5 1 S MocIe7V2 Languages. [Chap. XV- 



tive; and the author displays an acquaintance with 

 the history of his language, and the peculiar merits 

 of its best authors, which eminently qualified hmi 

 for the task which he undertook to execute. 



This grammar and dictionary, we are told, have 

 been useful, beyond any other publications, in 

 correcting the orthography, in exploring the ety- 

 mology, and in regulating the syntax of the Ger- 

 man language. The incessant efforts of Adelung 

 have also served to animate and guide the exertions 

 of his countrymen in pursuit of the same object. 

 Since he wrote, philological inquiries have acquired 

 an ascendency and a prevalence in that empire 

 which they never before possessed. Grammars, 

 dictionaries, and critical essays, have unusually 

 abounded. Questions for elucidating and improv- 

 ing the language have been published by acade- 

 mies and literary associations in every part of the 

 country, and have occupied much of the attention 

 of learned men. And, finally, their popular writers, 

 especially their poets and dramatists, are continu- 

 ally adding to the stores of the language new 

 words, and combinations of terms, which, though 

 in some cases they have been considered as inju- 

 rious innovations, have yet contributed not a little 

 to tlie mass of improvement. 



This language, as well as the two preceding, has 

 been much more studied towards the close of the 

 eighteenth century than ever before. So many in- 

 teresting works in literature* and science have been 

 published in Germany, particularly within the last 

 thirty years, that the acquisition of the language 

 seems now to be regarded by the literati of Europe 



