GENDERS.—JAMES HARRIS.
A good translation of Xenophon’s Cyropædia is much wanted. That by Ashley is vilely done; though Mr. Harris has pronounced a high eulogium on it in his Philological Inquiries.
Mr. Harris was an excellent Greek scholar, but beyond that he does not seem to have great merit as a writer. In his “Hermes,” speaking of the grammatical genders, he says, they are founded on a “reasoning which discovers, even in things without sex, a distant analogy to that great distinction, which, according to Milton, animates the world.” To this he adds, in a note, “Linnæus has traced the distinction of sexes through the vegetable world, and made it the basis of his botanic method.” Should not one be induced to think from this, that Linnæus classed some plants as male, and others as female, from their form and character? when, in fact, they are classed according to the number and form of those parts on which the fructification of the plants actually depends. What becomes of this supposed analogy in the German language, where the sun is feminine, and the moon masculine?
Lowth, in his grammar, mentions the poetical advantage our language derives from making all inanimate things neuter, by the power it gives of personification by the mere change of gender.[343]
[343] Pye.
For the Table Book.