The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1858-11-29

| Inc second lecture OF the course of the Library
Association OF the Methodist Episcopal Church. was
delivered on last Wednesday evening, by s. Teackle
! Wallis, Esq. The subject of the lecture was, The
forms and Of Speech, indicating and dfectiny
National Character. Language was treated as a
monument and a teacher-as reflection of the peo-
pie who use it, and as in its turn influencing and
/ fashoning the thoughts and sentiments of men.
The history of nation is to be learned far more
accurately from the monuments which it leaves be-
hind it, than from the books of its chroniclers.
Language is one of the most durable of such monu-
ments and is far truer historian than the records
which men make in its words The fidelity with
which language reflects national traits and charac-
teristics was illustrated by the different words
which different nations had hit upon to express the
idea of ricaly or competition in business The
French, Spaniards, and Italians had borrowed from
the Latin, the words concaTrena, concurrence, sig
nifying running nth alongside of each other
That was their idea of competition. The Anglo
Saxon, from the same Latin source, had selected
the word opposition, meaning to run not toh or
alongside of his rival, but against him. Attention
was next called to what Dean Trench has styled
''the morality in words"-the morality which they
teach, as well as that which they represent.
The national tendency to hyperbole and exag-
geration illustrated by numerous common ex-
pressions in daily use amoug us, which involve de-
parture from the standard Of truth. With individ
ua instances of falsehood, hypocrisy and deception
the lecturer had no concern. His endeavor was, he
sad to test and weigh the current coin of the whole
community which all men give and all men take
debased currency, made standard bya demoralized
public opinion. As illustration Of this corruption
of language and of that Generalization of thought
from which it proceeds. The popular phrase "ma-
king capital" particularly "poitica capital" was
cited. The national tendency to run into extreme
opinions was next touched upon, and the Lecturer
here took occasion to refer to the congressional
obituary speeches. and said it would be curious to
look at these documents for the last twenty years
and see how large 4 number of ''great men" and
| ''sages" we have lost, and how many voids there
have been in the National Councils that never could
be filed but which, if we Judge from the ovatiOns
to new comers, were more than filed the next day.
The evil effect of all this alluded to-the conse-
quent confusion of right and wrong, truth and
fasehood, and the corruption of public taste by
lowering its standard of truth and virtue, and
teaching it to acqusece in what is known to be an
imposture The evanescent and ephemeral character
of the literature most admired in our country was
commented upon, and reference made to the good
service which literary art was rendering abroad to
the cause of public morals, by illustrating and ex-
posing social vices and foes in works of well or.
dered fiction.
Mr. Thackerays novels cited as the best illus
trations of this kind of writing, and the wish
expressed that American Thackeray-born on
our own soil-knowing well-knowng our faults
and loving us well in spite of them-might arise to
lay bare our national and social pretens0ns and i'm
postures, and make us so ashamed of them, that we
should grow wiser and better The want of
Punch in our periodical literature-to laugh
at us, and scOurge us, was also alluded to
and the claims of satire and rdcule to be consider
ed as part of the detectire police Of TRUTH asserted and
defended The example and the history of the old
Republics were referred to, for our admoniton and
our warning. The downfall of their freedom and
their greatness was preceded and occasioned by
Just such vices and corruptions now be-
ginning to manifest-when in the spread of power,
and growth of empire, the swell and outbreak of
luxury and corruption debased the organs of pub
lie speech, and they in their turn sent back upon
the people the tide of their own corruption. The
state of public decentralization, and the apathy
which they manifest with respect to any remedial
measures that may be proposed, were next advert
ed to, and gave occasion for word or two ofprac-
tcal suggestion and remonstrance in conclusion
of remonstrance against the practice, which every
where prevails, of paying that homage to faIsehOOd
ard vice which is due only to truth and virtue-of
of suggestion, to the effect that the mere with
drawal of good mems countenance and support
would % itself be death to folly and imposture.