English The Eighteenth Century to the Present.pdf

Chapter 8. The Eighteenth Century to the Present

Anyone who glances at a text written after 1800 will find the language remarkably familiar. Its idioms may

seem a bit odd, and the occasional archaic spelling, such as <shew> for <show> may be found, but the

language is essentially the same as the language we use today. Grammatically, English did not substantially

reach its present-day form until around 1800, making the 1700s a crucial period in the history of the

English language. Many of our contemporary attitudes towards the English language (such as the socially

constructed idea of ‘proper grammar’) which began their development in the early modern period also

reached their current form by the end of the eighteenth century. Developments have taken place since this

time both within the language and within attitudes towards language, but we still live with the legacy of the

eighteenth century both in the way we use English and in how we view the language.

The increasing awareness of the importance of English in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century society

which were explored in chapter 6 soon began to spawn ambitious plans for deliberate interference in the

form of the language. As we shall see, such schemes were increasingly often devised with the intent of

affecting society through the medium of language. There was by no means a consistent movement, and the

aims and purposes of linguistic ‘meddlers’ evolved over time. We will look at three developments which

began as early as the sixteenth century but became exceptionally important in the eighteenth century. Many

people desired the establishment of an organised academy, charged with the task of establishing a standard

form of English. Such bodies existed (and still exist) in France, Italy, and Spain, but one was never

established in England. However, their purpose has been partially achieved by the development of

prescriptive ‘grammars’ – works which attempt to guide us in how to use English – and by dictionaries,

which sometimes have a similar effect. Neither grammars nor dictionaries developed out of the blue; in

particular, we should concentrate on how their purposes and intended audiences changed over time.

To study the history of attitudes towards English in the eighteenth century and beyond, it is necessary

to look first at earlier attitudes and how eighteenth-century attitudes developed from them. Proposals for an

English Academy came relatively late in the seventeenth century and more or less subsided less than a

hundred years later. Dictionaries and grammars have roots as far back as the Middle Ages, but they began to

resemble forms we recognise in the 1500s.

Proposals for an English Academy

1. Purpose of the Académie Française , according to the royal charter of 1635

To labour with all possible care and diligence to give definite rules to [the] language, and to render it pure,

eloquent, and capable of treating the arts and sciences.

2. John Dryden, Dedication to Troilus and Cressida (1679)

I am desirous, if it were possible, that we might all write with the same certainty of words, and purity of

phrase, to which the Italians first arrived, and after them the French; at least that we might advance as far as

our tongue is capable of such a standard.

3. Daniel Defoe, ‘Of Academies’, from An essay upon Projects (1697)

The Work of this Society shou’d be to encourage Polite Learning, to polish and refine the English Tongue,

and advance the so much neglected Faculty of Correct Language, to establish Purity and Propriety of Stile, and to

purge it from all the Irregular Additions that Ignorance and Affectation have introduc’d; and all those Innovations

in Speech, if I may call them such, which some Dogmatic Writers have the Confidence to foster upon their Native

Language, as if their Authority were sufficient to make their own Fancy legitimate.

By such a Society I dare say the true Glory of our English Stile wou’d appear; and among all the Learned Part

of the World, be esteem’d, as it really is, the Noblest and most Comprehensive of all the Vulgar Languages in the

World.

4. Joseph Addison, Spectator 135 (Saturday, 4 August 1711)

There is another Particular in our Language which is a great Instance of our Frugality of Words, and that is the

suppressing of several Particles, which must be produced in other Tongues to make a Sentence intelligible: This

often perplexes the best Writers, when they find the Relatives, Who , which or that , at their Mercy whether it may

have Admission or not, and will never be decided till we have something like an Academy, that by the best

Authorities and Rules drawn from Analogy of Languages shall settle all Controversies between Grammar and

Idiom.

5. Jonathan Swift, A Proposal for Correcting, Improving and Ascertaining the English Tongue (1712)

The persons who are to undertake this work, will have the example of the French before them, to

imitate where these have proceeded right, and to avoid their mistakes. Beside the grammar-part, wherein we

are allowed to be very defective, they will observe many gross improprieties, which however authorised by

practice, and grown familiar, ought to be discarded. They will find many words that deserve to be utterly

thrown out of our language, many more to be corrected; and perhaps not a few, long since antiquated, which

ought to be restored, on account of their energy and sound....

But what I have most at heart is, that some method should be thought on for ascertaining and fixing our

language for ever, after such alterations are made in it as shall be thought requisite. For I am of opinion, that

it is better a language should not be wholly perfect, than that it should be perpetually changing; and we must

give over at one time, or at length infallibly change for the worse.

But where I say, that I would have our language, after it is dully correct, always to last; I do not mean

that it should never be enlarged: provided that no word which a society shall give a sanction to, be afterwards

antiquated and exploded, they may have liberty to receive whatever new ones they shall find occasion for.

