To conclude, the Greeks have left the most durable monuments of human wisdom, fortitude, magnificence, and ingenuity, in their improvement of every art and science, and in the finest writings upon every subject necessary, profitable, elegant, or entertaining.

The Greeks have furnished the brightest examples of every virtue and accomplishment, natural or acquired, political, moral, or military: they excelled in mathematics and philosophy; in all the forms of government, in architecture, navigation, commerce, war: as orators, poets, and historians, they stand as yet unrivalled, and are like to stand so for ever; nor are they less to be admired for the exercises and amusements they invented, and brought to perfection, in the institution of their public games, their theatres, and sports.

Let us further observe, that in vain our readers will look for these admired excellencies in any of the best translations from the Greek: they may indeed communicate some knowledge of what the originals contain; they may present you with propositions, characters, and events: but allowing them to be more faithful and more accurate than they really are, or can well be, still they are no better than copies, in which the spirit and lustre of the originals are almost totally lost. The mind may be instructed, but will not be enchanted: The picture may bear some faint resemblance, and if painted by a masterly hand give pleasure; but who would be satisfied with the canvass, when he may possess the real object? who would prefer a piece of coloured glass to a diamond? It is not possible to preserve the beauties of the original in a translation.-The powers of the Greek are vastly beyond those of any other tongue. Whatever the Greeks describe is always felt, and almost seen; motion and music are in every tone, and enthusiasm and inchantment possess the mind:

Greis ingenium, Graïïs dedit ore rotundo,
Musa loqui.
HORACE.

181. SECT. VIII. Of the Latin Language. Origin of the RoTHIS language, like every other spoken by barbarimans, and of their ans, was in its beginning rough and uncultivated.— language. What people the Romans were, is a point in which an* Tit. Liv. tiquarians are not yet agreed. In their own opinion lib 1. cap 1. they were sprung from the Trojans *; Dion. Halicar. &c. derives them from the Greekst; and Plutarch informs + Antiq. Rom. lib. i. us that some people imagined that they were sprung Vita Ro- from the Pelasgi. The fact is, they were a mixture of people collected out of Latium and the adjacent parts,

mul.

The Latin language ought then to be a mingled mass of the Arcadian, that is, the Æolian || Greek, the Pe- || Strabo, lasgic, Hetruscan, and Celtic dialects. These jarring lib v elements, like the people to whom they belonged respec- licarn. AnDionys.Ha tively, gradually incorporated, and produced what was tig. lib i. afterwards called the Latin tongue.

The Arcadians were a Pelasgic § tribe, and conse- § Strabo et quently spoke a dialect of that ancient Greek produced Herodotus. by the coalition of this tribe with the savage aborigines of Greece. This dialect was the ground-work of the Latin. Every scholar allows, that the Æolian Greek, which was strongly tinctured with the Pelasgic, was the model upon which the Latin language was formed. From this deduction it appears, that the Latin tongue is much more ancient than the modern Greek; and of course we may add, that the Greek, as it stood before it was thoroughly polished, bore a very near resemblance to that language. Hence we think we may conclude, that the knowledge of the Latin language is necessary in order to understand the Greek. Let us not then expect to find the real ingredients of the Greek tongue in the academic groves of Athens, or in Smyrna, or in Rhodope, or in Hæmos; but on the banks of the Tiber and on the fields of Laurentum.

A very considerable part of the Latin tongue was derived from the Hetruscan. That people were the masters of the Romans in every thing sacred. From them they learned the ceremonies of religion, the method of arranging games and public festivals, the art of divination, the interpretation of omens, the method of lustrations, expiations, &c. It would, we believe, be easy to prove, that the Pelasgi* and Hetrusci (x) were * Thucydsthe same race of people; and if this was the case, their des, lib vi. languages must have differed in their dialect only.

The Umbrian or Celtic enters deeply into the composition of the Latin tongue. For proof of this, we need only appeal to Pelloutier, Bullet's Memoires de la Langue Celtic, partie premiere, Abbé Pezron's Origin of Ancient Nations, &c. Whether the old Celtic differed essentially from the Pelasgic and Hetruscan, would be a matter of curious investigation, were this a proper subject for the present article.

