Believe a Doctrine (L.); obey a Precept (L.).

It may be right to Avenge (L.) injuries, but never to indulge Revenge (L.).

Attitude (L.) of wonder; reclining Posture (L.).

A thing is Ancient (L.) or Antique (L.) when not modern; it is Antiquated or Obsolete (L.) when it is out of fashion or use. Ancient republics or temples; built in the Antique style; Antiquated customs; Obsolete words.

An Abridgment (L.) contains the more important parts of the larger work. A Compendium (L.) or an Epitome (Gk.) is a condensed abridgment. An Abstract (L.) or a Summary (L.) is a brief statement of a thing in its main points. A Synopsis (Gk.) is a bird's-eye view of a subject or work in its several parts.

An Example (L.) represents a class of objects; an Instance (L.) may be a single and solitary case.

Common (L.) friend (not "mutual friend "), country, or enemy (belonging alike to all); Mutual (L.) benefit, services, or friendship (interchange in the same act); Reciprocal (L.) kindness or reproaches (acting in response to another act).

Fields are Adjacent (L.) when they lie near to each other; Adjoining (L.) farms meet or join at some point. Contiguous (L.) implies touching or joining closely.

Ample (L.) room or resources; Spacious (L.) hall, house, or garden; Capacious (L.) vessel or mind.

The taste and feelings of a Fastidious (L.) person are easily offended; a Squeamish (S.) person is over-scrupulous and easily disgusted.

Grandeur (L.) of the ocean; Sublimity (L.) of the heavens.

Before leaving this chapter we wish to say that, while the

meaning of some words is widened and that of some is narrowed,

XXXVI. Some Words Change Completely in Meaning.another, เ , is gradually

To the first meaning,

α

taken on, and the signification is represented by

α

The first, or a, signification is gradually crowded out,-the younger Jacob dispossessing the elder Esau,-until at last only the meaning is left. Tyrant meant at first one who by military force raised himself to an unconstitutional sovereignty a usurper; then by degrees one who, besides having so raised himself to power, ruled despotically; now, only a despot, whether coming to the throne legitimately or by a coup d'état.

Without a knowledge of the changes in sense which words have undergone, hundreds of such terms as these in Shakespeare, Bacon, Spenser, Milton, Bunyan, and other old authors,

Orchard, thought, censure, still, reduce, dear, going, presently, sensual, shrewdly, futile, tracts, humorous, plausible, wizard, quick, whirlpool, quell, fact, manure, regard, ruining, and artfully, would be misunderstood or not understood at all. We add that

XXXVII. Words are Dropping out of the Vocabulary.The pages of all the old writers are sprinkled with such words as

Brent, stond, teen; eftsoones, swinge, sikerly, which, in all likelihood, will never again do duty. Their death is not an unhealthful symptom. "A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age; " and for words, as for food, "the appetite changes." Only the thrifty tree outgrows its old bark, and then throws it off.

CHAPTER XI.

NEW WORDS.-PREFIXES AND SUFFIXES.

XXXVIII. New Words are Constantly Coming into the Vocabulary. They enter to supply the demand which increase of knowledge creates. The changes in the vocabulary of a language, unlike those made in its grammar, are greatest during periods of high intellectual activity. As shown, this demand is partly met

1. By the Widening of Meaning in Words. Of this we need not give illustrations here. When we learn something new of an object, we do not cast about for a new word. We simply add this new fact to the old facts, and stretch the old word to cover it.

Out of some kind things, we can, for upper part of the

2. By Metaphor and Metonymy. When we come upon a new thing resembling an old, or sustaining any other noteworthy relation to it, we may bring over the word denoting the old, and apply it to the new. of likeness, real or fancied, between the instance, apply head, the name of the body, to one end of a pin, to the top of a cabbage, to the source of a river; we can extend moon to name the satellites of Jupiter and Saturn. Words so transferred on the basis of likeness between the things, we call metaphors. From the material used in making it, we can call a sword, steel, and sails, canvas. Putting a part for a whole, we may speak of a ship as a keel or a mast or a sail. A word so used we call a metonymy.

And even when the metaphor or the metonymy yields only an additional name for a thing, how the expression gains in beauty and vividness by its use! How apt is bubble applied to the South Sea Scheme! and who does not wish he had anticipated Lowell in calling humming-birds zigzagging blurs and winged emeralds?

3. By Distinguishing between Synonyms.-As said in the preceding chapter, this discrimination does not actually add new words to the vocabulary, but it releases from a joint work all the words of a group, and leaves each for a distinct service.

4. New Words Come from Proper Names. - Places and inventors, discoverers, and other persons, noted for some act or quality, leave their names in nouns and verbs and adjectives.

Martinet, tantalize, boycott, canter, macadamize, petrel, maudlin, Jeremiad, Gerrymander, Puseyism, cereal, meander, money, dunce, jovial, gypsy, worsted, volt,

and scores of other words illustrate this source of verbal growth.

5. Obsolete Words are Recalled.—Words return to active duty after a long Rip Van Winkle sleep. It would seem that hitherto men have not been able to carry on abreast all departments of investigation. In their advance they have moved not in straight lines, but in lines that zigzag. When engrossed with one class of questions, and off on what we may call one tack of their progress, they have been forced to neglect topics that once occupied them. Words needed and used before are not needed now, and drop into disuse. They become, in the language of the dictionary, first obsolescent, and then obsolete. But when the investigators have put about, and return, not over the old course, but in the old

direction, and are absorbed in the re-discussion of old questions, the disused words are wanted, and are revived, and re-enlisted into active service.

6. Old Words are Compounded. The compounds stand for a while with a hyphen between their parts, as in camp-stool, door-post, and foot-note; the hyphen drops out, as in steamship, railway, fortnight, and forehead, when the relation between the parts has become intimate.

It is worth noting that this capacity for composition possessed by Anglo-Saxon words gradually diminished, though it was not wholly lost, after they had entered English. A paralysis seems to have fallen upon them. Words grew indisposed to combine with words or with prefixes, and prefixes to unite with words. The reason is not far to seek. The new tongue supplemented its available Anglo-Saxon words by a liberal employment of the Norman-French. The old habit of answering calls for words by compounding them out of old Anglo-Saxon material-a habit which all self-relying languages have-was not continued in the new tongue, because of its free use of Latin. To employ the ready-made words seemed only just, and was easier than to make new ones. Consequently the facility and the felicity of combination which Anglo-Saxon words once possessed no longer distinguish them. They still combine, but with an awkwardness that comes from loss of habit.

7. We Borrow from Modern Languages.-The English go everywhere, and bring back many things; and, along with the things, their foreign names. This accounts for the hundreds of commercial terms illustrated in Chapter II.

8. We Use the Greek and the Latin.-We need not enlarge upon this way of adding to our vocabulary. We may, perhaps, say that those coming in from the Greek, often