Chapter XVI: Common Improprieties of Speech (3)

Language, its value to man, 2, 3, 21;
its power, 5, 6;
not indispensable to thought and its expression, 19-21;
elaborated by successive generations, 21;
abbreviates the processes and preserves the results of thought,
22, 23;
its educational value, 23;
the limit of thought, 23;
of savages, 24, 25;
not the dress of thought, 35;
unity of language essential to national unity, 47, 48, 50;
gains by time and culture, 56;
no new additions to, 56;
formed out of twenty elementary sounds, 60;
an index to individual character, 62-67;
an index to national character, 67-82;
how enriched and impoverished, 67, 68;
debasement of the Italian, 68-70;
the Greek and the Latin characterized, 73-75;
reveals the climate of a country, 75, 76;
the Italian contrasted with the Swiss, 76;
its influence on opinion, 83;
its lubricity, 95;
mischiefs caused by its debasement, 101;
barbarized by fineries of style, 122;
of art and science, 129-131;
expressiveness of the English, 132-138;
transcendental, 210;
inadequate for the expression of thought, 211;
obscure caused by obscurity of thought, 214, 215;
its virtues moral, 221;
its suggestive power, 222;
Goldwin Smith on, 222;
its magical effects, 224, 225;
stamped with local influences, 243, 244;
an imperfect vehicle of thought, 317;
Emerson on, 369;
contains the history of nations, 370;
mirrors the tastes, customs and opinions of a people, 374;
of savages, 410-412;
over-nicety in its use, 427;
is living and organic, 428;
is ever growing, 428;
defies all shackles, 429;
Henry Rogers on, 433;
how to use it well, 440.

Languages, of conquered peoples not easily extirpated, 48-50;
the study of foreign, 50, 239.

Lavoisier, his chemical terminology, 15.

least, 454.

leave, 458.

_Les Gueulx_, 357.

less, 446.

let, 420.

Lewes, G. H., on frankness, 158.

lie, lay, 447.

lieutenant, 414.

light, 14, 302.

like I did, 447.

likewise, 448.

Lincoln, Abraham, anecdote of, 363.

Literature, effete, 163.

Locke, John, his “Essay on the Human Understanding,” 276.

London, 312, 313.

looks beautifully, 457.

£. s. d., 387.

Louis XIV, 167.

Lower, Mark A., quoted, 329;
anecdotes by, 330, 333;
on the origin of certain historical names, 337, 338.

lust, 385.

Luttrell, Henry, lines by, 167.

luxury, 295-298.

M.

Macaulay, T. B., on Milton’s words, 7, 8;
on Dryden’s, 10;
on Johnson’s language, 206;
his eulogy on Saxon-English, 206;
quoted, 84, 240;
on disputes in Parliament concerning James II and William, 282.

Macready, W. C., his elocution, 53.

malignants, 347.

manumit, 402.

Marsh, Prof. G. T., on Demosthenes, 29;
on the Italian language, 69, 70;
on Goethe as a linguist, 238.

Martineau, James, D.D., on words, 103.

martinet, 409.

Materialism, derives no support from language, 288, 289.

maudlin, 408.

megrim, 419.

menial, 382.

Methodist, 355.

Mezzofanti, Cardinal, 177, 178.

Michaelis, J. D., remarks of, 79.

Mill, J. S., on the misuse of certain words, 273.

Miller, Hugh, his style, 238.

Milton, the suggestiveness of his verse, 7, 8;
Macaulay on his words, 7, 8;
his versification, 9;
his necromantic power over language, 9;
his use of monosyllables, 151;
his use of words in their etymological sense, 233, 375, 376;
his prose style, 241;
extracts from his “Paradise Lost,” 250, 251, 252, 254;
from “Il Penseroso” and “L’Allegro,” 253.

Mirabeau, his words, 3.

miscreant, 380.

mistaken, 421.

money, 259.

mongrel, 405.

monomania, 94.

