INFLUENCE OP WORDS AND NAMES. 247 



tita,' is well known ; and it was so in the classical ages 

 as it is now. On the other hand, we have to encounter 

 constantly the seductions of new words, sometimes 

 necessary to the progress of knowledge, but often 

 giving only a new facing to old facts and opinions. 

 All that Quintilian says on these topics is excellent. 



The theology of the Christian Church in its darker 

 ages is heavily chargeable with invention of new words 

 the creation of doctrinal controversy and is gene- 

 rally ponderous in proportion to the obscurity of the 

 matter. This remark occurs to me fresh from reading 

 the Epistles of the Patriarch Photius, whose mastery of 

 Greek (well attested by Person's double labour on his 

 Lexicon) revelled in the construction of compound 

 words a luxury to his intellect, as well as a necessity 

 of the topics he is handling. Bacon speaks of ' the ill- 

 starred alliance between the old philosophy and the 

 new faith.' This alliance required and invented a lan- 

 guage of its own, which has been too largely trans- 

 mitted by inheritance to our own creeds and con- 

 troversies. 



