Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1877-09-15
WHOLE NO. 2,3O3.

: guage, can be anything less than
: ineXhaustable. And in this there is
) no Encouragement for the student,
z but rather encouragement. When
: we reflect upon, the nature OF Lam
guage, upon its genesis and its Won
J derful processes, its subtle principles
OF association, its historyland mIta-
tiOns, or rather upon our very ignO-
rance of these things, the wonder Is
} rather that we can explain sOlmuch,
not that so much must yet be left
unexplained. II there are words
that we cannot trace, forms that we
cannot analyze, idiOms that we can
refer TO no analogy, much less tORny
ultimate principles, IL Is not that
these things have no law, bul only
that their laws lie deeper than we
have yet penetrated into this won
derful mystery of human speech.
What wonder? So long as human
| ity itself, in its tears and smiles, its
thoughts and fancics, its dreams and
aspirations, shall have heights and
! depths and infinite possibilities
which no human ken can fathOm,
so long shall our human language,
which is but the concrete of human
ity itself i'm all its infinitude, hold
secrets which will yield themselves
to no human inquiry. Language Is
indeed commensurate only with hu-
man nature Itself. Homo san, RikH
hltBldai q me 0Iie7ilipl glltto, is its YER
liable motto. We often hear that
language is concrete thought; so IL
is, but IL is more than thought II Is
lmagination-fancy-emOtiOn-
Gan thoughts-an passions-ail delights"
are in it; and as heart answereth
unto heart often when reason Is most
at fault, so does the common instinct
of language often recognize most
strikingly the force and business of
precisely those forms of expression
which the grammarian Is least able
to explain. For these, too, we should
have reverence, and for those per-
haps most of all 4; not condemning
because we cannot explain, but re-
garding them assecrets lying beyond
the ken of our science, vet sure to
reveal themselves, if only their deep
underlying principles can be discoV-
cred. There is no laWlessness i'm
language, though for us, as In many
divine ordinance, the law
may be hidden. When we have on
the other hand complete psychol-
ogy, and on the other a complete
history, of the human race, then
and then only can we hope TO have
a perfect grammar of human Ian
guage. Meantime, let US be reVe-
rent, and thankful, that as we bear
in our civilization the accumulatiOns
of ages in which we have not lived,
so we possess in our mother tongue
treasures that we can neither fathOm
nor exhaust.
Let us moreover be sure, I'm our
study of our mother tongue, that
our reverence be directed towards
the right object-that is, the langu-
age itself, rather than itsassumed an
except indeed within their
limits. They are but
records: when they cease TO be true,
they cease TO be valuable, except for
history. Let us harken, indeed, To
the voice of the past, vet not be deaf
nor blind to the movements of the
present; avoiding equally vulgar
ism on the one hand and purism ON
the other; well knowing that our
age, like every other, IL to contrib
ute its waves TO the growing tide Of
English speech, and that we can
neither arrest its flow nor turn back
is course. It Is well, indeed, TO be
But in language as
we'll as i'm politics, there Is a point
along the line of human progress
beyond which conservatism becomes
and reasonable. To
know this point i'm politics is the in-
,tinct of the true statesman to
know this point I'm language, must
DC the care of the true scholar. Let
Is be reverent then toward this our
mother tongue; using, as not abus-
ng, its treasures Of both old and new.
Let us on the one hand, hold with
ealOus pride, to its ancient tradi-
ions, avoiding the too ready accept
lnce of unauthorized and unneces-
AIRY innovations but let us take
are, on the other, lest by too great
levotiOn to the past, or too slavish
to an assumed authority,
We fall behind its progress, and Glil
o appreciate its growth, its surpass-
ng powers, and its glorious destiny.