The Press.
London, England, 1858-11-13 00:00:00

THE PRESS, NOVEMBER 13, 1858.

With these views, we can have no hesitation in
saying that the " Curiosities of Literature "
must triumphantly defy the malice of some super-
ficial snarlers who have sought to wither its fair
fame. The reading public has long since made
up its mind that the " Curiosities" was a good
book, and a fourth generation of readers will
confirm the praise bestowed upon it. The Dry-
asdusts could never produce anything half so
interesting, or lively, or entertaining. Isaac
Disraeli had one special quality which he knew
well how to employ. He had a remarkable sense
of knowing how much of profundity or disserta-
tion a general reader would endure, and he chose
his matter and discussed it with a shrewd
and artistic sense of how the reader would be
affected. Ile saw how much Voltaire had been
able to do with popularizing grave subjects, and
making them readable by the crowd, while at
the same time treating them in literary spirit.
Apart from his reading, and acuteness, and
ingenious turn of mind, Isaac Disraeli's style
makes competition with him a hopeless thing for
all the Dryasdusts, who were ever

Sleepless themselves, to give their readers sleep.

We shall select some:of the characteristic pas-
sages in the volume before us. " The History of
New Words" is a most entertaining article. In
it the author observes :

There are three foul corruptors of • language : caprice,
affectation, and ignorance ! Such fashionable cant terms as
"theatricals," and " musicals," invented by the flippant
Topham, still survive among his confraternity of frivolity.
A lady eminent for the elegance of her taste, and of whom
one of the best judges, the celebrated Miss Edgeworth,
observed to me, that she spoke the purest and most idiomatic
English she had ever heard, threw out an observation which
might be extended to a great deal of our present fashion-
able vocabulary. She is now old enough, she said, to have
lived to hear the ♦ulgarisms of her youth adopted in
drawing-room circles. To lunch, now so familiar from
the fe-est lips, in her youth was only known in the
servants' hall. An expression very rife of late among our
yuuug ladies, a nice man, whatever it may mean, whether
that the man resemble a pudding or something more nice,
conveys the offensive notion that they are ready to eat him
up I When 1 was a boy, it was an age of bon tow; this
good tone mysteriously conveyed a sublime idea of fashion
the term, imported late in the eighteenth century, closed
with it, Twaddle for a while succeeded bore; hut bore has
recovered the supremacy. We want another Swift to give
a new edition of his " Polite Conversation." A dictionary
of barbarisms too might he collected from sline wretched
neologists, whose pens are now at work! Lord Chester-
field, in his exhortations to conform to Johnson's Dic-
tionary, was desirous, however, that the great lexicographer
should add as an appendix," A neological dictionary, con-
taining those polite, though perhaps not strictly gram-
matical, words and phrases commonly used, and sometimes
understood 'uy the beau-nwnde."

To the three sources of corruption of a tongue
mentioned by I. Disraeli a fourth might be added
—provincialism. Our English language has to
some extent suffered from the localisms and from
the unidiomatic construction of several Scotch
and Irish writers. These provincial writers
affect the construction of a language more than
its positive diction. If our own Dr. Johnson
Latinized the English tongue, the rhetorical style
of the Edinburgh Reviewers, and of writers like
Burke and others, removed the standard of purity
too much from genuine Saxon models. " Horner
" has good English, but it is only governess'
" English," said a Parliamentary critic, alluding
to the artificial mode of speaking employed by
Francis Horner. Slang is also a ruinous cor-
ruption of a language, and several instances
might be cited. The annotator on the above
passage remarks :

The term pluck, once only known to the prize-ring, has
now got into use in general conversation, and also into
literature, as a term in lieative of ready courage.
Such terms as "patent to the public "—" normal condi-
tion "—" crass behaviour," are ithe inventions of the last
few years.

We have been told that "pluck" originated in
the cockpit and not in the prize-ring, and that
there was always the phrase about a cock, " He'll
" pluck up again." IVe have never met with any
public writer or speaker using the phrase "crass
behaviour " ; and so applied, the term has no
meaning ; but Lord Brougham, as we ourselves
well remember, on a memorable occasion used
the word " crass ignorance." Against the use
of the word " talented," which is originally an
Americanism, there were strong protests uttered
by the late Mr. Croker and Mr. Lockhart ; but
the word seems to have become naturalized, and
we observe good writers using it, though one
might as well say, "a geniused gentleman."