The Latin abounds with oriental words, especially Hebrew, Chaldaic, and Persian. These are certainly remains of the Pelasgic and Hetruscan tongues, spoken originally by people who emigrated from regions where those were parts of the vernacular language.-The

α

Greeks,

Latin

Greeks, in polishing their language, gradually distorted Language, and disfigured vast numbers of the rough eastern vocables, which made a very great part of it. (See the preceding section).

The Romans, of less delicate organs, left them in their natural state, and their natural air readily bewrays their original. We had collected a large list of Latin words still current in the east; but find that Thomas† Glossary, sin† and Ogerius (Y), and especially Mons. Gebelin, in his most excellent Latin Dictionary, have rendered that labour superfluous.

182

How far the Latin resembles

In this language, too, there are not a few Gothic terms. How these found their way into the Latin, it is not easy to discover, unless, as Pelloutier supposes, the Celtic and Gothic languages were originally the same or perhaps we may conjecture, that such words were part of a primitive language, which was at one time universal.

There are, besides, in the Latin a great number of obsolete Greek words, which were in process of time obliterated, and others substituted in their room; so the Greek. that, upon the whole, we are persuaded, that the most effectual method to distinguish the difference between the early and modern Greek, would be to compare the ancient Latin with the latter; there being, we imagine, very little difference between the ancient Greek and Latin in the earliest periods.

However that may be, it is certain that the Roman letters were the same with the ancient Greek.-Forma literis Latinis quæ veterrimis Græcorum, says TaciTacitus, tus; and Pliny says the same thing, and for the truth of his assertion he appeals to a monument extant in his own times.

Anal.

lib. i. § Nat Hist. lib. vii. cap. 59.

These old Greek letters were no other than the Pelasgic, which we have shown from Diodorus Siculus (see preceding Section) to have been prior to the Cadmean. For the figure of these letters, see Astle, Postellus, Montfaucon, Palægraphia Græca, Mons. Gebelin, and our Plates XV. and XVI.

That the Latins borrowed the plan of their declensions from the Greeks, is evident from the exact resemblance of the terminations of the cases throughout the three similar declensions. In nouns of the first declension, the resemblance is too palpable to stand in need of illustration. In the second, the Greek genitive is . In Latin the o is thrown out, and the termination becomes i. In the Greek section, we have observed, that the sounds of and differed very little; therefore the Latins used instead of v. The Latin dative ends in o, which is the Greek dative, throwing away subscriptum, which was but faintly sounded in that language. No genuine Greek word ended in μ or m.

The Hellenes seemed to have abhorred that bellowing liquid; it is, however, certain that they imported it from the east, as well as the other letters, and that they employed it in every other capacity, except in that of closing words. In the termination of flexions, they changed it into y.

The Latins retained m, which had been imported to them as a terminating letter at an era before the Greek

Latin

The Language.

language had undergone its last refinement.-Hence the Latin accusative in um, instead of the Greek or. vocative case, we imagine, was in this declension originally like the nominative. The Latins have no dual number, because, in our opinion, the Æolian dialect, from which they copied, had none. It would be, we think, a violent stretch of etymological exertion, to derive either the Latin genitive plural of the second declension from the same case of the Greek, or that of the latter from the former; we therefore leave this anomaly, without pretending to account for its original formation. The third declensions in both languages are so exactly parallel, that it would be superfluous to compare them. The dative plural here is another anomaly, and we think a very disagreeable one, which we leave to the conjectures of more profound etymologists.

For the other peculiarities of Latin nouns, as they are nearly similar to those of the Greek, we must beg leave to remit our readers to that section for information.

183 The Latins have no articles, which is certainly a de- Deficiency fect in their language. The Pelasgic, from which they of articles. copied, had not adopted that word in the demonstrative sense. Homer indeed seldom uses it; and the probability is, that the more early Greek used it less frequently, at least in the sense above mentioned. Thus in Latin, when I say, video hominem, it is impossible to find out by the bare words whether the word hominem intimates a man," or "the man" whereas in Greek it would be Βλεπω άνθρωπον, I see a man, Βλεπω τον avbewrov, I see the man. Hence the first expression is indefinite, and the second definite.

