philosophy and theology arc often of 
 
 N 2 
 
180 
 
 very doubtful acceptation, which some churches and people 
 have found but a broken reed. 
 
 There is no foundation that Plato held or was conversant 
 with the word or the doctrine of the trinity, for nothing but 
 revelation could impart this mysterium Jidei. Their trinity- 
 was a triad subordinate to a monad, the etherial intellec- 
 tual principle of the universe. And Aristotle had his 
 trinity in the beginning, middle, and end, which include 
 the enumeration of every thing, and fulfil the numbers of 
 the triad. This trinity he finds also in nature, habit, and 
 reason, the good and contemplative, so becoming by these 
 three things. 
 
 From vague traditions twisted to and fro arose those 
 fantastic notions of metaphysics among the ancients, which 
 were attempted to be reconciled in the third century of 
 grace by Ammonius Saccus ; a Christian philosopher who 
 opened a school at Alexandria, and received Origen, one of 
 the most learned of the Fathers, and Plotinus, whose 
 writings were collected by Porphyry for scholars ; and from 
 this attempt sprung the eclectic school of Platonists, who 
 kept paganism alive until the schools were imperatively 
 closed by Justinian ; when those philosophers retired to 
 realise their shadowy dreams under Chosroes, and diffuse 
 the oracles of Zoroaster and the famous Hermetic books, to 
 make confusion worse confounded, by contracting rather 
 than enlarging the circles of virtue and wisdom. 
 
V 
 
 181 
 
 On Language. 
 
 The soil under our feet does not make a country, bat 
 identity of language, religion and laws; great inequality 
 exists in all these three essentials in every region of the 
 globe ; but we are forced to admit them, as we receive 
 temporal government, which rests on a compromise of in- 
 terests and abstract rights. 
 
 The mutability of letters in figure and power and the 
 use to which they have been applied constitutes a singular 
 fact in human exigence. Some letters are mere symbols, 
 and some have been adopted for purposes of sound in variety 
 of depth, strength, or harmony. 
 
 Some letters are uselessly introduced and almost choke 
 pronunciation and scandalise orthography, while in the 
 lapse of time and voluminous writing, letters like soldiers 
 are apt to desert and drop off in a long march. The change 
 that may be run on letters, words, and sentences are almost 
 infinite. Letters have certain significations, as A means 
 motion, D completion, E energy, and so with the rest. 
 
 Sounds preceded symbols, and were the progenitors of 
 letters, which may have been used in the antediluvian ages, 
 for we have no proof that writing was unknown before the 
 flood, all the evidence of which may have been swept away 
 in that tremendous cataclysm, the wreck of a world. 
 
 The language of Noah was the pure fountain of all 
 tongues subsequent to that event ; and although many are 
 so disguised as apparently to baffle the reiterated attempts 
 of philologists to shew similitude or establish consanguinity, 
 yet some affinities of the primitive speech with existing 
 languages arc confirmed, despite the fragments into which 
 that speech was broken at the period of the confusion of 
 tongues. 
 
 The forms of every known alphabet may by an attentive 
 
182 
 
 collation be traced into Sanskrit, and the Orientals have 
 through all antiquity cherished the same opinion, calling 
 it the writing of the Immortals. 
 
 All language must be subjected to grammar, which as it 
 is the art of levelling difficulties, the lever should not be 
 heavier than the weight. Grammar must have followed 
 quickly on the advance of civilisation, which extends the 
 scale of necessaries, and especially on the art of writing, but 
 at what period that wonderful invention arose philosophers 
 are unable to state, for according to Josephus writing was 
 not even known in Greece in the days of Homer, b.c 900, 
 there being no alphabet in existence, and this would rather 
 confirm the belief that all his poems like those of Ossian 
 were committed to memory, and were recited as wandering 
 ballads to wondering hearers. 
 
 The first mention of Homer is thought to be in Simonides, 
 the cotemporary and rival of Pindar, cited by Athenseus, 
 and all the detached parts of his poems were popular stories 
 in his time allusive to Greek mythology. It seems in- 
 credible how Pisistratus could have collected these rhap- 
 sodies some 500 years after the decease of their supposed 
 author, for the fact of their authenticity would be obnoxious 
 to the same remark that Dr. Johnson ventured about 
 Ossian's poems, that writing was unknown in Scotland or 
 Ireland in his time, and the poems were too long to be 
 remembered. 
 
 Prom the inequality of Homer's poems, the division of 
 the Iliad into 24 books, containing some 15,683 verses, and 
 his omitting to mention the pyramids or city of Memphis 
 in Egypt, and the names of cities being cited which had no 
 existence in his days, it might be thought and concluded 
 that much was afterwards added to the Grecian ballads, 
 and that the Epic or Epopcea was really fashioned into what 
 we now find it by Pisistratus and the Athenian grammarians. 
 Many have believed the Iliad and Odyssey not to have 
 
1S3 
 
 been executed by one hand, and that the rhapsodists had 
 the monopoly of the ballads, and sung them for hire and 
 salary on public occasions, and prevented the circulation of 
 written copies as detrimental to their singing or saying 
 them at festivals with the usual accompaniment of voice, 
 gesture, and harp. 
 
 If language is a proof of civilisation the Greeks must 
 have attained a very high condition of refinement in the 
 days of the bard, for the honour of whose birth seven cities 
 contended. It is remarkable that little alteration was made 
 in the dialect of Homer from his epoch to that of Eusta- 
 thius, his elaborate commentator, who died, a.d. 1190, 
 some thirteen centuries after the demise of the bard of 
 Scio's rocky isle, and the language was as unchanged as 
 that of Hebrew when written by Moses as compared with 
 Hebrew as written by Malachi after the lapse of 1100 
 years according to the received computation, and how little 
 Homer has suffered from transcribers. Marginal words 
 have been interpolated as text, for what writings are wholly 
 free from such sacrilegious audacity, like the famous version 
 in 1 St. John, v. 7, " There be three which bear record in 
 Heaven," &c, of which Porson wrote to prove the spu- 
 riousness with almost unprecedented learning. 
 
 The multiplication of copies made Homer as familiar to 
 the Greeks of the age of Herodotus as the bard of Avon 
 now with us, and yet great obstacles still remain in the 
 almost hopeless possibility of distinguishing interpolations 
 from the genuine text of Shakspere. 
 
 It has been found that invaders of countries have bor- 
 rowed more from the language of the country they ravaged 
 than they lent it in return, and a mixed jargon has been 
 formed of which the mother idiom still remained by far 
 the predominating element. 
 
 In mixed and corrupt tongues the changes of oral accent 
 and inflection precede by a long interval any correspondent 
 
184 
 
 change in the written orthography or acknowledged analo- 
 gies of its grammar. 
 
 But the fate of the Latin tongue was very different in 
 its rise, continuance and perfection. Before the arrival of 
 Eneas in Italy, if the story be not a very myth altogether, 
 the aboriginal language was Oscan, a dialect of the Keltic. 
 Barbarous it was enough, harsh and incomprehensive, but 
 necessity soon forced the sojourners in the land to coin, 
 bend, transmute, or adopt words for existing contingencies. 
 This was a happy augury, hence the language improved, 
 but a specimen of it in all the crudity of its native idiom 
 was seen in the verses of the Salii, Oscan priests, who were 
 wont to recite canticles which stimulated to war or impinged 
 a sense of religion on the heart. 
 
 In process of time lingual excrescencies dropped into 
 contempt and were retrenched ; old grammar and diction 
 became obsolete although uncouth words were retained. 
 Many fell into desuetude and were supplanted by others 
 with great success, about the age of Camillus. Neverthe- 
 less Cicero declares he could not quite comprehend the 
 meaning of many words and terms employed by his antique 
 Roman ancestors. The language did not totally change, 
 it was weeded and enriched, leaving the basis identical 
 with the first structure, some words remaining nearly 
 identical, as the word EL in Hebrew, which is God, being 
 changed into Eloi. Dante cites this as an instance of the 
 change which had taken place in the primeval language 
 before the confusion of Babel. 
 
 JEI s'appellava in terra il Summo Bene 
 
 Eloi si' chiamo poi e cio conviene 
 
 Che Puso de' mortali e come fronda 
 
 In ramo che sen va, ed altra viene. — Paradiso XXVI. 
 
 The Greeks civilised the Romans, for half the Italian 
 
 peninsula was designated Magna Grecia, nor was it called 
 
 Italia before the reign of Augustus Csesar. It appears 
 
185 
 
 that the Greeks and Romans formerly were not very fa- 
 miliar, as Italy was almost unknown to Herodotus and 
 Thucydides. The natives, however, amalgamating with the 
 foreigners became literary, and they soon grafted the ex- 
 pressive tongue of Homer into their then defective speech, 
 deriving from Greece the nucleus of their laws, and with 
 them making improvements in their tongue ; which by the 
 infusion of Doric and iEolic Greek, ripened into the diction 
 of the 12 tables, imported some 449 b.c and that of the Du- 
 ilian Column. This gave an impetus to their zeal for ame- 
 lioration, and each year found them more familiar with the 
 language of the invaders, a literary investment for them- 
 selves, and a boundless resource of wisdom for posterity ; 
 and its truth enabled them to discern the social benefit. 
 Thus these two languages coalesced ; a spirit was infused, 
 and it would seem that nearly all claim to polite language, 
 except the raw material, was derived grceco fonte. Perhaps 
 there is not more likeness between any two languages de- 
 rivable from Latin, than between old Greek and Latin. 
 This affinity was acquired by the intermixture of emigrants 
 in part, and partly to a relationship in the primordial modes 
 of speech; but it seems from some extant Etruscan or 
 Oscan words, in which the vowels are emitted as in Hebrew 
 and Arabic, that great verbal transitions are apparent, and 
 here were gradually incorporated the beauty and vigour of 
 the Greek dialect. 
 
 Unfortunately the Greeks deemed all nations barbarians 
 but themselves, and would apply to nothing but their own 
 tongue, much less to the Pelasgic or Oscan, and ignorantly 
 thought themselves avroxOoveg, and that their speech came 
 by inspiration ; still they entertained no more solicitude or 
 curiosity about its origin, or in fact about ethnography, 
 than they evinced about the origin of evil, or the primitive 
 stock of the human species, having no conception of their 
 common derivation from that goodliest of men, " Adam, 
 who was the son of God." 
 
186 
 
 Even in later days their literati learned with reluctance 
 the Latin tongue ; although it produced orators, poets and 
 statesmen who might justly challenge comparison with 
 their own. There is not an instance among the entire band 
 of Greek litterateurs in any past time of a sage knowing any 
 other than his own matricular tongue, although many 
 orientals and foreigners acquired that of Greece. Rome 
 felt its perfection, and of necessity applied to its cultivation. 
 It extended with their arms and colonies, and never an- 
 ticipating the decadence of their nationality, they trusted 
 the Greek tongue would permeate the globe and become 
 universal; and with reason did they hope, for time has 
 shewn that their erudition and their success in eyerj branch 
 of literature is still the admiration of this breathing world, 
 and the very pith of sense. 
 
 When the Romans found that intrepidity and skill en- 
 abled them to war down their neighbours first, and that 
 they were afterwards capable of subduing all circumjacent 
 nations, they began to enter on a rivalry, and to raise 
 themselves in literature to a level with their wise precep- 
 tors, and to adopt a stiffneckedness in respect of other 
 people, in which pride the lofty Greeks had set them a 
 contagious example. So they would learn no foreign 
 tongue but Greek, and by this omission we are mainly 
 ignorant of the languages of those eras. What an advan- 
 tage to all the learned of all times had any one erudite 
 Greek or Roman like Yarro, who is said to have written 
 500 volumes on curious and probably on most futile matters, 
 explained aught of the Egyptian, Carthaginian, Oscan or 
 Persian tongues, all within the reach of Rome through their 
 colonies, their mercantile associations, or conquests. 
 
 Had there been but one Mezzofanti (before whom Mi- 
 thridates was nothing, and of whom Lord Byron said, he 
 might have been interpreter at the Tower of Babel), to 
 learn and record their indagations and discoveries in 
 speech not unworthy their researches, how much more 
 
187 
 
 easily had the analysis and synthesis of language been 
 effected by us, who now know what close connexion exists 
 between them, superseding the various conjectures on 
 conjectures ventured by scholars and philosophers in wan- 
 dering mazes lost. 
 
 The great advance that we have made in philological 
 studies enables us to detect etyma quite out of the ken, and 
 inconceivable to the aucients, by which we not only ana- 
 lyse their tongues, but solve their fables, assigning to them 
 a moral or mythological significance. 
 
 We have a little Celtic left, very few words of Persian 
 and Egyptian, and still less of Oscan and Carthaginian, 
 but which latter the perspicuity and perseverance of men 
 have apparently unravelled from the disjointed text of 
 Plautus as given us by Bochart and Sir Wm. Betham. 
 
 Some have interpreted these fragments as modern Irish, 
 while Bochart, a French Protestant, and the great philologer 
 of his age, who died 1667, found a meaning in pure Hebrew 
 out of the Carthaginian supposed to be Punic and Liby- 
 phenician blended; but on comparing the Hebrew and 
 Gaelic versions as rendered in our vernacular, the discre- 
 pance is so great that but little identity remains. 
 
 Different nations have preferred different methods of 
 writing. The Chinese wrote from the top to the base of 
 the column of a page. Some write upside down ; while the 
 Greeks and Latins wrote from right to left as other oriental 
 nations, or rather in the £ovotjoo0tjSov manner, resembling 
 the furrows which an ox ploughs. It seems more natural 
 to write from right to left, similar to drawing operations ; 
 however they soon recognised the inconvenience of that 
 method, and they finally wrote as all Europeans now write 
 their repertories of wisdom. 
 
 The Romans once had different symbols for letters, but 
 these they wisely abandoned and adopted the Greek cha- 
 racter of letter, which was converted into the Roman by 
 various transformations. 
 
188 
 
 The form of cyphers are certainly Sanskrit, and there 
 is inductive reason to believe the whole globe was peopled 
 from the progeny of one race ; yet the variety of tongues 
 into which its population has been subdivided might seem 
 to militate against this opinion. The astonishing coinci- 
 dence in almost all languages of certain words of universal 
 necessity, as terms of consanguinity, pronouns and numerals, 
 establishes this conjecture. 
 
 What the pronunciation of any dead tongue was, it is 
 impossible to say, but conjecture and authority may de- 
 cide, and to it nations may partially agree. Not two na- 
 tions pronounce any dead tongue alike, and between the 
 Homeric age and that of Theocritus and ApolloniusRhodius, 
 the alphabet, orthography and pronunciation of the Greeks 
 appear to have changed. 
 
 It is rather a matter of curiosity, however, than ne- 
 cessity. Quantity is of importance, although the modern 
 Greeks dispense with this precision, and follow an accen- 
 tuation, expressive of musical notes, which is thought to 
 be as old as the days of Dionysius, who wrote, with great 
 critical exactness, on the structure of his own language — 
 Tlepi ^vvOtaewg ovofiaruyv, and a work on Rhetoric. 
 
 There is as much discrepance about the true pronuncia- 
 tion of Hebrew, as the other learned tongues, and the 
 Jews of the North read the Pentateuch in a very different 
 accent and key from their brethren in Judea ; and each 
 polished nation pronounces the learned tongues precisely 
 as if reading their own, hence no nation is correctly speak- 
 ing right, though there may be a greater probability or 
 approximation in some as to their acquisition of this hope- 
 less achievement, aided by accents, which were introduced 
 by Tzetzes, in the 11th century. 
 
 Pronunciation is so delicate and pliable that there was 
 probably no entire uniformity, for if the dialects of Greece 
 evince what anomalies existed in speech at the distance of 
 even a few leagues, a fortiori there must have existed 
 
189 
 
 practically endless anomalies in sound. These very local 
 varieties must have facilitated and accelerated change and 
 instability, and have proved as effectual in realising dis- 
 order in sounds, as the irruptions of barbarians from the 
 populous regions of the north, the Goths, who were Ger- 
 mans, and conquered Rome, and went under the generic 
 name of Getse, and spoke a similar language to that found 
 in the Ulphiline gospels. 
 
 Of course, the two leading characteristics of language, 
 sound and quantity, would be the first to be corrupted ; 
 then followed the aspirates and the general grammatical 
 structure, and at length a total dissolution of tongues so 
 artful and complex as those of Italy and Greece. 
 
 Each country has the effrontery to insist that it has the 
 true pronunciation of these tongues, and modern Italians 
 boast that they alone read correctly the writers of their 
 predecessors. 
 
 I cannot but believe in general that the Italians are 
 truly more remote from that consummation, so much 
 wished, than many other nations, if we judge of their 
 sounds of ci and ce, &c. 
 
 Should Quintilian be taken for arbiter, or what Plutarch 
 has revealed on pronunciation, the modern Italians are as 
 much to seek as their neighbours. Provincialisms 
 abounded in Greece and Italy, so that neither Latin nor 
 Greek could be said to be purely enunciated fifty miles 
 from Rome or Athens, and to the four dialects of Greece, 
 which were recognised and in currency, endless varieties 
 were in use, and in Italy, where Greek was spoken, the 
 tongue changed, as much as the Spanish of the European 
 Peninsula, and the Spanish of America. 
 
 Doric is a contraction of iEolic, and Attic is a contrac- 
 tion of Ionic; see Herodotus, B. I.e. 142. rXwaaav St 
 ov rrfv avrfjv ovroi vtvofitKCKTi, ciAXa rpowovc rtaaepac 
 irapaytoyiuyv. 
 
190 
 
 " The Ionian states have not all one and the same lan- 
 guage, it divides into four different branches, and these 
 again into endless varieties." 
 
 Perhaps it is difficult to say whether vowels, liquids or 
 consonants have given most trouble to ascertain their true 
 powers ; aspirates, both vowel and consonant, were sub- 
 ject to elision in Greek, and even the digamma was elided 
 when necessity enforced the principle of " nee Deus in 
 tersit nisi dignus vindice nodus." However, some sounds 
 are really detected, and for some we must rely on analogy 
 and verisimilitude. As in our own tongue, the vowels are 
 all interchangeable, it is not impossible with them that 
 many or one sound was assigned to the majority of their 
 vowels or diphthongs. Besides they had the iEolic digamma, 
 which as convenience or necessity impelled, was used for 
 more than half the alphabet, one of whose peculiarities it 
 was to impart an aspirate, and volumes have been composed 
 about this mysterious adjunct to language. 
 
 Mr. Payne Knight thought a copy of Homer could not 
 be perfect until this mysterious digamma was restored to 
 the text, and in his edition of those poems, it figures in all 
 its plenitude and pride of place. 
 
 The letter was used as a pure vowel, and sometimes as 
 a pure aspirate, as well as for all metrical purposes, to 
 prevent hiatus, which is a characteristic of most tongues, 
 as eytofiai, iyw^a, &C. 
 
 Time was when all the earth was of one speech, not 
 even a dialect prevailed, and the words were few. " Behold 
 the people is one, and they have all one lip or pronuncia- 
 tion," and seeing the necessity for some sort of writing, 
 and for accounts to fulfil agricultural purposes, to ascer- 
 tain the numbers of flocks and herds, it is verisimilar that 
 written language was in use before the Deluge, for if the 
 Creator gave perfect speech to Adam and Eve, and they 
 taught it to their children, who transmitted it to their 
 
191 
 
 descendants, the fourteen plain letters of the alphabet 
 may have been employed by the prediluvians as indis- 
 pensable to the necessities of life, for these people being 
 under the more immediate direction of Heaven, than 
 savage tribes posterior to the Deluge, the inference is not 
 to be repudiated, that they possessed the means of count- 
 ing and recording. 
 
 It has been averred with assurance that the Saxon 
 a e l' 8 n — a, e, i, o, u, are perhaps the most ancient 
 symbols in the world, which soon varied for distinction of 
 sound, so that by degrees one sound became the echo of 
 another, and these vowels may be styled the Pleiades of 
 symbols. 
 
 The world had been divided into three quarters, sever- 
 ally peopled by Shem, Ham and Japhet, whose business 
 must have necessitated the use of letters or numerals. It 
 is said no oriental alphabets had vowels except Phoenician, 
 and that had only two, aleph and ain, for even jod is not 
 considered a vowel; the Greeks formed all the other 
 vowels, and double vowels supplied the place of aspirates, 
 as in Welsh ff, in Ffluellen, Ffloyd, &c. Hence vowels were 
 arbitrarily extended by the aspirates and liquids, and were 
 either long or short at the caprice of the author, as they 
 are a part of a system wholly conventional, and the latest 
 improvements of letters forming an artificial cement to 
 all the interstices, and give mass and continuity to accu- 
 mulative sounds, but they are not ligative sounds like 
 consonants. Primitive letters are found in all alphabets, 
 and the similitude of their forms may be identified by 
 consulting any synoptical tables of alphabets. Where 
 punctuation marks the place of the intermediate vowels, 
 certain vocal sounds, which often form the radical or 
 initial of words, require a complete geographical form as 
 well as the consonants. They are like the consonants, 
 letters of pictorial origin, and in Hebrew and in Sanskrit 
 
192 
 
 it requires the aid of separate punctuation to assign to 
 these letters any peculiar vowel function, and that punc- 
 tuation determines the vowel. 
 
 Letters are to pictures what speech is to sound, and 
 alphabets were formed from graphic imitations. All vowels 
 in Hebrew are consonants — page 6, Canon 3. 
 
 Wilkins* Dictionary of Sanscrit remarks that the want 
 of vowel-forms in language furnishes proof that the 
 figures which were at first pictures, then verbal signs, and 
 afterwards syllabic ones, become finally the marks of ar- 
 ticulation or letters, and vowel points were invented to 
 mark minuter distinctions. Till that time the consonant 
 signs served to express the whole word. 
 
 All the Saxon vowels, or symbols very like them, were 
 in use, and are on the Sigean monument and Parian stone, 
 and were engraven probably from the exact figures giving 
 account of events much anterior to that epoch, therefore 
 it is not to be rejected altogether that symbols were pre- 
 diluvian; and it is a fallacy to maintain that Bp. Ulphilas, 
 who lived only in the fourth century, invented Gothic letters, 
 which strictly resembled the Greek. Nations have derived 
 their literal symbols from a common source. The Gothic 
 o appears on Egyptian relicks. Pausanias saw an inscrip- 
 tion in primitive characters, Gothic, which were engraven 
 in the time of the Greek Deucalion, whom Bryant thinks 
 to be Noah, but some make cotemporary with Moses ; and 
 the Arundelian marbles, which date from the same epoch 
 some 1500 years anterior to our chronology, and must be 
 coeval with the annals of time. 
 
 The Eugubian tables, so called from their being found 
 at Gubbio near Cortona in Italy, consisting of eight brass 
 tablets, are commonly ascribed to a date of 247 years before 
 Hesiod, who lived 900 b.c, and are thought to be Pelasgic or 
 Oscan, and though not prediluvian, of an early epoch after 
 that cataclysm. Gibbon, V. viii., thinks the savage dialect 
 
193 
 
 gii them to be old Latin or Oscan, which was derived from 
 the migratory Tyrrheni of Lydia mentioned by Herodotus, 
 who said that he was amazed to hear the tones of the 
 Pelasgic tongue at the city of Crestona, a town of Thrace, 
 which differed so little from the tones of Attica, confessing 
 that the Athenians were formerly Pelasgians. In the tenth 
 century, b.c, these Athenians had the oriental guttural in 
 their speech indicating a descent from Sais in Egypt, hence 
 it may be inferred that the oldest specimen of the Eolic, 
 Doric, and Ionian approached nearer to the Eastern tongues 
 than the earliest specimen preserved in Hesiod or in bards 
 of the Homeric age. With this very infusion of Doric and 
 Eolic Greek the Latin tongue improved into the style of 
 the twelve or decemviral tables, written some 450 B.C., 
 serving as beacon rocks in the ocean of time. 
 
 Polybius, B. III. c. 3, alleges that the ancient books of 
 the Roman kings, written 754 b.c or at the foundation 
 of the future empire of the world, were unintelligible, and 
 that all fragments found on pillars were so too, almost 
 including the Duilian pillar, 260 b.c The Decemvirs 
 travelled into Greece to copy these laws, and with them 
 they brought the nucleus of the ten arts and seven sciences, 
 all translated into the current Latin of the day. Greek 
 was in vogue and currency in Italia, and what enabled them 
 to grammaticise their diction was the grammar published 
 by Aristotle, mentioned in his Poetics ; moreover the 
 Latins went to consult the oracles at Delphi, and eventually 
 to Athens to be educated and to promote the moral disci- 
 pline of the mind. 
 
 Herodotus seems to have acquired some Persian words, 
 for he pretended to explicate the recondite meanings of the 
 ceremonies and the great mysteries, averring that the eight 
 great gods were not Greek but Coptic or Egyptian. In 
 his 5th Book, Terpsichore, he says, the Phoenicians were 
 the companions of Cadmus (or as the Hebrew orthography 
 
194 
 
 is of Moses, the Cadmonite or Phoenix which is the same) , 
 and introduced letters into Pelasgic Greece, &c. He then 
 quotes some lines he read in Cadmean letters as old as the 
 age of Laius, grandson of Cadmus, inscribed on a tripod 
 consecrated in a temple at Thebes. 
 
 On the tomb of Alcmene a brazen tablet was found on 
 which letters were disclosed of an iE-coptie or ^Egyp- 
 tian character. In the opinion of Cnuphis, an Egyptian, 
 they retained the form and use under King Proteus, 
 said by ethnic writers to be the Pharaoh of Moses, for 
 information on which subject we may consult the Demon 
 of Socrates by Plutarch, as explained by Bochart in his 
 learned work styled Phaleg. Cadmus or some immigrants 
 settled in Thebes some half century after Cecrops who led a 
 colony from Sais to Attica, so that Diodorus, Book V. says, 
 the Philistines or Phoenicians taught letters to Greece 
 through a colony which sailed thither with Cadmus, with 
 whom were Arabians and Erythreans or Edomites. By the 
 annals of Tyre teste Josepho, according to Newton's Chro- 
 nology, Cadmus fled from Zidon, about the sixteenth year of 
 David's reign, with his sister Europa; while Hales in his 
 Chronology traces the era of Cadmus on the Arundelian 
 marbles, and copies of the Cadmean letters have been pre- 
 sented to the eye of learned curiosity, as well as the Pelasgic, 
 Etruscan, and Sigean monuments with ancient Punic and 
 the earliest Hebrew. It is asserted by Diodorus, Book III., 
 that Linus and Orpheus wrote their poems in this Pelasgic 
 character. On the Etrurian coins and monuments the 
 words are the rudest specimens of Pelasgic and old Latin, 
 and the letters are specimens of the rudest Greek. \ i 
 
 Dionysius Halicarn. Book IV. c. 26, speaking of a pillar 
 to be seen in the temple of Diana at Borne with an inscrip- 
 tion in ancient Greek characters, tends to show that the 
 founders of "Rome were not barbarians, for had they so 
 been, they had never employed Greek characters. This is 
 
195 
 
 no small weight in proof that the Romans were grceco fonte, 
 because no nation is supposed to have written its language 
 in foreign symbols except the Jews in their captivity. 
 Still some nations have changed, for the ancient Persian 
 was written in cuneiform, and now it is wrote in Arabian 
 characters. It is worth while to consult a dissertation by 
 Spelman at the end of Book IV. of his Dionysius' transla- 
 tion. 
 
 The story of Cadmus may be a myth altogether, but he 
 is said to have arrived in Greece, according to the Parian 
 marbles, 310 years before the fall of Troy, and 23 years 
 before Moses led the Israelites from Egypt, and that the 
 letters were identical with the Ionian- characters Herodotus 
 attests in Terpsichore, c. 58. ^ 
 
 Bryant observes, to pass a proper judgment on the 
 Grecian histories we must use them collectively as a rich 
 mine, wherein the ore lies deep, mixed with earth and 
 other base concretions, which we should sift and separate, 
 and by refining to disengage it, and then what a fund of 
 riches is to be obtained. 
 v_/Perhaps it may not be irrelevant in inquiry about the 
 origin of language, to advert also to the names of those 
 ancient people, who either spoke languages analogous to 
 those now in use, or from which very many undoubted 
 vocables may be deduced. 
 
 The word German has taken several phases, it is said to 
 be true — Ger = verus. It appears again in Caraman, which 
 may be the cognomen of German, albeit some think German 
 to be a political rather than an ethnological term. 
 
 Italians are styled Welsh — does that imply affinity to 
 Gaul or Wales, or foreign, Wala, p. 173. The Gauls went 
 south of Germany to Italy, and called Lombardy Welsh and 
 Italian Welshcrs. We find the same names in Gaul, Walsh, 
 Welsh, Wals Brabant and Walsh Blaenderen or Flanders. 
 The great service that Dr. Prichard has rendered to 
 
 o 2 
 
196 
 
 philology and ethnography consists in his shewing that the 
 Celtic languages are Indo-European, styled also Indo- 
 Germanic, extending from Indus to the Rhine. 
 
 I here give a citation from Strabo, Book VII. c. 2, relative 
 to the word German. Fv{]<tlol yap ol Tepfiavol Kara rrjv 
 Ftopmwv SioXektov. The Romans have very appositely 
 applied to them the name Germani, as signifying genuine, for 
 in the Latin language Germani signifies genuine, wherein it 
 is presumed that Strabo meant the Ger implied verus or 
 genuine, the wahr of modern Germans, and that Germani 
 signifies the true men of the country, the undoubted 
 avroxQovEQ of Galatia or Gaul. 
 
 It has been suggested by Welsford that Ger is identical 
 with the yar of the Hebrew, meaning wood, woodmen. 
 The Indian philosophers were divided into Brachmans and 
 Germans, the latter being dwellers in woods. Such and 
 so many etyma are found or applied, much of which may 
 be dubiety, although not all stigmatised as stark phrensy. 
 It is a source of infinite pleasure to the etymologist to find 
 probabilities even, and language would lose much of its 
 attraction, if this propensity were arrested. 
 
 It was proposed by Boileau to review all the polite writers 
 and to correct such impurities as were found, that their 
 authority might not contribute at any distant time to the 
 depravation of language. Should this be carried out on 
 imaginary etymologies, which occasionally approximate to 
 truth, considerable havoc would be made in the derivations 
 of places as well as words, though it might keep reason a 
 constant guard on imagination. 
 
 Again the word Teuton has been of very extensive appli- 
 cation, whether as to the appellative of Germans, or to those 
 who dwelt near Germany, which country is called Deutsch- 
 land. Now dlut means people, and its use is found no 
 earlier than the 9th century. In Moeso-gothic thiu-disko 
 means WvikCoq = Wvog, nation-thiuda. Hence the Ger- 
 
 
197 
 
 man dlot populus. In Anglo-Saxon heod means heathen, 
 d is th. 
 
 The Germans of Germany are Deutsch, the Rhenish 
 Germans are Alemannic or Frankic. It is said however 
 that these two vocables, Deutsch and Teuton, are not iden- 
 tical. 
 
 Who were the Cimbri, if not Cimmerians, Cumri, Cam- 
 brian Welshmen ? This name is recognised in the Cini- 
 brian Chersonese and Crim Tartary, Crimea, supposed to 
 be descendants of Gomer. Modern ethnography knits all 
 these together and assimilates them with Celts, Goths, Getse, 
 et id genus omne, and groups them with Greeks and Latins, 
 all deriving from Sanskrit and of eastern descent. (Page 4.) 
 
 The Iberians agaiD are a Spanish colony from the east 
 which settled in that part of Europe inhabited by the Celts, 
 hence Keltiberians, who spake the same tongue as the men 
 of Gaul. 
 
 The Celts migrated and became intrusive in Spain and 
 Italy, and the Latin tongue is a refined Celtic, intermixed 
 with iEolic-Greek. 
 
 On analysis there seem to be affinities between all these 
 nations either by name or speech, for the Sabines were 
 Gaelic rather than the British, which fact a collection of 
 military, political, and religious words seems to strengthen, 
 independent of the identity of the numerals. (Page 5.) 
 
 Distance of time and space and a plurality of circum- 
 stances have so modified the Celtic languages, that they 
 appeared diverse like the Gaelic of Wales and Scotland and 
 Armorica or Brittany. In the south of Italy the language 
 was superseded or swallowed up by the Greek, and the 
 natives driven northwards, who adopted the Latin which 
 was supposed to be of no great account anterior to CamMus' 
 days, B.C. 400. Subsequently the Sabine and the Celtic 
 amalgamated with the yEolic Greek, and produced the 
 language of Cicero and other Latin stars of the first mag- 
 nitude. , 
 
198 
 
 I have said I had seen a very probable derivation of 
 Prussia from Britain. (Page 162.) The euphonious word 
 Cruitneach is interpreted Picts in Irish, which is a kind 
 of generic name, as German means Deutsch. It has been 
 resolved into Pruth-neach, Pruthenians, Prussians. Brit, 
 Welsh, Land; Lud, leod, means folk, and Lud-gate, 
 folks-gate, porta populi. (Page 196.) 
 
 Javan was certainly the progenitor of all the western 
 world, and he spake the language of his father Japhet, so 
 if affinity exists between the languages of the east and 
 west, it is because all these tongues derive originally from 
 Shem and Japhet, sons of Noah, who spoke purely the 
 Adamic speech, subsequently modified by time and circum- 
 stance, such as the confusion at Babel; probably however 
 the basis of all languages were left alike, discrepancies 
 arising from fortuitous events and tendency to change, 
 for a pleasing variety is discernible throughout the whole 
 visible creation. 
 
 I have made a digressive attempt to recapitulate what is 
 admitted relative to the condition of languages and the 
 names of countries which are affined and kin, so I pass to 
 some brief and succinct observations on the power of letters 
 or symbols, rather to revive remarks than to proffer what has 
 not been before the public on coins or in treatises. 
 
 It is not my intention or pretension to dive below the 
 depths of my predecessors in this path of literature, but 
 merely to unite in one focus what I have observed and 
 treasured, with a latent hope that it may be at once a profit 
 to some, as it has been an entertainment to myself. 
 
199 
 
 On the Power or Literal Symbols. 
 Vowels and Diphthongs. 
 
 It is a remark of P. Knight, in his analytical essay on 
 the Greek alphabet, that none of the ancient oriental 
 alphabets had any vowels, except the Phenician, and that 
 had properly only two, Aleph and Ain> About this re- 
 mark there is some donbt. 
 
 In Plutarch's Symposiacs, ix. Quest. 2. 3. He asks 
 what is the reason that Alpha is placed first in the alpha- 
 bet, and what is the proportion between the number of 
 vowels and semi- vowels ? The answer was, it is fit the 
 vowels should be set before the mutes and semi-vowels, 
 and that of vowels the short one should have precedence 
 of the long vowels, and that a placed after iorw will not 
 be pronounced, and will not make one syllable with them ; 
 but if i and u are placed after a they are obedient, and 
 quietly join in one syllable, as in the words avptov, avkuv, 
 &c. because it is both long and short. 
 
 He then adverts to Cadmus styling A an Ox, as an Ox 
 is among the most necessary things in life, so A should 
 take precedence in vowels. He further adds that the 
 first articulate sound that is made is a, for the air in the 
 mouth is formed and fashioned by the motion of the lips, 
 and the sound is emitted plain and simple, not depending 
 on the motion of the tongue, but is gently breathed forth 
 while that is still. Therefore that is the first sound that 
 children make, as ahiv to hear, a^eiv to sing. Thus all 
 the mutes besides one, have a joined with them, as it 
 were a light to assist their blindness for wt alone wants it. 
 <pt and yl are only wl and Kcnnra with an aspirate. Again, 
 it was said that Mercury was the first God that discovered 
 letters in Egypt, and therefore the Egyptians made the 
 figure of Ibis, a bird dedicated to Mercury, for the first 
 letter. lie proceeded to say, among all the numbers, that 
 the 4 th is peculiarly dedicated to Mercury, because he 
 
200 
 
 was born on a 4th day, and the first letters called 
 Phoenician from Cadmus are 4 x 4=16. Subsequently 
 Palamedes found 4, and Simonides 4 more. During this 
 reasoning one Lopyrion sneered and hissed, and said all 
 this was egregious trifling, and that it was no design but 
 mere chance as to the order of the letters, as much as it 
 was that the first and last verses of Homer's Iliad should 
 have as many syllables as the first and last of the Odyssey. 
 
 A, considered the first vowel as the most open 5 simplest 
 and easiest to pronounce, has also the power of a conso- 
 nant, and the distinction of vowel and consonant is a mere 
 grammatical fiction, (p. 6.) All the vowels in Hebrew 
 are consonants, and consonants become liquids which are 
 akin to vowels, as 1, m, n, r, and in some languages they are 
 in the category of vowels. Vowels like numbers must have 
 some one from which to start. All vowels are naturally 
 short, but as words extend into many syllables, vowels 
 become both long and short arbitrarily, and so they must 
 have been before music was invented, if that delight of 
 the sense, for Ci cantus permulcet sensum/' is not as old as 
 speech itself. Different kinds of a were subsequently 
 invented for long or short time, like a a, so with e and o, 
 having varieties to indicate metre, but which began in the 
 necessity of subjecting syllables and vowels to metrical 
 regularity. 
 
 A is styled the first vowel, but it is not, being a diph- 
 thong, at least in form, and composed of o and i, and has 
 relation and affinity with the other vowels ; a had probably 
 the broad sound a a as in pater, which may have been 
 drawled into o as our what is pronounced whot. Now the 
 Latin mater derives from foyrrjjO, and the Greeks from whom 
 the Latins have borrowed so much, pronounced rj like a, and 
 the Latins may also have sounded mater, milter, and not 
 ma-ter. I believe it was Porson who said that in dissyl- 
 lables all short syllables were pronounced long, always pro- 
 nouncing pater, though short, as if long. 
 
201 
 
 This a went into e as ago, egi. So does onr a go into 
 e in Thames, Quay, many. Their a went into o as sparta, 
 sportum. So does our a. Again, it went into u, as 
 camera, cumera. If this first of vowels be susceptible of 
 all these vocal emissions, it can not be proved that a did 
 not in either of the learned tongues assume these sounds, 
 and was as mutable as our own first letter, though generally 
 pronounced broad, for Dionysius asserts that a was 
 emitted avoiyfitvov arofiaTOQ lir\ tt\zlgtov, which means 
 with a very full open mouth, The symbol a means 
 motive. The Phoenicians called a Cow, Alpha, which 
 the author of the Analysis of Ancient Mythology, thought 
 had direct relation to the ark and to the sacred steer 
 of Egypt branded with a crescent, to whom sacrifices were 
 made as emblematical of Noah, the avOpw-irog yijg or 
 husbandman, and the father of mankind. 
 
 E is again incertse potestatis. It is a diphthong like a, 
 and is composed of a and i. 
 
 In Homer the loss of the digamma is supplied by the 
 epsilon being transposed into tj, and in Pelasgic, Mr. 
 Knight says it was fashioned like 8, as was H. 
 
 It was in quantity, both long and short, until r\ made 
 the difference clear. Eustathius avers that €fj the bleating 
 of sheep was a criterion for the sound of rj, like bete in 
 French. But was it baa or ba? if the latter it would col- 
 lide with the first letter of the alphabet a, Ainsworth, 
 the lexicographer, an excellent authority in general, thinks 
 1) was emitted like ei ; it had a mutual intercourse with 
 the sister vowels, running insensibly into them, as reor, 
 ratus, hcri, here — Sibi, scbc, quasi, quase — Yearn for viam, 
 Deana for Diana, &c. 
 
 If it were pronounced like ei, which is equivalent to i 
 by foreigners, viz. e e } how far removed are all continental 
 nations from its true power, sounding it as our a. 
 
 It came also into o as vestrum, vostrum — tcgo, toga, 
 Xtyw, \6yog. It passed also into a as pcrccllo, perculi, 
 
202 
 
 dui for die, lucu for luce. Hence like our e it had 
 various tones and sounds, and there is much doubt as to 
 its true value. It may also have had the sound of our 
 word male, mail, &c. This letter was once written ei, 
 and pronounced ee, hence it was a diphthong, which Lanzi 
 confirms, who copied his authority from the Sigean monu- 
 ment, whose era is fixed 600 B.C., about coeval with the 
 Eugubian tables, if much reliance can be put on any con- 
 jecture relative to Chronology. 
 
 To lengthen this vowel H was invented; it is not a 
 distinct vowel — for it is the Phoenician Heth, and is not 
 inscribed on the first Sigean monuments, on which e only 
 is found in common with the vulgar letters. The Phoeni- 
 cians brought them to Syria, and on analysis they prove to 
 be almost all of them only transcripts of the Hebrew. 
 
 If u on the monument stands for H, then is H as old 
 as E, but probably it was only so written and pronounced 
 ee when not gutturalised. This H is inscribed on the said 
 stone where the writing is from right to left ; see Athe- 
 nseus, B 9. c. 12. H is only two epsilons turned face to 
 face like E3 the Phoenician Heth. 
 
 It was used for an aspirate as Ho, tarty, for 6 Icttlv. 
 
 Plutarch,* Vol. IX. says, that there are seven letters in 
 the alphabet rendering perfect sounds of themselves, as in 
 the heavens there are seven stars or planets, moved by their 
 own motion. That e is from the beginning the second in the 
 order of vowels, and the sun of the planets second or next 
 to the moon, and that the Greeks repute Apollo to be the 
 same with the sun. Hence « on the temple is a convey- 
 ance or form of prayer to the God, all implying If — if you 
 shall marry, &c, and that this word has no less a pre- 
 catory than an interrogatory power. Shakspere observes, 
 
 " Your if is your only peace maker, much virtue in if" 
 
 As you Like it. 
 
 Plato says, (i Heretofore we did not use tj but e, which 
 
 * Tubingen Ed. 1798. 
 
203 
 
 confirms Plutarch's remarks on £*, in his treatise on that 
 word at Apollo's temple in Delphi — e* ofaXov — if it might 
 came to pass, and that u has an optative power — it is the 
 great quinary or fifth power, hence irEfxiraZeLv, to count by 
 fives, and that the two EE were consecrated to the God 
 for a mark and symbol of all things. E means efficient., 
 symbolically. 
 
 I, like its predecessors, is anomalous in sound, and it 
 is analogous to e. 
 
 Before the Hebrews adopted the use of points, they 
 expressed e and i by the same mark, and its form in ancient 
 writings was like Z to prevent its being mistaken for gamma, 
 which at that time was I upright, a little inclined. Indeed 
 the I was substituted for V by the Dorians and Eolians, as 
 Eustathius shews in Svtypog for ci(j>pog, jivaog for fiiaog. 
 
 The Hebrew yod has the power of y and i — in Greek 
 iota. The y was retained by the Romans and is no other 
 than upsilon. This was the only vowel over which no stroke 
 or mark was drawn to denote its quantity, but it was 
 lengthened in the nature of a capital as pIso vlvus, and 
 this was styled a long letter, and jocosely one desirous of 
 hanging himself, said he wished to make a long letter of 
 himself. — See Plautus Aulularia. 
 
 The Greek i is converted into e by the Latins, as /mtvOa, 
 mentha, rtyyw, tingo. The latter had our diphthongal i 
 and u, as is evidenced by murorum and Puni, which they 
 wrote indifferently with ce or u, as mccrorum, Poince, 
 poenio, punio. 
 
 It may have been commonly sounded as at this day on 
 the continent, and that the ei found on the tomb of Scipio 
 and on the Twelve Tables, in Plautus as captivei, and in 
 Lucrctivs omneis, &c, may be similarly emitted. But 
 Justus Lipsius, in his treatise De vera pronunciatione Latini 
 Scrmonis, thinks, the English have the real sound of i in 
 their pronunciation of Latin, and I believe he founds on the 
 letter to Cicero of Papirius Pectus, where there is a question 
 
204 
 
 as to tlie exact sound of ei in binei. Cic. Epist. 22, Lib. ix. 
 Biuus means two, hence Bivsio coeo, written ga'vew. This 
 shews that ei or i in these words were sounded alike, and 
 were identified by Tully, who was an orthoepist as well as a 
 rhetorician. In Virgil olli is put for illi. In Greek all 
 datives end in i subscript, which was dropped by the 
 iEolians, and in this they were followed by the Latins, 
 making agro for agroi, metu for metui, &c. 
 
 With us i sinks into e, as virtue, mirth, and shire, which 
 should never be sounded shire. The irregular sound of 
 sirrah is exploded, contrary to the fear of Dr. Walker, who 
 thought the sound of a in sirrah, instead of i, was a fixture 
 in English and incorrigible. The i was written with two 
 dots on either side or above, *r i, to indicate it was the eye 
 letter, in honour of the organ of vision, and the signification 
 of the symbol i is extent or indefinite. 
 
 The letter J was always sounded like y in Latin, yuvat 
 for juvat, and Yupiter, &c. as the Germans pronounce it. 
 
 O is symbolical, and means individual or whole. It is 
 one of the oldest vowels, and it appears thus 8, on Egyptian 
 relics. The quantity was long or short, until w came to 
 fix and note the difference. It is very easily glided into a, 
 and conversely as aporpov, aratrum, and into e as yovv, 
 genu, into i as koviq, cinis, into u as vv%, nox, into au as 
 codex, caudex, the stem or trunk of a tree, with which 
 books were bound ; similar to liber, the bark of a tree, 
 whence is derived liber, a book, pars pro toto — plostrum 
 drifts into plaustrum. It has its mutations in English, and 
 is frequently pronounced as double o— in bosom, Pole, 
 Brome, Croke, Scrope, Poley, &c, which words are never 
 pronounced otherwise by correct speakers. The ancients 
 had this full thick sound for w, as if pronounced in the 
 hollow of the mouth. It has the sound of w also in the 
 French word oyer and terminer, and in Bowyer. It is 
 pronounced like u with us, as Monday, &c, and so it was 
 with Greeks and Latins, as Osiris, Usiris, Odusseus, Ulysses. 
 
205 
 
 It may have been emitted wau if the Syriac o was styled 
 ovau. In Greek oIkoq was sounded wolkoq, oivov, from the 
 Hebrew iin ; the first jod by repetition pronounced u, which 
 indicates a vowel and a consonant at the same time, so it 
 might lapse into the power of <j>, one of the digamma class. 
 Thus o would lose its vowel character and become a diphthong 
 and a consonant in power. The genitive ov is expressed 
 by a simple o on the Sigean monument and on the Nointel 
 inscription,* supposed to be some 500 or 600 years anterior 
 to Christianity. Some coins have the same peculiarity. 
 Omega was written o or £2, and w is evidently two oo so 
 united. In Plato it is thus written, and in the Alexandrine 
 manuscripts the forms were <ytt, and in the later manu- 
 scripts oo <u> . 
 
