18a 



mad-ere,* mad-iAus, and ynoist, as vXrj evidently is with v^wp, vypSg, u-dns. 

 ttl-igo, and ^u-midus. So too with the expressive words the German 

 writer Novalisf uses for an idea and a conception, when he says genius 

 has be-griSe or ideas, talent, hand-grif^e or conc^tions. I 



It is impossible fully to discuss here another subject, which hitherto 

 seems never to have sufficiently attracted the attention of philologists : 

 I mean the existence of the first numeral, most commonly allied to the 

 first personal pronoun, in one or other of its forms, in almost all that 

 large class of words which signify being, ^ as well as in those which 

 express perjnanence. A most elaborate dissertation might be wTitten on 

 this subject, perhaps tending to throw considerable light on many 

 metaphysical subjects, especially with reference to the doubts which have 

 been entertained by some of the most eminent metaphysicians, |1 as to 

 the existence of matter ; and no less so with regard to discussions about 

 the oneness, indivisibility and permanence of being. This remarkable 

 branch of the subject I have not now time to follow out. I cannot 

 however resist directing attention to the curious fact that we find the 

 first numeral in one of its forms, in most of those words which denote 

 singleness and rectitude of purpose. The stem IM or SIM, which we 

 find in Et/i{, sum, and am, sim-ilis, sim-ul, sem-e\, sem-iper, sam-e, 

 image, imitate,1[ and others is also found in sin-gle, siw-ple and sincere, 

 though these two last words are generally absurdly enough derived from 

 sine-plica and sine-oerd,*'^^ derivations which have been repeated over and 



* It occurs in the name of the island Madeira, so called from its forests, and in the river 

 Madeira, a tributary of the Amazon, deriving its name from the vast selva or forest through 

 which it passes, and in the Brazilian province Malto Grosso, a great forest. Grimms 

 (Deutsche Grammatik, vol. 2, pp 467 and 712,) also notices that the word for material, in 

 one of the old German dialects, was an-timber, and for a family " mago-timber," lit. "child 

 material." 



+ Novalis Schriften, vol. 2, p. 132. 



t The relation between the "cep" in conception, and "hand" in ^anrf-griffe, may bo 

 clearly seen by comparing the Gothic tai-hun, ten, with the Latin de-cem, each meaning 

 properly " two bands." 



§ Compare eyo), tfcaffrof, eke, each, with the San.scr. Ekas, one; Ei-fii, ttrri, i(TTT)fiif 

 iisto, exist, idea, idem, with kg and la ; essence, ontology, with iv ; me, man-eo, with 



flittf HOVOQ. 



n Professor Stewart asserts that he who has not, at some period of his life, felt favourably 

 inclined towards Bishop Berkeley's theory as to the non-existence, or rather mere relative 

 existence of matter, may be sure that he has as yet shown no genius for metaphysical 

 research. 



IT Ima-go and «i7n-ul-acrum are but different formations from the same stem. 



•• It seems much more natural to consider sim-plex, like du-plex and tri-plex, to be a 

 compound of the first numeral, and to mean one-fold, than to derive it from sine plica, in 

 which case we must translate it no-fold. Moreover, the analogy of »»m-plex to the Greek 

 aTrXvg exactly corresponds to that between <im-ul and afxa, tetn^l and a7ra$, stm-ilis 