66

184

The substantive verb sum in Latin seems to be partly Origin of formed from the Greek and partly not. Some of the the substanpersons of the present tense have a near resemblance to tive verb, the Greek verb i or u, while others vary widely from that archetype. The imperfect præterite and præterperfect have nothing common with the Greek verb, and cannot, we think, be forced into an alliance with it. The future ero, was of old eso, and is indeed genuine Greek. Upon the whole, in our apprehension, the Latin substantive verb more nearly resembles the Persian verb hesten than that of any other language we are acquainted with.

185

From what exemplar the Latin verbs were derived, and of ois not, we think, easily ascertained. We know that at- ther verbs.. tempts have been made to deduce them all from the Eolic Greek, and that the Romans themselves were extremely fond of this chimera; but the almost numberless irregularities, both in the formation and conjugation of their verbs, induce us to believe that only a part of them were formed upon that model. We are apt to think that the terminations in bam, bas, bat, bamus, &c. are produced by their union with a fragment of some obsolete verb, which is now wholly lost. In the verb amo, e. g. we are sure that the radix am is the Hebrew word mother; but how am-abam, am-abo, am-arem were fabricated, and connected with the radical am, is not so easily determined. That Latin verbs are composed of an inflexible radix and another flexible verb, as well as the Greek, cannot be doubted; but what this flexible

cause of an awkward circumlocution wherever it happens Latin to present itself. Thus, "The general having crossed Language. the river drew up his army;" Imperator, cum transiisset flumen, aciem instruxit. Here cum transiisset flumen is a manifest circumlocution, which is at once avoided in the Greek ὁ ήγεμων πέρασας τον ποταμον, &c. This must always prove an incumbrance in the case of active intransitive verbs. When active deponent verbs occur, it is easily avoided. Thus, "Cæsar having encouraged the soldiers, gave the signal for joining battle;" Casar cohortatus milites, prælii committendi signum dedit.

Latin flexible auxiliary was, we think, cannot now be clearly Language. ascertained. It is not altogether improbable that such parts of the verbs as deviate from the Greek archetype were supplied by fragments of the verb ha, which pervades all the branches of the Gothic language, and has, we think, produced the Latin verb habeo. When the Greeks began to etymologize, they seldom overpassed the verge of their own language: the Latins pursued nearly the same course. If their own language presented a plausible etymology, they embraced it; if not, they immediately had recourse to the Greek; and this was the ne plus ultra of their etymological researches. Cicero, Quintilian, Festus, &c. and even Varro, the most learned of all the Romans, stop here; all beyond is either doubt or impenetrable darkness. Their opinion above mentioned we offer only as a conjecture; the decision we leave to more able critics.

186 Deficien

tin verbs.

The want of aorists or indefinite tenses seems to us a cies in La- palpable defect in the Latin language. The use of these among the Greeks entitled the writer to express the specific variations of time with more accuracy and precision than the Latins, who never attempted to specify them by any other tenses but the imperfect and pluperfect. Indeed we should imagine, that both the Greeks and Latins were much inferior to the English in this respect. The Latin word lego, for example, may be translated into English three different ways: 1st, I read; 2d, I do read; 3d, I am reading.

187 Irregularities in the conjuga

tions.

188

The Latins, in reducing verbs to their four conjugations, formed their inflexions in a very irregular manner. Many very of the first class inflect their præterite and supine like those of the second: thus domo, instead of giving avi and atum, has ui and itum, like monui and monitum. Again, not a few verbs of the third conjugation have ivi and atum, as if they belonged to the fourth; e. g. peto, petivi, petitum. Then, some verbs have io in the present, ivi in the præterite, and itum in the supine, while, contrary to the rules of analogy, they in reality belong to the third: such are cupio, cupivi, cupitum, cupere, &c. Some verbs of the second conjugation have their præterite and supine as if they belonged to the third; thus, jubeo, jussi, jussum, jubere; augeo, auxi, auctum, augere. Some verbs, which are actually of the fourth conjugation, have their præterite and supine as if they were of the third; thus sentio, sensi, sensum, sentire; haurio, hausi, haustum, haurire, &c. If these are not manifest irregularities, we cannot what deserves the name. The fact seems to stand say thus: The Romans were originally a banditti of robbers, bankrupts, runaway slaves, shepherds, husbandmen, and peasants of the most unpolished character. They were engaged in perpetual broils and quarrels at home, and seldom enjoyed repose abroad. Their profession was robbery and plunder. Like old Ishmael, their hands were against every man, and every man's hand against them. In such a state of society no time was left for cultivating the sciences. Accordingly the arts of war and government were their sole profession. This is so true, that their own poet characterizes them in the following manner :

Excudunt alii spirantia mollius æra, &c. The Latin Another blemish in the Latin tongue is occasioned deficient in by its wanting a participle of the præterite sense in the participles. active voice. This defect is perpetually felt, and is the 3

Another palpable defect in this language arises from the want of a participle of the present passive. This again must produce an inconveniency upon many occasions, as will be obvious to every Latin student almost every moment.

