we certainly have many classical authors, and we need but mention the names of Gellert, Rabner, Kleist, Rammler,Wieland, Hagedorn, Klopstock, Lessing, and many others, who have become the favourite writers of all Germany; for every man will acknowledge that in this sense they are classical writers.

But if, on the contrary, such only are meant as have never failed to write with perfect propriety, whose style and choice of words, and even their departure from rules, whenever they indulge in such liberties, are so far authorized that the reader may naturally go along with, and always safely appeal to these writers; if this, I say, be the criterion, I do not believe any writer has, or ever can have, so much authority in the German language.

But no sooner could we grant any author this degree of consideration, than we should have a book of examples, which must be followed on every occasion, from which no one could dare to deviate, and by which the varieties of speech would be confined to a single form and meaning by the short but conclusive argument of auros ε; nor would any one dare to write otherwise than this author had authorized by his example. Even his faults, however incompatible with the most obvious rules of the language, would pass for the most perfect purity. But should we not by such a decision preclude every possible means of improving and refining our native language?

The German, by its construction, has this advantage over all the other European languages, that all its rules are derived from itself, nor can any thing be declared to belong to it that is not either founded on the actual constitution of the language, its etymology and analogy, or fully established by common usage. And when a writer departs from these fundamental principles, whatever consideration he may in other respects enjoy, his single authority can never justify or establish these deviations, or prevent critics and others from considering them as faults. But even our best writers cannot be considered as always the best critics at once as to language and to grammar. The general use of certain inaccuracies and peculiarities of their native dialect, or of the province in which they live, and which they daily and constantly hear repeated, renders them insensible to their impropriety, and sometimes misleads them so far that they even use them in their writings, as I have remarked of some of them in the third part of my little work entitled Considerations, &c.

Cases also occur where good writers give different senses to the same word: as, for example, some use a verb with a

noun

noun in the dative case, and others with the accusative: as ich getraue mir, ich getraue mich; ich liebkose dir, ich liebkose dich; es kostet mir, es kostet mich, and many others. In such cases bare authority cannot determine the preference, since each is equally supported by it. Here, therefore, we must necessarily refer to principles, and he alone can be right whose usage has the best foundation in those principles, or who writes according to the fundamental construction of the language, and the analogy of words. If indeed both parties can adduce such reasons, both forms of speech must then be used, yet the arguments of the one will generally outweigh those of the other, and then that party must be deemed right.

The best writers, however, may sometimes adopt an opinion under the idea that it has a good foundation, whereas the contrary may be afterwards clearly proved and demonstrated by others. But if this writer were esteemed classical in the last of the above-mentioned senses, no one would, notwithstanding the inaccuracy, dare to deviate from what this author had once maintained, or to correct and improve the language: at least such authorized inaccuracy would not be considered as a fault.

Gottsched, who was by most of his contemporaries considered as a classical writer, yet chose to write häucheln, schmäucheln, knäbelspiess, because he imagined these words came from hauchen, schmauchen, knabe, and not only his particular admirers, but many others who had not investigated the subject, followed his example. But if he were universally esteemed a classical author,we must then necessarily adopt this error. But, however generally this fashion might then prevail, yet a better etymology having been afterwards pointed out, the world have assented to it, and now write with far more propriety, heucheln, schmeicheln, knebelspiess.

*

The same mistake which Gottsched has in these instances committed, may be incurred in the like case by others who have been called classical authors. Tis the nature of man to err, and the best of writers are by no means infallible. Many men imagine they have reason on their side in various opinions of which the error will perhaps be first pointed out and proved by some future philologist. But ought we notwithstanding to persist in these errors? Certainly not; nor ought we to follow any examples but such as are founded in the language itself. Evidently fundamental proof should always outweigh any authority whatever, inasmuch as it leads to a more conclusive conviction.

There still remain many corruptions in our language to correct and improve, and the more we examine it,--the more we * As the English have adopted many of Dr. Johnson's.-Ed.

investigate

investigate why any thing must necessarily be as it is, the more truth we shall discover, while at the same time we shall correct and improve the language.

Indeed it requires a long course of time to lay aside certain prejudices and provincial peculiarities of pronunciation and of phraseology, &c. to which we are accustomed from our youth, and which endeavours are constantly made as much as possible to correct, if it can be done with any plausible reason. Nor can the truth be fully disovered without sufficient proof and examination, after which whatever is demonstrated to be right by sufficient reasons must be adopted.

It is in fact very fortunate, and truly advantageous to our language, that we have not yet suffered ourselves to be so shackled as to follow any one writer implicitly and on all occasions, but always assert our freedom to examine, and only adopt that as the orthography, which is founded in the lan guage itself. Thanks to our good genius, we have as yet no academy of forty, nor can any writer assume the office of a dictator, or make his ipse dixit a universal authority; for his opinions must be tried by the principles of the language before they can be received, and every philologist has a right, not only to bring these principles to the severest trial, but to adopt any other opinion, provided he can establish it on a firmer foundation.