 O is said to be derived from the Syrian vau. O reversed 
 A answering both to o and u, which latter was of later use. 
 Lanzi observes with verity that time was when the Romans 
 reiterated their vowels to indicate a long quantity, as vaala 
 fe-elix ; hence the eii for ei in Plautus. The Hebrew had a 
 dot to mark a double vowel or consonant which served to 
 denote quantity also. O means the whole. " His eyes 
 drouped Zfo/e sunken in his hede," (Chaucer) where hole is for 
 whole ; and d used imperatively before o means completion, 
 as a-d-o completing the whole. The efficacy and antiquity 
 and affinity between to and do has been explained in the 
 chapter on Do and To, page 66. I again remark that 
 Do is one of the most ancient and cardinal words in our 
 language, and is a specimen of primitive diction. 
 
 O had an affinity with c, hence so many adverbs in e and 
 o ; as vere, vcro, tute, tuto. By this analogy genitives in 
 e arc formed as vulnus, vulncris j and the reduplication in e, 
 and o, as momordi for memordi. O and u are nearly the 
 same, Hccoba, notrix, servom for servum. 
 
 U, Y. In this we find as much variety as any other 
 vocal symbol. It was sounded like double o in prove, and 
 * Inscription discovered at Athena by ilie Martinis dc Nointel. 
 
206 
 
 assumed that of y in Sulla ; and Kvpi c sounded Kyrie, Lord, 
 and i in monimentum, as in modern Greek, and it may 
 have been sounded like the French eu. When it com- 
 menced a word in Greek it was aspirated, and it filled the 
 sound like ou y assigned to it as its power in lumen, like 
 humeri, fouit for fuit, jure written joure, which favour the 
 hypothesis. Before a consonant a sound like v or f was 
 inserted as ^evyw, fefgo. 
 
 The negative ov was once indicated by o simple, and 
 letters were omitted as Ifii for elfii. All writings, whether 
 in manuscripts or on lapidary inscriptions, lapse into con- 
 tractions, not from want of vowels, but with a view to 
 expedition. In fact the transformations and metamorphoses 
 in Greek manuscripts are very extensive, and almost in- 
 credible. Words of ten and fourteen letters are reduced 
 by contraction to two, as may be seen in the Pcecilographia 
 graeca, published in London in 1807. -A- sort of pictorial 
 contraction is also found, as feet drawn for 7r6^eg; and 
 waves to indicate sea, for da\a<j<ra, besides the shrinking 
 and shrivelling of long words, " Oavjua ISeaQai." There is 
 scarce any thing that can not be done in words and lan- 
 guage which has not been done between the license of the 
 writers and the commentators, establishing whimsical rules, 
 so that every variety of change could take place in aspirates 
 before vowels, or in the augment of particular tenses in 
 particular verbs, of which Payne Knight speaks (page 41), 
 of his Greek alphabet. As this letter u is cut on the 
 Sigean monument it evinces it to be of no later date than 
 other vowels. It is not a pure vowel, being composed of 
 eu, and is convertible into v, which glides into f and w. 
 So it was used for that mysterious letter the iEolic digamma, 
 as antique monuments illustrate in Venus, Fenus, &c. 
 
 U takes the power of eu or yu in English, as union, 
 usage, and all words preceded by u. Ex. : usurp, utensil, 
 uvula, utility. 
 
 This digamma, of which I shall treat under V, is of a 
 
207 
 
 very long range, and by repute draws its birth from the 
 Phenician Vau. The aspirate was more frequent in Greek 
 and Latin than is supposed, and this letter was one of its 
 chief agents, Quintilian avouches, B. xii. C. 10, that the 
 Greeks could not pronounce the double u in equum or 
 represent it in their characters. 
 
 In tracing to its sources the characters of the early- 
 Greek alphabet the vowels are found to be Phoenician, 
 which is only a Hebrew dialect, as the letter y is expressed 
 by u ; what is required to be known about it is referable 
 to that vowel. The Latins pronounced it either way — as 
 sulla, sylla — and modern Greeks pronounce Kvpis, kyrie, 
 and so did the ancients, as observed before. Dr. Wallis 
 thought y an aspiration of g. 
 
 Here I shall briefly advert to the diphthongs, and remark 
 that there is as much difficulty about their true sounds 
 as those of vowels ; anomalies abound, and in their sound 
 no two nations concur, for the explanation of the vowels 
 given by Dionysius is not so clear as to be unequivocal ; 
 it is certain the modern Greek usage differs greatly from 
 the pronunciation there set down ; though they think it 
 literary treason to dispute their dicta on this point, and 
 despise all European practice, yet they pronounce the 
 diphthongs, nearly all alike. We used their method until 
 King Edward's reign, when Sir John Cheke, " who taught 
 our Cambridge, and King Edward Greek," and Sir Thomas 
 Smyth, Kt., of Hill Hall, Essex, and Ankerwycke Wrays- 
 bury, County Bucks, two learned professors of that 
 language in the Cambridge University, arrested the pro- 
 gress of it. The Greek refugees from Constantinople, who 
 were beginning to touch on the outside rind of science, 
 introduced into Western Europe this modern utterance, 
 which had been general with them for centuries, but that 
 does not prove it to have been the very same employed by 
 Pericles and Demosthenes in their palmy days. To have 
 pursued the pronunciation adopted by modern Greeks had, 
 
208 
 
 perhaps, been better, having been so taught originally, 
 and now we have changed it we are not more certain we 
 have improved it, or discovered a nearer approximation to 
 truth or utility. 
 
 A Greek nobleman once told me that he went to a 
 University in France to hear their Greek recitations, and 
 having asked when they would begin, was informed they 
 were all over. The fact was he had not understood one 
 word or recognised a note to indicate that his native 
 language was in process of declamation. Being a firm 
 friend, and attached to literature, he politely read me 
 some parts of Aristophanes, with due grace and emphasis, 
 and I observed a frequent recurrence of aspiration, which 
 did not however deduct from the melody of the verse, 
 although he violated quantity, availing himself of the 
 accents only, on which, as about Hebrew points, there is so 
 much discrepance. Variety is a characteristic of physics, 
 and man has made it common too in all matters of 
 language, polity, morals and religion. " Tradidit mundum 
 disputationi ejus." 
 
 At, the diphthong, or bivocal, was pronounced as our, 
 <j(j)aXpa, sphsera, vp.ivaiog — hymenseus, alvsiag iEneas — 
 fiovcra, musse. This @e was sounded e as setas, etas, es for ses, 
 and inversely 8e was substituted for e. The town of Caere 
 is said to be derived from %a1pz, a ^ieu. Hence comes 
 Cures and Quirites — though some derive it from Coir or 
 Quir, a spear in Gaelic, so Quirinus, the Sabine God, is 
 quiris or spear. 
 
 Av took the sound of af — and thus by it Aristophanes 
 expresses the barking of a dog, as av, av, but this re- 
 sembles the crying of a hound more than the yelping of a 
 small canine quadruped. It lapsed into o as caudex, codex 
 — and the Dorians said, w\a% for av\a% sulcus, Aorelius 
 for Aurelius. 
 
 El emitted e by modern Greeks, and its mutation 
 was into se, as olarpog, sounded estrum, and oldnrovg got 
 
209 
 
 into GEdipus, sounded also JEtf-ipus, and not OiSlitovq, which 
 first sound our ancestors folio wed, although some modern 
 purists pronounce the diphthong as 01. The Latins said, 
 mestus, for msestus ; loiber, leiber, liber. 
 
 I think Latin as pronounced by some moderns a vicious 
 deviation from authority and truth. Ev was like f, as evje, 
 bravo, was sounded efge. — a^aptorta, like efcharistia. 
 Some think 01 was sounded as written, but as the Latin 
 nominative plural ends in i, there can be little doubt but 
 the Greeks pronounced the oi as i, that is e. — -Ex.: ovav^aXoi, 
 Vandali, So/moi, domi — and that this is true comes out in 
 full evidence from the words in Thucydides, B. II. c. 54. 
 \oifxbg pestilence and Xi/jibg famine, both pronounced the 
 same way exactly. f H£a Awpiaicog woXefiog teal Xoijubg a/*' 
 avToj. The conjunction kcu was always sounded kee, and is 
 no other then the Latin que, which qu came into k, and oe 
 come into u, as Pceni, Puni — quasi Phceni, as coming from 
 Phenicia — the Jews had no p in their alphabet, as remarks 
 St. Jerome. — ov had the sound of f — as vlov, wiof, which 
 of is the same as father, denoting origin, and is the same 
 as ab father— a7ro, a$, ab-habeo, of; the general preposition, 
 one of the oldest words in language, in Russian also, as 
 Eoman-of. See page 74 under Of and Have. 
 
 These analogies shew common descent, and a common 
 language is a proof of it, although there are instances 
 where the native tongue has been completely extinguished 
 by interlopers ; for some invaders impelled by the power- 
 ful and dominant instinct of freedom in the olden times, 
 planted their speech to the exclusion and even annihilation 
 of the aboriginal and matricular tongue. Still language is 
 an evidence of community of origin hard to be effaced, and 
 the contact of two languages has a greater tendency to 
 effect obliteration than to form a new tongue out of both. 
 There is a fundamental unity of all forms of speech which 
 go to establish the opinion that all languages are derived 
 from one common source. The philologves of the present 
 
 p 
 
210 
 
 day admit this, and they find the affinities of language 
 greater the deeper rooted they are, as is proved from the 
 analysis and synthesis to which they may be almost said to 
 be chemically subjected. 
 
 On the Power of Consonants. 
 
 B. All letters are symbolical which are not created for 
 distinction of sounds, hence B is inhabitation, and is said 
 so to be called from Beth, bad, bat, abad — a booth, but no 
 more resembling one than a resembles a camel, or a whale. 
 However in Malleus Northern Antiquities, b is styled 
 Biarkan in Runic, which denotes a house or booth. B is 
 subject to various sounds ab, p, v, and their cognates, the 
 same as the iEolic digamma, the letter of many powers. 
 Quintilian remarks, what shall I say of our syllables 
 which lean on B and D in so rough a manner, " imituntur 
 adeo aspere," so that v is often substituted for b, as aversa 
 for abversa ? 
 
 Boo-jco begot pasco, and labor lapsus, 6piajufioQ 9 trium- 
 phus, (jxtXaiva, balsena bixit is only vixit and Aaj3tS, David, 
 — a word inscribed on Etruscan monuments perplexed 
 the sages for a time — it is Ril — and it is proved to be 
 only Vixit. Vix-sit. — R being substituted for b, and the 
 final i for k. The modern Greeks sound b like v, and the 
 Latins said as the French now do, apstineo for abstineo — 
 apsent for absent — ap-soudre, &c. 
 
 B was an aspirated p, and was used for <£ & tt like the 
 digamma or h — as fipoSog for poSog, and it was intro- 
 duced into the middle of words with the digamma proper- 
 ties — we do the same with be. (Page 120.) B was repre- 
 sented also by d. — Ex.: bellum, duellum, bellona, duelona, 
 and even duorum was inscribed dvonoro — the m being 
 omitted. 
 
 C denotes cause instrumental. After the Trojan war, 
 about whose history and facts Jacob Bryant entertained 
 such grave doubts, taking Homer's Epic to be a mere 
 
211 
 
 novel and a fiction, the Greeks introduced t and k for 
 distinction of sound. 
 
 In fact, y, k, c, q, are all identical in sound. C was 
 employed for s, as we use it in sincerity, and for sh, as, in 
 short, from curtus, for k and g as Caius, Taiog, acnom for 
 agnum — acrum for agrum, pucnandodfor pugnando— cum 
 for aw, once written you v. Most of the Ionic letters cor- 
 respond with the Roman, except c or s and g. The Roman 
 c though differing from s in its shape supplied the power 
 of it in the Roman language. When they had not the 
 letter g they used c, and Quintilian says that some letters 
 are written one way and enunciated another, as c for g, 
 and the Duilian pillar has rem cerens for gerens, and so of 
 many words where c is substituted for g, and pronounced 
 like the latter. 
 
 Note that c was always sounded hard before all vowels, 
 as in ccena, scaena, celer, and scelus, and the words caedo, 
 census, cygni, were pronounced differently from sedo, 
 sensus, signi. Cicero was written Ki/ccpwv. The Italians, 
 who pretend to correct Latin pronunciation, emit ce and ci 
 as if with a ch — and the Spaniards give ce-ci, a slight lisp 
 like th — which enables them to conquer the English th, 
 so hard for foreigners to effect. 
 
 D is symbolical, and denotes completion or cause total. 
 It is daleth — said to represent a door. This letter, a 
 dental consonant, is a t hardened, as t is a soft d, — modus 
 glides into mutus, (lingua is written for lingua, sedda for 
 sella, cadamitas, for calamitas, poSov, rosa, dig, bis, Duilian 
 and Bilian arc the same, the word is engraven bilios on 
 the column ; perhaps the modern Greek pronunciation 
 may approximate to its ancient sound th, as thclta for delta. 
 The d indicated completion, and so terminated gerunds 
 and oblique cases, carrying a sort of lisp with it, as fader, 
 father — jmcnandod — in altod mari. It was, however, an 
 aspirate or kind of breathing, rather than a distinct sound, 
 and it was occasionally dispensed with by the Romans as 
 
 p2 
 
212 
 
 they improved in orthography, for diction merely vocal is 
 always in its childhood, putting duit for tuit, whence 
 comes tuer to kill in French. Maled illuxisset dies — d 
 was also used on account of the concurrence of vowels. 
 All labials, palatines and dentals are related, and are inter- 
 changeable as z for f, and d for t. Ex. : zeit, tide— Zweig, 
 twig — thun to do ; thing, ding, thought ; id is idea — ■ 
 synonymous with thought. 
 
 The Anglo-Saxon p=th in thin, and d=th in thine, 
 have become obsolete, but we see that the Saxons had a 
 sound more than ourselves in pronunciation. 
 
 Welsford in his Mithridates Minor, p. 38, asserts, he 
 does not believe that d ever did close words, and that no 
 such words were really found on antique sculpture, and 
 says he can not discern the reason, and concludes they 
 were added by the engraver only — but the truth stands on 
 numberless records, and the mystery is in the power of 
 the letter d which certainly may be very reasonably, and 
 as certainly does mean completion or cause total. 
 
 F. This is another letter comprised under the conve- 
 nient iEolic long range, ycleped digamma. Ex.: Foivog 
 o'lvog, vinum — is changed into f — as fy-qp, fera. The 
 Spanish language avails itself of this metathesis in many 
 Latin words commencing with f, as hacienda, a farm 
 from facienda — haz, for fasces, haya, fagus, &c. This 
 digamma, the JDeus ex machind was interposed in words 
 for the sake of aspirate as oIq, ope — fostis, hostis. Quin- 
 tilianL.xii. c. 10, thinks the letter f to be horrid, and only 
 fit use for savages, " pame non hum ana voce, vel omnino 
 non voce potius inter discrimina dentium efflanda est." 
 Its force is gone when followed by a vowel, and by a con- 
 sonant it breaks the sound, " ut in hoc ipso frangit multo 
 fit horridior." 
 
 <J) is exchanged for p. The compound <p is directly 
 adapted from the Sanskrit, while its kindred digamma 
 j" is the Samaritan B converted by a transition of sound, 
 
213 
 
 of which fact language offers numerous examples, into the 
 softer ones of bf — pf, or f. 
 
 I shall advert to this letter again in V, where by its so 
 frequent application it is seen that language proceeds 
 through improvement to degeneracy. 
 
 G is always pronounced hard before vowels like c, and is 
 a letter used for distinction of sound, and is shaped va- 
 riously. Ex. : on the Pelasgic inscription it is formed 
 thus, TVS an( l perpendicularly I. From this shape it was 
 curved into C, and its next step was G, which was not used 
 for some thirty years after the C found on the Duilian 
 pillar in the year of Rome, or B.C. 493. The first signs of 
 its articulation were P and T, says P. Knight. It is a pity 
 we do not give its due power in our schools and universi- 
 ties, c is soft g, nor could the Romans have adopted any 
 other sound coming so immediately from the hard K, as 
 \iyu), Xl£w, \e\exa, which represents the y of "the root. 
 The Greeks, ancient and modern, give a guttural sound 
 to y, but y and k were introduced for distinction in sound, 
 and were interchangeable, and in their power the Latins 
 and Greeks coincided. Gu was sounded as in guerra — ■ 
 gtarra. In the word reyyd), found in tingo, it is likely the 
 first double g took the sound of n ; and in ayyeXog, angelus 
 also. It is doubtless the Phoenician gimel, gam el, meaning 
 camel, in whose long neck some resemblance was recognised. 
 
 II — a letter of distinction and not a pure symbol, written 
 E=3P and /» — , also like the figure 8, as was also the 
 double letter <j> in the Pelasgic monuments or character. 
 Again it was inscribed EI, and the junction formed the 
 letter II in the Athenian Manuscripts, B.C. 430. The 
 Greeks arc thought to have dropped the sound of the h in 
 combination, as all foreigners do, athys sounding like 
 atys, and athrax like atrax, th in Thebas was Tebas ; and 
 so written on medals T for 0, Tebe — the h or aspirate 
 being sunk. Demosthenes was so emitted also. This letter 
 is another of the iEolic digamma order, in fine, a guttural. 
 

 214 
 
 It was superseded, a mark being substituted to denote its 
 absence thus after sucb words as 'Pctjuvoe, f P/jrwjO. It had 
 a very strong guttural sound, like the French and Italian 
 h, a canine letter. 
 
 It is the same as the double letter x when introduced 
 into mihi and nihil, and it hardens the aspirate — jui got 
 into semi, and e% into sex. 
 
 This guttural sound is still preserved by modern Italians, 
 in Florence, at least, the word casa, house (whence is derived 
 the French chez) is emitted Hasa, with a slight sound of 
 c before it. Londoners are wont to prefix and sound h 
 before vowels and omit it when there, by some woeful per- 
 versity, and in the days of Martial he complained of the 
 same corruption in some of his metropolitan friends and 
 acquaintances who were not purists in the Roman dialect, 
 Quintilian, that Magister elegantiarum, adverts to this 
 anomaly and sin. I have adverted to this letter under E. 
 
 K. Has but one sound, and is in the distinctive class of 
 letters, not purely symbolical. It is a digamma, being a 
 combination of g repeated, which arises from g being 
 originally a perpendicular line, thus, , as observed before, 
 from which it took a curved shape and became angular, 
 for K is an inverted 3, A, and is so found in the Eugubian 
 tables, and 01 in Pelasgic. It is expressed in the letter (J > 
 the origin of Q from C 0. Two gammas turned visage to 
 visage. K H was used for X, and it supplied the place for 
 gamma. There was no K in Latin so C was substituted, 
 kcu is only que, sounded by both nations kee. K preceding 
 i might have a guttural effect like G. Its power is not even 
 given by French, Italians, or Spaniards in reading Greek. 
 
 L. Is a symbolical letter and imports extent — a most 
 significant liquid, and is used in a geminated form in Welsh 
 as Lloyd — pronounced and written also Floyd. Plato 
 styles it the sweetest of liquids and almost a vowel. It can 
 be aspirated, and it is joined with mutes, but not before p 
 and v. It changes into several letters and may be sub- 
 
215 
 
 stituted for d. If consonants are bent into other symbols 
 it is not surprising that the flexible I can scarcely be 
 identified in its sundry metamorphoses. Liquids are called 
 immutable, but what letter is so ? The figure has assumed 
 various phases in its form, the earliest of which, the Pelasgic, 
 is thus, V, and \7/>. 
 
 Dr. Wallis says, that the liquids L and U are anomalous, 
 and he derives them from d and n. Some people can not 
 sound these letters, but fall into n for 1, as nobster for 
 lobster : and R is the last letter that an infant learns, often 
 using L in its stead. Hence the affinity between them, and 
 their interchangeability. 
 
 M. This liquid implies might, and like its predecessor 
 is symbolical. The variations in its form have been few, 
 but eventually it was reversed thus jli, according to the 
 synoptical tables in the Murbacensian* authorities, A.D. 
 800. It is emitted at the end of a word like die-m, and 
 like the French word dompter — sounded do?*ter nasally 
 before a consonant. Before a vowel it was elided in poetry 
 as optimu-est, though some have thought there was no 
 elision, and that the m was carried on in the scansion. 
 This letter is convertible into n occasionally, as ansanctus 
 for amsanctus. 
 
 It is never found at the close of Greek words, but in 
 lieu of it a v, which gives a sweet ending says Quintilian, 
 who nevertheless styles it (Lib. XII. c. 10) a bellowing 
 letter — " quasi mugiente litem claudimus m qua nullum 
 grsecc verbum cadit." 
 
 N. Indicates production, and has been considerably diver- 
 sified in its shape from an upright N to the reverse in V. 
 The earliest form in the Pelasgic alphabet gives it these 
 figures ^l fj i and in the Cadmean age it resembled an s 
 in Z£. Subsequently it continued its present shape N. 
 
 * So styled in the Pacflographia groeca ; a work on Greek contractions 
 published at the instance of FoTSOD, in 1807, from the Palaeographia grccca 
 of Montfaucon in 1708. 
 
216 
 
 There is an affinity between it and m. The Latins con- 
 tinually substituted m for the Greek v, as musam for 
 fisaav, lignum for £,v\ov. Sometimes that general repre- 
 sentative the digamma was interwoven as in wov, o-v-um, 
 an egg, eggery, aery. It was changed for m in Greek, as 
 fir], not, turned into ne in Latin, also into r as julovti, mora, 
 and kviZu), crisso. The letter Z is also used for n. It is 
 said that the Romans never had the sound of our ing, but 
 if so, how did they pronounce anxius ? It was added to 
 words or interposed in words, and was styled v l^eXKvarKov 
 or paragogic v, a subsidiary letter, like <j)i at the end of 
 a word, €tr?0t. (Page 89.) The pronoun lya was formerly 
 written engo, iwvya from aham in Sanscrit and Celtic. 
 (Page 87«) The Greeks softened away the concurrence of 
 consonants. Ex. : ag, eig, once ended in avg, evg, as found 
 in the genitive nag, iravrog, and was formerly navg. The 
 dative plural iraai in Homer is found to be ttclvtzggl 
 contracted to iravTcn, and the participle wv was once ovg, 
 as dialog, SiSovTog, and in ovg, the same, rvwriiyv, tvtttovgcl, 
 instead of rvrrTovTeGcraj thus softening the inflexions of the 
 feminine gender. 
 
 P. Is not a symbol, but used for distinction of sound, 
 and is a cognate with b, v, f, and in common with many 
 other letters is supplanted by the accommodating iEolic 
 digamma, a sort of talisman among letters or symbols. In 
 Coptic this letter is styled hi. II H were used for <pi, which 
 was adopted from the Sanskrit. The form of the letter 
 has varied from these shapes 1 Vl ^ until it reached n, 
 in which figure it remains conjointly with ST. We find its 
 mutability in nriyit), written figo, and wdOa), fido. It declines 
 into q in linrog, equus, and into v in levis from \e7r\g ; 7rf/, 
 Kit), qua ; and it is dropped in latus from irXarvg, and also 
 in uro from wvpu), and by its interposition in Xaag, it forms 
 la-p-is. So of daig, dapis is made. In sounding the word 
 obtcmr in French, the b is emitted p, optenir, as we have 
 remarked under B. <f>i is exchanged for p, and out of 
 
217 
 
 crirovSri comes studium. The Latins dispense with its ser- 
 vices when this letter is followed by t, as pt. tttxhjgiq — for 
 tussis, cum multis aliis. The labial aspirate was repre- 
 sented in the Etruscan alphabet like our figure of 8 ; and 
 in the Alexandrine Manuscripts these forms appears 
 A^ 43 for \p. 
 
 Q. As a symbolical significant, it implies individual or 
 whole, and is a Roman letter, having the power of k, as quis, 
 quae, quid (kcu og) was thought to be sounded kis, kse, kid, 
 and Kai is que, kee ; though Mithridates junior derives quis 
 from ke alius in Coptic, and is, added by contraction quis. 
 The Sanskrit ki or chi and the Italian chi, he thinks iden- 
 tical, and all deducible from chi, life or creature in Hebrew. 
 This letter was used for c, pequunia, loquor, locantur, 
 quando, cuando, and the recapitulation of the Ciceronian 
 pun determines the pronunciation of this letter in the words 
 coque and quoque to be exactly the same. Q is co, and if i 
 be added we have the word coeo. In English it is sounded 
 in quantity, quality ', &c, always rhyming with jollity. 
 
 The intervention of the iEolic digamma is not wanting 
 here again, teste Ainsworth ; and Quintilian observes that 
 the Greeks could not pronounce it, the sound being quite 
 unknown to them ; Quintus they wrote Kolvrog. In Book 
 XII. c. 10, Quintilian says, " duras et ilia syllabas facit 
 quse ad conjungendas demum subjectas sibi vocales est utilis, 
 alias supervacua, ut equos ac et equum scribimus." The 
 letter Q makes a harshness in syllables, though useful for 
 joining the vowels which follow it, as equos and cquum. 
 In other respects it is superfluous. These two vowels also 
 form a sound unknown to the Greeks, and therefore can 
 not be represented by any of their characters. 
 
 R is symbolical, and denotes motion. Er in Islandic 
 means am, and its figure is the same in both alphabets of 
 the learned tongues. R generally formed by P, but the 
 shapes q a are Pelasgic. It is styled the canine letter, 
 Sonat hicc dc nare canina, Litera — Pcrsius, Sat. I. v. 108, 
 
218 
 
 and for this reason it was softened into s as ara, asa, 
 carmen, casmen — labor, labos, and sometimes is inserted 
 fAvaZ, murex : vvbg, murus. This is confirmed by Varro, 
 B. vi. 
 
 It has been said that R was unknown to the Latins, 
 who used s, as the hymn of Fratres arvales, discovered 
 A. D. 218, and supposed to be coeval with the foundation 
 of Rome, seems to confirm. 
 
 Enos, Lases juvate is for lares juvate. The same sub- 
 stitute of s, for It seems to obtain in Indo-European 
 tongues. The R is also substituted for s, which is a much 
 older form than R, and in fact the Sanskrit S was mis- 
 taken for R. So S and R are interchangeable in Sans- 
 krit, the letter R, often redundant is used or abstracted 
 without altering the sense. The Chinese can not pro- 
 nounce R, and we find many with us who cannot conquer 
 that letter ; the same defect was observed in Demosthenes, 
 whose speech also was inarticulate, says Plutarch in his life. 
 
 Hsereo written hseso and sosorem for sororem. In 
 Greek iTnrog was written linrop. irovg, irop. 
 
 The liquids are commutable in both tongues, and in 
 English also. Colonel is pronounced kurnel, a word cor- 
 rupted from corona — Sojpov, donum, TrXnprig plenus, iravpog, 
 paucus, apvn, agna, &c. 
 
 With the Hebrews it had a guttural sound, and a lisp 
 with the Romans when they commuted it for S ; went 
 into puer puella, and n as sereus, seneus. 
 
 The oldest form of Rho resembles A, and hence arose 
 mistakes. 
 
 Dryden observes that Virgil commencing the iEneid 
 seems to sound a charge, and begins his glorious Epopsea, 
 with the clangor of a trumpet. 
 
 " Arma virumque cano Trojse qui primus ab oris" — 
 scarce a word without an R, and the vowels for the greater 
 part sonorous. 
 
 This letter was accompanied by a deep aspirate as in 
 
219 
 
 Pa/xvoe, 'Pwjurj — from which word some derive Rome, im- 
 plying strength, but this derivation may be on a par with 
 the whole early Roman story, which Lord Macaulay holds 
 for mere myth the first 300 years. The original Roman 
 records were all burnt by the Gauls under Brennus the 
 Goth, about B.C. 390, and it is probable that Livy and 
 other florid writers finding no genuine records presumed 
 on tradition or fragmentary evidence, and yet patriotically 
 wrote to please their countrymen ; as Dr. Johnson remarked 
 of Scotchmen, saying a Scotchman loves Scotland better 
 than truth, he will always love it better than inquiry, and 
 if falsehood flatters his vanity he will not be very diligent 
 to detect it. 
 
 The Eugubian tables were thought to be engraven be- 
 fore Hesiod's sera, 1000 B. C. and among these early 
 engravings are found the words, erihont, erafont, eriront, 
 all which may be only the iEolic digamma or aspirate 
 interposed, as in aiuv sev-um, lv HoSta inheo. There was a 
 primitive orthography as well as a primitive diction, and 
 Time, that common arbitrator, did for the ancients what it 
 has done for us, make our orthography and pronunciation 
 correspond. Men and language should be what they seem. 
 
 When R precedes certain symbols, it denotes increase 
 of energy. Thus e-w, I go, peu), I flow. Ruo I rush, and 
 if followed by its own symbol and used as a prefix, it de- 
 notes repetition. 
 
 The Eretrians received colonists from Elis, whence it 
 comes that they use the letter R as well in the middle as at 
 the end of words, a common practice among the Dorians, 
 for which they were derided, as this example proves — 
 'A(j> ov kul rq> ypufjifxaTi Tip 'P^ ttoXX^ XpnvaiizvOL °^ K ^ 
 TtXti fiovov twv pfifMTtoVj aXXci leal zv juccrtu, /aKw/x^jSrjvrcu. 
 Strabo, B. x. c. 10. " They received colonists from Elis, 
 whence their frequent use of the letter R, not only at the 
 end, but in the middle of words, which exposed them to 
 the raillery of comic writers." 
 
220 
 
 S. Symbolical, and in significative interpretation, it 
 means existence. JEr denotes an incipient motion, and es 
 an incipient existence. In ancient symbolical diction a 
 difference was made between motion and existence, but in 
 writing, the z and s serves either office, as ero and eso in- 
 differently. 
 
 The figure of S is nearly the same in both languages, 
 that of the famous Scythian bow S taken from the Phoe- 
 nician alphabet without variation. Its oldest Pelasgic 
 form is % and its Cadmean ^ . About the time of Alex- 
 ander, the C prevails in MSS. as well as this form C, the 
 Doric san mentioned by Herodotus and Pindar. The 
 Ionians called it sigma, and it is aspirated t. 
 
 Now S and T are interchangeable ; o<r was converted 
 into tt. Especially in Bceotia, as Gvpvrruv for avpiZeiv. 
 T was also employed for ev, as rv for ev. 
 
 The Lacedaemonians pronounced two dental aspirates 9 
 and S alike, but they were not confounded in orthography 
 or expressed by one sign. 
 
 C was substituted for 2, or in reality was the original 
 S, as AEMOS0ENEC, in fact it is common on engravings 
 and manuscripts; for the attributes of this letter, see 
 page 78. 
 
 S is styled a servile letter and is substituted for sundry 
 consonants in conjugating verbs, and it was elided by the 
 Greeks, hence, confusion was caused in the tenses of 
 verbs, 
 
 Plato styled it a breathing letter, but the Greek spirit 
 or aspirates were changed into S, as dfii sum— owrrog, 
 succus, a\g, sal, i£ sex. 
 
 The Romans melted it away to avoid sibilation as audi'ne, 
 credi'ne. 
 
 *? Nos sumu' Romani qui fuvimus ante Rudini." 
 
 The S is often dropped iu the Sanskrit substantive — 
 verb to be, asmi, asi, asti — which is only sum-es-est, and 
 so with the rest of the conjugations. (Page 25.) 
 
221 
 
 The poets elided it. as m was elided — pugnantibu 'ventis 
 plenu' fidei, and in prose, Cicero has not denied himself 
 this liberty. 
 
 S was prefixed to some words as slites, slocus, to impart 
 strength, but it was certainly divested of euphony. In 
 the time of Tully the geminated s came into vogue to 
 demonstrate that s was sharp, and never pronounced like 
 z as caussa, causa, cassus for casus. 
 
 Quintilian B. V. i. 17- avers that both Cicero and Virgil 
 doubled the s, and we double ours in some words, but in 
 the mouth of correct speakers it is rather softened into 
 single s, as asociate for associate ; and in the same may 
 be observed and followed in double ff, where only one 
 single f should be heard offensively, as e-face and not 
 efface, which Dr. Walker critically remarks is so agreeable 
 to a chaste ear and speaker, and is a distinguishing mark 
 of elegant pronunciation. 
 
 The Saxons omitted s when two came together, as " Ther 
 is grete melodee of Aungele Song." — Prikke of Conscience. 
 Lambeth MSS. 
 
 S has a hissing sound, so the Spartans preferred the 
 letter R to it, and a famous line of Euripides, 
 
 " Eo-ojoxi cr'oJc laaaiv f EXXr]vt5v oaoi," is a specimen of 
 Greek alliteration, (of which I have remarked in the 
 Figures of Speech) which came under the animadversion 
 of the critics, while Pindar over appreciating his barren 
 achievement is reported to have written more than one Ode 
 without the service of s, a task apparently impossible, 
 except in a magician or fiction-dealing bard, and like 
 Scaliger who estimated two favourite Odes at the value of 
 a kingdom. 
 
 T. This letter is similar in Greek and Latin. It is the 
 Coptic Dau, with the power of D, and it is the last letter 
 in the Hebrew, alphabet, and means bound. It varied 
 with d as, |3arw vaclo, kutw cado ; and again d is turned 
 into t, as tvdov, intus. Tujztoov, terebra an awl; b 
 
222 
 
 comes also into t, as gijo-o-w tussio, t>o(TKr\fia bestia. TV 
 reversed is et, and sometimes it is converted into o- as 
 vavria, nausea, with the same hissing sound as in patient. 
 
 T was put also for s, as ^art for Qclgl, |3art for ]3ac, Ittztov 
 for £7T£o-ov. It was always sounded as t pure, and never 
 like our s or c, as moderns pronounce Latin. J. Lipsius 
 admits it retained its natural sound, and should never lose 
 its natural power before vowels. 
 
 G is supposed to be a primitive letter, and a symbol re- 
 presenting the solar luminary, and was emitted theta, and 
 not teta, as Aristophanes shews. Tha is a circle like the 
 sun by a strain 6a with the article 6c- The relative 
 and article also, as Oaog, Oeog, God the. (Page 81.) 
 
 In early times we know not what schemes of intelli- 
 gence abounded, and as in our times, Roscommon and Swift, 
 formed a plan of a society for refining our language, and 
 fixing its standard, so did the Italians in their De la Crusca 
 Association, and they succeeded wonderfully ; but ours 
 failed, because unanimity is impossible in law, language or 
 religion (under present circumstances), and a certain amount 
 of respect is wanting where law can not be enforced, or 
 means of preservation established. 
 
 Those who admire Lucian, and taste a joke, may see 
 how T was treated in a mock action of ejectment by S, the 
 letter T being brought before the tribunal of vowels, and 
 was made to hang on his own gibbet for intruding on the 
 rights of S, but being-non-suited by the prevailing power 
 of the Athenian eloquence, meditated revenge, and made 
 reprisals by the help of a barbarous nation, who, though 
 they left T in possession, gave her power away to S, in 
 more instances, both in her own and the conquered Roman 
 dominions, than she could pretend her neighbour had 
 invaded her right ; viz. — that wherever T came before the 
 third vowel, another vowel following, S under very few 
 restrictions should take her power ; and the grammarians 
 who ought to have opposed this usurpation confirmed it. 
 
223 
 
 In some cases with us t is omitted as in them. Prey- 
 sing hem — for them. 
 
 There has not been so much variation in this letter since 
 writing or engraving were adopted, the elder forms of 
 which were t + Y m Pelasgic monuments, subsequent 
 to which epoch it has ever borne an upright posture. 
 
 This letter was called nigrum theta, because the first 
 in the fatal word Oavarog death, which was inscribed on 
 the condemnatory tables. In the amphitheatres the 
 depressing of the thumb was a • signal for saving the 
 gladiatorial combatant, but if he were to die, pollicem ver- 
 tebant, they turned up their thumbs. Shows of gladiators 
 were prohibited by Constantine the Great, but this in- 
 human butchery was not entirely suppressed till the reign 
 of Honorius, A. D. 404, these exhibitions having lasted 
 some 670 years. 
 
 V. Here the iEolic digamma shines in all efficacy and 
 pretensions, and to appreciate its manifold applications a 
 scholar should read Payne Knight on this letter, a sort of 
 literal menstruum, which solves all difficulties, and like 
 gold, " solders close impossibilities, and makes them kiss.-" 
 
 It is no letter of its own inherent right, but it is used 
 variously for distinction of sound. 
 
 In Mithridates Minor there is a pendant to Mr. Knight's 
 dissertation on this letter, which is a very charm among 
 vocables, and so various, that it seems to be not one, but 
 all the letters epitome. Known as digamma, or double 
 gamma, and such an affection and predilection had Mr. 
 Knight for it, that he thought the venerable Homer 
 imperfect, until his digamma edition was published ; yet 
 this novelty lias not prevailed over much, for those who 
 try to read Greek, with the antique adjunct, find them- 
 selves rather embarrassed by its presence, though it may 
 be very proper in these days of advancement or experi- 
 ment, that such an edition should appear. 
 
 Its power lies in b, f, p. Before the depressive conso- 
 
224 
 
 nants I v$to became efdo, sounded like f when preceding the 
 acute consonants as avrog, aftos, lv\apig, efcharis. 
 
 It had the power of w as in wall, vallum — wend, venio — 
 way, via — weigh, veho. 
 
 The Saxons substituted f for v also. Before ua it took 
 the power of wa, as in lingua for strength, and v was dis- 
 solved for melody into u as siluse for silva ; v\r) eolice yvXpri 
 — silva, wood or substance of any kind, like roba in Italian, 
 thing. 
 
 It had the power of y in sulla, and it was exchanged for 
 i in optumus, maxumus ; it was sunk in imperii, audii, 
 and fui for fuivi. In fact, it was a perfect talisman, 
 bearing a magical character and attributes, sui generis. 
 
 The digamma is said also to be used in Sanskrit which 
 has the power of V in all the Shemitic alphabets, and is no 
 other than the Phoenician Vair, the parent of $1 and f. 
 Mr. Knight writes of pew to flow as refo, and in Sanskrit 
 the root is Riva, flow. Perhaps R here denotes fluidity, 
 and is symbolical of motion. The aspirated and unaspi- 
 rated forms of words are found in Sanskrit, and would 
 seem to assume distinct roots — the h aspirate is a positive 
 digamma — as ay a— and aha to go — Raya and raha to go, 
 as explained by Welsford. 
 
 The Roman tongue is chiefly iEolic, the oldest Greek 
 form, hence the cherished digamma a Phenician adoption, 
 3 the vau. H perpetually stands on inscriptions for 
 aspirate only, and is occasionally inserted in the middle of 
 words for that purpose as in lv. II . oSta (p. 219) — and H is 
 found on the Sigean monument, which is older than Pala- 
 medes, where it stands for an aspirate^only. Sol repeat 
 my remark that there was a primeval orthography as well as 
 primitive diction. H V F were all used _as aspirates by 
 the two learned nations, and were undoubtedly digammas; 
 Horta, vesta, where in Herodotus we find the word written 
 ironically istie, kttiy}. It means vesta or fire, and Ovid felt 
 that to be its meaning, and says it can only mean that. 
 
225 
 
 Fasti. B. 6. v. This is another proof of the fire worship- 
 ping tendency throughout all antiquity. See Chapter on 
 Eastern tongues and times. 
 
 " Effigiem nullam Vesta, nee ignis habent" — speaking of 
 the statues erected to Vesta or Fire. Lanzi reads Vitellia 
 for Italia, and as vltulus means calf in Latin, this is con- 
 jectured to be the origin of Italia, but if no better deriva- 
 tion is produced, we may remain in our ignorance, or in 
 timidity, which is the instinct of ignorance. Various parts 
 of Italy went by various names until finally it was com- 
 prised under one generic term. 
 
 The Digamma, as Dionysius insinuates, seems to have 
 been prefixed to every word beginning with a vowel, some- 
 times as H, sometimes as y and cp either for euphony, force or 
 scansion, and participated the attributes of vowel, guttural, 
 aspirate or consonant, and no doubt all the oriental 
 tongues used itin the same way, though Quintilian observes 
 that the Greeks could not even pronounce the Roman f. 
 Perhaps there has been more dissertation on this mysteriovs 
 letter than all the rest of the alphabet, but they have 
 never changed the current pronunciation of the Greek 
 tongue, which is of no remote date in England, for even 
 Oxford University, temp. Henry VIII. actually resisted its 
 introduction, and the Band was styled Trojans, as Sir 
 Thomas More wrote in 1519, when Erasmus attempted to 
 revive the study of a language truly like themselves, and 
 conformable to their transcendent and universal genius, 
 made, as Hermes observes, from its propriety and univer- 
 sality for all that is great, and all that is beautiful in every 
 subject and under every form of composition. 
 
 What is called JSolic digamma was doubtless used by 
 that people, but it was also inherent in all Eastern tongues, 
 and became wholly indispensable in Greek wherever 
 spoken, whether it preceded a vowel or was inserted in 
 the middle, as in the word OviXta. L\\ the 20th chapter 
 
 Q 
 
226 
 
 of DionysiuSj Liber I., he says they always made a digamma 
 to precede a vowel like a gamma formed by two oblique 
 lines joined to an upright line, Tovro Sijv tocnrsp yap.p.a 
 cittcuq hri fiiav op6r)v STTi^vyvvfAEvov raig 7r\ayiatg wg 
 ytXivr) Kat Jiava^ kcll JioiKog teat y.avr)p Kai TtoXXa TOiavTa. 
 In fact the number of digammated words was very con- 
 siderable. 
 
 I have comprised the letter Y under U, which is virtually 
 the same letter — there is no word in Latin commencing 
 with it. Pythagoras, the originator of the doctrine known 
 as Metemphysicosis, or transmigration of souls, who settled 
 in Magna Grsecia, and there founded his peculiar sect, 
 said the letter Y by its figure represented the two roads of 
 virtue and vice, the narrow and the broad way, and to 
 this does Persius allude in this third Satire. 
 
 iC Surgentem dextro monstravit limite callem." 
 
 X is a double consonant of the second order of mutes, 
 k. y. X- The Greeks wrote Xeycrto for Af£w, but the 
 sound was identical. Aeiccrai for de^ai and okcfoXv for 
 oxolu, and jeracks for ieracks seolice : ^ is y, <r, and k, <j. 
 Sfvycxw is future of Zevyio composed of y and g, and not 
 k and g. The Latins wrote apecs for apex, and it was 
 used for g in iriaTptg, pistrix, a whale or sea monster. 
 aiag, ajax, &c. The old Pelasgian % was formed thus 
 f 9 and thus on the Sigean monument f. The old Pelas- 
 gian ¥ was like a digamma V and the Alexandrine MSS. 
 fashion it -j-^F — the letter n Pelasgic was "1 and later F and 
 § — yet the forms of the Greek letters from the early 
 Pelasgic B.C. 1400 to the MSS. of A.D. 1400, do not vary 
 considerably, and mostly are identical. The modern 
 Greeks gutturalise this double letter, and the ancient 
 Greeks probably did so, as there is an irrepressible ten- 
 dency to guttural emissions in all Eastern tongues and 
 dialects. ^ was substituted for S to avoid sibilation, which 
 letter is called the serpent's letter, and the chief of the 
 
227 
 
 consonants. Ben Jonson says it is the most easy and 
 gentle letter, and softly hisseth against the teeth in the 
 pr ola Hon or utterance. 
 
 Z. This letter is one for distinction of sounds, and was 
 wont to be written after this guise I, the perpendicularity 
 of which was afterwards obliquated. It is a compound of 
 S and D — the word Zevg is found on medals to be engraven 
 SSaue- The same in AaicwOog and AeXem for ZaXwOog 
 and AfXea— Afc, Aia, Divus. It had the soft sound of our 
 g, in ginger, zinziber — and 0v£w was written for (pvya). 
 Its sound was considered soft and sweet, and the Romans 
 are said never to have attained these properties. Our 
 words want those sweet Greek letters Y and Z, than 
 which no other are sweeter in respiration and which give a 
 charm to our words as often as we use them. The Greeks 
 changed z into s as occasion required, and the Latins put 
 ss for it in patrisso from Trarpu^w and of %vybg jugum 
 was fashioned, so that z declined into y, as far as pronun- 
 ciation went. The Spaniards sound z like th lispingly, 
 which enables them to conquer the difficulties of our th, 
 sounded mostly de by foreigners, to effect which the 
 tongue should be interposed between the teeth. The 
 Portuguese sound de like the, as Vasco the Gama — for de. 
 
 7j is said to have been invented by Palamedes, or at 
 least the sound of it, for other nations had the sound in 
 zita. Before the invention of the six double consonants Z, 
 O, <I>, X, E, X Y, the Ionians expressed their power in sd, th, 
 gh, kh, kg, gs. Hence we find the old Greek and Roman 
 letters identical, come whence they might, and where 
 they did adopt them the language improved, and with it 
 literature pari p<tssn } so that they attained an eminence 
 only equalled since by urcat Britain. The Romans 
 followed in the wake, knowing better how to copy than 
 invent, for invention is true genius, the utmost sketch of 
 human study, Learning and industry which masters every 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 
 
 thing beside, can never attain to genius. The Romans 
 reached the sovereignty of arms, and Rome was the 
 empire of the world, and the nurse of heroes, but how 
 evanescent, compared to Greek literature, in whose great- 
 ness real sovereignty presides, demonstrating how superior 
 mind and spirit are to all sublunary attainments, which in 
 comparison are of the earth, earthy. 
 
 Thus have I given a brief but inadequate account of the 
 letters, partly to shew their power, their figures, their ten- 
 dencies, either as significative symbols, or used for distinc- 
 tion of sounds, partly to shew how variable and inter- 
 changeable they were within themselves, and to point out 
 the direct dependence of the Roman and the Greek alpha- 
 bets, chiefly derived from the Hebrew, or rather the Indo- 
 European stock, as may be more clearly shewn by com- 
 paring the synoptical tables of all the languages in their 
 alphabetical forms, On symbols I could have dilated 
 further, but this tractate, which I designed to be something 
 more than an essay, and which I felt to be something less 
 than a treatise, as broad and general as the casing subject 
 itself, was compiled'rather to collect symbols of speech and 
 to touch currently on their properties, than to pretend to 
 penetrate and explain all their powers or uses, on which so 
 many abler productions have been penned, like that capa- 
 cious work styled an Analytical Essay on the Greek al- 
 phabet by Richard Payne Knight. 
 
 We may hence conclude that the grammars of the two 
 learned dialects are very like, if not quite identical in struc- 
 ture, participating also analogy and sound. The Greek 
 tongue had its unfashioned and crude state, and is like our 
 own tongue a very compound of Sanskrit, Phoenician, 
 Egyptian, and Keltic, in which all these lingual elements 
 are at least blended. 
 
 Time, taste, and grim necessity, and " destiny unshun- 
 nable like death," crystalized it into that divine speech 
 
229 
 
 which Homer, and writers subsequent to the era of Eusta- 
 thius, used. 
 
