UNCONNECTED is used in reference to things that have never yet been connected. This house of business is unconnected with any other. The business of the two houses has since been disconnected. TO RIDICULE is to laugh at something with the intention of correcting it. TO DERIDE is to laugh at something with the intention of exposing it. We love the man although we ridicule his peculiarities. It is disgraceful to deride a man for a personal deformity. (Exercises XI.-XXI.) CHAPTER III. ON THE PROPER ARRANGEMENT OF WORDS. THE meaning of a sentence is often determined by the arrangement of the words composing it. A careful arrangement groups words in such a manner as to place those which limit or qualify in as close connection as possible with the words to which they refer. We are accustomed to approve of certain uses and arrangements as proper, and to stigmatise others as improper. The standard by which we judge in such cases is decided sometimes according to simple logical principles, but generally according to custom. No method of arranging or using words in a language is absolutely wrong, but custom has decided in favour of certain usages and against certain others; so that when we apply the words proper and improper, or correct and incorrect, to language, we should understand distinctly that we are judging according to a purely conventional standard. That which gives law to language is custom. 1. We must be careful however, while recognising the control which common usage exercises over language, to mark certain limits for that control. In the first place, there are many people who commonly use the words this here, that there, instead of the simple demonstratives this and that, which of themselves denote proximity and remoteness without the addition of the adverbs of place. There are others who, in negative replies to questions, use the word nay in preference to no. Some persons would ask the question, where are you for? when educated men would ask, where are you going? Although these usages may be common, yet since they are not adopted by educated men we do not recognise them as correct. The use which gives law to language must be REPUTABLE. A common usage which is not reputable is called a vulgarism. 2. Again, there are certain usages in language which are entirely local. In one part of England there is a very common word gradely, denoting agreeable, pleasing, bonny; in other parts manual labourers attribute gender to the tools which they employ in working. In other parts a homely substantive, mawther, is used in reference to women; while elsewhere it is common to omit the definite article before substantives. He walked up street, and past castle, and then over bridge home. We do not recognise these usages as correct, because they are local. The custom which gives law to a language must be NATIONAL. A common usage which is not national is called a provincialism. 3. Lastly, many expressions were once common and recognised as proper, but have now fallen into disuse. The phrase it came to pass, instead of it happened, was once commonly and correctly used, and is to be met with on almost every page of the English Bible, though it is never used in our own day. The affirmative yea was once common, and th was a frequent ending for parts of verbs now ending in s; loveth, praiseth, doeth, for loves, praises, does. The relative pronoun which was used personally ("Our Father which art in heaven”), and the pronoun his in reference to things as well as persons. ("The iron gate opened of his own accord." Acts xii. 10.) Thus a language is continually growing and changing, and the usages which are received as correct in one age are prohibited in the next. We do not recognise obsolete usages as correct. The custom which gives law to language must be PRESENT. A usage once common, but now obsolete, is called an archaism. Having arrived at a distinct understanding as to what constitutes correctness in the use of language, we will proceed to discuss the subject of the correct arrangement of words. In our own language, more perhaps than in any other, owing to the few inflections we have, it is important to arrange words in such an order that their united meaning cannot possibly be mistaken. If we use such a sentence as The king conquered the rebels, there is nothing whatever except the arrangement of the words to inform us of its correct meaning; for there would not be the slightest alteration in the form of either of the words if the sentence were intended to signify that the rebels conquered the king. In another language it would be otherwise, and the verb would assume one of two different forms, according as it denoted an action performed by the king or by the rebels, while each of the substantives would have a distinctive form denoting whether it was the subject or the object of the verb, and hence the mere order of the words would be of little or no significance. In such cases we make arrangement do for us the work that inflexion does in other languages, and have a tacit but distinct understanding that in a sentence the subject shall come before the predicate, and the verb before the object which it governs. An observance of this simple rule keeps us from ambiguity. Thus in the sentence quoted above the very order of the words tells us that the king performed the action of conquering, and that the rebels were conquered. The special importance of a correct arrangement of words in English composition may also be aptly illustrated by comparing our use of the relative pronouns with that in another language such as Latin. We have three very common relative pronouns, who, which, that. Not one of them has any significance in itself. They derive all their meaning from some word or words in the same sentence as themselves, and for which they act as deputies or representatives. There is but one thing except arrangement which can guide us in finding out the words to which they refer, and that is that who must refer to persons, and which to animals or things, but we are never certain with regard to that, because it may refer either to persons or things. Neither of them has any inflected form to show whether it refers to a singular or a plural antecedent, and only one of them, who, has a distinct form whom, for denoting when it is an object instead of a subject. In each of the following sentences in English we have no choice in the use of relative pronouns except between that and which, while in Latin a different relative would be used in each sentence. The field that belongs to us adjoins the wood. (qui) |