10 Comments on Mafon’s Supplement to Fobnfon’s Didionary. [Feb. 1, 
nify both a tournament and a righteous 
mar; on which account modern writers 
moftly f{pell the etymon jouff, and infer 
the frequentative jofile. ‘This isa rational 
method of withdrawing ambiguity: when 
two words of diftin& parentage and mean- 
ing become orthographically identical, the 
lefs ufual of the two thould be traced back 
to ifs original form, and employed in 
fome one of its more antique but more 
diftinguifhable appearances. 
Gladful.—From the Anglo-Saxon gled, 
a live coal, a fire, comes the adjective 
glad; which means primarily bright, /bin- 
img; and is employed in that fenfe by 
Ottfried, and in the Edda of Szmund. 
Light and joy are naturally affociated ; 
hence a word, originally fignifying /uz- 
nous, eafily turns to fignify cheerful. Still 
there is fome incongruity in employing 
fuch a term for cheerful, when the idea of 
luminoufuefs is expre{sly excluded; as where 
Milton talks of ‘glad evening.” Al- 
though a metaphorical ufe of the adjec- 
tive glad is very common in Englifh: yet 
the fubftantive-etymon glede, as the old 
writers fpell it, is never ufed for a frolic, 
a merry make, as is the word fuz, which 
likewife meant originally a bonfire. The 
affixes full and /e/s, being adjectives, are 
only capable of combination with fub- 
ftantives: it is therefore not the adjec- 
tive glad, but the fubttantive glede, which 
forms a part of the word gladful, if it be 
at all a legitimate word. In this cafe 
what would it mean? Full of live. coals, 
fery! There is not then yet in the lan- 
guage an inftance of the only tolerable ufe 
of this word. Suppofe we contrive one :— 
Th’ intrufive poker grubs the gladful grate, 
And cinder-cataraés patter on the hearth. 
Henceforwards.—Henceforwards, {ays 
Mr. Mafon, is the fame as Acuceforward; 
if fo, let us always emit the cacophonous 
ess: the Englifh language fuperabounds 
with hiffings, and we fhould negleé&t no 
opportunity of thinning the number. Pin- 
dar could write in Greek an efslefs ode; 
but neither Gray, nor that vanquifher of 
glottic difficulties, Jofhua Sylvefter,would 
have accomplifhed it in our tongue: its 
fibillations are attached to its mof ne- 
ceflary inflections, the cafes and numbers 
ef its nouns, the perfons of its verbs, and 
the formation of its adjectives are too often 
affifted by the officious efs., If one feeks 
in Wallis, or in Lindley Murray, for the 
lift of Englith adverbs, one is furprized 
to obferve fo many terminating withs ; 
Sometimes, oftentimes, always, ftrait- 
ways, nowadays, anights, elfe, whilf, 
befides,. darklings, once, twice, thrice 
whence, hence, thence, fince, thus, perhaps, 
atherwufe, upwards, downwards, home- 
wards, backwards, forwards, &c. ; 
Of thefe adverbs fome owe the s final 
to the accidental termination of the noun 
which forms their bafis, as otherwife ; 
fome to the circumftance, that the noun, 
which forms their bafis, is, by the nature 
of their meaning, employed in the plural 
number, as oftentimes; but a great many 
affume it only in their adverbial form. 
Thus we fay :—=‘* a backward bafhful 
man,”’--§*a forward officious fellow ;” but 
‘© to walk backwards and forwards.” 
Again—‘‘ I am to pafs a day at Clark- 
fon’s ; Coleridge too is gone to live befde 
the lake; I fhall vifit him befides.”” One 
and omce are never counfounded. That 
this s is a formative letter, and adver- 
bializing affix, and therefore as effential as. 
the Jy in wifely, or the fo in to-day, may be 
further fhown from the analogy of other 
Gothic dialects. So in German are 
formed from azder, other : anders, other- 
wile: recht, right: rechts, avight: link, 
left: links, aleft: ctheil, part: theils, 
partly : ffatt, ftead : (whence to ffay and 
fiaith) ; fiets, continually : abend, evening : 
abends, ov-evenings: (if our vernacular 
adverbs may be fo written): Montag, 
Monday: Montags, o-Mondays : her, here: 
herwarts, hither. So again in Holland- 
ifth:—on Jangs, of laie; dikils, often; 
Siraks, prefently ; eertyds, formerly; wer- 
vaards, ubither; derwaards, thither, &c. 
Anglo-Saxon :—Elles, elfe; _ blindlings, 
blind-eyes, &c. The refult of all which 
pedantry is—what? That henceforwards, 
although unufual, ought to be fubftituted 
to henceforward? No. For the aver- 
bializing 5 is already included in the hence ; 
and, in appoftte or compound words, we 
never infleét both members of the concord. 
But this refults—that, although hencefor- 
ward be itfeif correct, yet the s may not 
be omitted in the apparently analogous 
adverbs, upwards, downwards, bome- 
wards, darklings, ftraitways, befides, 
whilff (which word, the ¢ being anoma- 
lous, fhould be written ewhiles), always, 
and fo on; becaufe it is the mark which 
ferves to diflinguifh them from their cog- 
nate nouns. 
Hight. —The Attic diale&t of the Greeks 
willingly converted figmas into taus, and 
employed @aratra for Garacce, and yAnrre 
for yaweoa: fo, among the Gothic dialects, 
the Englith. The German kefél, is ex- 
prefled by kettle; fchmeiffen, by finite ; 
Spiefs, by [pit ; weifs, by white ; beifen, by 
bite ; and heifen, by hight. Thegh has “ | 
intro. 
- 
ea 