 Between it and Latin the grammar and etymology are 
 closely affined and kin^ for the superstructure of the Roman 
 is proved to be a refined Celtic, its peculiar embellishments 
 being borrowed from the parent dialect. Hermes justly 
 observes, that in the short space of little more than a cen- 
 tury the Greeks became such statesmen, warriors, orators, 
 historians, physicians, critics, painters, sculptors, architects, 
 and last of all philosophers, that one can hardly help con- 
 dering that golden period, as a providential event in honour 
 of human nature, to shew to what perfection the species 
 might ascend. Let me add if these things were done under 
 Paganism, and in days of darkness, what may not be ex- 
 pected under the power and light of the Christian dispen- 
 sation, art, policy, faith, worship abounding, and mankind 
 indisputably gravitating towards that perfectibility of which 
 it is rationally susceptible in religion and government ; 
 and as the monarchical system has been perfected in us, 
 why may not an American say the republican form shall 
 be ultimately perfected, and may direct his own affairs by 
 election and not by any hereditary arrangement, which 
 implies weakness, and is defective in that liberty which is 
 the gift of God and nature ; and maintain that although 
 an hereditary monarchy may be a good institution, it is by 
 no means better or more sacred than other good political 
 institutions, for government is but a national association 
 acting on the principles of society. 
 
230 
 
 On Letters representing Numerals. 
 
 As letters have subserved the purposes of numerals I 
 here shew how they are applied. 
 
 Having possessed the benefit of Arabic numerals in 
 modern times, it appears surprising that the ingenuity of 
 no European nation rose to the discovery of a more com- 
 pendious method of calculation than that supplied by sub- 
 stituting letters for figures. A lthough printing is ingenious, 
 it is nothing compared with the invention of letters. The 
 invention of the art of printing seems to have been on the 
 eve of discovery, if we observe the letters impressed on some 
 loaves of bread disinterred from Pompeii or Herculaneum, 
 and which are still to be seen in the Museum at Naples. 
 Yet this almost obvious means of transferring letters to 
 types, and fixing them on any substance capable of receiving 
 impression did escape their observation, and it was left for 
 the fifteenth century to develop this universal advantage 
 of printing, which has been termed intellect embalmed in 
 type, ars omnium conservatrix, and brain preserved in ink. 
 Now printing was not so essential to social happiness, and 
 to that central idea of life, which is interest and ease, as the 
 discovery of something simple, whereby the ever-recurring 
 affairs of life might be accurately conducted. There must 
 have been great difficulty in making computations of any 
 magnitude through the medium of letters, and its inaccu- 
 racy is recognized and felt when in authors anterior to 
 this discovery we read of numbers slain in battles, or in- 
 deed any where in which multitudes are represented by 
 literal symbols. A new edifice was to be raised, and time 
 is man's architect, and to it we are indebted for supplying 
 a necessity. The complex and operose process of counting 
 by letters, and the cumbersome alphabet was followed by 
 the graceful Arabic numeral, which is said to have been 
 
231 
 
 introduced through Spain to the rest of Europe, when the 
 Moors possessed part of that peninsula, about the 11th 
 century, and to have been in use time out of mind in India, 
 but it is not improbable that an alphabetical notation pre- 
 ceded numerals, the simple and most perfect of inventions. 
 But it does not occur in England until a century later, 
 and its adoption is owing to one John of Halifax, whose 
 classic appellative was Sacro Bosco. Calculation is deemed 
 to be verity itself, and can not err, — but many a liber Veri- 
 tatis may prove only to be a book of folly. For facility va- 
 rious expedients have been adopted to perform arithmetical 
 operations. The calculus or pebble was one ; ^^oc ; hence 
 we get the name Calculation, ancients and moderns have 
 used a board for like purposes, styled by them a/3a£. This 
 table was divided from the right to the left hand by vertical 
 columns, in which calculi were placed to denote decimals, 
 and which were subsequently supplanted by tali or dice, 
 and took the name of bench or bank. Scaccarium is a 
 chess-board, and is chequered with lines, hence our term 
 exchequer. It is curious to analyse the letters which were 
 made to represent numbers. 00 and CIO, or M, repre- 
 sents 1000. 1 I i which is a sort of M reversed when 
 mutilated, comes into -I, or D, which is dimidium, or half 
 of mille, and so stands for 500. The word miles, a soldier, 
 is no other than mille, being one of a band of that number : 
 as a Centurion was Captain of 100 men. C is the circle 
 O for 100, and L is half of the circle O, and exhibits the 
 number 50. 
 
 Letters are used in algebra, and if we rind them intro- 
 duced before algebra commences it shews that letters and 
 numbers belong to the s<une language; the premature in- 
 troduction of letters will then excite curiosity and stimu- 
 late inquiry. Geometers proved that circles are in duplicate 
 ratio of each other, that is they are to each as the squares 
 of their diameters. Dr. Johnson says that a cypher is an 
 
232 
 
 arithmetical mark which standing by itself signifies nothing, 
 but in apposition increases the value of the other figures — 
 now the cypher is a character, in value 10.. The ancients 
 found it impossible to transact business and keep records 
 of property by units, so a series of characters was therefore 
 invented comprehending all antecedent characters. This 
 was an improvement, but inadequate to the purposes of 
 science and the concerns of increasing commerce, the ab- 
 breviation of powers was therefore limited to 10, and all the 
 subordinate characters were considered as parts, and used as 
 indices to the circle or whole — which circle was placed over 
 the second figure, as are now placed £. s. d. — e. g. 6° 7 — 
 six circles and seven. Hence arithmetic, in which when 
 you multiply fractions you divide, and when you divide 
 fractions you multiply, or in other words, multiplication is 
 as to the result a real division, division a real multiplica- 
 tion. Enunciation and decomposition are confounded by 
 arithmeticians, for when they enunciate 37*5 they say 
 thirty-seven integers five-tenths — but this in truth is a de- 
 composition. If they mean to enunciate they ought to say 
 three hundred seventy-five tenths. The origin and inven- 
 tion of arithmetic, says Chambers, in his Cyclopaedia, are 
 unknown. How came we then by the term digit ? — our 
 fingers taught us this, hence the fingers doubled gave us 
 the decad — and the decimal calculation, consonant with 
 nature, theory and practice, is the only true system, to which 
 it behooves all nations to adhere. Figures might have been 
 discovered as early as letters, and they were much more 
 indispensable. There is an affinity between characters 
 and letters, as A means one. Letters, however, had pri- 
 ority, and they were employed for numerals until some- 
 thing more or better — something more compendious was 
 invented. VI am not certain, but I believe all nations have 
 used characters for numerals, although simple strokes would 
 seem to precede any thing more complex. 
 
233 
 
 Anomalies. 
 
 Perhaps I may be allowed to recapitulate here some 
 lingual peculiarities to which I have adverted in the body of 
 the work, without overlaying the intention I had in giving 
 it to the world, which I had not done, had I not thought 
 there was room for such a tractate, which would comprise 
 the disjecta membra and phenomena of language. 
 
 My opinion has been expressed under ie the chapter on 
 the Article" that, the article 6g, 17, 6, was used before nouns 
 to mark the gender only, and this before inflection was 
 adopted. This may be a speculation, and thus I submit it 
 to the learned and ingenuous public to disprove or con- 
 firm. (Page 6.) 
 
 r Etg, jiia, kv is not an article, but a numeral, and corre- 
 sponds with our one, which is an adjective of number. 
 Unus is employed in the same sense, and is proved by the 
 phrase, vidi unam adolescentulam. I saw a young woman. 
 Mea unius opera, by my own labour. 
 
 The Greek article when employed became an expletive, 
 for the real article surely is at the termination of the noun 
 in \oy-oq, and in every word in Greek or Latin ending in 
 as, es, is, os, us, um. It is only the Sanskrit mode of 
 articular termination, as Baan-oh — arrow the, a language 
 proved by modern indagators to be analogous to the learned 
 languages, so that Van Kennedy in his researches avers 
 that the Sanskrit roots in English arc some 300 or 400 ; that 
 there arc 4 Sanskrit root-verbs found in the composition 
 of 500 or GOO English words, and that we can hardly utter 
 a sentence without a Sanskrit root. That the Latin tongue 
 is reduced to some S00 words from which the whole lan- 
 guage has been built up, half of which may be traced to 
 the Greek, and the rest to the Sanskrit, Phoenician, and 
 
234 
 
 Hebrew. There are also 208 Sanskrit roots in Greek which 
 are not in Latin, 188 in Latin and not in Greek. And 
 out of 900 Sanskrit words in Greek, Latin, and Teutonic, 
 there are 265 Persian, 83 Zend, 251 English; and he 
 allots 339 to the Greek, 319 to the Latin, 162 to the 
 German, leaving 80 for the remaining Teutonic tongues. 
 
 The Latin "being a more elliptic tongue than Greek did 
 not require the article as a prefix, hence Dominus is not a 
 pure substantive, but a concrete, because it coalesces with 
 the article og which gives its meaning, and the same oc is 
 the relative pronoun, as avrog ecrrtv 6v Xeyeig avOptonov. 
 Hie vir est quern dicis. Here is an affinity between the 
 two learned languages equivalent to the Attic where 6v is 
 governed by Xtyeig. (Pages 7, 81.) 
 
 Respecting cases the Greek absolute is the genitive, and 
 the Latin absolute is the ablative, called absolute because 
 the preposition was omitted. (Page 133.) All cases may 
 be put absolutely. There are but two cases in reality, the 
 dative and ablative are the same and the nominative is no 
 case, as the peripatetics held, and likened the noun in this 
 its primary and original form to a perpendicular line — 
 hence the TTToxretg, or casus, or fallings. The oblique cases 
 termed irXayiai tttwguq, sidelong fallings. 
 
 Respecting verbs the chapters on them may suffice, 
 though I recapitulate here that in verbs the analogy is the 
 same, the difference being in the variety of tenses — and 
 that tense does not mean time, but is the contraction of a 
 phrase, containing subject, copula, and predicate. 
 
 In the phrase " Allv apiaTtvuv, kcl\ virdpoyov Ipfjievat 
 aAXwv," which is a proud motto to write on books, or to have 
 ever before one in a social, intellectual, or religious view, 
 viz. : always to fight like Ares, or Mars, and be superior 
 to others ; here grammarians say, that ^ij is understood, 
 but that is erroneous, it stands on its own basis, and it is 
 
235 
 
 primitive diction and found in all the elder writers of an- 
 tiquity. 
 
 I have observed that there is and can he but one part of 
 speech, the noun, and that to be, ESSE, is the verbal noun, 
 one mood the infinitive, which is a noun, and is used in all 
 languages as a substantive, as le boirera French, far niente 
 in Italian, das schlafen in German ; and that there is an 
 affinity between the infinitive moods and the aorists, deriving 
 from words indicating, infinitive, aopiarog, aopog. Now the 
 uv of the infinitive is only dvai which derives from el/ui, eco, 
 Cj, to go. And the re in Latin infinitives I think to be re 
 in reality, as ire, go in reality ; Sic et tu facere, go and do 
 likewise. All aboriginal languages were undeclined, and 
 no root has more than three letters. (Page 12.) 
 
 There are instances in the learned languages of the 
 infinitive mood being substituted for many tenses. Moods 
 are only manners of being, and tenses abbreviations of 
 sentences, "HAu&c £k iroXifia tl-c w^fAec avroO' oXsaOai. 
 Thou hast returned from battle, would thou hadst perished 
 there. (Page 11.) 
 
 The primitive verb sum, written esum derives from ew, 
 w. Sumus is Iv/iev, and m means multitude — asmi sum, 
 and nt means number. The Latin fore is derived from 
 (pvu), gignor — hvy they — and huynt is they in Welsh, while 
 in Sanskrit anti is they, whence ant, ent, unti 
 
 The pronoun ego is from twor the latter from it, for all 
 the persons of the verb substantive in Shemitic languages 
 are both pronouns and verbs, and signify Being. (Page 88.) 
 
 In Boeotia, one of the oldest of the Grecian divisions, ego 
 was expressed by lo, hence Ka-io I burn, Uro, and so with 
 all the Greek verbs deriving from Sanskrit, which illus- 
 trates Greek etymology — for asmi, sum is the basis of the 
 Indo-European tongues, found in the Persian hastam, 
 shunt, Greek i<rpi, Sclavonic jesmi, Lithuanian asmi, Mceso- 
 
236 
 
 gothic im, and the verb substantive in all these is obvious, 
 the further we advance the more the identity comes out in 
 bold relief, for as notes incipient existence ; iw is written 
 Ionic for w, and all the same as hfii, which is iEolic Greek, 
 that being the most ancient form. 
 
 This auxiliary verb is like the iEolic digamma, (of an un- 
 usually long range,,) recognised in Ii/ull eo, and irijui mitto, 
 lefiai cupio, r)fiat sedeo, &c. — ujxi indicating sum, which is 
 demonstrated in the Port Royal Greek Grammar, a work 
 where the substratum of language is illustrated by copious 
 citations. 
 
 The Greeks in their struggles with language and distinct 
 words felt the want of etymology as an adjunct indispen- 
 sable to correct ideas on the subject, and yet it is sur- 
 prising how little account they took of such subsidiary 
 aids. 
 
 Homer in his Iliad, Z. v. 168, only once mentions or hints 
 aught about writing — for in no other part does a written 
 missive appear (if this citation be even one) to be sent by 
 any one of the champions of Greece or Troy. It seems as 
 if all antiquity concurred in making no mention of this 
 wonderful art, for though printing is ingenious it is nothing 
 compared with the invention of letters. (Page 230.) 
 
 Nothing in the Sanskrit hymns, or in all Sanskrit 
 literature gives allusion or remote intimation relative to 
 writing, or even writing materials. The Greeks must have 
 used papyrus as they were in constant intercourse com- 
 mercially with Egypt, of whom they were indeed a colony, 
 while all other permanent and frequent means of writing, 
 as on leather, hides or felts, or tablets of bronze were too 
 expensive and too cumbersome. 
 
 The Cratylus of Plato, which is a dialogue on the recti- 
 tude of names, evinces how little the then philosophers 
 knew of philology, and the futile suggestions of the author 
 
237 
 
 on verbal • derivations would seem to deduct from his 
 generally acknowledged intellectual supremacy. Some say 
 his wish was only to investigate names philosophically, but 
 as for etymology, that he despised, facetiously ridiculing 
 Heraclitus, of whom Cratylus was a follower, who con- 
 sidered all things as perpetually flowing, without admitting 
 any period of repose in continual generation. This essay 
 of the author Plato is however a very noble performance, 
 the scope of which is to exhibit in things the prolific energy 
 of souls, and the assimilative power, which essentially re- 
 ceiving, they evince through the rectitude of names, as 
 Taylor, his translator, teaches. 
 
 Still it must be admitted that knowing no foreign, or 
 barbarous tongue, he could not ascend to the fount of 
 language, neither had he, nor Aristotle, any idea how com- 
 pletely factitious was their own elaborated speech, once as 
 simple and barbarous as the Scythian. It passed through 
 its phases, neither did the Attic dialect come into vogue and 
 ascendance anterior to B.C. 400, and was considered then 
 the common Hellenic dialect, and the standard of purity, 
 though it is really corrupt, if corruption is measured by its 
 divergence from primitive roots and diction. Mr. Knight 
 observes, that besides the changes, inflections, and ortho- 
 graphy, the articles, particles, and prepositions have been 
 frequently omitted, transferred, and inserted to the detri- 
 ment of metre and critical nicety of expression, although 
 the sense was rarely altered. 
 
 Not only Plato, but Xenophon, Arrian, and Marcus An- 
 toninus felt and admitted how useful to ethic science and 
 knowledge in general would be a grammatical disquisition 
 on the etymology and meaning of words. Nothing has 
 produced greater confusion than that fatal turn in the 
 Greeks of reducing every unknown term to some word 
 with which they were better acquainted; they formed 
 
238 
 
 every thing from their own idiom, and full of illusions, 
 they made every nation speak the language of Greece, 
 ignoring the fact that their language, mythology, and 
 rites were chiefly borrowed from Egypt. 
 
 Although I have adduced instances many, of lingual 
 anomalies within the scope of former pages, I thought I 
 might separately interweave here some proofs which have 
 not appeared, as an appendix to the Chapter on Language 
 and the power of literal symbols, to illustrate speech, the 
 principal object of this tractate, and I would fain hope 
 that the space assigned to these citations may not be 
 deemed irrelevant or misplaced, at the risk even of some 
 reiteration. 
 
 Nomenclature of Science constitutes the terms of any 
 particular art, and may be almost called the art itself, to 
 be well acquainted with which advances the student rapidly 
 in his pursuits ; as in Geometry, definitions, postulates, 
 axioms ; in Logic, subject, predicate, copula, moods, syllo- 
 gisms, definition or description, division, notation or 
 etymology, conjugation, genus, species, similitude, dissimi- 
 litude, contrary, opposite, comparison, cause, effects, ad- 
 junct, antecedent, consequent ; in Oratory, exordium, 
 narration, confirmation, proposition, confutation, perora- 
 tion. Under Parallelism, correlation, antithesis, gradation, 
 simile^ ellipsis, repetition, alliteration, accommodation, 
 rhyme. In Sciences, theology, ontology, or metaphysics, phy- 
 sics, ethics, internal or liberal arts, grammar, arithmetic, 
 geometry, astronomy, rhetoric, logic, magic, mechanism. 
 
 Syntax is divisible into concord and grammar. Inflec- 
 tion is a creature of institution, and was invented for 
 variety of sound and a more concise form of expression. 
 
 Every grammatical accident may be converted into 
 another and the sense preserved, number for number, case 
 for case, gender for gender, as miser animi, o, um, are all 
 
239 
 
 equivalent, in fact, analytically considered, the transposi- 
 tions of language are incredible, the mode of expression 
 depending on the will. 
 
 Almost every number, case, degree, tense and mood, 
 each is used for the other in prose or verse, plural for 
 singular, dual for plural, and vice versa, substantive for 
 adjective, and all cases for each other, relative for recipro- 
 cal and inversely, passive for active and inversely, indica- 
 tive for optative mood, infinitive mood used substantively 
 and for all tenses, while aorists as the name implies, are 
 used in every tense and in present, past and future time. 
 Genders are com mutable, antecedent and relative in 
 some cases by attraction. 
 
 The figure by which most of this transformation takes 
 place is styled enallage, as common in speech as hyper- 
 bole, and all these varieties are found in the best authors, 
 confirming the Horatian canons — Usus, quern, penes, &c. 
 Technicality has no influence as to the sense of the author, 
 while composition is universal and not particular. 
 
 Grecisms are so common in Latin that without the 
 Greek, Latin could not be explicated : " Graeci quibus est 
 nihil negatum," and the anomalies of this tongue have 
 been adopted by the Latins. (Page 32.) 
 
 Cscsardicitur venturus forvcnturum esse in the accusative 
 case. Cupio esse clcmens ; and the figure syllepsis is very 
 usual in Latin by which words in a sentence differ in gen- 
 der, number or tense, as Verbura qui est Alius Dei, where 
 the meaning is discerned by the sense and not the gram mar. 
 Desine quserelorum, vacuus irae for ab ira. Dives equum, 
 pictai vestis, &c. Thus the genitive; in Greek is a constant 
 equivalent to the ablative in Latin. Major omnium for ex 
 omnibus. idere doctus for videri doctum, dixit 
 
 daturus for datum m. Licet vobis esse beatis for vos i 
 beatos. Tibi expedit esse bono for bonum. Hocetmihi 
 docto for doctum. 
 
240 
 
 The Latins affected the Greek construction in prefer- 
 ence to their own, at least, we find it so in Horace, and all 
 the writers of the Augustan age. 
 
 Egeo librorum quorum habeo, a Grecism shewing ana- 
 logy. The Greeks and Latins cannot omit the relative, 
 but the English can ; xptojuai &i£\ioig 6ig ex^, where the 
 relative is attracted by the substantive. 
 
 Dignus aliquid amoris, for amari ; verbs are neither 
 active nor passive, they are in a state of rest, and what 
 is meant by the active and passive voice is a mere gram- 
 matical fiction, importing no more than the natural and 
 inverted form of the subject and object, introduced for 
 variety, and this remark extends from the primeval lan- 
 guage of man to every dialect spoken. (Page 59.) 
 
 Sanctus olia id genus alia, for ejus generis alia. Est locus 
 in carcere quod Tullianum appellatur, where quod agrees 
 with Tullianum and not with locus, the subsequent instead 
 of the antecedent. Parum habet consul creatus esse, for 
 'se creatum esse. Multi putantur venturi esse, for se esse 
 venturos. Apponendum est olentium herbarum, for olentes 
 herbas. Olet unguenta. Lassus maris, plenus curarum, 
 dives agri, all Grecisms. 
 
 Quo leto censes me ut peream potissimum, for ego. 
 Qui pote, how can that be ? Qua pote lucet, by which power 
 it shines, is the motto of Smyth of Essex. Potis and 
 pote are of all genders answering to Svvarov in Greek. 
 
 An accusative is put for the nominative in, Ilium ut 
 vivat, for ille. Patrem vellem viveret tibi, for pater. Non te 
 latet, for tibi. Res cibi equivalent to cibus, res laboris 
 voluptatum ; dominetur piscium maris, let them rule over 
 the fishes of the sea. Reguavit populorum, he lorded it over 
 the nations, in Horace. Tempus desistere pugnse, for 
 desistendi a pugna. Captae prohibere nequiret. Cum 
 Paenos aquilae for aquila. Justitias ne prius mirer bellive 
 
241 
 
 laborum Virgil. Utor hanc rem. Mea utantur sine, for 
 meis. Nunc dierum. Sat temporis, in star montis ; where 
 the substantive has a genitive after it : it is to be con- 
 sidered a substantive by analogy. 
 
 Partem virorum ceciderunt. Partem vescuntur lacte 
 et melle, in Caesar, where the accusative is used for the 
 nominative. Again the genitive is substituted for the 
 ablative, viz., nullius fidei. 
 
 The Latins borrowed the genitive and dative from the 
 Greeks, having only two cases, accusative and ablative. 
 There are but two cases in reality, the dative and ablative 
 l)eing the same, and the nominative is no case ; it is the 
 substantive uninflected, and may be used without a verb, 
 as, the Lord he is God. The prophets, where are they ? 
 Case means accidents, and accident proceeds from neces- 
 sity, (see Case, p. 132). Analogy was not consulted when 
 authors made the plural noun and the singular verb ter- 
 minate alike, but custom has determined otherwise because 
 the concurrence of ss is unpleasant, as horses runs, and by 
 this it is more agreeable to the auricular organ. 
 
 Suo sibi gladio hunc jugulo where sibi is the Grecism. 
 Implentur veteris Bacchi, where there is a genitive for an 
 ablative. Eo vsenui, I am going to market, for ad vsenum. 
 Major, maximus omnium, for omnibus. An adjective 
 which is put with two substantives should agree with the 
 principal, but this is not so always. 
 
 Yldvra vTroTCKTvtTai Gey every thing is subservient to the 
 Deity. The plural in Greek expresses a universal dis- 
 tributive. 
 
 Nouns neuter, masculine and feminine, when they ex- 
 press an individual unity arc accompanied by the verb in 
 the singular to denote that unity. 
 
 Amantium ine amoris redintegratio est. Where est is 
 singular after the plural irrc, for the renewal of love can 
 
 R 
 
242 
 
 not be said to be the quarrel of lovers, therefore redin- 
 tegratio must be the predicate. Pectus quoque robora 
 fiunt, plural verb to a singular noun, multitudo gaudent, 
 omnis terra venerunt in iEgyptum. " Pars gladios stringunt 
 manibus, par missile ferrum, Corripuint ;" Pars cseci, where 
 Virgil has disregarded an important rule of Syntax to ex- 
 press himself naturally and elegantly. To appreciate the 
 metamorphosis of letters, words, tenses, and dialects, in 
 Greek also, the essay on the Greek alphabet of Payne 
 Knight should be consulted. 
 
 The Greek word Anagram is one, by the transposition 
 of which another word can be formed, a conceit, called also 
 a divination by letters, of which Greeks and Latins were 
 cognisant, and its invention was referred to Lycophron, 
 and perhaps he deserves the merit who has written the 
 darkest poem in literature, Cassandra; yet, darkness is 
 among the sources of the sublime. 
 
 The extension of the principle seems to be applicable to 
 phrases or verses which backwards and forwards are still 
 the same. To find a word like Anna is not so difficult, but 
 to exercise ingenuity in framing entire lines which read the 
 same both ways is a curiosa felicitas. This labor ineptiarum 
 has been classified by the collectors of mots under Anagram, 
 and it is traditional that Sotades invented the puerility ; 
 hence certain lines elaborated and eliminated may be turned 
 inside out like lace or tapestry, being however the same in 
 sense and sound. It is said that men of letters love those 
 •they amuse, as travellers love those they astonish. As these 
 literary vagaries are rare I annex specimens, which may be 
 comprised under the phenomena of language. 
 
 Signa te, signa, temere me tangis et angis 
 
 Roma tibi subito motibus ibit amor 
 
 Si bene te tua laus taxat sua laute tenebis, 
 
 Sola medere pede, ede perede malos. 
 
243 
 
 Such is the affinity between Latin and Italian and Latin 
 and Spanish that pure lines have been produced which are 
 of either tongue, but with infinite labour. A literary man 
 however is like a silkworm employed and wrapped up in 
 his own work, and unravels apparent impossibilities. 
 
 When language becomes an object of taste, exuberance 
 of diction is applied to purposes of elegance and dissemina- 
 tion. If defective in variety the tongue is equally elegant, 
 and words may be used in construction one with the other. 
 In epistolary correspondence, in public harangues, in 
 answer to ambassadors in which the Romans evinced great 
 elegance and dignity, and in composition from the press all 
 transgressions merit censure, and the presumption that the 
 public will pardon negligence on the plea of inattention to 
 things more than words is not tenable. 
 
 The following instances of violation of the laws of hex- 
 ameter metre are chiefly from Virgil, and yet are in ac- 
 cordance with certain usages of prosody, and evince the 
 skill, taste, and ear of the poets, that the sound should 
 seem an echo to the sense ; and it shews that what have 
 been laid down for canons and laws of prosody are not so, 
 any more than the numerous rules to which grammarians 
 have restricted grammar, while the force of habitual ex- 
 pression is the sole apology which can be admitted for the 
 violation of the laws of concord, confined to familiar inter- 
 course. 
 
 R 2 
 
244 
 
 Metrical Irregularities. 
 
 Adversi longa transverberat abiete pectus. 
 Altius ingreditur et mollia crura reponit 
 Brontesque Steropesque et nudus membra Pyracmon. 
 Cara Deum soboles magnum Jovis incrementum 
 Emicat Euryaliis et munere victor amici. 
 Et succus pecori, et lac subducitur agnis 
 iEquus uterque labor seque juvenemque magistri 
 Ferte citi ferrum, date tela, scandite muros. 
 Fliiviorum rex Eridanus campos que per omnes. 
 Genua labant gelidus concrevit frigore sanguis 
 Hie latus niveum molli fultus hyacinthi 
 Ille autem paribus quas fulgere cernis in armis. 
 Insulee Ionio in magno quas Diva Celseno, 
 Italiam fato profugus Lavmia que venit. 
 Limina que laurusque Dei totusque moveri. 
 Miscueruntque herbas et non innoxia verba 
 Occulta spolia et plures de pace triumphos. 
 Ostentans artem pariter arcumque tonantem 
 Parietibus textum csecis iter ancipitemque 
 Eeligione patrum mullos servata per annos. 
 Troas reliqiiias Danaum atque immitis Achillei, 
 Vellera que ut foliis despectant tenuia Seres 
 Victor apud rapidum Simoenta sub Ilio alto. 
 
 Poetry is called tbe language of the Gods, and Pro- 
 metheus is said in fable to have been severely punished for 
 imparting the blessing to humanity. Mr. Bryant considers 
 this appellative the same as Deucalion, which he interprets 
 Noah, and with him commenced Gentile history ; and 
 that the ark was looked on as the womb of nature, and the 
 descent from it as the birth of the world, the ultimate 
 
245 
 
 whence all things were to be deduced, as law, religion, 
 justice, and the seven Noachic precepts which obtained in 
 ethnic nations. The ancients were generally materialists 
 and thought the world eternal, and that its mundane part 
 began with the ark or Theba. The serpent too was em- 
 blematical of immortality from its annually casting its skin, 
 which is supposed to renew life from a state of inactivity. 
 Eusebius says the ancients called Prometheus, JVoah, vsv, 
 or wisdom, who raised the first altar to Heaven and con- 
 structed the first ship and transmitted useful inventions. 
 
 Ylacrat rkyyai fiporolcFiv Ik Tlpo/uiriOaiog. JEschylus, Prom. 
 v. 504. So that Prometheus was styled Noi>e and roig 
 avOpwTToig 6 Nouc, which may mean Noos, Noah, from 
 whom both time and things were deduced. 
 
 In the grandest of the old myths (all of which were 
 derived from the flood, and Noah the avawavaig, or emblem 
 of peace, so the dove became a sacred symbol, and was so 
 acknowledged in the purest worship, the sacred Ogdoas of 
 the Egyptians or the eight persons of the ark), this 
 demigod, who taught letters and arts to man, was doomed 
 to expiate the offence by a fearful agony, being rivetted in 
 adamantine chains to the beetling precipice by the agency 
 of the demons, Strength and Force. The winged hound 
 of Jove, the eagle self-called to a daily feast still wheeled 
 down to his prey, still fiercely tore and battened on the 
 flesh of Prometheus. Allegories were brought to perfection 
 by the ancients, and virtues and vices were personified to 
 signify their several subjects, and in this human nature is 
 represented by an emblem, as Bacon expounds in the 26th 
 Chapter, De sapientia veterum. 
 
 Of such high consideration w r as speech in the contem- 
 plation of philosophers ; hence I have drawn into a focus, 
 independent of what is diffused through the tractate where 
 every anomaly is displayed, some further examples to shew 
 how closely the lloman pupil followed the Grecian pre- 
 
246 
 
 ceptor, and although the latter subverted or set at defiance 
 the laws of grammar, yet the beauties of their mutations 
 were so apposite that the Latins were seduced, and they in- 
 corporated anomalies into their own phraseology " from 
 the bard of Scio's rocky isle/' the reputed father of poetry, 
 ethics and theology, and from others, at once enriching and 
 embellishing a diction which was the perfect offspring of 
 that polished nation, whose philosophers, poets, and heroes 
 were led by the light of the Moeonian star. 
 
 On Philology and Letters. 
 
 Sciences, like plants, each have their particular sphere. 
 Philology is the science of characters, articulations, terms, 
 and propositions. Characters, as a, b, c. Articulations, as 
 al-ter, e-vil. Terms, as man, tree ; propositions, as virtue 
 is amiable. 
 
 Richard Johnson, a famous grammarian says, grammar is 
 the art of expressing the relation of things in construction 
 with due accent in speaking and orthography, according 
 to the custom of those whose language we learn ; had he 
 said of words instead of things and quantity not accent, 
 which is an ancient art now lost, the definition had been 
 good and acceptable. Accent raises or lowers a syllable in 
 pronouncing it, the acute sharpens, the grave acts con- 
 trariwise and depresses, while a circumflex both blunts 
 and sharpens. With the Greeks these risings and sinkings 
 were independent on quantity and yet were used with 
 quantity. 
 
 A vowel is a letter and must be the sign of a sound, and 
 not the sound itself. It is not a simple articulate sound 
 formed by the impulse of the voice and opening of the 
 mouth, (page 6.) 
 
 In Chinese and Hebrew all words begin with a conso- 
 
247 
 
 nant, so that verbs may be termed consonants, for they 
 are part of a system wholly conventional, and the latest 
 improvement in letter. All letters were significant as 
 symbols and sounds. A and b were prefixed, to words, 
 and sometimes inserted in the middle of words by ancient 
 writers, (pages 120-163.) 
 
 A means motive, as a- do. B means dwelling, or inhabi- 
 tation, as b-sprinkle ; and also motion as b-gone, b-cause ; 
 but like a, the learned now dispense with their services. 
 C means cause ; D is symbolical, and t is derivative from 
 it, while d also means completion, as love-d, and is cognate 
 with t, as bende-d, bent. E implies energy, ence is comm- 
 encement. End is propagation of the energy, eke, eac, 
 increase, identity. H implies exaltation and continuation 
 as hend, hand. Ion is progress, while I means indefinite 
 extent. L indicates length. M might. N production, 
 and O individuality. R means motion, while S notes 
 existence. 
 
 The grave letters are b, d, g. Acute, c, d, k, t. Aspi- 
 rates, f, h, s, w, z. Double letters, c, j, g, u, w, x. C is s 
 and j is dz. G is u and yu. W is two o's. X is xi. 
 
 Impure letters are c, d, e, f, g, h, ph, u, w, y, z. G or 
 j is d impure. C is t impure. H is e impure. Y is i im- 
 pure. U is y impure ; and Wisuu impure. 
 
 C as cent, city, char, chevy, clove, clean, sacrifice. D as 
 verdure. E ewe, eunuch. F as if. G as grandeur. H 
 as hero, he. Ph as phial. U as use, union. "W as wise» 
 worse. Y as ye, yes. Z as chintz, fitz. 
 
 I shall briefly notice here the power of the vowels, and 
 how each is used for the other. Vowels are all inter- 
 changeable in English, and were mostly so in the learned 
 languages. This application is more fully developed in 
 the chapter on the figures and powers of literal symbols. 
 (p. 199.) 
 
 A is a diphthong composed of o and i, and it takes many 
 
248 
 
 sounds, as bat. Many comes into meny, with e, so do 
 quay, flay, Thames. Comes into awl in ball, fall ; into o, 
 as what, quash, quantity, wasp, yatch. 
 
 E a compound of a and i. It comes into a in where, 
 weight, freight, and before r into a as, servant, harte, mer- 
 chant, but now observed chiefly in proper names, as Derby, 
 Berkeley, &c. It comes into i as pretty, England, engine, 
 into o as shew, sew, strew. 
 
 I glides into e, as virgin, virtue, mirth ; and into double 
 ee, as shire, and in oblige, now emitted with the i according 
 to its orthography, I used to lapse into a in sirrah, pro- 
 nounced sarrah. 
 
 O naturally declines into double oo, as prove, move, 
 bosom ; into a as ought, into au as broth, froth ; into i as 
 women ; and into u, as conduit, Monday, company, govern. 
 In some proper names, as Pole, Coke, Broke, Brome, &c, 
 the o is -always sounded double 00. 
 
 U naturally declines into oo, as bull, pulpit, put, cushion ; 
 into e as bury ; into i as business, busy ; into eu as tube, 
 duty, cubit : though the double o in these words is often 
 retained. 
 
 Y associates with i, and is almost identical, as thyme, 
 chyme. It assumes the sound of ee in vanity, phylactery, 
 panegyric. It was prefixed to words as ylike, and was used 
 for I, the pronoun. Y dwell, as Y can. 
 
 The impure vowels h, y, w, and sometimes e, o, u, occa- 
 sionally require a not an before them. 
 
 Dr. Lowth says that a becomes an before a vowel, the 
 letters y and w excepted, and before a silent h preceding a 
 vowel. But a becomes an before a pure vocal power and 
 when vowels lapse into aspiration, a is used. 
 
 When words begin with an aspirate a must be used, as 
 a house, a horse. So in the aspirated words, ewe, Euro- 
 pean, union ; a is used with others but not always. 
 
 A is used before h mute if the word commences in sound 
 
249 
 
 with the power of y. Ex. : a human being, a humourous 
 man, humoursome child. 
 
 A is used before h aspirated when the word is accented 
 on the first syllable, as a hundred, a hermit, a hero, a habit, 
 a history. 
 
 An is used before vowels and h mute ; and h aspirate 
 when the word is not accented. Ex. : an angel, engine, 
 inn, empire, oven, honour, hospital, historian. 
 
 When the ictus or accent falls on the second, third, or 
 fourth syllable of a word beginning with h aspirate, an is 
 used for a. Ex. : an historian, heresiarch, hexameter, her- 
 maphrodite, and generally before all vowels, but not with 
 words beginning with u, or a coalition of letters equivalent 
 to it in sound, as ewe, eunuch, union. 
 
 Between w or u, a labial or palatine closing the syllable, 
 a is sounded or emitted like au. Ex. : wan, quart, quality, 
 quantity, so it is pronounced awe before a double* palatine 
 closing the syllable, as alder, altar, also. And it takes the 
 same sound as quality in wamble, wabble, wapentake (whose 
 derivation is weapon-take), want, waft, wrath, wrap, what, 
 wather, &c. But if the 1 is separated and single, a had a 
 sound like ah, as, altitude, alternate ; but the more ana- 
 logical sound of al-ternate, not all-ternate, is preferable. 
 
 A is emitted ay when it terminates a syllable with the 
 accent on it, or is opened by the final <?, as able, care, ware, 
 waver, wafer, &c. 
 
 C is t impure ; and Murray in his Grammar says it is 
 superfluous in both its sounds, the one expressed by k and 
 the other by s. But we ask how is c sounded in church, 
 clove, sacrifice, ostrich? are there not more than two 
 sounds in c ? There is c like s in cent, cinder, city ; like 
 z in sacrifice, suffice ; like k in can, cot, cut ; like g in 
 sanction, unction ; like t in clove, clean ; like dz in ostrich, 
 Norwich; like ts in church and cherry. 
 
 Ch is impure in catsup, cursorily pronounced ketchup, 
 
250 
 
 as courtesy in churches. Dr. Johnson says c has but two 
 sounds and might be omitted from the language, but it 
 preserves to the eye the etymology of words, as face, facies, 
 the facet of a diamond. Now this letter, we think, has 
 six sounds. Ex. : t in clove, ts in church, dz in ostrich, z in 
 sacrifice, s in faces, k in calendar. In fact, as many as a dozen 
 sounds may be predicated of c, not one belonging to itself. 
 
 Clepolemus is sounded like Tlepolemus, Clascala in 
 Mexico like Tlascala, and so with Cloe. C is an x or 
 double cc inverted. C means action, as stick, seek, sicht, 
 sight. Ce, ci, ce, si, ti, have the power of sh when preceded 
 by the accent and followed by another vowel ; but when 
 accented or followed by the secondary accent the vowel 
 remains pure. 
 
 Ch sinks into the grave when unaccented, as Norwich, 
 Dulwich, "Woolwich, ostrich. What think the chosen 
 Judges ?* In orthography, known as phonetic, a kind of 
 euphuism, which some purist in spelling proposed for adop- 
 tion, and who printed specimens to evince its efficacy and 
 adaptation to modern use, but which the world declined to 
 receive, these words would be thus written : Houat think 
 the tchosen Djeudges ? 
 
 Ch, gh, ph, are often denoted by single letters, so is qu, 
 w, and hw has been written for who ; and hohl for whole. 
 
 D impure ought to be marked thus g^ } and impure T 
 thus, cc. 
 
 The termination ed becomes acute or assumes the power 
 of t after an acute. The original sound of d was a lisp, and 
 is so pronounced by the modern Greeks and Spaniards. 
 We doubled the d } as the sound tedder for tether, pudder 
 for pother, now bother. 
 
 E is an impure letter, as ewe, eunuch. E is also changed 
 into o } as streng, strong. The word neither is derived from 
 weder in German, (p. 106.) This word is by some speakers 
 pronounced as if written with an i contrary to all our 
 
251 
 
 analogy, for in what pure English word is ei so pronounced? 
 The word height is evidently a misspelling, for hight, high. 
 In eider down we have a pure German word, and with it its 
 native pronunciation, so neither are in point. The word 
 sleight should be written slight, from the verb, to toss over 
 carelessly, as " the rogues slighted me into the river." — 
 Shakspere. These are the only words in our tongue where 
 such a pronunciation has been attempted, the vowel e taking 
 its own analogy in weight, freight, &c. The soft e in 
 neither, as it is ho diphthong, is always sounded by speakers 
 of taste, in accordance with usage and which was once the 
 unvarying practice of the country ; the word is ne-ither and 
 not neither or nither. "What is to become of all words in 
 ceive, receive and their derivatives, or ceiling, which should 
 be spelt cieling from del, or leisure, eisel and every word 
 where e precedes an i ? From uncertain pronunciation 
 arise in a great part the various dialects of the same 
 country, which however grow fewer as books are multiplied. 
 We require softness in vocal emissions rather than strength, 
 for our language is constitutionally strong, if it is vainly 
 imagined that the violation of all analogy can give vigour 
 by the adoption of so coarse and unanalogical sound as i in 
 lieu of the soft e. Let us be consistent then, and if i is to 
 have its natural power, let it be carried out in whither, 
 hither, thither, and in every word where e precedes an i, 
 and we should set the American innovators to school in 
 abnormal pronunciation and undoubted vulgarism ; risum 
 teneatis ? To any chaste ear there can be no doubt, that the 
 ancient prolation or utterance should be adopted, neether. 
 We repeat here that words like lands have a limit to their 
 right, and it is better to leave orthography and pronuncia- 
 tion after long possession as they have been transmitted 
 than to disturb them by even a better claim, if we would not 
 barbarise our speech. Analogy and taste are both violated. 
 E, G in the termination eng is mute by the intervention 
 
252 
 
 of a consonant preceded by a mute guttural — which rec- 
 tifies an error in Lindley Murray, (p. 101.) 
 
 When G is guttural or hard, it ought to have something 
 to note it ; the same may be said of C, if used for K, as the 
 Italians have an h after it, making it k, as chiamare. Gh 
 is frequently pronounced like f, says Dr. Walker, as laugh, 
 cough, &c, but really gh final is mute. Laugh is pro- 
 nounced laffe, whose past tense was formerly written loffe. 
 It is the u which assumes the sound of f, and this f lapses 
 into v. The aspirated G should not be received for d, nor 
 aspirated c for t, as frigid, suet, rich. 
 
 F in of is pronounced ov } and lieutenant is always pro- 
 nounced leftenant ; though was once pronounced thof. W, 
 F, V, are afined and kin, hence the Russians pronounce w, 
 as f in Orlow, Woronzow. The Welsh, descendants of the 
 Kelts, write ff, and so did we once at the beginning of 
 words, as Ffloyd, Lloyd. So Y is expressed with a single f. 
 This is traced to the digamma, which seems to have been 
 native with the iEolians, and common to all Greece, a con- 
 venient symbol, the substitute for at least half the alphabet 
 in the shape of letters and aspirates, and probably existed 
 at the Tower of Babel. See my remarks on this letter, 
 page 223. : 
 
 H. When a word begins with h y having the accent on 
 the second syllable, an is invariably used, as it is before the 
 power of a pure vowel ; so is a before a vowel when impure 
 and before consonants. 
 
 When H mute begins a word, the application of a and 
 an depend on the power of the succeeding vowel. 
 
 Silent H then is regulated by the subsequent vowel, 
 which if pure takes an, impure takes a. When a word 
 begins with h 3 and is not accented on the initial syllable, 
 h is silent, as in heir, hour, honour, herb, hostler, hotel, 
 &c. Humour has h silent, and yet does not admit an 
 before it. When initial H impels the accented syllable a 
 
253 
 
 is used, but when the accented syllable falls beyond the 
 initial syllable an is indispensable. 
 
 I. The long i is a sound composed of the Italian a and 
 our e, which latter is expressed by short i or enunciated ee. 
 The dot or pupil might be dropped when it is pronounced 
 short, and the pupil over j might be omitted without in- 
 convenience as to sound or appearance. / is impure before 
 the power of K, ing, ink, &c. I has the power of h when 
 preceded by the power of S, and that of y when preceded 
 by any other letter. / and E after the accent, and suc- 
 ceeded by another vowel, have the power of h when pre- 
 ceded by the power of s, but if preceded by any other 
 power, they have the power of y, as Persian, nation, coer- 
 cion, anxious, Judges. 
 
 / and E are impure after the accents, when followed by 
 another vowel, having the power of H, when preceded by 
 the power of s, and that of y, if preceded by any other 
 letter. E is the Gothic i } meaning eye — and ive means 
 desire, as sportive. 
 
 / and E preceding a vowel in the same syllable lose their 
 power, as nation, nashun, but i and e, preceded by the 
 power of s or z, and succeeded by a vowel, with which it 
 coalesces, assumes the power of H, as contrition, contri- 
 shun — lei-zhure, expo-zhure. 
 
 / and E succeeded by another vowel in the same sylla- 
 ble, and preceded by any other letter, except the power of 
 s, assume the power of y, as minion, pavilion, pavil-yun. 
 
 I or E impelling a perfect letter and preceded by the 
 power of s however symbolised, assume the essence of h. 
 Preceded by other powers, it becomes y as action, ac-shun, 
 coer-shun. I in Lybian is pronounced Lib-yan — ruffian, 
 ruff-yan, billion, bill-yun. 
 
 In the words medicine, venison, business, diamond, the 
 sounds of i and a are omitted in the second syllable, and are 
 specimens of the beauty of cursory pronunciation. I was 
 
254 
 
 sounded by the Latins as y, which power the Germans re- 
 serve, Jupiter, Yupiter. 
 
 J, which is equivalent to G, might be written and printed 
 without the dot over it, and when i has the power of e 
 would it not be advisable to omit the dot or pupil ? 
 
 We use long f and a short s without distinction, might 
 we not use the long f between the vowels when it is acute 
 and a short s when it is grave ? Were this distinction 
 observed by printers we should not be at a loss to pro- 
 nounce resign, resolve, when they mean to sign again and 
 solve again, and the same words when they mean to give 
 up and determine. 
 
 Murray says we do not need the letter j, because the 
 soft g in English is sounded the same, but what of James, 
 Judah, Joram, &c. ? 
 
 O is a circle, and implies whole, hole, hohl. ' i His eyes 
 drouped hole sunken in his hede/ ? Chaucer. O denotes 
 entirety and individuality. It is the representative of u 
 between w and a consonant, and these words ought to be 
 written swoom for swum, swong for swung, and swonk for 
 swonken, an obsolete term, to overlabour. O being u 
 before a final consonant the pronunciation of o in woman 
 is easily traced. U is used as w in quiet, quote ; and as 
 double o in rule, ruin, lure ; as a in ought, it comes into i 
 as women, into oo as womb, tomb, wolf; and into u as 
 come, love, dove. 
 
 Q is always guttural and invariably used before u as 
 quaint, quell, quilt. Q and K before n in the same syllable 
 are not emitted in modern pronunciation. C is guttural 
 before a, o, u, but c assuming the power of s before e, i, 
 y, k is used instead of c before these letters. 
 
 K is substituted for s, and in its symbolical significance 
 it is motion, as s means existence, but as that which moves 
 necessarily exists, R was made the representative of exist- 
 ence by the Western world. An inversion of a word and 
 
255 
 
 a substitute of s for R may be detected in Her, if so her 
 is she inverted, (page 94.) Si means her in Gothic, and Seo 
 in Teutonic ; w preceding g is lost in it, as wright, write, 
 sounded as right and rite. 
 
