Anacalypsis/Volume 1/Preliminary Observations/Chapter 2

by Godfrey Higgins

CHAPTER II.

ETYMOLOGY AND ITS USE.

1. A little time ago two systems of Etymology were published, one by the Rev. Mr. Whiter, of Cambridge, and the other by Mr. James Gilchrist. The former called his work Etymologicon Universale. It is very large, and was printed by the University of Cambridge, at its press. The object is to prove that all the words of every language may be traced back to the word Earth.^[1] Great learning and ingenuity are displayed, and incredible labour must have been bestowed on the production. The work of the latter gentleman, entitled Philosophic Etymology, is not so large, and in its doctrine is directly in opposition to the former. Mr. Gilchrist contends, that CL, CR, LC, or RC, is the primary simple word of written language, and that all the copiæ verborum are merely varieties and combinations of that one simple word, or rather sign.

2. He says, “There is nothing arbitrary about language. All the dialects, as Hebrew, Celtic, Greek, Latin, &c., are essentially but one language. They have such diversities as may be termed idioms; but with all their circumstantial varieties, they have substantial uniformity: they proceed on the same principles, and have the same origin. The philosophic grammar and lexicography of one, is in reality that of all.”^[2] In this I perfectly agree with Mr. Gilchrist: I also agree with him that there is a wide difference between a scholar and a philosopher, but I cannot think with him that men in the first instance conversed wholly by looking, not by listening; and that the different modifications of sound, emitted from the mouth, were a subsequent step of improvement and conveniency, not contemplated when the mouth was first applied to curiologic signs; which application of the mouth was not anticipated when these signs were first employed, and which signs were not contemplated when hieroglyphics were invented: that thus, in the use of signs, men were led on step by step from hieroglyphics or picture-writing to curiologics, an abridged form of the preceding; from curiologics engraved or drawn on any substance, to the expression of them by the mouth; and from the expression of them by the mouth to the eye, to the expression of them by sound to the ear, enabling men to converse in the dark as well as in the light. If I understand Mr. Gilchrist, he supposes both hieroglyphics and letters to have been invented before speech. This does, indeed, surprise me very much. On reflecting on the first situation of man, I cannot help believing that he would not perceive his mate many minutes before he would utter some kind of a sound or sounds, which would soon grow into monosyllabic words.

3. I lay it down as a principle, that there were no such persons as Aborigines (as this word is often used)—that man did not rise into existence by accident, or without cause: but that he was the effect of a cause, a creation, or formation by a Being possessing power. This admitted, I consider that he must have acquired his knowledge of speech either by experience, or have such knowledge of it given to him by his Creator, as would enable him to communicate his ideas to his mate, and that in each case his Creator gave him the power of using his voice at the same time that he gave him the power of using his teeth and other organs. And if I admit the former, that man acquired by experience the use of speech, which of course every philosopher will do, I must think that both Mr. Whiter and Mr. Gilchrist go to causes far too scientific to account for it. Speech would be very much the effect of circumstance—there would not be any thing like system in its first formation.

4. Mr. Gilchrist’s idea that the first letters arose from curved lines, seems to me not only not to be so probable as that of right lines, which I have unfolded above, but it seems to me to be actually against all the early and, what is more, well-founded historical facts which we possess. For the fact of the oldest letters and figures which we possess consisting of right lines does not depend, alone, on the relations of writers, but upon their existing at this day on old coins and stones: in which latter fact, therefore, we cannot be deceived. I think my theory as rational as Mr. Gilchrist’s; in addition to which, I have the evidence of the oldest inscriptions, and, as I have shewn, analogy also, on my side; for the higher we ascend the more right-lined the alphabets become.

5. As I have just now said, if I understand Mr. Gilchrist aright,^[3] he maintains that hieroglyphics were invented before letter-writing. We know of only one nation, the Egyptians, among whom hieroglyphics ever existed, and I think I have proved that they were not invented by that nation till after letters were in use. I make no account of the Mexican paintings, for our information respecting them is too scanty to draw any conclusions from them; and that part of our information which we do possess, namely, the painting of Cortes’s ships and horses, is against hieroglyphics being the origin of letters, rather than in favour of it; because, as I have observed above, these drawings were not to convey ideas of known things, but ideas of unknown things—new things, and new ideas.

