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flowers — have each a distinctive uanie and title, often, as in the case of 

 the very flower which the poet instances, descriptive of its appearance, 

 its origin, its qualities, or its locality. Much more is it so with men. 

 We may perhaps not be aware of it ; but still it is a fact that every 

 name, whether christian or surname, has a meaning — a meaning often 

 containing within itself a miniature histoiy, as it were, of its owner's 

 ancestry, their appearance, their occupation, their deeds, their place of 

 abode, and perhaps much else connected with them. Names moreover, 

 like other things apparently trifling, often exercise a wide-spread and 

 deep-seated influence over the minds of men, which we are at a loss to 

 accoimt for, unless we refer it to the wonderful power of association. 

 The Greeks knew this when they changed their " Pontus Axenus," or 

 " Inhospitable Sea," to " Pontus Euxinus," or " Hospitable Sea;" and the 

 Romans, when they altered their Malexentum unto jBe?!eventum. The 

 first Napoleon also must have been well aware of this when he changed 

 the original Italian form of his name, Buovafaxte, into Bonapai'te, in 

 order .to give it a French air — to conceal his Corsicaa, and to claim a 

 Gallic origin ; and in our own days we have witnessed the speU which 

 a name may throw over a whole nation. 



The origin of manj' Christian names is given in the Bible. Thus 

 " Adam" means " Red Earth;" and the name was doubtless given to the 

 first man to remind him that he was, after all, but " dust and ashes." 

 It may be observed, that we have a good instance of the two possible 

 meanings of the word in Isaiah xliv. 11 : " And the workmen, they 

 are of men ;" which Bishop Lowth renders, " Even the workmen them- 

 selves shall blush;" making the word our translators intei^pret "of men" 

 to signify "grow red through shame," or "blush." Abraham was in 

 name, as well as in fact, " The Father of Nations." Jacob, which has 

 now taken the difi"erent forms of Jacques, James, and Jachimo, signi- 

 fies a ' supplanter ;' and a knowledge of this meaning of the name gives 

 us a deeper insight into, and affords a fresh illustration of that passage. 

 " Is he not rightly named Jacob? hath he not supplanted me these two 

 times ?" Shakspere, who in addition to the wonderful minuteness and 

 variety of his knowledge, had above all men an inborn sense of the fit- 

 ness of each thing for its own place, has given to the one of his charac- 

 ters, who is eminently a plotter and a supplanter, the name of lago, — 

 the Spanish form of the Hebrew Jacob and our James, — lago, the 

 supplanter. Moses appears to be a coptic word, signifying " Water," 

 or, according to Josephus, " Drawn out of the water,'" and was the 

 name given to the prophet who bore it, when he was rescued from the 

 waters of the Nile by Pharaoh's daughter. Joshua again means " God 



