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A STRANGE TONGUE !

What do you mean when you use the words “ let,” “ bless,” and “ before ”? Professor Ovid R/ Sellers,_ of the Presbyterian Theological Seminary of Chicago, put that rhetorical question to the Linguistic Society of America, at its fourteenth annual meeting. “Let” may mean “allow,” or it may mean “ prevent ” or “ hinder,” as a let ball in tennis, he said. “ Bless ”■ may mean curse. “ Cleave ” may mean split apart, or it may mean adhere. “ Before ” in “ before the war ” refers to the past, and in “a golden age is before us ’’ implies the future. Other opposites: To stone a man and stone a cherry; to seed a field and seed a raisin; to fish a garden (spread fish fertiliser) and fish a pond. No wonder, said Professor Sellers, that lawyers wrangle over the meaning of words in wills and why every student of the Constitution seems to interpret it differently.

Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/ESD19380212.2.16.1

Bibliographic details

Evening Star, Issue 22881, 12 February 1938, Page 3

Word Count
151

A STRANGE TONGUE ! Evening Star, Issue 22881, 12 February 1938, Page 3

A STRANGE TONGUE ! Evening Star, Issue 22881, 12 February 1938, Page 3

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