6. The plan or theory proposed by Mr. Whiter and Mr. Gilchrist, of resolving all words into one, or nearly into one, seems to me to be not only contrary to the analogy of nature, but to clog their philological researches with insuperable and unnecessary difficulties. Let us for a moment consider man to have newly started into existence, by what means does not signify, and to exist alone. I will suppose this to have happened in a beautiful valley in upper Tibet, about latitude 35, at the vernal equinox, a fig-tree growing near him, bearing its early crop of fruit. The olfactory nerves, I think, would speedily draw him to the tree; he would take of the fruit, and what is vulgarly called instinct would teach him to put it into his mouth and to eat it. Before he ate the fig, he would have become master of several ideas; but as he would have had no occasion to communicate them, he probably would not have made any effort at speech.

7. We will now suppose this being, in the state of about twenty years of age, to awake and find a beautiful young woman close to him and touching him. Instinct would again begin to move him; love would ensue and its consequences, and very speedily afterward the wish to communicate happiness; for it is all a mistake that man is born to evil as the smoke flies upwards. He is born to good, and all his natural tendencies are to good, though he possesses passions and is a fallible being, from which circumstances partial evil has naturally arisen. Much time would not elapse before he would, in order to communicate happiness, wish to call the attention of his mate to something—perhaps to partake with him of some fruit—and, to awaken this attention, an attempt to speak or make a sound would be made; after this, another and another attempt; and thus a few monosyllabic words would be formed, such as were easiest made by the organs of speech, and thus from this kind of process the first language would arise. It would probably consist of arbitrary sounds, not formed in any way from one another or from one word; and had Mr. Gilchrist tried to trace all language to these primitive words, he would, I think, have perfectly succeeded.

8. But after some time a second race of original words would have arisen, which would a little increase the first language, and which must not be neglected. The voice of love would have been heard, and would not have been heard in vain. A child would make its appearance, and would have a little language of its own, which would never be lost, which would grow with its growth, strengthen with its strength, and which we actually find yet existing in every language on earth—exemplified in the words Ma, Mater, Moder, Muder, Pa, Pater, Fater, Fader, &c., &c.; and thus from these two sources came to be formed the first original language. It would probably consist of monosyllabic roots, which would be very simple: and to these, I think, all language may be reduced.^[4]

9. It is necessary to guard myself from being misunderstood in what I have said above, that the language of the eyes was not the first language, because I believe that it was; but what I mean is, that this language would last but for a very short time—a very few hours, perhaps only a few minutes. The first man and his mate, surrounded as M. Cuvier has shewn that they probably were, by animals, formed long before, young and old, in every state, and, like these animals, possessing animal sensations, and being, in addition, imitative creatures, would in a very few hours, perhaps minutes, perform all the animal functions, exercise all the animal powers, do as other animals did: and until they had thus exercised these powers, perhaps the eyes, the most eloquent eyes, would continue to be the medium of the communication of ideas; but eloquent as they are, they would not continue to be so much longer; for an attempt to emit sound would be made, and thus would arise the first words.

10. I beg my reader to attend to the beings of the animal creation. He cannot suppose man, though inferior to them in many respects, to be much inferior to them in those which we are considering. How long is it before the dove or the partridge learns to call its mate with the voice of love, or its young about it, when it has found a nest of ants? Has man any language more significant than that which these birds possess? When the hen chucks her first chickens around her, can any language be more intelligible?^[5] and she has no profound philosophers to make grammars for her, or divines to write creeds for her. Can the animal man be supposed to have been worse endowed than these fowls? I think not. Grant but these advantages of the animals around him, and it is all which I ask for my system, and I think it must be established.

11. If these philosophers had undertaken to prove that all languages might be resolved into one, consisting of a certain number of monosyllables or roots, they would have undertaken to prove what I am persuaded is perfectly true; and they would, I doubt not, have succeeded in their undertaking. But I think neither of their theories tenable. If their theories had been well founded, the abilities which they have displayed would not have failed to establish them. But though I think they have both failed, I beg to be understood not to have any wish to detract from their merit. Nor do I wish to enter into controversy with either of them. I should not have noticed their treatises but that I felt it would be a great reflection on myself to let it be supposed that I was ignorant of them.

12. I now take my leave of these two gentlemen, to whom, with Bacon, Hobbes, Locke, and Tooke, we are all under great obligation. I enter not more into their systems, because my object and theirs is different. Their systems are only auxiliary to mine. I feel perfectly confident that it will not be long before some ingenious man, with the assistance of Mr. Tooke, Mr. Whiter, and Mr. Gilchrist, will, upon the foundation which I have laid, erect the edifice of the true philosophy of grammar. If in this I am mistaken, I shall be only like hundreds of my predecessors.

