being distinguished by brackets [], he may use his own judgement as to its relation to the text.

A work of such celebrity, connected with studies to which I had been much attached, having been thus intrusted to my care, I was tempted, during its progress, to hazard a few notes in my capacity of Editor: and though it may have been presumptuous in me to place any observations or conjectures of mine on the pages of Mr. Tooke, yet I must plead in excuse the interest excited by the investigations which they contain.

ADDITIONAL NOTES

BY THE EDITOR.

VOLUME I. page 155.

The following particulars of the author of Criticisms on the Diversions of Purley, published under the assumed name of I. Cassander, are taken from a memoir in the Gentleman's and Monthly Magazines for 1804, the authenticity of which I believe may be relied on. I well remember Mr. Bruckner; and I believe Mr. Tooke had no reason for coupling him with Mr. Windham, ("my Norwich critics, for I shall couple them," see pp. 217, 218 and Note, 232, &c.) except that he resided in the city for which Mr. Windham was returned to Parliament.

1

ED

"The Rev. John Bruckner, born in the island of Cadsand, 1726-educated at Franeker and Leyden, where he obtained a pastorship, and profited by the society of Hemsterhuis, Valckenaer, and the elder Schultens. In 1753 he became minister of the Walloon Church at Norwich, and afterwards of the Dutch-till his death, May 12, 1804. In 1767 was printed at Leyden his Theorie du Système Animal,' in the 7th and 10th chapters of the second part of which there is much anticipation of the sentiments lately evolved and corroborated in the writings of Mr. Malthus.

"In 1790 he published, under the name Cassander, from his birthplace, those Criticisms on the Diversions of Purley which attracted some hostile flashes from Mr. Horne Tooke in his subsequent quarto edition. This pamphlet displays a profound and extensive knowledge of the various Gothic dialects, and states (p. 16.) that the same theory of Prepositions and Conjunctions so convincingly applied in the Epea Pteroenta to the Northern languages, had also been taught concerning the Hebrew and other dead languages by Schultens."

Mr. Bruckner can hardly be considered an opponent of Mr. Tooke, as might be inferred from the style in which he is answered by the latter. He imputes a want of care, of knowledge, or of success in some particular instances, but concurs with Mr. Tooke in the main, and bestows great praise on his work, assigning as his motive for publication a regret "that a performance, in other respects valuable, and well calculated to open the eyes of the learner with regard to false systems, should remain in its present state, and not be rendered as perfect as the nature of the subject will permit."

To the same purpose he adds, in p. 5:"You have not given your system the consistency and solidity of which it is susceptible, and which you were very able to give it, had

you been willing to bestow a little more thought upon it." At p. 22, alluding to some alleged mistakes," I have been examining your outworks again; and, as I find them absolutely untenable, I would advise you to abandon them in case of a regular attack, and to shut yourself up in your capital work, which is of good design and workmanship, and will stand the best battering-ram in the world, provided, however, you bestow a little repairing upon it. In what follows, I shall point out to you the places where this is most wanted.” And in p. 73, "I have read with pleasure, and even with some advantage, your ninth and tenth chapters, which treat of prepositions and adverbs. The light in which you place these parts of speech is new,' and well calculated to turn the attention of the studious in general from idle and endless subtleties to the contemplation of truth, and acquisition of real knowledge." "Truth, as you say, has been improperly imagined at the bottom of a well : it lies much nearer the surface. Had Mr. Harris and others, instead of diving deeper than they had occasion into Aristotelian mysteries, contented themselves with observing plain facts, they would soon have perceived, that prepositions and conjunctions were nothing more than nouns and verbs in disguise; and the chapter of the distribution and division of language would have been settled and complete long ago, to the contentment and joy of every body: whereas, in the way they proceeded, their labour was immense, and the benefit equal to nothing.”—p. 77.

I may with propriety add here a candid estimate of Mr. Tooke's work from the Annual Review for 1805

"Few good books have been written on the theory of language: this is one of them. Philosophic linguists have mostly pursued the Aristotelic, the antient, method of reasoning, a priori; they have rarely recurred to the Baconian, the modern, method of reasoning, a posteriori. They

have examined ideas instead of phænomena, suppositions instead of facts. The only method of ascertaining in what manner speech originates, is to inquire historically into the changes which single words undergo; and from the mass of instances, within the examination of our experience, to infer the general law of their formation. This has been the process of Mr. Horne Tooke. He first examined our prepositions, conjunctions, and adverbs; all those particles of speech foolishly called insignificant, and showed that they were either nouns or verbs in disguise, which had lost the habit of inflection. He now examines our adjectives and abstract substantives, and shows that they too are all referable to nouns or verbs, describing sensible ideas.

"Whether this opinion is strictly true, scarcely merits inquiry; it was never applied before on so grand a scale, and in so instructive a manner."

After mentioning the suggestions of Schultens, Lennep, and Gregory Sharpe, the writer proceeds: "Such scattered solitary observations may have prepared and do confirm the comprehensive generalizations of Mr. Horne Tooke; but to him the English language owes the pristine introduction of just principles, and a most extensive, learned, and detailed application of them to the etymology of its terms. He has laid the groundwork of a good Dictionary."

"The good sense with which all the phænomena, are explained, the sagacity with which the difficulties are in vestigated, the force of intellect displayed in every conjecture, these constitute the essence of the treatise, and will cause it to outlast the compilations of a more laborious erudition. This work is the most valuable contribution to the philosophy of language which our literature has produced: the writer may be characterized in those words which Lye applied to Wachter: ad ornandam, quam nactus est, Spartam, instructissimus venit in intima artis adyta videtur

penetrasse, atque inde protulisse quodcunque potuerit illustrando ipsius proposito inservire."-p. 675.

VOL. I. p. 412.

ABOUT.-Mr. Tooke seems to have gone astray in his account of this word; and very strangely, as its history seems tolerably clear. He appears to have been put on a wrong scent by Spelman, who derives it from the French Bout and Abouter; and overlooking Skinner's derivation of it, which he quotes, and Junius's, which he omits, he says, in p. 414, "Spelman, Junius, Skinner, and Menage all resort to Franco-Gall. for their etymology." This is certainly not true with regard to Junius and Skinner, however some of the passages as quoted by him from them may have this appearance. What is given from Junius relates to a different word, 'BUT, Scopus,' and has no reference to ABOUT; his account of which, being omitted by Mr. Tooke, I here insert:

"ABOUT, circum, circa. A.-Saxones abutan vel abuton dicebant; quæ videri possunt facta ex illo embe utan quod occurrit Marc. 14. 47; An of dam þe þaɲ embe utan stodon, Unus ex circumstantibus. Vide tamen Spelmanni Glossarium in Abuttare."

Skinner, as will be seen in the first quotation from him, (p. 413.) which is the whole of what he says upon the word ABOUT, derives it unhesitatingly from A.S. abutan, ýmbutan. The other passages which Mr. Tooke quotes from Skinner treat of ABUTT and BUT, which he derives from the Franco-Gall. Bour, and have no reference whatever to ABOUT.

Skinner errs in compounding Abutan of the Latin preposition Ab and the Saxon utan; for analogy obviously leads us to consider the A as a contraction of the Saxon On (as Again, ongean; Away, on peg; Aback, on bæc, &c.) and