150 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 



ence about it. Similarly hour (aspirated) is easier to say than 

 Hora, and 'our becomes easier still. So Dies Dominica has 

 been welded into Dimanche. Why some nations find it easier 

 to say b for /, d for /, and g for ch (hard) q or k, it is difficult to 

 say ; but such is the case. Thus what a Frenchman calls 

 boutique, a German pronounces apoiheke, and a Spaniard bodega. 

 Each has found what is easiest for himself to pronounce ; but 

 there was no struggle for existence between these three words 

 in as many countries, not to add the English apothecary. 



Letters get transposed if it be found easier to pronounce 

 the word with the vowels in a different order. Thus Curasao 

 and Cacao have become Curagoa and Cocoa ; having changed 

 both in spelling and pronunciation. 



Nor has Natural Selection got anything to do with the 

 origin of new words, idioms, etc. They arise automatically or 

 are invented as the want is felt. Once in a way an alternative 

 is proposed, and while one stays the other disappears. Thus 

 the words " telegram " and " telegrapheme " were both sug- 

 gested when the telegraph was first employed. The latter 

 may be more correct etymologically, but the shorter word was 

 quickly adopted. " Wireless telegram " of five syllables is 

 being subjected to the same process to-day, and will probably 

 yield to " Marconigram " of four. 



A new meaning is often added to an old word. Thus 

 several Greek words acquired new meanings under Christianity. 

 'AyttTTTj is the word in the LXX, in the Song of Solomon, as the 

 love of lovers for each other. In the Christian dispensation, 

 it became Brotherly Love and human reverence for God. 



Evolution, per se, undoubtedly may be applicable to the 

 origin of languages ; but Darwinism is not. New words, 

 changes of old ones, different pronunciations, etc., all arise 

 as "definite variations" in adaptation to new circumstances 

 when old ones become obsolete and disappear ; so that whole 

 languages, like whole families of animals and plants, become 

 extinct in the course of ages. Natural Selection may be called 

 the descriptive phrase of that process ; but it has nothing to do 