Monosyllables, their potency in life and literature, 140;
how constructed in English, 148;
their number in English, 156.

Montaigne, on verbal definitions and explanations, 310.

Montgomery, James, on Milton’s versification, 8, 9.

Moon-Alford controversy, the, 424.

Moore, Thomas, anecdote of, 27;
verses of, 153;
saying of, 240.

more perfect, 465.

Morris, Gouverneur, anecdote by, 87, 88.

Motley, J. L., on “The Beggars,” 357.

mountebank, 388.

Müller, Max, on “The Supernatural,” and “To Know and To Believe,” 264;
on etymology, 413.

murder, 303, 304.

muriatic acid, 293.

musket, 232, 248.

mussulmen, 469.

mutual, 462.

myself, 458.

mystery, 406.

N.

Names, of children, 323-325, 343, 344;
of things, once names of persons, 408;
of places--how corrupted, 417, 418.

Names of Men, 323-344;
how regarded by the Jews and the Romans, 43, 45;
their suggestiveness, 325;
all originally significant, 326;
Roman, 327;
surnames, 328;
Saxon, 334;
obsolete words preserved in, 332;
ending in _er_, 332;
ending in _ward_, 332;
derived from offices, 332;
disguised, denoting mean occupations, 333;
from personal qualities, 334;
Puritan, 334;
derived from oaths, 334;
indicating personal blemishes or moral obliquities, 335, 336;
some changes of, 336, 339;
“Erasmus” and “Melanchthon,” 336;
corruption of, 336, 337;
queer conjunctions of, 339;
that harmonize with, or are antagonistic to, their owners’
occupations, 339-341;
puns upon, 341-343;
not mere labels, 346;
Goethe on, 346;
their influence on their wearers, 346.

Napier, extract from his History of the Peninsular War, 201.

Napoleon, his love of glory, 64, 65;
his hypocrisy, 168;
his style, 222;
on epithets, 350.

naturalist, 378.

nature and art, 298.

nature and law of nature, 269, 270.

nervous, 420.

never, 453.

Newman, Prof. J. H., verses by, 174.

nice, 394, 461.

Nicknames, 345-366;
their influence in controversy, 346;
Goethe on, 346, 348;
of Van Buren, Tyler, Gen. Scott and Bonaparte, 348, 349;
why effective, 350, 351;
theological, 351;
loving, 351;
Cobbett’s skill in, 351, 352;
Carlyle’s, 352;
meaningless, 352;
their origin, 352-354;
felicitous, 354;
fondness
of the Italians for them, 354, 359;
memorable English, 360-363;
originally complimentary, 363;
Southey’s “Doctor Dove” on, 364.

no, 455.

none, 457.

notwithstanding, 470.

numerous, 470.

O.

_ock_, 334.

O’Connell, Daniel, his “Lax Weir” case, 16;
his stock phrases, 168.

off of, 465.

oh!, 142.

old, 280.

older, 468.

_O_, _Mac_, and _Ap_, 328, 329, 330.

Onomatopes, 242-256;
objections to the theory of, 245-247;
why they vary in different languages, 246;
their expressiveness, 248, 255;
abound in poetry, 248;
examples of in English poetry, 249-254;
Homer’s, Virgil’s and Aristophanes’s, 254;
Dr. Johnson on, 255;
no rules for their choice, 255.

on to, 467.

opposite and contrary, 284.

or, 285.

Oratory, an important law of, 190.

originality, 290.

ostracize, 371.

ovation, 117.

overflow, 468.

owl, 399.

oxygen, 293.

P.

pagan, 371, 372.

palace, 405.

palfrey, 405.

palsy, 419.

Pambos, anecdote of, 174.

pander, 409.

pantaloon, 398.

pantheist, 276.

paradise, 382.

paraphernalia, 464.

parasite, 399.

parliament, 272.

parlor, 400.

parson, 385.

partake, 437.

parts, 380.

party, 451.

