Litchfield enquirer., 1857-12-17
History of Words.


human heart lies at the root of many words !;
and if only We would attend to them, what val
liable warnings many contain against subtle
temptations aud sins 1t is "a relnarkabI.
fact that men should have agreed to apply tht
word miser," or miserable, to the man en-
nehty addicted to the wee of tovetousness to
him who loves his money with bis whole heart
| and soul. There is much, too that We may
learn from looking a little closely at the wore.
passion" We sometimes think of the pas
Solate man as a man OF strong will, and OF
real though ungoverncd energy But this
WORD declares to Us most plainly the contrary
for 1t, as very seldom use Of it declares ueas,S
properly suffering )" and a passionate Mali
| is lot tnan doing something Lut one sutf'r
llS SOMETHING to b. done Oh him. When, tn Ii
man or child Is " in pass on," there is 10
coming out i'll INN of a strong will, Of real
energy, but rather the proof that for the time
at least he has no will, no energy he is suffer
Ing, not suffering his anger, or what
other evil temper 1t may be, to lord over him
without control. Let no one then think vi
passion as a sign of strength
Let US consider the word "kiEd" We
speak of knd' person. and We speak OF
mankind and perhaps, five think about the
matter at all, We seem to ourselves to be using
quite different words, or the same word in sens
rs quite unconuected, and having no bond be-
tween tn m. But they are connected, and
that most closely L" kind" person is - kin
ned person, one of kin one who acknowl
edges and acts upon his kinslip with other men
contesscs that he owes to them as of One bl BOD
With himself the debt Of love. And so NAH
kind" is mal,klAned." Thus it is not mere
play upon words, but something deeper, which
Shak>p eare puts into Hamvts mouth when
Speaking of his fathers brother who had mar
rled lis mother, he characteriZcs HIM as a
little more than kin and less than kind"
There are also words which bear the slime
Oh them of the Serpent,s trail and the uses
of words, which imply moral p,rvrrsty Thus
| for instance is it with the word "prude," sig
nltying as it now does, a woman with al over
scrupuous atIrctation of mo,icsty winch she
does not really feel, and betraying the absence
of the reality by this over prccSeess aid nee
ness about the shadow This Use Of tine VOID
mast needs have been the result of Il great cor
ruption of manners in them among whom it
grew up. Goodness must have gone strangely out
OF fashion, before things could have come to
this. For "prude,' which is French word,
means virtuous prudent "prud' homine" b.
G ii man of courage and prob.ty. But where
morals are greatly and almost uniyer ally re-
Taxed, virtue is Often treated as hypocrisy !;
and thus, in Il diSSolutc age, and one d>Lel.ev
ing the exist nee of any Inward putty, the
word "prude" Game to DIES gnate one vino al
tected il virtue, even as none We're esteemed to
do anything more ; and in TINS use of It, VIII h
| having once eur, d, it con'i u,s to +, tan,
ab d an CIV .drncc OF the corrupt words dis
Ike to aud disbelief ia the realities OF goodness,
its Willingness to treat them as mere hypocris-
les and shows.
Examine the w'rds pagan" and "pagan-
ism" and you will ti:rl th't tn re is hi tory in
them. Many OF us no doubt are aware tnat
! the word "pagan," der we'd from "pagus," IL
village, signifies properly the dwell rs IN la ~
,ets and villages, as Distinguished from the III
habitantS of towns and cities a,d the word
Was SO used, and without any religious ii ni
canoe, in the earlier periods of the Latin Ian
ruage. Pagan" did indeed thea not unt. E.
qurntiy designate all civ lan>, as cun,rad. Stn-
pushed from thu military caste al d TINS fact
may not have been w1tnuut is ilu zee, wht
the idea of the faithful, us soI,i.rrs OF Christ
was strongly rea'iz,d in the m,ndS OF men
equivalent to " heather" and apple d to those
vt alien from the church of CHRIST 1t was
IN this way the Christian church fixed Itself
first in the seats and centres of mtellye,cc>
IN the towns aud cities of the Rom.n empire
and III them It's first trlumpl> were Won While
long after these had accepted the truth heath
| en- Sup,rsttions and ilola:ric>. langui>hed aud
fingered Oh in the obscure hainlrts ana villages
of the country so that pnganS Or Villagers
came to lie applied to ali tn, rrllinng votar-
of the old and dtcaysng sui'cr>t.tlo ,> lu;.S
much as far the greater numb OF them wtrv
OF this class The first document i'll winch the
word appears i'll this its secondary sense is an
edict OF the emperor Earnt IN, of date A. ID.
36S. The word g heather" acquired its n,ai'-
| ing from exactly the same fact, namely that at
the introduction of Christianity Into G,rma.ty,
the wild DIV, Hers on the heaths" longest re-
sisted the truth Here, then, are two lnStrnct-
i've net ces for us--frst, the h storic fact that
the church Of Christ did thus plant itself first
in the haunts 1f learning and iute ligence aid
then the more important moral fact that it
stunned not discussion, that it feared not to
grappIe with the wit aud wisdom of this worlu
or to expose its claims to the searching exam
nation of educated men ]; but on the contrary
had its claims first recognized by them, aud ii"
! the great cities of the world Won first a com:
prte triumph over all opposing powers.
A curious piece Of history is wrapped mp in
the word "poltroon," supposing TO be indeed
derived las many excellent erymoiogsts have
considered, from the Latin "polIice tru'cus y
one, that is deprived or who has deprived HIM
self of his thumb We know that in old times
"a standardization of this dcscript on Was not u''-
frequent on the part of some cowardly Sinking
fellow, who wished to escape his share in the
defence Of his country he would cut off his
right thumb, and at once become incapable OF
drawing the bow, and thus useless for the wars
! It was not to be wondered at that the Eng.
Esa;aen. The men Of Crecy and AgiucouEt, Who