[158] Emerson’s Nature.
[159] Compare ἐφιέμαι, ὀρέγομαι.
[160] Three derivations have been proposed: re-lego, Cic. de Nat. Deor. ii. 28; re-ligo, Lact. Div. Inst. 4; re-eligo, Augustin, de Civ. Dei, x. 3. See Fleming’s Vocabulary of Philosophy.
[161] See Bunsen’s Outlines, ii. 142 seqq. Dyaus, θεὸς, deus, &c., from the root div, to shine. The derivation of our English word “God” is doubtful; but I fear the beautiful belief that it is deduced from “good” must be abandoned. Grimm (Deutsch Myth. p. 12) shows that there is a grammatical difference between the words in the Teutonic language signifying “God” and “good;” if the Persian “Khoda” can be derived from the Zend “qvadáta,” Sanskrit “svadata,” à se datus, increatus, a very appropriate etymology would be given.
[162] See Dugald Stewart’s Philosoph. Essays, p. 217, 4th ed. Compare the widely different conceptions of happiness involved in the derivations of two such words as “beatus” and “selig.” Or take the word “poet;” if in these days of wider knowledge and shallower thought, we find it nearly impossible to frame a satisfactory definition of poetry, how should we have been able to invent the word itself, which goes to the very root of the matter, by at once attributing to “the maker” that divine creative faculty whereby he is enabled “to give airy nothing a local habitation and a name?”
[163] χαλκαίνω, πορφύρω.
[164] “Une lumière éclate, des couleurs crient, des idées se heurtent, la mémoire bronche, le cœur murmure, l’obstination se cabre contre les difficultés.”—Nodier, p. 45.
[165] For the facts alluded to in this passage, see Herod. iii. 46, iv. 132. Liv. i. 54. Jerem. xix. 10, &c.
[166] Arist. Rhet. iii. 10.
[167] ἤστραπτ’, ἐβρόντα, κἀνεκύκα τὴν Ἑλλάδα.—Aristoph. “Proinde tona eloquio.”—Virg. Æn. xi.