On Figurative Language. $1 
elue ; yet the number of instances is sufficient 
to verify the fact, and fully to shew the nature 
ef the modification which imnumerable words 
must have undergone. 
Generally in all eine in, the English, 
atleast, in its present state, men do not abso- 
lutely invent new names (as quinbus, flestrin, 
in. the yoyage to Lilliput) to denote new 
objects or things, but,.either compound old 
ones, or use old names in. a new or transferred 
meaning. ‘Thus at the inyention of the ma- 
chine which turns a spit, it was called jack, in 
compliment to the former operator... The 
contrivance to change the level of a vessel in 
a canal is called 4 lock; from its confining the 
vessel, by an analogy rather remote. When 
_ an artificer in wood-work confines his object 
to one species of labour, e.g. making carts or 
wheels, he is denominated cartwright or wheel- 
aright. There are other compositions in the 
danguage, in great numbers, less apparent, but 
not less real: asin the words Godhead, good- 
ness, saimtship, gaily, preferment,. and others; 
the latter syllable was originally .a. word or 
part of a word, in composition with God, 
good, &c. There would have been many more 
contrivances of this nature in our language, if 
it had not borrowed so copiously from other 
