The St. Louis Republic. [volume], June 11, 1905, SUNDAY MAGAZINE, Page 4, Image 56

About The St. Louis Republic. [volume] (St. Louis, Mo.) 1888-1919

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SUNDAY MAGAZINE for JUNE II. 190
',uetio:i. imt of them needle-, anil a few of tin 1
frc-h ami tent- and -inj:n.int. The adroit writer
cannot ilo 1 tetter than accept the advice pro'Tcrod
by one of tin- sagc-st of M!i re's chara tor Ari-te
in the ,"ScIioii for Husbands" who declares th.it
it is ?t-st to follow the fahion -duwly in language
as well a in clothes.
Ami another comic dramat-st. Hen Jonon. who
rivals Moli. re in hi-. -.ti-nmon-sen-e. puts the oae
pithilv a- iva his wont, when lie as-crtcd that
"custom is the mit certain mistress of language,
as the public stamp makes the current money.
Hut wo mn-t not It- too frequent with the mint,
every ilay coining, nor fetch words from the ex
treme and uttermost ages. sir.ee the chief virtue of
a style is perspicuitv. ami nothing mp vicious in it
as to neeil an inleqreter. Words lmrruwed "i
antiquity i!o lend a kind of majesty to stylo, an.l
are not without their delight -ometimes. For they
have the authority of years, ami out of their inter
mission do win them-clves a kiml of grace-like
newness. Hut the eldest of the present, ami newest
of the past language, is the best."
The French, who have le-- initiative than the
twin-peoples that speak Knglish. have yicMctl au
thonty to the Frciith Acailemy. founded by
Kit hclic-u. to act as tlic guardian ami trustee of
the language Whenever a word or a phrase has
I -con passed ujion hy the Acailemy ami admitted
to citizenship, then its validity is plated lt-yond
all lUcstiou. Hut there is no French dictionary,
even if it is edited iiy a moiulfr of the Aiailemy.
which does not include thousands of locutions not
yet warranted by the amval of the Aade:ny ;i
a whole Ami there are feu of the individual mem-It-rs
of the Academy v. ho do not uo unhesitatingly
a host of wonls which they h.ive not yet sanctioned
collectively. Thus it is that the Academy lags far
liehiml the lest usage as established hy its own
tneuuVrs. Thus al- we six how futile :i Kich-t-heu's
e'iort to confide the tare of the language to
any ldy of men. however tom-ftont or however
distinguished. Xo dikes ,a:i Ik et to the over
turning forces which ever are hroadening the com
mon sj.cech. at le.tst no arti:iti.:l embankments are
elective for long. The sole restraint must In-sought
in thecominon-M'Hse. the tact and the tastein whnh
Hen Joiison and Mohcrc wioly jut their trust.
There is Mgnil'uan.e in the fact that not a few
of the momlfrs of the French Academy employ
frcelv many phrases not approved by the august
tribunal to which they It-long. Many authors of
the most scholarly distinction have delighted to
keep their talk vigorous, even if their writing was
tilt rare-titled. Tennyson had a relish for the homely
veru.li ular. and used the ilaimst words, on casioti
finding a keen delight in their unadorned directness
He toM Oarlyle ojne that if any m.m-on-horsihaik
any masterful Duke William, should appear in
F.uglaml to curb jhtsou.i1 li t-rty. "he"l xnui feci
my knife in his guts." Ami in Professor Pock's
rot cut and most admirable biography of i'rescott
we are told of the fondness of that slatolv ami
soiurou historian for the f-ank colloquialisms :"
his station and of his time No doubt Pretott
found in these siiatthos of slang a wholesome cor
rective lor that Johnsonian grandiloquent c toward
uhn h he was tempted ly his early training.
Professor Pock point out that in his first !k.
the '"History of Ferdinand ai.il Isalt-lla." published
in .s;7- "l'reso:t had not vet emancipated himself
from that formalism which had Kin inherited from
the eighteenth- cut ury writers, ami which Amcri
ans with the wonted conservatism of jirovitnial.
retameil long after Knglislimcn had It-gun to write
with naturalness ami simj.lnitv " And in the
jiref.n to the s,-, oful sprits of the " Higclow Pajt-rs."
written thirty years after 1 rcsc .; t ' first history.
