Double comparatives and superlatives pleonastically resulting from syntactical contamination are not unusual in English: cf. ‘Farmers find it far more profitable to sell their milk wholesale rather than to retail it’ (Fawcett, Pauperism, ch. vi., p. 237): ‘Still it was on the whole more satisfactory to his feeling to take the directest means of seeing Dorothea rather than to use any device,’ etc. (Middlemarch, vol. iii., bk. vi., ch. lxii., p. 365). Thus we have in Shakespeare, more kinder, more corrupter, and most unkindest (Julius Cæsar, III. ii. 187); and thy most worst (Winter’s Tale, III. ii. 180). In poetry, again, we find adjectives with a superlative sense compared; as, perfectest, chiefest (Shakespeare), extremest (Milton), more perfect (English Bible), lonelier (Longfellow).[75]
In Latin and Greek, we find the comparative where we should expect the positive; as, ante alios immanior omnes (Vergil, Æneid, iv.); αἱρετώτερον εἶναι τὸν καλὸν θάνατον ἀντὶ τοῦ αἰσχροῦ βίου (Xenophon). In Scotch it is usual to say He is quite better again for He is quite well again. We find the positive where we should expect the comparative, as in St. Mark ix. 43; Καλόν σοι ἐστί ... ἤ (It is good for thee than, etc.). We also find the superlative used where the comparative would be regular: cf. Theocritus, xv. 139: Ἕκτωρ, Ἑκάβας ὁ γεραίτατος εἴκατι παίδων.[76]
Pleonasm arising from contamination occurs most extensively in the case of negations. Cf. ‘There was no character created by him into which life and reality were not thrown with such vividness that the thing written did not seem to his readers the thing actually done’ (Forster’s Life of Dickens, vol. ii., ch. ix., p. 181). In older stages of English, as of German and French, this usage was very common. Cf. Parceque la langue française cort parmi le monde est la plus délitable à lire et à oir que nulle autre (Martin da Canale);[77] Wird das hindern können, dass man sie nicht schlachtet? (Schiller). In Chaucer and Shakespeare the use of the double negative is common: First he denied you had in him no right (Comedy of Errors, IV. ii. 7). You may deny that you were not the cause (Richard III., I. iii. 90).[78] With this we may compare the redundant negative in Greek after verbs of denying: οὐκ ἀπαρνοῦμαι τὸ μή; and, in Latin, non dubito quin: cf. also the use of the double negative in Plautus, neque illud haud objiciet mihi (Epid., V. i. 5). In these cases a negative appears with an infinitive where the main verb itself contains a quasi-negatival force: numerous instances may be found in Shakespeare; cf. Forbade the boy he should not pass those grounds (Pas. Pilgrim, 9).
So we find a contamination of the two constructions: ‘not—and not’ and ‘neither—not’ in cases like Shakespeare’s ‘Be not proud, nor brag not of thy might’ (Venus and Adonis, 113), = Be not ... and brag not + neither be ... nor brag.
Compare also, ‘I cannot choose one nor refuse none’ = I cannot choose one and I can (or may) refuse none + I can neither choose one nor refuse one.[79]
A pleonastic negation occurs in French and other languages after words signifying ‘without:’ cf. Mätzner, Fr. Gr., § 165: Sans NUL égard pour nos scrupules (Béranger); Elle ne voyait aucun être souffrant sans que son visage N’exprimât la peine qu’elle en ressentait (Bernardin de St. Pierre).[80] A curious pleonasm of the article occurs in the following sentence: No stronger and stranger A figure is described in the modern history of England (Justin McCarthy, History of our own Times, vol. i., ch. ii., p. 31); a contamination between There was not a stronger figure, and No stronger figure.
[NOTE TO PAGE 148].
A very interesting and useful little book has been published by Professor Nichol and M’Cormick on English Composition. It came too late into our hands for us to make use of the many instructive and often amusing examples it contains. We subjoin one (from p. 76).
‘The curses of Mr. A. B., like chickens, will come home to roost against him’ (a contamination of ‘will be brought up against him,’ and ‘will come home to roost’).