 S, symbolically denotes existence. Between two vowels 
 it expresses the acute power, and s the grave power. Initial 
 s being always acute, may continue its present form. If 
 two ss come together it is more graceful to sound one, as 
 associate, should be pronounced a-sociate ; the same may 
 be predicated of double if, efface and double cc occasion, 
 which Dr. Walker judiciously observes, (t is a distinguishing 
 mark of elegant pronunciation," to which I have before ad- 
 verted, (p. 221.) S declines into Z in houses, houzes, on 
 account of number. It is acute in yes, this, thus, us in ous 
 — and in words derived from the learned languages, C has 
 the power of s before e, i, y. Its tendency to sibilation has 
 gained for it some reprobation, as well as the sobriquet of 
 the Serpent's letter, as Z is called a canine letter, to avoid 
 which the Spartans converted it into R, and the Athenians 
 into T, and it is often elided in poetry. We commute it for 
 th, loves, loveth, but its use in the third person is adverse 
 to correct analogy. Th was common to singular and plural 
 in all persons though it is now confined to the third person. 
 I here repeat a remark made in the body of this Tractate, 
 (p. 29) that until some of the learned can assign a substantial 
 reason why the third person in the verb is varied, as loves, 
 and the rest not, one might plead for the simpler method. 
 A little practice would make it familiar, and we should see 
 analogy trample over custom, more honoured in the breach 
 than the observance. Having made s or es the symbol of 
 plurality, was it analogical to symbolise individuality in the 
 sui no way? 
 
 In some cases after s, a c should follow and not a k, as in 
 skreen, skonce, skull. Walker observes that c, st, arc 
 sounded before some vowels like sh, which is contrary to 
 
256 
 
 English analogy. When the letter s collides with s, or 
 even with another consonant, an apostrophe should be 
 used, as Atreus' sister, Moses' minister, and indeed 
 wherever the two s come together in poetry or prose the 
 ear tells us that it is indispensable to omit one s. (p. 134.) 
 
 T being used for mere distinction of sound, has no sym- 
 bolical signification. Th becomes grave in the plural as 
 bath, bathes, should be pronounced softly, bath-es, almost 
 as if the th were omitted. The e is added to s to form the 
 plural of substantives when pronunciation requires it. 
 
 The letter T is often reduplicated improperly as bigot- 
 ted. The same may be said of other letters. When the 
 accent does not fall on the last syllable the consonant 
 ought not to be geminated or doubled, as worship, 
 worship-ed, libel, libel-ed. This takes place when the first 
 letter is immediately preceded by a vowel. Words termi- 
 nating in a single consonant having the accent on the last 
 syllable, double the last consonant when the word is de- 
 clined, as stir, stirrest, fit, fittest, &c. 
 
 U loses half its power in busy, business, busy, &c. This 
 vowel was originally printed V, hence it assumes, 
 
 V, acute power in cough, rough, laugh. What we have 
 remarked under o is applicable here. 
 
 V in some words is changed for u as Lieu-tenant, pro- 
 nounced lef-tenant, which becomes acute before an acute, 
 as u assumes the power of f and its derivatives, in cough, 
 chough, slough, trough. When li begins a word having the 
 accent on the second syllable, the h is mute, or pronounced 
 f, as Loughbro, pronounced Luffbro. 
 
 Gh assumes the power of k, as hough, to hock cattle ; 
 shough, shock dog ; lough, loch, lake. In some words gh is 
 wholly mute, as plough, bough, and now written plow. V 
 becomes f on account of tense also, as leave, left ; and f 
 becomes v on account of number, as calf, calves, staff, staves, 
 wife, wives. 
 
257 
 
 Dr. Walker has strayed into the devious path in the dis- 
 cussion of our palatine characters by the emphatic u, and in 
 many words beginning with labials and terminatiug in a 
 palatine, as bull, pull, push, bushell, butcher, cushion, 
 cuckoo, huzza, for which see under the words, chew, 
 chuse, rue, duke, with a numerous catalogue of similar 
 vocality, which he condemns. Initial W is styled a conso- 
 nant, but with as much reason might the u in languish be 
 so called. H and y are no more consonants than e in 
 ocean, i in onion, o in one. Initial y is the grave power of 
 H, or the aspirate i as i-hung, young. Initial w is the as- 
 pirate of u pronounced oo. Initial u, emitted yu is a double 
 letter. Initial Y is aspirated i, and it is preceded by a. 
 Initial W is impure, and should not be followed by u, 
 hence the impropriety of swum, swunk, swung. This w is 
 the aspirate of m, being in form m reversed as mine, wine. 
 It has a fluctuating property, when w and y are consonants 
 and impel another letter, which impulse is characteristic, 
 as i-ew, yew, i~oung, young. The same may be said of j 
 and v, which were formerly reckoned among the vowels. 
 
 W is elegantly melted away as a liquid in some 
 words — no one pronounces would as it is written, nor 
 should they pronounce Dulwich and Greenwich as written. 
 It is contrary to beauty as well as analogy to pronounce 
 knowledge as two words, know and ledge, because it is a prin- 
 ciple in English to throw the accent back on compound 
 words, hence knolledge is the most correct and agreeable 
 emission of sound, and it is to be hoped that no such inno- 
 vation will prevail to spoil our language by efforts to make 
 orthography and prolation coincide. So I again advisedly 
 repeat that words like lands have a limit to their right, but 
 established rules arc conventional, and should not be unduly 
 contravened. See Walker under the word Knowledge. 
 
 X is a double letter composed of c and c placed in dittc- 
 
258 
 
 rent aspects. Siccity expresses this letter uncombined. 
 X that is k s, loses half its power when initial as Xenophon, 
 Xenocrates. 
 
 Z is not a double consonant as is commonly supposed, 
 but it has the same relation to s as v has to f, y to h, b to 
 p, and d to t, g to k ; s, f, h, p, t, k being acute ; and z, v, 
 y, b, d, g being grave. Z ishke y or j in Benzoin, benjoin. 
 As initial S is invariably acute, so is z in words requiring 
 the grave sound, as Zigzag, Zeno ; and by the initial u as 
 union, use. In ewe, &c, the initial e has the same sound 
 as y in year, yet the name of consonant to e in this situa- 
 tion has^ never been applied, why then should initial y be 
 so designated ? 
 
 Y is a vowel, but not pure, so are i, u, e, o. Y and w are 
 initial, and are always impure vowels. U, e, o, are also im- 
 pure on some occasions, and cannot admit an before them, 
 as union, ewe, one. 
 
 The same vowel which we express by the initial y, our 
 ancestors in many instances expressed by the vowel e, as 
 eower, your, and by the vowel i asiew, yew, i-ong, young. 
 
 In the word yew the initial y has precisely the same 
 sound as i in view, lieu, adieu. The i is acknowledged to 
 be a vowel in these latter words, how then can the y, which 
 has the very same sound possibly be a consonant in the 
 former ? 
 
 Its initial sound is generally like i in shire, sheere, from 
 to sheer or cut off, so the shore, share, plough-share, cum 
 multis aliis. It is formed by opening the mouth without 
 any motion or contact of the parts ; in a word it has every 
 property of a vowel and not one of a consonant. This said 
 Dr. Lowth, in a note in his grammar, but unhappily it is 
 subverted by a second note. The learned prelate confounds 
 the form with the power of the letter. 
 
 No doubt i y e, w, emitted alone are vowels, but when 
 
259 
 
 they impel another vowel they are indisputably consonants, 
 for if we understand consonant aright, it means any letter 
 consonous with another. 
 
 The Romans marked the letters in question I, V, but 
 they pronounced them as we do in y and w, the y taking 
 the place of i as in jacet, yacet, Jupiter, Yupiter, Ventus, 
 Wentus, and thus applied they ranked them among the 
 consonants. Some admit them into the rank of conso- 
 nants when they impel a subsequent vowel, being con- 
 vinced of their consonous power, hence a vowel sounded 
 with a consonant, becomes a consonant. 
 
 The distinction of vowel and consonant is a mere gram- 
 matical fiction, for all the vowels in Hebrew are conso- 
 nants, see page 6. We therefore oppugn the idea that 
 consonants are interceptions of vowels, which opinion was 
 broached by Savary, and Dr. Johnson inadvertently coun- 
 tenanced the mistake. In Chinese, the most ancient 
 language in the postdiluvian world, not one interception is 
 to be discovered, all words beginning there with a conso- 
 nant, in fact all vowels and consonants are one and flow 
 together. 
 
 Nature, says Coleridge, seems to have dropped an acid 
 into the German tongue which curdled the vowels, and 
 made all consonants flow together. The modern German 
 resembles the Moeso-Gothic (p. 4), from which all the 
 existing northern dialects spring, as the French and its 
 cognates derive from Latin, and that tongue in character, 
 symbol words and syntax is an easily recognizable daughter 
 of Greece, and its parent is Sanskrit, a descendant of some 
 fragment of language which arose in the confusion ; as 
 there had been a chaos of matter so was there to be a 
 chaos of speech. 
 
 No language admits greater variety in tone than the 
 English, except that extraordinary language the Chinese, to 
 which I have already adverted, page 148. Variety in tone 
 
 s 2 
 
260 
 
 is partly derived from accent,, and we place the acute ac- 
 cent sometimes on the pre-antepenultimate, as necessary, 
 favourably. This the Italians do, as sequitano, desiderano, 
 and also on the fifth and sixth syllable from the end, as 
 portandosenela, desiderandonivice ; we do this elegantly 
 in parliamentary, supplementary. But the Italian ex- 
 ceeds in this peculiarity, for the Romans and Greeks and 
 Hebrews went no farther back (I believe • further implies 
 procession and farther retrocession) than the penultimate, 
 but the Italian actually throws back the accent to the 
 eighth syllable, as seminandovicisene, edificandovicisene, 
 which must require effort and tact to accomplish as they do 
 it, so we should not bring a prejudicate ear against what is 
 consonant to their practice. There is what is termed an 
 enclitic accent, so named from ey/cAtpw to incline or fall 
 on, that is it falls from its natural position to a place more 
 remote, as theology for theology. It was originally used in 
 pronouns, which were called leaning or inclining pronouns, 
 but here we advert merely to their accentual power and 
 attribute, (p. 91.) 
 
 As an essential ingredient in language, definition should 
 not be pretermitted, for if the definition be false or ob- 
 scure, no art can be thoroughly comprehended. Con- 
 summate skill in derivation is the first excellence in a gram- 
 marian or philologer, while precision in the definition of 
 words, nominal or real, is the second in value and import- 
 ance. Logic lays it down that it should be adequate, be 
 more clear and obvious than the thing defined, and neither 
 too long nor too short. Let definition contain neither the 
 thing defined nor a mere synonymous name. I believe it 
 is admitted that our great Lexicographer failed occasionally 
 in all these requisites. He was ignorant of German, Teu- 
 tonic, and the Islandic languages, and although he pos- 
 sessed a most logical head and was destined to be the Aris- 
 totle of England, yet he was very deficient in taste and 
 
261 
 
 feeling. Even his biography of the Poets has encountered 
 condign animadversion, in which inordinate and unquench- 
 able prejudice has been added to want of nice taste and 
 feeling quite indispensable for such a national undertaking. 
 His best lives are of those he liked best, as Dryden and 
 Savage ; the poets Milton and Gray coming under his im- 
 mitigable aversion ; while in his stupendous preface to 
 Shakspere he has poised the faults and merits so evenly as 
 to leave it difficult to say on which side the scale of praise 
 or blame preponderates. 
 
 It has been strenuously maintained by the admirers of 
 Greek and Latin that modern uninflected language in point 
 of expression falls short of polysyllabic tongues. In mo- 
 nosyllabic tongues, which are more ancient, every word 
 preserves through every circumstance of grammatical ac- 
 cident the same force which it possessed in its original. 
 Thus what is imputed to simplicity in our ancestors be- 
 comes a proof of justness in their feelings, and of con- 
 stancy in their nature, and while admirers regard with 
 satisfaction the ingenuity displayed in the construction of 
 those languages, they do no more in fact than profess a 
 predilection of sweetness to force, or dignity of sound, to 
 energy of imitation. The English language is composed 
 of many monosyllables, and this is a proof of its antiquity, 
 and consequently of its energy, words being originally the 
 offspring of sensation. 
 
 Salmasius, De re hcllenistica, says truly, "Certum est 
 linguas omncs quae monosyllabis constant esse cseteris, an- 
 tiquiorcs. Multis abundavit monosyllabis antiqua Grcca, 
 cujus vestigia apud poetas, qui antiquitatem aflectarunt, re- 
 mansere non pauca." 
 
 We have this advantage from our monosyllables that we 
 can express more in fewer words than any language what- 
 ever ; and although monosyllables are not so fit for 
 numbers, yet that happiness of composition which is pecu- 
 
262 
 
 liar to English and the Greek tongue, renders our poetry 
 as harmonious as that of any nation in the world. 
 
 Mr. Dennis, an excellent judge, says the English is 
 more strong, more sounding, more significant, and more 
 harmonious than any other tongue. The French cannot 
 entertain blank verse, and what verse is equal to that of 
 Milton and Shakspere ? Should a selection be made from 
 the lofty grave tragedians of Greece, a moderate judge 
 could soon find passages of equal splendour for verse as 
 well as rhythm in an English iambic or blank measure. 
 
 Let all Greece or Home surpass these aud such lines of 
 Shakspere ; even Virgil's oft cited, 
 
 Formosam resonare doces Amaryllida silvas, 
 the most melodious line in the iEneid, is not superior to, 
 
 How silver sweet sound lovers' tongues by night, 
 Like softest music to attending ears. 
 
 Again — ■ 
 
 Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath, 
 That the rude sea grew civil at her song. 
 
 Shakspere surpasses all the ancients in the harmony of 
 his numbers unrestricted by particular feet, to which they 
 were confined, although there were numberless infrac- 
 tions of the canons of prosody. He pleases not by bringing 
 the actions of many years into his plays, though Dr. 
 Johnson has extenuated, if not wholly vindicated in his 
 preface, his overleaping this law of the drama, where he 
 copiously adverts to the mysterious unities. Neither does the 
 Bard of Avon delight by his grotesque admixture of tragedy 
 and comedy in one piece, which was the vice of the age. 
 Nor by the strained thought and affected criticisms which 
 he sometimes employs. But he delights by his constant 
 adherence to nature, and Pope remarks he is the organ 
 of Nature. It was said of Aristotle that he was Nature's 
 
 
263 
 
 secretary, and that he dipped his pen in intellect, so of 
 our poet in literature he has a name above every name. 
 
 Our tongue is not composed wholly of monosyllables. 
 There is a sweetness as well as harmony in verses com- 
 posed of monosyllables judiciously and artfully arranged, 
 and in some verses the sound arising from monosyllables 
 is inimitably expressed, and can not be copied in any poly- 
 syllabic diction. We think this will challenge comparison 
 with any Homeric verse analogous to it — 
 
 So eagerly the Fiend 
 O'er bog, or steep, through strait, rough, dense, or rare, 
 With head, hands, wings, or feet pursues his way, 
 And swims, or sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies. 
 Again the commencing line of Dryden's translation of the 
 iEneid, who observes that Virgil seems to sound a charge, 
 and begins with lines replete with the letter It, and the 
 vowels for the greater part sonorous, (p. 218.) 
 
 Arms and the man I sing, who forced by fate — 
 
 Another instance of monosyllabic verse is found in 
 Creech's Manilius — 
 
 Nor could the world have borne so fierce a flame. 
 
 And, lastly, let me quote Denham's description of the 
 silver Thames — 
 
 Tho' deep yet clear, tho' gentle yet not dull, 
 Strong without rage, without overflowing full. 
 
 Monosyllabic languages have a decided advantage over 
 the polysyllabic in point of perspicuity; monosyllables 
 clogged with consonants are the dead weight of our tongue, 
 thought Dryden. 
 
 In vocables of one syllable the idea and the word run 
 together, and keep each other in countenance, while in 
 words of more than one syllable more than one idea is con 
 tained under them, and that not being always thoroughly 
 
264 
 
 understood, is a cause of ignorance, sense being sacrificed to 
 sound. We have never submitted to inflection, preferring 
 energy to sound, and that is the superior consideration, and 
 elevates the English over every tongue or dialect in the 
 world. 
 
 It is another marvel accorded to us by the great Dis- 
 penser of all Good, that even our language should equal, 
 perhaps surpass all others ; and it may be no hyperbole to 
 add that we are far advanced in arts ; first in mechanics, 
 in arms, wealth, and literature, in general intellect and 
 true religion. In a country of between twenty and thirty 
 millions of population there must be crimes of deep dye 
 and turpitude, still Great Britain, like the Northern star, 
 of whose true, fixed, and resting quality there is no fellow 
 in the firmament, holds on her course unshaked of motions 
 which have shattered or convulsed the world, and is the 
 Nestor of nations, bearing the highest moral and political 
 rank of all social communities. 
 
 Fragmentary Observations on the French Language. 
 
 The object of this short chapter is to advert to some 
 peculiarities in the French language about which treatises 
 have been written from early times, that tongue having 
 been employed from the epoch of the Norman invasion, 
 and even anterior to that period the French was familiar 
 at the English court. The incursion of Norman William 
 and his adherents, caused the dialects of French soon to 
 be incorporated and adopted in Britain, while the frequent 
 intermarriages of native Sovereigns with foreign Princesess 
 confirmed a predilection for it. These unions were the 
 proximate cause of large accessions of strangers visiting 
 and settling on our shores, hence we account for the 
 
265 
 
 numerous foreign surnames recognised in our patronymics 
 whose origin by lapse of years have nearly escaped detec- 
 tion. Out of twenty-five male Sovereigns who have swayed 
 the British sceptre from the accession of William I. to the 
 necessary and equitable expulsion of King James II., there 
 have been only three who have died unmarried ; ten have 
 married native wives, and some who have married wives, 
 not French — while twelve English monarchs have espoused 
 French princesses ; and from the marriage of William I., 
 in 1048, to the death of Henry VI., in 1472, the spouses 
 of all our Sovereigns were of French extraction for nearly 
 424 years consecutively ; besides the collaterals of the 
 Plantagenet race (planta genestse, so called from a broom 
 sprig in their caps, from whom descended the families of 
 Brome.) The English retained their foreign possessions 
 in France, until the loss of Calais, in 1558, which left so 
 deep a cicatrix on the tender and impressive Queen Mary, 
 that at her death she said Calais would be found engraven 
 on her heart. 
 
 For the comfort of Protestant England however this 
 meek potentate expired that same year, when she was 
 succeeded by her tolerant sister Elizabeth, whose name, 
 like that of our present female Sovereign, Britons delight to 
 honour. Elizabeth gave countenance to the French 
 language, which she added to her other various polyglot 
 accomplishments. 
 
 Although the French tongue was not unknown in Eng- 
 land anterior to the transference of supreme power to a 
 stranger in William I., yet it is notable that from the ac- 
 cession of King Egbert, in 819, to the death of Edgar 
 Atheling, the last of the Saxon dynasty in 1110, without 
 issue, not a single French alliance was contracted by any 
 of the Sovereigns who swayed our destinies, save that of a 
 second union of Ethelrcd II., with Emma, daughter of 
 Richard I., Duke of Normandy, who remarried Canute 
 the Great, King of Denmark, and who died in 1052. 
 
266 
 
 The advent of William here caused a decline in the 
 venerable Saxon tongue, for the Courts of England trans- 
 acted business in Norman-French so long that the native 
 speech was not restored until the 36 Edward III., in 1362, 
 to the Courts of Law, still French continued in parliamen- 
 tary affairs, nor were the statutes published in it until the 
 accession of King Richard III. in 1483. 
 
 Some documents, however, have been' disinterred from 
 the accumulated masses of manuscripts, national and 
 historical, of which no nation has any more perfect than 
 our own ; there is extant an indenture in English, bearing 
 date 1483, b but the earliest parliamentary proceedings in 
 English are not prior to 1388. 
 
 The Cambrian, or Kymracan tongue, is Welsh or Gaelic, 
 and the Walloon, or Galloon, is a dialect. The French, 
 like the Castilian, was styled in its infancy the Roman 
 tongue, which was the language of the Troubadours ; 
 parler-roman, meant speak French, to the days of Charles 
 V. of France, in the 14th century. 
 
 The oldest French poem was written about the sera of 
 William the Conqueror, whose antecessors were North- 
 men from Scandinavia, so it can not be affirmed that the 
 French ever conquered England. Normandy is said to be 
 the cradle of minstrelsy perfected by her sons of iron who 
 wrested that part of France from its weak natives. They 
 descended from the extreme north, and they brought with 
 them the art acquired from the Scalds, while the language 
 gradually declined into what is termed Romance, in which 
 dialects the minstrels composed their lays, and all that 
 resounds in fable and romance, for their history, laws, and 
 religion, like most primitive people, were expressed in 
 verse. The Troubadours were identified, in character and 
 spirit, with our Welsh harpers, temp. Edward I., and with 
 the Gaelic bagpipers ; and from these sprung the later 
 Improvisator -e of Italy, whose genuine successors are the 
 players and musicians of our days . 
 
267 
 
 Their credit lasted long, and robust was their frame and 
 fame, until they degraded themselves by licentiousness, 
 and were suppressed, like the Knights Templars, and sub- 
 sequently the Jesuits, who, for their inordinate arrogance, 
 have been at various times expelled all Europe (even from 
 Rome, the capital of Popery, in 1773?) from the time of 
 their suggesting to Chatel to assassinate King Henry IV. 
 of "France in 1594, he confessing that those fathers were 
 the instigators of the crime, until their late expulsion from 
 every Romanist state in Europe, when they at last found 
 refuge in .the Protestant realm of Frederic the Great of 
 Prussia, much to his credit both on the principles of 
 humanity and Christian injunction, " Love one another ." 
 This should have been a lesson of toleration, but in what 
 Romanist country, under similar circumstances, could Pro- 
 testants have found it ? It is grievous to remind Christians 
 that even to this day, for it is problematical to say whether 
 the laity or the hierarchy of Spain are the most intole- 
 rant, that in Spain a Protestant is not even allowed burial 
 on earth, or in it, but is taken out to sea and slighted into 
 its merciless bowels, there to find sepulture, a burning 
 shame to all who call on Christ's name, and at which Pagans 
 and Mahomedans would blush and, in exultation, add : 
 " Thou can'st not say we did it V It is a great political 
 mistake that toleration of religion is not only enjoined but 
 enforced as a Law of Nations, and thus true Christianity 
 be made to be respected even in heretic Spain. 
 
 The cause of toleration is that of the world, for it has 
 gone forth that man shall not be accountable to man, 
 dressed in brief authority, for his faith — the sin of intole- 
 rance, like ingratitude, is worse than witchcraft. 
 
 To revert, the French of this day derives through the 
 Romance tongue, which was corrupt Latin. This corrup- 
 tion began early, for in the days of Quintilian he said of 
 the people " cxclamasse barbarc." 
 
 - 
 
268 
 
 This declension continued, and begot Romance or Pro- 
 vencal, which dialect became more refined as the Latins 
 degenerated, and from being colloquial it took the place of 
 a fixed tongue, and into it were Church homilies translated, 
 while it attained its perfection about the twelfth century. 
 
 And so it lasted for about 250 years, and from the middle 
 of the 14th century it dates its decadence, while the French 
 became more cultivated, although there is no standard 
 French author anterior to the 17th century. 
 
 Let the French and Italians value themselves on the re- 
 gularity of their tongue, we are content that strength and 
 elevation should be our countervailing attribute. We are 
 irregular and yet we have the truest analogies, though to 
 them we do not yield a slavish adherence. 
 
 We were never uniform in our pronunciation, for John 
 de Trevisa in 1387 remarks, " Hit semeth a grete wonder 
 how Englisch is dyverse of soun in this oon ilond," and 
 the regret may be reiterated still, the phonetic expedient 
 finding no more countenance for orthography than did of 
 old the affected euphuism for expression of sentiment. 
 
 The syntax of French resembles Latin, but the tongue 
 owes more to Italian, from which it is immediately derived. 
 The French are perhaps the only people who speak with- 
 out accent, except an occasional circumflex, pronouncing 
 their words with a uniformity that renders their language 
 ill adapted for poetry, for where there is no variety there 
 can be no continued melody. 
 
 In versification of feet and quantities the French and Ita- 
 lian are imperfect, for Malherbe first brought pauses into 
 use. They are apparently unaware what feet are to be 
 used in heroic poetry ; formerly they had but five feet or 
 ten syllables in their heroic verse, but since the days of 
 Eonsard, who died 1585, they found their tongue too weak 
 to support epic poetry without the addition of another 
 foot ; and as Dryden observes this gives the run and mea- 
 
269 
 
 sure of a trimeter. They have more activity both in per- 
 sonal character and poetry than strength ; the nimbleness 
 of the greyhound, but not the bulk and vigour of the 
 mastiff, while our nation and our verses overbear them by 
 their weight, pondere non numero. 
 
 Perhaps the French is unique in the number of its 
 mutable syllables, for there are scarce three words together 
 in any sentence in which one or two are not at least par- 
 tially quiescent. No language whatever is spoken so un- 
 like its orthography, and it seems to have been invented 
 to prove how dissimilar letters and sound could be. There 
 are great inconsistencies in English, but French enun- 
 ciation exceeds it, although the mute condition of the 
 letters, the anomaly in its prolation once established, is 
 recognised, and seldom varies in French ; but in English 
 we use different sounds for different vowels and conso- 
 nants, which do much involve and perplex foreigners, as 
 well as those who are native and to the manner born. 
 
 The French H is nearly always mute, but it is aspirated 
 before all the vowels in some words, amounting to some 
 140; so said Jean Palsgrave, a Priest and Prebendary of 
 St. Paul's, who died in 1554, and who wrote a French 
 grammar, temp. Henry VIII., " which was compyled for the 
 Ladie Marie of England, his doughter — introductorie for 
 to lerne, to rede, to pronounce, and to speke Frenche 
 trcwly," to whom it was dedicated in 1530. The first gram- 
 mar published in that tongue, although the schools and 
 monasteries had their grammars of French also. 
 
 The English II is occasionally dumb at the beginning 
 of words, but in Spanish it is never uttered. The double 
 LL in Spanish is always liquid, and it is so mostly in French 
 when preceded by an i, like brilliant. Some words however 
 do not require this liquid sound, as illcgitimc, Chillon, &c., 
 though one can sec no reason why the French should not 
 follow the norma loquendi of Spanish pronunciation in all 
 
2?0 
 
 cases. Some words in English assume new import accord- 
 ing to the accent thrown, as gallant for brave., gallant for 
 polite, and this answers to the position of the adjective be- 
 fore the noun in French, (page 124.) 
 
 The nasal ing is used by the Portuguese as well as the 
 French, the former taking it from their French connection 
 under Henry King of Burgundy, in the eleventh century. 
 
 Many words end in merit in French from the Italian 
 mente, which is the word incrementum, increase, and by 
 grammarians these words are styled Hemantic ; the gram- 
 mar of French resembles the Italian in verbs requiring 
 the objective or dative case after them, as plaire aux dames, 
 S'approcher du feu, resister a vos desirs, &c. 
 
 De is of or from, and answers to the genitive and abla- 
 tive cases ; a answers to the dative, as a lui, and en to the 
 accusative. 
 
 In French, whenever the participle perfect is preceded 
 by the pure affection, that is the accusative case, the parti- 
 ciple is declined, and agrees with the said accusative in 
 number and gender, if not the participle is not varied. 
 This rule does not hold exactly with Italian or Spanish, 
 where the agreement of the participle is less frequent. 
 
 Pure affection, quand ils se sont rendus. Impure, quand 
 ils se sont rendu maitres de la ville. The participle con- 
 jugated with avoir is declinable when the object precedes 
 it, as II les abattus; also when the object is followed im- 
 mediately by que ; and when without altering the position 
 of the object the verb avoir can be resolved into avoir 
 ete. 
 
 It is varied when it has for a subsequent a neuter in the 
 infinitive mood, as the object cannot be governed by the 
 infinitive mood, but by the participle, as Je lai laisser passer. 
 When the participle is followed by que it is indeclinable, 
 as elle avait espere que je viendrais. 
 
 In Latin the passive participle is substantiated into a 
 
271 
 
 noun as, Eo ad eubitum j in jussu parentum abiit. Turpe est 
 dictu. So the French offers examples of the same sub- 
 stantiation of participles, as Je vais a mon git, a Finscu de 
 ses parens. 
 
 The use of what grammarians call apposition is very rare 
 in the French tongue, as in Latin, Anna Soror, that is by 
 substantives only, because it has an aversion to ellipsis \ 
 but either they put one of the nouns in the genitive, as La 
 Ville de Rome, or they add a verb, La ville qui est appe- 
 lee Rome, or else they add an adjective as Rome, ville ce- 
 lebre, and do not say Rome ville, nor do they say, priez 
 pour nous pecheurs, but they put the adjectives before 
 the substantives, as pauvres, &c. 
 
 They occasionally use ellipsis, as Ouvrez la porte quel- 
 qiiun, that is de vous omitted, indeed the pronouns are con- 
 tinually repeated in French. 
 
 Participles are often not declined, when we say J'ai trouve 
 cette femme Usant, &c, where neither the participle past, 
 nor the participle present are varied. La peine que m'a 
 donne cette affaire, and not donnee, which participles are 
 equal to gerunds. 
 
 The motto of the Order of the Garter is a metaphorical 
 idea, for the word honi does not mean evil but by implica- 
 tion. 
 
 It used to be a law in reading French and pronouncing 
 it, never to let the principal fall on the accessory ; but, un- 
 fortunately that law seems be evaded, in cursory pronun- 
 ciation and in declaiming, euphonise gratia, but it will spoil 
 the language, as the substantive should stand alone, being 
 the grand fulcrum of the sentence, tear t£ox»?v, par excel- 
 lence, giving majesty and independence, for if every word 
 is to be carried into its following word, why should not the 
 conjunction et be subjected to the same fate and practice. 
 Where the hyphen is employed, it is well to sound the two 
 words as if one—M, Champs-Elysees. 
 
272 
 
 It is the only tongue in existence where words naturally- 
 separated are yoked in reading or speaking it, and I think 
 it had been equally graceful had it been allowed to follow 
 the same law as other speech, and that without any 
 loss of euphony, for whose sake even the genders have 
 been altered — as mon ame for ma alme, and so with the 
 rest. It is carrying deference to sound too far to render a 
 language ungrammatical for its sake. There are anomalies 
 in most tongues, arising frequently in a desire for va- 
 riety. Hence all the changes in Greek and all the innu- 
 merable tenses which perplex and scarcely enucleate the 
 sense. It is still to be hoped this innovation will not pro- 
 ceed so far as to get beyond the reach of recovery, and 
 that in the pronunciation of all who have delicate ears and 
 just judgment, the final consonant of the substantive may 
 never fall on the adjective, and that imbroglio of sense 
 and sound may never be predicated of a language which 
 is truly graceful, and, ex necessitate rerum, the common 
 vehicle of thought between nations in diplomatic and social 
 relation. Pity it is, that French were not more indispen- 
 sable in all education, which would preclude the alternative 
 of learning more than one tongue besides the matricular. 
 Not that it has a moiety of the qualities requisite for a 
 universal language that English has, for its idiom being very 
 elliptical, the nasal tones (which happily are becoming less 
 so daily), and the difficulty of pronouncing eu and u, ren- 
 der it very hard for any but natives, I had almost said for 
 Parisians to conquer its peculiar intonations. The French 
 pronounce E with ten different variations of tone, and 
 Mitford asserts in his Harmony of Language, that U as 
 pronounced by the French is only found in the French 
 dialect, and that no other people use the sound, or have 
 any character to express it. They used to pronounce oi, 
 like ai, as Francois, Louvois. Although e constitutes half 
 the French rhymes, it seldom occurs twice successively in 
 
273 
 
 the same word, as in devenir, remener, &c. In interroga- 
 tions, e is sounded as aime-je prie-je? 
 
 The majesty and simplicity of the English tongue give 
 it infinitely better claims to become a universal tongue, 
 and the wide area over which it is spread, induces reason- 
 able belief and hope that it will be what its predecessors — 
 the learned dialects — have been in their range of time, al- 
 most a universal dialect ; but in all things human, " Sur- 
 git amari aliquid." The pronunciation is its stumbling 
 block, and although the grammar is said to be easiness 
 itself by reason of an almost absence from inflection (shew- 
 ing its pure descent from primitive tongues in its primitive 
 diction, for originally all tongues whatever were nearly 
 uninflected, as is demonstrated by the oldest living dialect, 
 Chinese, and what can be recovered from Egyptian monu- 
 ments as to its hieroglyphic character, and also from the 
 arrow-headed or cuneiform), yet the irregularity and want 
 of analogy in our enunciation, exposes us to the smart 
 reproach of our witty neighbours, the men of Gaul, who 
 remark that the pronunciation of English is an impossi- 
 bility, for what is written Moses is pronounced Nebuchad- 
 nezzar, and as was said of the Portuguese, it would be an 
 excellent language if the natives knew how to pronounce it. 
 Many are surprised at the apparently irregular pronun- 
 ciation of English, and assert it is impossible to account 
 for its multifarious variety on any principles of analogy. 
 Many devoted to the dead languages (but not buried), 
 when they emerge into the world, begin to find that they 
 have still to learn their matricular tongue, and arc un- 
 willing to surrender time to its attainment, yet flatter them- 
 selves they shall obtain their object by association. This 
 is a good help, but insufficient to acquire an adequate 
 knowledge of English. Many writers and speakers have 
 enjoyed these advantages to their fullest extent, and are 
 
274 
 
 very deficient in its grammar, etymology, and origin. They 
 must avail themselves of the works of the orthoepists and 
 logicians, by diligent perusal of which they may accom- 
 plish that literary desideratum. 
 
 All pronunciation is referable to analogy, and although 
 the French admit the grammar is simple, they still aver 
 that the pronunciation is invincible. Like the Greeks, 
 they rarely learn any language but their own, and would, 
 in this particular, like them, proclaim all other nations 
 barbarians but themselves. They have written books to 
 prove that French is the all in all sufficient, and if it pleases 
 their vanity, for they live in a halo of it, ]et them indulge. 
 Their tongue has of anomalies in grammar and pronun- 
 ciation satis superque. A Jesuit named Bouhours, known 
 for his work, " La maniere de bien penser," of consider- 
 able acumen and delicacy of discrimination, wrote a trea- 
 tise to shew that French was the sole language for mortals 
 to speak. He gives ugly epithets to all others, and con- 
 cludes that French alone has the secret of uniting brevity 
 with clearness, purity, and politeness. In fine, all affec- 
 tation and labour are equally repugnant to a good French 
 style. He goes so far as to add that the pronunciation of 
 French is most natural and pleasing of any, characterising 
 all tongues with some discordant defects — the English with 
 whistling in their talk— and winds up by saying the French 
 alone can properly be said to speak, which arises from not 
 accenting any syllable before the penultimate. I think 
 vanity and critical deficiency can hardly go beyond these 
 observations, for the French certainly combines as many 
 defects in pronunciation as can fall to the lot of language. 
 Their enunciation of eu and u is hideous and unnatural ; 
 and few will think that a nasal tendency adds harmony to 
 sound. It has its merits for grace, precision, and delicacy 
 of expression, but in pronunciation it is perhaps the most 
 
275 
 
 remote of all civilized tongues from perfection. The hide- 
 ousness of the nasal twang is in process of reduction, but 
 it would be to annihilate French to abstract nasality from 
 its enunciation ; it is an inherent and ineradicable taint. 
 
 Fragmentary Remarks on Eastern Tongues and 
 Times. 
 
 The writer has no pretension to more than a superficial 
 acquaintance with Eastern tongues, so that what follows 
 here is written as merely connected with what has preceded 
 this chapter blending oriental story with language, perhaps 
 inseparable from such a conjunction. 
 
 Placing affiance in the facts, and to render this tractate 
 on human speech more acceptable, and to imbue it with 
 a collateral interest, these fragmentary remarks are ap- 
 pended, which will comprise as much history as will 
 contribute to illustrate the various customs and usages 
 which have relation to the languages to which reference is 
 made. 
 
 It is generally, though not universally admitted, that all 
 languages were originally one, and that they proceeded from 
 that one which Adam spoke in Paradise, given to him 
 for all necessary purposes, and transmitted purely to his 
 descendants, one of whom was Noah in the tenth descent, 
 whose son Japhet peopled the western world ; while Shem, 
 probably the eldest born as first mentioned in Scripture, 
 and from whom Abraham descended also in the tenth 
 degree, so to our Saviour according to the flesh, who 
 derives in lineal succession, being the sixty- first deduced 
 from Adam who was the Son of God. 
 
 How far the language of the first man, and Eve his wife, 
 (not created like him but who was a development from him as 
 a child from its mother,) subsequently spoken without even 
 a dialect, was affected by the confusion of tongues can never 
 
 t 2 
 
276 
 
 be determined, but some learned in tbese questions, as 
 Bryant, thought the confusion a partial event, while 
 Socrates, the Christian divine, surmised that the lingual 
 subdivisions consequent upon it diverged into seventy-two 
 varieties, from which arose all future speech. 
 
 It has been maintained that Abraham and his immediate 
 antecessors did not lose the purity of that tongue in which 
 also Moses wrote his history and explained his cosmogony, 
 although they were idolaters and worshipped Teraphim, 
 or lunar amulets or types of the ark in the form of a cres- 
 cent. At the age of two hundred and five years Terah died, 
 having removed from Ur in Chaldea to Haran in Mesopo- 
 tamia, whence Abraham came to Canaan, and in the year 
 1893, B.C. in the one hundred and seventy-fifth year of his 
 age died, having previously undergone the rite of circum- 
 cision. The Jews from that time settled in Palestine, the 
 meaning of which proper name is Pali, shepherd, and stan, 
 place or country, and the waters laving the coasts is called 
 Tarshish, which means sea. In Sanskrit it is rendered by 
 Carchish, like Carthage. Tarshish was son of Javan. 
 
 This present is emphatically the age of philologers and 
 etymologists, who dive into the arcana of dead dialects in 
 like manner with the geologists who extort their treasures 
 from the womb of earth, and it is to be hoped that the two 
 languages known as the arrow-headed and the Sanskrit, 
 which obtained in the civilised world while the languages 
 of Greece and Borne were only in embryo much less 
 matured, may yet be satisfactorily interpreted and de- 
 cyphered — 
 
 Errors like straws upon the surface flow, 
 They who would seek for pearls must dive below — 
 through a well applied labour commensurate with exigen- 
 cies. 
 
 We possess the Hebrew, probably the most ancient of 
 tongues, in all its simplicity, as written by the author of 
 
 
277 
 
 the Pentateuch ; neither did it lose any of its purity when 
 written by Malachi. Subsequently it deteriorated in speech 
 and composition, for the language in Syria and the Holy 
 Land at the advent of our Saviour was not Hebrew but a 
 dialect of it, when the Peshito or literal is supposed to have 
 been the common tongue of Palestine, into which the New 
 Testament was translated in the first century of grace with 
 the greatest fidelity, according to Michaelis. 
 
 Sir William Jones says that the square or Chaldee 
 character in which Hebrew is written is of no remote an- 
 tiquity. The Psalm, cxix, divided into twenty-two parts 
 from the same number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet, 
 is supposed by some to be no older than the time of Esdras, 
 who on his return from Babylon about 457 B.C. copied 
 the books. 
 
 The learned Dr. Gyll in his treatise on the Hebrew 
 tongue combats these opinions, and has entered largely 
 into the nature and antiquity of Hebrew letters, vowel 
 points, and accents, deducing them from the earliest times 
 without variation, and he affirms that what Moses wrote 
 was the same that Adam spoke or wrote, and that speech 
 was given to our progenitor by a beneficent Creator when 
 he breathed life into him, and made him at once a reasoning 
 and a speaking animal, in which it seems to me that man 
 is analogous to the hypostatic union, a trinity, composed 
 of soul, life or spirit, and matter. 
 
 This language then augmented by degrees as necessity 
 impelled, through new wants or new ideas, and thus con- 
 tinued in its entirety until the overthrow of all human 
 speech on the plains of Shinar in Mesopotamia some 2230 
 years before the dawn of the year of grace. From this 
 source came those which are sister dialects — Samaritan, 
 Chaldee, Syriae, Arabic, and Egyptian, the Hebrew being 
 anterior in time and superior in dignity and simplicity. 
 The prediluvian tongue lasted IGjG years unimpaired, for 
 
278 
 
 Moses alleges (Gen. xi.) that the whole earth was one 
 language and one speech, no dialects or idioms prevailing. 
 The longevity of the patriarchs contributed to this end, for 
 Adam's life was protracted to the sixteenth century, and 
 in the seventeenth following the flood eventuated. 
 
 " The people is one, they have all one lip or pronuncia- 
 tion," so we see that all these tongues were nearly allied, and 
 bear relation, similar to the Ionic, iEolic and Doric dialects 
 of Greece, for Herodotus makes known that he actually 
 heard the same language in Colchis that he heard in Egypt, 
 this being a colony founded by some of the soldiers of 
 Sesostris. Kcu rj Z,ori Traaa kol tj yXwcro-a kfx^epriQ $gtl 
 aXXqXoitH, their colour and language being similar each to 
 each. B. II. c. 105. 
 
 The Arabic is a Semitic tongue nearly as antique as 
 Hebrew. Hence the Arabians, and so also the Chinese 
 claim priority of antiquity, but this pretension can not be 
 entertained. Noah taught his matricular tongue, and so 
 it may have been spoken by Abraham during his sojourn 
 at Ur. The confusion took place in the days of Peleg, 
 when Abraham was forty^eight years of age. 
 
 Did his family then talk Hebrew in its purity and carry 
 it to Judea? The Chaldean is evidently a derivative from 
 Hebrew, which is the very language which the Creator 
 wrote on the tables of stone ; and it is hardly to be sup- 
 posed that Ezra would change the Hebrew character 
 without an order from God himself, and no such injunction 
 is to be found. Itis at least credible and worthy belief that 
 the Jews kept their language and letters as they did their 
 precepts and ritual, unaltered. 
 
 Adam having received from heaven the gift of speech, it 
 is consonant to verisimilitude that he also invented letters 
 as indispensable to a social status, and that the art of nume- 
 ration was not unknown to the prediluvians whose property 
 was in flocks and herds, so they must have transacted 
 
279 
 
 business as did the postdiluvians subsequently,, who were 
 not so immediately under the care of heaven as the Jews 
 under the theocracy, and that there was no mutation in the 
 writing, as far as the Jews were concerned, hence the 
 inference that the noble square, majestic letters were the 
 same as those still found recording the Law and Prophets. 
 
 During the captivity the Jews had to be taught the 
 Chaldee. Now the Syriac and Chaldee are nearer to each 
 other than the Hebrew. All holy writ is in Hebrew except 
 Job in Arabic, and parts of Daniel in Chaldee. If therefore 
 the language was constant so were the letters. With the 
 confusion came variety of tongues which necessitated 
 change of symbols, and this took place in Chaldea where 
 the adjacent capitals of Nineveh and Babylon, almost 
 coevals, were located. 
 
 A great controversy has reigned among Hebrew sages 
 touching vowel points and accents, which act and react on 
 each other. They allege that there is no syllable without 
 a point and no word without an accent. Dr. Gyll has 
 analysed this question, and I think he deduces clear proof 
 of their existence and use at all times ; but while he has 
 many a Hebrew champion on his side he has robust oppo- 
 nents against him. 
 
 Philo the Jew positively insists that his people never 
 changed a word that Moses wrote ; and many anterior to 
 him mention the books of the Law in Hebrew with letters 
 and vowels, so that Ezra can not be proved to have intro- 
 duced points j for if they were indispensable in Ezra's 
 days they were equally so in the old time before him. 
 
 Besides it is impossible to read Hebrew without them ; 
 and although Bibles may be printed without them or manu- 
 scripts found indicating their absence, it does not signify 
 indubitably that they were not in use previously. Time was 
 when Greek accents were not in use, although known to 
 the Greeks of the earlier and purer ages, but as to their 
 
280 
 
 appearing in MSS. they are even of a very modern date, and 
 have been in common use only since the 7th century, and 
 even subsequently many MSS. appear divested of these ad- 
 juncts, and to hear a modern Greek read his own language 
 in violation of all quantity must be proof, satis superque, that 
 accents are very arbitrary, contrary to analogy and reason, 
 and contradictory even to perverseness, for it is futile to pre- 
 tend that accents as used in modern Greece are consistent 
 with quantity, and that a due regard may be had to both. 
 Ex. : they enunciate Euripides, Evripedes, and so with 
 clouds of other words and vowels, inverting their quantity 
 and making what is naturally short to be emitted long, 
 annihilating in fact quantity, rhythm and scansion too, in 
 most admired confusion. 
 
 The cases respecting the question of Greek and Hebrew 
 accents or points are not analogous, for the accent may 
 indicate an elevation or depression of voice and still be 
 read without them, but no one can so well dispense with 
 Hebrew points styled diacritical or distinctive, which really 
 separate or distinguish ; or who is to discriminate between 
 nouns and verbs, active and passive voices, &c, and es- 
 pecially what is termed the vau conversive of tenses to be 
 observed, or even to investigate the roots of vocables ? 
 
 In Hebrew the future, imperative, optative and potential 
 forms are all identified or nearly so with each other, or else 
 one modification of the verb answers to all. Such is the 
 nicety of this tongue and its requirements that an insertion 
 of the Vau will also convert many Hebrew into Indo- 
 European words, though their connection has been disputed, 
 and that the Semitic dialects constitute a distinct depart- 
 ment of language. 
 
 In confirmation of the opinion of Dr. Gyll, a very learned 
 Hebraist, Dr. Parkhurst, did not think the Jews exchanged 
 the Hebrew for the Chaldaic tongue at the captivity ; and 
 that seventy years, the lapse of their thraldom, was too 
 
281 
 
 short a period for a people to lose a tongue in which they 
 prayed daily, and from which selections from the Old 
 Testament were recited, independent on the sure and 
 certain hope of their revisiting Jerusalem, the joy of the 
 whole earth, and if they retrieved or retained their tongue 
 the symbols would undergo no change ; and according to 
 Esther viii. 9, Ahasuerus* decree was written in all lan- 
 guages, and that too only five years after Ezra had obtained 
 his commission for the Jews to return to Salem, while 
 Ezekiel wrote his prophecies in Hebrew which were pub- 
 lished during the captivity, and so did all the prophets, 
 God's penmen, write to the period of Malachi, whose holy 
 strains close the sacred roll. 
 
