Page:Ralcy H. Bell - The Mystery of Words (1924).pdf/210

 this word should be any worse than spicy, rainy, etc., is not revealed.

The use of build for make has caused a good deal of uneasiness in critical circles. It is urged tearfully that one should not say “build a fire” which, it is held, one can make but can not build. In a hair-splitting sense, that is true enough. One can, however, build a structure for burning, insured or not, and, having set fire to it, one logically is permitted by the laws of language to say that the fire was built. So may one pile up a mass of inflammable material and set fire to it; by leave of a little looser law of speech, he still may say that he built a fire. Kindle (from candle) a fire is better perhaps than either build or make, unless it be desirable to show by the verb what the method was of starting the fire. The objection to make, in this sense, is absurdly over-stated when it is said that virtually no other word correctly can take its place; for to lay or light a fire is equally good English.