Grammar Wars

Language as Cultural Battlefield in 17th and 18th Century England

Linda Mitchell, Linda C Mitchell

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9780415793797
• eBook ISBN: 9781351807869
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

This title was first published in 2001: Although 17th- and 18th-century English language theorists claimed to be correcting errors in grammar and preserving the language from corruption, this new study demonstrates how grammar served as an important cultural battlefield where social issues were contested. Author Linda C. Mitchell situates early modern linguistic discussions, long thought to be of little interest, in their larger cultural and social setting to show the startling degree to which grammar affected, and was affected by, such factors as class and gender. In her examination of the controversies that surrounded the teaching and study of grammar in this period, Mitchell looks especially at changing definitions and standardization of "grammar", how and to whom it was taught, and how grammar marked the social position of marginal groups. Her comprehensive study of the contexts in which grammar was intended or thought to function is based on her analysis of the ancillary materials - prefaces, introductions, forewords, statements of intent, organization of materials, surrounding materials, and manifestos of pedagogy, philosophy, and social or political goals - of more than 300 grammar texts of the time. The book is intended as a landmark study of an important movement in the foundation of the modern world.

Chapter One

Vernacular Claims Victory

We assume that a book about grammar is one that records the standardized, codified language used by educated people. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, however, “grammar” was an elastic term, one that varied from textbook to textbook. In A Social History of English Dick Leith states, “there are probably more misconceptions about the term ‘grammar’ than any other term in the popular vocabulary of linguistics.”¹ Several of these misconceptions have been byproducts of the evolution of grammar. These include the notions that some people are automatically equipped with grammar while others are not, that grammar is an integral part of the written language but not of the spoken language, that the use of the term “grammar” refers to a written account of language rules, that grammar is good or bad, and that some languages have more complicated grammars than others.²

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, several changes occurred in the way grammar was understood and the way it was perceived to relate to other disciplines. Some of these changes manifested themselves in battlefields that were centered on the relationship between English grammar and Latin grammar. Another battle was fought between two growing factions in the eighteenth century: the prescriptivists, who wanted language to remain unchanged, and the descriptivists, who recognized that language changes and custom and habit determine how people speak. And finally, a much subtler change took place: the linguistic authority held by grammarians in the seventeenth century was transferred in the eighteenth century to lexicographers. This chapter will look at some of these changes, in hopes of coming to a greater understanding of why we force illogical Latinate rules onto English grammar, why people resist language change, and why dictionaries carry the burden of maintaining the integrity of language.

I. English and Latin Models

In the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, several controversies centered on the relationships between English grammar and Latin grammar. One thing decided by mid-seventeenth century was that the vernacular should be taught in schools as a way to prepare students to learn Latin. Pedagogues who promoted this idea had won the argument, but one hold out was Thomas Farnaby. He argues in the preface of Systema grammaticum (1641) that Latin should be taught in Latin and claims that bilingual translations make schoolboys lazy. Farnaby objects to using English models of grammar to teach Latin on the grounds that the elements are not transferable and that English examples keep schoolboys from learning Latin (Preface). A “model of grammar” is used here to mean a grammatical construction in one language that can be used as an analogy to teach a similar construction in another language. By the end of the seventeenth century, the vernacular had won the battle to become the language of the learned. Acceptance of and victory for the vernacular gave rise to four separate schools of thought: using English as a way to get to Latin; promoting English for its own merit; using Latin as a way to “fix” or legitimize English; and acknowledging language that cannot be “fixed.”

English as a Way to Get to Latin (or Other Languages)

Many grammarians argued that children should learn the grammar of their mother tongue first because they could apply that knowledge to Latin or another foreign language.³ Schoolmasters agreed that learning the native tongue was pedagogically sound.⁴ In arguing for mastering English, however, grammarians were motivated by additional issues. It was a matter of national pride to give the mother tongue priority. Grammarians were engaged in a battle of breaking the traditional dependence on Latin as the language of the educated. In Ludus Literarius (1612) John Brinsley argues that English is a separate subject from Latin. In this text Brinsley has two schoolmasters talk about their teaching of English and Latin. Spoudeus teaches Latin and then has trouble finding time to teach his students English, which they consequendy do not learn. “I have sometimes beene so abashed and ashamed, that I have not knowne what to say, when some being a little discontented, or taking occasion to quarrel about paying my stipend, have cast this in my teeth, that their children have been under me sixe or seven yeeres, and yet have not learned to reade English well” (14). The other schoolmaster Philoponus, however, has had success with his students learning English and Latin, and he explains why, making a forceful early statement about the value of English when Latin was still the language of the education: “There is no care had in respect, to traine up schollers so, as they may be able to express their minds purely and readily in our owne tongue, and to increase in the practice of it…because that language which all sorts and conditions of men amongst us are to have most use of, both in speech and writing, is our owne native tongue” (22). Brinsley suggests through the voice of Philoponus that students can learn English separately from Latin and then apply that knowledge to Latin. Students were to follow the method Roger Ascham describes in The Scholemaster (1570) of translating Latin into English, and then, their English back into Latin (23). What is interesting here is that grammarians like Brinsley referred to William Lilys Introduction to Grammar (1567), a Latin grammar in English, to argue for teaching grammar skills first in English and then in Latin, an indication that English skills would take on increasing priority as the century progressed.

