Quand un bon vin meuble mon estomac
Je suis plus savant que Balzac—
Plus sage que Pibrac.
Mon bras seul faisant l'attaque
De la nation Cossaque
La mettroit au sac.
De Charon Je passerois le lac
En dormant dans son bac.
J'irois au fier Eac
Sans que mon cœur fit tic ni tac
Présenter du tabac.
On ancient monuments are often found the letters A. E. R. A. meaning Annus erat Regni Augusti. The ignorance of copyists may probably have formed of these letters the single word ÆRA. Would it not be a better derivation than the Latin ÆS?
The work of John Albert Fabricius, the Hamburg professor, entitled Bibliotheca Græca, in which his sole object is to render an account of the Greek authors extant, occupies fourteen thick volumes in quarto.
The usual derivation of the word Metaphysics is not to be sustained. Meta physicam is tortured into meaning super physicam, and the science is supposed to take its name from its superiority to physics. The truth is, that Aristotle's treatise on Morals is next in succession to his Book of Physics, and this order he considers the rational order of study. His Ethics consequently commence with the words Μετα τα φυσικα, &c. from which the word Metaphysics.
The commentators upon Mr. Beckford's Vathek say that the locusts derive their name from having been so called by the first English settlers in America. The word comes evidently from loco usto, the havoc they made wherever they passed leaving the appearance of a place desolated by fire.