E. I. C.
[517] Microcosmographis 1628, cited in Pennant’s London, 5th ed. 8vo. 528.
[518] Part III., Canto III., p. 213. ed. 1684.
[519] Vide a paper by E. J. C. in Gent.’s Mag. vol. xc. p. 1, 589.
A DEFENCE OF SLANG.
For the Table Book.
“To think like wise men, and to talk like common people,” is a maxim that has long stood its ground. What is the language of “common people?” slang—ergo, every body ought to talk it. What is slang? Many will answer that it consists of words used only by the lowest and most ignorant classes of society, and that to employ them would be most ungenteel. First, then, we must inquire a little what it is to be genteel, and this involves the question, what is a gentleman? Etymologically, every body knows what is the meaning of the term; and Dekker, the old English play-poet, uses it in this sense, when in one of his best dramas he justly calls our Saviour
“The first true gentleman that ever breathed.”