POWELL] PHILt)LOGT CLV 



With advancing thought new concepts arise. For these new 

 concepts new words may be coined, or the synonyms of coales- 

 cing languages may be used; but the usual method is to use 

 an old woi'd with a new meaning; this leads to duplicate mean- 

 ings of words. In every language words have many meanings. 

 If the words of the English language were multiplied so that 

 one Avord should have but one meaning, and if synonymous 

 words were reduced so that one meaning should be expressed 

 only by one word, still the number of words in the lauffuag-e 

 would be multiplied several fold. Duplicate meanings give 

 rise to ambiguities, for the speaker may use a word with one 

 meaning and the hearer ma}' interpret it with another. There 

 is a mechanical habit of using words bv which nuun- fallacies 

 are produced in logic. That pseudo-science which is known 

 as formal logic is provocative of these fallacies, for formal logic 

 is a system of reasoning with words rather than with thing's. 

 When we remember the number of distinct meanino-s with 

 which words are conventionally endowed, it is not surprising 

 that such fallacies should spring up; but it is surprising that 

 they should be used from generation to g-eneration and from 

 century to century, so that fallacies of antiquit}^ should still 

 survive. 



The rules for deriving one word from another ditfer in the 

 difterent languages, but the method of deriving one word 

 from another is universal. There is a nniemonic advantag'e in 

 knowing the derivation of a word. Wishing to express ideas, 

 the words are more easily recalled for deft expression through 

 the laws of association, and words which are unfamiliar may 

 be recognized by recognizing the elements of which they are 

 compounded. 



In the early history of the European nations the literature 

 of Hellas and of Rome jjlayed an important part in human 

 culture, for the Latin and Greek languages were the reposito- 

 ries of the thought to which scholarly men most resorted, and 

 learning itself was dependent on these languages; so that 

 learning was often considered as the acquisition of the lan- 

 guage rather than as the knowledge of the thought contained 

 in the literature of the language. 