Pascal, quoted, 111.

pasquinade, 409.

Patkul, and Charles XII., 167.

pensive, 394.

people, 465.

person, 283, 397.

personalty, 467.

pet, 396.

petrels, 396.

Phidias, saying of, 223.

Philologists, their dangers, 412.

Phillips, his “World of Words,” 429.

Pinkney, William, his study of words, 17, 18.

Pitt, Christopher, lines by, 250.

plagiarism, 400.

Plantagenet, 338.

plenty, 445.

Poetry, English, of the 18th century, 163-165.

policy, 414.

Political economists, their disputes, 259, 260.

poltroon, 392.

pontiff, 406.

Pope, Alexander, his translation of Homer, 35, 36;
saying of, 53;
his use of small words, 139;
his circumlocutions, 165;
lines from, 249, 252.

Popes, their management of theological controversies, 263.

porpoise, 416.

post, 420.

Practical men, and theorists, 305, 307.

Preachers, their use of philosophical words, 109, 110.

predicate, 451.

premier, 358.

prevent, 378.

preventative, 461.

previous, 445.

priest, 263.

Proctor, Adelaide, on words, 2, 104.

property, 390.

proposition, 455.

proven, 455.

punctual, 379.

puny, 407.

Puritan, 359.

Q.

quaker, 359.

quandary, 388.

quantity, 458.

_quamquam_, 289.

quinsy, 419.

_Quirites_, 85.

quite, 457.

quiz, 393.

R.

raising the rent, 471.

rascal, 378.

raven, 398.

reasons, 97.

recommend, 446.

regeneration, 382.

relevant, 381.

rendition, 463.

resent, 384.

restive, 458.

retaliate, 384, 423.

revolt, 448.

rhinoceros, 320.

right, 287, 310, 398.

ringleader, 232.

rip, 422.

Robertson, Rev. F. W., on calumny, 91, 92;
on talk without deeds, 173;
on the use of superlatives, 174, 175, 191, 192.

Robinson, “Boot-jack,” 360.

rodomontade, 410.

Romanic words in English, 197-201.

Romans, the, degeneracy of their language, 75;
their ideas of virtue and vice, 81;
had no idea of sin, 81.

Roscius, the Roman actor, 19.

rosemary, 415.

Rossini, saying of, 176.

rostrum, 405.

Roundhead, 360.

Rump, the, 360.

S.

sagacious, 378.

Sainte-Beuve, C. A., on Napoleon’s style, 222.

salary, 398.

salmon, 405.

Salutation, its forms an index to national character, 77-79.

same, 290.

sandwich, 409.

sarcasm, 399.

saunterer, 409.

Savages, no ethical nomenclatures in their languages, 80;
their poverty of language, 24, 25.

Saxon-English, its merits and defects, 196-197, 201-208;
the basis of the language, 208;
its witchery, 208;
its obsolete pictorial words, 201;
Robert Hall on, 205;
Macaulay on, 206;
its freedom from equivocation, 278.

Saxon Words, or Romanic?, 194-209.

scarcely, 468.

Scarlett, Sir James, on brevity in jury addresses, 182.

Schiller, on the study of foreign languages, 239.

Scholarship, the error of modern, 178.

schooner, 399, 400.

Science, influence of its names and phrases, 89.

scrupulous, 400.

second causes, 270.

secret, 376.

Secret of Apt Words, the, 210-241.

Selden, John, saying of, 56.

seldom, or never, 454.

selfishness, 81, 279.

Seneca, his moral discourses, 169;
his wealth, 169, 170;
his crimes, 170.

seraphim, 465.

servant, 400.

servitude, 274.

setting-room, 464.

sexton, 388.

shacklebone, 372.

Shakespeare, his words, 7;
suggestiveness of his diction, 54, 55;
not a classical scholar, 235;
quoted, 254.

shall, will, 471-477.

Sharp, Dr., saying of, 173.

Shenstone, on melody of style, 255.

