A History of English Language

A history of the english language 246
Tongue. In the former paper, in order to set out more clearly the abuses he objected to, he
published a letter supposedly “received some time ago from a most accomplished person
in this way of writing”:
Sir,
I cou’dn’t get the things you sent for all about Town.—I thôt to ha’
come down myself, and then I’d ha’ brout’um; but I han’t don’t, and I
believe I can’t do’t, that’s pozz.—Tom begins to g’imself airs because he’s
going with the plenipo’s.—’Tis said, the French King will bamboozl’ us
agen, which causes many speculations. The Jacks, and others of that
kidney, are very uppish, and alert upon’t, as you may see by their
phizz’s.—Will Hazzard has got the hipps, having lost to the tune of five
hundr’d pound, thô he understands play very well, nobody better. He has
promis’t me upon rep, to leave off play; but you know ‘tis a weakness
he’s too apt to give into, thô he has as much wit as any man, nobody more.
He has lain incog ever since.—The mobb’s very quiet with us now.—I
believe you thôt I banter’d you in my last like a country put.—I sha’n’t
leave Town this month, &c.
“This letter,” he says, “is in every point an admirable pattern of the present polite way of
writing.” The remedy he proposes is for the editor (Steele) to use his position to rid the
language of these blemishes, “First, by argument and fair means; but if these fail, I think
you are to make use of your authority as Censor, and by an annual index expurgatorius
expunge all words and phrases that are offensive to good sense, and condemn those
barbarous mutilations of vowels and syllables.” Later, in his Proposal, he was to go much
further.
191. The Desire to “Fix” the Language.
One of the most ambitious hopes of the eighteenth century was to stabilize the language,
to establish it in a form that would be permanent. Swift talked about “fixing” the
language, and the word was echoed for fifty years by lesser writers who shared his desire
and, like him, believed in the possibility of realizing it. The fear of change was an old
one. Bacon at the end of his life had written to his friend, Sir Toby Matthew (1623): “It is
true, my labours are now most set to have those works, which I had formerly
published,…well translated into Latin…. For these modern languages will, at one time or
other, play the bankrupts with books.” 9
9
Works, ed. Basil Montagu (Philadelphia, 1841), III, 151.