 The languages of Syria, Phoenicia, Palestine and Canaan 
 were sister dialects, and Arabic is another congener of 
 extreme antiquity. The Samaritan alphabet is denominated 
 Phoenician, and medals of Tyre and Carthage have legends 
 in Hebrew and Chaldee characters, for the Phoenicians 
 were in common with the Hebrews of Semitic original. 
 
 Canaan was the son of Ham, and the Phoenician and 
 Panic (see Masclef s grammar) was the same tongue says 
 Augustin the father. There is scarce a single Punic word 
 extant, (p. 187.) Mago, like Cato the Censor, wrote on 
 agriculture ; and the Periplus of Hanno was rendered into 
 G reek, but nothing of the original remains. 
 
 They called themselves Chanani, and St. Jerome asserts 
 identity of language for its base, and that it is a middle 
 tongue between Egyptian and Hebrew. 
 
 Again the Pelasgic is Phoenician according to Diodorus 
 Siculus; and the Pelasgi came from India, of which pro- 
 bability or fact the Sanskrit roots which occur abundantly 
 in their tongue do not permit us to doubt ; hence the 
 Celtic must be of Indo-European extraction. 
 
 Now the Scriptures point that Javan populated Ionia 
 and Greece, and that all the countries to the west of Greece 
 
282 
 
 derived their population from him, who must have spoken 
 Hebrew, the language of Japhet, and this before language 
 was corrupted, for all the descendants of Noah were pro- 
 bably not collectively settled on the plains of Shinar. One 
 Cadmus (if such a one there were, for the word is Kedem, 
 and being interpreted means sun or the east, for Herodotus, 
 B. V. c, 58, says he saw their symbols on certain tripods) 
 is said to have carried letters into Greece, hence Greek 
 is mediately derived from Hebrew, and Latin is semi- 
 Greek, or in other words an Eolian dialect of it. Even 
 the Lacedaemonians and Jews thought themselves deducible 
 from one common stock, for which opinion Josephus, B. 
 XII. c. 5, may be consulted. 
 
 Latin was blended with Oscan, a language which existed 
 in Italy down to the age of Ennius the poet, who died 
 169 B.C. ; so difficult is it to extirpate a language once 
 grounded and rooted in any country. In England the old 
 Norse idiom was till lately spoken in the Orkneys, and the 
 Cornish dialect has not been discontinued more than a 
 century. 
 
 In fine, modern investigators shew such unequivocal 
 evidence of affinity in language, that out of 2000 German 
 radicals the erudite Bibliander in his day, for he died in 
 1564, found in his researches 800 radicals common to 
 German, Greek and Latin, all of Keltic origin, which is 
 the same as Gaelic or Gaulish, which comprises Wales, 
 Great Britain, and its isles. 
 
 In the numerals there is a marked similarity between 
 English, German, Keltic, Persian, and Sanskrit. This 
 latter is a wonderful structure and more perfect than the 
 Greek, bearing affinity to the learned languages in root 
 and grammar, for the Greek has a considerable portion of 
 its vocabulary pure Sanskrit. The word crusca, as applied 
 to Italian literature, the meaning of which is bran, bears 
 analogy to the word Sanskrit, which means pure, or sifted 
 
283 
 
 tongue, while Prakrit means residuum, or natural tongue 
 without philosophical or artificial addenda or increments. 
 
 It has been remarked that Sanskrit answers Greek as 
 face to face in a mirror, for you will find the verb in the 
 corresponding tense, and so with the noun and adjective 
 as to case and gender, while the idiom and government are 
 the same with many roots identical. 
 
 Collateral evidence may be adduced of the common 
 origin of the Indian tongues from the peculiar arrangement 
 of the Sanskrit alphabet, so different from that of any 
 other part of the world, and which exists in the greater 
 part of the east from Indus to Pegu, in dialects apparently 
 unconnected and in dissimilar characters. 
 
 A dual number is found in Greek, Gothic and Icelandic ; 
 whilst in some languages a number for more than two has 
 been discovered and used : for example there is a tetral 
 number in Sclavonic or Sarmatian, which is written in 
 Greek character, resembling the Sanskrit in gender, de- 
 clension, and moods with their form and paradigms. Their 
 substantive verb Jesmi is only the asmioi Sanskrit (pp. 25. 
 88.), the tlfjLi of Greek, the esum or sum of Latin, 
 
 I advert to the Arabic language here as a congener of 
 the remotest antiquity, the same in which Job composed 
 his narrative, probably the most choice Arabic then, since 
 which it has passed through its verbal and syntactical 
 mutations, diverging into dialects of various orders of 
 purity of which the Koreish or Koran (the Book) is the 
 most chaste and efficient specimen of lingual purity. The 
 Arabic characters were invented only a brief period before 
 this publication, but it was not perfected from the Cufic till 
 some centuries after the epoch of the arch-impostor Ma- 
 homet, like Attila the scourge of heaven, one who flushed 
 with conquest engaged in rivalry, and who impiously chal- 
 lenged comparison with the Son of God, but whose dc- 
 
284 
 
 grading doctrines and pretensions are gradually growing 
 pale and withered before the Sun of Righteousness. 
 
 Fortunately we are now perfectly cognisant of the Arabic 
 of all ages, but in other contemporaneous speech we have 
 much to seek owing to the insensate character of both 
 Greeks and Romans, who might have learned other tongues, 
 especially the one of mystery, the hieroglyphic, which is a 
 sort of exalted gas, a crystallisation of hieratic, which was 
 again a crystal of demotic, perhaps not very far removed 
 from Hebrew, containing many of its constituents, as before 
 remarked. From inattention to etymology it seems never 
 to have struck the ancients that to know their own it was 
 indispensable to investigate other languages ; they placed 
 every ancient record to their own account, and made their 
 country the scene of every action (p. 237). From what source 
 did they conclude their language flowed, or did they surmise 
 that the avroxOoveg must also have had a heaven-inspired 
 speech ? This obstinacy has its birth in pride, the same 
 which caused the conflagration of the famous Alexandrian 
 library, A.D. 640, by Omar the Caliph, inspired by the fury 
 of a fanatic, an indisposition to be familiar with or sift any 
 language, so it ended in ignorance, whose broad veil mantles 
 the earth with darkness till right and wrong are accidents. 
 
 What stores of curious learning might have been revealed 
 to us had any one Greek or Roman of intelligence applied 
 himself to Egyptian lore, and enabled us to unravel the 
 mysterious meanings on their motley stones and sepulchres. 
 This nation is of a date little subsequent to the flood, and 
 the very name is thought to be u, a house, and koht fire — 
 but more probable from ai, land, and Gupti, Coptic. 
 
 Names and religions in the East seem to use the word 
 fire, as generic for every thing, whether proper names of 
 places or patronymics. The word cham means fire, Ind, 
 flame, implying sun and start, is locality. All the Eastern 
 
285 
 
 world were star-worshippers, and what is equally true and 
 remarkable that the Peruvians in South America were fire- 
 worshippers, for the Incas, their hierarchs and monarchs 
 too, pretended descent from the Sun like the Persians and 
 Chinese, and among the ten Avatars or incarnations of 
 Vishnu the name of the wife of one was Sit a. The word 
 Rama is found among the Avatars, which would imply that 
 the principal festival of the Peruvians, styled Rama-sitoa,, 
 had reference to the Indian Avatars. 
 
 In fact all antiquity through consecutive ages seems to 
 have been one vast body of fire-worshippers supposed to 
 have been taught first by Nimrod the giant, the hunter, to 
 the Assyrians, whose king he was after the Deluge, which is 
 the most rational of all mere natural religions, whether we 
 take "the glorious planet Sol" or the Northern Star, of 
 whose true fixed and resting quality there is no fellow in 
 the firmament. These untutored children having deflected 
 from the true course of virtue, and brought on themselves 
 the retribution due, as apparent in the overthrow of lan- 
 guage, for shameful disobedience, quite forgot or preter- 
 mitted what Noah and his immediate posterity had taught, 
 and so substituted externalities for spiritualities, whereby 
 mankind again lost sight of him to whom they owed all, who 
 created them as they were, nor was his service hard. Even 
 Abraham was an idolater worshipping the lunar amulets or 
 types of the Theba or ark, till reclaimed for ends beyond 
 his reach to know. They had their magicians, all conver- 
 sant with fire, whose name derives from May, fire. Rab 
 mag is great magician, Hub Saris chief eunuch, Rab-shakah 
 chief elder. With them the names of offices were trans- 
 ferred to tin? holder, as among Europeans, Mareschail and 
 Butler, or Botteler, arc given to certain functionaries. 
 
 In fine there is scarce an important word in the East 
 which docs not either mean or imply the Sun or its attri- 
 butes. Beginning with Budha in Sanskrit, which means 
 
286 
 
 Sun, while the Trinity, "Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, are 
 names which bear similar interpretation. Budha is thought 
 to be identical with Vuda, hence Wodi, and with nasa 
 suffix, Wodin, the northern celebrity. The Egyptian Menes 
 is again a transformation of Menu, the Sun, or fxr^v ; fiav, 
 the Moon, implying crescent, or else Noah ; some think it 
 means Nimrod, founder of the Assyrian monarchy, and 
 Khur, hence Cyrus, all mean, Sun. Pharaoh is only Phre, 
 the same in the Coptic as Phoroneus, of all Argos king, 
 is only the same word a little modified (p. 117) ■ Memnon 
 in mythology is styled son of Aurora or the dawn, and 
 Tithonus means Sun likewise. What is Cadmus but Kedem 
 the East or Sun ; and in the twelve labours of Hercules, 
 that myth of a man, we discover the twelve signs of the 
 Zodiac; and in the eight great gods the eight persons 
 saved in the ark, for the history of the Deluge was no secret 
 to the ethnic world. What of Apollo and of Mercury the 
 Egyptian Taut or Hermes and Cadmus, all are identical ? 
 The Sun is Achad-Achad-Ham, hence Cadmus by contrac- 
 tion. In Chinese the Word Ge or Jee means Sun, and 
 Yue the Moon, while Tien means heaven personified as a 
 God, corresponding to the ovpavbg and Ccelus of the 
 Western world. 
 
 To arrive at etymologies words are compressed or evolved, 
 letters are inserted and inversions used. If we adopt this 
 legitimate process with Tien we get neit. Now the 
 temple of Neita was at Sais in Egypt, and Cecrops came 
 with a Saite colony and founded Athens, the eye of Greece. 
 
 In this mysterious vocable, signifying intellect and the 
 dianoetic power, etymologists have disclosed Athena, by 
 the addendum of ena, and this tien is surmised to be no 
 other, implying eternity. Further association seems to be 
 in the word tihan, meaning a bow, or the concavity of 
 heaven in Sanskrit, which seems to be the womb of 
 mythology as well as of inflected diction; but Bryant 
 
287 
 
 assigns it a different derivation, and that it is the genius 
 of the ark. 
 
 Take again the proper names Venus, Vesta or Bona 
 Dea, among the Scythians, and we discern a common 
 source. Mitra is a name for Venus with the Persians, 
 and Mitras means Sum 
 
 The Greeks styled Diana Artemis, supposed to be only 
 another variety of Mitras, the same being Venus in As- 
 syria, associated with Astarte the Moon, the identical 
 Ashteroth. 
 
 Even Europe was one of the names of the Syrian Astarte. 
 So that to this fountain of light, the Sun, that with 
 surpassing glory crowned, may all Ethnic mythology be 
 referred, who 
 
 Looks from his sole dominion like the God 
 Of this vast world. 
 Let those who would see to what extent the word Sun 
 or its equivalent is carried consult Bryant's Mythology, 
 at once applicable to Deity, person, temple, tower, and town. 
 The Linga and Phallus are only types of that power 
 whose genial warmth engenders all things. 
 
 The word Hur, of frequent occurrence in the East, from 
 which so many Persian words proceed, is only the arch- 
 chymic Sun, as Houri, which in Hebrew is aor, Sun, while 
 the oldest form of Sabaism consists in Sun-worship, or what 
 is more general in adoration of the whole heavenly host, 
 and from these facts are derived appellatives of all kinds. 
 
 Suhaa in Arabic is the Sun, hence Sakya, a Sanskrit 
 name for Budha ; from this again is supposed to be the 
 parent of Sacsc, Scythse, &c. Odin or Wodin is designated 
 son of Sigge or Sacsc, the origin of Saxon, who are thus 
 comprised in the ample fold of fire-worshippers. 
 
 The image which Nebuchadnezzar set up was probably 
 that of'Budlia or Sacya, hence Sach, Se-sacli, meaning illus- 
 trious, and all are analogous. The Babylonians styled 
 
288 
 
 their kingdom Sesach. — Jerera. xxv. 26. The Sacse, Saca- 
 sense or Saxons, all may derive from the God Sacya, a deity- 
 adored under the form of a sword, which again is called 
 Seax, venerated under the title of Woden, a variation of 
 Boden or Budha, such close affinity seems to adhere to 
 these appellatives. The festivals at Babylon were also 
 known by the name of Sacea, the metropolis of Sun- 
 adorers, and even the Massa-getse offered horses to the 
 Sun in sacrifice, as swiftest of animals. 
 
 To extend these observations let me observe that Kisha 
 and Kusha means Sun in Sanskrit, rendered also Ethiopia 
 in the Bible ; and the Arimaspians, " who purloined the 
 guarded gold," are fabulously said to have but one eye, 
 implying Sun- worshippers, in the golden eye of day. 
 
 If then the Sun came in for so large a share of man*s 
 adoration, the earth, which Dr. Faber thinks was the once 
 blessed and original habitation of Satan the archangel in 
 his sphere of immortalities, hurled into chaos only for his 
 rebellion in unison with his horrid crew, who dared defy the 
 Omnipotent to arms, and which earth was and ever will be 
 the only theatre of man's innocence, fall, recovery, and 
 future place of bliss, this Planet on which the Son of Man 
 laid down his life for our redemption on the bitter cross was 
 not less worshipped by the manifold adorers of creation. 
 
 Tacitus remarks in his German history, c. 40, that all the 
 tribes agree in worshipping Hertham, mother earth, who 
 teems and feeds all — " id est terram colunt/' for earth has a 
 creative power as well as the arch-chymic Sun, and was ac- 
 knowledged mother, as indicative of fertility by the Scandi- 
 navians to the north, and Italy to the south, whose tributary 
 sacrifice to the earth was a hog. The proper name Scanda is 
 thought to be identical with Budha, which we have ob- 
 served is Wodin and Odin, all indicative of the Sun. 
 * The very habits and customs the Eastern and Western 
 world were analogous, which we detect in the Beltane or 
 
289 
 
 Midsummer day fire of the Highlands of Scotland ; and in 
 Ireland mountains seem to have been the receptacles of 
 these fiery tributes to heaven, akin to the fire worship of 
 Baal ; hence the round towers of the West, according to the 
 concurrence of archaeologists, connected with a worship, 
 whose range of empire comprised all this habitable globe. 
 
 Nations having taken their names from heat, as repre- 
 sented by the sun, so have they from its opposite quality, 
 cold, which is only the abstraction of heat. This is in- 
 stanced in a country whose name is a synonyme for cold — 
 Siberia, which authorities have derived from Sabarah, the 
 Arabic for intense cold ; while in Persia Sarma means cold, 
 which leads us to infer that to be the origin of Sarmatia 
 and Sauromatse, who spoke Scythian. Again Himalaya is 
 Sanskrit for a cold country, and from this name are with 
 verisimilitude deduced Imaus, and Mount Haemus. 
 
 Scythia is that populous region of the north, the cunabula 
 linguarum, from whose speech came the compound Etruscan, 
 Greek and Latin immediately, and from the Sanskrit and 
 Arabic mediately; and if so Celtic, Sclavonic, Teutonic, 
 Gothic and the Tartaric tongues, each may be so, and 
 u add of whose train am I." 
 
 The name of the earth in Scythian was Apia, the female 
 of Apis; in Herodotus Tr\ S£ cnria. Bryant thinks the 
 sacred Bull Apis worshipped at Memphis in Egypt is the 
 same as awia, which means native, as ama 777, father-land ; 
 ira-rnra, means father, nainra QiXe. — Odyssey, Z. v. (p. 75.) 
 Pelasgia comprised all Greece and Thrace, which was a 
 parcel and part thereof. In Homer, Iliad V. v. 270, we 
 find it was called uina, from this line Ti)\69tv ££ 'AmrjQ 
 
 The bull is an emblem of agriculture and husbandry, so 
 the patriarch Noah is called avOpwirog yrjc — husbandman. 
 The Israelites worshipped a golden calf also. 
 
 Xuthus was the father of Ion, and this appellative is not 
 
 u 
 
290 
 
 very remote from ^KvOog, which seems to imply a Scythian 
 origin, an erratic band, who ascended and descended geo- 
 graphically in their roamings on this ball of earth, which 
 seems to be the rationale for the word Iltkapydi, or storks, 
 given to the same migratory body ; or it may be the type 
 of a people in a nomadic condition — to support which hy- 
 pothesis we cite a phrase from Strabo, B. IX. c. 18, Keu 
 otl v7ro twv ' Attikljv UeXapyol TTpOGtiyopevOriGav, §ia rrjv 
 7r\avr]v. Homer calls the Leleges and Caucones by the 
 same name, people who once inhabited Ionia, whereby we 
 see UeXapyoL, come into UeXacryoi, by the change of E for 
 S, a conlmon substitute, for which see page 218. 
 
 Kcu AiXeysg /ecu KavKOJvsg diotTe UeXcKryou — Iliad 20, V. 
 429. The term Pelasgae was of extensive application and 
 synonymous with Graikoi — whence comes Grseci, which 
 word followed EWriveg. Even the Tyrrhenians or Tuscan 
 were once called Pelasgi. This subject has been thoroughly 
 investigated by Welsford in his instructive work on the 
 English Language, which is a valuable pendant to Prichard's 
 Celtic Nations. These co-ordinates have done for the 
 explication of names, places and persons, what H. Tooke 
 did for the affinities and descent of words ; but however 
 extensive their labours and indagations may have been, 
 there will always be still some thing left for happier industry 
 and future information in the exhaustless subject of lan- 
 guage. 
 
 Before I close this excursive chapter on tongues and 
 times as bearing reference to the East, I can not pretermit 
 the opportunity of adverting to a singular language, that 
 of Iran or Airan, Arian or Persian) whose character is 
 arrow-headed or cuneiform, and whose mysteries may 
 be unravelled more readily than its coeval in singularity 
 and difficulty of explication, the Egyptian hieroglyphic 
 symbol. 
 
 Philologers have already attacked the wrought stones and 
 
291 
 
 tiles of Babylon and Nineveh, but such almost insuperable 
 difficulties have arisen at every step that we may be said to 
 hope against hope ; yet " nil mortalibus arduum est '* is 
 an encouraging adage, and experience teaches us that little 
 is difficult to diligence and skill. 
 
 The Chinese is a symbolic and a pictured tongue, which 
 is reported to be as old as Noah. (p. 148) . This great 
 patriarch, jointly with the sun, was the embodiment of all 
 Ethnic worship ; and the ark, comprising some dozen 
 names, Theba being the principal one. He or his erratic 
 offspring founded that ancient empire of China ; but here 
 also there has been a greater mutation, either by lapse of 
 time, which subverts things and replaces them, or from 
 change itself, which creeps in like air, than from foreign 
 invasions which have been found both to corrupt and im- 
 prove language. 
 
 When we are better acquainted with China, which pro- 
 mises us a vast harvest of literary, political and religious em- 
 ployment, we shall in a few decades of years or less, sift, 
 winnow and analyse a tongue (p. 149) which, like its 
 locality, is remote from general civilisation — " divisos orbe 
 Chineses" — whose durability resembles the Eoman boast 
 of M Capitolii immobile Saxum," a vaunt and a vain promise 
 of eternal duration in a world, where one mutation treads 
 on the vestige of another. 
 
 If language is phonetic, alphabetical and pictorial, as 
 wc understand in the Egyptian, Cuneiform and Chinese, 
 what hope have we of retrieving its peculiar sounds, and as 
 if the words concentrated in figures, and symbols were not 
 sufficiently unapproachable, a conjecture as to what words 
 were phonetic is superadded to the mystery, for great is 
 the mystery of symbols. 
 
 The whole number of hieroglyphical characters now 
 discovered, thanks mainly to the efforts of Champollion 
 and Young, does not exceed a thousand, which can not com- 
 
 u 2 
 
292 
 
 pose a system of real language, and yet are too numerous 
 to be kegs only like Chinese, for they are only 214. (p. 149.) 
 Perhaps these hieroglyphics are only a phonetic form, which 
 was the sign of things ; they were not letters, but they may 
 represent whole words. The question has been asked were 
 the Egyptians or Chinese ever possessed of an alphabet? 
 It would seem that revelation only can unravel the mystery 
 of these emblems, possessed by a wonderful people who 
 combined in their policy great vices with a corrupt and 
 casuistical civilisation, especially the Chinese, who indulge 
 in immorality without stint or shame. 
 
 In the pages of Eawlinson, Layard, and others on As- 
 syria, from Assur we find that the language of Babylon 
 styled Assyrio-Babylonian, (probably the same as Syrian 
 and Chaldaic of the Semitic family,) is also strikingly like 
 the Hebrew and Egyptian, (p. 90.) Some words pregnant 
 with meaning are styled ideo-graphs, as others are phonetic 
 and alphabetic. 
 
 A dialect of Scythia is said to have been in use before 
 the immigration of the Arian races in the days of Darius 
 Hystaspes, B.C. 500. Is the Arian language allied to 
 Sanskrit, of which the present Persian seems an offspring? 
 for Herodotus remarks that the Median kingdom was once 
 styled Aria, and that theArians and Brachmans,the civilisers 
 of Europe, these two great branches were kept asunder for 
 centuries after their first separation is noted by Dr. Miiller. 
 The Indus divided India from Ariana, which is the same 
 as Iran or Persia. 
 
 Modern investigation admits there are three kinds of 
 Cuneatic or Cuneiform writing; the first, Persian or 
 Pehlvi, of the Arian family closely allied to Sanskrit, and 
 is it not allied to Chaldee ? 
 
 The Chaldee and Syriac are the same tongue written in 
 different characters. The inscription on the horse of 
 Rustan, the Persian Hercules, is recognised as pure Chaldee 
 
293 
 
 in Cufic characters, and adverts to Sapor the King of 
 Persia who died A.D. 273, who took Valerian, Rome's 
 emperor, prisoner. Secondly, there is supposition that the 
 Brahmish or Scythic was the tongue in Persia previous to 
 the emigration of the Arian races. And there is a third 
 class styled Assyrian, or Babylonian, allied to Hebrew and 
 Chaldaic, whose remotest date is assigned to 1200 or 1300 
 B.C., synchronous with the 19th or 20th dynasties of 
 Egypt, if affiance can be placed in these order of kings, 
 although adjusted by the judicious and indefatigable Wil- 
 kinson, whose valuable tribute to Egyptian literature will 
 be Pyramede perennius. 
 
 Herodotus, B. I. c. 95, says that the Assyrians had been 
 lords over Upper Asia during 525 years anterior to the 
 defection of the Medes, which took place about 800 B.C. 
 
 The Persians under Cyrus were in a nomadic state, and 
 spoke the Pehlvi or Chaldee. The Assyrians are presumed 
 never to have penetrated into India, for in that country no 
 vestiges of them are recognized. The Sacse (in whom the 
 type of Saxon is found) (p. 287) or Kymri were frequently 
 on the inscriptions of Khorsabad about 1300 B.C., and 
 under this name was included all the Northern nomadic 
 tribes, and the Celts appropriated their name to them- 
 selves, as the Moguls do that of Elath or Ilyat, which is 
 indicative of nomades. 
 
 In lower Chaldaea advances are in progress through the 
 diligence of earnest indagators of language, for at Sankern 
 we are aware that there have been found bricks surcharged 
 with arrow-headed inscriptions, one commemorating the son 
 of Cambyses who is not known in history, others with the 
 names of kings also unknown, which, on the decyphcring, 
 are apparently of the family of Nabonassar who preceded 
 Nebuchadnezzar. The locality of Werka, traditionally the 
 Ur of Chaldasa, forms one vast necropolis. In excavating 
 under the great pyramid of Nimrood the sagacity and 
 
294 
 
 steadiness of purpose of Mr, Layard, whose emulation was 
 quickened by previous discoveries, brought to light the 
 tomb of Sardanapalus where the statue of this historical 
 personage was found in a vaulted chamber, which was 
 replete with inscriptions, being records of his reign. Even 
 a " House of Records " has been disinterred similar to one 
 mentioned by Ezra, containing a copy of the decrees of 
 Cyrus, permitting the Jews in Babylon to return to Jeru- 
 salem, held in wearisome captivity " till Cyrus set them 
 free." 
 
 This is likely to prove a mine of historical wealth, rein- 
 forcing Scripture and rectifying pagan accounts, and un- 
 doubted records of the empire during a long succession 
 may yet be discovered after ages of burial. 
 
 All these records are in the cuneiform character, in which 
 are the oldest Persian inscriptions, a figure or symbol 
 capable of forming the greatest variety of ramifications 
 and shapes, and perhaps the most extraordinary extant, 
 quite unique in all known tongues, for here is one single 
 form only applied so variously that it can subserve all the 
 complications and requirements of human speech ; it is 
 simplicity exemplified in symbols like primeval diction in 
 words, (p. 150.) 
 
 The present Persian resembles that of the Persian of 
 Constantine's days, and much of it has been judiciously 
 and accurately explicated by Sir H. Rawlinson on the 
 same principle as that adopted by Dr. Young on the tri- 
 lingual Rosetta stone, that is, by grouping the clauses and 
 so extorting the hidden sense. The current language of 
 Persia is supposed by Malcolm to be a rude dialect of the 
 Pehlvi, but from Indian immigrants it is thought subsequent 
 to the death of Alexander, B.C. 323, that a Zend dialect 
 prevailed, and that Pehlvi was neglected. 
 
 The ancient language of Persia is extinct, although the 
 subsequent sojourners in that delightful province of the 
 
295 
 
 sun continued to use the arrow-headed form of writing. 
 It is generally admitted by modern inquirers that ancient 
 Persian was Sanskrit or the Zend tongue. At the present 
 time the whole of this important subject has passed under 
 the searching spirit of the age, giving us by a kind of pre- 
 science, an analysis of what relates to the Vedic period 
 and the Zenda Vest, their Bible, which has been even 
 ascribed to Abraham, whom they style Zoroaster, living or 
 golden star, another appellative for the sun (Zor, Sur, Syria, 
 Osiris, Dionusus called Surius) (p. 98), the God of their 
 idolatry. Dr. Miiller remarks that Veda means seed, a 
 name given to the sacred literature, in fact a collective 
 name for the sacred literature of the Vedic age, which 
 forms the back ground of the whole Indian world, (p. 4.) 
 
 If these affinities in oriental language are found, for there 
 is a singular congruity of structure between all native 
 Armenian tongues, which implies common origin, the 
 African tongues apparently so wide asunder in sound, 
 structure and distance are mutually related. So some 
 indigenous or primogenial languages of America have all 
 their words in a cluster, like grapes on a stalk, without the 
 aid of conjunctions to marry them. According to Pro- 
 fessor Arabesque and the Missionary Lopez, in the 1500 
 varieties of American dialects, there were obvious affinities, 
 especially in their sameness of structure, the relation to 
 each other, and their relation to the tongues of the old 
 world, although the likeness does not lie on the surface, 
 except in the remarkable ecphonesis utl, otl, which is both 
 Mexican and Eskimaux, and similar prolations. 
 
 I have passed in rapid review, I feel very inadequately, 
 more historical than critical, the languages of the East, from 
 the Sanskrit (p. 121) whose complex grammar and inflections 
 was said to be too abstruse even for the comprehension of 
 the learned Brahmins, and too prolix for reference, to the 
 tongues whose hieroglyphic and arrow-headed symbols may 
 
296 
 
 yet be unravelled by indomitable industry, and which once 
 predominated in the learned world ; but despite of their 
 fame, and that of Greece and Rome, these complex tongues 
 were inferior to that used in Great Britain and its colo- 
 nies, and which is perhaps from its simplicity more than 
 any other adapted to be an universal language, (p. 273.) 
 
 The lead which our native tongue, the least inflected of 
 the lettered world, has taken in science and literature, the 
 splendid proofs it affords of its entire competency for the 
 expression of every idea that feeling or science may impart, 
 at a period when all the efforts of intellect and imagination 
 challenge its inadequateness and try its powers, is also 
 sufficient proof that language needs little of inflection to 
 convey with rapidity every thought which the mind is able 
 to cherish or conceive. 
 
 Mr. Gladstone has remarked that we can not know men 
 or nations unless we know their tongue. 
 
 Diversity of language was, like labour, a temporal 
 penalty inflicted on our race for sin, but being like labour 
 originally penal, like labour it becomes by the ordinance 
 of God a fertile source of blessing to those who use it 
 aright, for it is the instrument of thought, and there is 
 a profound relation between thought and the investiture 
 which it chooses for itself. 
 
297 
 
 On Figures of Speech. 
 
 These citations are selected to exemplify grammar as 
 well as poetry, (p. 129.) 
 
 Figurative diction, which is composition, admits all 
 foreign and domestic construction; but some may say 
 what have we to do with foreign auxiliaries ? To enrich 
 our vocabulary with words from every division of the globe 
 is wisdom, but to allow any nation to control our style is 
 indignity. In Greek an unrivalled felicity of diction adorns 
 every page, but it is chiefly artificial, the work of rheto- 
 ricians, (p. 114.) 
 
 Perhaps in arts and arms and language we may add we 
 can scarce acknowledge a superior. "We have in fact a 
 noble language admirably adapted to every species of com- 
 position, from the simplicity of Addison in prose, the 
 Raphael of easy writers, and the sweetness of Pope in 
 numbers, to the variety of Shakspere, and the sublimity, 
 the majesty of the music of Paradise Lost in blank verse. 
 
 Enriched with the simple, the sublime, the majestic, and 
 a diction which will not bend to a foreign yoke, well may 
 we defer to less gifted rivals the boast of lighter compo- 
 sitions. 
 
 For who did ever in French authors see 
 
 The comprehensive English energy, 
 
 The weighty bullion of one sterling line 
 
 Drawn in French wire would through whole pages shine. 
 
 Roscommon. 
 
 On custom depends composition and not on artificial 
 rules. We learn grammar to be initiated into the changes 
 which words undergo, but the application of the variations 
 rest with authors by whose authority they arc, and ought 
 to be directed. 
 
298 
 
 Composition is universal and common to all languages 
 and every period of its existence, for we know that writing 
 never took place in any language whatever before the 
 diction had attained a degree of perspicuity, so as not to 
 be misunderstood, (p. 112.) " m 
 
 Ancient and modern diction claim the studious atten- 
 tion of every aspirant to literary fame, for he who confines 
 his composition to the rules of grammar and disregards 
 that of Horace will never earn the title of accomplished. 
 
 The delightfully figurative and picturesque expressions 
 of Spenser almost stand unrivalled. Dryden was one of 
 the great masters of our language, and veneration is paid 
 to his name as a cultivator of it and literature in general^ 
 because he refined our diction, improved the sentiments 
 and tuned the numbers of English poetry, and was the 
 precursor of his rival Pope, who also reaped his full harvest 
 of praise. 
 
 The language of all poetry is figurative, especially that of 
 an epic poem, which is wholly figurative. We can not 
 forget the sestrum which animated Virgil, when he finished 
 an incomplete line in the fervour of reciting it by which 
 he was transported — 
 
 t6 iEre ciere viros — Martemque accendere cantu." 
 
 In poetry owing to its nature much license is allowed, and 
 the bard " may snatch a grace beyond the reach of art." 
 This may be against law, but it is not against reason. 
 Sciolists in criticism often assume a privilege to which they 
 are not entitled, that of condemning imperiously without 
 rendering sober reason, and this has led into many absur- 
 dities which might have been avoided, for such indiscrimi- 
 nate censure lessens confidence without benefiting the 
 understanding. 
 
 It is cheering and indispensable to peruse and mark what 
 the earliest writers of English have done in their composi- 
 tions to enhance our language, for want of which many have 
 
299 
 
 proceeded on theoretical and erroneous principles of criti- 
 cism. Our authors wrote on principles corroborated by 
 classical authority, unknown to grammarians and philoso- 
 phers unacquainted with the origin of their native speech. 
 
 Passages in poets considered violations of syntax are 
 easily explained on reference to antiquity and especially to 
 primitive diction, of which mere routineers are ignorant. 
 
 That beauty of style is not a cosmopolite, like sentiment 
 and thought, but has a native land, a sun and climate of its 
 own, is a remark of Chateaubriand. 
 
 Language is not to be learned from general rules, it is 
 founded on particular precedents. 
 
 Oriental poetry as compared with that of the "Western 
 world appeals more exclusively to the senses ; the latter 
 seems to unite in its appeals to the senses, mind and heart ; 
 and as language advances to perfection asperity wears away, 
 while aspirates and gutturals are dismissed and elisions are 
 permitted euphonice gratia. 
 
 Beware of parenthesis ; Dr. Johnson was of opinion 
 none should be used, as they often embarrass periods and 
 are inconsistent with accuracy of style, and should be 
 avoided. The ancients in no tongue used parenthesis. 
 The proper place for the parenthetical character is in all 
 digressions foreign to the context. It is often used unne- 
 cessarily, as, Speak ye (who saw) his wonders in the deep. 
 Again — Innumerable as the stars of night (or stars of 
 morning) dew drops. 
 
 Some editors overcharge punctuation ; no point should 
 be either before or after parenthetical characters ; it being 
 itself an interpunction admits no interpunction before or 
 after it. 
 
 Sometimes an interrogative point answers the province 
 of the cxclamativo, as, 
 How beautiful has he described the art of gaining friends ! 
 
 How many arc the instances of chastity in the fair sex ? 
 
300 
 
 Some sentences require the period or full stop although 
 they seem interrogative, a sentence in which wonder and 
 admiration are expressed, and no answer expected or im- 
 plied is properly terminated by the exclamative point, as, 
 How many are enchanted with idle popularity ! Who can 
 express the noble acts of the Lord ! What must be the 
 Creator when his works are so magnificent ! 
 
 Punctuation was originally assigned to periods for their 
 proper division into their constituent parts. Points care- 
 lessly placed mislead the sense, and being used by printers 
 as much as by authors we must refer to the sense and not 
 to the points, which should arouse the vigilance of critics, 
 without being controlled by printed MSS. 
 
 The Latin enclitics, posterisque and quibusque and such, 
 should have only one dot if the que is left out. (p. 91.) 
 
 A colon should not be used before a conjunction, a semi- 
 colon only should be used. No elegant period admits 
 more than one colon, for description becomes very heavy 
 if the periods are too long. This fault is perceived in 
 Lord Bolingbroke and especially in the histories of Guic- 
 ciardini, where much redundance is found. In fact were 
 all books reduced to their quintessence many a bulky 
 author would appear in a penny paper, and there would be 
 scarce such a thing as & folio in all literature. Simplex 
 munditiis or careless art is to be cultivated, in which quality 
 David Hume was pre-eminent, (p. 160.) 
 
 Our thoughts can not be expressed but by words of dif- 
 ferent import. Equal periods must not follow one another 
 too close. Names of persons and localities should be 
 always written in capital letters, although Voltaire in his 
 histories always used small letters, out of singularity or to 
 annoy and deride greatness. 
 
 The dash — thus is too often used by incoherent writers 
 in an arbitrary manner in the place of the regular point. 
 The use of it where the sentence is abrupt, where a signifi- 
 
301 
 
 cant point is required or where an unexpected turn occurs 
 in the sentiment, as, 
 
 Is it foreign to ravage seas and land ? 
 
 To raise such mountains on the troubled main 
 
 When I — but first 'tis fit the billows to restrain — 
 Again in Othello : 
 
 Put out the light and then — put out the light ? 
 
 That is kill Desdemona. A note of interrogation should 
 follow the repetition of the word light, as denoting a sudden 
 start of thought and inquiry as to what would follow. 
 After a solemn pause the dash is necessary, as 
 
 Here lies the great — false marble, where ? 
 Nothing but sordid dust lies here. 
 
 Those epitaphs are the most perfect which set virtue in 
 the strongest light, as, 
 Epictetus who lies here was a slave and a cripple, poor as 
 
 the beggar in the proverb, but the favourite of heaven. 
 
 Some epitaphs are very touching, as exemplified in this 
 Latin specimen of simplicity, of which I annex a translation. 
 
 Innocent and very blessed, 
 Like a flower I fell — and sleep. 
 Traveller, why art thou oppressed? 
 Happier I than you who weep. 
 
 The invention of epitaphs proceed from the presage or 
 sense of immortality implanted in us, memorials to remind 
 men of their frail condition and to excite their inward 
 thoughts by the sight of death to a better life ; and so 
 sacred were monuments considered that those who violated 
 them were punished with banishment and even death. 
 Hence monuments were erected in churches and chancels, 
 and either removing or defacing them is punishable by 
 law, for the spot belongs in fee to the families, who have 
 purchased their right to set up these memorials to remind 
 the living of their mortality, and as a record of departed 
 
 Innocens et per beatus 
 More florum decidi. 
 Quid viator fles sepultum ? 
 Flente sum felicior. 
 
302 
 
 worth and comfort to their friends and descendants. In- 
 tramural burial is coeval with Constantine the Great in the 
 fourth century of Christianity, and in the middle ages 
 monuments and brasses are found, while tombstones in 
 churchyards have not been in use more than two centuries. 
 
 To revert to the dash, in Horace the line 
 
 "Regina sublimi flagello" requires a dash, and then 
 follows " tange Chloen semel arrogantem." 
 
 Here the stroke is impending, the whip is in the air, and 
 the reader in pain for the fair criminal, when her lover 
 relents and desires she may be treated tenderly. On this 
 contrast so graphically executed, (the words tange semel, 
 the threat in sublimi flagello) depends the sudden turn of 
 sentiment and beauty of the passage, for without proper 
 punctuation much beauty is lost and ignorance interposed 
 from inapt compositors as well as inadequate composers. 
 
 There is a prosaic as well as a poetic pronunciation ; 
 wherever the poetic varies from the prosaic it is poetic 
 licence. In composition the period must not be so long as 
 to exhaust the breath of the speaker. Particular sentences 
 should be equal in expression, so that the voice may repose 
 at equal intervals. To this end a period should consist of 
 at least two members, and at most of only four. Equality 
 supposes at least two terms and variety is established two 
 ways in a period, in the sense and expression ; a discourse 
 incommodious to the speaker must be disagreeable and 
 unattractive to the hearer. 
 
 All figures of speech are reducible to analogy, and so 
 must be all known sciences thus reduced. The figures 
 antiplosis, apposition, evocation, prolepsis, syllepsis, syn- 
 thesis, synecdoche and zeugma belong to rhetorical and 
 poetic language. 
 
 Paronomasia is not an uncommon figure, whereby a 
 letter is changed which suggests a new idea and gives a 
 new word, as fiends for friends. But the figure anacolu- 
 thon implies want of sequence or a non-sequitur. 
 
303 
 
 Under parallelism may be included nine figures, viz., 
 accommodation, alliteration, antithesis, correlation, ellipsis, 
 gradation, repetition, rhyme, simile. 
 
 It seems that the multitude of these figures may be 
 reduced to four, for Sanctius' dictum is^ that all the rest 
 are mere chimaeras dire — {i Monstruosi partus grammati- 
 corum," — viz., ellipsis, hyperbaton, pleonasm, syllepsis or 
 synthesis, (p. 238.) 
 
 Short explanations of these figures may not be irrelevant 
 with examples in Latin. 
 
 Apocope, like aphaeresis, abstracts something from a 
 word, as mi for mihi, a figure much used by the vulgar. 
 
 Antithesis is opposition or one letter substituted for 
 another, as olli for illi in old Latin. 
 
 Aphaeresis is the removal of part of a word, as conia for 
 ci-conia, a stork. 
 
 Crasis is a mixture of syllables, as vemens for vehemens. 
 
 Diaeresis is a mark thus •*, as aulai', pictai, for aulae, 
 pictae. 
 
 Enallage can change the voice, word and tense, (p. 32.) 
 
 Epenthesis is an insertion in the middle of a word, as 
 relligio for religio. (p. 120.) 
 
 Metaphor is the most elegant amongst tropes and figures, 
 and one of the most frequent in speech in savage or civil 
 language, as Sunday is the golden clasp which binds up 
 the volume of the week. Prayer is the key of the day and 
 the lock of the night. 
 
 Aristotle remarks of this figure that every metaphor 
 founded on analogy must be equally correct in a reversed 
 sense, as Age is the winter of life, and winter is the age of 
 the year. Of all figures of speech none comes so near to 
 painting as metaphor, making intellectual ideas visible to 
 the eye by imparting a ray of colour, (p. 160.) 
 
 Mctaplasm, is adding, removing, or altering a letter or 
 syllable for verse, ornament or necessity. 
 
 Metathesis is when one letter is put for another, as 
 
304 
 
 pistris for pristis, a kind of whale, luncheon for noon-cheon. 
 (p. 169.) 
 Paragoge is lengthening a word, as dicier for dici. 
 Prosthesis is the addition of a letter to a word, as gnavus 
 for navus. 
 
 Syllepsis is when words in a sentence differ in gender, 
 number or both, as verbum qui est filius Dei. (p. 239.) 
 Turba ruunt. 
 
 Syncope is the removal of a part from the middle of a 
 word, as dixti for dixisti. 
 
 Poetic diction has terms peculiar to itself, or employs 
 such as are common to prose in a peculiar way. Poetry 
 not only retains many terms obsolete in prose, but uses a 
 diction denied to her sister art. Poetry prefers host to 
 army, din to noise, ken to cognisance, bourn to bound, 
 behest to command, plaint to complaint, scowl to frown, 
 erst to formerly, erewhile to heretofore, &c. 
 
 " "While she consent my sighing plaint to hear." 
 
 Gay. 
 The Lord of Hosts, the hen of angels, high behest, &c. 
 « The Devil 
 Eyed them askance, and to himself thus plained, 13 
 The lowring element scowls o'er the dark'ned landscape, 
 snow or show'r. 
 So spake the Patriarch of mankind, but Eve 
 Persisted, yet submiss, tho* last replied." 
 More dreadful and deform for deformed. 
 
 Oh, foul descent ! that I who erst contended 
 "With Gods, to sit the higb/st, am now constrained 
 Into a beast. 
 So the term like, in the ancient sense of seem. " Before 
 man is life and death, and whether him liketh, shall be 
 given him." 
 
 And as they please — 
 
 " They limb themselves, and colour, shape, and size 
 Assume as likes them best, condense or rare." 
 
305 
 
 The words welkin, duress, wight, ycleped, hight, whilom, 
 hardship, person, the named, heretofore, &c. 
 There is a tall long-sided dame, 
 But wondrous light, ycleped /awie. Hudibras. 
 The sublime style employs the term morn for morning, 
 even for evening, helm for helmet, trump for trumpet, 
 weal for wealth, vale of death for valley, dell for recess, 
 rill for rivulet, spray for branch, hind for labourer, acclaim 
 for acclamation, and many synonymes of like value. 
 
 The adjectives primal for primary, primordial for primi- 
 tive, supreme for heavenly, illumine for illume, relume for 
 relight, opine for judge, interwoven for entangle, inhume 
 for inter, circumfuse for pour around, annumerate for 
 enrol, simulate for pretend. 
 
 " For God will deign 
 To visit oft the dwellings of just men, 
 Delighted, and with frequent intercourse, 
 Thither will send his winged messengers 
 On erands of supernal grace." 
 
 Milton, Paradise Lost. 
 " The bounding steed you pompously bestride 
 Shares with his lord the pleasure and the pride. 
 Some neither can for wits and critics pass, 
 As heavy mules are neither horse nor ass." 
 
 Pope. 
 Laureate, roseate, animate, devote, dedicate, &c. (p. 104) 
 are to be found elegantly used in prosaic as well as poetic dic- 
 tion indiscriminately, and there is no reason for their rejec- 
 tion, as they add grace and variety to English composition. 
 " Imparadised in one another's arms." 
 Impassioned, dispread, distrain, are peculiar to poetic 
 diction, although in elevated phrase they may be legi- 
 timately and elegantly applied. Noun and verb, commu- 
 table in prose, and still more so ill poetic lore. Hence the 
 root or radix of the verb proclaims the poetic energy (p. 122.) 
 
306 
 
 " Eve, discovered soon the place of her retire" 
 This word is now used for withdrawing in a commercial 
 sense — as, retiring a hill. 
 
 Instant, without disturb, they took alarm. 
 " Uplifted imminent one stroke they aimed, 
 That might determine, and not need repeat." 
 
 Milton, Paradise Lost, 
 " After short silence then, and summons read, 
 The great consult began. 55 
 The whole employ of body and of mind. 
 
 Pope. 
 " What she wills to do or say, 
 Seems wisest, virtuosest, discreetest, best." 
 
 Milton. 
 "Whether the charmer sinner it or saint it. 
 
 Pope. 
 "Which way I fly is Hell— myself am Hell." 
 The thought is not changed by thus enunciating it ; but 
 with how much more force is it conveyed by laying the 
 stronger emphasis on the word am. Take the comment 
 from Milton 5 s own terms, viz. : — 
 " Horror and doubt distract, 
 His troubled thoughts, and from the bottom stir, 
 The Hell within him, for within him Hell 
 He brings and round about him, nor from Hell 
 One step, no more than from himself, can fly 
 By change of place — 
 
 That glory then, — when thou no more wert good, 
 Departed from thee." 
 At that time, and to mark the sense we must lay the 
 emphasis on the word then, followed by a pause. Nothing 
 has occasioned more false recitation than terms of this 
 class, for as many of them set down under the heads of 
 conjunctions, prepositions, and adverbs, often change their 
 class, have various uses and meanings, and as this dis- 
 tinction can be marked only by the emphasis or ictus. 
 
307 
 
 reciters habituated to consider the same term always in 
 the same light, and knowing that these smaller parts of 
 speech are seldom emphatic, are apt to pass them un- 
 noticed, even when they are the most important words in 
 the sentence — 
 
 " Such pleasure took the serpent to behold, 
 This flowery plat, the sweet recess of Eve, 
 Thus early ! thus alone !" 
 
 The importance of the sense conveyed by the sound 
 thus, demands a suitable force of emphasis — as, thus 
 early — thus alone — that is in a manner so consonant to 
 the DeviPs wishes. Thus early, means so early — so very 
 early — as we say in common parlance, She is so good. 
 
