English Past and Present
ENGLISH PAST AND PRESENT ***
Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Amy Cunningham, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
{TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
All square brackets [] are from the original text. Braces {} ("curly brackets") are supplied by the transcriber. Characters that could not be displayed directly in Latin-1 are transcribed as follows:
{-e} e with macron above {)e} e with breve above {+} obelus (dagger) symbol
In addition, a short passage on page 222 uses unusual phonetic symbols, which are transcribed with Latin-1 characters where possible and with letters in {braces} otherwise. The html version contains images of the original book's symbols.
In the original book, the odd-numbered pages have unique headers, marked here as sidenotes.
Obvious printing errors involving punctuation (such as missing single quotes), as well as alphabetization errors in the index, have been corrected without notes. Other corrections of printing errors, as well as notes regarding spelling variations, are listed at the end of this file.}
* * * * *
ENGLISH PAST AND PRESENT
BY
RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH, D.D.
_Edited with Emendations_
BY
A. SMYTHE PALMER, D.D.
_Author of 'The Folk and their Word-lore,' 'Folk-Etymology,' 'Babylonian Influence on the Bible,' etc._
{Illustration: Printer's Mark}
LONDON
GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & SONS, LIMITED
NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.
1905
EDITOR'S PREFACE
In editing the present volume I have thought it well to follow the same rule which I laid down for myself in editing _The Study of Words_, and have made no alteration in the text of Dr. Trench's work (the fifth edition). Any corrections or additions that seemed to be demanded owing to the progress of lexicographical knowledge have been reserved for the foot-notes, and these can always be distinguished from those in the original by the square brackets [thus] within which they are placed.
On the whole more corrections have been required in _English Past and Present_ than in _The Study of Words_ owing to the sweeping statements which involve universal negatives--statements, e.g. that certain words either first came into use, or ceased to be employed, at a specific date. Nothing short of the combined researches of an army of co-operative workers, such as the _New English Dictionary_ commanded, could warrant the correctness of assertions of this kind, which imply an exhaustive acquaintance with a subject so immense as the entire range of English literature.
Even the mistakes of a learned man are instructive to those who essay to follow in his steps, and it is not without use to point them out instead of ignoring or expunging them. Thus, when the Archbishop falls into the error (venial when he wrote) of assuming an etymological connexion between certain words which have a specious air of kinship--such as 'care' and 'cura,' 'bloom' and 'blossom,' 'ghastly' and 'ghostly,' 'brat' and 'brood,' 'slow' and 'slough'--he makes just the mistakes which we would be tempted to make ourselves had not Professor Skeat and Dr. Murray and the great German School of philologists taught us to know better. Our plan, therefore, has been to leave such errors in the text and point out the better way in the notes. In other words, we have treated the Archbishop's work as a classic, and the occasional emendations in the notes serve to mark the progress of half a century of etymological investigation. It is hardly necessary to point out that the chronological landmarks occurring here and there need an obvious equation of time to make them correct for the present year of grace, e.g. 'lately,' when it occurs, must be understood to mean at least fifty years ago, and a similar addition must be made to other time-points when they present themselves.
A. SMYTHE PALMER.
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
A series of four lectures which I delivered last spring to the pupils of the King's College School, London, supplied the foundation to this present volume. These lectures, which I was obliged to prepare in haste, on a brief invitation, and under the pressure of other engagements, being subsequently enlarged and recast, were delivered in the autumn somewhat more nearly in their present shape to the pupils of the Training School, Winchester; with only those alterations, omissions and additions, which the difference in my hearers suggested as necessary or desirable. I have found it convenient to keep the lectures, as regards the persons presumed to be addressed, in that earlier form which I had sketched out at the first; and, inasmuch as it helps much to keep lectures vivid and real that one should have some well defined audience, if not actually before one, yet before the mind's eye, to suppose myself throughout addressing my first hearers. I have supposed myself, that is, addressing a body of young Englishmen, all with a fair amount of classical knowledge (in my explanations I have sometimes had others with less than theirs in my eye), not wholly unacquainted with modern languages; but not yet with any special designation as to their future work; having only as yet marked out to them the duty in general of living lives worthy of those who have England for their native country, and English for their native tongue. To lead such through a more intimate knowledge of this into a greater love of that, has been a principal aim which I have set before myself throughout.
Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Amy Cunningham, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
{TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
All square brackets [] are from the original text. Braces {} ("curly brackets") are supplied by the transcriber. Characters that could not be displayed directly in Latin-1 are transcribed as follows:
{-e} e with macron above {)e} e with breve above {+} obelus (dagger) symbol
In addition, a short passage on page 222 uses unusual phonetic symbols, which are transcribed with Latin-1 characters where possible and with letters in {braces} otherwise. The html version contains images of the original book's symbols.
In the original book, the odd-numbered pages have unique headers, marked here as sidenotes.
Obvious printing errors involving punctuation (such as missing single quotes), as well as alphabetization errors in the index, have been corrected without notes. Other corrections of printing errors, as well as notes regarding spelling variations, are listed at the end of this file.}
* * * * *
ENGLISH PAST AND PRESENT
BY
RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH, D.D.
_Edited with Emendations_
BY
A. SMYTHE PALMER, D.D.
_Author of 'The Folk and their Word-lore,' 'Folk-Etymology,' 'Babylonian Influence on the Bible,' etc._
{Illustration: Printer's Mark}
LONDON
GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & SONS, LIMITED
NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.
1905
EDITOR'S PREFACE
In editing the present volume I have thought it well to follow the same rule which I laid down for myself in editing _The Study of Words_, and have made no alteration in the text of Dr. Trench's work (the fifth edition). Any corrections or additions that seemed to be demanded owing to the progress of lexicographical knowledge have been reserved for the foot-notes, and these can always be distinguished from those in the original by the square brackets [thus] within which they are placed.
On the whole more corrections have been required in _English Past and Present_ than in _The Study of Words_ owing to the sweeping statements which involve universal negatives--statements, e.g. that certain words either first came into use, or ceased to be employed, at a specific date. Nothing short of the combined researches of an army of co-operative workers, such as the _New English Dictionary_ commanded, could warrant the correctness of assertions of this kind, which imply an exhaustive acquaintance with a subject so immense as the entire range of English literature.
Even the mistakes of a learned man are instructive to those who essay to follow in his steps, and it is not without use to point them out instead of ignoring or expunging them. Thus, when the Archbishop falls into the error (venial when he wrote) of assuming an etymological connexion between certain words which have a specious air of kinship--such as 'care' and 'cura,' 'bloom' and 'blossom,' 'ghastly' and 'ghostly,' 'brat' and 'brood,' 'slow' and 'slough'--he makes just the mistakes which we would be tempted to make ourselves had not Professor Skeat and Dr. Murray and the great German School of philologists taught us to know better. Our plan, therefore, has been to leave such errors in the text and point out the better way in the notes. In other words, we have treated the Archbishop's work as a classic, and the occasional emendations in the notes serve to mark the progress of half a century of etymological investigation. It is hardly necessary to point out that the chronological landmarks occurring here and there need an obvious equation of time to make them correct for the present year of grace, e.g. 'lately,' when it occurs, must be understood to mean at least fifty years ago, and a similar addition must be made to other time-points when they present themselves.
A. SMYTHE PALMER.
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
A series of four lectures which I delivered last spring to the pupils of the King's College School, London, supplied the foundation to this present volume. These lectures, which I was obliged to prepare in haste, on a brief invitation, and under the pressure of other engagements, being subsequently enlarged and recast, were delivered in the autumn somewhat more nearly in their present shape to the pupils of the Training School, Winchester; with only those alterations, omissions and additions, which the difference in my hearers suggested as necessary or desirable. I have found it convenient to keep the lectures, as regards the persons presumed to be addressed, in that earlier form which I had sketched out at the first; and, inasmuch as it helps much to keep lectures vivid and real that one should have some well defined audience, if not actually before one, yet before the mind's eye, to suppose myself throughout addressing my first hearers. I have supposed myself, that is, addressing a body of young Englishmen, all with a fair amount of classical knowledge (in my explanations I have sometimes had others with less than theirs in my eye), not wholly unacquainted with modern languages; but not yet with any special designation as to their future work; having only as yet marked out to them the duty in general of living lives worthy of those who have England for their native country, and English for their native tongue. To lead such through a more intimate knowledge of this into a greater love of that, has been a principal aim which I have set before myself throughout.
+
Comments & Reviews
-
Popularity
319
reads
reads
0
0
comments
comments
Remember to Tweet and Facebook to increase the popularity score!
Read on Mobile : 25893 
Recommended
Method By Which the Causes of the Present and Past Conditions of Organic Nature Are to Be Discovered
