localisms and technical terms-and sound in matters of taste-free from vulgarisms and colloquialisms-but present. This means, first, being free from obsolete words. There is little need of discussing this phase of good usage at length. No student uses many obsolete expressions, however ready he may be to catch up new words. Now and then a student affects verbs in eth for humorous purposes, but so long as he keeps them out of themes there can be no quarrel with him. Indeed, there are certain words strictly obsolete in oral speech which may be retained in literary usage to the distinct enrichment of our written language. Very much of the phraseology of the King James version of the Bible is of this nature. The speeches and even the letters of Abraham Lincoln reveal the power that still lives in words half-obsolete, if they are such as befit high and serious thoughts. Of this subject more will need to be said later in the present chapter.

It must not be inferred from the many warnings which have been given as to usage that literary usage is a very restricted and formal matter. English, as we know it in modern. books, is a rich and varied language, and no other tongue is so free from petty restrictions.

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When all local, vulgar, and colloquial expressions are thrown out, there still remains a vocabulary so immense that the temptation is to choose unusual and fantastic words rather than familiar and simple. In the next section one form of this temptation is considered.

§ 7. Neoterisms. The more alive a people is, the more alive its language; only dead peoples have dead languages. Living words change their meaning with new circumstances. The English people has been very much alive in recent centuries, and its language has grown immensely by the coinage or the importation of new words. The coinage of a word, or the coined word itself, is called a neoterism. Some of the best established words in the language are, comparatively speaking, neoterisms. In 1589, such words as the following were considered new coinages: 1 delineation, dimension, figurative, idiom, impression, indignity, method, numerous, savage, scientific. The word gas was invented by the Belgian chemist, Van Helmont, who died in 1644. Dr. Johnson (died 1784) would not admit patriotic into his dictionary. International is the coinage of the English

1 Puttenham: Art of English Poesie, 1589. print. See also Hall: Modern English, p. 109.

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jurist, Bentham, who died in 1832. Telegraph is perhaps a few years younger than international; Morse's experiments were completed in 1835. Scientist, fortnightly, dyspeptic, volcanic are all very recent words.

So rapid has been the progress of invention and discovery, and so little have the newspapers and the public felt the responsibility of preserving the purity of the language, that every manner of new coinage has been made. Things have now reached such a stage that the patent laws almost encourage the formation of hideously incorrect trade-names.

A new word should not be accepted unless it meets three conditions. "First of all, a new word ought to supply an antecedent blank; or else, on the score of exactness, perspicuity, brevity, or euphony, it ought to be an improvement on a word already existing. Sec

ondly, a new word should obey some analogy.

In the third place, a new word should be euphonious." 1

It has often come to pass that a word has been accepted by the body of reputable writers though it violates one or more of these canons. The second has been disregarded more than the

1 Fitzedward Hall: Modern English, pp. 171, 173, 183.

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other two. When Dr. Hall says that a new word should obey some analogy," he means that it should be formed like some well-established English word, preferably not a hybrid or mongrel form. A hybrid is a word whose parts are derived from different languages. Diamondiferous is a hybrid. It does not really follow the analogy of a word like carboniferous, derived from Latin carbo and Latin fero. Diamond is an English word, and should take an English suffix. Diamond-bearing is a correct and easily understood compound. Diamondiferous has never been accepted by the body of reputable writers, though certain other hybrids have been, as talkative, a mixture of Anglo-Saxon and Latin, and interloper, a mixture of Latin (through French) and Dutch.

Our safest rule with regard to neoterisms is to write none until we find it in the works of several reputable writers. If, in conversation, we need to name some new invention, we may, as far as in us lies, apply the three canons of neoterism ourselves. Our classical studies may not have progressed far enough to give us a sense of security in applying the second, but we can apply the first and the third. Which of the following words,

naming machines that reproduce pictures from life, seems to you the best sounding? Which is the simplest? Which seems to carry its meaning most easily to a high-school student?

Eidoloscope, biograph, bioscope, verascope, vitagraph, cinematographe, cinematoscope, cinetoscope, cineograph, kinematograph, kinematoscope, kinetograph, kinetoscope, kineoptiscope, triograph, trioscope, centograph, zimograph, multiscope, hypnoscope, vitamotograph, magniscope, magiscope, animatograph, animatoscope, kineopticon, motograph, mutagraph, alethoscope, projectoscope, phantographoscope, polygraph.

There is always a list of words which are candidates for acceptance in literary usage, but are not as yet fully accepted. The following seem to fill antecedent blanks, are formed on analogy, and sound well enough, but have not as yet been fully accepted by the best authors: climatic, electricute (a better word than the hybrid electrocute), onto, tasteful. The word standpoint is used by all except the most fastidious, though it is not formed by analogy. View-point is by no means admitted, nor likely to be admitted. Standpoint (German standpunkt) carries the idea of a point of view that is firmly or permanently taken. The word burglarize is formed by analogy, but is hardly