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i « h and whose form was not contemplated in the imposition of their names $ yet tbeir names are after all resolvable into CR , &c ., signifying round or-roundish . "pp . 75 , 76 , We cannot forbear to insert the auth or's note at this place , for it is a literary curiosity .
" I hesitated for some time , whether I should not leave the eighteenth ( I ought to apologize for giving so many ) proposition wholly unsheltered by explanation aod proof , to invite attack , and draw on Controversy ; for I do not expect it to be generally admitted without resistance : but on further reflection , it appeared
unwise to induce war , which comes soon 4 ho « gh through all precautions for peace . " — Note , P . 76 * . As the contents of the third part , which consists of an application of the above principles to the analysis of the ^ mponent pa rts of speech , could not be presented in a form very much ^ bridged with fairness , we shall content ourselves with ^ an extract which
our readers may consider as a fair sample of the whole dissertation . u The verbul terminations are merely mmective . —There is strictly but one verbal termination , though it be diversified by various spelling and pronunciation : ath , ( the very same as the Hebrew ath , ) aith , et * h , or ith , &c . was the older form , which became ed , et , es , eat , an , en , &c . ; fH ( which is now in Dutch the conjunction
answering to our and ) is still connected with many words ; as seen , known , &c . in what is called the past participle : it is also firmly grafted into many words , as brighten , lighten , drown , &c ; nay , it is both prefixed and postfixed to some words , as enlighten , enliven . The reader will
perceive in these instances how liable words tte to be used superfluously and insignificantly : in enliven the connective is put twice j in enliveneth is is put thrice ,- in ttUvenedst it is put four times . '—P . 9 . 9 . It is always a certain sign of idolatry , ° r of a Babel-system , when the tongues of J ™>«« employed about it are divided . . e has been wonderful gibbering about e wonders of the verb ; and among « rest Dr . Crombie is seriously alarmed <* tthis important part of speech be dep ^ ed from its true dignity into a mere P ^ i pfe . - . , . * ... toth . o uk * ^ e superfluous to explain eth that ? . / nt e m £ ent reader ; he must perceive me en , ed , esy it is merely a connecverb 6 th < : r affixed to what is called a ^ ate ^ ^ ec ^ ve a noun , or any word j . v er ; it would be easy to con" *** that this is the primary use * f
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all verbal terminations in all the dialects , It has t > een the fashion of late , indeed , with some Greek and Latin grammarians , to consider them as primarily pronouns : in this tbey are nearer the truth than themselves are aware of , ( for eth however diversified , is originally the same as what are called pronouns , ) yet it is not as they mean it . Home Tooke seems to have
considered th , do and to , as the same word , but what he considered do he did not communicate . In Hebrew , ath , the grammarians say truly , ** seldom admits of translation into English after an active verb , ( nor does the verbal termination eth in English , admit of translation into any
other language ) : when prefixed to a person it commonly signifies with / Wilson ' s Hebrew Grammar . —This is always its signification when it has any signification , whether , it be called a proposition , as ad , at ; or a conjunction , as and * et ; a ^ termination as in amat , amat-us , amans , amant-is , &c . The reader must be now convinced that
verbal , participial and simple adjective terminations , ( those which do not . denote negation , diminution or augmentation , ) are all alike merely connective , and in fact the same copula , somewhat varied in its form by the accidents of pronunciation and spelling . "—Pp . 100—102 .
Whether our author has or has not solved the great problem of language , whether he has untied the knot or merely cut it , we shall leave to the sagacity of his readers to cletermine . He has , as he is fully persuaded , foU lowed up the most remote parts , cf speech , through every winding , and
sometimes up passages sufficiently rugged and ' abrupt , to one common channel ; he has also . pursued that to its fountain , the supppsed source of all written language , and he declares it to be neither more nor Jess than th $ cypher which is raised from insignificance into significancy almost infinite , or the circle , under all its variations
into greater or less , single or double , more or less regular , Sec . We do not certainly intend prediction ; but a $ the author in a moment of extraordinary diffidence has imagined what may happen , we shall annex the passage , both , as it shews jthat he is prepared for the worst , and as it presents him to the reader jri a gentle and everi
tender apd elegiac mood . ' He / , ' ( meaning the author of Etymologicon Magnum , to whom in very gratitude our author owed an elegy)—" He was almost within sight of the proper starting post of etymological in-
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Review . —Gilchrisfs JPHitosqphic Etymohgy . . 5 43
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1816, page 543, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2456/page/43/
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