manner, and in the least compass: and the Qualities and Relations, by suitable Additions, and Composition of Primitive Words[1]; for which the Saxon Language is very remarkable, as has been before observed, and of which there are numerous Examples, in the following Treatise of Saxon Grammar, and infinitely more might have been added.
The second Enquiry is, whether or no the Copiousnes and Variety of Monosyllables may be always justly reputed a fault, and may not as justly be thought, to be very useful and ornamental? Were this a fault, it might as justly be charged upon the learned language the Latin as Greek: For the Latin you have in Lilly's Rules concerning Nouns, several Verses, made up for the most part of Monosyllables, I mention him not as a Classick, but because the Words are Classical and Monosyllables; and in the Greek there are several as it were, idle Monosyllables, that have little Significancy, except to make the Numbers in Verse compleat, or to give a Fulness to their Periods, as the Verses of Homer and other Greek Poets plainly evidence: An Instance or two may suffice;
Ἐξ οὖ δὴ τα πρῶτα διαστήτην ἐρίσαντε.
Here are four Monosyllables in this Verfe.
Τὴν δ' ἐγὼ οὐ λύσω, πρίν μω καὶ γῆρας ἔπεισεν.
Here are six Monosyllables, and one cutting off.
- ↑ Of this the Greeks give us a fair Example, when they express the Original and Author of all Things, their Πατὴρ ἀνδρῶντε θεῶντε, by their Monosyllable Σεύς, As the Hebrews do by יָהּ the Goths the Ancestors of our Saxon Progenitors by the Word 𐌲𐍉𐌸 , the Saxons, old Germans, Teutons, Francick, and English, in the Monosyllable od, the Germans Gott, and the French Dieu.