In Latine Grammar (1651) Charles Hoole used English models on the left side of the page and Latin models on the right side. It is possible that Hoole came up with the bilingual text as a way of publishing his own school grammar without breaking the royal edict of 1542 that only William Lily’s text could be used in schools. Nonetheless, the bilingual method proved to be a practical system for learning a foreign language insofar as it built on old knowledge (the vernacular) before introducing new knowledge (Latin grammar). The bilingual edition worked especially well for those students who did not intend to study the classics and who would be apprenticed to a trade. Hoole also translated Johann Amos Comeniuss Orbis sensualium pictus (1658) as a means for children to use their mother tongue and pictures of those words to learn Latin and English.

John Wallis writes in Grammatica lingua Anglicanae (1653) that people should learn first their native language and that they should not have to make it conform to Latin (A7v). He states in the Praefatio ad Lectorem that grammarians like Alexander Gills Logonomia Anglica (1619) and Ben Jonson’s English Grammar (1640) had written grammars in English but did not accomplish what they set out to do. He argues “none of the [grammarians] proceeded on the way which is more suitable to the undertaking; for all of them have forced our tongue too much into the pattern of Latin (an error shared by nearly all teachers of other modern languages)” (Praefatio). He continues to describe the inadequate grammar texts of grammarians: they “have taught many useless things about the cases of Nouns, Genders and Declensions, and about the Tenses, Moods, and Conjugations of Verbs, about the government of nouns and verbs, etc., matters absolutely foreign to our language, producing confusion and obscurity rather than serving as explanations⁵ (Praefatio).

Wallis further ponders the futility of using English to learn Latin and calls for a new method, “one not so much adapted to Latin as to the logic of our own tongue” (Praefatio):

Even in Latin there are some nouns and adjectives such as … instar.; sat, frugiy neguam, præsto, etc., which are quite indeclinable and which are supposed to have cases and genders on the analogy of other words, but which remain absolutely invariable: if all Nouns and Adjectives had been so, it is more than certain that there would have been a deep silence about cases and genders and a good deal of the syntax of the Noun would never be heeded. And so with the Moods and Tenses of the Verb if they were expressed by circumlocutions (Praefatio).

Wallis questions the logic of using English to get into Latin: “Why should we introduce a fictitious and quite foolish collection of Cases, Genders, Moods and Tenses, without any need, and for which there is no reason in the basis of the language itself?” (Praefatio). Wallis’s opinion differs from other scholars. Educational reformer Samuel Hardib argues in The True and Readie Way To Leame the Latine Tongue (1654) that a student learns by using what is familiar to him. Teachers, he believed, have to build a foundation by referring to a student’s native language and comparing the common elements to the new ones of the foreign language. Hartlib warned grammarians that they must understand both languages they are teaching, English as the mother tongue and Latin as the foreign one, in order to point out the common elements and the disparities and lay a “good Foundation of the first” (Al). Many grammarians complained that schoolmasters were not well grounded in the grammar of either language.

In English Grammar (1654), Jeremiah Wharton states that his grammar will be a good model and preparation to learn other languages: “Upon the sight of any Englished-Latine-Word, pertaining to the rules of Derivation set down herein, hee shall bee able presently to turn it into Latine; though before hee never saw or heard of it before” (A5r-A5v). Wharton claims that if a student learns English grammar first and then transfers the knowledge to Latin, he can be accurate in both languages. He explains that it is “more especially profitable for the youth of this Nation immediately before their Entrance into the Rudiments of the Latine tongue: becaus the knowledg of their mother-tongue is most necessarie, both for the understanding of what they hear or read therein, as also the expressing of their conceit, in what they understand” (A5v). Wharton cites analogy as a good reason to learn English first because “Lastly, it will bee a notable Preparative to the learning of the Latine, or any other Grammatized language; becaus the Rules in this, for the most part may bee applied unto that” (A6r). Still concerned with using English as a preparation for Latin, Wharton states that one needs to have a “warrantable rule or reason of their own, as of a forrein tongue … Besides they will more easily comprehend the Rules and Terms of Art in that tongue, wherein they have been accustomed from their infancie, then in the Latine, whereof they are altogether ignorant” (A5v–A6r).