189

The two supines are universally allowed to be sub- Supines and stantive nouns of the fourth declension. How these gerunds. assumed the nature of verbs it is not easy to determine. When they are placed after verbs or nouns, the matter is attended with no difficulty; but how they should acquire an active signification, and take the case of the verb with which they are connected, implies, we should think, a stretch of prerogative.

The Latin gerunds form another unnatural anomaly. Every Latin scholar knows that those words are nothing but the neuters of the participles of the future passive. The fabricators of the Latin tongue, however, elevated them from their primary condition, giving them upon many occasions an active signification. In this case we must have recourse to

Si volet usus,

Quem penes arbitrium est et jus et norma loquendi. Another inconveniency, perhaps more severely felt than any of the preceding, arises from the want of the use of the present participle of the verb sum. Every body knows what a conveniency is derived from the frequent use of the participle wy in Greek; and indeed it appears to us somewhat surprising that the Latins neglected to introduce the participle ens into their language. In this we believe they are singular. Here again a circumlocution becomes necessary in such a case as the following: "The senate being at Rome, passed a decree." Instead of saying senatus ens Romæ, legem tulit, we are obliged to say cum senatus Romæ esset, &c. If the words ens or existens had been adopted, as in the Greek, this odious circumlocution would have been avoided.

Many other defects of the like kind will occur to every person who shall choose to search for them, and those in the most approved classical authors. Perhaps our mentioning so many may be deemed invidious by the admirers of that language; but we write from conviction, and that must be our apology.

190 Different

If one take the trouble to compare the structure of the Greek and Latin languages, he will, we think, quickly genius of be convinced that their characteristic features are ex- the Latin and Greek tremely different. The genius of the former seems easy and natural; whereas that of the latter, notwithstanding languages, the united efforts of poets, orators, and philosophers, still bears the marks of violence and restraint. Hence it appears that the Latin tongue was pressed into the service, and compelled almost against its will to bend to the laws of the Grecian model. Take a sentence of

Hebrew,

Latin Hebrew, Chaldean, Arabian, &c. and try to translate Language it into Greek without regarding the arrangement of the words, and you will find it no difficult attempt; but make the same trial with respect to the Latin, and you will probably find the labour attended with considerable difficulty. To translate Greek into English is no laborious task; the texture of the two languages is so congenial, that the words and phrases, and even the idiomatic expressions, naturally slide into each other. With the Latin the case is quite otherwise; and before elegant English can be produced, one must deviate considerably from the original. Should we attempt to translate a piece of English into Greek, and at the same time into Latin, the translation of the former would be attended with much less difficulty than that of the latter, supposing the translator equally skilled in both languages.

191

Causes of

this differ- cause.

ence.

192 The Latin

This incongruity seems to spring from the following Before any man of considerable abilities, either in the capacity of a poet, grammarian, or rhetorician, appeared at Rome, the language had acquired a strong and inflexible tone, too stubborn to be exactly moulded according to the Grecian standard. After a language has continued several centuries without receiving a new polish, it becomes like a full grown tree, incapable of being bent to the purposes of the mechanic. For this reason, it is highly probable, that the tongue in question could not be forced into a complete assimilation with the Greek. Notwithstanding all these obstructions, in process of time it arrived at such an exalted pitch of perfection, as to rival, perhaps to excel, all the other European languages, the Greek only excepted. Had men of the taste, judgment, and industry of Ennius, Plautus, Terence, Cicero, and the worthies of the Augustan age, appeared in the early stages of the Roman commonwealth, we may believe that their language would have been thoroughly reduced to the Grecian archetype, and that the two dialects might have improved each other by a rivalship between the nations who employed them.

