after all the refearches of the moft profound Rabbies and learned Theologues, is now, I imagine, for the first time rightly conceived and juttly explained. The mot general opinion has been, that Adam is derived from ADMH (8) red Earth, becaufe (according to Jofephus) the true virgin Earth is of this colour. Thofe, who derive it from the formative A and root DM (≈) which fignifies" to liken of compare," deduce it from the idea that Man was made in the likenefs of God! They are totally ignorant that TM or DM, in its fimpler form, is the name of the Earth. The A is intenfive, and A-DAM means the DAM-the DEM-as (Aɛaxs, corpus)—the Form-the Being. The effect of this name for Man is to be traced in every language, with which I am acquainted. In Sanferit ADIM meant the fir; and I itrongly fufpect that their name for a Husband SWAAMEB, is the fimpler form of DAM-the original name for Man. It occurs in the Mokaa Bhaarot, or Great War, the great Epic Poem of India. "SWAAMEE boneetar potee, SwAAMEE boneetaar gotee." "The hufband is the Lord of the Wife; the Husband is the guide of the Wife." (See Mr. Halhed's Bengal Gram. p. 54.) In these few Sanferit words, no less than three are found moft familiar to our ears: BHaaRot-WaR; PoTee-PoTent; GoTee-Guide; BoNeetar—VeNus. BN is the appropriate and familiar name for Woman in the Dialects of the Celtic. We fhall not wonder that the idea of shape-form or likenefs fhould be derived from the plaftic materials of the Earth. We inftantly fee the coincidence of Mould (the fubftance of the Earth) and Mould, form or figure; and it might easily be proved that Form is itfelf derived from the fame fource. The Hebrew Lexicographers have feen nothing of all this; though DMN (27) which fignifies Dung follows next in order to DM ()" to liken or compare;" which might have been interpreted with the true metaphor, “to mould into a-likeness." P.201. The reader will of courfe perceive that, before he can admit all this fpeculation (for fuch in truth it is, though the author profeffes to deal only in facts) he must be prepared to allow, that ZM. DM. TM. SM. are perfectly equivalent, and that an N fubjoined to each pair makes no difference; and that all these are nearly allied to CR, and that to CB. But all this is very inconceivable: and, with fuch a multiplicity of changes as are thus admitted, no wonder if a vaft variety of words may be brought together. The author is fo eager to find his radi cals on every occafion, that he will even be contented to meet them in the oblique cafe of a noun, or the added termination of a diminitive. Thus he finds MN in HoMiNis, though it is not in Home, and CL in teftiCuLus. If this be not riding an hypothefis to death, it is difficult to fay what can be fo termed. The reader who fees these things, and fome even in the fpecimen we have quoted, and the various objections we have made to other parts, will, we doubt not, be as much furprised as as we have been, at the high tone of difcovery which this author on many occasions affumes. He is no where more magnificent than in the concluding paragraphs of his various fections, of which the enfuing quotation will afford an apt example. "In the fucceeding fection I fhall engage in a more arduous task; and labour to unravel a fubject, which, without a due fpirit of invefti-gation, at once patient and ardent, will elude our fearch and mock our enquiries. I fhall endeavour to illuftrate a great race of words, which are to be found in every language, conveying the idea of what is high -eminent or exalted; as it relates to a BEING invetted with fuperior powers of reafon and of action. It is a theme, which, if I do not deceive myself, will fupply us with an ample and a fertile subject of inserefting difcuffion. It will lead us into trains of thought, as yet totally unexplored; and develope thofe myfteries in language, which are at prefent either clouded by doubts or buried in the profoundelt obfcurity. I muft again be permitted to repeat and to urge, that as we advance forward in thefe fpeculations, the nature of the Human Mind will become more fully unfolded, and more faithfully exhibited. As we afcend by flow but perfevering fteps to thofe higher feats and more commanding ftations in the regions of Knowledge, from which the mind delights to look abroad on the world around it; the clouds vanifh-the scene opens--and the profpect brightens to our view.