I 



GREEK PREPOSITIONS. 331 



" te will fight, — medium to bring about his fighting, — the pro- 

 " fped of benefiting the Athenians." 



"Oos'oii uyeipofjuivav SVa aaXXecc, irot.^dti/tKK.m. MusJEUS. 



" They haften, not with the view of celebrating religious rites 

 " in honour of the gods, but for the fake (or on account) of the 

 " beauty of the damfels who affemble on thefe occafions ;" — 

 " they haften, — medium or paffage to induce them to do fo, — 

 " the beauty of the damfels,— the profpedt of meeting the afTem- 

 " bled damfels." 



In feveral of thefe applications of S/« to caufation, particular- 

 ly the laft, it muft be admitted, that the mode of exprefllon is 

 elliptical and circuitous j in all of them, however, it is eafy to 

 trace, either immediately or remotely, the radical fenfe of 5«» as 

 a noun, modified by ufe into a prepofition. 



This prepofition, as well as i\>, was fiippofed by Dr Moor to 

 have been originally the numeral adje<flive «s, /«,(«, kv, both pre- 

 pofitions, denoting, as he conceived, the one f pace ; that is, the 

 Ipace immediately adjoining the objecfl fpoken of. This idea, 

 though ingenious, appears clogged with infurmountable diffi- 

 culties. Eis and h are by no means fo nearly the fame in mean- 

 ing as this derivation would make them. Linnep derives as 

 from the verb lu, to/end^ — a derivation undoubtedly forced and 

 unnatural ; and Scheide makes «j a contradlion of ettru, within^ 

 evidently reverfing the analogical order of the language, «s be- 

 ing in fa(S the parent of e'lini. 



None of thefe deductions being at all fati8fa(3;ory, for ex- 

 plaining the various ufes of «j, we muft have recourfe to fome 

 other origin of the word ; and one better adapted to the purpofe 



may, 



