Immagini della pagina
PDF
ePub

French language were distinguished by their several affirmatives, and were called Langue d'oil and Lengua d'oc.

512. Negation then being a sentient product, a subjective thing at its very root, we ask with curiosity out of what materials its formula was first made. Of this I have no opinion whatever to offer. But of the probable history of the N-formula I will boldly give my own notion, not so much from confidence in its certainty, as for the incidental illustration which will thus be called out. My conjecture is, that our N-particle is the relic of some such a word as one, or an, or any, three words which, as the student knows, are radically identical. I conceive that of the primitive formula of negation we know nothing, or only know that it has perished. Like the primitive oak, it has passed away; but it has left others instinct with its organism. Men are markedly emphatic in denial, and hence such formulas as not one, not any, not at all, not a bit, not a scrap, not in the least. See how any echoes back, and that with an emphasis, the antecedent negative :

We come back to Sir Roundell Palmer's suggestion, and repeat the inquiry whether a majority is never to be allowed any rights or privileges? March 26, 1870.

Hence too, in French, the pas and point, which back up the negation, also rien and aucun and jamais, and other indifferent words which by long contact with the negative, like steel from the company of the loadstone, have got so instinct with the selfsame force that they often figure as negatives sole. Thus pas encore, point du tout; while the other three are so well known as negatives, that when they stand alone they are hardly ever anything else. Yet none of these words possess by right of extraction the slightest negative signification.

513. The fact seems to be that the word which is added

for the sake of emphasis, comes to bear the stress of the function by the mere virtue of its emphasis, and often ends by supplanting its principal. As in French we see but one or two extant relics of negation without the subjoined adverb, and as the subjoined adverb has in many instances grown into a recognised negative in its own right, so there is every reason to apprehend that but for the conservative influences of literature, the ne would have been by this time very much nearer to vanishing from the languages than it actually is. And, had this happened, it would have been only a repetition of that process in which I conceive ne to have formerly borne the converse part of the action. Ne is probably the relic of some adverbial pronoun, which at first served a long apprenticeship under some still more ancient and now quite forgotten negative, of whose function it long bore the stress and emphasis, until at length it became the sole substitute.

514. The Welsh dim, which means 'no,' 'none,' is well known in the familiar answer dim Saesoneg, which means 'no Saxon,' or, 'I don't speak English.' Now this word dim is merely the word for thing. Pob means 'every,' and pob ddim is the Welsh for 'everything.' Thus, in modern Greek, the negative dev is the relic of ovdév, 'not one': the not has perished, and the one is now the negative.

As a further illustration it may be added that it is common for rustic arithmeticians to call the tenth cipher, the Zero or Nought, by the name of Ought, thus retaining only that part of the word which is purely affirmative by extraction.

Nought is an abbreviation for nan-wuht, 'no-whit'; and the verbal negative not is but a more rapid form of nought. The answer No! is a curt form of none, Saxon nấn, and is plainly a Flat Adverb.

(2) Of the Flexional Pronoun-Adverbs.

515. Under this head come such old familiar forms as here, there, where, when, then, hence, whence, how, why, hither, whither, which are ancient flexional forms that sprang from pronouns of the substantival and adjectival classes. The tracing of some of these to their origin is a matter of obscure antiquity: others are clear; but the enquiry belongs rather to Saxon than to English philology.

If we search back into the growth of these, we shall find that they are old cases, genitive, dative, accusative, ablative. For instance, why is an old ablative; and so also is the, when we say 'so much the better,' like the Latin eo. This is among the demonstratives what why is among the relatives, and its old form is the or thŷ, 487.

But these Cases are now obscure, and the only adverbial inflection that is still manifest is the genitive; as always, else A. S. elles, eftsoones Sp, hereabouts, inwards, once, othergates Sh, outwards, since, thereabouts, towards, whereabouts.

anis = once.

Consider it warily, read aftiner than anis,
Well at ane blink sly poetry not tane is.

sonderlypes severally.

=

Gawin Douglas.

Were he neuere of so hey parage,
Wold he, ne wolde, pat scholde he do,
Oper pe dep schold he go to.
pus sonderlypes he dide þem swere,
Tyl Argayl schulde pey faip bere.

R. Brunne's Chronicle, 3876.

516. Space will not permit us to unravel the history of each of these words, and we must pass lightly on to a group of composite pronoun-adverbs, in which Flexion is aided by

a preposition, as if forming a link of transition between these adverbs and those of the third section:-hereabout, hereafter, hereat, herebefore, hereby, herein, hereinbefore, hereinto, hereof, hereon, hereout, hereto, heretofore, hereunder, hereunto, hereupon, herewith, herewithal; thereabout, thereabouts, thereafter, thereafterward H. Coleridge Glossary, thereagainst Id., thereat, thereby, therefore, therefrom, therehence Coleridge, therein, thereinto, thereof, thereon, thereout, thereover Coleridge, therethrough Id., thereto, thereunto, thereupon, therewith, therewithal, therewithout Coleridge; whereabout, whereabouts, whereas, whereat, whereby, wherefore, wherein, whereinto, whereof, whereon, wherethrough Wisdom xix. 8, whereto, whereunto, whereupon, wherewith, wherewithal.

These Composites might be presented in the form of a Declension, with a Nominative as true to history as the

[blocks in formation]

Thereof is used interchangeably with of it in Lev. xiv. 45; I Kings vii. 27. These adverbs, so far as they are now used, are more highly symbolical than they once were. In the following stave of the twelfth century we have thereby in the physical sense of by that piace :—

Merie sungen de muneches binnen Ely,
Da Cnut ching rew derby:

Rowed cnites near de lant,

And here we des muneches sang.

Merry sang the monks in Ely,
As king Canute rowed thereby :
Row, boys, nigher the land,
And hear we these monks' song.

(3) Of the Phrasal Pronoun-Adverbs.

517. As the flexional character becomes obscure, and the flexional signification is forgotten, symbolic words are called in to supplement the enfeebled case-ending. Thus whence gets the larger formula from whence, as Genesis iii. 23:

Miles Coverdale, 1535. The LORDE God put him out of the garden of Eden, to tyll yo earth, whence he was taken.

1611.

Therefore the LORD God sent him foorth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground, from whence he was taken.

The next step is that the inflection is dispensed with, and the preposition only is used, and so we get the complete phrasal adverb.

To this class belong all such adverbial phrases as these: at all, at once, after all, of course, in a way, in a fashion, in a manner, in a sort of way, in some sort, after a sort, at most, at least, to the uttermost.

at next.

When bale is att hyest, boote is att next.

Sir Aldingar, 117.

518. Some of these naturally develope with peculiar luxuriance after negative verbs and as a complement to the negation:

Whereas in deede it toucheth not monkerie, nor maketh anything at all for any such matter.-Hugh Latimer, The Ploughers, 1549.

not at all.

Not at all considering the power of God, but puffed vp with his ten thousand footmen, and his thousand horsemen, and his fourscore elephants.2 Maccabees xi. 4.

at no hand.

And in what sort did these assemble? In the trust of ther own knowledge, or of their sharpenesse of wit, or deepenesse of iudgment, as it were in

« IndietroContinua »