Without pretending to entertain our readers with a pompous and elaborate account of the beauties of that imperial language which have been detailed by writers almost without number, we shall endeavour to lay before them as briefly as possible its pristine character, the steps and stages by which it gradually rose to perfection, the period when it arrived at the summit of its excellence, and by what means it degenerated with a rapid career till it was lost among those very people to whom it owed its birth.

We have observed already, that the Latin tongue tongue was a colluvies of all the languages spoken by the vacomposed grant people who composed the first elements of that rechiefly of public. The prevailing dialects were the Pelasgic or and Celtic Hetruscan, which we think were the same; and the

Pelasgic

words.

Celtic, which was the aboriginal tongue of Italy. Hence the primary dialect of the Romans was composed of discordant materials, which in our opinion never acquired a natural and congenial union. Be that as it may, this motley mixture was certainly the original dia

lect of the Romans. The Pelasgic or Hetruscan part of Latin it retained a strong tincture of the oriental style. The Language. Celtic part seems to have been prevalent, since we find that most of the names of places (z), especially in the middle and northern parts of Italy, are actually of Celtic original. It is therefore clear that the style of the first Romans was composed of the languages above mentioned. Who those first Romans were, we believe it is impossible to determine with any degree of certainty. The Roman historians afford us as little information upon that subject, as their etymologists do upon the origin of their language. Their most celebrated writers upon this point were Ælius Gallus, Quintus Cornificius, Nonius Marcellus, Festus, and some others of less note. At the head of these we ought to place Terentius Varro, whom Cicero styles the most learned of all the Romans. From these writers we are to expect no light. Their etymologies are generally childish and futile. Of the language of the most ancient Romans we can only reason by analogy; and by that rule we can discover nothing more than what we have advanced above.

In the first place we may rest assured that the dual number, the articles, the participle above mentioned, the aorists, and the whole middle voice, never appeared in the Latin tongue; and accordingly were not current in those languages from which it was copied, at least at the time when it was first fabricated.

Besides all this, many circumstances concur to make it highly probable that, in the earliest period of the language, very few inflexions were introduced. 1st, When the Pelasgi left Greece, the Greek language itself was not fully polished. 2d, The Arcadians were never thoroughly cultivated. They were a rustic pastoral people, and little minded the refinements of a civilized state; consequently the language they brought into Italy at that era must have been of a coarse and irregular contexture. 3d, When the Thessalian* Pelasgi arrived in * Dionys. Italy about the time of Deucalion, the Greek itself was Halicarn. rude and barbarous; and, which is still of more consequence, if we may credit Herodotus quoted in the former section, that people had never adopted the Hellenic tongue. Hence it appears, that the part of the Latin language derived from the Pelasgic or Hetruscan (for those we believe to have been the same) must have taken a deep tincture from the oriental tongue. (See preceding Section). If we may judge of the Celtic of that age by that of the present, the same character must likewise have distinguished its structure.

lib. i.

193

state.

From these circumstances, we think it appears that Hence the earliest language of the Romans was very little di- little inversified with inflections. It nearly resembled the orien- flected in its tal exemplar, and consequently differed widely from the original modern Latin. The effect of this was, that the modern Romans could not understand the language of their early progenitors. Polybius †, speaking of the earliest treaty + Lib. 3. between the Romans and Carthaginians, makes the fol- sub initio. lowing observation: "Believe me (says he), the Roman language has undergone so many changes since that time

Latin time (A) to the present, that even those who are most Language. deeply skilled in the science of antiquities cannot understand the words of that treaty but with the greatest difficulty."

194

Bent after

the Gre

cian model.

From this source we make no doubt has flowed that vast number of oriental words with which the Latin language is impregnated. These were originally inflexible. like their brethren of the east. They were not disguised as they now are with prefixes, affixes, metatheses, syncopas, antitheses, &c. but plain and unadorned in their natural dress.

