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behind it, in other cases it was the origin of the received orthography. Thus wizard became the recognized form instead of wisard, which was the spelling of Spenser, as may be seen above, p. 274.

In the Faerie Queene we see this fashion well displayed. There are such forms as bruze, uze (iii. 5. 33), wize, disguize, exercize, guize (iii. 6. 23), Paradize (iii. 6. 29), enterprize, emprize, arize, devize (vi. 1. 5). So that there is nothing to marvel at if we find covetise (= covetousness) spelt covetize (iii. 4. 7), and the substantive which we now write practice written practize :

'Ne ought ye want but skil, which practize small

Wil bring, and shortly make you a mayd Martiall.' (iii. 3. 53) But there is a much more important observation to be made concerning this French substantive form. It seems that we must acknowledge it to have acted as the usher to one of the most extensive innovations ever made in the English language. It was apparently the employment of this substantive as a verb that gave us our first verbs in -ize, and so ushered the Greek -iew. An example of one of these substantives verbally employed may be quoted from the correspondence of Throgmorton and Cecil in 1567:

'They would not merchandise for the bear's skin before they had caught the bear.'-Quoted by J. A. Froude, History of England, vol. ix. p. 163.

Indeed, there are instances in which the substantive of this form is no longer known, while the verb is in familiar use. Such is the verb to chastise, which appears in its substantive character, equivalent to chastity, in Turbervile, Poem to his Loue (about 1530):—

'And sooth it is, she liude
in wiuely bond so well.
As she from Collatinus wife
of chastice bore the bell.'

I imagine the case is the same with the verbs to jeopardise, and to advertise. Both of these I would identify with this substantive form, though I am not prepared with an example of either in its substantive character. But there is perhaps evidence enough in Shakspeare's pronunciation, that the verb to advertise was not formed from the Greek -ize. In all cases, though with degrees of clearness in proportion to the clearness of the passage, does this verb in Shakspeare sound as advértice, and never as now advertize :—

'Aduertysing, and holy to your businesse.'

Measure for Measure, v. 1. 381.

'Please it your Grace to be aduertised.'

2 Henry VI, iv. 9. 22.

For by my Scouts, I was aduertised.'

3 Henry VI, ii. 1. 116.

'I haue aduertis'd him by secret meanes.'

3 Henry VI. iv. 5. 9.

'We are aduertis'd by our louing friends.'

3 Henry VI, v. 3. 18.

'As I by friends am well aduertised.'

Richard III, iv. 4. 501.

'Wherein he might the King his Lord aduertise.'

Henry VIII. ii. iv. 178.

There is one instance in which the First Folio writes it with a z, and the pronunciation is not so plain, yet it is by no means certain even here that it is to be pronounced in the modern fashion:

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'I was aduertiz'd, their Great generall slept.'

Troylus and Cressida, ii. 3. 211.

In esse, and by anglicism -ess. Either from the Latin -issa, as abbatissa, or from -itia, like the last. M. Brachet

derives it from -itia. So that it would be little more than a collateral form to the last. And the French language presents us with justice and justesse, co-existent in differing shades of sense.

Examples:-finesse (quite acknowledged as an English word, and found in Mr. Poynder's School Dictionary), largess.

Riches belongs here by its extraction, as it is only an altered form of richesse. The grammatical conception has been transformed from a singular noun to a plural which has no singular. This may be set down as one of the effects of a Latin education continued during three or four centuries. The word richesse having been constantly used to render opes or divitia, which are plural forms,and being itself so nearly like an English plural, has thus come to be so conceived of, and written accordingly.

Burgess has taken this shape, but it is from the French. bourgeois, and that from the Latin burgensis.

The form -esse as derived from -issa, has its chief importance as expressive of the feminine gender. Examples of this will be found at the close of the present section.

As to the origin of all the forms in the above list, it clearly cannot belong to English philology to do much more than indicate the source from which we received them. Their derival into French from Latin has therefore been only slightly touched upon. The reader who wishes to know more on this head should consult the Historical Grammar of the French Tongue, by Auguste Brachet, an admirable manual, which has been rendered accessible to the English student by Mr. Kitchin's Translation. This book supplies all the information which is needed for tracing the forms intelligently from the Latin through the French, to the threshold of their entrance into the English language.

The effect of the French pre-occupation of our language was not limited to the period of its reign. It also imparted a tinge to the subsequent period of classic influence. The Latin words that were next admitted into English, became subject to those French forms which were already familiar among us.

-acy, from the Latin -acia, as fallacy.

-ance and -ancy, from the Latin -antia; as substance, constancy. The words acquaintance, cognisance, and many others of this form, are rather French than Latin.

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The honourable member ought himself to be aware that in this house we have no cognisance of what passes in debate in the other house.'_ House of Commons, July 21, 1869.

-ence and -ency, from the Latin -entia.

Examples: affluence, beneficence, benevolence, competence, confidence, conscience, consequence, continence, difference, diffidence, eminence, evidence, exigence, experience, impotence, influence, licence, magnificence, munificence, negligence, opulence, preference, reticence, science, sequence.

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'Pubescence on the branches, peduncles, or tube of the calyx is the only invariable character I have discovered in Roses. Distinctions drawn from it I have every reason to consider absolute.'-John Lindley, A Monograph of Roses (1820), p. xxiii.

The following are of a different origin, being either from Latin nouns in -ensio, or from Latin participles in -ensus, but they have been assimilated to this group. Such are defence, expence (obsolete), offence, pretence. With these may be mentioned a few which have not succumbed to this assimilation, as incense, sense, suspense, and one which has recovered its original classical consonant, namely expense.

The -ency form is peculiarly English. Clemency is in French clemence.

-ity, from the Latin -itas; as quality, vanity. The English termination is after the French -ité, with the last syllable accented, because it represents the two syllables of the Latin accusative -tatem.

Examples :-antiquity, benignity, civility, dexterity, equality, fidelity, gratuity, humanity, integrity, joviality, legibility, majority, nativity, obscurity, posterity, quality, rapidity, sincerity, timidity, urbanity, velocity.

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civility, equity, humanity, morality, security.

The morality of our earthly life, is a morality which is in direct subservience to our earthly accommodation; and seeing that equity, and humanity, and civility, are in such visible and immediate connection with all the security and all the enjoyment which they spread around them, it is not to be wondered at that they should throw over the character of him by whom they are exhibited, the lustre of a grateful and a superior estimation.'— Thomas Chalmers, Sermons in Tron Church, Glasgow (1819), Sermon V.

Among these, the forms in -osity have acquired a prominence, as animosity, curiosity, impetuosity, pomposity.

Mulierosity is quoted by Dr. Trench (On Some Deficiencies in our English Dictionaries, p. 7) from Henry More, with the observation that it expresses what no other word in the language would do. He has also produced others of this type from writers of the seventeenth century, as fabulosity, populosity, speciosity. The latter also from Henry More.

'So great a glory as all the speciosities of the world could not equalize.'On Godliness, iv. 12. § 4.

The words in which this formative appears merely as -ty, are of an early medieval French strain.

Examples: casualty, certainty, fealty, loyalty, mayoralty, nicety, novelty, royalty, shrievalty, soverainty, surety.

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