In this article I. Disraeli observes that Cicero
invented the term "moral philosophy." This is

a mistake. Ethical philosophy was treated of
eo nomine by several Greeks before Cicero's time,
thou(,•h he used the word mog as an equivalent
for the corresponding Greek word. The whole
of this article, indeed, would require more critical
annotation than has been given to it in this edi.
tion. The following passage is curious :
A new word, the result of much consideration with its
author, or a term which, though unknown to the language,
conveys a collective assemblage of ideas by a fortunate
designation, is a precious contribution of genius; new
words should convey new ideas. Swift, living amidst a
civil war of pamphlets, when certain writers were regularly
employed by one party to draw up replies to the other,
created a term not to be found in our dictionaries, but
which, by a single stroke, characterises these hirelings;
he called them answer jobbers. We have not dropped the
fortunate expression from any want of its use, but of per.
ception in our lexicographers. The celebrated Marquis
of Lansdowne introduced a useful word, which has of late
been warmly adopted in France as well as in England—to
liberalise; the noun has been drawn out of the verb—for in
the Marquis's time that was only an abstract conception
which is now a sect; and to liberalise was theoretically
introduced before the Liberals arose. It is curious to
observe that as an adjective it had formerly in our language
a very opposite meaning to its recent one. It was syno-
nymous with "libertine or licentious;" we have "a
liberal villain " and " a most profane and liberal eon.
sellor : " we find one declaring " I have spoken too
liberally." This is unlucky for the Liberals, who will not—

Give allowance to our liberal jests
Upon their persons—
Beaumont and Fktehet.
Dr. Priestley employed a forcible, but not an elegant teem,
to mark the general information which had began in his
day ; this he frequently calls " the spread of knowledge."
Burke attempted to brand with a new name that set of
pert, petulant, sophistical sciolists, whose philosophy the
French, since their revolutionary period, have distinguished
as phitosophisns, and the philosophers themselves as ph;lo.
sophists.. He would have designated them as literators,
but few exotic words will circulate; new words must be
the coinage of our own language to blend with the verna-
cular idiom. Many new words are still wanted.

" Answer-jobbers" is an expressive word worthy
of the minting of the Dean of St. Patrick's, but
the organization which has produced leading
articles has destroyed the occupation of " answer,
jobbers." We are not sure whether I. Disraeli
is right in tracing " liberalize " to the late Lord
Lansdowne, but tt is possible that he is correct.
In Mr. Hallam's " Constitutional llistory " there
is a well-penned contrast between the Whip
and the Tories, and the able author uses the
phrase " territorial aristocracy,' and he also
employs in characterization of the Tories
adjective " conservative." It was Mr. Crolk
we believe, who proposed that the party opposed
to destruction should be called " Conservatives."
We believe that the word " radical," in eon,
nection with " Reform," can be traced to Horne
Tooke. On " Political Nicknames" there
some interesting illustrations in this volume
Concerning the origin of the words " Whig
and " Tory," Disraeli observes :
These silly terms of reproach, IVhig and Tory, are '
preserved among us, as if the palladium of British liberty
was guarded by these exotic names—for they are not Eng•
lish—which the parties so invidiously bestow on each
other. They are ludicrous enough in their origin. The
friends of the Court and the advocates of lineal succession
were, by the republican party, branded with the title r
Tories, which was the name of certain Irish robbers; WL.
the Court party in return cquld find no other revenge than
by appropriating to the covenanters and the republican:
of that class the name of the Scotch beverage of soul
milk whose virtue they considered so expressive of the;
dispositions, and which is called whigg. So ridiculous
their origin were these pernicious nicknames, which 1
excited feuds and quarrels in domestic life, and may
be said to divide into two great parties this land of polii

freedom.
We have seen it contended, also, that " whig
gam" was a word used by west-country carrier
in Scotland equivalent to the English "gey-ht.
of the waggoners. The text is not strictly sem
rate about the way that the word :fories cam(
into fashionable use.
The article on " Palaces built by Ministers'
interesting, but several illustrations might
added to it. Not only did Walpole
bur
lioughton, but Chatham, though with lit
money to spend, rushed into stone and mortar
his seat in Somersetshire, and even made
workmen labour by torchlight. From our of
observation we should say that politicians have
passion for building houses. Lord Brougham
the busiest period of his life set about entailing
his family seat of Brougham (alias " The Bird's
Nest") into the present imposing structure. Sir
Robert Peel spent vast sums on Drayton Manor,
besides collecting a picture gallery. The Irish
agitator, O'Connell, erected a vast barrack-ike
structure, which he called De e Abbey
Wilson Cruker built large =or hun