70 Rev. Mr Williams on the Force of the prefix Ve or Vcb 



names and qualities of the substances with which we are conver- 

 sant. To each word, therefore, a particular idea is attached, and 

 as these roots take various forms, from the addition of simple 

 and well known prefixes and affixes, the shades of meaning gra- 

 dually multiply, and yet the transition is never so sudden as to 

 prevent the original idea from being still presented to the hearer's 

 mind, as his principal guide, in ascertaining the new meaning. 

 This can proceed only for a limited period. Political convulsions, 

 originating in disgust with the past, and in sanguine hopes for 

 the future, a rage for novelty, and consequently the necessity 

 imposed upon the orators and poets of the day of courting the 

 public favour by new metaphors, new versions of the old, and 

 fresh importations of new words, operate so powerfully, that, in 

 many cases, the original idea entirely disappears, and nothing 

 remains for our guidance but the gratuitous meaning which 

 every body is supposed to attach to a certain term. I need not 

 say, that, in such a case, no two individuals will agree in attach- 

 ing the same meaning to a word thus let loose from its moorings, 

 and sent forth to wander in the boundless ocean of possible com- 

 binations. That hence misapprehensions must arise, with all 

 their inevitable train of strifes, quarrels, and combats. 



To prevent the deterioration of language is impossible. To 

 fix it down on certain principles, and to guard it from the caprice 

 of fashion, the thirst of notoriety, and the slow but sure attacks 

 of time, is beyond our power. But the evil can be confined 

 within a certain range ; the transgressor can be forced to err with- 

 in certain limits, and the path may be pointed out through 

 which, in better times, a return to first principles may be secured. 

 Thanks to the Great God who made language the main instru- 

 ment of rational man, its substance (as far as the lapse of ages 

 during which the great Caucasian family of man has existed can 

 lead us to infer) is indestructible. Although apparently the most 

 fleeting, the most evanescent of all the accidents connected with 

 man in his temporal state, it has hitherto proved the most im- 