After the Romans became acquainted with the Æowards into lian Greeks, who gradually seized upon both coasts of Italy towards the south, which they called Magna Græcia, they began to affect a Grecian air, and to torture their language into that foreign contexture. It appears, however, that at first the Grecian garb sat rather awkwardly, and several marks of violence were easily discerned. The most ancient specimen of this kind that we can recollect consists of the remains of the twelve tables. Here every thing is rude and of a clumsy cast; for though by this time considerable progress had been made in refinement, and the language of Rome had begun to appear in a Grecian uniform, still those changes were not altogether natural. Soon after appeared Marcus Fabius Pictor and Sisenna; historians often quoted by Livy, but whose works are long since irrecoverably lost. The Fasti Capitolini are often mentioned; but they too perished in the burning of the Capitol during the civil wars between Marius and Sylla. Had those monuments escaped the ravages of time, we should have been able to mark the progress of the Latin tongue from stage to stage, and to ascertain with the greatest accuracy its gradual configuration in the course of its progress towards the Grecian standard. We must therefore leave the Latin tongue during those periods rude and barbarous, and descend to others better known and more characteristically marked. Those commenced after that

195

The principal authors by whom it

was gra

lished.

Græcia capta ferum victorem cepit, et artes
Intulit agresti Latio.

In this period we find Ennius, who wrote a Roman history in hexameter verse in 18 books, which he called Annals; most part of which is now lost. He likewise translated Euhemerus de Origine Deorum; a work often dually po- mentioned by the Christian fathers in their disputes with the Pagans. It is sometimes quoted by Cicero. Then followed Caius Lucilius the famous satirist, and a number of other writers, such as Accius, Valerius, Ædituus, Alpinus, &c. whose fragments were published by the Stephens, Paris, 1564. All these imitated the writers of Greece or translated from them. By their perseverance and active exertions, the spirit of these authors was transfused into the Latin tongue, and its structure accommodated to the Grecian plan.

Plautus and Terence, by translating the comedies of Menander and Diphilus into their own language, taught the Latin muses to speak Attic Greek. To speak that language was then the ton of the times, as it is now with

us to chatter French. Greek tutors were retained in Latin every reputable family; and many Romans of the first Language. rank were equally qualified to speak or write both in Greek and Latin. The original jargon of Latium was now become obsolete and unintelligible; and Cato the Ancient condescended to learn the Greek language at 85.

ult.

196

To pretend to enumerate the various, and we may The oldadd inimitable, examples of the Augustan or golden age en age of of the Roman tongue, would be an insult to the under-Rome. standing of our readers: we shall only take the liberty to translate a few lines from a most excellent historian *, * Velleius who, had his honesty been equal to his judgment, Paterculus, might have rivalled the most celebrated writers of his lib. i. cap. country. Having observed, that the Greek authors, who excelled in every province of literature, had all made their appearance nearly about the same space of time, confined within very narrow limits, he adds, "Nor was this circumstance more conspicuous among the Greeks than among the Romans; for unless we go back to the rough and unpolished times, which deserve commendation only on account of their invention, the Roman tragedy is confined to Accius and the period when he flourished. The charming wit of Latin elegance was brought to light by Cecilius, Terentius, and Afranius, nearly in the same age. As for our historians (to add Livy also to the age of the former), if we except Cato and some old obscure ones, they were all confined to a period of 80 years; so neither has our stock of poets extended to a space much backward or forward. But the energy of the bar, and the finished beauty of prose eloquence, setting aside the same Cato (by leave of P. Crassus, Scipio, Lælius, the Gracchi, Fannius, and Ser. Galba, be it spoken), broke out all at once under Tully the prince of his profession; so that one can be delighted with none before him, and admire none except such as have either seen or were seen by that

orator."

107

racy of the

From this quotation it plainly appears, that the Romans themselves were convinced of the short duration of the golden age of their language. According to the most judicious critics, it commenced with the era of Cicero's oratorical productions, and terminated with the reign of Tiberius, or perhaps it did not reach beyond the middle of that prince's reign. It is generally be- Causes of lieved that eloquence, and with it every thing liberal, the degene elevated, and manly, was banished Rome by the despo- Latin tism of the Cæsars. We imagine that the transition was tongue. too instantaneous to have been entirely produced by that unhappy cause. Despotism was firmly established among the Romans about the middle of the reign of Augustus; and yet that period produced such a group of learned men as never adorned any other nation in so short a space of time. Despotism, we acknowledge, might have affected the eloquence of the bar; the noble and important objects which had animated the republican orators being now no more: but this circumstance could not affect poetry, history, philosophy, &c. The style employed upon these subjects did not feel the fetters of despotism. The age of Louis XIV. was the golden pe

riod