13. Perhaps it will be said that my system depends too much on the explanation of words. The observation does not cause me much uneasiness. For if my system be founded in the truth, it must shew itself in the words of all languages, in an infinite variety of ways; in which case the observation will never do it any injury, or be able to prevent its reception when it comes to be known. If it be not true, it will fall, as others have done before it, whether depending on explanation of words, etymology, or not. As among the ancient Greeks and Romans, and the modern Europeans, we have a great number of systems, in like manner there was the same variety among the Orientalists; but I feel confident I shall be able to shew that they all flowed from one fountain; that one refined and beautiful system was not only the foundation, but that, however varied the systems which branched from it might be, yet in many respects the parent, the original, is every where to be seen, even in the Western systems of the present day.

14. It will probably also be objected by those who wish not to discover truth, but to throw discredit upon this work, that I often make etymological deductions in one word from two languages. This would have been more plausible if I had not first proved, most unquestionably, (as I believe,) the intimate connexion—indeed, I feel I am quite justified in saying the absolute identity, of the Western and Oriental languages in a very remote period. And this observation will apply to all the languages in which the sixteen-letter system has obtained. It is impossible to doubt that one original language has extended over all the old world, which is the reason that we find Hebrew and Hindoo words in Britain, and words of the most remote countries and climates intermixed, in a manner in no other way to be accounted sixteen for. All the sixteen-letter languages are but dialects of an original language.

15. But my practice of explaining words from what are at this day two languages, will be objected to by enemies of inquiry, because it has a tendency to discover hidden truths. But if there have been one language upon which several have been founded or built, what is so natural as that the roots of a compound word should be found in several of them? Suppose two colonies emigrated, the one to Europe and the other to Africa, from Chaldea, and that each carried a certain word; this word might change, by being compounded with other words, in both cases, so as to become in each case a new word. Is it not evident that the roots of the word may reasonably be sought in either or both the new languages?

16. In etymological inquiries a mere corruption no doubt may sometimes be admitted; but this must be done with great caution, and when there is strong extra evidence to support it. For proof of this, our own language affords innumerable examples. Of this kind of corruption I need to produce only one instance from our Liturgy—prevent us in all our doings. Here we have not a change in one or two radicals only, but in a whole word. Again in the Latin word hostis.

17. Etymology may be considered in another point of view. What is a written word but an effect—an effect arising from an unknown cause? What we want is, to find the cause—to ascertain if there were one original written language—by what steps any given word descended from that first parent to its present state. In many cases this may be difficult, in others it may be impossible to make it out; but is there not the same difficulty with translations? Does not one word often mean several different and often opposite things? There is scarcely a word in Parkhurst’s Hebrew Lexicon which has not four or five different meanings; and how do we proceed to find out which, in any case, is the one intended, but by comparing it with the context? Most words may be derived from several others, but the variety or uncertainty, great as I admit it is, is generally not greater than in mere translations.

18. Sir William Jones says, “I beg leave, as a philologer, to enter my protest against conjectural etymology in historical researches, and principally against the licentiousness of etymologists in transposing and inserting letters, in substituting at pleasure any consonant for another of the same order, and in totally disregarding the vowels.” I most heartily join in the protest, though I think etymology the grand and only telescope by means of which we can discover the objects of far distant and remote antiquity. But Sir William afterward says, “When we find, indeed, the same words, letter for letter, and in a sense precisely the same, in different languages, we can scarce hesitate in allowing them a common origin.”^[6] To shew how little he attended to his own sound and sensible remarks respecting the changing of letters, in a page or two preceding he had been observing, that the word Moses ought to have been Musah, not Moses. It is written in the Hebrew משה Mse. I cannot admit this to be either Musah or Moses. If, in compliance with modern authority, I admit the u to be supplied, I cannot admit the ה e, the fifth letter, to be changed into א a, the first, and the letter ח h, without authority, to be added. I have shewn in my Celtic Druids, that the Hebrew system of letters is the same as the English and Greek; and when it is desired to write the Hebrew letters משה Mse in the English characters, the same letters which the order and the power of notation shew to be identical, ought to be used, and no others. The practice of substituting one consonant for another can very seldom be admitted; it can be subjected to no rule, but in every instance where such a liberty is taken each case must stand upon its own merits, and be left to the judgment of the reader. I do not mean to say that a letter may never be changed, but it ought never to be changed except for a very good reason; and when it is so changed, the doctrine to be deduced from it will stand on a much worse foundation than if it had not been so changed. But after all, the practice of changing letters cannot possibly be denied. For instance, do we not see sovereigns in India sometimes called Nawab, and sometimes Nabob—the w and b interchanged; and so on in other cases?