6. Philip Dormer Stanhope, Lord Chesterfield, Letter to The World (28 November 1754)

I had long lamented that we had no lawful standard of our language set up, for those to repair to, who might

chuse to speak and write it grammatically and correctly: and I have as long wished that either some one person of

distinguished abilities would undertake the work singly, or that a certain number of gentlemen would form

themselves, or be formed by the government, into a society for that purpose. The late ingenious doctor Swift

proposed a plan of this nature to his friend (as he thought him) the lord treasurer of Oxford, but without success;

precision and perspicuity not being in general the favourite objects of ministers, and perhaps still less so that of a

minister than of any other.

Many people have imagined that so extensive a work would have been best performed by a number of persons,

who should have taken their several departments, of examining, sifting, winnowing (I borrow this image from the

Italian crusca ) purifying, and finally fixing our language, by incorporating their respective funds into one joint

stock. But whether this opinion be true or false, I think the public in general, and the republic of letters in

particular, greatly obliged to Mr Johnson, for having undertaken and executed so great and desireable a work.

7. Samuel Johnson, Preface to A Dictionary of the English Language (1755)

I have, notwithstanding this discouragement, attempted a dictionary of the English language, which, while it

was employed in the cultivation of every species of literature, has itself been hitherto neglected; suffered to spread,

under the direction of chance, into wild exuberance; resigned to the tyranny of time and fashion; and exposed to

the corruptions of ignorance, and caprices of innovation.

When I took the first survey of my undertaking, I found our speech copious without order, and energetick

without rules: wherever I turned my view, there was perplexity to be disentangled, and confusion to be regulated;

choice was to be made out of boundless variety, without any established principle of selection; adulterations were

to be detected, without a settled test of purity; and modes of expression to be rejected or received, without the

suffrages of any writers of classical reputation or acknowledged authority.…

So far have I been from any care to grace my pages with modern decorations, that I have studiously

endeavoured to collect examples and authorities from the writers before the restoration, whose works I regard as

the wells of English undefiled , as the pure sources of genuinine diction. Our language, for almost a century, has, by

the concurrence of many causes, been gradually departing from its original Teutonick character, and deviating

towards a Gallick structure and phraseology, from which it ought to be our endeavour to recal it, by making our

ancient volumes the groundwork of stile, admitting among the additions of later times, only such as may supply

real deficiencies, such as are readily aadopted by the genius of our tongue, and incorporate easily with out native

idioms.…

Of the event of this work, for which, having laboured it with so much application, I cannot but have some

degree of parental fondness, it is natural to form conjectures. Those who have been persuaded to think well of my

design, will require that it should fix our language, and put a stop to those alterations which time and chance have

hitherto been suffered to make in it without opposition. With this consequence I will confess that I flattered

myself for awhile; but now begin to fear that I have indulged expectation which neither reason nor experience can

justify. When we see men grow old and die at a certain time one after another, from century to century, we laugh

at the elixir that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with equal justice may the lexicographer be

derided, who being able to produce no example of a nation that has preserved their words and phrases from

mutability, shall imagine that his dictionary can embalm his language, and secure it from corruption and decay,

that it is in his power to change sublunary nature, and clear the world at once from folly, vanity, and affectation.

The Development of Prescriptive Grammar

1. William Lily, A Shorte Introduction of Grammar (1549)

[This is a grammar of Latin, not English, and it was originally written in Latin. Compiled in the early 16 th

century by Lily (1486?-1523), the work comprises an account of Latin inflexions by John Colet and a section

on syntax by Lily. The work was subsequently revised and translated into English, and by a proclamation of

Edward VI in 1548 its use was made mandatory in all grammar schools; a final revision of the work was made

at that time, and it long remained the chief grammar of Latin used in schools.]

Of a Verbe.

A verbe is a parte of speche, declined with mode and tense, and betokeneth dooyng; as Amo , I loue: or sufferyng:

as Amor , I am loued: or beeyng: as Sum , I am.

Of verbes such as haue persons, be called personalles: as Ego amo , Tu amas . And suche as haue no persons, be

called impersonalles: as Tædet , it yrketh. Oportet , it behoueth.

Of verbes personalles there bee fiue kyndes, Actiue, Passiue, Neutre, Deponent, and Common.

A verbe actiue endeth in o , and betokeneth to doo: as Amo , I loue, and by putting to, r , it maie be a passiue: as

Amor .

A verbe passiue endeth in or , & betokeneth to suffre: as Amor , I am loued, & by puttyng away, r , it may be an

actiue: as, Amo .

A verbe neuter endeth in o , or m , and can not take r , to make hym a passiue: as, Curro , I renne, Sum , I am. And

it is englyshed sometyme actiuely: as Curro , I runne: and sometyme passively: as Aegroto , I am sycke.

