CHAP. II.
I. Concerning the various changes and corruptions to which all vulgar Languages are obnoxious.II. Particularly concerning the changes of the Engliſh tongue.III. Whether any Language, formerly in uſe, be now wholly loſt.IV. Concerning the firſt riſe and occaſion of new Languages.
§. I.THere are three Queres which may deſerve ſome farther diſquiſition.1. Whether the pureſt of thoſe Mother-tongues, which yet remain, be not now much changed from what they were at the firſt Confuſion.2. Whether and how any of the Mother-tongues have been quite loſt ſince the Confuſion.3. Whether and how other new Languages have ſince ariſen in the world.
I. To the firſt, Beſides the common fate and corruption to which Languages as well as all other humane things are ſubject, there are many other particular cauſes which may occaſion ſuch a change: The mixture with other Nations in Commerce; Marriages in Regal Families, which doth uſually bring ſome common words into a Court faſhion; that affectation incident to ſome eminent men in all ages, of coining new words, and altering the common forms of ſpeech, for greater elegance; the neceſſity of making other words, according as new things and inventions are diſcovered. Beſides, the Laws of forein Conqueſts uſually extend to Letters and Speech as well as Territories, the Victor commonly endeavouring to propagate his own Language as farre as his Dominions; which is the reaſon why the Greek and Latin are ſo univerſally known. And when a Nation is overſpread with ſeveral Colonies of foreiners, though this do not alwaies prevail to aboliſh the former Language, yet if they make any long abode, this muſt needs make ſuch a conſiderable change and mixture of ſpeech as will very much alter it from its original Purity.
Thoſe learned Languages which have now ceaſed to be vulgar, and remain onely in Books, by which the purity of them is regulated, may, whilſt thoſe Books are extant and ſtudied, continue the ſame without change. But all Languages that are vulgar, as thoſe learned ones formerly were, are upon the fore-mentioned occaſions, ſubject to ſo many alterations, that in tract of time they will appear to be quite another thing then what they were at firſt.
Brerewood's Enquiries, chap. 2. & 6.The Liturgies of S. Baſil and S. Chryſoſtom, which are yet uſed in the Greek Churches in their publick worſhip, the one for ſsolemn, the other for common days, have been a long time unintelligible to that people; ſo much is the vulgar Greek degenerated from its former purity.
Histor. lib. 3.And Polibius teſtifies, that the Articles of truce betwixt the Romans and Carthaginians could ſcarce be underſtood by the moſt learned Roman Antiquaries 350 years after the time of their making.
§. II.Alex. Gill Logonom. Anglican. Preface.If any Engliſh man ſhould now write or ſpeak as our forefathers did about ſix or ſeven hundred years paſt, we ſhould as little underſtand him as if he were a foreiner; of which it were eaſie to give ſeveral proofs