19. But uncertain as the nature of etymological science is supposed to be in researches into the early learning of the world, it is the best fountain from which we can draw. Let those of a different opinion pursue their own plan, and continue to believe the histories of Greece that Cadmus founded Thebes by means of men raised from sowing the teeth of serpents; or that Jupiter, in the form of a Bull, ran away with Europa from her father Agenor, by whom he had three sons—Minos, Sarpendon, and Radamanthus, who were really all living persons.

20. As reason cannot be made effectual against etymology, the power of ridicule has been applied, and it has had the success it will always have against truth—it will fail. A pickled cucumber has been derived from Jeremiah King (e. g. Jeremiah King—Jer. King—Girkin). Now this is very good, and whenever similar licences are taken under the same or similar circumstances as this, the result deserves nothing but ridicule, and the persons who depend upon such deductions are really ridiculous. Forced allegories are equally ridiculous; and pray what are our orthodox impugners of etymology better in their literal explanations of the Old-Testament writings? What shall I say to the wrestling of God with Jacob and wounding him in the thigh? What of his ineffectual attempt to kill Moses at an inn? These gentlemen run down etymology in order that they may open the door to their literal meanings. But the truth is, the abuse of either is ridiculous, as every thing must be when not kept within the bounds of sense and reason. And with respect to etymology, however uncertain it may be, it is the only instrument left us for the investigation of ancient science, all others having failed us, and the certainty of facts discovered by its agency will depend upon the reason and probability which the etymological deduction will possess, in every individual case; and of each case the reader must be the judge. But the real truth is, that etymology is not run down because it is not calculated to discover truth, but because it is calculated to discover too much truth.

21. Very certain I am that if we are not willing to receive the learning of the ancients through the medium of etymology, and a comparison of the words of one language with another, we must remain in ignorance. The early historical accounts are all little better than fables. Every word, in every language, has, no doubt, originally had a meaning, whether a nation has it by inheritance, by importation, or by composition. It is evident, then, if we can find out the original meaning of the words which stand for the names of objects, great discoveries may be expected.

22. I repeat, the science of etymology is the standing but for the shafts of every fool. If a witling be so foolish that he can ridicule nothing else, he can succeed against etymology. The true and secret reason of the opposition to etymology is, that the priests knowing it is by its aid only that ancient science can be discovered, have exerted every nerve to prejudice the minds of youth against it. After all, what is it but the science of explaining the meaning of words? Its uncertainty every one must admit. But in this it is only like the words of all languages, in almost every one of which every noun has a great number of meanings. On the meaning of the words, as selected judiciously or injudiciously, depends the value of the translation, which is, of course, sometimes sense, sometimes nonsense. But, I think, one is scarcely less doubtful, or subject to fewer mistakes, than the other. Are there not at least two meanings given to almost every important text of the Bible? The same is the case with etymological deductions.^[7] The devotee, as in duty bound, will take the construction of his priest, the philosopher of his reason. And when an etymologist finds out a new derivation, we are as much obliged to him as we are to a lexicographer when he discovers a new meaning in a word which has been before overlooked.

23. The first word of Genesis may furnish an example of what I mean. We have great authorities to justify the rendering of the word either by wisdom or beginning, or both. And it must be for the reader to decide whether it has one or the other, or both—the double meaning.

24. When a translator finds a word with several meanings, than which nothing is more common, it is his duty to compare it with the context and to consider all the circumstances under which it is placed, and his prudence and judgment are displayed, or his want of them, in the selection which he makes. It is precisely the same with etymology. There is no argument which can be brought against etymology which may not be advanced with equal force against translations. In the course of the following work I shall have occasion to return to this subject several times.

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1. See his Prelim. Diss. p. 77.
2. Phil. Etymol. p. xx.
3. Philosophic Etymol. p. 33.
4. I wish Mr. Gilchrist had undertaken the task of so reducing them, for no man is better qualified. Had he and Mr. Whiter attempted to re-form or re-discover the ancient first language or collection of words, and their systems had been left unfinished, other learned men would have continued them, perhaps, till they had been completed.
5. The common barn-door hen has at least two clear and distinct words, one which she commonly uses to her chickens, and another when she calls them to her on having discovered any unexpected hoard of food.
6. Asiat. Res. Vol. III. 4to. p. 489.
7. I beg my reader to look in Mr. Whiter’s Etymologicon for the meaning of argo. It has scores of meanings, some as opposite as the poles.