A verbe deponent endeth in r , lyke a passiue, and yet in significacion is but eyther actiue: as, Loquor uerbum , I

speake a woorde: or neutre, as Glorior , I boste.

A verbe common endeth in r , & in significacion is both actiue and passiue: as Osculor te , I kisse the. Osculor a te , I

am kissed of the.

Modes

There be syxe modes, the Indicatiue, the Imperatiue, the Optatiue, the Potencial, the Subiunctiue, and the

Infinitiue.

The Indicatiue mode sheweth a reason true or false: as Ego amo , I loue: or els asketh a question: as, Amas tu ?

Doest thou loue?

The Imperatiue byddeth or commandeth: as, Ama , Loue thou.

The Optatiue wyssheth or desyreth, with these signes, woulde god, I praie god, or god graunt: as Vtinam amem , I

praie god I loue, and hath euermore an aduerbe of wishyng ioyned with hym.

The Potenciall mode is knowen by these signes, maie, can, might, would, shoulde, or ought: as Amem , I can or

maie loue, without an aduerbe ioyned with hym.

The Subjunctiue mode that euermore some coniunction ioyned with hym: as Cum amarem , whan I loued. And it

is called the Subjunctiue mode, because it dependeth of an other verbe in the same sentence, eyther goyng afore, or

commyng after: as, Cum amarem eram miser , whan I loued, I was a wretche.

The Infinitiue signifieth to dooe, to suffre, or to bee, and hathe neyther numbre nor person, nor nominatiue case

before hym, and is knowen commonly by this signe to: as, Amare , to loue. Also whan two verbes come together

without any nominatyue case between them, then the latter shall be the infinitiue mode: as Cupio dicere , I desyre to

learne.

2. William Bullokar, Pamphlet for Grammar (1586)

[Bullokar’s Pamphlet for Grammar was printed in a reformed orthography devised by Bullokar, using a number of

idiosyncratic symbols. In the extracts that follow the orthography and punctuation have been adapted to those of present-

day English.]

(a) William Bullokar’s Pamphlet for Grammar : Or rather to be said his abbreviation of his Grammar for English ,

extracted out of his Grammar at Large . This being sufficient for the speedy learning of how to parse English speech

for the perfecter writing thereof, and using the best phrase therein; and the easier entrance into the secrets of grammar

for other languages, and the speedier understanding of other languages, ruled or not ruled by grammar; very profitable

for the English nation that desireth to learn any strange language, and very aidful to the stranger to learn English

perfectly and speedily; for that English hath short rule (therefore soon learned) yet having sufficient rules therein to

make the way much easier for the learning of any other language unknown before to the learner.

(b) A verb is a part of speech declined with mood, tense, number, and person.

It is called a verb active when it signifieth to do , as, I love , I teach ; and hath a participle of the passive voice derived

of it, as, loved , taught ; which participle being joined with the verb substantive, to be , taketh his mood or manner of

suffering, and his tense also, of the verb substantive, and his case, gender, number, and person, of his ruling

substantive, as, I am loved , be thou loved , O that he were loved , would God we had been loved , if they have been loved , when

shall we be loved , &c.; and having no participle passive is called a verb neuter, whose participial is joined with the verb

substantive in being only, as, I being run to the town, my father came home . More is said of the participle in the title

thereof.

To have may be called a verb possessive, and his compound, to have liever , a verb choicative. All other verbs are

called verbs neuters unperfect, because they require the infinitive mood of another verb to express their signification or

meaning perfectly; and be these may , can , might or mought , could , would , should , must , ought , and sometime will , shall ,

being a mere sign of the future tense.

There be five moods: the indicative, the imperative, the optative, the subjunctive, and the infinitive.

the indicative mood showeth a reason true or false, as, I love ; or else asketh a question, as, lovest thou ?

The imperative biddeth or commandeth, as, love thou , love ye .

The optative, or wishing mood, wisheth or desireth, and hath alway an adverb of wishing joined before his

nominative case; as, praying God I love , I pray God thou love , God grant he love . Also these, I would , would , would God ,

would to God , O that , and O if , be adverbs of wishing showing the optative mood.

The subjunctive mood hath evermore a conjunction set before his nominative case, and dependeth upon another

verb in the same sentence either going before or coming after it; as, the master will be angry if we be idle , when we use

diligence we learn .

The infinitive hath neither number nor person, nor nominative case before it, and is known commonly by this

sign or preosition, to ; which to is not expressed many times when there cometh an accusative case between the

infinitive mood and the verb before-going, as, bid him come hither . With some verbs we use a like phrase in the

nominative case, as, you say I am idle ; that being a resolver of the first and understanded in the last, as, bid that he come

hither , you say that I am idle . Neither do we use to after a verb neuter unperfect, except after ought , as, we ought to go

thither .

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