-Our conceptions will enlarge, as our ideas are expanded; and while the understanding grows enlightened by the contemplation of its own fa culties; we fhall be ftill more enabled to appreciate-to feel and to enjoy the energies of intellect-the powers of knowledge and the bleflings of truth. "Sed nil dulcius eft, bene quam munita tenere Defpicere unde queas alios, pallimque videre Errare, atque viam palanteis quærere vite." P. 345• The Temple of Truth has feldom been found among these Caftles in the Air. The writer of thofe verfes certainly found it not; and we fancy that very few perfons will expect the difcovery to be made by the prefent writer; at least, in the courfe of enquiry which is here inftituted. We fhall here take leave of the etymological part of this remarkable volume. We have done no more than the author requires in the conclufion of his Preface. He fays there, "I expect, and I defire, a free and full trial of my pretenfions, at once juft and fevere." Severe we have never wished to be, certainly never without being completely juft. We have examined his book with care, and have given an account of it as full as the nature of a periodical work appeared to allow, and as free as the intereft of Truth feemed to us to demand. Our general judgment upon it is, that it is an effort conducted with great ingenuity, and abundant proof of learning, which would have had had a much better chance of being carried to a fuccessful flue, had the author been lefs enamoured of his own ideas. Sagacity he has in plenty, coolness of judginent feems allotted to him in a very fcanty proportion. The difcovery for which the world will really be obliged to him is perhaps only this, that vowels are of lefs importance in etymology than they have ufually been thought. But, on the influence of certain combination of confonants, he must be heard with great caution, and under many more restrictions than he himself has placed. We cannot, however, quit the book without fome notice of the author's opinion, always dogmatically, and fometimes infolently, announced concerning the genuineness of the poems which Chatterton afcribed to Rowley. Thefe Mr. Whiter ftrenuously maintains to be genuine ancient poems: ftrenuoufly, but in truth with little foundness of judgment. A ftronger proof cannot poffibly exift than appears in his explanation of the word Barganet. This Chattertop has interpreted a fong or ballad; but Mr. W. having found a derivation of it to fuit one paffage, contends that Chatterton did not understand the word, and confequently could not be the author of the poems and this he has the audacity to fay in a molt peremptory manner, though in one paffage out of two where it is found, he is obliged to own that Chatterton's interpretation conveys its real meaning. In the other place alfo, we boldly fay, it means the fame. Mr. Whiter indeed contends that it fignifies "a petty boggling-baggling queftion." But that queftion, be it what it may, is afked in a little ballad, and therefore Chatterton knew better than the prefent critic its real meaning. The ballad is this. "All-a-boon, Syr Prieft, all-a-boon, Bye yer preeftfchype now faye unto mee, Syr Gaufryd the Knyghte, who lyvethe harde bie, Bee more greate, Inne honnoure, knyghtehood and eftate?" P. 364 How Chatterton found Barganet in the fenfe of a ballad is perfectly plain. It ftands fo in one of the gloffaries to Chaucer, and there he had it, as he had many other things. But Mr. Whiter will have it mean fomething elfe; and to the palpable abfurdity of its fignifying in one paffage a fong, and in the other a captious queftion, he is totally blind: blinded, as ufual, by the glare of his own imagi ation. On this worthy fubject obferve, reader, how modeftly he triumphs! "Thofe, who are ardent in the fearch of Truth, will, I truft, be inftructed and gratified by this endeavour to elucidate a controverted queftion; and I shall gladly leave the fupporters of an oppofite principle to the quiet enjoyment of their own hypothefis. Still however I might venture to obferve, for the benefit of that race of difputants, who form or rather maintain opinions on fubjects like thefe; that the bufinefs of Criticifm was once confidered as an ART, which must be learnt, before it can be practifed; and that our decifions on the meaning of ancient words might perchance be fometimes enlightened by a knowledge of Ancient Language." P. 367. Whoever reads this paffage will certainly not think the writer of it severely treated in being anfwered without ceremony. His other digreffions, on Rowley amount only to the fame thing. He fancies he can interpret a word, by his mode of derivation, better than Chatterton ;-ergo-Chatterton did not write the poems, but Rowley. Without going into a particular examination of any more paffages, we fhall endeavour to show Mr. W. that