Throughout the seventeenth century, grammarians continued to be critical about how grammar was taught to children and foreigners. Grammarians used common elements in languages, their “universal” aspects, to teach by analogy.⁶ Teachers found, for example, that it was easier to explain the subjunctive in a familiar language before explaining it in a foreign language.⁷ In Syncrisis, Or The Most Natural and Easie Method of Learning Latin (1675), Elisha Coles argues that “the whole Mother-Tongue … assists … in the introducing [of] any other that is foreign” (Alv). Using analogy, he urges schoolmasters to look at one language that “may assist us in the Learning of the other” (Alv).

In A Rational and Speedy Method Attaining to the Latin Tongue (1695), Archibald Lane believes that by using analogy one can better learn idioms and other eccentric practices in a language. The purpose of English models to learn a foreign language brings us to the “true End and Use of Grammar … to teach us how to speak and write well and learnedly in a Language already known, according to the unalterable Rules of right Reason, which are the same in all Languages how different soever they be” (8). Lane, like other grammarians, urged students to learn English in order to transfer the elements common to English and another language to that other language. Thus, grammarians continued to be locked into the concept that universal grammar validates English. Later, in the eighteenth century, Lane would be accused of abusing the practice of universal grammar by distorting English to fit whatever Latin model he wanted to use. In Grammar of the English Tongue (1712) Charles Gildon describes Lane as a competent grammarian, but one who “extended and tortur’d our Tongue to confess to the Latin” (2).

The author⁸ of Royal Grammar Reformed (1695) takes the position that to learn Latin, one must learn English grammar first. He writes his text in English: “If this method were adopted in our Schools; if children were first taught the common principles of Grammar by some short and clear System of English Grammar, which happily by its simplicity and facility is perhaps of all others the fittest for such a purpose, they would have some notion of what they were going about, when they should enter into the Latin Grammar” (xii). The author argues that if there were better methods of teaching grammar, children “would hardly be engaged so many years, as they now are, in that most irksome and difficult part of literature, with so much labour of the memory, and with so little assistance of the understanding” (xii–xiii). Finally, he states one must know his mother tongue over anything else: “From the learned Languages we derive that Art and Skill which enables men for the highest Employments; for which reason the study of them will be necessary, as long as good Sense is esteemed in the world” (20).

In the early eighteenth century, Lane continued to use English models to illustrate Latin grammar, but he tried to give more credibility to grammar by insisting that it is a science of exact rules that governs decisions. In A Key to the Art of Letters (1700), Lane looks to the English model as the best way to explain Latin and other foreign languages, finding in it the “exactest rules.” In the phrase “exactest rules,” Lane implies that English is a formed, perfect language. He even goes so far as to say that grammar is “indispensable” and of “far greater importance to Mankind, than of any other Art or Science whatever: for Grammar, or the Art of Letters, is universally necessary” (vii). He calls it the “the Golden Key to unlock all other Liberal Arts and Sciences, and the gate that gives an easy entrance into all Forein Languages” (viii). It is the “hardest of all others to be attain’d to … because it is every where misunderstood, and consequently misapply’d, ever since the Latin Tongue ceas’d to be a living language” (viii). Lane asks if “any thing be imagined more absurd and ridiculous, than to put Children to learn Latin and Grammar at once? To learn an unknown Tongue by an unknown Art, must needs be a Barbarous and Gothic Custom” (xi–xii). He claims that a boy can transfer his knowledge of English grammar to Latin grammar and uses the following example, Pater amat filium to illustrate what a student can do within a year if he learns English grammar:

Pater is a Noun Substantive of the Nominative Case, of the Masculine Gender, and of the Singular Number; that amat is a Verb Active Transitive of the third Person Singular of the Present Tense, and of the Indicative Mood; that filium is the Accusative of the Object after the Verb amat, and so of any other plain Sentence: and all this in less than quarter of an hour, which many cannot do in the common Methods, after they have been a whole year at the Latin School (xii–xiii).

Lane’s argument of applying the rules of one language to another was further proof that grammar could be approached as a science.

Lane also noted problems with idioms when students used English as a way to get to Latin. Lane recognizes the problem in A Key to the Art of Letters (1700): “That some will be ready to object, That the many Idioms, and burdensom Exceptions that are in the Latin Tongue, will stop the Youths Career, and be a clog” (xiii). He answers, “first, That all Languages have their Idioms, and anomalous words no less than the Latin Tongue only, more than to English or any other Language.” Second, he states, “That the only way they can be a hindrance to him is (by stopping his progress in reading Authors) to put him to get by heart as a particular Task, unconnected and loose Words, or Terminations, which like Ropes o...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Vernacular Claims Victory
• 2 “Reformation of Schooles”: Hartlib, Comenius, Milton
• 3 The Battle: Good Grammar or Good Writing
• 4 Repairing Babel: Battles in Universal Language and Universal Grammar
• 5 Regulating Social Position
• Afterword
• Bibliography
• Index