SOME NEURAL TERMS. 117 



The Greek opyavov might be rendered by part, instrument, or 

 agent, and these are its English heteronyms; but the Latin 

 paronym is organum ; the French, organe ; the Italian, organo ; 

 the English, organ; and the German, Organ. Each of these 

 is, so to speak, a geographic variety of the original or antece- 

 dent word; indeed, it may be regarded as the same word modi- 

 fied in accordance with the genius of each language. The case 

 may be compared with that of a traveler who maintains his 

 essential identity notwithstanding "in Rome he does as the 

 Romans do," and in other countries conforms to the customs 

 of the inhabitants in respect to garb and demeanor. 



Methods of Paronymixation. For linguistic reasons par- 

 onymy is general and easy with the Romance languages, less 

 so with the Germanic and with English. Still, there are ex- 

 amples enough to warrant the belief that into either may 

 be adopted any Latin substantive or adjective. 1 Paronymic 

 methods vary with the language and with the word, and involve 

 more or less orthographic modification, ranging in extent from 

 the case of fiber (iron\ fibra) to that of alms (from eleemosyna}. 

 These are changed paronyms. 



Unchanged Paronyms. But there are other evidences of 

 paronymization, viz., (a) Pronunciation ; e.g., Paris, Detroit, 

 (b) Hyphenation with a word unmistakably of another language; 

 e.g., in Balken-splenium, the hyphen indicates the adoption of 

 the Latin splenium as a German word, (c] Combination ; e.g., 

 Ponsfasern and numerous similar terms, (d) Declaration that 

 the writer regards the unmodified word as adopted. 2 (e) Em- 

 ployment of the vernacular form of the plural or of an oblique 

 case; e.g., the Latin plural of lens is lentes, but the English is 

 lenses; so atlas (atlantes), atlases ; enema (enemata), enemas; 

 animal (animalia), animals : in the phrase " fibers of the cal- 

 losum," the last word might still be regarded as Latin; but if 

 one said " callosum's fibers," the English possessive would 

 indicate paronymization. 



1 Also other and perhaps all parts of speech, but they do not concern us here. 



2 Were all foreign words italicized, then in a given case the non-italicization of 

 a word would indicate its adoption. Since the Germans commonly capitalize all 

 nouns, that feature does not necessarily signify that a word is regarded as an 

 unchanged paronym. 



