A distinction, however, may be made. In the expression ἀνήρ τις (anær tis) = a certain man, or a man, and in the expression sum mann, the words sum and τις preserve their natural and original meaning; whilst in a man and an ox the words a and an are used in a secondary sense. These words, as is currently known, are one and the same, the n, in the form a, being ejected through a euphonic process. They are, moreover, the same words with the numeral one; Anglo-Saxon, án; Scotch, ane. Now, between the words a man and one man, there is a difference in meaning; the first expression being the most indefinite. Hence comes the difference between the English and Mœso-Gothic expressions. In the one the word sum has a natural, in the other, the word an has a secondary power.
The same reasoning applies to the word the. Compared with a man, the words the man are very definite. Compared, however, with the words that man, they are the contrary. Now, just as an and a have arisen out of the numeral one, so has the arisen out of the demonstrative pronoun þæt, or at least from some common root. It will be remembered that in Anglo-Saxon there was a form þe, undeclined, and common to all the cases of all the numbers.
In no language in its oldest stage is there ever a word giving, in its primary sense, the ideas of a and the. As tongues become modern, some noun with a similar sense is used to express them. In the course of time a change of form takes place, corresponding to the change of meaning; e.g., one becomes an, and afterwards a. Then it is that articles become looked upon as separate parts of speech, and are dealt with accordingly. No invalidation of this statement is drawn from the Greek language. Although the first page of the etymology gives us ὁ, ἡ, τὸ (ho, hæ,
to), as the definite articles, the corresponding page in the syntax informs us, that, in the oldest stage of the language, ὁ (ho) = the, had the power of οὗτος (howtos) = this.
The origin of the articles seems uniform. In German ein, in Danish en, stand to one in the same relation that an does. The French un, Italian and Spanish uno, are similarly related to unus = one.
And as, in English, the, in German der, in Danish den, come from the demonstrative pronouns, so, in the classical languages, are the French le, the Italian il and lo, and the Spanish el, derived from the Latin demonstrative ille.
In his "Outlines of Logic," the present writer has given reasons for considering the word no (as in no man) an article.
That the, in expressions like all the more, all the better, &c., is no article, has already been shown.