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devised on the ancient plan, and framed with the same elaborate and studied care, if it did not carry away the orator from the matter of his discourse, to the manner of his delivery, could never be matured in our day, from the unavoidable incompleteness of our whole oratorical discipline. It is certain that the gifted men who have been most successful with us in pouring the flood of their resistless eloquence into the minds and souls of their auditors, have erred in the opposite extreme. They have excluded from their system of oratorical culture, the precepts of this art as worthless accessories-precepts which, in the ancient scheme of persuasion, were among the most efficient of its instruments.

ART. IV.—1. An American Dictionary of the English Language, &c. To which are prefixed, an Introductory Dissertation on the Origin, History and Connection of the Languages of Western Asia and of Europe, and a concise Grammar of the English Language. By NOAH WEBSTER, L. L. D. New-York. 1828. 2. Grammaire Arabe à l'usage de l'ecole speciale des langues Orientales vivantes, avec figures. Par A. J. SILVESTRE DE SACY. 2 vols. 8vo. Paris. 1810.

WE value too highly the study of the philosophy and etymology of languages, if we consider it as one of the most essential parts of literature, and we should not agree without restriction, to one of the adages of Plato, "that he who knows words, knows things also." On the other hand, however, we cannot assent to the opinion of those who pretend that this study has no other advantage than the mere gratification of curiosity.

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Of the many literary benefits which may arise from etymological researches when they are accompanied by the necessary knowledge and conducted with intelligence, we will only enu

merate two.

In the first place, no one, we trust, will doubt that the developement of the origin of words throws great light on the origin of VOL. V.-No. 10.

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nations, of their migrations and commercial intercourse, as well as upon other obscure points of antiquity.

In the second place, the formation of words, which may be considered as the basis of the science of etymology, can never be profound and exact, without examining the relation which they may bear to the spirit of the people, as well as to the primitive disposition of their organs; in a word, without studying man through all climates and all ages, and without viewing him under all aspects. Such a study may not be unworthy of a philosophical mind, and such researches are, we think, what ought to be embraced in the study of languages.

The investigation of the origin of words and of languages, opens, in truth, a vast career to true criticism. How much knowledge and sagacity are required to guard against the seductions of false resemblances, and to trace back to their true origin the words that additions, retrenchments, and other alterations have actually disfigured. It is true, that this art is very often founded on mere conjecture, but it is precisely where the combinations of conjecture are established by correct induction, that the human mind appears to glorify itself in its acuteness and research. We may say more-man himself, with all that bear connexion with his moral and physical existence, depends almost exclusively on the art of conjecturing. The very nature of things does not permit that much of what is useful to man, should be susceptible of demonstration. The etymological art must, therefore, be valued on account of its relation both to the objects which are interwoven with the knowledge of man, and to the conjectural conclusions which are the necessary means of all arts. Even the grammatical subtleties which seem to disgrace this art, become ennobled by the philosophical spirit which, when properly conducted, presides over them.* Should we, even with this assistance, sometimes be unable to attain any probability in our researches, then we, at least, may acknowledge our ignorance without feeling any self-reproach, and say with Varro, "Qui de originibus verborum multa dixerit commode, potius boni consulendum, quam qui aliquid nequiverit reprehendendum.”+

Etymological researches may be pursued in two separate modes. In the first, which is undoubtedly the simplest and the surest, we take the history of nations for our guide, and explore the progress of a language and the various alterations which it has been suffering from time and man, by the vicissitudes of

* Plus habet in recessu quam fronte promittit.--Quinc. Ins. Qrat. lib. iv.
+ De Ling: Lat. lib. vi.

the people to whom it appertained-for languages without men are a shade without a subject-and, consequently, we are obliged to pause in our researches where the national history ceases, or, at least, begins to be obscured in the mist of uncertainty and fiction. This method Johnson appears to have followed in composing his English Dictionary. He carries his etymological inquiries no farther than to the Anglo-Saxons on the one side, and to the Greeks on the other. As to the former we are destitute of all historical identities and information concerning the origin of the ancient Germans or Teutones, and it was only in the year of Rome, 604, that the Consul C. Papirius first met them in Noricum, and compelled them to proceed towards Gaul. The ancients described their figures and manners, but gave no satisfactory account of their origin. The history of the Celts is equally obscure. All that we learn concerning them from Herodotus,* is, that they, next to the Cynetæ, were the most remote people in the west of Europe. For the Greeks, although we have notices of them as far back as two thousand years before Christ, yet nothing certain can be discovered respecting their origin. All that we know of them is, that the Athenians were ancient, and supposed themselves to be Aborigines, (auroxoves) and that there was a constant migration from the Peloponnesus to Thessaly, and back again.