Shibboleths, their influence with the people, 87-89.

shoot, 416.

Siddons, Mrs., on one of Haydon’s pictures, 85.

Sidney, Sir Philip, on the ballad of “Chevy Chase,” 224;
saying of, 441.

signing one’s name, 404.

silhouettes, 408.

silly, 382.

simple, 385.

simplicity, 299.

sincere, 367.

sit, sat, 454.

slave, 400.

Small Words, 139-157;
when necessary, 156;
their potency, 140;
abound in English, 147.

Smith, 331.

Smith, Prof. Goldwin, on language, 222.

Smith, Sydney, saying of, 26;
his word-coinings, 433;
on Sir James Macintosh’s style, 118, 119;
his solecisms, 442.

snob, 395.

Solecisms, in eminent writers, 434, 437, 438, 442-444.

solidarity, 430.

Some Abuses of Words, 177-193.

somerset, 417.

son, 327, 333.

sophist, 271.

South, Robert, D. D., on verbal magic, 94, 275;
extract from, 184.

Spaniards, their love for long names, 127, 128, 339.

“Spasmodic School” of Poetry, 362.

specialty, 461.

species, 300.

speculation, 383.

spencer, 409.

Spencer, Herbert, on Saxon-English, 154.

Spenser, his “Abode of Sleep,” 249.

spoonsful, 468.

Spurgeon, Rev. C. H., on religious cant, 172.

squatter, 430.

squirrel, 399.

Stanhope, Lady Hester, 319.

Stanley, Lord, on Saxon words, 194, 195.

starvation, 360.

stentorian, 410.

stipulation, 387.

stopping, 462.

Story, Judge Joseph, anecdote told by, 312.

Story, W. W., quoted, 199.

stranger, 403.

strong, 302.

Style, the most vital element of literary immortality, 30;
Gibbon’s and Hume’s, 30;
Starr King on its mystery, 30;
an index to character, 65;
intensity of, 192;
the transcendental, 210;
how to form a good, 215, 216, 222, 225;
no model, 217;
varieties of, 219;
Joubert on, 220, 221;
the kind demanded to-day, 220;
not to be cultivated for its own sake, 221;
images the writer’s nature, 221;
Ruskin on, 221;
a question concerning it, 224;
perspicuity its first law, 225;
should be vivid, 225.

succeed, 469.

succession powder, 96.

such, 456.

suffrage, 406.

sunstroke, 293.

supercilious, 400.

superior, 457.

supplement, 456.

surname, 415.

Swinburne, A. C., his command of words, 11.

sycophant, 399.

Synonyms, 26.

T.

tabby, 399.

tale, 375.

Tartar, 469.

tawdry, 409.

Taylor, “Chicken,” 362.

Taylor, Henry, on the writers of the 17th century, 13-14.

Taylor, Jeremy, his latinistic style, 233.

team, 313-316.

telescope, 430.

tend, 276.

Tennyson, his command of words, 11;
his use of onomatopœia, 251, 252;
on words, 212.

terrier, 405.

that of, 470.

the above, 450.

the church, 262, 263.

the masses, 452.

theory, 305.

then, 450.

Theological disputes, 260-264.

thing, 380.

Thomson, James, his list of obsolete words, 57.

Thought, difficulty of expressing it, 211.

thrall, thraldom, 403.

tidy, 379.

toad-eater, 389.

to a degree, 456.

to allude, 459, 460.

to curry favor, 418.

to extremely maltreat, 467.

Tooke, Horne, on “truth,” 286, 287.

topsy-turvy, 388.

Tory, 355.

Townsend, Lady, on Whitefield, 173.

Translations, their inadequacy, 31-43;
of the New Testament, 32-34;
of the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey,” 35, 36;
of Horace, 38;
blunders in, 39-41.

transpire, 470.

treacle, 419.

tribulation, 399.

trifling minutiæ, 462.

trivial, 392.

