The Century Vocabulary Builder - Garland Greever; Joseph M. Bachelor

Bias Supersede Sly
Aversion Capital Meerschaum
Extravagant Travel Alley
Concur Travail Fee
Attention Apprehend Superb
Magnanimity Lewd Adroit
Altruism Instigation Quite
Benevolence Complexion Urchin
Charity Bishop Thoroughfare
Unction Starve Naughty
Speed Cunning Moral
Success Decent Antic
Crafty Handsome Savage
Usury Solemn Uncouth
Costume Parlor Window
Presumption Bombastic Colleague
Petty Vixen Alderman
Queen Doctor Engage

To thread with minute fidelity the mazes of a word's former history is the task of the linguistic scholar; our province is the practical and the present-day. But words, like men, are largely what they are because of what they have been; and to turn a gossip's eye upon their past is to procure for ourselves, often, not only enlightenment but also entertainment. This fact, though brought out in some part already, deserves separate and fuller discussion.

In the first place, curiosity as to words' past experience enables us to read with keener understanding the literature of preceding ages. Of course we should not, even so, go farther back than about three centuries. To read anything earlier than Shakespeare would require us to delve too deeply into linguistic bygones. And to read Shakespeare himself requires effort—but rewards it. Let us see how an insight into words will help us to interpret the Seven Ages of Man (Appendix 4).

In line 2 of this passage appears the word merely. In Shakespeare's time it frequently meant "altogether" or "that and nothing else." As here used, it may be taken to mean this, or to have its modern meaning, or to stand in meaning midway between the two and to be suggestive of both; there is no way of determining precisely. In line 12 the word pard means leopard. In line 18 saws means "sayings" (compare the phrase "an old saw"); modern means "moderate," "commonplace"; instances means what we mean by it today, "examples," "illustrations." (Line 18 as a whole gives us a vivid sense of the justice's readiness to speak sapiently, after the manner of justices, and to trot out his trite illustrations on the slightest provocation.) The word pantaloon in line 20 is interesting. The patron saint of Venice was St. Pantaleon (the term is from Greek, means "all-lion," and possibly refers to the lion of St. Mark's Cathedral). Pantaloon came therefore to signify (1) a Venetian, (2) a garment worn by Venetians and consisting of breeches and stockings in one. The second sense is preserved, substantially, in our term pantaloons. The first sense led to the use of the word (in the mouths of the Venetians' enemies) for "buffoon" and then (in early Italian comedy) for "a lean and foolish old man." It is this stock figure of the stage that Shakespeare evokes. In line 22 hose means the covering for a man's body from his waist to his nether-stock. (Compare the present meaning: a covering for the feet and the lower part of the legs.) In line 27 mere means "absolute." In line 28 sans means "without."

Of the words we have examined, only sans is obsolete, though pard, saws, and pantaloon are perhaps not entirely familiar. That is, only one word in the passage, so far as its outward form goes, is completely alien to our knowledge. But how different the matter stands when we consider meanings! The words are words of today, but the meanings are the meanings of Shakespeare. We should be baffled and misled as to the dramatist's thought if we had made no inquiries into the vehicle therefor.

In the second place, to look beyond the present into the more remote signification of words will put us on our guard against the reappearance of submerged or half-forgotten meanings. We have seen that the word tension may be used without conscious connection with the idea of stretching. But if we incautiously place the word in the wrong environment, the idea will be resurrected to our undoing. We associate ardor with strong and eager desire. For ordinary purposes this conception of the word suffices. But ardor is one of the children of fire; its primary sense is "burning" (compare arson). Therefore to pronounce the three vocables "overflowing with ardor" is to mix figures of speech absurdly. We should fall into a similar mistake if we said "brilliant fluency," and into a mistake of another kind (that of tautology or repetition of an idea) if we said "heart-felt cordiality," for cordiality means "feelings of the heart." Appreciate means "set a (due) value on." We may perhaps say "really appreciate," but scrupulous writers and speakers do not say "appreciate very much." A humor (compare humid) was once a "moisture"; then one of the four moistures or liquids that entered into the human constitution and by the proportions of their admixture determined human temperament; next a man's outstanding temperamental quality (the thing itself rather than the cause of it); then oddity which people may laugh at; then the spirit of laughter and good nature in general. Normally we do not connect the idea of moisture with the word. We may even speak of "a dry humor." But we should not say "now and then a dry humor crops out," for then too many buried meanings lie in the same grave for the very dead to rest peacefully together.

Even apart from reading old literature and from having, when you use words, no ghosts of their pristine selves rise up to damn you, you may profit from a knowledge of how the meaning of a term has evolved. For example, you will meet many tokens and reminders of the customs and beliefs of our ancestors. Thus coxcomb carries you back to the days when every court was amused by a "fool" whose head was decked with a cock's comb; crestfallen takes you back to cockfighting; and lunatic ("moonstruck"), disaster ("evil star"), and "thank your lucky stars" plant you in the era of superstition when human fate was governed by heavenly bodies.

Further, you will perceive the poetry of words. Thus to wheedle is to wag the tail and to patter is to hurry through one's prayers (paternoster). What a picture of the frailty of men even in their holiness flashes on us from that word patter! Breakfast is the breaking of the fast of the night. Routine (the most humdrum of words) is travel along a way already broken. Goodby is an abridged form of "God be with you." Dilapidated is fallen stone from stone. Daisy is "the day's eye," nasturtium (from its spicy smell) "the nose-twister," dandelion "the tooth of the lion." A lord is a bread-guard.

You will perceive, moreover, that many a dignified word once involved the same idea as some unassuming or even semi-disreputable word or expression involves now. Thus there is little or no difference in figure between understanding a thing and getting on to it; between averting something (turning it aside) and sidetracking it; between excluding (shutting out) and closing the door to; between degrading (putting down a step) and taking down a notch; between accumulating (heaping up) and making one's pile; between taking umbrage (the shadow) and being thrown in the shade; between ejaculating and throwing out a remark; between being on a tension and being highstrung; between being vapid and having lost steam; between insinuating (winding in) and worming in; between investigating and tracking; between instigating (goading on or into) and prodding up; between being incensed (compare incendiary) and burning with indignation; between recanting (unsinging) and singing another tune; between ruminating (chewing) and smoking in one's pipe. Nor is there much difference in figure between sarcasm (a tearing of the flesh) and taking the hide off; between sinister (left-handed) and backhanded; between preposterous (rear end foremost) and cart before the horse; between salary (salt-money, an allowance for soldiers) and pin-money; between pedigree (crane's foot, from the appearance of genealogical diagrams) and crowsfeet (about the eyes); between either precocious (early cooked), apricot (early cooked), crude (raw), or recrudescence (raw again) and half-baked. To ponder is literally to weigh; to apprehend an idea is to take hold of it; to deviate is to go out of one's way; to congregate is to flock together; to assail or insult a man is to jump on him; to be precipitate is to go head foremost; to be recalcitrant is to kick.