Lowell assorted "that the g-e.lt vi e of Amcriian
writing and sj-.iking was a studjeil want of sim
Init that we were in danger of coining to !k
on o.ir mother tongue as a dead language, to It
anight in the grammar and Inttotiary rather than
m the heart "
Lowell went on to sav that "it i only from
its piots s-j :J,C H-in generation that a language
4 an lie riforted with fresh vtgic for its needs;
wli.it tn.iv lt c.illtsl a literate diale t grows
ever more ami more ;tilantic ami foreign, till it
l-s :..- at last as untitling a vehiile for living
though: a monki-h Latin" F.lsewhere in the
s.i"n ltitp-luitm:: Iiwell ds.larcd that "there is
death in the dii tinnarv." and that "true igor and
luartmess of phrase do not jiass from ;age to
pagt . !i: from :nan to :nan. when the hratn is
km He! ami the lips Jupplied by downright living
interests ' j
Atter praising LimJa" ":ruly :nas uliiie ling
!:sh. vlassj, Itecnti'e i: was of no iettal jt'rioil ami
level at once to the highest ami the lowest of his
tountrymcn." Lowell voncd his scom !f mn
gressional grandilo-.ueme In the two -iw years
sunc Lowell wrote this indictment, there lias K-eti
an evident improvement in the directness of our
puMic sj-eaking and in the app-eciatioti of dirivt
nes. Homhast there is in plenty still, and "talking
for Ituncom!." also; hut the evil intluence of Web
ster's orotund manner, wholly utisuttcd to men less
amply framed than lie. scents to If passing away,
liven if we have now m public speaker who can
attain at will to the noble and lofty simplicity of
Lincoln, there is satisfaction in recalling that our
Secretary of State is the author of the nny "I'ike
I'ov.nty Hallads." and that our President is the au
thor of the vivid and pkturos.iv.o "Winning of the
West." The stvle of Mr. K-scveIl and of Mr.
Hay. oath excellent in its own fashion, is tin style
of a gentleman and of a scholar, no doubt, but it
is also the stylo of a man- of a man not stifled in
a library, but alert and alive by rea-on of friendly
contact with his fellow-men. Stnh also is the stle
of more than one of our younger university presi
dents, in whose public uttcran.vs we tint I an ap
ppiath at least ''to the ideal "sjtxvh of the people
in the mouth of the scholar."
It is pleasant also to note tliat the two authors
who now have the. widest j"pularity among the
jfoples that sjt-ak F.nglish. the two writers of our
language whose fame seems most solidly established.
Mark Twain ami Rudyard Kipling, are It.th of
them anxious always to get into the printed page
as much as possible of the elemental energy of the
sjken word. Hoth of them are verbal craftsmen
of surpasing skill, lt-mling wonls to their bidding;
and I Kith of them are ever on the alert to avoid
the merely txiokish and the emptily literate. It is
to le no to I al-o that Mark Twain is an American,
and that Kudyard Kipling still reveals the intluence
exerted on him in his youth by the Amcriian story
tellers from whom he learned his trade when he was
serving his apprenticeship in India. This may be
taken as evidence that the w iters of the I'nited
States have come to a lt-tter understanding of the
WHEN-OUR SHIP.
COMES IK
By Grace G. Bos&icftl
We Jre.im of the nHe tilings e "It J.
of the ln-Itul uitJs ue"ll sj.
Of the hearts we'll sheer anJ the huns we'll mciii.
When iur slup cumes up the hiy.
But alas f.r the Jay tlut is passing .y
With ne or a kinJIy JceJ :
AnJ al.is f(ir the hearts that are hrer-king ntw
l".r the want of kinj worjs to sceJ!
Wo tell of the wonJrous gifts o"ll gue
To the helpless anJ suk anJ pir.
Huw n me tlut may want shall l-e tumeJ away
l"rn the shelter of our J.r:
Hut we wait tor oar ship tlut nexer comes in.
AnJ we let the ears go lv.
Till our kmJ thoughts taJe iti the misty past
AnJ our Ji'ipos in the KtaxeyarJ l:e
Then rra". let us Jo wlut we cm each Jay
To lighten earth's sorrow anJ care.
Let usstaileatiJ speak ktnJlynJ strive as we may
To g:o of ourselves a stun ;
1'iir our slup is like castles in Spain, our own
As long as the Jream may last:
But when Jrcarns shj. the:r anchor anJ Jntt aay
Thctr white satis are ltt in the past.
tr:e prinapies of rhetoric. They seem : have
reiiouinetl the lorig-tatlcd Johnsonese, most jn
tlerous and most ttlautic of dialects, in which our
fathers delighted only half a icnlury ago.