 Milton who has copied the sublimity of Homer, and has 
 transfused the beauties of all the learned poets into his 
 compositions is yet no plagiarist. Dr. Johnson observes 
 he was the least of all poets indebted to the ancients. He 
 was imbued with their spirit and their rays were reflected 
 on him. To a certain degree every learned author must 
 be a plagiarist. Virgil acknowledged that he appropriated 
 what was good of the poet Ennius, which he called culling 
 pearls from dunghills, and it is verisimilar that Homer 
 availed himself of the ballads of his cotemporaries and 
 poets anterior to his time, and interwove their rhapsodies 
 with his own; for poems as well as those written by 
 Homer floated through Greece, and the isles of Greece 
 for centuries before they were collected and adjusted by 
 Pisistratus of Athens, a firm friend and attached to science, 
 one of valour in the field and eloquence at home, who died 
 B.C. 527, having reduced to 24 books in each epic, the 
 poems of Homer relative to the siege of Troy, its antece- 
 dents and its consequents. The famous author of the 
 Analysis of Ancient Mythology, Jacob Bryant, had much 
 misgiving as to the locality of Troy, or the siege of Troy 
 divine, and wrote very astutely to disprove the received 
 
 x 2 
 
308 
 
 notion ; although it is generally admitted by the learned 
 that the war actually took place in the sera ascribed to 
 it, some 1100 B.C. Mr. Bryant is considered fanciful by 
 some in his mythological disquisitions, and has given um- 
 brage to the adherents of Homer by denying the veracity 
 of the narrative of the epic, the greatest effort of human 
 genius, if invention has this claim, as being the very foun- 
 dation of poetry, which pours along like a fire that sweeps 
 the whole earth before it, and as Pope remarks, in him 
 only it burns every where clearly and irresistibly. 
 
 He wrote also on the disputed locality of Malta, where 
 St. Paul was wrecked, alleging it was on a little island 
 called Melita in the Adriatic Sea, for the Sacred roll 
 declares the ship in which the Apostle and his 275 souls were 
 freighted, was tossed up and down in Adria, in this too he 
 is considered fanciful. 
 
 Homer, Virgil, Dante, Shakspere and Milton appear to 
 be the poetic universal individualities and the great parent 
 geniuses which have nursed and nourished all others, and 
 from whom so much has been taken, as they also committed 
 literary larceny on their gifted predecessors. A writer may 
 steal wisely after the manner of bees without robbing or 
 wronging any one. 
 
 The bard of Avon says we are all arrant thieves, and 
 playfully ascribes theft to the sun and moon and sea, and 
 to all the powers of the universal frame of harmony, for 
 from harmony this universal frame began. 
 
 The following citations and illustrations are under the 
 figure 
 
 A ccommodation. 
 
 With impetuous recoil and jarring sound 
 The infernal doors. — Milton. 
 
 Here the words are an echo to the sense. 
 
 Light as the lightning glimpse, they ran, they flew. 
 
 Amplification. — This is a figure that exaggerates the 
 
309 
 
 circumstances of some action which is to be placed in a 
 strong light, and may be termed Description, as that of 
 Time. 
 
 Time in advance behind him hides his wings, 
 And seems to creep decrepit with his age. 
 Behold him when passed by — what then is seen, 
 But his broad pinions swifter than the wind. 
 
 Description of the moon by Pope. 
 
 Or, when the moon refulgent lamp of night, 
 O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light. 
 Again, in Adam's consternation on hearing that Eve 
 had eaten the defended fruit. 
 
 Adam, soon as he heard 
 The fatal trespass done by Eve, amazed, 
 Astonied stood and black — while horror chill 
 Ran through his veins and all his joints relaxed, 
 From his slack hand the garland wreathed for Eve 
 Down dropped — and all the faded roses shed — 
 Speechless he stood and pale. 
 
 Antithesis is the opposite of Simile. 
 
 Manners with fortunes, humours change with climes, 
 Tenets with books and principles with times. 
 
 Again : Reason is man's jjeculiar, instinct the brute's. 
 (p. 128.) 
 
 In the days of prosperity be joyful, but in the day of 
 adversity consider. 
 
 He hath put down the mighty from their seat, and 
 exalted them of low degree. 
 
 If I climb up into heaven thou art there, if I go down 
 into hell, thou art there also. 
 
 For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, and cir- 
 cumcision is that of the heart. 
 
 In the spirit and not in the letter, whose praise is not 
 of men, but of God. 
 
310 
 
 A very animated instance in Milton. 
 
 Black as night, 
 Fierce as ten furies, terrible as Hell, 
 And shook a dreadful dart. 
 
 Inanimate objects are incapable of action but not of 
 passion. Ex : The lance rages with eagerness to destroy. 
 
 Alliteration, — The author of Piers Plowman wrote in 
 
 metre, but not after the manner of our rhymes, because 
 
 his verses did not all end alike ; but three words at the 
 
 last verse, which begins with some one letter, as — 
 
 In a somer season, when sette was the sunne, 
 
 I stope me into shrobbes, as I a shepe were. 
 
 This work is ascribed to Robert Langland, a secular 
 priest of Oriel Coll. Oxon. and was written about the 
 middle of the 14th century. The first poetry of the Saxons 
 was without rhyme, and so must have depended on the 
 quantity of their syllables. See Chapter on Rhyme. 
 
 Where Envy reads the nervous lines, 
 She frets, she rails, she raves, she pines — 
 Alas, no more methinks we wandering go 
 Through dreary waste, and weep each others woe. 
 
 It has been alleged that the ancients never used allitera- 
 tion, but nearly ever author disproves the assertion, although 
 they were giants in literature, and their taste so exquisite, 
 that they would neither tolerate alliteration, rhyme, nor 
 any other monkish jingling : only particles and expletives, 
 (p. 112.) 
 
 Alliteration was common in Ennius, Catullus, and the 
 old poets, but became more rare in later writers until the 
 decadence of literature, an example from Ennius. 
 
 iC O Tite, tute Tate, tibi tanta, tyranne tulisti — " 
 
 From Silius Italicus, 8, v. 205. Diva Deas parereparet. 
 
 There are many instances in Plautus, and in Lucretius 
 not less than thirty, and many even in Virgil. 
 
 Homer indulged in the same vein, \p. 115. — 
 
311 
 
 IloXXa $' avavTa, Karavra irapavra te, So^tar' r}\Qov. 
 O'er hills, o'er dales, o'er crags, o'er rocks they go. 
 
 Pope, 
 ^schylus— Prom. V. ?33. 
 Srpf^/acra aavrr\v } gtu\ avriporovg yvag. 
 Sophocles, Thebes, V. 1480. TtW l/c tekvwv tzkol 
 £lg rag a$e\<pag rag Se rag e/uag \epag. 
 Euripides. 'Ea-axra a wg \aaaiv EAArjvwv otrot. 
 Apostrophe — This is a figure by which we address absent 
 persons, or the inanimate objects which we personify, the 
 most animated figure in rhetoric. In the Bible the sword 
 of the Lord is thus personified and addressed. 
 
 O thou sword of the Lord, how long will it be ere thou 
 be quiet. 
 
 Put up thyself into thy scabbard, rest and be still. — 
 Jeremiah xlvii. 6. 
 
 Adam, in his first surprise after his creation, thus apostro- 
 phises every thing he sees. 
 
 Thou sun, said I, fair light, 
 And thou enlightened earth so fresh and gay, 
 Ye hills and dales, ye rivers, woods and plains, 
 And ye that live and move, fair creatures, tell, 
 Tell if ye saw, how came I thus — how here ? 
 Again: in Sophocles' Philoctetes he addresses the moun- 
 tains and rocks of Lemnos. 
 
 O mountains, rivers, rocks and savage herds — 
 To you I speak, to you alone, I now 
 Must breathe my sorrows. You are wont to hear 
 My sad complaints, and I will tell you all 
 That I have suffered from Achilles' son. 
 Adam, bewailing his transgression, addresses all sur- 
 rounding inanimate objects. 
 
 "Why comes not Death, with one thrice acceptable stroke 
 To end me ? Shall truth fail to keep her word, 
 Justice herself not hasten to be just ? 
 O woods, O fountains, hillocks, dales and bowers 
 
312 
 
 "With other echo late I taught your shades 
 To answer, and resound far other song ! 
 Eve's regrets on leaving Paradise. 
 
 Must I thus leave thee, Paradise ? Thus leave 
 Thee, native soil ? these happy walks and shades 
 Fit haunt of Gods ; where I had hoped to spend 
 Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day 
 "Which must be mortal to us both — O flowers 
 That never will in other climate grow, 
 Who now will rear ye to the sun, or rank 
 Your tribes ? 
 Aporia, or doubt. — This figure expresses the debate of 
 the mind when involved in difficulty. Thus Dido, in Virgil, 
 expresses herself after the loss of Eneas. 
 
 "What shall I do ? What succour shall I find ? 
 Become a suppliant to Hiarbas' pride, 
 And take my turn to court or be denied ? 
 Rather with steel thy guilty breast invade, 
 And take the fortune thou thyself hast made. 
 If it be required what are the sources of the sublime, 
 we reply they are to be found every where in nature, and 
 if correct, does the redditive correspond with the interro- 
 gative? This is a grammatical term, and implies, does 
 the representation in words or figure of speech answer to 
 the original? 
 
 Change of Person. — This appliance in rhetoric or poesy 
 is not uncommon. The repetition of the noun is more 
 elegant and forcible than the pronoun, as, How fares it with 
 my Lord? How with my Lady? (p. 120.) 
 
 Again, There is a transition in this couplet, from the ex- 
 pression of endearment to that of courtesy. 
 Now, now I seize, I clasp thy charms, 
 And now you burst, ah, cruel from my arms. 
 Combination. 
 
 Reason's whole pleasure, all the joys of sense 
 Lie in three words, Health, Peace and Competence. 
 
313 
 
 There is a combination of superiority in the epigram- 
 matic letter of Julius Csesar, Veni, vici, vici. Where two 
 active verbs are followed by a so called neuter verb. (p. 15.) 
 His glory is in the rapid sequel of events. 
 
 Commination, or threat, where the word sker is the same 
 as skirre, scour, scud. 
 
 If they'll do neither, we will come to them, 
 And make them sker away. 
 All the stored vengeances of heavens fall 
 On her ungrateful top. Strike her young bones 
 You taking airs with lameness. 
 No ; you unnatural hags, 
 I will have such revenges on you both 
 That all the world shall — I will do such things — 
 What they are yet I know not, but they shall be 
 The terrors of the earth. — K. Lear. 
 Contrast. — He hath filled the hungry with good things 
 and the rich he hath sent empty away. 
 
 Climax, or gradation, is nothing more than a continued 
 parallelism. 
 
 Believe and shew the reason of a man. 
 Believe and taste the pleasure of a God, 
 Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell 
 their children, and their children unto another genera- 
 tion. 
 
 Again in Young. 
 
 By silence, death's peculiar attribute, 
 By darkness, guilt's inevitable doom, 
 By darkness, and by silence, sisters dread. 
 Redemption, 'twas creation more sublime, 
 Redemption, 'twas the labour of the skies. 
 
 Soft creeping words on words the sense compose, 
 At every line they stretch, they yawn, they dose. 
 But health consists with temperance alone, 
 And peace, O Virtue, peace is all thy own. 
 
314 
 
 Ah come not, write not, think not, once of me, 
 Nor spare one pang of all I felt for thee. — Pope. 
 
 Concession, or Epitrope. — By this figure, something is 
 admitted by the advocate which might be disputed to obtain 
 something we require granted, and which he thinks can not 
 be refused. This figure is sometimes favourable at the 
 beginning, but unfavourable at the close, as 
 
 ' ' I allow the Greeks learning and skill in many sciences, 
 sharpness of wit and fluency of tongue ; and if you praise 
 them for other excellencies I shall not contradict you, but 
 that nation was never eminent for tenderness of conscience 
 and regard to faith and truth." 
 
 Ellipsis, or suppression. — This is the opposite of repeti- 
 tion, a very common figure in speech, and of extensive 
 utility, indispensable to elegance by excluding useless 
 repetition, where the recurrent idea is understood, as I am 
 that I am — ; Tis the survivor dies. My heart — no more. 
 
 (P. 107.) 
 
 Excitement. 
 
 With thrilling clangor sounds the alarm of war — 
 I am tortured e'en to madness when I think 
 On the proud victor. 
 Exclamation } or Ecphonesis, is a figure which expresses 
 some emotion of the mind and is introduced by an inter- 
 jective particle (p. Ill), as 
 
 Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and 
 knowledge of God, 
 
 How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways 
 past finding out. 
 
 Vital spark of heavenly flame 
 Quit, O quit this mortal frame. 
 Trembling, hoping, lingering, flying, 
 Oh the pain, the bliss of dying ! 
 Cease, fond nature, cease thy strife, 
 And let me languish into life. — Pope. 
 
315 
 
 The whole of this splendid rhapsody may be considered 
 one lengthened, long drawn out exclamation. 
 Adam seeing Abel murdered exclaims, 
 
 Alas, both for the deed and for the cause ! 
 
 But have I now seen death ? Is this the way 
 
 I must return to native dust ? Oh sight 
 
 Of terror, foul and ugly to behold ! 
 
 Horrid to think— how horrible to feel ! 
 Again, Samson when blind, and in the power of his 
 enemies, piteously pours forth his laments. 
 
 O loss of sight, of thee I most complain ! 
 
 Blind among enemies ! O, worse than chains, 
 
 Dungeon or beggary or decrepit age. 
 
 Expostulation is related to interrogation, by which the 
 person injured urges the offender with all the questions he 
 thinks can be proposed, and pleads with him for all the 
 topics of reason, that he may convince him of the impro- 
 priety of his conduct. 
 
 " For what have you left unattempted — what have you 
 held sacred ? What name shall I give to this assembly ? 
 Shall I call you soldiers, who have besieged the General 
 and Emperor's son with trenches and arms ? Citizens who 
 contemptuously insult the authority of the Senate ?" 
 In Milton, Abdiel expostulates with Satan. 
 
 Shalt thou give law to God ? Shalt thou dispute 
 With Him the points of liberty — who made 
 Thee what thou art, and formed the powers of 
 heaven ? 
 Enallage — implies every change of speech — as one mood 
 for another, and reciprocally one tense, one gender, &c, 
 of which instances arc given p. 32, and, seem so arbitrary 
 that grammar is at a discount in composition, and all 
 transgression is law — Quintilian said, Aliud est grammaticc, 
 aliud Latino loqui. (p. 239.) 
 
316 
 
 Frequency. — That it may please Thee to succour, help and 
 comfort all that are in danger, necessity and tribulation. 
 
 No change could improve this collocation of words. 
 Our writers have taken great pains to energise their com- 
 positions, which gives them advantage in foreign competi- 
 tion, because they never forget, that, 
 
 True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, 
 As those move easiest who have learned to dance. 
 Gradation. 
 
 O for the bright complexion, cordial warmth 
 And elevating spirit of a friend ; 
 But oh, the last, last what ? Can words express, 
 Thought reach, the last, last silence of a friend. 
 Harangues. — As comprising the beauties of oratory in a 
 short space, I have translated from Sallust the speech of 
 Catiline to the conspirators against the Roman Republic, 
 for it shows in a brief specimen the logical division of such 
 orations. The delivery of these set speeches occupied days, 
 and were to the auditory what newspapers are to us, a 
 resume of the politics of the time, as in the case of Demos- 
 thenes on the Crown, where he answered the accusation of 
 iEschines, which is esteemed the greatest oration which has 
 descended to us, containing all beauties that can be com- 
 prised in words and wisdom, which is the child of delibera- 
 tion. A prompt, fluent, correct, unembarrassed and un- 
 affected use of speech is the most pleasing and ornamental 
 of accomplishments, and in a free state eloquence is the 
 principal medium of good government, the most direct and 
 honourable road to rank, power, and reputation. 
 
 It is singular that from an indifferent speaker, as Plu- 
 tarch affirms, this orator, who had great natural defects, 
 should have surmounted all difficulties in his profession, 
 which he carried to the greatest height attainable. He 
 laboured amazingly, mentally and physically, and would 
 never address an assembly without preparation, or subject 
 
317 
 
 his fame to the fortune of the moment ; that is, after he 
 had attained a name above every name in Eloquence. He 
 thought that to teach others required preparation, for few 
 could speak as from a supernatural impulse. He consi- 
 dered action the chief agent in speaking, and that boldness 
 is in business what action is in an orator. 
 
 The harangue of Catiline to his accomplices, conspi- 
 rators against the Roman Republic, is brief; but as it con- 
 tains all the beauties and structure of an oration, I have 
 set it down here in this my own translation of it. 
 
 Sallust. Catil. Cap. xx. — Exordium. Had I not had, 
 my countrymen, ample proofs of your bravery and attach- 
 ment, this juncture had escaped us. Vain had been these 
 vast hopes ; vain the universal dominion within our view. 
 Nor had I been so rash to grasp uncertainties for certain- 
 ties, with the aid of men, fickle and inactive ; but since, 
 in various and important conjunctures, I have experienced 
 your prowess and fidelity, I am induced to achieve an en- 
 terprise, the greatest and most glorious that ever occurred, 
 persuaded that the smiles and frowns of fortune will affect 
 us equally, for to entertain the same aversions and the 
 same desires, this, this is the very bond of friendship. 
 
 Narration. But you, all of you, have been apprised of 
 my views repeatedly. In fact, my soul is daily fired at 
 the very thought of the wretched life we must lead, if we 
 do not assert our liberty. For since the government has 
 fallen into the power, nay, is under the absolute sway of 
 an oligarchy, kings and tetrarchs have been their tribu- 
 taries, nations and states have been taxed, while we brave 
 and honourable men, nobles and commons, have been 
 numbered among the herd, the mob, devoid of interest, 
 destitute of authority, servile tools to those very men to 
 whom, were the government rightly administered, we 
 should be a terror. Hence all interest, power, honour, 
 wealth, arc theirs j to us are consigned repulses, perils, 
 
318 
 
 impeachments, penury. How long, ye bravest of the 
 brave, will you tolerate such abuses ? 
 
 Proposition. Is it not more preferable to die in the 
 field, than to drag on a dishonourable life, the scorn of 
 their insolence ? 
 
 Confirmation. But, O ye immortal powers, victory is 
 in our hands, age in its bloom, courage in its vigour. 
 They, on the contrary, are on the decline, emaciated by 
 luxury, and verging on the grave. We have only to 
 begin, and the business is accomplished. For what man 
 of spirit can allow them to riot in splendour and magnifi- 
 cence, while we are in want of the necessaries of life. 
 Nay, not even a friendly roof to shelter us from the 
 inclemency of the seasons. Although they are for ever 
 purchasing paintings, statues, massy plate of exquisite 
 workmanship ; although they are for ever pulling down 
 new edifices and rebuilding them — in a word, although 
 they contrive every way to consume their colossal wealth, 
 yet with all their extravagance, they can not exhaust their 
 treasures. But what have we ? Poverty at home, debts 
 abroad. Our circumstances are intolerable, our hopes 
 desperate. 
 
 Peroration, Arise, then, arise. Lo, that liberty, that 
 glorious liberty for which we have so often sighed. Be- 
 sides, riches, honour, glory, await us — these the rewards 
 which fortune proffers to the conqueror. Let the case 
 itself, the present juncture, the imminent danger, the spoils 
 of war, excite you more than my voice. Elect me your 
 general, or fellow-soldier. My brethren, my heart nor my 
 hand shall never desert you. These things, as your 
 adviser, I hope to execute with you, unless I am deceived, 
 and you prefer slavery to empire. 
 
 The difference between a Letter and an Oration is, that 
 one should be attired like a woman, the other like a man. 
 One with large side robes, long periods, parentheses, si- 
 
319 
 
 miles, examples. A letter should be short and closely 
 couched. This was the opinion of the judicious in all ages ; 
 and Cicero, the model in both kinds, has realized these 
 desiderata. 
 
 The Song of Moses is another instance of poetry and 
 oratory blended. — Deut. xxxii. 
 
 Hyberbation is that figure by which there is a mixture, 
 or inversion of the order of words, as mecum for cum me, 
 when a word is divided into two parts, as hunc and cunque 
 — quo me cunque. Parenthesis comes under here. Hy- 
 pallage or change of case or tense, and anacoluthon or a 
 non sequitur or no connection in the periods. 
 
 Interrogation is a figure of speech, which by asking a 
 question gives ardour and energy to discourse, it is enlivened, 
 strengthened, and thrown more forcibly along by this 
 figure. 
 
 Demosthenes says — Would you perambulate the city, 
 and ask what news ? What greater news can there be 
 than that a Macedonian enslaves the Athenians, and lords 
 it over Greece ? Is Philip dead ? No — but he is sick. 
 And what advantage would you reap from his demise, for 
 should aught happen to Philip, you yourselves would im- 
 mediately raise up another Philip ? 
 
 See in exemplification of this figure, the inimitable 
 passage in the prince of Christian poets, Milton, where the 
 serpent in his temptation of Eve, uses frequent interroga- 
 tion. 
 
 Ye shall not die, 
 How should you? By the fruit ? It gives you life 
 To knowledge. By the thrcatcner ? Look on me, 
 Me who have touched and tasted, yet both live. 
 Shall that be shut to man which to the beast 
 Is open? Or will God increase his ire 
 For such a petty trespass ? 
 In this interrogation is the deception concealed, which 
 
320 
 
 duped an easy unsuspecting mind ; here is the first lie ever 
 told, and justifies the assertion that Satan is the father of 
 lies. 
 
 Metonomy. — This figure is of daily usage, where the 
 matter is put for the materiate, as He died by steel, that is 
 by the sword. Ex. : God draws the curtain of night. 
 
 Omission, or paraleipsis, is a figure whereby an author 
 pretends to conceal what he declares. " I do not mention 
 the scandalous gluttony of my adversary, I pass his bru- 
 tality. I say not a syllable of treachery, malice and 
 cruelty." 
 
 Parallelism j tinder which is taken Correlation. 
 Pitifully behold the sorrows of our hearts, mercifully 
 forgive the sins of thy people. 
 
 In all time of tribulation, in all time of our wealth, 
 in the hour of death and in the day of judgment. 
 First, highest, holiest, best. 
 Wisest, virtuest, discreetest, best. 
 Holy, divine, good and amiable or sweet. 
 Correlation. — 
 
 Over the fish and fowl of sea and air, 
 Air, water, % earth by fowl, fish, beast was flown, 
 Was swum, was walked. 
 A more easy correlation is no where to be found than in 
 beauty's value by Shakespere. 
 
 Beauty is but a vain, a fleeting good, 
 A shining gloss that fadeth suddenly. 
 A flower that dies when almost in the bud, 
 A brittle gloss that breaketh presently. 
 A fleeting good, a gloss, a glass, a flower, 
 Lost, faded, broken, dead within an hour. 
 This is another instance of beautiful correlation in com- 
 position, when nature measures every impulse by reason, 
 her impulses are as regular as they are diversified. When, 
 therefore, the number of sentences are successively pro- 
 
321 
 
 duced, whether for reciprocal illustration, collateral ex- 
 hibition, or regular gradation, it is natural that their parts 
 occur in analogical order and symmetry. Now this appears 
 with peculiar lustre and dignity in the Sacred records, as, 
 
 Heal the sick — cleanse the leper — raise the dead — cast 
 out devils — freely ye have received freely give. Are they 
 Hebrews? So ami. Are they Israelites? So am I. 
 Are they the seed of Abraham? So am I. Again, 
 2 Cor. xi. 22. Are they the ministers of Christ ? I speak 
 as a fool (?'. e. in simplicity) I am more. In labours more 
 abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more fre- 
 quent, in deaths oft. Who is weak and I burn not ? 
 
 Indirect Correlation. 
 
 The blind and dumb both spake and saw. 
 
 Direct Correlation. — That it may please thee to illu- 
 minate all Bishops, Priests and Deacons, and both by their 
 preaching and living, they may set it forth and shew it 
 accordingly. 
 
 Stood they or moved in station, motion, arms, 
 Fit to decide the empire of great heaven. 
 Not for himself he sees or hears or eats, 
 Artists must choose his pictures, music, meats. 
 
 Pope. 
 So eagerly the fiend, 
 
 O'er bog or steep, through strait, rough dense or rare, 
 With hands, or wings, or feet pursues his way, 
 And swims, or sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies. 
 Personification. — This figure is employed where any 
 powers are called in aid to effect something, as thunder, 
 lightning, hail — Virtues or Vices. 
 
 The thunder 
 Winged with red lightning and impetuous rage 
 Perhaps has spent his shafts. ^ Milton. 
 
 Pleonasm is redundancy of expression, and is the 
 
322 
 
 opposite of ellipsis, which is defect or omission, as to live 
 a life. Enjoy a joy, &c. Because the verb by itself is as 
 equally significant as when joined to a substantive or other 
 words, (p. 15, 20.) Should an adjective be added it is no 
 longer pleonastic, because the verb there does not imply all 
 the meaning. 
 Reciprocity. — 
 
 Dunce scorning dunce, beholds the next advance, 
 
 But fop shews fop superior complaisance. 
 
 Where wigs with wigs, with sword-knots sword-knots 
 
 strive, 
 Beaux banish beaux, and coaches coaches drive. 
 
 Pope. 
 Adjectives are frequently used in reference to the sub- 
 ject, as before observed in this Tractate, (p. 1270 
 Sedate and silent move the numerous bands. 
 Silent the warrior smiled, and pleased resigned. — Iliad. 
 Swift down the steep of heaven the chariot rolls. 
 Adverbs are sometimes varied by er and erst, as Plain- 
 lier shall be revealed. Sceptre and power I gladlier shall 
 resign, (p. 141.) 
 
 Either was formerly and properly used where we now 
 employ each, as 
 
 Here in the midst in either army's sight, 
 And next the troops of either Ajax views. 
 East by our side let either faithful swain 
 To arms attend us, and their part sustain. 
 In this couplet, either is said to be used for each, and 
 their employed for his, but without foundation, for such 
 an application of the terms was, in the day this couplet 
 was written, perfectly analogous. The adoption of 
 each for either is a capricious innovation, they are synony- 
 mous, and may be retained for variety of expression. 
 
 We have remarked on the true and analogical pronuncia- 
 tion of either in p. 251, and we trust its original beauty 
 
323 
 
 will not be discontinued, at least by men of taste. It is 
 not earlier than this century that ei has been sounded like 
 a diphthong — which it is not. It is the business of criti- 
 cism to detect and exterminate errors, although embalmed 
 in the sanctuary of science, (p. 45.) English pronuncia- 
 tion is fixed, and will not bear any change, at least for the 
 worst ; for no one can prefer niiher to the soft and analogical 
 neether. 
 
 Reflection. — The reflected picture of the young cock on 
 the brink of the well in Gay is inimitable. 
 
 This said, he mounts the margin's round, 
 
 And prys into the depth profound. 
 
 He stretched his neck, and from below 
 
 "With stretched neck advanced a foe. 
 
 With wrath his ruffled plumes he rears, 
 
 The foe with ruffled plumes appears. 
 
 Threat answered threat, his fury grew, 
 
 Headlong to meet the war he flew. 
 This is a copy from Milton. Eve painting her first 
 appearance to herself. 
 
 And laid me down 
 
 On the green bank to look into the clear 
 
 Smooth lake, that to me seemed another sky. 
 
 As I bent down to look, just opposite 
 
 A shape within the watery gleam appeared 
 
 Bending to look on me — I started back — 
 
 It started back, but pleased I soon returned, 
 
 Pleased it returned as soon, with answering looks 
 
 Of sympathy aud love. 
 Repetition. — To deliver a message in the very words it 
 is given, is founded in nature. 
 
 Art thou he or do we look for another ? Lord, hadst 
 thou been here, my brother had not died. While ye 
 have light, believe in the light, that ye may be children 
 of light. 
 
324 
 
 Against our peace we arm our will, 
 Amidst our plenty something still, 
 For horses, houses, pictures, planting, 
 To me, to thee, to him is wanting. 
 The cruel something unpossessed 
 Corrodes and leavens all the rest. 
 
 Prior on Something. 
 Milton never fails in this or in any other poetic excel- 
 lence to blazon imperfections or beauties, whether in diver- 
 gence or convergence. 
 
 Oh, shame to man, devil with devil damned, 
 
 Firm concord holds — men only disagree 
 
 Of creatures rational. 
 
 And in fierce hosting meet, who wont to meet 
 
 So oft. 
 
 With ruin upon ruin, rout on rout, 
 
 Confusion worse confounded. 
 
 Him first, him last, him midst and without end, 
 
 Tho 5 fallen on evil days, 
 On evil days tho 5 fallen, and evil tongues. 
 For then the earth 
 Shall all be Paradise, far happier place 
 Than this of Eden, and far happier days. 
 This word was gracefully pronounced Parades always, 
 and not Paradzse, and was so written, as well as Paradies. 
 As though I were in Paradis. — Gower. 
 That be from thee far, 
 That far be from thee, Father, who art judge 
 Of all things made, and judgeth only right. 
 Thus from the source of all perfection, Milton elegantly 
 repeats with inversion after Moses. There are also touch- 
 ing instances of exclamation repeated, as 
 
 We have wronged no man, we have corrupted no man, 
 we have defrauded no man. 
 
 Again. Had ye believed Moses, ye had believed me, 
 
325 
 
 for he wrote of me. — Not every one that saith, Lord, 
 Lord. — And verily, verily, I say unto you. — A sword, 
 a sword is sharpened. — The sword, the sword is drawn. 
 Ezek. xxi. 9. — Awake, awake, put on strength, O Zion — O 
 Earth, Earth, Earth, hear the word of the Lord. Jer. 
 xxii. 29. 
 
 Holy, holy Lord God Almighty, who was, and is to come. 
 And the glory which thou gavest me, I have given them., 
 that they may be one, as we are one. 
 
 This excellence has been preserved by holy Milton, the 
 faithful imitator of the sacred penmen. 
 Where with me, 
 All my redeemed may dwell in joy and bliss, 
 Welcome with me, as I with thee am one. 
 Prepare the way, a God, a God appears, 
 A God, a God the vocal hills reply, 
 The rocks proclaim the approaching Deity. 
 Simile or Comparison. 
 
 As in smooth oil the razor best is whet 
 So wit is by politeness sharpest set, 
 Their want of edge for their offence is seen, 
 Both pain us less when exquisitely keen. 
 Suppression or Aposiopesis.— A figure by which one in a 
 rage or perturbation of mind suddenly breaks off discourse. 
 
 But oh, Ulysses deeper than the rest, 
 
 That sad idea wounds my anxious breast. 
 
 If thou be'est He, but oh ! how fallen ! 
 
 Nothing my Lord or if 1 know not what. 
 
 Lord Cardinal ! if thou think'st on heaven's bliss, 
 
 Hold up thy hand, make signal of that Hope 
 
 He dies, and makes no sign. 
 
 Syllepsis, is when the sense differs from the import of 
 
 the words, hence the meaning and not the words is to be 
 
 taken. In the learned languages words may differ in 
 
 gender or number or both, as Turba ruunt. (p. 212.) Or 
 
326 
 
 when the relative is referred to an antecedent that has not 
 been expressed, but of which we form an idea by the mean- 
 ing of the whole sentence, (p. 98.) To this figure are referred 
 those short parenthetical modes of speech so graceful in 
 Latin. 
 
 Suspension or Anastrophe. — A figure keeping the hero in 
 suspense and attentive by expectation of that in which the 
 speaker purposes to conclude his oration. 
 
 Oh God, darkness is not more opposite to light, frost to 
 
 fire, pain to pleasure, or death to life, than sin is to thee. 
 
 With what sweetness does Eve carry on that rapturous 
 
 speech to Adam, and with what grateful surprise does it 
 
 terminate. 
 
 Without thee is sweet, 
 Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet, 
 With charm of earliest birds. 
 Critics have observed that neither Homer nor Virgil 
 have mentioned the singing of birds, but passages are 
 found in which this obvious delight to any observer of 
 nature is pourtrayed ; while ominous birds, and divining 
 birds are cited frequently, as are those who gave omens by 
 flight or by singing. Hence, the phrase, Si avis occinuerit ; 
 sing or chirp inauspiciously. 
 Variation. 
 
 Anthares had from Argos travelled far, 
 Alcides' friend and brother of the war ; 
 Now falling by another's wound, his eyes 
 He casts to heaven, on Argos thinks, and dies. 
 Each of these words imply some pursuit, or object re- 
 linquished, but from different motives. 
 
 Milton is far from forgetting the obscurity which sur- 
 rounds the most incomprehensible of existences, but with 
 the majesty of darkness round circles his throne. 
 
 Dark with excessive light thy skirts appear. 
 He had the secret of preserving this idea, when he 
 
327 
 
 seemed to depart farthest from it, as described in the light 
 and glory, which flow from the Divine presence. In his 
 poetic flights he had an excellence of style with all har- 
 mony and beauty of numbers, and in his majestic prose 
 writings, his style was above prose and below poetry. 
 
 That style is best which couches the most meaning in 
 the fewest words. In poetry and prose every diversity of 
 grammar and construction is employed, though some have 
 despised musical arrangement; so that the mysteries of speech 
 may be acquired from the numberless examples of poetic 
 diction, which are various and gorgeous as sunbeams. Here 
 I introduce some grammatical peculiarities in conjunction 
 with poetry, which was one of the objects I had in view in 
 treating of figures of speech. 
 
 " Let the blind beggar dance, the cripple sing, 
 The son a hero, lunatic a king." — Pope. 
 Here the definite article the is suppressed before lunatic. 
 
 Now thousand tongues are heard in one loud din. 
 Here the indefinite article a is omitted, (p. 1270 
 
 Alike in what it gives or what denies. 
 Here the pronoun it is suppressed, and in the following 
 line— (p. 330.) 
 
 Is this too little, would you more than live ? 
 The verb adjective do is superseded by the principal, and 
 in the next citation the verb essential by the specifying 
 adverb, (p. 61.) 
 
 Once on a flock bed but repaired by straw, 
 With tapestried curtains never meant to draw. 
 In the following verse the preposition in is left out. 
 
 In wit a man, simplicity a child. 
 Here the sign of the infinitive is wanting, (p. 61.) 
 
 When to repress, and when indulge our flights. 
 The following are beautiful examples of elliptic diction. 
 Who can the past rccal, or done undo ? 
 
 But to create 
 Is greater than created to destroy. 
 
328 
 
 Nor more, but fled. 
 
 I overjoyed could not forbear aloud. 
 
 He thus to Eve in few. 
 
 My earthly by his heavenly overpowered. 
 These are extracts from the poet of Christians, Milton, 
 who availed himself of every species of composition known 
 to the ancients, and copied largely from holy writ. The 
 law of God he read and found it sweet, made it his whole 
 delight, and in it grew to such perfection that he could 
 transfuse its beauties, and soar with its inspirations. 
 
 In this poet we find that the truest ornament and 
 greatest benefactors of a nation are its learned and virtuous 
 authors, who reverently remarks, that the end of learning 
 is to repair the ruin of our first parents, by beginning to 
 know God aright. 
 
 Perhaps Pope has obtained the highest name for versi- 
 fication, although Dryden, superior in intellect to his 
 successor, reduced our language to melody. 
 
 The long resounding march and energy divine. 
 The annexed couplet was said to be a peculiar favourite 
 of the Swan of Thames, and was prized by him for its har- 
 mony and description, more than any pair of his numerous 
 verses, and it may be admitted he had reason good for 
 his predilection. 
 
 Lo, where Mseotis sleeps, and hardly flows 
 The freezing Tanais through a waste of snows. 
 
 The ear of Dr. Johnson was not struck, and he could 
 discern no reason for the preference. Peradventure his 
 aversion to music, a defect inherent in many of the wisest, 
 precluded the power of appreciating such lines. 
 
 To the beauty of another couplet in Pope's composi- 
 tions I will advert, in which perhaps the criticism of Dr. 
 Johnson is not in accordance with just judgment. 
 
 Flies o'er the unbending corn and skims along the main. 
 
 Here the critic wonders that the celerity of Camilla 
 should be expressed in so protracted a line, and in one of the 
 
329 
 
 most unbending in poetry. But it describes graphically 
 the motion of passage, like that of a bird, a partridge, 
 brushing the surface lightly, with a long drawn-out sweep. 
 
 It is astonishing what instances of grandeur appear in 
 Milton. Not only every metre and sound echoing to the 
 sense, but the most apt and gorgeous language with sub- 
 limity of idea that can be conceived, being indebted as he 
 was to the sacred roll, and warmed by the glowing fire 
 which touched Isaiah's hallowed lips. 
 
 The admirable critique of Addison, graceful and truth- 
 ful as it is, remains still below the merit of our great epic 
 poet. The sublimity of Homer, being of human tincture, 
 is in this particular inferior to Milton, and of Shakspere 
 the same may be predicated, although his magic could not 
 copied be, or surpassed save by Milton, when aided "by 
 Iter who dictated to him slumbering, " and reinforced his 
 easy unpremeditated lay. 
 
 " Hail, holy Light 
 
 May I address thee unblamed." 
 
 For the powerful use to be made of adjectives, (p. 129.) 
 there is a beautiful example in the elegy on the death of an 
 unfortunate lady, by Pope, shewing the effect produced by 
 the repetition of words, with a similar termination. 
 
 By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed, 
 By foreign hands they decent limbs composed, 
 By foreign hands thy humble grave adorned, 
 By strangers honoured and by strangers mourned. 
 The inverted correlation in Milton of the three abstracts 
 to their concretes is admirable, (p. 128.) 
 
 But then thou must outlive 
 Thy youth, thy strength, thy beauty, which will change 
 To withered, weak, and gray. 
 Poetry delights in concretes for abstracts, (p. 86) as, 
 If ample of dimension, vast of size, 
 Even thee an aggrandising impulse give. — Young, 
 
330 
 
 Again — 
 
 And reduce to nothing this essential. 
 From one entire globose stretched into longitude. 
 Tenfold the length of this terrene. 
 By tincture or reflection, they augment 
 Their small peculiar. 
 Whose intellectual more I shun. 
 Prevenient grace descending had removed 
 The stony from their hearts. 
 And since in prose, the adjective is often converted into 
 the substantive, as necessaries for things, so in poetry, 
 (p. 128.) 
 
 The fulness of the Deity breaks forth 
 In inconceivables to men and Gods. 
 About him all the sanctities of heaven. 
 The substantive being the qualifier of another, (p. 123.) as, 
 Uprose the victor angels. 
 
 Greater now in thy return, 
 Than from the giant angels. 
 Here the verb-adjective do is superseded by the prin- 
 cipal, (p. 327.) 
 
 Is this too little ? Would you more than live ? 
 Thus also is the adjective elegantly used for the adverb, 
 as, (p. 126.) Her hand soft touching. 
 
 The application of the adjective is every where more 
 energetic than the adverb, as remarked page 127. 
 Sudden she rages like the troubled main, 
 Now sinks the storm and all is calm again. 
 Sometimes the verb is used for the adjective or the ad- 
 verb, as, 
 
 Down the slope hills. 
 Bore him slope downward. 
 See the blind beggar dance, the cripple sing, 
 The sot a hero, lunatic a king. 
 Where the ellipsis is in the suppression of the definit 
 and indefinite articles, (pp. 80, 85, 327.) 
 
331 
 
 Who finds not Providence all good, all wise 
 Alike in what it gives and what denies. 
 
 Here is an instance of the repeated subject or governing 
 pronoun, (p. 86.) 
 
 Take nature's path and mad opinions leave, 
 All states can reach it and all heads conceive. 
 
 Here again the repeated object or pronoun governed. 
 Whose, which is usually appropriated to ' persons is 
 applied by rhetoricians to inanimate objects, as The ques- 
 tion whose solution I require, (p. 96.) 
 
 Eternity whose end no eye can reach. 
 From whose bourn no traveller returns. 
 
 Whose is used instead of which, because the expression 
 is prosaic, and can not be so readily admitted into 
 elevated poetry. Dr. Lowth remarks, that the highest 
 poetry loves to consider every thing as bearing a personal 
 character, but in these passages, there is no shadow of 
 personal character or personification. It is a rhetorical 
 figure, by which inanimate objects are represented as per- 
 sons. Ex. : — 
 
 Nature cries aloud through all her works. 
 
 Joy has her tears and transport has her death. 
 
 Wisdom has length of days in her right hand. 
 
 The deep uttered his voice. — Habakkuk iii. 10. 
 These words and ideas are properly personified, because 
 they are accompanied with personal attributes, so that all 
 intellectual adjuncts contribute to the formation of ideas. 
 In Milton is a fine application of the personal pronoun to 
 an abstract quality, virtue, and the substitution of her for 
 its, which is never once found in either Testament. See 
 page 8, 101. 
 
 Abashed the devil stood, 
 
 And felt how awful Goodness is, and saw 
 
 Virtue in her shape how lovely. Saw, and pined 
 
 His loss. 
 
332 
 
 Prose and verse, every style without distinction admits, 
 one's elders, one's betters, for a person's elder, or better 
 than one. Thus poetry subjoins to a possessive pronominal, 
 a comparative as an appropriate agent. 
 
 Horn an and Greek grammarians, know your better, 
 Author of something yet more great than Letter. 
 
 Style is jejune from a paucity of ideas more than from 
 a paucity gf expression, and we must be as cautious to 
 multiply but with ideas, as to make no picture when 
 nothing is represented. Eloquence is not the product of 
 art, but art is derived from it, and mends the slowness of 
 genius. Correspondent to the art of building ideas into 
 thought, and thought into reasoning, must be that of 
 framing words into a sentence, and sentences into dis- 
 course, for the accomplishing of which, there must be the 
 mens divinor, and a gravitation towards living wisdom, 
 and although our utmost hope be not realized, for more 
 will have to admit than like it, ct I have loved wisdom 
 more than she has loved me," we should not be dis- 
 heartened, but go on our way rejoicing, and bate not a 
 jot of heart or hope. A book may be amusing with faults 
 and to spare, and be dull without any very risible absurdity ; 
 authors may publish, and books be in a continual state of 
 multiplication, and but for books intellect would suffer 
 catalepsy, or die of famine and mental inanition. 
 
 It is astonishing what progress has been made in science 
 and literature, even since the dawn of this century. New 
 discourses, fresh literary and scientific indagations, old 
 MSS. brought to light, and power of production have been 
 evinced " beyond thought's compass." 
 
 La Bruyere vainly asserted in his time, that we were come 
 into the world too late for new discoveries, and that both 
 nature and sentiment were exhausted. There may be still 
 regions of fiction and fact yet unexplored, and what phy- 
 sical or mechanical inventions shall be left for future ages 
 we have slight conception ; they may resemble celestial 
 
333 
 
 beatitudes, which eye hath not seen nor ear heard. So will 
 it continue on this sublunary ball of earth, till we reach 
 regions beyond the grave, for this life is a mystery, and 
 when it ceases, then will begin the mystery of death and 
 its sequel, when we may find that God alone is a simple 
 uncombined spirit, and that this world is the exclusive 
 theatre of man's past and future existence, so we must feel 
 that sublimity is a mystery, (p. 288.) 
 
 We are sent here to exercise our faculties, neither is 
 there aught physical nor metaphysical, which is unlawful 
 for man, the paragon of animals, to investigate. Time it- 
 self is nothing, it is what is effected in time, and this world 
 will not end until man attains all the perfection inherent 
 in his being; and in proportion as minds are elevate, 
 though they come in contact with a world of sin and im- 
 perfection, like sunbeams, they may traverse pollution and 
 recede unsullied. 
 
 As thought and spirit were given from above so was 
 speech, in which all should excel, because in that attribute 
 we surpass all mortal creation, and should accustom our- 
 selves, aristocrats by birth or intellect, 
 
 To use a language raised above the vulgar, 
 Just as we wear a more superb attire. 
 
 It is within the scope of all well educated people, 
 although it may alone be within the province of the pcet 
 or orator, " Est finitimus oratori poeta," to reach the 
 pathetic, which Cicero calls the mistress of affections, 
 a power which rouses and alarms the passions, and is 
 considered the sceptre of eloquence ; it is this power which 
 commands the world, which rears the stooping, bends the 
 erect, and makes captive even reluctance and opposition. 
 
 Hence, it is hoped that these citations from poetic pieces, 
 shewing their dependence on figures of speech, and the 
 illustrations of grammatical laws or peculiarities, may 
 prove acceptable to all who favour rhetoric and cherish 
 poetry. 
 
334 
 
 On Rhyme. 
 
 With respect to rhyming poetry, however untoward its 
 prospects might be, from the circumstance of its birth 
 and nurture, yet in time it has arrived at such a degree 
 of strength as to invade the possessions of harmony and 
 numbers in the region of poetry, the genuine children of 
 knowledge and politeness, which it subdued, and reduced 
 to a state of slavery and an implicit obedience to its 
 despotic power. The barbarism of its origin can not be 
 doubted, since it has ever been found amongst the most 
 rude and savage nations, but was not even known to be 
 polished and refined. Nor have we to seek from what 
 stock it comes, when we see that it is so congenial with all 
 the tongues derived from the Gothic root, that in these it 
 is considered an ornament and gives delight ; but in the 
 Greek and Latin, far from adding beauty to them, it 
 becomes ridiculous and creates distaste, as the specimens 
 we have of it illustrate in its use, begun about the end of the 
 fourth century. So that any nation proud of its poetry, 
 boasts only of its barbarism, and is so far on a footing 
 with those savages that wear rings and gewgaws in their 
 ears and noses, staining their face and lips by way of 
 ornament. And should any people be fortunately pos- 
 sessed of a language equally capable of every charm and 
 power of numbers with those of the ancients, yet give the 
 preference to rhyme, how would they differ from the wild 
 Indian who barters his diamonds and precious stones for 
 bits of glass and tinkling baubles. Rhyme has not only 
 been a false ornament to English poetry, but has also 
 destroyed much of its true beauty, and has in a measure 
 unharmonised our language. An objection to rhyme is 
 the restraint it throws on the fluency of the periods. The 
 word reim in its origin, means to count, and this poetry 
 
335 
 
 abounded in rhyme and alliteration. Like some kinds of red 
 paint, that applied to the face, gives it an artificial glow, 
 but the poisonous quality of which, by constant use devours 
 the natural bloom, shrivels the skin, and destroys the con- 
 stitution. So that a custom begun through an accidental 
 pallor, from a weakly habit of body, or indulged through 
 wantonness may in time become not a matter of choice, 
 but of necessity. "When the English language was in its 
 first state of rudeness, like others derived from the Gothic 
 original, it abounded so in monosyllables and words art- 
 lessly composed of dissonant and discordant letters, that 
 all attempts in our poets towards introducing numbers and 
 harmony into their measure must have proved nugatory. To 
 supply their place, they were compelled to recur to rhyme. 
 But when it was enriched and refined by the culture of the 
 learned languages, with stores of well formed and euphonic 
 words, composed of different and proper numbers of sylla- 
 bles, it had then been easy to establish new and harmo- 
 nious measures suited to the genius of the recently im- 
 proved tongue. But, on the contrary, the sole use made of 
 these acquisitions was to augment and extend the empire 
 of rhyme. Exotic words were not admitted as denizens, 
 but treated as prisoners, and without regard to their illus- 
 trious descent, were robed in slavish dresses, and chained 
 to the car. 
 