True Blue, 407.

truth, 286, 289.

try, 451.

try and, 469.

two good ones, 471.

tyrant, 271.

U.

ugly, 466.

underhanded, 461.

unity, 283.

upon, 14.

Usage, a presumptive test of purity of speech, 434;
of old writers, 435.

usury, 380.

utopian, 88, 410.

V.

vagabond, 384.

ventilate, 470.

villain, 382.

violation of nature, 267.

Virgil, his “Æneid,” 28;
his onomatopœia, 254.

virtual representation, 265.

Vocabularies, of different men and callings, 66, 67.

Vocal Organs, the, their adaptation to the atmosphere, 60.

volcano, 409.

W.

Walton, Izaak, his style, 236.

was, 471.

watched him do it, 457.

we, 161, 162.

wealth, 390.

wearies, 446.

Webster, Daniel, his study of words, 17;
the impressiveness of his words, 52;
his early speeches bombastic, 124;
his use of plain words, 124;
his temperance of language, 192.

Wellington, on his “duty,” 64.

Whately, Archbishop, his simplicity in preaching, 123.

whether, 453.

Whipple, E. P., on the words of Chaucer, Edwards, and Barrow, 54;
on the suggestiveness of Shakespeare’s diction, 54, 55;
on the styles of Sydney Smith, Bacon, Locke, etc., 219, 220;
his style, 237;
his knowledge of English literature, 237.

Whitney, W. D., quoted, 234.

Whittington and his cat, 417.

whole, entire, complete, total, 460, 469.

William, 326.

Willmott, Rev. Robert A., on Dryden’s and Pope’s versification, 253.

window, 404.

wiseacre, 414.

wit, 380.

Wolcott, Dr., his lines on Johnson, 113.

woman, 391.

women, their language, 240.

Words, their significance, 1-61;
their range and power, 2, 46;
are things, 3;
Mirabeau on, 3;
Hazlitt on, 3;
more enduring than sculpture or painting, 4, 5;
Homer’s, 5;
the incarnation of thought, 6;
Milton’s, 7-9;
Montgomery on Milton’s, 8, 9;
Bacon’s, 10;
Dryden’s, 10;
Montaigne’s, 10;
Rousseau’s, 10;
Coleridge’s, 10;
Tennyson’s, 11;
Swinburne’s, 11;
De Quincey’s mastery of them, 12;
of the 17th century writers, 13;
difficulty of defining, 14-16;
Daniel Webster’s study of, 17;
Lord Chatham’s study of, 17;
William Pinkney’s study of, 17;
Theophile Gautier’s fondness for picturesque, 19;
comprehensive, 23;
their use a test of culture, 25, 26;
should fit close to the thought, 26;
never strictly synonymous, 26;
Wm. Pitt’s use of, 96;
Robert Hall’s use of, 26;
John Foster’s scrutiny of, 27;
Thomas Moore’s use of, 27;
how used by the ancient writers, 27-30;
Demosthenes’s choice of, 28, 29;
Cicero’s use of, 29;
Cowper on, 34;
their necromantic power, 34, 35;
how regarded by the ancients, 43-45;
use of in “the black art,” 45;
T. W. Higginson on, 46;
Prof. Maurice on, 46;
Hawthorne on their spells, 47;
their meaning and force depend upon the man who uses them, 50-56;
E. P. Whipple on the transfiguration of common, 54;
suggestiveness of Shakespeare’s, 54, 55;
media for the emission of character, 55, 56;
no new ones can be invented, 56, 57;
difficulty of restoring obsolete, 57;
their significance disclosed by life, 59, 60;
their morality, 62-104;
an index to character, 62-104;
their power over the popular imagination, 82;
test of thought, 82;
embalm mistaken opinions, 84;
Bacon on their power, 84;
Balzac on their witchery, 85;
South on the enchantment of popular ones, 85, 86, 87;
illustrations of their power, 86, 87;
their influence in theology, 88, 89;
their influence in science, 89;
their influence upon authors, 90;
employed as expletives, 90;
calumnious, 92;
their power in politics, 93;
Bulwer on their influence, 93;
their perversions by the Greeks and Romans, 96;
used to gloss over vices, 99, 100;
auctioneers’ use of, 100;
criminality of their corruptors, 101, 102;
James Martineau on, 103;
a startling fact about them, 104;
grand, 105-138;
the mania for big, 106-108;
St. Paul on, 109;
the simplest best, 124;
the affectation of foreign, 125, 126;
uncouthness of scientific, 130, 131;
small, 139-157;
conventional, 158, 160, 172;
used without meaning, 162-176;
lose their significance by handling, 170, 171, 190;
some abuses of, 177-193;
the secret of apt, 210-241;
only symbols, 213;
their arrangement on the battle-fields of thought, 226, 228;
onomatopœic, 242-256;
phonetic corruption of, 247;
fallacies in, 257-322;
effect of equivocal in theology, 257-264;
and in philosophy, 264;
their changes of meaning, 271;
dictionary definitions of, 275;
“rabble-charming,” 275;
question-begging, 279;
derivative and primitive, 280;
mere hieroglyphics, 288;
shadow forth more than they express, 289;
their insinuations of error, 292;
in legal instruments, 311;
their ambiguity in statutes, 311, 312;
express only the relations of things, 317;
imperfect signs of our conceptions, 317, 318, 321;
convey different ideas to different minds, 318, 319, 320;
denote but part of an object, 320;
their power in the French revolution, 349, 350;
fascination of their study, 367, 368;
concentrated poems, 369;
knowledge embodied in, 371;
Arab in English, 371;
changes in their meaning, 374-382;
their degradation, 382-397;
common with curious derivations, 387-412;
of illusive etymology, 412-420;
causes of their corruption, 412;
Anglicizing of foreign, 412;
their contradictory meanings, 420-423;
origin of new, 428;
legitimate once denounced, 429;
coined by poets, 432;
advantages of their accurate use, 436-440;
the use of pet, 444;
the coining of, 425, 432-434.

