412 THOUGHTS ON THE FORMATION OF 



So far as the question, as to giving up the Chinese character, 

 can be decided by authority, it seems sufficiently settled. I may 

 refer particularly to what is said on this subject in Mr Kidd's 

 work on China. One kind of influence exerted by the character 

 is sufficiently peculiar to deserve mention. We have many 

 words whose meaning has been changed in consequence of a 

 mistake caused by accidental resemblances of sound. Such, for 

 instance, has been, at least in popular use, the case with demean. 

 Johnson even thought the secondary meaning had the authority 

 of Shakespeare. Again, there are words whose meaning has 

 been influenced by ' juxta-position,' by their occurring, so to 

 speak, in contact with others. Such are implicit, and buxom*. 



But both kinds of influence may concur in Chinese. Not 

 only the sound of the word, but also the way in which the 

 sound is expressed, by bringing the character into constant 

 association with another, may influence the meaning. Take as 

 an instance the character already noticed, composed of heart, 

 woman, and mouth. The two latter characters alone form a 

 binary character, pronounced ju, and meaning even as, sicut. 

 This binary character is the phonetic element of the ternary 

 one, of which it forms the upper part. The latter is pronounced 

 shu, and means goodness or kindness. But it is related that 

 Confucius taught that this word is the summing up of all mo- 

 rality ; that it means the state of mind in which a man interests 

 himself in the happiness of others, even as in his own. 



This development of the meaning of the word was, it is pro- 

 bable, merely the result of an acccidental coincidence of sound, 

 and of the selection of the one character to be the phonetic clement 

 of the other. But, error or not, this opinion as to the meaning 

 of the word has perpetuated itself; and what in this case is 

 referred to the authority of Confucius, has probably happened 

 tacitly in many others. 



One of the difficulties in making a Chinese dictionary arises 

 from the number of compound words, that is, words each of 

 which means something separately, but when grouped together 

 express a single idea. 



Remusat went so far as to say, that the compound word was 

 polysyllabic, and that each character merely represented a syl- 

 lable. This question is scarcely worth the attention which has 

 * So too in German Ehe. 



