English spelling and spelling reform

by Thomas Raynesford Lounsbury

I

The first of these objections is connected with the subject of derivation. There goes on, we are told, an irrepressible conflict between etymological spelling and phonetic, or anything approaching phonetic spelling. If the latter come to occupy the foremost place, the former, it is asserted, will disappear. Incalculable harm would thereby be wrought both to the speech and to its speakers. According to some, life would become a burden to the individual, and the language would be ruined beyond redemption, if the spelling of a word should hide from our eyes the source from which it came. The mystic tie that binds the speech of the past to that of the present would be severed. This is the special argument which comes not unfrequently from members of the educated, and sometimes of the scholarly class, though not from that section of it which deals with English scholarship. In the course of the preceding pages there has been constant occasion to give illustrations of its falsity, and far too often of its fraud. Consequently, to discuss it directly and at length will seem to many very much like going through the process of slaying the slain. But it plays so conspicuous a part in all discussions of spelling reform, that it is perhaps advisable, if not necessary, to consider it with special fulness of detail.

There is no question, indeed, that this argument based upon etymology has the strongest hold upon the educated class. It is constantly brought forward as if it were sufficient of itself to settle the question. Words, we are told, have a descent of their own. Letters which are never heard in the spoken speech, and indeed cannot be pronounced by any conceivable position known to us of our vocal organs, are not to be dropped from the written speech, because they remind us, or at least remind some of us, of forms in the languages from which they originally came. It sends a peculiar thrill of rapture, we are assured, through the heart of the student to find, for illustration, in deign, reign, feign, and impugn, a letter g which he never thinks of pronouncing. Silent as it is to the ear, it is, nevertheless, eloquent with all the tender associations connected with dignor, fingo, regno, and impugno. That persons with little education, and on the other hand persons with the highest linguistic training, should not share in these feelings is not at all to the purpose. Such are not really the ones to be consulted. Between these two classes lies a vast body of educated men whose wishes in this matter should be considered paramount.

That this argument in their behalf may not be charged with misrepresentation, take the following passage from Archbishop Trench, one of the deservedly favorite linguistic writers of the previous generation. Furthermore, as about the only English scholar of any repute who has come to the aid of the opponents of spelling reform, his words deserve quotation on that very account. He is giving as a reason for the retention of useless letters that while they are silent to the ear, they remain eloquent to the eye. “It is urged, indeed,” wrote Trench, “as an answer to this, that the scholar does not need these indications to help him to the pedigree of the words with which he deals, that the ignorant is not helped by them; that the one knows without, and the other does not know with them; so that, in either case, they are profitable for nothing. Let it be freely granted that this, in both these cases, is true; but between these two extremes there is a multitude of persons, neither accomplished scholars on the one side, nor yet wholly without the knowledge of all languages save their own on the other; and I cannot doubt that it is of great value that these should have all helps enabling them to recognize the words which they are using, whence they came, to what words in other languages they are nearly related, and what is their properest and strictest meaning.”[36]

Now, in the first place, were all this true, the objection would not be a valid one. The well-being of the many is always to be preferred to the satisfaction of the few. A language does not exist for the sake of imparting joyful emotions to the members of a particular group who are familiar with its sources. When committed to writing it is so committed for the purpose of conveying clearly to the eye the sounds heard by the ear. Anything in the form of the printed word which stands in the way of the speediest arrival at such a result is to that extent objectionable. But even this so-called advantage of suggesting origins is distinctly limited. What educated men know of the sources of words is almost entirely confined to Latin and Greek. Of the earlier forms of the more common native words and of their meanings the immense majority of even the most highly cultivated are ignorant. Their ignorance, however, does not seem to impair their happiness any more than it does their comprehension.

But the objection, further, is a purely artificial one. The happiness conferred is a happiness assumed to be confined to the words in their present form. The example of other tongues shows there is no justification for this belief. The Italian is a phonetic language. Does any one believe that an Italian scholar experiences any less satisfaction in finding the Græco-Latin philosophia, converted in his speech into filosofia than an English one does in seeing it in the form philosophy? Has his language suffered any material injury in consequence? Were I not myself inconsistent and lazy and several other disreputable adjectives, I should write fonetic instead of phonetic. This I cheerfully admit. But were not the strictly virtuous defenders of spelling according to derivation equally lacking in consistency, and absolutely unfaithful to the high etymological ideals they hold up for our admiration, they would be writing phansy, at least, instead of fancy. In one of the sporadic attacks of common-sense which have sometimes overtaken the users of our speech, f has displaced ph in this word, though to prevent the result from being wholly rational it has substituted c for s. The Greek phantasia has come down to us through phantasy, fantasy, and has finally subsided into the present form. To the believer in etymological spelling fancy ought to be as objectionable as fonetic.