 The merciless poets, with a cruelty like that of Pro- 
 crustes, dragged all that were of comely stature to the bed 
 of rhyme, and lopped them to that size ; nor did those 
 natives who resembled them share a better fate. What- 
 ever disorders there might have been in the language 
 before, this was the first blow given to its constitution, 
 and the first disease that seized its vitals. Words of two syl- 
 lables were reduced to one, of three to two, and so on. 
 This was done by a general law with so little regard to 
 sound, that vowels were banished, and consonants clustered 
 
336 
 
 together. Nor can a cause be assigned for this, but in 
 order to increase the number of rhyme. For as the final 
 syllables of our heroic measure must be long or accented, 
 no word, terminating in a short or unaccented syllable 
 could be used. Against this, the poets found a remedy, 
 by throwing out the vowels of every such syllable, and 
 crowding the consonants into the preceding. This prac- 
 tice is humourously described by Swift in the Tatler. "Thus 
 we cram one syllable and elide words, in which, some have 
 indulged themselves so loosely, as to give a different pro- 
 nunciation to the same words in different places, according 
 as it best suited the present occasion." The same cause 
 has also affected our language, not a little, in regard to 
 the sense and meaning of words. 
 
 This will be obvious to any who has studied our rhymes, 
 and seen with how little ceremony they have used words, 
 that furnished them with a lucky rhyme, though at the 
 expense of precision, and this may be one of the chief 
 sources of the very vague signification of some words. 
 
 Thus has rhyme proved a considerable enemy to our 
 tongue, in all its essential as well as ornamental qualities, 
 and in proportion as its influence increased, that of sound, 
 harmony, numbers, expression, energy, perspicuity and pre- 
 cision have been diminished. And though the general 
 opinion be that the refinement of our language may be 
 dated from the time the real refinement began in rhyme, 
 in the days of Dryden ; yet this may be shewn to be ori- 
 ginally an error in judgment founded on false appearances, 
 since corroborated by time and custom, and that our 
 language, instead of a progressive motion towards perfec- 
 tion, which it is judged to have had by incautious critics, 
 has in reality been describing a circular motion, and con- 
 stantly though imperceptibly tending towards the point of 
 its own original barbarism. This may be seen by collating 
 its present with its past condition in that respect. The 
 
337 
 
 great defects of our tongue, in its rude primary state, were 
 that it was linked by as few vowels as possible. This fault 
 it had in common with all other tongues, previous to their 
 state of cultivation, but especially those of the northern 
 nations, the roughness of whose nature and manners seem 
 to have imparted a roughness to their speech. When by 
 conquest commerce, the introduction of literature and of 
 the arts and sciences, our tongue became enriched with 
 numbers of words borrowed from other languages, or else 
 new coined, it was rendered only more copious and fit for 
 use, but it received little or no benefit in point of sound or 
 harmony. For the new and adopted words were compelled 
 to bend to the genius of the natives, and on their admis- 
 sion were despoiled of their ornamental vowels, and in 
 many of their better sounding consonants were changed 
 for those of a rougher kind, that were more in use and 
 familiar to the ear. They were all reduced to one, or to 
 as few syllables as possible, by cutting off" their initial 
 vowels or their termiuations. Thus out of expendo was 
 made spend, extraneous came strange, debitum debts* 
 dubito doubt, clericus clerk, spiritus spright. 
 
 Our first poets found it impossible to produce any thing 
 harmonious out of materials so discordant, and were there- 
 fore obliged to content themselves with the single and poor 
 ornament of rhyme. Those that succeeded them endea- 
 voured all they could to remedy the defects of our lan- 
 guage, and make it capable of numbers, by adding length 
 to words and increasing the number of vowels. This was 
 begun by Sir John Gowcr, and afterwards carried to a 
 great height by his disciple Chaucer ; though the language 
 had not as yet arrived at sufficient perfection to admit dis- 
 carding rhyme entirely, and relying wholly on numbers ; 
 yet by keeping rhyme in its proper subordinate state, it was 
 daily tending towards it. For in the days of Chaucer, 
 rhyme was considered in its true light, the lowest part of 
 
338 
 
 poetry, who may be said to be tbe first of our versifiers 
 who wrote poetically, while Lydgate, a monk of Bury, his 
 cotemporary, induced a more settled condition of writing. 
 Neither sound nor meaning were sacrificed to it, when- 
 ever their interests became incompatible rhyme was 
 obliged always to give way ; it was thought less evil to 
 have an indifferent rhyme than to maim the sense or pro- 
 nunciation. No words were contracted, no vowels thrown 
 out of syllables to make room for that, on the contrary, 
 they prefixed initial and added final vowels, as often as 
 possible. The termination e was always sounded. The 
 words were generally lengthened by the addition of eth 
 and ed in their variations ; and many nouns as well as verbs 
 by en instead of es, as shoen for shoes, iperceiven for per- 
 ceives. But all these steps towards rendering our tongue 
 completely fit for numbers and measures were defeated by 
 some, who afterwards arose, and who have been styled the 
 refiners of our tongue, when in fact they have been the 
 corrupters of it. Some that were possessed of a happy 
 facility in rhyming, so level to the capacity of all people, 
 influenced the taste of the nation, and consequently gave 
 rhyme the first place in poetry. 
 
 This usurper, like all others, exercised his power tyran- 
 nically, and the whole language submitted to his will. 
 Then it was that our vowels were again discarded, accord- 
 ing to the old barbarous rule, and the consonants were 
 clustered together as if curdled. Then it was that the 
 initial and final syllables were lopped, and monosyllables 
 again multiplied. E final became mute, eth was changed 
 into the hissing s } and ed was dispoiled of its vowel, with 
 innumerous other corruptions. And all this with no other 
 view than to increase the number of rhymes. Had this 
 been used as poetical licence only, the constitution of our 
 language had not been impaired by it. But the poets 
 knew too well that if words were written or enunciated 
 
339 
 
 differently at the end of lines from what they were in 
 other places, rhyme would have but a precarious existence, 
 and would be soon deniched. They therefore abridged 
 their words in the same manner in all parts of the verse ; 
 and not content with this, they introduced the same cus- 
 tom into prose. Thus has the evil been irretrievably spread 
 through the substance as well as the form of our tongue. 
 Whoever will but cast his eye over a few pages of Chaucer 
 and will collate them with those of any other poet, will 
 find by the number of apostrophes in the latter, that the 
 proportion of vowels to consonants was greater in his days 
 than at present, and consequently the words of our lan- 
 guage was better constituted at that time to give pleasure 
 to the ear in point of sound. 
 
 All those corruptions will, on reflection, appear to have 
 been owing to the neglect of the study of oratory ; for had 
 the art of speaking been made a necessary branch of edu- 
 cation, which it certainly should have been, our language 
 had soon, like the Roman, been fixed on invariable rules. 
 The care of it, in regard to sound and pronunciation, had 
 then belonged to their natural guardians — the public 
 speakers — who were more interested in the proper support 
 of those rules, as they addressed their words only to the 
 ear, nor had they allowed this province to be usurped by 
 the poets, whose works are chiefly submitted to the eye. 
 The poets, in that case, must have taken their standard of 
 sound and pronunciation from the orators, who had cer- 
 tainly the better right to fix it ; whereas, by this neglect 
 our speakers have been obliged to follow the poets in their 
 capricious changes of pronunciation and in the Gothic 
 sounds again restored by them, through the amputation of 
 syllables and banishment of vowels, in order to bringdown 
 our words to their low standard. Had the art of reading 
 and speaking well been studied by all who applied them- 
 selves to literature, people in general would have had some 
 
 z 2 
 
340 
 
 rational principles and stated rules to guide them in these 
 points, and had never suffered so absurd and pernicious 
 innovations to obtain. But, having neither precept nor 
 example, they were without judgment or taste, and there- 
 fore were admirably fitted to follow with blind zeal those 
 writers most pleasing to them or most fashionable. The 
 prevalent ignorance or want of taste compelled the poets 
 also to adapt their measure to the capacity of their readers ; 
 for it is obvious that had knowledge and taste been more 
 general, all who were possessed of genius would have 
 studied numbers and measures only, and left rhyme to 
 pretenders and men of inferior capacity. But to what 
 purpose was it to be at great pains and cost to collect 
 pearls to throw them before mere animals? Numbers, 
 cadence, and harmony in measure can no more be per- 
 ceived by persons, who can not read with propriety and 
 grace than the charm of musical composition can be 
 known from a view of the notes by one who is not ac- 
 quainted with their powers. There are few ears so dull 
 that are not sensible to rhyme, and this it was that made 
 it of general use among all that wished to have many 
 readers, all that wrote with a view to profit or reputation. 
 But under whatever necessity the French or other mo- 
 dern tongues may be to use rhyme, and the imperfect rule 
 of measure which they employed, the English alone, from 
 the very genius and constitution of the language, need not 
 submit to those restraints. On the contrary, from what- 
 ever concurrence of circumstances it has happened, it may 
 be proved to be superior in its qualities, not only to all 
 the modern, but, on the whole, to the admired languages 
 of antiquity. Whether it be, as in the well-known story 
 of the painter's sponge, that the casual blending of the 
 colours produced a more natural foam on the horse than 
 the utmost skill of the paintbrush could have drawn, so the 
 variety of tongues out of which ours has been composed 
 
341 
 
 has formed one more finished in its nature than the utmost 
 labour or art of man could have contrived; or from what- 
 ever cause it may proceed, the fact is indubitable, that we 
 are possessed of one more capable of answering all the 
 purposes of speech, whether of use or ornament, than any 
 that has ever existed. 
 
 Were our language studied and improved to that degree 
 of perfection of which it is susceptible, it would appear 
 that the qualities of sound to fit it to all sorts of poetical 
 composition are blended in more happy proportions than 
 in any other, and that we have on that account as great 
 an advantage over the ancients in point of numbers, 
 as the invention and improvement of our musical instru- 
 ments have given us in respect to harmony. But in both 
 cases we have failed of the end, by an abuse or neglect of 
 the means which could give us the superiority. An inge- 
 nious treatise on musical expression has laid open the 
 sources of the bad taste that prevails with respect to that 
 art. Music consists of tune and time. As the fate of its 
 sister, poetry, seems to be similar, and from similar causes, 
 I shall use what he has said of the one to elucidate what 
 I have advanced with relation to the other. He remarks 
 that, properly speaking, there are but three circum- 
 stances on which the worth of any musical composition can 
 depend — these are melody, harmony and expression. 
 When these three are united in their full excellence, the 
 composition is then perfect ; if any of these be wanting or 
 imperfect, the composition is proportionably defective. 
 The chief endeavour, therefore, of the skilful composer 
 must be to unite all various sources of beauty in every 
 piece, and never so far regard or idolise any one of them 
 as to despise and omit the other two. 
 
 Every reader of discernment will see at once that this 
 is analogous to the numbers of poetry. lie proceeds to 
 shew the present errors and defects in these respects. 
 
342 
 
 The first error we shall note is, where the harmony, and 
 consequently the expression, is neglected for the sake of 
 the air, or rather an extravgant modulation. The extreme 
 of running all our music into one single part, to the utter 
 neglect of all true harmony, is a defect more essential 
 than the neglect of modulation only, for harmony is the 
 basis of all musical composition. Is not this similar to 
 the practice of our poets in making rhyme the chief object 
 of their attention, and using, as much as possible, one 
 uniform movement in their verses, to the great prejudice 
 of harmony and expression? In accounting for the 
 spreading of this false taste, he assigns the following as 
 the chief cause : — 
 
 " It may be affirmed with truth, that the false taste, or 
 rather the total want of taste, in those that hear and that 
 always assume to themselves the privilege of judging, has 
 often produced this low species of music ; for it must be 
 owned that this kind of composition is apt, above all 
 others, at first hearing, to strike an unskilful ear, and 
 hence masters have often sacrificed their art to the gross 
 judgment of an unrefined audience/" 
 
 Is not this directly parallel to what has been said of 
 poets and their readers ? He has assigned a quite con- 
 trary cause for a corruption of a different kind, when com- 
 paring the state of modern with ancient music. He says, 
 from the structure of these instruments we can not form 
 any vast idea of their powers, they seem to have been in- 
 ferior to those in use at present, but which, indeed, being 
 capable of as much execution as expression, are rendered 
 only more liable to be abused. Thus the too great com- 
 pass of our modern instruments, tempting as much the 
 composer as performer to exceed the natural bounds of 
 harmony, may be one reason why some authors have 
 warmly espoused the cause of ancient music, and ex- 
 claimed against that of modern music. 
 
343 
 
 Here, indeed, the comparison does not hold. Our poets, 
 far from running riot on account of their abundance, have 
 starved themselves in the midst of plenty, and through 
 their want of skill in the management of their instru- 
 ments, instead of producing the great variations of tones 
 of which it is capable, they have confined themselves to a 
 few simple modulations, which make it appear to have a 
 little less compass than those of the ancients. 
 
 And this was a natural consequence of not studying our 
 language, without which it was impossible we could know 
 its peculiar grace or force, or perceive what sort of num- 
 bers were best suited to its genius. Nothing was left us 
 in this case but imitation, and as it was soon found that 
 the Roman measures could not be adopted into our tongue, 
 we followed the track of our neighbours, and built our 
 poetry on their rules. Thus did we submit through choice 
 to all the imperfections under which theirs laboured through 
 necessity. We blindly considered our language as formed 
 upon the same Gothic model with other European tongues, 
 and, through want of inquiry, did not know that ours alone 
 had retained all the qualities that gave charms to ancient 
 poetry, besides some peculiar to ourselves which, properly 
 used, give us a superiority over them. We did not know 
 that amidst all their variety of measures in their different 
 species of poetry, there is not one to which we either have 
 not, or may not have, something analogous in ours, and 
 for the most part, superior in its kind. Our blindness in 
 this respect is the more extraordinary because it is a thing 
 no longer in embryo, to be seen only through microscopes, 
 but we have proofs of it glaring as daylight, and the full 
 grown perfect productions arc obvious to the senses. But 
 we have eyes and see not, ears have we and hear not. How 
 few know that Milton docs not equal or exceed Homer and 
 Virgil in aught so much as in numbers. And if it can be 
 proved that we excel them in that respect in the more 
 
344 
 
 sublime compositions of epic and tragic poetry, no one 
 can pretend to say that we may not compete with them 
 even in lyric strains, if our language be cultivated and re- 
 stored to its purity. We have one instance at least on 
 which to ground this opinion, which is, that the English 
 can boast of the most finished ode that was ever produced 
 in any language in point of variety, harmony, and expres- 
 sion in its numbers, and were it not disfigured by rhyme, 
 it must, in the opinion of the most delicate and unpreju- 
 diced judges, bear away the palm from all antiquity — I 
 mean Dryden's Ode to St. Cecilia. If our language in 
 its corrupt state were capable of so much, what might we 
 not hope from it, were it polished and refined ? Should 
 we recover a true taste, and by discarding rhyme, make 
 room for our exiled vowels ? who knows, when the sound 
 of our words were rendered more melodious, what delight- 
 some measures a true genius might yet discover, and what 
 yet bold Pindaric flights he might take when his wings 
 were full grown, and his fetters struck off? Lest we 
 should too hastily determine with respect to the number 
 and kinds of measure that the genius of our tongue will 
 admit by what has been done, be it remembered that 
 Horace, the li numerosus Horatius," was the first that dis- 
 covered to the Romans the variety of numbers of which 
 their language was susceptible, although it had been for 
 some time in the utmost state of perfection before he began 
 to write. 
 
 The general ignorance that has prevailed in respect to 
 this point will not appear surprising to any one who re- 
 flects, that it is impossible to know anything of poetic 
 numbers without skill in reading. The verses of a poet, 
 and the compositions of a master of music, are precisely on 
 a par. Let us suppose a country in which the science of 
 music were at a low ebb, and the instruments proportion- 
 ably poor — let us suppose that men of the most eminent 
 
345 
 
 genius in the art should arise in that country, could they 
 shew them beyond what was in the compass of their in- 
 struments to execute ? Suppose one of extraordinary abi- 
 lity should be able to set down on paper compositions of 
 the sublimest harmony, must they not be totally un- 
 known, were it impossible to have them executed ? Is it 
 not to be supposed that all musicians who sought either 
 fame or profit, would in such a country restrict themselves 
 to such strains and modulations as were best suited to 
 their instruments, without lavishing their time in laborious 
 researches into useless theory which could not be reduced 
 to practice ? Could it be expected that any genius, ever 
 so towering, should be so disinterested as to employ himself 
 entirely in works which could add neither to his fame nor 
 profit, while alive, in hope that proper instruments might 
 afterwards be invented, which in the hands of able per- 
 formers might display their beauties, and gain him honour 
 with distant posterity ? Nay, let us suppose that he could 
 invent proper instruments, or import them, with proper 
 performers from some other country, would he not find it 
 difficult to alter an established national taste, till the art 
 were first studied, and a true taste introduced, founded on 
 the knowledge of the rules ? It would be difficult to per- 
 suade an ignorant Highlander that any instrument is so 
 agreeable to his ear as the bagpipe, or an uncultivated 
 Welshman or Irishman that the harp is not superior to the 
 violin, nor would all the rhetoric in the world induce them 
 to believe that a piece of Mozart's composition is compa- 
 rable to one of their own wild airs. And this prevalence 
 of custom and early impression is not peculiar to the rude 
 and ignorant only, but is seen as remarkable in the most 
 polished countries. All know with what rapture in old 
 times the Parisian listened to the music of the French 
 opera, which is disagreeable and grating to the ear of a 
 polished foreigner. But the poetical composer is in every 
 point under greater difficulties than the musical. 
 
a46 
 
 The works of the latter are publicly shewn in all their 
 beauty and force by the hands of skilful performers regu- 
 larly trained, so that he has a chance of having some good 
 judges among his auditors, as all persons inclined to obtain 
 a critical knowledge of that science are furnished with 
 examples as well as rules, on which to form their taste. 
 But the tune of the poet is sung only in private, where 
 every reader is to himself a performer. How skilful soever 
 he is likely to be may be judged by considering that in an 
 art infinitely more difficult than the musical, he has neither 
 rule nor example to guide him. So that if the instrument 
 be out of tune, or the ear vitiated, the performer will not 
 be sensible of these defects in himself, but will impute 
 the fault to the numbers of the poet. To such an indivi- 
 dual those strains which are most harmonious, and in which 
 the skill of the poet is most displayed, will appear most 
 discordant. The more diversified the cadence, the more 
 varied are the numbers ; the more disagreeable and ill- 
 formed will the verses appear from a uniformity of pro- 
 nunciation — an error, into which unskilful readers of ne- 
 cessity fall. To such, the introduction of different feet into 
 the same measure, and their judicious combinations appear 
 to create disorder and confusion, and the want of rhyme 
 is with them the want of measure, which used to be their 
 unerring guide in making the close. Thus it is the Chinese 
 judge of European pictures. Unaccustomed to consider 
 the different excellence of their own, only in regard to the 
 richness of the colouring, they see no beauty in ours, which 
 they say have too many black spots in them, for so they 
 term the shades. 
 
 Hence it is evidenced, that our poets, if they expected 
 to be read with pleasure, were compelled to adapt their 
 strain to the capacity of their readers, and to use such num- 
 bers only as could easily be perceived. And hence arose that 
 uniformity of cadence and general use of rhyme in their 
 
347 
 
 works. Thus, as their task became extremely easy, they 
 were saved the trouble of studying the principles of their 
 art, and set up at once for masters without serving an ap- 
 prenticeship. They entered immediately on the practice 
 without knowledge of the theory, and instead of unerring 
 rules to direct them, they had only two uncertain guides, 
 imitation and their own ears. Of all the poets that have 
 written in our language, there seems to be but two who 
 have dived into the principles of versification, and traced 
 English numbers to their source. These were Dryden and 
 Milton. This may be sufficiently exemplified by the dif- 
 ferent conduct of these two contemporary writers, and the 
 different uses they made of their powers, as well as the 
 reception their works obtained from their countrymen. 
 Dryden knew perhaps the theory of numbers as well as 
 Milton, but was far from making the same use of his know- 
 ledge, which he turned wholly to serve his own views. He 
 wrote for sustenance, which depended on his present fame, 
 and present fame was to arise from pleasing present taste. 
 That once obtained, the bookseller, who considered not the 
 intrinsic value, paid him in proportion to the bulk of the 
 work, or the number of Hues it contained. Being always 
 a needy,, he was of course a hasty writer, but his genius 
 came to the rescue. Possessed as he was of such a happy 
 turn for rhyme, he could have produced almost a hundred 
 lines fi stans pede in uno," that would give delight on ac- 
 count of that facility, in the same space of time that he 
 could have written ten, whose beauty depended on the pro- 
 priety and harmony of numbers, and the charms of which, 
 after all his pains, could not be perceived by the multitude 
 of unskilful readers. 
 
 The tragedy of Gordobuc by Thomas Sackville, Lord 
 Buckhurst, written and printed in 1565 surreptitiously, 
 and reprinted 1571, was the first proof of this style of com- 
 position, known as blank verse, but others ascribe it to Grim- 
 
348 
 
 bald, who was educated at the same College as Milton was, 
 viz. Christ's Coll. Camb. Many hasty thoughts would 
 appear beautiful on account of the richness of the rhyme, 
 which in blank verse would be considered puerile. Add 
 to this, that indulgence to all faults and errors of this 
 kind of writing, is more easily granted than in any other, 
 from a supposed restriction under which the poet lies — 
 which in fact to one possessed of a natural faculty in 
 that respect, improved by habit, there is no style easier. 
 When all this is considered it ceases to be a subject of 
 wonder that Dryden should exert his powers to keep up a 
 taste so well adapted to his purpose, and to make it exten- 
 sive as possible. With this view he gave a remarkable 
 instance of what has been before observed, how it is 
 in the power of one single individual of reputation to 
 introduce or confirm a bad taste in a whole nation, by 
 making even tragedies in rhyme, which were not only 
 heard without degout, but, as we are informed, imparted 
 delight to the viciated ear of those days. Now it is long 
 since we have evinced propriety enough to banish those 
 monstrous productions from the stage, introduced by King 
 Charles II. who had been inoculated in France with this 
 bad taste. Upon the whole Dryden was the reigning poet 
 of his time, and his works were universally perused and 
 admired. Nor would the number of his votaries have been 
 lessened at this day had not a successor of more application 
 and greater leisure outstripped him in his own art. 
 
 Milton acted on principles directly opposite. Like the 
 great bard of antiquity he painted for eternity, only his 
 conduct in this respect was infinitely more disinterested, as 
 he resigned all chance of present fame. His light shone 
 forth in vain, for the darkness comprehended it not. His 
 almost divine poem of Paradise Lost was sold for £15, 
 which sum was to be received at three different instalments, 
 the last of which payments we have reason to believe was 
 
349 
 
 never satisfied. Nor do we find that the bookseller was 
 a great gainer by the transaction. Yet, notwithstanding 
 the unsuitable returns made him he was not to be deterred, 
 but still proceeded with a noble zeal for the honour of his 
 country and its language, to leave behind him most finished 
 models, the beauty of which, though lost upon the blind- 
 ness of the age, might be perceived and appreciated by an 
 enlightened posterity. Nor could any selfish motive induce 
 him to swerve from that strict rule of right, by which he 
 squared and quadrated all his poetic writings. To use the 
 words of one of the most ingenious and judicious of the 
 moderns, u the contempt in which, perhaps with justice, he 
 held the age, prevented his condescending either to arouse 
 or instruct it. He had before given his unworthy country- 
 men the noblest poem that genius conducted by art could 
 produce ; and he had seen them receive it with disregard, 
 if not with contempt. It was said of it " A blind poet, one 
 John Milton, had writ it." Conscious therefore of his own 
 dignity and their demerit, he looked to posterity only for 
 his reward, to posterity only directed by his future labours. 
 Hence it was peradventure he formed his Samson Agonistes 
 on a model more simple and severe than Aristotle himself 
 would have demanded, and chose iEschylus for his master 
 rather than Sophocles, or his familiar, much loved Euri- 
 pides ; intending by this conduct to put as great a distance 
 as possible between himself and his contemporary writers, 
 and to make his works, as he himself said, " different from 
 what among them passed for the best." The success of 
 this poem was what was to be expected. The age in which 
 it appeared treated it with total negligence, # nor until 
 lately had that posterity to which he appealed, and which 
 has done justice to most of his other writings, given to this 
 excellent piece its full measure of popular and universal 
 fame. It is now as fully recognised as Paradise Lost, 
 although Iludibras was preferred at starting. 5 ' 
 
350 
 
 Here may arise a dissent from the opinion of this judicious 
 observer, when he seems to think that the posterity to which 
 he appealed has already done justice to most of the other 
 writings of Milton, though not to his Samson. We have 
 indeed done him all the justice in our power, and given him 
 his due degree of praise for such part of his excellence as we 
 are capable of perceiving, but we scarcely think the present 
 age so illuminated as to be able to see, or fully admire, 
 some of his greatest beauties. True it is, his Paradise Lost 
 has long since obtained its full measure of popular and uni- 
 versal fame. But this perhaps may be attributed to ano- 
 ther cause than a general improvement of taste. It is 
 more than probable that it was chiefly, if not wholly, owing 
 to the papers of criticism on that poem, published by the 
 most popular and universally admired of our writers in 
 prose, Addison. As these are preserved in books which 
 have been more generally read than perhaps in any other in 
 the English language, the fame of the poet goes hand in 
 hand with that of the critic, and the perfections of the poem 
 pointed out by him are as generally known as the essays 
 in which they are displayed. An argument in support of 
 this opinion may be drawn from the vast number and 
 variety of editions of that poem which have appeared since 
 the publication of those papers ; whereas before that time 
 the work was little known or little sought. True criticism 
 was then a new species of writing in English. It had not 
 only the charms of novelty to recommend it, but likewise 
 the highest abilities in the writer. All who admired the ana- 
 lysis of the work of course applied themselves to read the 
 original, partly led by curiosity, and partly from an actu- 
 ating principle of man to judge for himself in all critical 
 inquiries, and to examine whether the remarks were made 
 with justice and propriety. This will account for the uni- 
 versality of this poem as to its being read, and also for the 
 general applause which has ever since attended it. Readers 
 
351 
 
 of taste and knowledge extolled it from a perception of its 
 merit, and the ignorant and tasteless relied on the autho- 
 rity of the critic, and joined in the cry, lest they should 
 discover their own want of judgment. This may also serve 
 as a clue to guide us to the cause why the Agonistes ob- 
 tained a so disproportionate degree of fame, and was known 
 only to the few — for had the same critic taken the same 
 pains to exhibit the beauties of that poem, which he did 
 in respect to the epic, it is more than probable that it had 
 been as generally known and lauded as the other, though 
 not so universally admired. To corroborate this position it 
 is worthy of observation that no other work of his has 
 made its way to public knowledge without the aid of some 
 helping hand. The Allegro and Penseroso were confined 
 to the closets of the judicious, till the celebrated Handel 
 by the charms of his music, forced them into celebrity — 
 and his Comus lay buried in obscurity till the magic of 
 music brought it before the public eye — and how little that 
 public was capable of perceiving its beauties might be seen 
 from the reception then attending it. For while the skill 
 of the musician was applauded to the echo, the poem itself 
 was little regarded, or occasioned weariness and satiety. 
 It will be alleged by some that had it not been for the orna- 
 ment of the songs the dramatic poet could not have long 
 survived, and the whole piece had declined in estimation. 
 
 A particular fatality seems to have adhered to Milton, 
 different from the case of all other poets. Any one piece 
 of allowed excellence and general reputation would be suf- 
 ficient in any other writer to excite the highest curiosity 
 to see whatever other curiosities he might offer the world, 
 and to stamp a value upon them beyond their intrinsic 
 merit, while in this case, though there never was anything 
 more generally allowed than that he was the author of the 
 noblest poem that lias appeared in our tongue, perhaps in 
 any, yet this has not induced many to look through his 
 
352 
 
 other works, though they are really, in their several kinds, 
 of equal excellence with Paradise Lost — and this is an in- 
 contestable proof that however general the praise has been, 
 and however lavishly bestowed on this noble performance, 
 the greater part of it arose in fashion and authority, and a 
 quota of the amount of admiration it has excited has been 
 only pretended. For if people were only as much pleased 
 with that work as they would make us believe, what could 
 stop them from pursuing the delight which they must of 
 necessity receive from the perusal of other, his incompar- 
 able pieces ? The fact is that though Milton has by the 
 means mentioned obtained universal renown, yet it is far 
 from being founded on a right and solid basis. Fashion 
 and the authority of a few allowed judges may go a great 
 way towards making a poem admired, and to obtain the 
 incense of general praise, but this, as Macbeth says, is only 
 " mouth honour — breath, which the poor slave should fain 
 deny, but dare not/' The poetical, like the regal crown, 
 can have no great security but in the hearts of the people, 
 and the hearts of the people can be engaged to the Poet 
 only by the pleasure and delight which his works ad- 
 minister to them. Now, although Milton has been put 
 into possession of his lawful sceptre, and all due homage 
 attendant on that investiture has been paid him, yet his 
 throne seems to be founded only on his right, and has not 
 yet obtained the full affections of the people. The reason 
 of this will at once be seen, when we reflect that however 
 some other points in a poem may to the judicious appear 
 more essential, yet it is by the charms of versification 
 chiefly that the multitude are won. In poetry as in 
 painting, the unskilful majority are more captivated by 
 the colouring than the drawing. If, therefore, the works 
 of Milton appear defective in this respect, if his verses in 
 general, far from giving pleasure and delight, should strike 
 the uncultivated or the viciated ears of the age as dis- 
 
353 
 
 cordant and unmusical, the whole difficulty will at once be 
 solved. His other merits and excellencies, displayed by 
 judicious critics, may procure him a few real and shoals 
 of pretended admirers, but cannot acquire him lovers. 
 Men may be reasoned into esteem, but not into affection. 
 This arises from an involuntary delight, immediately per- 
 ceived from a contemplation of the exciting object. Ad- 
 dison has with great accuracy and clearness laid open the 
 art and judgment of Milton in the choice and conduct of 
 his fable, in the masterly drawing of his characters with 
 suitable manners, and in the sublimity of his sentiments 
 and diction. These justly challenge our admiration and 
 extort our praise, but the charms of his numbers are 
 covered with a veil. The admirers of the ancients, when 
 they are compelled to allow him his due merit, yet add, 
 with an apparent concern, though with a secret satisfac- 
 tion, that it is a pity so excellent a workman had so poor 
 materials, and the composition of so great a genius had 
 not the advantage of the ornaments which the languages 
 of Greece and Rome have supplied ; while those of modern 
 taste sigh for their rhyme, like Dr. Johnson, and lament 
 the want of that uniformity of cadence to which their ears 
 have been attuned. But not one reader perhaps in many 
 thousands knows that a peculiar beauty of Milton is his 
 versification, and that he has excelled all writers of all 
 ages and countries in the uniform variety, harmony, and 
 expression of his numbers. Shakspere's numbers are oc- 
 casionally inimitable, for " rough, smooth, dense, or rare," 
 but he is not so uniformly harmonious as Milton, who de- 
 dicated his time to the delectation of music, and his verse 
 to the realisation of melody. Nor will this appear an 
 extraordinary assertion when we reflect that this is impos- 
 sible to be known without perfect skill in reading — that 
 we are of necessity corrupted in our principles of that art 
 by ignorant masters and false rules — and that there is 
 
 2 A 
 
354 
 
 little attempt made to amend it. While, therefore, we 
 remain in an ignorance of that art, we must as necessarily 
 remain in ignorance of the true beauty and secret power 
 of numbers, as we should do in regard to musical composi- 
 tions where the instruments are defective, out of tune, or 
 the players unskilful. The poems of Milton must ap- 
 pear in the same light to us as our pictures to the Chinese 
 — too many dark shades and opacity. Until that art is 
 studied we shall be far from having it in our power wil- 
 lingly to give that first of poets his wonted praise, that we 
 shall be even blind to some of his unapproachable excel- 
 lencies. Besides the charms of versification we shall lose 
 some of the finest parts of his imagery, and in many places 
 not even be able to comprehend the full drift of his ideas. 
 Let us therefore apply ourselves con amove, and with dili- 
 gence, to a study capable of affording such unalloyed de- 
 light. Let us examine our language with care, and dive 
 into its secret and recondite treasures. Let us be no 
 longer content with a poor meagre vein of ore which we 
 find near the surface, and which, after the French fashion, 
 serves only to wiredraw or gild over a baser metal, but let 
 us dig into the mine, where we shall discover a plenteous 
 lode, equal in richness and superior in amplitude to that 
 of the ancients. Should theirs be held for a purer speci- 
 men, yet will ours be found to contain no more alloy than 
 will render it fitter for all sorts of curious workmanship. 
 
 Too long time have the beauties of the British muse, 
 like those of the sex, been concealed, or spoiled, or cor- 
 rupted by foreign mode and false integuments. The car- 
 mine on the cheeks and lips, the fantastic dresses, the 
 tightened stays, (the prodigious crinoline, successor of the 
 hoops, under whose amplitude, Swift remarked in his 
 day, that a moderate sized gallant might be concealed), 
 only spoil the bloom of a complexion, the flowing ringlets 
 of the hair, the easy shape and graceful mien. Should a 
 
355 
 
 polished Athenian arise and behold her thus decked, he 
 would be astonished to see in a country, illumined by their 
 rules and examples, deformity made a science, and bar- 
 barism reduced to rule and practice. Our northern muses, 
 thus adorned, like a traviata, are made to inflame passions, 
 and not to regulate them. What hope can we entertain 
 of a robust and healthy offspring if we allow such incon- 
 sistencies and irregularities ? Let our muse be redeemed 
 from tyrannical sway, which fashion superinduces, and 
 restore her to her native rights, simplicity and demeanour. 
 We require little meretricious ornament, — let us leave to 
 the sallow foreigner their ceruse and cosmetics, but let 
 the British carnation and white appear in their genuine 
 lustre, as laid on by nature's own pencil. Let other writers, 
 remote from our shores, torture the body of their muse 
 into a fantastic shape, or hide crookedness of limb, or cur- 
 vature of spine under an armour of steel, cover puny 
 members and a mincing gait under wide circumference of 
 garments, but let the easy mien, the comely stature, the 
 nicely chiselled symmetry, decently revealed, and the un- 
 restrained majesty of motion in the British muse be dis- 
 played to sight in their native charms. Then shall she 
 stand confessed the genuine sister of the Grecian muse, 
 and not the less beautiful for being supremely engaging 
 as ' ' Beauty's youngest daughter." Then shall her votaries 
 burn with a pure and holy flame, and the poetic offspring, 
 from chaste union between sense and harmony, will be 
 found lovely, vigorous, and destined to long-lasting, in- 
 stead of chimeras, dire shapes flitting as clouds, and mere 
 airy echoes produced from the wanton marriage of sound 
 and fancy. 
 
 It is remarked by Du Bos, an eminent French critic, 
 that although the French language is incapable of any 
 tolerable poetic measure without rhyme, that there is no 
 rule in poetry the observance of which costs so much 
 
 2 a 2 
 
356 
 
 trouble and produces so few beauties in verse as that of 
 rhyming. Rhyme frequently maims, and almost always 
 enervates the sense of a discourse. For one brilliant 
 thought which the passion of rhyming throws in our way 
 by chance, it is certainly every day the cause of a hundred 
 others which we should blush to use, were it not for the 
 richness or novelty of rhyme with which these thoughts 
 are attended. Some, perhaps, will say, there must be 
 greater beauty in rhyme than it is pretended to shew. The 
 consent of all nations, they may add, is a sensible proof in 
 favour of rhyme, the use of which is universally adopted. 
 It is to be replied, in the first place, that we contest not 
 the agreeableness of rhyme, but look on this agreeableness 
 only in an inferior and subordinate light to that which 
 arises in the numbers and harmony of verse, and which 
 shews itself continually during metrical pronunciation. 
 Numbers and harmony are a light which can emit a con- 
 stant lustre, but rhyme is a flash that disappears after 
 giving a short-lived splendour. In fact the richest rhyme 
 has but a transient effect. Were we even to note the 
 value of verse only by the difficulties that are to be sur- 
 mounted in making it, it is less difficult, without compari- 
 son, to rhyme completely than to compose numerous and 
 harmonious verse. In arriving at the latter we encounter 
 obstacles at every word. Nothing extricates a French 
 poet from these difficulties but his genius, his ear, and his 
 perseverance, for he derives no aid from any method re- 
 duced to art. 
 
 These obstructions occur not unfrequently when the 
 poet purposes to rhyme well only, but endeavouring to 
 surmount them, he consults a lexicon of rhyme, the fa- 
 vourite code of all versifiers. For let these writers say 
 what they may, they all have that excellent work in their 
 studies, as their poetical Yade mecum. 
 
 Secondly, I grant that we rhyme all our verses and that 
 
357 
 
 our neighbours do the same. We find the use of rhyme 
 even in Asia and America, but these are barbarous, and 
 the rhyming nations that have been civilized were barba- 
 rous and illiterate when their poetry was first formed. The 
 languages they spoke were not susceptible of greater per- 
 fection of verse, when they laid the foundations of their 
 poetry. True it is that the European nations became in 
 process of time polite and learned. But as they polished 
 themselves not till a long time after they were formed into 
 a body politic, and as their national customs were settled 
 and even strengthened by their long standing, when these 
 nations received improvements arising in a judicious cul- 
 ture of Greek and Latin, those customs had been polished 
 and mended, but could never be totally altered. An ar- 
 chitect who undertakes to repair an old gothic structure, 
 may make alterations to render it more commodious, but 
 he can not alter defects arising in the first construction. 
 He can not shape it into a regular building without pulling 
 down the old one, in order to erect a new edifice on a dif- 
 ferent plan. 
 
 Rhyme, like fiefs and duels, owe their origin to the 
 barbarous state of our ancestors. The people from whom 
 modern nations are descended, and who subverted the 
 Roman Empire, had their poets, though barbarians, when 
 they first settled in Gaul and other provinces of the em-* 
 pire. As languages in which ignorant poets wrote were 
 not sufficiently improved to endure treating according to 
 the rules of art, nor even admitted the attempt, they 
 fancied there would be some ornament in terminating with 
 the same sound the two consecutive or relative parts of a 
 discourse, that were to be of equal extent. This identity 
 of final sounds repeated at the end of a number of syllables 
 formed a kind of grace, and seemed to express something 
 of cadence in verse. Thus was it in all verisimilitude that 
 rhyme first arose, and was established in Europe. 
 
358 
 
 Here we have a fair picture of rhyme offered to us with 
 the history of its rise and progress, the legitimate offspring 
 of barbarism and necessity, nursed by ignorance. 
 
 Nature is the supreme model of imitation in every art 
 and science. When we view her in all her operations, we 
 find her invariably simple and uniform. She never ap- 
 pears in fantastic ornament, never decorated with un- 
 seemly embellishments ; her air and attitude are graceful, 
 her mien sober, grave, and venerable ; her language, easy, 
 familiar, unaffected ; her works distinguished by harmony 
 and proportion, and she never exhibits those extravagant 
 images which characterize some productions of art. Do 
 we cast our eyes over these objects which constitute the 
 theatre of nature, we find in every one an inimitable order 
 and symmetry. The firmament displays admirable in- 
 stances of grandeur and magnificence commensurate to its 
 utility. The earth is decorated with a boundless variety 
 of landscapes, and such a simplicity as gratifies the spec- 
 tator, yet of myriads of repetitions never creates satiety. 
 "We rise from a view of nature with satisfaction, and we 
 return to it with delight and instruction. Hence we may 
 infer that the noblest model of imitation in every art and 
 science, is Nature. 
 
 Would the historian follow this simple track, which he 
 is by nature directed to pursue, his narrative would be 
 pursued with more pleasure and advantage. But some 
 have perplexed their narrative by embarrassing digressions 
 and protracted periods, like Guicciardini, florid descrip- 
 tions and a formal pedantic style — not confining them- 
 selves to an easy, familiar representation of facts in due 
 order, they confound the imagination of their readers by 
 an idle exhibition of rhetorical ornaments. Would the 
 poet follow this infallible guide, his works would not sink 
 into oblivion with the trivial and insignificant productions 
 of the day, but would remain as standards of taste and 
 
359 
 
 elegance to succeeding ages. Homer, the simplest writer 
 of antiquity, has been admired by every judicious critic and 
 reader for near three thousand years. And why? Be- 
 cause his descriptions and characters are natural. Pope 
 says nature and Homer are the same ; and that nature 
 spoke through the voice of Shakspere, where he is not 
 bombastical, as the coarse spirit of the age constrained 
 him occasionally to be — sometimes deserving the best recep- 
 tion, and sometimes the worst. " Aliquando bonus dormitat 
 Homerus," may also frequently be predicated of Shakspere. 
 The moderns, save him of Avon, and Milton, have never 
 approached this admirable Greek, because they have not 
 described the great events they selected for their subjects 
 with the same majestic simplicity. They have embellished 
 their productions by extravagant descriptions, incredible 
 prodigies, characters that never existed, in language com- 
 posed of turgid expressions, an endless variety of inconsis- 
 tent epithets and discordant metaphors. Such images 
 have no uniform appearance, no natural features, but are 
 monsters, "maculosa vellera," decorated with all the colours 
 of Iris. Consider then, that the reader of taste is nau- 
 seated with such profusion of fantastic portraits. Com- 
 pare even the Jerusalem of Tasso (" Oh victor unsurpassed 
 in modern song," as says Lord Byron), the lively poem of 
 the Henriade, and the most elaborate compositions of the 
 English poets who have attempted the epic poem, save 
 Milton, with the works of Homer and Virgil, and while 
 you arc dazzled with the false brilliant — le clinquant de 
 Tasse — you will admire the grave simplicity of the bards of 
 Greece and Rome. Did the dramatic writer follow nature, 
 never would he introduce his speakers declaiming in a 
 wild, inflated style— avec les mots ampoules. We should 
 think it outre and prodigiously unnatural were one in deep 
 affliction to express the anguish of his mind in measured 
 periods, florid similes, and splendid metaphors, and we can 
 
360 
 
 see no reason that these things should be allowed in scenes 
 of tragic distress. The rhyme at the end of every act, 
 which was usually introduced by the best poets of the last 
 age, has been justly exploded. On a similar account, tra- 
 gedy in rhyme has been reprobated as affected and gro- 
 tesque. Should the speaker on the stage consider with 
 attention the character he represents and the passions he 
 attempts to express, he would not " outstep the modesty of 
 nature." He would not vociferate in scenes where the 
 pathos is delineated ; he would not rant in the depths of 
 sorrow, not declaim in a soliloquy, where the hero in a 
 tragedy is supposed to be in a contemplative attitude. 
 Nothing can shock a judicious audience more than to hear 
 an actor that represents the grave Cato, speaking his cele- 
 brated soliloquy with Plato on the immortality of the soul 
 before him, in a loud, fantastic tone, pointing at the hea- 
 vens, when he says, " The stars shall fade away, the sun 
 himself grow dim with age, and nature sink in years " 
 
 Shakspere, introducing Henry VI. thus addressing 
 Cardinal Beaufort in his expiring moments, " Lord Cardi- 
 nal, if thou thinkest on Heaven's bliss — Hold up thy hand, 
 make signal of that hope \" Did an actor repeat this pa- 
 thetic address with the least degree of negligence or 
 rapidity, we should be shocked at his absurdity. Nature 
 teaches that he ought to address the dying man in a calm, 
 sympathetic tone, and that he ought to wait some time 
 before he starts back with concern and affliction, and pro- 
 nounces these words — " He dies— -and makes no sign." 
 
 Action is the language of the body and should cor- 
 respond to the idea passing in the mind of the speaker in 
 the forum or the histrionic performer on the stage. Cicero 
 in his rhapsody about the effect of oratory thought no art 
 comparable to it, an art of equal power with music itself, 
 which could "take the prisoned soul and lap it in Elysium." 
 
 It should be predicated of orators and of poets what 
 
361 
 
 Swift applies to fortunate married women, they should have 
 a quick conception and an easy delivery. 
 
 Would the senator condescend to follow the dictates of 
 nature, we should not see so many orators assume a for- 
 mal aspect, as " I am Sir Orator, when I do speak, let no 
 dog hark," then attempt a vociferous tone, saw and swing 
 their arms, like a peasant brandishing a flail. Should the 
 preacher in his sermons observe the rules of propriety and 
 decorum prescribed by nature, he would not appear so 
 affected, nor address his audience like a fanatical declaimer 
 with a rueful visage, a bellowing voice, a canting tone, or 
 puritanical formality. The air of levity and the aspect of 
 gloom are equally absurd and mistimed. The Christian 
 orator ought to be meek and inviting, shewing humility 
 and simplicity, the first of Christian virtues, in his manner 
 and address, eschewing violence and commination as ini- 
 mical to spiritual allurement, and rather by winning words 
 to conquer willing hearts, and make persuasion do the 
 work of fear. 
 
 Originally about nine-tenths of our words were consi- 
 dered to be Saxon, but now they are not more than one- 
 fifth ; the Saxon is almost as inflected as the learned tongues, 
 and it has imparted this property to its daughter the Ger- 
 man. But the English has escaped this misfortune, and 
 we scarcely inflect at all. The Gothic set the example and 
 that probably is derived from the Sanscrit, (see page 295) 
 and we have mangled our words, or lengthened them, as 
 wc thought necessity required — according to the manner 
 that the owl fattened the mice, after she bit off their legs 
 to prevent their running away; and if ours be the same 
 reason for the maiming of words it will certainly answer the 
 end, for sure we may be no other nation will borrow them. 
 