criticism, as an art, has been better learned by fome perfons unknown than by himself, and that therefore they have, by his own conceffion, a better right to practife it. Let us remark then, without entering into verbal queftions of any kind (which have been fully and triumphantly difcuffed by Mellrs. Tyrwhitt, T. Warton, and others) that the belief in the authenticity of the poems attributed to Rowley, as productions of the 15th century, can reft only upon the groffelt and moft deplorable ignorance of the nature and progrefs of verfification. Whoever has attended to this progrefs, with refpect to English verfe, from the time of Chaucer to that of Pope, muft be fenfible how very gradual the improvement was; with refpect to our couplet verse more particularly, but in a great degree as to all our rhymed measures. Blank verfe, of more fimple conftruction as to meafure (though more difficult to fupport with poetic vigour) more speedily received its perfection. But the heroic couplet (which Mr. Southey calls the Jews-harp twing-twang*) the most difficult to fuftain with dignity and variety through a long compofition, never received the perfection of its refinement and harmony till it came into the hands of Pope. Waller laboured at it, Denham made great efforts, the mighty powers of Dryden ftruggled at the tafk, and formed, in fact, the full preparation for the higher polifh of Pope; but the complete and most perfect style and cadence of our heroic verfe, and confequently of stanzas of fimilar lines, never was given before the compofitions, and those the later and more finished compofitions, of that poet appeared. His Art of Criticifm has many of the afperities of the * See Brit. Crit. for September, p. 309, olde older Time. All our poets, from the first to the laft, wrote occafionally good and harmonious verfes,-lines of the very beft conftruction, but the whole texture was never fo finished; and twenty lines together of any poet fifty years older, no more refemble or are comparable to twenty lines from Pope's best writings, than an Egyptian idol to a flatue of Praxiteles. Roughneffes and licences intervene, which fhock the cultivated ear; and the poet, evidently contented to furpafs his predeceffors, comes into no degree of competition with thofe who followed him. The fame has been the cafe in moft languages, except the Greek; and probably there alfo, but the ruder attempts of Greek writers not being extant, we have nothing but what is finished to perufe. But, in the Latin language, Ennius, though he produces occafionally fine and fonorous verfes, has nothing in the general management of them comparable to the art, polish, and delicacy of Virgil: and the early French poets, La FrefnaieVauquelin and others,bear exactly a fimilar proportion to Boileau. It is, in fact, in the nature of things, that a difficult, and very artificial verfification, is no more to be perfected by the efforts of one or two individuals, than the complete civilization of a ftate is to be achieved by the fuperior genius or understanding of a fingle barbarian. But what are the pretended poems of Rowley? Moft manifeftly the compofitions of a man whofe ear had been formed by the beft verfificati n of the eighteenth century, and habituated to it; lines uniformly of the best construc tion, and most harmonious cadence; and, removing the flight difguife of obfolete words, in all refpects refembling the corref ponding measures of the latest and most polifhed poets. Mr. Whiter, therefore, who, from his high temples of learning looks down upon the rest of the world," may fay what he pleafes, and may pretend to prove what he thinks proper, by his etymological fancies; but the thing is clearly and abfolutely impoffible; and they who have at all Atudied criticifm as an art, must know and feel it to be fo. Not to difmifs this queftion entirely without an example, let us take any twenty lines of the Pfeudo-Rowley, and putting modern words in the place of the antiquated (which is almost always practicable*) . It has been thought, not unreafonably, from this fact, that the practice of Chatterton was to write his verfes in modern language, and afterwards feek out old words of equivalent cadence to fill their place. When practice had given him a ftore of obfolete words at command, he might do otherwife. His imitation confifts generally more in words than in ftyle, though a very little of the latter is now and then caught by him. His fructuous entendement, in the first Battle of Haftings, 1. 6, is a phrafe borrowed from older writers, and feems to have been originally interwoven with his verse. |