_"Construe" and "Translate"_ (Vol ii., p. 22.).--It is very common, I
apprehend, in language, for two words, originally of the same meaning, or
two spellings of the same word, to be gradually appropriated by usage to
two subordinate uses, applications, and meanings of the word respectively,
and that merely by accident, as to which of the two is taken for one of the
subdivisions, and which for the other. We have made such an appropriation
in our own time,--despatch and dispatch.
It may be curious, however, to inquire how far back the distinction
mentioned by your correspondent is found.
"Construe," originally, must probably have meant, not to turn from one
language into another, but to explain the construction, or what is called
by the Greek name syntax, much like what in regard to a single word is
called parsing.