Perhaps tiiis impp.vement in American style s
title in part to the disestablishment of the tin tion.iry
as a 'inal authority and to the dicpwuing of the
gnrntnar as the sole ir.onan.lt of all it sv.rvt-yn'
Pirhaps it is due to the growing peri option that the
spoken language is franker, fresher and rrccr ili.fi
tlie written. The old grammars were absurdK
arbitrary and sclf-sufin icnt in the rules thev laid
i low n and in the way they sought to slunkle the
healthy growth of the language. They were guilty
of the tinpan tollable sin of declaring that Shakts
pe.ire anil the translators of the F.nvlish Hil-V
had committed faults of grammar, as if nice n:
loins did not curtsy to gre:i: kings. These nit J
fashioned grammarians arrogated to thein-elvi
the privilege of saying that this Usage v. as rig!
ami that usage wrong, instead of contenting them
selves with the humbler task of recording the
several usages whit h thev might find in the p.igt s
of the masters of Knglish.
A lomparison of two American grammars Lindlev
Murrav's and the more ret cut volume bv Protess,,r
". K. t'arpentcr. will serve to show how tar v e h.te
ailvam otl. for the later author is modest and ten: i
live where the earlier is arngant ami dorcmccrini
The trouble with these outwoni grammars ami
rhetorics was nl merely that they laid an lntcrdn '
tin tertaiu locutions, but that their tone was always
pmhibithe. They kept on dot hiring that this or
that must not ! done. Their advice was mainlv
negative, and thus it tended always to t ramp ami
to sli'Vn. They orderol us to shun double nega
tives and split infinitives and final prejiiiion.s
a if mere avoidance of ctTor would ever give sine"
tt a phrase. They set up fabe standards ami the
result was that "st hoolmastcr's Knglish" It-tamo
a term of reproach. I" r it desertliil a stxle junelesss
ami nerveless, a style unfit for hard work a stjle
whit h was as remote as juissihlo from the terse vigor
of at tual speech. These false standards are not
ol wholly cast tmt; ami there are still sold here in
the I" intcd States every year thousands of text
tua.ks which lay down rules of mi real validity,
and whith tell t lie st tti lent what not to say. instead
of helping him to say what he wants. Hut although
this is unfortunately true, it is true also that in m
department of education has the impro emetit
lteti more obvious than in the tcathing of Kngli.h
Attention is now rarely called to the "grammatical
errors" of Shakespeare, and the callow student is
not now ptr'ttl i with the toticeit that he know .
more alft'.t the Knglish language than the mighty
masters who made it what it is.
Three t outlines ago. Samuel Daniel, the ft-la:i-rente
of King James, made i prophetic iivitury
Anil who in time knows w hither we tnav vert
TI.e treasures of our tongue' t uli.it strange short-s
Tlie gain t.t tmr ltt glory m.v If cnt
To enrich unknowing nations with our siim -J
What world in the Vrt tinforiT.tsl Oifi-Unt
May coino retinetl with atients tli.it are ot:rsJ
Not only in the "unformed Occident" but tin t lu
st range shores of the 1 Irieilt also are the treasures of
teir tongue now eiirnhing nations unknown when
iMuicl rimed those lines. And here it is that
Knglish is favored alve all other languages, that
it is sf.iken not merely in a single ompaet count rv
but by two groat jt-oples with their many outposts
on all the seven se:is. There is thus the less danger
that the language may stagnate. There is thus a
far greater variety of souries of refreshment and
renewal. The Knglish language is the mother-tongue
of the Hritish ami of the Americans, of the Canadians
and of the Australians, and new words and new
meanings are Ifing contributed constantly from
everyone of these sources of supply.
Xor is there any danger of tontntntnation in this
multitude of contributors, all loyal to the -same ideal
Professor Lomishury has stated the governing pnn
tiple with his ctistomarv tlearness ami common
sense "The tin.il decision." as to propriety of
usage and as to all new words and plinises. "rests
not with individuals; neither with men of letters
however prominent, nor with scholars, however
learned. It is in the hands of the whole Ix-dv of
cultivated Users of speech. They have an unerring
itistimt as to its necessities. They are a great deal
wiser than any of their self-constituted advisers
however prominent Fortunatelv tm. thc-v have
the ability to tarry their wishes into e'Tet t Tin v
know what thev need, ami they can neither If
t-rsiiaded out of it nor bullied out of it. . .
If. in spite of clamor, they retain a -cord or
construction it may gcnerallv be taken for granted
that i: supplies a demand which really c ists."