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out of their own country, yet all who have the least tincture of learning, will continue to feel an ardent desire to acquaint themselves with English authors. Let us then, for a moment, imagine the time to have arrived, when Americans shall no longer be able to understand the works of Milton, Pope, Swift, Addison, and other English authors, justly styled classic, without the aid of a translation into a language that is to be called, at some future day, the American tongue! By such a change, it is true, our loss would not be so great in works purely scientific, as in those which are usually termed works of taste ; for the obvious reason, that the design of the former is merely to communicate information, without regard to elegance of language, or the force and beauty of the sentiments. But the excellencies of works of taste cannot be felt even in the best translations ; a truth, which, without resorting to the example of the matchless ancients, will be acknowledged by every man who is acquainted with the admirable works extant in various living languages. Nor is this the only view in which a radical change of language would be an evil. To say nothing of the facilities afforded by a common language in the ordinary intercourse of business, it should not be forgotten, that our religion and our laws are studied in the language of the nation from which we are descended ; and, with the loss of the language, we should finally suffer the loss of those

peculiar advantages, which we now derive from the investigations of the jurists and divines of that country.”

III. NEW AND OBSOLETE WORDS.

On this subject, I shall take the liberty of quoting a passage from Dr. Armstrong, but without professing to adopt all the opinions which it contains.

“ It is the easiest thing imaginable to coin words. The most ignorant of the mobility are apt to do it every day, and are laughed at for it. What best can justify the introducing a new word, is necessity, where there is not an established one to express your meaning. But while all the world understands what is meant by the word pleasure, which sounds very well too, what occasion can there be for saying volupty?

Nothing can deform a language so much as an inundation of new words and phrases. It is indeed the readiest way to demolish it. If there is any need to illustrate the barbarous effects which a mixture of new words must produce, only consider how a discourse, patched all over with sentences in different languages, would sound; or how oddly it would strike you in a

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which is prefixed an Essay on the present State of the English Language in the United States. By John Pickering. Boston, 1816, 8v0.- Mr. Pickering, one of the most scholar-like American writers with whom I am acquainted, is likewise the author of An Essay on the Pronunciation of the Greek Language. Cambridge, 1818, 4to. In this learned work, he strenuously contends that the true pronunciation of the ancient language is to be learned from the practice of the modern Greeks. In almost every instance, in short, where the opinions of the learned have been at variance with the usage of the modern Greeks, whenever any evidence has been discovered relating to the point in controversy, the theories of the former have proved to be unfounded, and the usage of the latter confirmed.”

serious conversation to hear, from the same person, a mixture of all the various dialects and tones of the several counties and shires of the three kingdoms; though it is still the same language. To make it sensible to the eye ; how greatly would a mixture of Roman, Italick, Greek, and Saxon characters deform a page? A picture imitating the style of different masters, which is commonly called a Gallery of Painters, can never be pleasing for the same reasons, want of union and harmony.

“ The present licentious humour of coining and borrowing words seems to portend no good to the English language ; and it is grievous to think with what volupty two or poetararorencouroac* eminent personages have opiniatred the inchoation of such futile barbarisms.

“ In short, the liberty of coining words ought to be used with great modesty. Horace, they say, gave but two, and Virgil only one to the Latin tongue, which was squeamish enough not to swallow those, even from such hands, without some reluctance.

“ Instead of creating a parcel of awkward new words, I imagine it would be an improvement to degrade many of the old ones from their

I am but a private man, and without authority; but an absolute prince, if he was of my opinion, would make it capital ever to say encroach or encroachment, or any thing that belongs to encroaching. I would commit inculcate, for all its Latinity, to the care of the paviours; and it should never appear above ground again. If you have the

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least sympathy with the human ear, never say purport while you breathe ; nor betwixt, except you have first repeated between till we are quite tired of it. Methinks strongly resembles the broken language of a German in his first attempts to speak English. Methought lies under the same objection, but it sounds better.

“ It is full time that froward should be turned out of all good company, especially as perverse is ready at hand to supply his place. Vouchsafe is a very civil gentleman ; but as his courtesy is somewhat old-fashioned, we wish he would deign, or condescend, or be pleased, to retire.

“ From what rugged road, I wonder, did swerve deviate into the English language ?—But this subject matter !—In the name of every thing that is disgusting and detestable, what is it? Is it one or two ugly words? Yet one dares hardly ever peep

into face, for fear of being stared in the face with this nasty subject malter."*

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CHAP. III.

OF PROPRIETY OF STYLE.

PROPRIETY of style stands opposed to vulgarisms or low expressions, and to words and phrases that would be

Armstrong's Miscellanies, vol. ij. p. 147. Lond. 1770, 2 vols. 8vo.

less significant of the ideas which we mean to convey. An author may be deficient in propriety, either by making choice of such words as do not express the idea which he intends, but some other which only resembles it ; or such as express that idea, but not fully and completely. He may also be deficient in this respect by making choice of words or phrases, which habit has taught us to regard as mean and vulgar.

All that I propose in relation to this subject, is to collect from the writings of different authors a considerable number of vulgar phrases.

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These and many other particulars might easily choke the faith of a philosopher, who believed no more than what he could deduce from the principles of nature. --Dryden's Life of Plutarch.

The kings of Syria and Egypt, the kings of Pergamus and Macedon, without intermission worried each other for above two hundred years.--Burke's Vindication of Natural Society.

Archbishop Tillotson is too often careless and languid ; and is much outdone by Bishop Atterbury, in the music of his periods.Blair's Lectures.

Every year a new flower in his judgment beats all the old ones, though it is much inferior to them both in colour and shape. -Mandeville on the Nature of Society.

I am wonderfully pleased when I meet with any passage in an old Greek or Latin author that is not blown upon, and which I have never met with in a quotation. --Addison, Spectator.

His name must go down to posterity with distinguished honour in the public records of the nationi.— Hurd's Life of Warburton.

Learning and the arts were but then getting up.-Hurd's Dialogues.

We enter into their gratitude towards those faithful friends who did not desert them in their difficulties; and we heartily go along

s with their resentment, against those perfidious traitors who injured, abandoned, or deceived them.— Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments. Fraternal hands and Christian lit the flame.

Mason's English Garden. This is a vulgar, or at least a colloquial abbreviation of

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