Inaugural address delivered at the opening of Morrison College, Lexington, Kentucky : November 4th, 1833 / by the Rev. Benjamin O. Peers.

  • Peers, Benjamin O. (Benjamin Orrs), 1800-1842.
Date:
1833
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Inaugural address delivered at the opening of Morrison College, Lexington, Kentucky : November 4th, 1833 / by the Rev. Benjamin O. Peers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    [11] language so early as the eleventh century when at the height of its improvement, and half its words have perished since that period. But even were this practicable, it is not expedient. What, in such a case would become of existing derivatives from the learned languages? Shall they be su- perseded by terms of Saxon origin? This would virtually be creating another dead language which our posterity would have to study in order to gain access to the numberless and invaluable writings of the past and present centuries. But it is useless to discuss this question. It has been unalterably decided, that the principal accessions to the English lan- guage, shall be perpetually from Greek and Latin sources. Swift declaimed and practised against this tendency more than a hundred years ago; but with what effect, let the en- largement of Webster's dictionary tell us. What was im- practicable then, would certainly be found impossible at the present day. The current has been uninterruptedly swell- ing its volume and momentum in its onward movement; and it would be easier to dam the Mississippi and divert it from its channel into an opposite direction, than to alter what we conceive to be the destiny of the English language. There is something animating and sublime in the prospect it enjoys of becoming a universal language, and its growing approxi- mation to the dialects of Greece and Rome, rendering more and more intimate its affinity to the French, the Spanish, the Portuguese, the Italian and the modern Greek, is calculated to fit it for this glorious destiny. In view of these considerations, the question is not, whether we shall learn the Greek and Latin, which are rapidly ex- periencing a kind of metempsichosis, again becoming living languages under an English garb, but how we shall learn them. Shall we study them in their ancient or their modern dress? It were foreign from my purpose to consume further time in the discussion of this question, but the answer which must present itself to a reflecting mind, is obviously such as ereatly to enhance the importance of the etymological argu- ment in favour of the study of the classics, strongly recom-