Woden, Freya and those others, pertain to a long extinct mythology, but to one existing at that very moment in its strength. And how was it, we may ask, that Paul did not protest against a Christian woman retaining the name of Phebe, (Rom. xvi. 1,) a goddess of the same mythology?

I will conclude this lecture by a comparison, and one which I trust what has been said will abundantly justify. Suppose the pieces of money, which in the ordinary intercourse of life are passing through our hands, had each one something of its own which made it more or less worthy of note; if on one was stamped some striking maxim, on another some important fact, on a third a memorable date; if others were works of finest art, graven with rare and beautiful devices, or bearing the head of some ancient sage, or heroic king; if others again were the sole surviving monuments of mighty nations that once filled the world with their fame; what a careless indifference to our own improvement would it argue in us, if we were content that these should come and go, without our vouchsafing them so much as one serious regard. Such a currency there is, a currency intellectual and spiritual of no meaner worth, and one with which we have to transact so much of the higher business of our lives. Let us see that we come not here under the condemnation of any such incurious dulness as that which I have imagined.

IV.]

ON THE DISTINCTION OF WORDS.

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IN

LECTURE IV.

ON THE DISTINCTION OF WORDS.

N the first of my lectures here, I expressed my intention of considering, during their course, the advantages which might be derived from the study of the distinction of words. It is to this, to the subject of synonyms and their distinction, that I propose to devote the present. What, it may be asked, do we mean, when, comparing certain words with one another, we affirm of them that they are synonyms? We mean that they are words which, with great and essential resemblances of meaning, have at the same time small, subordinate, and partial differences -these differences being such as either originally, and on the ground of their etymology, inhered in them; or differences which they have acquired in the eyes of all by use; or which, though nearly latent now, they are capable of receiving at the hands of wise and discreet masters of the tongue. Synonyms are words of like significance in the main, but with a certain unlikeness as well.

So soon as the term is defined thus, it will be at once perceived by any acquainted with the derivation, that strictly speaking, it is a misnomer, and · is given to these words with a certain inaccuracy and impropriety; since, according to strict etymo

logy the terms "synonyms," or synonymous," applied to words, would affirm of them that they covered not merely almost the same extent of meaning, but altogether and exactly the same, that they were in their signification perfectly identical and coincident. The terms, however, are not ordinarily so used, and plainly are not so, when it is undertaken to trace out the distinction between synonyms; for, without denying that there are such absolutely coincident words, such perfect synonyms, yet these could not be the object of any such discrimination; since where there was no real distinction, it would be lost labour and the exercise of a perverse ingenuity to attempt to draw one. Synonyms then, as the word is generally understood, and as I shall use it here, are words with slighter differences already existing between them, or with the capabilities of such :-neither on the one side absolutely identical; but neither, we may add, on the other only very remotely related to one another; for the differences between these last will be self-evident, will so lie on the surface and proclaim themselves to all, that it would be impossible to make them clearer than they already are, and it would be like holding a candle to the sun to attempt it. They must be words which are more or less liable to confusion, but which yet ought not to be confounded; words, as one has said, quæ conjungi non confundi debent; words in which there originally inhered a difference, or between which, though once absolutely identical, such has gradually grown up, and so established

IV.]

HOW SYNONYMS EXIST.

89

itself in the use of the best writers, and in the instinct of the best speakers of the tongue, that it claims to be recognised and openly admitted by all.

But here an interesting question presents itself to us; this namely, how do languages come to possess synonyms of this latter class, which are differenced not by etymology or other deep-lying and necessary distinction, but only by usage? If languages had been made by agreement, of course no such words could exist; for when one word had been found which was the adequate representative of a feeling or an object, no further one would have been sought. But languages are the result of very different and far less formal and regular processes than this. Various tribes, each with its own dialect, kindred indeed but in many respects distinct, coalesce into one people, and cast their contributions of language into a common stock; sometimes two have the same word, but in forms sufficiently different to cause that both remain as different words; thus in Latin, "serpo" and "repo" are merely two slightly different appropriations of the same Greek word, and "puteo" and "fœteo" in like manner. Or again, a conquering people have fixed themselves in the midst of a conquered; they impose their dominion, but do not succeed in imposing their language; nay, being few in number, they find themselves at last compelled to adopt the language of the conquered; or after a while that which may be called a transaction, a compromise between the two languages, finds place.

Thus was it in England; our modern English being in the main such a compromise between the AngloSaxon and the Norman-French.

These are causes of the existence of synonyms which reach back to an early period in the history of a nation and a language; but other causes at a later period are also at work. When a written literature springs up, authors familiar with various foreign tongues, import from one and another words which are not absolutely required, which are oftentimes rather luxuries than necessities. Of these which are thus proposed as candidates for admission some fail to receive the rights of citizenship, and after longer or shorter probation are rejected; it may be, never get beyond their first proposer. But enough receive the stamp of popular allowance to create embarrassment for a while, and until their relation with the already existing words is adjusted. As a single illustration of the various quarters from which the English has thus been augmented, and in the end enriched, I would instance the words trick," "device," "finesse," "artifice," and "stratagem," and enumerate the various sources from which we have gotten these words. Here "trick" is Saxon, "devisa" is Italian," "finesse" is French, "artificium" is Latin, and "stratagema” Greek.

By and bye however, as a language becomes itself more an object of attention, at the same time that society, advancing from a simpler to a more cultivated state, has more things and thoughts to express, it is felt to be a waste of resources to have two or more words for the signifying of one and the