There is, however, no cause to fear that any confusion should hence arise in the orthography, or that various opinions should prevail relative to phraseology; for our language generally carries with it such clear principles, that every one, who reflects at all, and would willingly shake off his prejudices, must easily perceive what best accords with its rules and constitution; and the doubtful cases are so inconsiderable that they cannot occasion any confusion. Even the rigorous trial which has been instituted by philologists relative to the new orthography of Klopstock, as compared with the old orthography, has shewn us the almost total want of foundation and great defects of this innovation. Thus it was perceived at length that the commonly received orthography has the most solid arguments and principles in its favour, and we shall always find that a full investigation, especially when undertaken by several and impartial persons, will ultimately establish such principles as will prove the truth or falsehood of any opinion.

For the very same reasons which forbid me to hold any author as infallible, or to accept him as the dictator of our orthography, I cannot admit any one province to be its supreme tribunal; a yoke which, however, Mr. Adelung is desirous to

lay

lay upon our language, by making Saxony the supreme tribunal in this respect, so that nothing can be right that is not adopted in the south of Saxony. But what German will submit to this yoke? If such a rule be established, we need no longer examine into principles or trace etymologies; we must look for the standard of the language in common usage itself, as that writer requires of the grammar-master, in the preface to his grammar; for the simple assertion of such is the usage of Saxony, would then decide every enquiry, and woe to him who has not learnt the language in that province, or does not receive all the peculiarities of that dialect as perfectly accurate and correct; nor would such a writer be any longer allowed to reply, I write, or I speak, High German. Mr. Beister deserves the gratitude of his countrymen for having asserted this freedom of speech, in opposition to the above-mentioned opinion of Mr. Adelung. X.

THE PYTHAGOREAN WOMEN.

BY WIELAND.

THE HE name of Pythagoras, like those of Hermes, Orpheus, Zoroaster, Confucius, and others, is so celebrated as scarcely to be entirely unknown even to the most uninformed. A fame which has been attached during more than two thousand years to the name of a man of whom nothing else has been preserved, leads us naturally to conclude that the possessor of it must have had uncommon merits, and a considerable influence both on his contemporaries and on the succeeding ages. That this observation is particularly applicable to Pythagoras may be maintained with justice; although we meet with few persons of antiquity whose history is more uncertain, more disfigured by popular traditions, or more blended with legendary tales.

In this respect, Pythagoras has shared the same fate with many extraordinary characters who existed before and after him he has been represented as an instrument of designs which never came into his head, and described as such an ambiguous, wonderful, and mysterious being, as puts it entirely out of our power, for want of authentic documents, to say with any degree of certainty, what he really was.

Thus much, however, is certain, that he acted during more than forty years an important part in Lower Italy, which the

3

Greeks

Greeks called Great Hellas, and was the founder of a school of theoretical and practical philosophy, or rather of a remarkable secret society, which spread itself through all the republics of that beautiful country, and of whose existence, notwithstanding its short continuance, the most beneficent traces were visible in Italy and Greece several centuries after its extirpation.

This society, of which Pythagoras was the soul, seems to have had no other object in view than a total reformation, or regeneration, of all those, in general very corrupt republics, and appears to have commenced its attempts by endeavouring to raise its members to the highest degree of perfection of which human nature is susceptible. This supposition appears extremely probable, when we consider that many years after it had ceased to exist in its original form, such an uncommon man as ARCHYTAS of TARENTUM arose as it were from its ashes; and that one of the greatest statesmen and heroes, and indisputably one of the most virtuous and accomplished men Greece ever produced, the venerable EFAMINONDAS, received his education from Lysis of Tarentum, who had actually been pupil of Pythagoras.

Even the fabulous tradition, which was the invention of later times, and which became a popular creed, viz. that several celebrated legislators, as Zaleucus of Locris, Charondas of Catana, and even the Roman king, Numa, had derived the wisdom which rendered them so famous, from the instructions of Pythagoras (who, by the bye, was born long after the death of these renowned characters), confirms the truth of what we asserted with respect to the great influence of the order of Pythagoras over his contemporaries; for it proves, according to a very just observation of CICERO, how great the fame of the Pythagoreans and of their institution must have been in Italy, when the later Romans, who had been induced from the accounts of their ancestors to form very high notions of the wisdom and virtue of their king Numa, could not but conclude that a man, who had excelled all his contemporaries in wisdom, must necessarily have been a pupil of Pythagoras.

Pythagoras was the first public teacher of ethics that ever attained any high degree of eminence among the Greeks, and more powerful effects are attributed to his discourses than any modern preacher of repentance can boast. When he came to Croto, then one of the most populous and beautiful towns in Italy, he found the inhabitants, according to the account of Justin (Book xx. c. 4.), immersed in luxury, voluptuousness, and pride. A man of ordinary talents, how great soever his elquence might have been, would have had little success in VOL. II.

G

preaching