NOTES

New Zealand Tablet, 30 December 1920, Page 26

NOTES

Pronunciation—Old and New ; : '., : / : . , ; l.^X'--There is a type of schoolteacher that is the nearest human thing we know of 1 to an abomination. Our readers will surely have met specimens of the type that thinks learning and scholarship are one and the same as meticulous pronunciation of old words according to new ideas and a capacity for spelling that would qualify for a "turn" as a Marvel of Memory at a vaudeville performance. We are told that some teachers^of the present day will punish children who refuse to become prigs and say "off-ten-' instead of the homely and free and easy "of n." And still worse is the wretch that insists on " Wed-nes-day" instead of good old "Wen'sd'y." The affectation that is" laying the whole land desolate also reveals- itself • in "Christ-ee-an" for "Chrischen", in "aposst-el" for '•'apostle" and "episst-el" for "epistle". Indeed, it would appear that the modern unlettered schoolteacher, not knowing the true meaning of the old phrase, "vulgar tongue", is trying to put a varnish of respectability on what he or she conceives as vulgarity. Need we point out that the adjective "vulgar" is'not used in its bad sense when qualifying old English? How Dante would smile if he thought that his phrase, lingua volgare should come to be perverted in this way by our sciolists! R.L.G. tells us,; in an article in the Nation, that a certain fastidious curate % used ; to, substitute "English" for the phrase "vulgar tongUe'*- m the Anglican Baptismal Office: "How, and when," he asks,' "did this 'v\ilgar tongue,' this great living English rah/are, become 'vulgar' in the bad sense? I think when it was first used with a conscious, snobbish sense of inferiority, when people whose mother tongue it was ceased to talk- naturally, and with a painful effort and many relapses' into their vernacular, endeavored* to speak what was practically a foreign .language. What remains of English at the present dav is bad in the further sense that it has' lost its. traditional character, brawling,-Robustious, good-humored straightforwardness and downrightness. • I It - has • become anaemic querulous, drawling." • - • ;: , ; .., ; ,v Changes ';" iU ' u ?s •' !^- n *•:-.;;' '^^H..'"*--'-"-So, then, the vulgar tongue does not connote vulgarity ; rather the contrary is. true. The very -last people to give it up were the Old County families. Dr. fuseys mother -always called her son "Ed'ard" and aristocrats of no mean culture always said'. "cowcumber";rJust as Sairey Gamp did. Sir Algernon West said that his parents always pronounced "Rome", China ' "golc V , and. "lilac", as "Room", "Chaney" goold/ and "lay ock- ; At the present day the new generation will make, you shiver, by the pedantic man of "Z . the - V l' et ° Ut thdr SttJ. «d only a few b ned -S rommCiationS h ° ld their ™ un"iTundef" jr&*u Z&ttF&f ; that musical ™>rd Arundel., (from hirunaelle) a ;; monstrosity; "dark"

is<iiow " clerk", and "almons" have r ,become more bitter by calling i. them* }, "almonds", but we may be'thankful that* "cupboard" rehiains^'cubbard'.^ "waistcoat" isi "still "weskit", and "stomach" still i; "stummick". "Preston" and "Clifton" were,-of course, "ClifE'ri", and "Press'n", "Berkshire" and "Derby" were "Barkshire" and "Darby". "Clergy" was "clargy", - and "Sermon" was "sarmon". We do not think sensitive people will ever take readily to. the modern corruptionsv; that pass | with dunces , for -. polite usage. , . Old "literature is -spoiled -by new-readings, and -, did .Shakespere, Jonson, and Malory, live in our time they, would have to •do a dealf]ofii polishing in . order/ to \ satisfy . the exactions of boarcLschool malams and piasters.. The writer in the "Nation whom we quoted, tells us that his particular • teacher once warmed, his jacket, thoroughly for saying -''Wed-nes-day';,''■'"and; B.L.G. admits that he deserved what he got; It ~is a. pity.we. have not more of that type of teacher to-day..'. Luridness in the Pulpit ?.. f 1: - Slang, is right in the right place; it has its uses as well as its abuses.' Most people, indeed all people, in whom the sense ; reverence is well developed, will agree that if there is a wrong place for slang it is the '.= pulpit.. Billy." Sunday- and his imitators may draw crowds and amuse them, : but. that they help religion ■in any way is not so clear, that they-disedify a great •number." to. whom, religion is dear. ■; In. New Zealand we have-little or. no. luridness in. churches, so far.- What there is of it is perhaps confined-.; to the "Christchurch ■/busybody who trys to fill his cohyenthT"..by publishing notices of sermons under .sensational headings. In Australia it has., a . few .scattered exponents—-even in • Catholic• pulpits., Father 1 Bernard Vaughan descends -to it not infrequently in his sermons to Society that is' not Society and to Sinners that are a rule not Sinners to any remarkable extent. * We believe the use of slang by preachers is a sort of passing disease which the healthy opinion of the sanior et major portion of church-goers of all denominations will stamp out speedily. . - And when slang in churches has died a natural or a violent ,death the world will have lost little. ;~ Long sermons are bad enough : ill-prepared sermons are an affliction of the spirit: inaudible sermons. .are among the unpardonable sins against humanity: but slangy sermons arc worst of all. - Slang in American Churches , ■.-■_->A Presbyterian clergyman collected a number of slangy and lurid titles . for sermons from a Western paper. A perusal of some of. them is enough to make us sit up vigorously. J. J. North has not advanced so far on his way of futility as'to advertise as some American brethren of his do. Even those who do venture to go ancj. hear him would be horrified if he announced rsuch titles as the following: "Has God Got your Number?" "Pussy-Cat, Pussy-Cat, Where Have You Been?". "The Man in the Moon," : "A Wonderful In- . vention : A Lunch-Box, Hand-Mirror, and Bath-Tub in One.''- In America there is a reaction already! The same clergyman, writes; "Happily there are ..hosts of ministers who are upholding the' .dignity of. the Church, who are above the miserable vulgarisation of religion." Of those who fill the church-columns of secular papers with disgusting advertisements', suggesting a "riot of department-store bargains, a printer's ink scramble for business," says: "We must either- correct them to a belief in the power of the Gospel of Christ, or, in the event of our failure-to do this" 'escort them out of the ministry." "W." C. E. Newbolt ■ : that even "in London pulpits slang has obtained a holds . We hear in sermons, in close juxtaposition with the most sacred things, the words and the phrases common in the camp and the barracks', which the army chaplams brought home -with them. '..';: An oath . or a- pro- ; -famty is;not unknown :it adds point to the discourse : and wakens the languid-interest of the audience " It ': is something to be thankful for that Catholic pulpits in New Zealand are free from such faults, even if "at times I they are gently soporific!; .:'-;-' ; : f >J >;/; '■- ;';.'< '; ■ *■