In the second place, the hollowness of this pretended regard for etymology is not only detected, it is emphasized by the fact that the opposition to change is equally pronounced in the case of words where the present form is the result of blundering ignorance which gives an utterly erroneous idea of their origin. Can any antagonist of simplification be induced by his devotion to derivation to abandon comptroller? This corrupt spelling does more than defy the pronunciation of the word; it gives an utterly false impression of its source. Controller is in Anglo-French contre-rollour, in law Latin contra-rotulator. These, again, were taken from the Latin contra, ‘against,’ and the diminutive rotulus, rotula, ‘a little wheel,’ which word in the middle ages acquired the meaning of ‘roll.’ The controller, in consequence, was the one who kept the counter-roll or register, by which the entries on some other roll were tested. How naturally the possession of such an office would be apt to give to him holding it “control” over certain others, in the modern sense of the word, is apparent on the surface. But in the sixteenth century, and even earlier, some members of that class, “neither accomplished scholars on the one side nor yet wholly without the knowledge of all languages save their own on the other,” got it into their heads that the first part of the word came from the French compter, ‘to count.’ Hence came the unphonetic spelling based upon a blunder of derivation!

Take two other examples, illustrative of this attitude of opposition. Could any upholder of etymological spelling be induced to drop the c of scent, though nobody ever pronounced the intruding letter? Yet, as it comes from the Latin sent-ire, the substitution of scent for the previous sent destroys in this case for the vast majority of educated men that delightful reminiscence of the classic tongues which, we are told, imparts so peculiar a charm to the present orthography. Mitford, the historian of Greece, was subjected to ceaseless ridicule and vituperation because he preferred the correct etymological form iland, and refused to adopt the s which had been inserted into the word under the blundering belief that it was either derived from or was in some way related to the Latin insula and the French isle.

In truth, the argument of derivation is invoked only to retain whatever orthographic anomalies we chance to have. It is abjured the moment an effort is made to root out any etymological anomalies which have been introduced into the speech. The fact is that if spelling according to derivation were heeded it would result in changes to which those proposed by any advocate of simplification of spelling would seem absurdly trivial. This would be particularly noticeable in the case of words derived from native sources. The opponent of spelling reform who bases his hostility upon etymological grounds would be aghast were he asked to conform to his principles in his practice. Out indeed would go the h of the very word aghast just used. Nothing would induce him to drop the intruding letter in this case or other letters in scores of other cases, though their only effect is to hide the origin of the word. Or take, for illustration of mere uselessness, the k of whole classes of words of native origin. The letter was as little known to the Anglo-Saxon alphabet as it was to the Roman. Hence, were spelling according to derivation strictly enforced, it would have to disappear from no small number of words where it is not merely superfluous as regards pronunciation, but gives an entirely erroneous impression of the form from which it came. It has been remarked that the original of back was bæc, of quick was cwic, of stock was stoc, of sick was seoc. Imagine the indignant feelings of the assumed ardent devotee of spelling according to derivation if he were asked to drop the final letter from these words. Yet from his own point of view it has no business there at all.

To a certain extent this particular brand of ruin had already overtaken the language. From the native words no one had ever thought of discarding the final k, because scarcely any one knew of the forms these originally had. But knowledge of Latin was widespread. Regard for derivation succeeded, therefore, in banishing it from whole classes of words taken from that language. The struggle, however, was long. The authority of Doctor Johnson was in vain invoked for its retention. One must be familiar with the history of orthography to appreciate what dissensions sprang up in once happy homes, what prognostics were indulged in of the ruin that would betide the speech, were men ever to be induced to spell musick and historick and prosaick, and a host of similar words, without their final k. Boswell, who could not help reproaching Johnson for dropping the vowel u from authour, praised him for standing up for the retention of this final consonant. He represents him as saying that he spelled Imlac in Rasselas with a c at the end because by so doing it was less like English, which, he continued, “should always have the Saxon k added to the c.” The “Saxon k” was the lexicographer’s personal contribution to the original English alphabet. “I hope,” continued Boswell, “the authority of the great master of our language will stop this curtailing innovation by which we see critic, public, etc., frequently written instead of critick, publick, etc.”