But in spite
of its power of assimilation, there is much of the speech of England
which has never become connatural to the Anglican people; and its
grammar has passively suffered the introduction of many syntactical
combinations, which are not merely irregular, but repugnant. I shall not
here inquire whether this condition of English is an evil. There are
many cases where a complex and cunningly-devised machine, dexterously
guided, can do that which the congenital hand fails to accomplish; but
the computing, of our losses and gains, the striking of our linguistic
balance, belongs elsewhere. Suffice it to say, that English is not a
language which teaches itself by mere unreflecting usage. It can only be
mastered, in all its wealth, in all its power, by conscious, persistent
labor; and therefore, when all the world is awaking to the value of
general philological science, it would ill become us to be slow in
recognizing the special importance of the study of our own tongue.
* * * * *
From "Man and Nature."
=_197._= THE EVERGREENS OF SOUTHERN EUROPE.
The multitude of species, intermixed as they are in their spontaneous
growth, gives the American forest landscape a variety of aspect not
often seen in the woods of Europe; and the gorgeous tints which nature
repeats from the dying dolphin to paint the falling leaf of the American
maples, oaks, and ash trees, clothe the hill-sides and fringe the
watercourses with a rainbow splendor of foliage, unsurpassed by the
brightest groupings of the tropical flora.
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