which we have the national vanity to conceive English scholars would cultivate with eminent success. The Germans amass information, but do not methodise it; they dig deep, but their building is disorderly; they have the materials, but they want the talent of arrangement. Comparative Philology is a branch of linguistic science which has sprung up but recently, and which may be said to owe its origin to the discovery, as it has been called, of the Sanscrit language. And without some knowledge of this language the study can be prosecuted with very little success. The works of which the titles stand at the head of this article, are the first in this country which have dealt with the general subject at much length, and separately from other subjects.

Mr. Donaldson's book is a work of great merit, and the University of Cambridge cannot but congratulate itself that one who, though he did not gain the elemental notions and the spirit of sound philology within its walls, has attained some of its highest collegiate and academical distinctions, has devoted himself to the task of endeavouring to disseminate accurate as well as expanded views of classical etymology among those who are at present strangers to the subject. For what has passed under the name of etymology in our Universities, and in our books till lately, is undeserving of the name, taken up as it has been in the way more of an amusement than a study, as a sort of guesswork, a pastime or game, something like the solution of riddles, instead of a science, requiring perhaps more learning, patience, and caution than any other that can be named, to be prosecuted successfully. There have hitherto been, and we believe we may say with truth, there are now at this moment, no systematic and scientific views of classical etymology taught publicly in the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. We say not that the tutors and lecturers never give or remark on the derivation of a word in passing, or never attempt to give a few instances of similar derivations; what we say is this, that there is no regular, consistent, scientific system of etymology taught or insisted on, and that those who come forth from such instruction have no clear, accurate, and consistent notions of the structural peculiarities and affinities of the languages in question. Individuals may have acquired sound views on these points, as undoubtedly the pupils of Mr. Donaldson and others of the same school, but we are now alluding to the public teaching of the class-room. Mr. Donaldson's book, and others to which he makes frequent reference, will, it is hoped, rouse a spirit of inquiry into the subject.

Mr. Donaldson observes, with truth, that the establishment of an English school of philology is to be referred to the opening of the London University, in 1828, and may truly be ascribed to 'the mode of teaching adopted by the first Greek Professor at

that institution.' Before that period there was in fact no English school of philology; the way had been prepared by the translations of German authors, chiefly in the historical department, such as Müller's Dorians, Niebuhr's Rome, and a few others; but nothing original had yet been done. And the impulse which has been given to these pursuits within the last three years undoubtedly originated in the teaching of Professor Long, to whom Mr. Donaldson has dedicated his work as a pupil and a friend. The publication of the Quarterly Journal of Education, in which the views of the Greek and Latin Professors were partially unfolded, and to which the simple-minded, but earnest and zealous erudition of Rosen furnished contributions of great value, produced quite a movement in the studious world among us. There is more sound philology, clearly and systematically developed, in the ten volumes of that Journal, than in all our periodical literature before.

Of the nature and general scope of Mr. Donaldson's book, the reader will form a better idea from seeing a table of the contents, than from a mere description.

BOOK I. GENERAL INTRODUCTION. Chap. I. The utility of Philological studies.-Chap. II. The history and present state of Philology.-Chap. III. The Philosophy of language.-Chap. IV. Relative position of the Greek language in the Indo-Germanic family.-Chap. V. The theory of the Greek alphabet.-Appendix to Chap. V. Extracts from Bentley's MS. on the digamma. Chap. VI. The parts of speech.

BOOK II. PRONOMINAL WORDS. Chap. I. The personal and other pronouns.-Chap. II. The numerals.-Chap. III. The prepositions. Chap. IV. The negation and other particles.

BOOK III. THE NOUN. Chap. I. The roots of nouns and verbs.-Chap. II. The case-endings of the noun.-Chap. HI. The pronominal terminations between the root and case-endings. Chap. IV. Nouns used as prepositions.--Chap. V. The adjectives. Chap. VI. Compound words.

BOOK IV. THE VERB. Chap. I. The person-endings.Chap. II. The tenses.-Chap. III. The moods and participles.Chap. IV. The conjugations.-Chap. V. The use of auxiliary verbs in Greek.

Mr. Winning's book cannot be better described than in the words of Mr. Donaldson (p. 36, note). The first and second 'parts of this work, which are composed in a great measure of 'well selected extracts and translations from other writers, with in'telligent criticisms on their opinions, are worthy of almost unqualified approbation. The third part is rather at variance with 'the other two, and is deformed by references to Rabbinical authorities, on which we do not place the slightest value.' Both Mr. Donaldson's and Mr. Winning's books would be more useful if

they had adopted the tabular form of exhibiting the affinities of the respective languages. In a table the words catch the eye more readily, and a glance will often give clearer information than the perusal of several pages of continuous writing. The German philologists have erred in the same way. Pott's books are not half so useful as they would have been. His style is very crabbed and obscure, not only to foreigners, but to Germans themselves; the work is very closely printed, and yet one must hunt through all this in order to get at what might easily have been given in a few methodical and well arranged tables.