Words without meaning, 158-176.

Wordsworth, lines from, 251.

Wotton, Sir Henry, his definition of an ambassador, 166.

Y.

Youth and Age, Coleridge’s lines on, 256.

Z.

zero, 419.

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

Footnote [38] is referenced twice from page 329.

Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been
corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within
the text and consultation of external sources.

Except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the text,
and inconsistent or archaic usage, have been retained: for example,
shop-keeper, shopkeeper; law-suit, lawsuit; sea-shore, seashore;
animalcules; profanation; bewrayed; sublimities; cometary; enginery.

Pg 14: ‘or decussed at’ replaced by ‘or decussated at’.
Pg 48: ‘Avars and Slaves’ replaced by ‘Avars and Slavs’.
Pg 112: ‘to “circumwented,” as’ replaced by ‘to “circumvented,” as’
Pg 152: ‘are monsyllables.’ replaced by ‘are monosyllables.’.
Pg 250: ‘horrible and g im’ replaced by ‘horrible and grim’.
Pg 254: ‘Τριχθί τε καὶ τετραχθὶ διατρύφεν’ replaced by
‘Τριχθά τε καὶ τετραχθὰ διατρύφεν’.
Pg 299: ‘this, unquestianably’ replaced by ‘this, unquestionably’.
Pg 392: ‘daily occurence’ replaced by ‘daily occurrence’.
Pg 407: ‘either were no’ replaced by ‘either wore no’.
Pg 410: ‘three dissyllables’ replaced by ‘three disyllables’.
Pg 433: ‘enriches the langauge’ replaced by ‘enriches the language’.

Index: Patkul, and Charles XII.; missing page number ‘167’ added.
Index: Words; ‘onomatopoetic,’ replaced by ‘onomatopœic,’.

End of Project Gutenberg's Words; Their Use and Abuse, by William Mathews