Page:Ralcy H. Bell - The Mystery of Words (1924).pdf/163

 fied also may be lost. We know this is the fate of multitudes of original meanings. Very often, only the collateral signification of a word persists. This is seen in all tongues. The causes of these diversions of meanings frequently are obscure and difficult to define. Sometimes they can be traced to perversions which, having broken the rules of one epoch, are accepted in another as grammatical exceptions. Usually the changes wrought in the significations of words are of slow process. They pass through intermediate stages, and they end often in direct opposites by some law of contraries.

There is a factor of division as well as of multiplication affecting word-meanings. Thus significations are reduced rather than restricted. That is to say, one part of a word is made to do the service of the whole. Or, instead of calling the factor one of division, it may be termed one of absorption. This is shown when, two words combined under one meaning, one is lost or rendered useless