 An instance or two will elucidate the subject, and shew 
 the effects of such practices. The third person of the first 
 form of the verb " to move" was formerly written xuoxcth, 
 
362 
 
 and so of all the rest, but seeing these could not be used 
 as rhymes in heroic verse, they were reduced to one sylla- 
 ble and the terminable altered to moves, proves, &c, and 
 this rule became general. In the increase of the verbs to 
 drudge, grudge, judge, &c. it was formerly written drud- 
 ged, grud-ged, jud-ged — as two syllables, but for the same 
 reason they were reduced to one, drudg'd, grudg'd. In 
 the former of these instances are seen the mutations to 
 which I advert. "Writers have not been content to admit 
 into the number of good rhymes all words the final sylla- 
 bles of which strike the ear with a similarity of sound, but 
 all those that appear to the eye constructed in the same 
 manner, though their sounds are very different when re- 
 peated. For instance, the words, doves, proves, and groves, 
 appear similar to the eye, the vowels and last consonants 
 being the same, they look as if their sounds should be ex- 
 actly alike, and would certainly so be read by one unac- 
 quainted with the peculiarities of our tongue. And yet 
 these three words, that are admitted to be good rhymes, 
 have very different sounds to the ear, though custom has 
 rendered this familiar to us, still the absurdity of the prac- 
 tice will be immediately visible by writing the words as 
 they are pronounced — lwves, prooves, groves, by which we 
 see that it is only in the last word the letter o has its own 
 sound. In the first it has the sound of u, and in the 
 second of double 00, and consequently these words can no 
 more rhyme to one another than those composed of dif- 
 ferent vowels. Nor can a more unsound rule be conceived 
 than that which makes the eye the arbiter of sound. But, 
 poets were right, in order to lessen their own labour, to 
 obtain as great a latitude as possible for their favourite 
 rhyme, and as they were in undoubted possession of all 
 words of similar sounds in speech, they might with equal 
 propriety lay claim to all words spelled on paper as if they 
 were sounded alike, although they appeared very different 
 
363 
 
 when tittered. As this practice is universal even among 
 our best rhymers, we have no occasion to say how much it 
 must perplex and mislead those who would assist them- 
 selves in acquiring a knowledge of our tongue by reading 
 the poets, not to mention the many deviations from the 
 right sound that may be shewn in the best of them, on 
 account of the temptation of our consonants to one vowel. 
 And this custom, according to Dr. Swift, of joining the 
 most obdurate consonants, without one intervening vowel, 
 has formed harsh and jarring sounds that none but an un- 
 critical ear could endure. In the former, by changing the 
 old termination eth — as proveth into proves, the use of that 
 sibilation has been greatly multiplied. This is more im- 
 mediately obvious in all verbs that originally contain one 
 or more 5 — as, resigns for resigneth, wishes for wisheth, 
 possesses for possesseth. Nor are these the only ill effects 
 of rhyme ; pronunciation has also been rendered uncertain 
 by it, for though at first view it might rather seem a guide 
 to that, as it certainly would be were it invariably used 
 with scrupulous attention, yet by the latitude which poets 
 have allowed themselves in order to render the taste of 
 rhyme more easy, it serves rather to perplex than to assist 
 in their inquiries. 
 
 "Rhyme originated with the monks, who had already de- 
 formed the Latin tongue with the tinkling of words, and 
 transferred it from their Latin poems into the modern 
 languages, and, considering it a beauty, substituted it in- 
 stead of inversion and metrical feet. The English tongue, 
 however, is most rich in rhyme, though we have suffered 
 many rhyming words to become obsolete; yet Lord 
 Byron has, in Childe Harold, restored the currency of se- 
 veral sterling old English terms and consonance of verses. 
 The Spenserian stanza glows with rhyming beauty ; but 
 it was reserved for the sweet-mouthed Pope, who " lisped 
 in numbers, for the numbers came," like his poetical pre- 
 
364 
 
 cursor Ovid, who remarks " Et quod tentabam scribere 
 versus erat," to carry rhyme to the highest state of which 
 it is susceptible, shewing how harmony in language is the 
 result of a happy combination of measure and melody. 
 
 On the Computation of Time. 
 
 The error relative to the end of centuries, like that of 
 1800, originated in the want of information in those unac- 
 quainted with the mode of calculation used by the Romans 
 of old. For instance, the Romans, in their computation 
 of time used the ordinal where we use the cardinal number 
 — tertio quoque anno is expressed in English, every 
 three years, and in French, tous les trois ans. Hence it is 
 evident that the moment we date 1800 or 1900, the cen- 
 tury will have expired. When we date a number it is gone, 
 as twelve at night is twelve hours struck and passed away. 
 So of 1800 years. 
 
 To ascertain the expiration of any century of the Chris- 
 tian era, it will be requisite to determine the precise time 
 in which Christ was crucified, and so retrace the year to 
 his nativity. When the Consulates, by which were gene- 
 rally dated the years in the Roman empire, began to be 
 confused, and were soon after extinct, Dionysius Exiguus, 
 a Scythian by extraction, and a learned Abbot of Rome in 
 the last year of the Emperor Justin, a.d. 527, published 
 his cycle, in which he computed his years from the 1st of 
 January following, representing the birth of Christ to 
 have been on the 25th December. George Syncellus 
 mentions one Panodorus, an Egyptian monk, in the reign 
 of Arcadius, in the fifth age, who, in a Chronicle, had made 
 use of this epocha, in which he was imitated by several 
 Orientals. But Dionysius first introduced this epoch into 
 the west, and before the termination of the eighth century 
 its adoption was so general, that it had been denominated 
 
365 
 
 the common Christian era, although Venerable Bede, the 
 great luminary of this island in the eighth century, a.d. 
 731, both in his history and in his learned work " De tem- 
 porum ratione," and some others, date their era one year 
 before Dionysius, and from the incarnation of our Saviour 
 or the annunciation of the Virgin Mary, styled 25th 
 March. 
 
 This computation was continued in this country until 
 the change of the style, which took place in 1752. Sel- 
 den, in his work styled " God made man," writes to prove 
 that the nativity of our Saviour took place on the 25th 
 December. 
 
 Some chronologers, thinking they had discovered this 
 era to be erroneous, and that the birth of Christ certainly 
 preceded it, have gone into extremes, and by their opinions 
 and perplexed dissertations have rendered the precise time 
 of the first period of our holy religion more obscure and 
 unsettled. 
 
 To avoid ambiguity and to throw a ray of light on this 
 part of Sacred history, it will be necessary to premise 
 observations, which may tend to serve as a clue to conduct 
 us through this labyrinth. 
 
 The neglect of the deference due to the Evangelists, and 
 of the Fathers who lived near those times, has been a 
 source of errors, which their testimony removes, and which 
 presents a system consistent with itself and the history of 
 the Gospel. 
 
 By this rule it may be proved that Christ was crucified 
 after he had completed his thirty-third year — that he was 
 near thirty years of age when he was baptized, and that 
 he had attained his twelfth year when he was taken up to 
 Jerusalem to celebrate the Jewish passover. 
 
 Hence chronologers dated a.d. 12, Christ disputes with 
 the Doctors — 29, he was baptized by John ; 33, on the 
 third of April on a Friday when he was crucified. From 
 
366 
 
 which it is evident that the Chronologers have dated time 
 as completed — for Christ was in his thirteenth year when 
 he was found 
 
 (t Among the gravest Rabbies disputant. 
 
 On points and questions fitting Moses' chair." — Milton. 
 
 He was in his thirtieth year when he was baptized, and 
 when he was crucified he was thirty-three years complete. 
 
 From profane history Christ was born when Lentulus 
 and Messala were Consuls, which year corresponds to that 
 of the Julian year 43 ; to that of the reign of Augustus, 
 42. For Julius Csesar was assassinated on the 15th of 
 March in the year two, after he had introduced the Calen- 
 dar called Julian, according to which every 4th year was 
 to be a bissextile or leap year — now this year answers to 
 the year of the Julian period 4711. Christ was therefore 
 born in this year ; the year preceding leap or bissextile 
 year, and of the reign of Augustus 42. Now it appears 
 from Petavius that Dionysius fixed his cycle in the year of 
 the Julian period 4712, but that he dated his year one on 
 the 1st January 4713, which was a year complete from the 
 circumcision of our Saviour ; whence it is inferred if 
 Christ was born the year preceding leap year, and as this 
 year is bissextile according to the Julian Calendar, that 
 1800 years must have elapsed since the birth, on the 25th 
 December, 1799. 
 
 Dionysius dated one year, when one year was completed 
 from the circumcision ; hence the moment we date every 
 succeeding year the time must be completed. 
 
 Therefore at the end of the last century, the moment 
 we dated 1800 the eighteenth century was elapsed — we 
 are now in the 19th century and not the 18th, although 
 we write it eighteen. The same may be predicated of a 
 lease for 99 years, which virtually is one hundred years, or 
 a century complete. 
 
367 
 
 It is marvellous that the knowledge and progress of that 
 with which man has most to do, Time, which begins in 
 eternity and euds in eternity, has been so imperfectly re- 
 corded in all ages. 
 
 Time was measured by the tides — the names are iden- 
 tical — as Whitsun-tide, noon-tide, etc. — being the Saxon 
 word for time. In the North tide or tite is employed for 
 anon, quick — tider is sooner. 
 
 Great discrepance exists in all computation of time, 
 whether Pagan, Jewish or Christian eras be implied, as is 
 seen in the date assigned to the flood. In accordance 
 with the Vulgate this cataclysm is fixed by Abp. Usher at 
 the year of the world 1656, and the date of the Saviour's 
 birth is variously settled at 4004 and 4138. The com- 
 puted difference between the Hebrew date of the deluge 
 and that of the Vulgate is 586 years, but some calculations 
 advance it to 1466 years. The curiosity of man and his 
 tendency to predictions have suggested hypotheses which 
 have greatly confused all chronology, but a better light 
 begins to prevail, and some credible theory as to chrono- 
 logy may eventually be propounded and accepted. Induc- 
 tion is obtained from facts, and causes from effects. Deduc- 
 tion is the opposite, deriving facts from laws, and effects 
 from causes. It was the same with physical sciences, until 
 Lord Bacon refused all but inductive proofs and inference, 
 and Sir Isaac Newton to that end said, " Hypotheses non 
 fingo," and held to the law. The ages of the world have 
 been divided into six, extending from the creation to the 
 deluge in 1656, and so the sixth age reached from the 
 Babylonish captivity to the nativity of Christ in 4000. 
 The world was to last according to a Jewish prophecy some 
 6000 years, "iEtate in scxtfi, mutabit machina mundi." 
 The ancient tradition of the house of Elias, 2000 years 
 without order j 2000 the Covenant; 2000 the Messiah ; 
 that as the instituted week consisted of six days and a 
 
368 
 
 sabbath, so the duration of the imperfect state of the world 
 or earth would be 6000 years, and then would come the 
 perfect state of it, or its true sabbath. 
 
 Experience and Astronomy was the thread of Newton 
 for his Chronology, and his system is precise and natural. 
 It was not before a Council or Synod held a.d. 743, that 
 Christians began to date from their Fouuder. Dionysius 
 had imagined this epoch in his Solar cycle of 526 years, 
 but it came not into use until it was employed by Bede, 
 circa 743. So late as the time of St. Augustine, the 
 father, there was no evidence to fix the year of the nativity 
 or that of the ascension. The space between the baptism 
 and the ascension of our Lord was a little more than two 
 years. On this uncertainty reigns; and Origen, who 
 flourished from a.d. 210 to 253, thought the ministerial 
 period of our Saviour was only one year and four months, 
 and then changed his belief, and adhered to the opinion of 
 three years, while Eusebius computed it at some three and 
 half years. 
 
 The age of our Saviour is very doubtful, for the Fathers 
 founded on St. Luke, who said he " was about 30 years of 
 age/' the 15th of the reign of Tiberius. Hence the birth 
 was 15 years before Augustus' death, which would be some 
 42 or 43 of his reign. St. Matthew asserts the Messiah 
 was born before the death of Herod, which is fixed 4 b.c 
 
 The day of the nativity was not actually selected for 300 
 years to serve for any fixed commemoration of the events 
 and then Julius, the Pontiff, appointed the 25th Dec. for 
 the purpose, between the years of grace 337 and 352. 
 Many believe the Paschal Lamb was slain 15 th April, at 
 3 p. m., but some prefer the 18th March; — so much varia- 
 tion is concomitant with chronology, a subject beset with 
 difficulties. 
 
 A work by the Rev. Samuel Jarvis, D.D., of the United 
 States, America, has lately been published on these 
 
369 
 
 moot points, and his inferences are that Christ entered 
 Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, 21 March — was betrayed 
 Wednesday, 24 March — celebrated the Passion and insti- 
 tuted the Sacrament, Thursday, 25 March, and was cruci- 
 fied Friday, 26 March — and arose Easter Sunday, 28 
 March, the year 4741 of the Julian period — in the 9th 
 month of the 4th year of the modern Christian era — in 
 the 19th year of the associated reign of Tiberius and the 
 15th of his sole reign, when Lucius Rubellius Geminus 
 and Caius Rufus Geminus were Consuls. 
 
 Christ was born 25 Dec. 4707., in the 193rd Olympiad, 
 5th day of the 9th month 7471; 39 Julian Calendar, 
 in the Consulate of D. Laelius Balbus and C. Antistius 
 Vetus. In the year, says Orosius, that the temple of Janus 
 was shut for the third time. 
 
 It would seem singular that the dates of the greatest 
 events have been so imperfectly recorded, and that the 
 sacred penmen had no more care as to accuracy in this 
 particular than they had to give a description of the person 
 of the Saviour, of whom the Prophet says, " There is no 
 beauty that we should desire him," — and who spake as 
 never man spoke. 
 
 There never was any attempted description of the per- 
 son of Christ, or any portrait of him — although some 
 miracle-mongers in that era of impudent forgeries, styled 
 dark ages, which lasted 1000 years, and well they deserve 
 that title, (which some modern retroactive worthies would 
 wish to revive on the principle of reader pour mieux 
 sauter) — uttered a portrait or coin or gem with the effigy 
 of that divine person, and which the effrontery of some 
 enthusiasts would urge on the enlightenment of these days 
 to accept as genuine, said to be done in the days of Clau- 
 dius Caesar. This imposture is redolent of certain unproved 
 doctrines since propagated as true, and partially held so to 
 be, for death or persecution followed a reasonable doubt, 
 and so the commandments of men took a place in theology, 
 
 2 B 
 
3 ?0 
 
 and assumed the authority of the commandments of God. 
 And this arose from ignorance, want of education, and 
 especially want of toleration, the absence of which latter 
 ingredient in human happiness and natural right is the 
 main cause of wars, superstition and heresy : for were 
 toleration accorded universally, away would go much of 
 the tyranny of priests, who chiefly carry silly persons cap- 
 tive, and then boast of conversions. Persecuting all, some 
 unconscionable sects demand all toleration and grant none, 
 and then exclaim they are persecuted. Tyranny and 
 superstition are the worst foes which afflict humanity, and 
 have given rise to idolatry and hero-worship, to which there 
 is a tendency even in the favoured land of England, and 
 what is worse, it is encouraged in high places, as a means of 
 government, but fortunately the conspiracy against man- 
 kind is neutralized, if not quite baffled by that common sense 
 which the Giver of all good has granted to us ex abundantid, 
 however abused. Toleration everywhere, and the Bible every 
 where should be the cry and the imperious demand of all 
 zealous of truth. England has proved the validity of these 
 practices since the Reformation, when the beams of spiritual 
 light shone on a nation which appears to be among Christians 
 what the Jews were among Pagan nations — a favoured and 
 a cherished people — esto perpetua. 
 
 But to resume the thread of this brief chronicle of time. 
 The Pontifices maximi of Rome, whose business it was to 
 note the efflux of time, had neglected their duty so com- 
 pletely, that the seasons fell into disorder. Julius Caesar, 
 the omnis homo of his age, or as our bard of Avon says, 
 " the greatest man that ever lived in the tide of time," 
 consulted Sosigenes, the Alexandrian astronomer, and set 
 time right again. The year of Confusion was 80 days more 
 than our current year, or 445 days instead of 365, &c. ; and 
 the vernal equinox, which should have fallen on the 21st of 
 March, fell on the preceding December. The cause of 
 
371 
 
 " the times being out of joint," was the precession of the 
 equinoxes, which fact was then unknown ; — since which 
 time the periods of the changes of the position of the 
 earth's axis, which occasion this precession, have been 
 duly investigated, and the calculations agree with astrono- 
 mic observations. The action of the moon's different 
 attraction on the nearer and more distant parts of the 
 earth concur to produce this phenomenon. In modern 
 times various systems have been suggested to rectify time ; 
 among which stands pre-eminent that of Joseph Scaliger, 
 a man of infinite literature, and on whom his cotempora- 
 ries lavished extravagant encomiums, and who was styled 
 the Father of Chronology. His scheme was entitled the 
 Julian period of 7980 years, being the product of the solar 
 cycle, which is 28 years, multiplied by the lunar cycle, 
 which is 19 years, and the Roman indiction or 15 years: 
 as, 28 x 19 = 532 x 15 = 7980. 
 
 The Indiction was instituted by the Romans, or rather 
 by Constantine the Great, and it is a cycle of tributes for 
 15 years, and by it accounts were kept after a.d. 312, when 
 the Olympiad system, which was four Julian years, and 
 which began B.C. 776, was finally superseded. 
 
 The Epact means excess of a common solar year above 
 the lunar year, and is derived from lirayu), to impel — the 
 former is 365 days, and the lunar 354, hence the lunations 
 get 1 1 days before the solar year — the cycle of the epacts 
 or lunar cycle consists of 1 9 years. 
 
 The sun, which in the time of Hipparchus, B.C. 125, was 
 in the 4th degree of Aries, is now in Pisces, having retro- 
 graded 30 degrees, and it requires some 2000 years and 
 more to run through a zodiacal sign. He thought the 
 equinox receded about a degree in 99 years ; but it recedes 
 50 seconds yearly, and one degree in 7 '2 years, says New- 
 ton. That year was called the great year by Astronomers 
 and Mathematicians, when the sun, moon, and stars re- 
 turned to the same place whence they set out, which con- 
 
 2 b 2 
 
3 ?2 
 
 summation requires 25,800 years, the poles of the heavens 
 having then revolved round the poles of the ecliptic. 
 
 The sun in its apparent motion makes a complete tour 
 of the Zodiac in a period usually estimated at 25,868 years 
 according to some, which is shortened to 21,000 by others, 
 the precessional cycle. 
 
 The cause is not a change in the sun's position but only 
 in that of the observer, from an altered inclination of the 
 earth's axis. This is called the evagation of the earth's 
 axis. The Pole itself varies its position slowly but de- 
 cidedly from time to time. 
 
 Herschell says that the entrance front of the Great 
 Pyramid, must in the year B.C. 2123 have looked towards 
 a Draconis instead of our present Polar star and Ursa Minor. 
 
 The monthly swayings of the earth's axis to and fro 
 (very slight) are called nutation, and the annual balance 
 of their aggregate result is called the precession of the equi- 
 nox. The equinoxes arrive earlier every year, so that the 
 seasons are earlier, and thus produce change of climate, 
 and indeed all nature seems to alter, as there is a shifting 
 of the beds of ocean, from the law which allows fluids 
 more readily than solids to follow the slightest impulse of 
 gravity, and from the congealing and liquefying of unequal 
 quantities of water in the Arctic and Antartic seas. 
 
 La Place has computed that since the time of Hippar- 
 chus, the year has become some few seconds shorter. In 
 the year 1582, Pope Gregory XIII. caused the style to be 
 altered where he had sway. Some 10 days were thrown out ; 
 but this was not adopted in England because the Pope had 
 ordered it, an indication of jealousy and littleness; which 
 change a philosophic nation should have embraced, had it 
 originated with Mahomet, or the Dalai Lama, and to which 
 error, the tardy Russians, regardless of astronomical truth 
 and temporal propriety, still adhere. In England truth 
 prevailed at length, and in 1752 we followed a multitude 
 to do good, and threw out 12 days to bring us then equal 
 
373 
 
 to the requirements of time, at which circumstance the 
 superstition of the people was awakened, and they were 
 wont to rebuke the ministry, and cry out, " Give us back 
 our 12 days, you have shortened our lives." 
 
 The wits say it takes four springs to make a leap year. 
 
 There are 44 minutes gained in every leap year, and 
 there are 25 leap years in a century ; so that we must 
 restore 1100 minutes or about a day every 400th year; 
 that is by dropping the leap year which falls on the hun- 
 dredth year for three consecutive hundred years ; and still 
 we are not correct, having taken too much, or advanced by 
 340 minutes. So we add one day more in 400 years, which, 
 leaves us still 80 minutes in excess, or the loss of about 
 one day in 5000 years. 
 
 The Gregorian Calendar is founded on the simple data, 
 that as every 4th year, according to the Julian system, one 
 day was added, which is an excess of 44 minutes ; so to 
 bring time to an equality, every 400th year was to be 
 reckoned a leap year, leaving the other 300 years common 
 years. 
 
 Bissextile is so termed because the 6 th day before the 
 Calends of March was repeated ; that is, the 24th of Feb. 
 was not styled 25, but 24 was repeated. The defalcation 
 of 1100 minutes in a century, is caused by an inaccurate 
 annual calculation, for the hour is not 60 minutes, nor is 
 the minute 60 seconds. 
 
 In the first edition of the Tractate, under the article of 
 Letters representing numerals, the number 666 expressed 
 by letters was referred to ; and the passage from St. John's 
 Revelation, chap. xiii. ver. 18, was cited — Let him that hath 
 understanding count the number of the Beast, for it is the 
 number of a MAN, and his number is 666. 
 
 As this fact and prediction are within the scope of time 
 prospective, although this is not a controversial work, the 
 author has again introduced the matter, with a view of 
 
374 
 
 giving the detail rather than entering into dissertation. 
 The statements are highly cnrious and interesting. Some 
 thinking what relates to time in the mystic number 1260 
 years is to be solved by the sum of 666. I shall recapitu- 
 late here the summary of this question, connected with 
 Time. 
 
 Now these letters used as numerals in value make up 
 the names of several words which have been interpreted to 
 mean the Roman Catholic Church or its representative. 
 Among the many words found in the mystic number is 
 that of Maometis, as well as Lateinos, Apostates, Romiith ; 
 and it is very singular that the number 666 should coincide 
 with these names or words, although in one instance only 
 the exact requisition is answered in its being the name of 
 a man — Maometis. It also makes the words Yicarius filii 
 Dei, which words were seen by Robert Elemyng on an 
 inner door of the Vatican, and to the comfort of Romanists 
 by the slight addition of a letter the hateful name of 
 Martin Lauter is formed. The number is a sort of secrecy, 
 as it is the same in all the places of units, tens and hundreds. 
 
 One of the Fathers of the Church, Irenseus, who died 
 A.D. 202, and was the disciple of Polycarp, who was the 
 disciple of St. John, first pointed out the words Lateinos 
 and Romiith, which means Romana sedes. There are many 
 mysterious numbers in the Bible. The grand apocalyptic 
 number is 1260, 42 months, and time, times and a half — 
 which are synchronical and must be interpreted propheti- 
 cally. Years are understood by days, and Scripture puts 
 less for greater numbers and definite for indefinite times. 
 Our Saviour calls days years, as the third day I shall be 
 perfected. Now the prophecy of Daniel, 70 weeks or 490 
 days, dates from the edict of Artaxerxes in his 20th year 
 to the time of the passion, which was exactly 490 pro- 
 phetical years, not Julian years. 
 
 Again the number 12 is a mysterious one — 12 apostles, 
 
375 
 
 12 tribes, twice 12 or 24 elders. 12 x 12 = 144 the square 
 root of 12 ; and if we add the word thousands it is the 
 mystical number of Christ's kingdom. 
 
 Again the number 7 is mystical, and from it, as from 
 666, fanciful conclusions have been educed. 7 stars, 
 7 churches, 7 persecutions, 7 candlesticks, sabbatical year 
 7 x 7 = 49. 
 
 Babylon the great or the apocalyptic Beast with seven 
 heads and ten horns is the Eoman empire, which is said to 
 have been governed by a woman, the Lady of Babylon or 
 ecclesiastical government or apostate church. Charlemagne 
 first granted temporal power to the Popes by the gift of 
 the Duchy of Benevento. His grandson Prince Hugo 
 married Elizabeth of Gonzaga, Princess of Lombardy. 
 The so-called patrimony of St; Peter, extending from Fer- 
 rara to Naples, from Aucona to Civita Yecchia, was the 
 donation of the Countess Matilda de Gonzaga, Princess of 
 Mantua, Duchess of Tuscany, Spoleto, &c. She also gave 
 the second crown to the Popes, and she lived at the palace 
 of Canossa, in the Neapolitan territory. This donation 
 dated 1102 is said to be preserved in the Vatican. 
 
 The donation of Constantine to St. Sylvester is the only 
 apparent plea that can be adduced for the possession of Rome 
 itself and the misnamed Patrimony of St. Peter. All the rest 
 of the church property was acquired by conquest or usurpa- 
 tion. The Romagna was wrested from its owner by Pope 
 Alexander IV., to form into a principality for his natural 
 son Caesar Borgia. Even Avignon and the Venaissin were 
 extorted by the Popes from Queen Joanna of Naples in the 
 14th century, while a minor, for 80,000 crowns, which were 
 never paid. 
 
 But the apocryphal donation of Constantine and the 
 false decretals of Isidore have both been pronounced, even by 
 Bossuet, as " damnable impositions," and it is not unlikely 
 that the Church of Rome may have to disgorge its usurpa- 
 
376 
 
 tions in retributive justice as the monasteries and conven- 
 tual houses in England did surrender theirs under our 
 Henry VIII., which quenched the power of the Pope. 
 
 The Papists assert that what the Pope holds is derived 
 from St. Peter himself, but Irenseus who favoured us with 
 the interpretation of the words before cited never assigns 
 this chair to St. Peter. Hence it seems a very gratuitous 
 assumption to say that St. Peter ever was in the city of 
 Rome, and it was only conceived when they required this 
 name to advance their authority or fortify pretensions, all 
 which was subsequent to the removal of the seat of govern- 
 ment from Rome to Byzantium, which transference of 
 power enabled the then mere Bishop of Rome to glide 
 into the vacant throne, and also to arrogate to himself the 
 attributes of a sovereign and to exercise regalian rights, 
 despite the solemn declaration of the Saviour himself, 
 " My kingdom is not of this world. 55 
 
 If we take Scripture for our guide it never was intended 
 there should be one specific head, all things were originally 
 in common, Christ alone being the Spiritual Head, no visi- 
 ble head being required. The Church can never fail — but 
 by that word is by no means implied the Roman Catholic 
 sect of Christians, or any other sect. Temporalities and 
 spiritualities are distinct properties, and we trust that 
 what Protestants have endeavoured to do for real Chris- 
 tianity may be effected by the Italians themselves, and 
 that Popery may be melted away in Protestantism or 
 proved religion, without endeavouring again to return to 
 the devices of the middle ages, and the captivating hope of 
 keeping the Laity in servitude by means of ignorance, and 
 its inseparable attendant, Superstition. 
 
 It is no novelty to doubt the allegation of St. Peter 
 ever being at Rome. In the 14th century it was denied, 
 nor is there any proof at all that he was martyrised there. 
 Clemens Bp. of Rome cites Peter and Paul as righteous 
 
377 
 
 pillars of the Church who suffered for the faith. But there 
 is not one word of the locality, which had been easy to 
 state and had been universally known had it been the capital 
 of the world. In the apostolic times the succession of 
 bishops was of no importance, neither have the primitive 
 Christians told us exactly who was the first bishop : and 
 we hear of no bishop until long after the death of St. Paul, 
 who was "not a whit behind the very chief est apostles." 
 (2 Cor. xi. 5.) while the fact of his rebuking St. Peter, 
 " whom he withstood to the face, because he was to be 
 blamed" implies equality in rank and office without dispute. 
 
 The apostolic constitutions make Linus first Bishop of 
 Rome, and all the apostolic sees were equal, and at the 
 time too when the whole management of Christian affairs 
 were on St. PauPs shoulders there is not a word men- 
 tioned about St. Peter, which leads us to infer that there 
 was then no recognised primacy. 
 
 Irenseus, who died 202 A.D. makes Linus the first 
 Pope, and he also names St. Paul before St. Peter, which 
 embarrasses Romanists, and exhibits the nudity of their 
 imaginary pretensions. 
 
 Origen in 250 A.D. says, he (Peter) came lv riXei at the 
 close of his life to Rome, but he adduces no proof. 
 
 Eusebius, the father of ecclesiastical history, and who 
 wrote A.D. 300, being cotemporary with Constantine the 
 Great, admits that it was a tradition only that St. Peter 
 was first Bishop of Rome. He quotes one Caius who lived 
 A.D. 219, and Dionysius, bishop of Corinth, from a letter 
 written some A.D. 177 to Soter bishop of Rome. He says 
 one Papias, a cotemporary of the Apostles, states he was 
 informed by John the Presbyter that Mark the secretary of 
 St. Peter wrote all he heard about the latter, and that he 
 came to Rome between A.D. 41 and 51, and upset Simon 
 the Magician. Surely this is merely hearsay or confused 
 tradition, and not to be accepted like truth, so easy to be 
 
proved if a fact. St. Ignatius merely alludes to Peter and 
 Paul as teachers, but never hints they were both at Rome 
 bodily, St. John's writings close the Apostolic age, in 
 which there is not a single word expressed that St. Peter was 
 present in Rome. All the inference is from tradition, yet 
 this was enough, and the axiom facile credimus quod 
 volumus came into play, and credulity was satisfied. 
 
 Now tradition is a word much abused and is received in 
 various senses, but it was never intended so to be stretched 
 as to match and master the Bible, or Christians may be 
 deceived with an appearance only — "decipimur specie recti/ 9 
 Tradition may augment or diminish in the course of ages, 
 hence a reasonable doubt may be raised as to its particular 
 significance, but the Bible is 
 
 Broad and general as the casing air, 
 "Whole as the marble, founded as the Rock. 
 
 It is immutable and knows no variableness or shadow of 
 turning. Rumours slid into tradition and it became his- 
 tory, for that reason the Book was published to evince the 
 fact that Christianity is a historical religion with super- 
 natural attestations. Away then with blind tradition, 
 whether it be to confirm a dogma or consolidate a Pope. 
 All indispensable tradition must be involved in the Book. 
 
 Had any unexceptionable evidence been extant that St. 
 Peter was ever at Rome it had been proudly paraded before 
 the Christian world for centuries. But no such testimony 
 can be found "nihil simile out secundum" save in the feigned 
 acts or revelations of St. Paul, which Gelasius, bishop of 
 Cesarea, who lived in the 4th century, ingenuously con- 
 demned for apocryphal. These vain traditions seem neces- 
 sary to bolster up the infirmities of a Church, and so a crowd 
 of forgeries was edited, and with them the pseudo-Ignatian 
 epistles were concocted, a conspiracy to transfer the Church 
 and God's inheritance to one man. Hence an exclusive 
 
379 
 
 Bishop was elected (Papa or pater patrum) and a corporate 
 body soon followed. 
 
 Be it noted that there is not a word in the sacred Roll 
 to warrant these conclusions ; or in the Acts of the Apostles, 
 where undoubtedly it had been mentioned, had St. Peter 
 bodily been in Rome, or ever enjoyed the primacy of the 
 apostles. 
 
 Not a hint in St. Paul's various epistles, citing by name 
 all who were of note then in Rome ; nor does St. Peter 
 himself come to the rescue, unless the term Babylon, im- 
 plies Rome, which assuredly would convey a bitter sar- 
 casm to call the capital of the world Babylon, as much as 
 if a Bishop of London, writing a pastoral letter, were to 
 style our capital Babylon, from which place the elect 
 offered gratulations. We see, then, how dubious is this 
 designation ; and that St. Peter ever inhabited Rome, or 
 was its bishop, is as remote from proof, as that the ecclesi- 
 astical lands in the tenure of the Popes were the gift of 
 Constantine the Great, or Charlemagne, which is still be- 
 lieved by those who quiet their minds " with the delusive 
 opiate of hasty persuasion." 
 
 It is in accordance with verisimilitude that the Babylon 
 of St. Peter was the town adjacent to Alexandria in Egypt, 
 and not Rome, and that this holy apostle lived near his son 
 Mark, who was himself Bishop of Alexandria, and sent 
 greetings in the letter, which seems a reasonable solution 
 of the word and locality of Babylon. This was appended 
 to the Catholic epistles of St. Peter in the salutations. 
 
 To investigate further this " vexata quaestio," we do not 
 find a single early Father of the Church who asserts St. 
 Peter's primacy or residence in Rome to be an established 
 fact ; and in modern times, the writings of Marsilius of 
 Padua disproved it, and as both Salmasius and Scaliger, 
 " duo fulmina belli/' argued and wrote after sifting the evi- 
 dence that St. Peter never was there, it may be conceded that 
 there is no proved foundation for this accommodating tradi- 
 
380 
 
 tion. Should the pretended seat of St. Peter be styled that of 
 St. Paul it would be more in accordance with genuine 
 history. St Paul founded' the first Christian Church in 
 Home, not St. Peter, " for he would not build on another 
 man's foundation/' and the oldest Church in Rome was 
 dedicated to the former saint, who was the Apostle of the 
 Gentiles, as contradistinguished from St. Peter, who was 
 the Apostle of the circumcision. These investigations 
 impeach not the cause, as all the apostles had the same 
 commission with parity of honour and power. It is of no 
 consequence to Christianity about St. Peter's advent to 
 Rome, or his martyrdom there, which no historian has 
 proved. But if so much stress has been placed on the bodily 
 presence of St. Peter in Rome, and that a Church partially 
 relies for its credit on that allegation, it is not hypercritical 
 to require better and fuller evidence, or any unreasonable 
 incredulity to doubt it, if adequate testimony is not adduced. 
 — Great facts exact great proofs — and these remarks im- 
 pugn no dogma of any Church, but merely the assertion 
 that St. Peter was ever in Rome, and was there crucified — 
 that he suffered elsewhere is certain, because he was to 
 suffer according to the Scriptures. 
 
 Not Vatican doctrine or allegations alone should ob- 
 tain, but facts of even minor importance, for truth's sake, 
 should be stated. There is no secret in the moral or 
 natural world, or deed sacred from the investigations of 
 men ; even conjecture can never be too free, if it be proved 
 to be just. So, let us say, without fear of animadversion, 
 in the search after truth, essential or contingent — 
 " Seize upon truth where'er 'tis found ; 
 
 Amid your friends, amid your foes, 
 In Christian or in Pagan ground, 
 
 That flower's divine where'er it grows." 
 Dr. Watts. 
 
381 
 
 On Longevity. 
 
 As there has been much controversy relative to time, so 
 has there been much question with respect to the ages of 
 men. It has been thought to credit the relation of the 
 long lives of the Patriarchs that one of our years was 
 equivalent to 10 of theirs. So that a person said to live 
 800 years, in reality attained no more than 80. But the 
 length of the year, according to Moses' computation and 
 the old Hebrews, (for the Septuagint is held to have mul- 
 tiplied the patriarchal years) there is no doubt but that 
 from the time of Noah it consisted of 12 months of 31 
 days, the proof of which appears in the particular account 
 of the days of that year wherein the deluge happened, as 
 given by Moses. So when Moses says the ages were so 
 many, it must be credited, because he must have meant 
 years of 12 months. All nature is marvellous, and this 
 long lasting in mortals is only another natural miracle. — 
 Since which period, the necessity subsiding, nature has 
 observed a certain gradation in reducing the life of man to 
 a level with our times. Homer recognized the difference 
 in the men of his day, and those anterior to him, and 
 averred there then was inequalityin strength and longevity; 
 and it was not till Solon's time that the term of life was 
 threescore years and ten. Moses lived 120 years, and 
 Solomon only JO; and though there be exceptions, in 
 Jenkins reaching 1G9, and old Parr that of 152, the com- 
 mon limit is 70 years, Oloi vvv tsporoi elai. — Homer. 
 
 The space allotted to man for his sublunary existence is 
 now threescore years and ten — or some 30 years to each 
 generation, about 3 generations to 100 years. As the 
 Patriarch Methuselah attained 9G9 years, he lived more 
 
382 
 
 than 32 generations, or nearly a thousand years. So that 
 in 1656, the antediluvian populousness must have been ex- 
 cessive, for in warm climates fecundity is great, and early 
 marriages the law ; and women of course had correspond- 
 ing physical properties with men, hence they continued to 
 increase and multiply for some three centuries at least. 
 
 Longevity began to abate in the time of the patriarch 
 Abraham, who was only 175 years old at his decease. He 
 was then in extreme age, a short period as compared with 
 his antecessors, whether in direct or collateral degree in 
 their several divergent branches. His son Isaac was born 
 to him when he had touched a century, and " both his pa- 
 rents were old and well stricken in years," his wife Sarah 
 being just ten years his junior, to whom also the promise 
 was passed that she should be a Mother of Nations. 
 
 Now the Patriarch and his wife were astonished at the 
 promise and the prospect of offspring, (for she had not 
 borne children hitherto), which proves the fact of their 
 feeling that senility had overtaken them. Had this not 
 been so Sarah might have expected or lived in hope of 
 issue until she had reached 200 years more, if, ceteris 
 paribus, the reasonable surmise be true that women were 
 on a physical parity with men, as in these our days, who, 
 as Lord Bacon observes, are in reality the ancients. 
 
 Holy Writ has not declared the age of any female what- 
 ever at her decease, except Sarah who reached 127 years, 
 (Gen. xxiii. 1) — nor is it probable that any woman outlived 
 the longest lived man. Man evidently has the superio- 
 rity, for what woman was ever so old as Methuselah, so 
 strong as Samson, or so wise as Solomon ? Woman was 
 a second and subordinate creation, an emanation or de- 
 velopment from the first of men, Adam, who was the son 
 of God — which establishes man's divine descent. 
 
 Some compensation, however, is accorded to Woman, 
 who may be allowed generally to excel her fellow Man in 
 
383 
 
 virtue, as appear in the many instances of devotion, purity 
 and love embalmed in Holy Writ, down to the time of that 
 incomparable exemplar of her sex, " Bless' d Mary, second 
 Eve." 
 
 The Jews are more numerous now than in Solomon's 
 days (4,500,000) ; at first they were only a family of 70 
 persons, which produced in 215 years some two millions, 
 and population increased till they were carried away cap- 
 tive, and many tribes never returned from Chaldsea. The 
 Assyrians sent colonies to re-people Samaria. The Hin- 
 doos were a nation of philosophers. Gentoo means animal 
 in the abstract. Budha is said to have died 600 b. c, and 
 an entire third of the globe, whose population is 1000 
 millions, is Budhist. 
 
 Perhaps the most long-lived family of modern record is 
 that of Parr. Nature always balances excess of age in 
 3 or 4 descents, so that the sum of each shall not exceed 
 the prescribed limit of 70 years. We have authenticated 
 proof of the longevity of Parr, who died in 1635, at the 
 prodigious age of 152, yet Henry. Jenkins surpassed him 
 by 17 years, and died 1670> but little is known of his family, 
 or to support the allegation relative to his great age. The 
 son of Parr died aged 113 ; his grandson at the age of 109, 
 and his son again, one Robert Parr, died in 1757, at the 
 advanced age of 124; all these dates have been verified. 
 The common progenitor of this patriarchal race was a 
 husbandman of Winnington in Salop, temp. Henry VII. 
 It is probable that all families in turn enjoy the various 
 gifts of ability, longevity, strength, and beauty — may we 
 add virtue ? 
 
 Some incredible instances of longevity are recorded in 
 Sir John Sinclair's code of health, which exact uncommon 
 testimony in confirmation, in the ratio of their improba- 
 bility. 
 
 The Greeks gave some 35 to 40 years for a reign, but 
 
3*84 
 
 experience has shewn that 1 8 to 20 would suffice in modern 
 times. A consecutive series of 30 kings of France lived 
 1427 years, which is 474 years for each potentate. 
 
 A calculation was made that 30 literary men lived 1919 
 years, which is 64 years a piece. 
 
 In the antique list of Athenian kings there is not a 
 single case of a minority, and only two cases in the entire 
 list of Spartan sovereigns. 
 
 Life assurance has become so necessary that actuaries of 
 the present day have discovered to a nicety the probable 
 duration of life under all its phases; and as tables of 
 assurance are in process of alteration and amendment, so 
 in the next century improvements may be made of which 
 we have imperfect anticipations : and as the necessity of 
 assuring lives strengthens, so the effect of accurate data, 
 increased premiums, and novel policies for all conditions 
 and contingencies, and diminished requirements may en- 
 hance the character and comforts of our social state, while 
 we hover on the narrow isthmus between time and eternity. 
 
 In the 16th century the average of literary life was 64 
 years, at which it appears to remain stationary. The 
 general lives of the aristocracy are computed at 67 years, 
 which is partly owing to good diet and immediate atten- 
 tions, medical and personal, in case of need, joined to the 
 otium cum dignitate, which is their portion in a cold and 
 crooked world of sorrow and inequality. The gentry average 
 some 70 years, and the learned professions, as contradistin- 
 guished from mere literary existence and those who have 
 wooed what has facetiously been termed the three black 
 Graces, Law, Physic, and Divinity, attain some 68 to 70 
 years. The dangerous lives of military and naval officers is 
 on a lower grade, but very little. 
 
 Fine arts seem rather less, something between 60 and 
 70 ; and trade obnoxious to strain of mind and body, 
 with carhing care, is slightly below the age of man. 
 
385 
 
 Marriage, as it is more natural, so it is more favourable to 
 longevity, being some 67 years, which presents a premium 
 as contrasted with unmarried life ; the latter is reduced by 
 a year or two only. I remember the age of no woman being 
 recorded in Holy Writ, save Sarah, and very few among 
 them in Pagan chronicles. Pliny the elder has a brief 
 chapter on the duration of existence, and he cites Hesiod, 
 as first inviting attention to the subject ; but he concludes 
 that his statements of longevity are fabulous. Subse- 
 quently Anacreon is made to assert that a king of the 
 Tartessians reached 150 years ; another of Cyprus 160, 
 and a worthy styled Egimidius rose to 200 long years. 
 Theopompus avers that Epimenides of Gnossus lived 157 
 years ; and one ancient reached 300 ; and another, a cer- 
 tain Dando, 500 years, incredibile dictu. 
 
 Xenophon asserts a certain king of the Tyrians lived 600, 
 and his son drifted on to 800 years ! But these supposi- 
 tions were too much for Pliny, who shrewdly puts the ages 
 to the score of myths ; because, he adds, they knew not how 
 to compute time, not making 365 days to each year, and 
 calling seasons years, and adopting other chronological 
 fallacies. It is very likely that as the history of the flood 
 was transmitted, so there came with it traditions of lon- 
 gevity. The oldest instance of length of years cited by 
 Pliny is 120, and modern statistics countenance the 
 verisimilitude. 
 
 The share women have in this gift of nature is not 
 pretermitted by Pliny, who however cites few examples in 
 the gentler sex. He recapitulates seven cases : — Livia, 
 wife of Rutilius, reached 97 ; the Lady Statilia, 99 ; Te- 
 rentia, the once beloved wife of Cicero the orator (who 
 said he would cause his name to transcend that of any of 
 the Patrician families), despite her untowardness reached 
 103; Clodia, wife of Ofilius, was 115, and had given 
 
 2 c 
 
386 
 
 birth to fifteen children, so that fecundity is no bar to 
 longevity. He also quotes a case of strength, activity, and 
 age, uniting in Lucceia, who declaimed on the stage at 
 100. Another histrionic worthy enacted her parts most 
 creditably at 104, having made her debut 91 years prior 
 to this appearance, and in such repute was she, that 
 Pompey the Great, on dedicating his famous theatre at 
 Rome, invited this time-honoured daughter of Thespis to 
 give eclat to the inauguration. One Sammula also lived 
 110 years, and here the record of Pliny stops. 
 
 It seems that with the Romans there did exist some 
 kind of registers to verify ages, and it is thought that 
 temp. Vespasian, the taxing afforded an authentic means 
 of ascertaining these facts; but it is presumable that 
 accuracy was very remote from a practice, which to realize 
 has cost moderns so much pains ; for our parish registers 
 date not earlier than some 1538, and as so many are lost 
 and are so ill written, and have been so disregarded, that 
 " etiam periSre ruince," what are left are often difficult of 
 decyphering, though a very current calligraphy charac- 
 terises many of these parchment annals of rich and poor, 
 reinforcing the fact, c ' omnes eodem cogimur," by inevitable 
 fate. 
 
 Subsequent to the Deluge ages were reduced to some 
 500 years, or nearly half the original gift to man. This 
 span gradually decreased until 100 years was considered 
 old, and thus " small by degrees and beautifully less," we 
 declined to 70 or thereabouts, which seems tine juste milieu 
 for the world's population. 
 
 Modern times can boast its longevity, and though the 
 allegation that a Negress who died 1780, attained 157 
 years, and the noted Countess of Desmond 140, and many 
 others with similar blessings, yet sufficient corroborative 
 evidence has not been adduced to justify our annexing 
 
387 
 
 these extended instances of longevity to the Book of 
 Truth. The longest life of man is short, but a good 
 death and its antecedents render it immortal. 
 
 If our progenitors lived so long, we ought to live 
 longer, should there be vitality in care, in skill, moral obli - 
 gation and experience. The secret of longevity is in 
 sustaining the vital functions in healthy action, with the 
 least indispensable stimulus — all unnecessary waste of vital 
 power is culpable improvidence, precipitating death and 
 pain, death's harbinger. Contraries beget contraries, for 
 it is known that bodily pain when excessive, terminates 
 in pleasure. Martyrs who have writhed in fire, and have 
 suffered the pitiless tortures of the rack, as applied in the 
 antichristian Inquisition, have experienced reaction, so that 
 a thrill of delight has succeeded to intolerable mental and 
 physical anguish. Events prove that this remorseless 
 Inquisition has existed in "Rome, the soi-disant capital of 
 Christianity and mercy, as well as in Naples, in 1860, and 
 the letters of Lord Lanover, from Naples, have confirmed 
 all that Mr. Gladstone averred some years ago, relative 
 to the prisons, while revelations from the Roman States 
 of Bologna, implicate the Papal authorities in similar 
 cruelties. 
 
 It has been affirmed that female is of longer duration 
 than male life. There seems no reason why this anomaly 
 should exist, either socially or physically, and as men 
 have generally the advantage of the tender sex in strength 
 of mind and body, it may be a paradox, unless their 
 general tranquillity and benevolence, which is the epitome 
 of all virtue and religion, contribute to this end. British 
 tables have a tendency to support this hypothesis. Women 
 come to maturity and loveliness sooner, which seems 
 a beneficent interposition to give them a full and early 
 scope to display those fascinating graces and engaging 
 sweet influences which nature has designed to counter- 
 
388 
 
 balance the power and energy of the males, through- 
 out the tide of time, 
 
 For time, tho' in eternity applied 
 
 To motion, measures all things durable, 
 
 By present, past and future. 
 
 Milton. 
 
 Sublunary creation is a system of antagonism and must 
 cease — it is motion and perception. Life is development 
 as well as creation. Dr. Kennedy remarks we are con- 
 scious of time by our senses, but eternity appeals to the 
 inner thought or mind. It is given in the idea of a Being 
 without beginning or end, which includes in its duration 
 the infinite past and the infinite future. Time is a mode 
 or condition by which the human mind perceives the flux 
 of events, and is made up of a series of events. Eternity 
 has no events. Time was given to man for repentance, 
 and eternity for forgiveness — so Time and Eternity will 
 reign together, when the last enemy shall be subdued — 
 that, Being and the cause of existence — the " I am," may 
 be all in all. 
 
 FINIS. 
 
 G. NORMAN, PRINTER, MAIDEN LANE, COVENT GARDEN.