The second mode in which etymological researches are conducted, is a bold yet labyrinthine course, where results are gained by analogical conjectures and the resemblances of words, structure and pronunciation. Thus we glide and steal through dark ages where no traces of man are before our eyes, we direct our steps only by the aid of distant sounds, which fall upon our ears from some quarters, and are courageous enough to attempt to become guides, even from these faint echoes, through the early history of men and their actions. In this hazardous road, Mr. Webster seems, in some measure, to have travelled. He did not wish to stop at the Greek tongue :-he ascends the stream to the Oriental and early languages of the first men, enters the depths of the Slavonian dialects-and but little is wanting to hear him exclaim with the Roman philosopher

"Avia Pieridum peragro loca, nullius ante
Trita solo; juvat integros accedere fontes
Atque haurire; juvatque novas decerpere flores
Insignemque meo capite petere inde coronam
Unde prius nulli velarint tempora Musæ."

# Melp. c. ix.

The enterprize is laudable and worthy of the human mind; but it cannot succeed without a thorough knowledge of the philosophy and the various dialects of the primitive languages. The mere aid of dictionaries, without profound grammatical knowledge, leads the inquirer to conclusions which often are equally absurd and delusive. As an instance, we shall cite here two or three of Mr. Webster's observations respecting the Russian language.

"Vo or ve signifies in, at, by, and may possibly be from the same root as the English by, be.”

Now if our author had really studied this language, he could never have imagined any analogy between the English by or be and the Russian vo or ve (as he spells it,) for all monosyllabic words in the Slavonic dialect, have a peculiar pronunciation which is grammatically settled This word is spelled in Russian with a v followed by a silent i, (called yeree) and the word is pronounced oov.

"Za, is a prefix signifying for, on account of, by reason of, after, as in zaviduyu, to envy, from vid visage, viju to see; Lat. video; zadirayu from deru, to tear; zamirayu to be astonished or stupified from the root of Lat. miror, and Russ: mir, peace, &c. Zamiriayu to make peace, &c."

Mr. Webster must have had before him a Russian dictionary in which the first person sing. pres. tense of the verbs is notified, and he mistook them for the infinitives-thus zaviduyu is not the infinitive to envy, but the 1st. per. sing. pres. tense, I do envy-all the Russian infinitives end in at or ect, and the 1st. pers. sing. pres. tense of all verbs ends in oo; consequently to see, is in Russian, veedat, zamirat, to be astonished, mirat, to pacify, &c.

"So, a preposition and prefix of extensive use, signifying with, of, from, and as a mark of comparison it answers nearly the English so."

This word is spelled in Russian with an s and a silent i (veree) it is consequently pronounced ees-and it will be difficult to find any analogy between ees and so!

Similar errors have been committed by our author in his concise and brief explanation of the German and Danish languages, throughout which, grammatical incorrectnesses, not to say ignorance, are so conspicuous as to leave no doubt that he had not studied even their elementary principles. Besides to collect a half dozen similar words in two languages, and to settle by them the connexion and affinity of the two languages, is like judging of the resemblance of two countries, by soine houses which were alike in both. In languages of at least 50,000 words can

not mere accident or some unknown circumstance have thrown in twenty or thirty similar words, and what influence can they have on the whole extent and on the structure of the languages? Nay, we will challenge Mr. Webster to show us any two languages whatever, in which we shall not be able to point out at least forty or fifty words resembling each other, if not entirely the same in both languages. It appears to be his object to trace words to their primitive sources, where history refuses all aid, and by what means, will he be guided in this research? Has he at least cleared up all doubts and obscurities respecting the primitive languages? Which are they? How many different dialects did they present? In what do the differences consist?

What

are the grammatical and philosophical principles of those languages? What have they in common, and in what do they differ? In what connexion do they stand with the Greek dialects? In what way have the Greek dialects been formed from the Oriental? There are difficulties enough we will answer for him-we need not increase them.

The common appellation “Oriental languages” does not embrace all the languages which are spoken by the many and various tribes of Asia, but is generally confined to those tongues which were formerly spoken by the Jews, Phoenicians, Syrians and Chaldeans, as well as to those which are still living and are spoken by the Arabs and Ethiopians, and we may justly add the ancient Egyptian tongue which became extinct with the nation, some traces of which, however, may probably be discerned among the Copts, who are supposed to be their descendants. The affinity between all these languages is of such a nature that we ought to regard them not as different tongues, but as dialects of one general and primitive language. It is, therefore, useless to enter here into a discussion which has vainly occupied so many learned men of different countries, and which Mr. Webster has canvassed with fresh courage through many an idle page of his introduction, namely, which of all these languages may be considered as the primitive, and which was at first spoken by the first men? Every one of these languages has had its partizans; and the question must remain unsettled. We will, therefore, quit these useless researches, the results of which can only be uncertain conjectures, to give way in their turn to others as vague and as indefinite. Such labours we relinquish willingly to those who are condemned to this Danaidean task, while we will endeavour to show, in the first place, the close affinity and connexion between all these languages, examine their differences, and then leave the reader to judge whether the slight orthographical alterations, to which all languages

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