This volume is intended to be a contribution, though a very slight
one at best, to a special branch of the study of our own language.
It proposes to trace in a popular manner and for general readers the
changes of meaning which so many of its words have undergone; words
which, as current with us as they were with our forefathers, yet meant
something different on their lips from what they mean on ours. Of my
success in carrying out the scheme which I had set before myself,
it does not become me to speak, except to say that I have fallen a
good deal below my hopes, and infinitely below my desires. But of the
scheme itself I have no doubts. I feel sure that, if only adequately
carried out, few works of the same compass could embrace matter of
more manifold instruction, or in a region of knowledge which it would
be more desirable to occupy. In the present condition of education in
England, above all with the pressure upon young men, which is ever
increasing, to complete their educational course at the earliest
possible date, the number of those enjoying the inestimable advantages,
mental and moral, which more than any other languages the Latin and
the Greek supply, must ever be growing smaller. It becomes therefore a
necessity to seek elsewhere the best substitutes within reach for that
discipline of the faculties which these languages would better than any
other have afforded. And I believe, when these two are set aside, our
own language and literature will furnish the best substitutes; such as,
even though they may not satisfy perfectly, are not therefore to be
rejected. I am persuaded that in the _decomposition_, word by word, of
small portions of our best poetry and prose, the compensations which we
look for are most capable of being found; even as I have little doubt
that in many of our higher English schools compensations of the kind
are already oftentimes obtained. _Lycidas_ suggests itself to me, in
the amount of _resistance_ which it would offer, as in verse furnishing
more exactly what I seek than any other poem, perhaps some of Lord
Bacon’s _Essays_ in prose.
In such a decomposition, to be followed by a reconstruction, of some
small portions of a great English Classic, matters almost innumerable,
and pressing on the attention from every side, would claim to be
noticed; but certainly not last nor least the changes in meaning which,
on close examination, would be seen to have passed on many of the words
employed. It is to point out some of these changes; to suggest how many
more there may be, there certainly are, which have not been noticed in
these pages; to show how slight and subtle, while yet most real, how
easily therefore evading detection, unless constant vigilance is used,
these changes often have been; to trace here and there the progressive
steps by which the old meaning has been put off, and the new put on,
the exact road which a word has travelled; this has been my purpose
here; and I have desired by such means to render some small assistance
to those who are disposed to regard this as a serviceable discipline in
the training of their own minds or the minds of others.
The book is, as its name declares, a _Select_ Glossary. There would
have been no difficulty whatever in doubling or trebling the number
of articles admitted into it. But my purpose being rather to arouse
curiosity than fully to gratify it, to lead others themselves to
take note of changes, and to account for them, rather than to take
altogether this pleasant labour out of their hands and to do for them
what they could more profitably do for themselves, I have consciously
left much of the work undone, even as, unconsciously no doubt I have
left a great deal more. At the same time it has not been mere caprice
which has induced the particular selection of words which has been
actually made. Various motives, but in almost every case such as I
could give account of to myself, have ruled this selection. Sometimes
the past use of a word has been noted and compared with the present,
as usefully exercising the mind in the tracing of minute differences
and fine distinctions; or, again, as helpful to the understanding
of our earlier authors, and likely to deliver a reader of them from
misapprehensions into which he might else very easily fall; or, once
more, as opening out a curious chapter in the history of manners;
or as involving some interesting piece of history, or some singular
superstition; or, again, as witnessing for the good or for the evil
which have been unconsciously at work in the minds and hearts of those
who insensibly have modified in part or changed altogether the meaning
of some word; or, lastly and more generally, as illustrating well
under one aspect or another those permanent laws which are everywhere
affecting and modifying human speech.
And as the words brought forward have been selected with some care,
and according to certain rules which have for the most part suggested
their selection, so also has it been with the passages adduced in proof
of the changes of meaning which they have undergone. A principal value
which such a volume as the present can possess, must consist in the
happiness with which these have been chosen. Not every passage, which
really contains evidence of the assertion made, will for all this serve
to be adduced in proof; and this I presently discovered in the many
which for one cause or another it was necessary to set aside. There are
various excellencies which ought to meet in such passages, but which
will not by any means be found in all.
In the first place they ought to be such passages as will tell their
own story, will prove the point which they are cited to prove, quite
independently of the uncited context, to which it will very often
happen that many readers cannot, and of those who can, that the larger
number will not, refer. They should bear too upon their front that
amount of triumphant proof, which will carry conviction not merely to
the student who by a careful observation of many like passages, and
a previous knowledge of what was a word’s prevailing use in the time
of the writer, is prepared to receive this conviction, but to him
also, to whom all this is presented now for the first time, who has no
predisposition to believe, but is disposed rather to be incredulous in
the matter. Then, again, they should, if possible, be passages capable
of being detached from their context without the necessity of drawing a
large amount of this context after them to make them intelligible; like
trees which will endure to be transplanted without carrying with them
a huge and cumbrous bulk of earth, clinging to their roots. Once more,
they should, if possible, be such as have a certain intrinsic worth and
value of their own, independent of their value as illustrative of the
point in language directly to be proved--some weight of thought, or
beauty of expression, merit in short of one kind or other, that so the
reader may be making a second gain by the way. I can by no means claim
this for all, or nearly all, of mine. Indeed, it would have been absurd
to seek it in a book of which the primary aim is quite other than that
of bringing together a collection of striking quotations; any merit of
this kind must continually be subordinated, and, where needful, wholly
sacrificed, to the purposes more immediately in view. Still there will
be many citations found in these pages which, while they fulfil the
primary intention with which they were quoted, are not wanting also in
this secondary worth.
In my citations I have throughout acted on the principle that ‘Enough
is as good as a feast:’ and that this same ‘Enough,’ as the proverb
might well be completed, ‘is better than a surfeit.’ So soon as that
earlier meaning, from which our present is a departure, or which
once subsisted side by side with our present, however it has now
disappeared, has been sufficiently established, I have held my hand,
and not brought further quotations in proof. In most cases indeed it
has seemed desirable to adduce passages from several authors; without
which a suspicion may always remain in the mind, that we are bringing
forward the exceptional peculiarity of a single writer, who even in his
day stood alone. I suspect that in some, though rare, instances I have
adduced exceptional uses of this kind.
One value I may claim for my book, that whatever may be wanting to it,
it is with the very most trifling exceptions an entirely independent
and original collection of passages illustrative of the history of our
language. Of my citations, I believe about a thousand in all, I may
owe some twenty at the most to existing Dictionaries or Glossaries,
to Nares or Johnson or Todd or Richardson. In perhaps some twenty
cases more I have lighted upon and selected a passage by one of them
selected before, and have not thought it desirable, or have not found
it possible, to dismiss this and choose some other in its room. These
excepted, the collection is entirely independent of all those which
have previously been made; and in a multitude of cases notes uses and
meanings of words which have never been noted before.
WESTMINSTER: _May 25, 1859_.
* * * * *
In the present edition the ‘Select Glossary’ has been carefully
revised, and a few of the articles have been rewritten. In the
work of revision special attention has been paid to two points,
the etymologies and the Middle English quotations. The aim
of the editor has been to bring this useful and interesting
little book up to date, by purging it of obsolete or doubtful
etymologies, and giving those which commend themselves to
the best modern authorities on the subject. Nearly all the
quotations from the works of Middle English authors have been
collated with the best modern editions, and care has been taken
to make the references in each case as clear and precise as
possible. It is hoped that the Alphabetical Lists of Authors
quoted, and of Philological Works referred to, may be found
useful to the student.