[22] We have the testimony of Robert, Earl of Gloucester (who wrote under Henry III. and Edward I.) to this purpose. Page 364.
"Vor bote a man couth French, me tolth of hym well lute,
Ac lowe men holdeth to Englyss and to her kunde speeche yute."
For but a man knoweth French, men told of him well little, and lowe men holdeth to English and to their native tongue.—— That is, unless a man could speak French he was little esteemed.
[23] 1731.
[24] "Ex hac malefano novetatis pruritu, Belgæ Gallicas voces passim civitate sua donando patrii sermonis puritatem nuper non leviter inquinârunt, et Chaucerus Poeta, pessimo exemplo, integris vocum plaustris ex eadem Gallia in nostram linguam invectis, eam, nimis antea a Normannorum victoriæ adulteratam, omni fere nativa gratia et nitore spoliavit."——Skinner Etymol. L. A. Pref.
[25] Raimond IV. of Aragon, count of Provence, rendered his Court a temple of the muses, and to this resorted the lovers of the Belles Lettres from every part of Europe. About the year 1300, a taste for the Provençal language and poetry was imbibed in Italy, and soon after in England.—Denina, Chap. 4.
[26] A remarkable example of this kind of stile, we have in Elphinstone's principles of the English Language. The author has taken great pains to be obscure, and has succeeded to admiration.
Of this kind of stile, the reader may see a specimen in the following passage, taken from Young's spirit of Athens. Page 6.
"Surely, in every mind, there is an emulation of virtuous superiority, which, however fortune or the meaner passions may hebitate its powers, still, at every example of success in the particular object of its predilection, glows into a momentary flame, which from frequent resuscitation may acquire a stability and strength sufficient to reach at the attainment of what, at first, was regarded solely as matter of admiration; the idea of imitation which hath thus enraptured the fancy, may in times of perilous crisis somewhat elevate the mind and influence the conduct; and if such ever may be the effect, what other lecture can ballance the utility of that, which thus animates the man, and urges him to noble and disinterested services in a good, great and public cause."
The author could hardly have invented an arrangement, better calculated to obscure his meaning.