In this respect the article on language in the Penny Cyclopædia is very superior. It consists of two parts. One treats of the philosophy of language, in reference both to its physical formation and to its logical distinctions. The other part treats of the structure of language, or etymology, and especially of the affinities existing between different languages of the same family. These affinities are represented in tables of leading classes of words; for example of relationship, of parts of the body, of the numerals, of most common verbs, &c. For this purpose the writer has selected the Indo-Germanic family; from this he has drawn the main phenomena, because the languages of that branch have been more thoroughly investigated than any others, and are better known to the majority of scholars. Illustrations, however, are added from the Sanscrit family, exhibiting the affinity of Hebrew, Arabic, &c.

A person who has but a vague or imperfect knowledge of the objects and aims of comparative philology, and the proper methods of pursuing it successfully, cannot do better than read over that article in the Cyclopædia, and then study the articles on the letters of the alphabet in the same work, as well as the articles Dual, Number and Gender, Ablative, Genitive, Accusative, &c.

Mr. Donalson's book is more a collection of disquisitions, than a didactic or dogmatic treatise. Some of these disquisitions are very useful, but we think that the book would have had more effect in extending clear and convincing views of sound philology if the author had confined himself to a lucid and ample exhibition of well ascertained affinities, such as the following:

These are affinities which are obvious to every scholar, even though he may never have studied the comparative anatomy of

language at all. But the relationship is shown still more strongly by the framework of the language being the same.

Words may

You

be imported by commerce or by conquest, inflections never. may naturalize a foreign word, but you cannot naturalize a foreign conjugation or declension. You may get Englishmen, for example, to talk of a toilette, a bureau, a billet-doux, a rendezvous, a soiree, a tête-a-téle, but you can never induce them to say I speakais, instead of 'I was speaking,' or you walkeras, for 'you will walk.' They will take a promenade, but they will not walker in the garden.

The Persian language has been inundated by Arabic words, but it has not submitted to the yoke of one Arabic inflection.

The sign of the accusative singular in Sanscrit and Latin is m, in Greek v. The sign of the nominative singular is s in all three languages. The similarities in the declension and conjugations are most striking; and if we did not believe that those of our readers who care about the subject will purchase one or more of the above works, and see for themselves, we would give a few specimens in this place. We cannot forbear, however, giving the present tense of the verb to give, in Sanscrit and Greek.

Mr. Winning's fourth chapter will be found very useful and instructive. The lists are very good.

To show the need of such books as those under remark, and the great ignorance on such subjects even among men of good scholarship in other respects, we will notice an attempt at etymology by an accomplished writer of the present day, in a work which abounds in valuable observations and brilliant flashes of eloquence. Mr. Wyse, in a note to p. 121 of his Educational Reform,' speaking of our system of numeration, derives the German zehn, ten,' from zehe, 'a toe,' because there are ten toes on the feet. Now Comparative Philology applied to these words would bring out a very different result. Zehn, ten,' and zehen, toes,' though similar in form, have arrived at that point by very different roads. The following scheme will show how they stand:

6

Now each of the changes in these words from one letter to another in the root, can be proved by scores of other examples. Zehn, ten,' and zehe, toe,' are no more connected than deka and δακτυλο.

We strongly recommend the works under notice, and if any impulse shall have been given to the study of Comparative Philology by these remarks, our object in making them will have been answered.

Since the above paper was written, the author of the article language, in the Cyclopædia, has published an Essay on the Study of Comparative Grammar (in the third publication of the Central Society of Education), which we may here take the opportunity of recommending to our readers. We may further congratulate them on the election of the gentleman referred to, Mr. William Smith, as Classical Tutor at Highbury College. It is a favourable omen for the state of learning among Dissenters, that the services of so sound a scholar have been secured.

Two

Art. VII. The Present Position of the Church of Scotland. Letters to George Cook, D.D. By JAMES BRYCE, D.D. Edin. burgh. 1838, 1839.

ΝΕ

EVER at any former period of our ecclesiastical history was the war of opinions so anomalously blended, and at the same time the war of parties more clearly defined. When before were the national churches of England and Scotland seen approaching each other on such terms of compliment, and with such proffers of co-operation, as have of late been exemplified in their common zeal to maintain their corporation rights against threatened aggression? As part and parcel of the common system, the Irish church has been taken under their sympathizing patronage; and on the north of the Tweed the spectacle has at length presented itself of a Presbyterian establishment, bound to endeavour the extirpa'tion of prelacy,' casting aside regard for the distinguishing principle on which the witnessing fathers of the Scottish church founded their claims to the confidence of the community, and joining in cordial league with a miscalled religious system whose errors are, on the principles of the covenant, among the most per