Society for Pure English, Tract 11 | Page 9

to "in theory" or "in thought"; for instance, Questions which are theoretically interesting to thoughtful people and practically to every one, or again, _He loves himself contemplatively by knowing as he is known and practically by loving as he is loved._' And he finds fault with the _O.E.D._, whence he takes his quotations, for not condemning such phrases as these, The application was supported by practically all the creditors, and, He has been very ill but is now practically well again.
The word is no doubt abused and intrudes everywhere. The Times writes of a recent gale, Considerable damage was done by the gale in practically every parish in Jersey, and again of a bridge on the Seine that _The structure has practically been swept away_; but it seems that in the sense of 'for practical purposes' it can be defended as a useful word. For instance, a friend, leaving your house at night to walk home, says, _It is full moon, isn't it?_ and you reply Practically, meaning that it is full enough for his purpose. You might say nearabouts or thereabouts or sufficiently, but you cannot say almost or nearly without implying that you know the full moon to be nearly due and not past. In such cases it might be argued that 'practically' is truly opposed to 'theoretically', but 'actually' is rather its opposite. 'Practically' implies an undefined margin of error which does not affect the situation.

LITERALLY
A correspondent quotes: For the last three years I literally coined money, and, My hair literally stood on end. The common misuse of this word is so absurd that it would not be worth while to protest against it, if its daily appearance in every newspaper did not show that it was tolerated by educated people. Mr. Fowler writes:
'We have come to such a pass with this emphasizer that where the truth would require us to acknowledge our exaggeration with, "not literally, of course, but in a manner of speaking", we do not hesitate to insert the very word that we ought to be at pains to repudiate; such false coin makes honest traffic in words impossible. _If the Home Rule Bill is passed, the 300,000 Unionists of the South and West of Ireland will be_ literally thrown to the wolves. _The strong "t��te-de-pont" fortifications were rushed by our troops, and a battalion crossed the bridge_ literally on the enemy's shoulders. In both, practically or virtually, opposites of literally, would have stood.'

INFINITELY
This word, like infiniment in French, is commonly used for 'extremely', and it is pedantic to object to it by insisting always on its full logical meaning; but it should be avoided where measurable quantities are spoken of; for instance, one may say to indoctrinate the mob with philosophical notions does infinite harm, but to say that England is infinitely more populous than Australia is absurd. That one can rightly call atoms infinitely small means that they are to our senses immeasurable, and the word, as it here carries wonder, may, like other conversational expletives, have an emotional force, and can therefore be sometimes well used even where its exaggeration is apparent. As when a man heightens some assertion with a 'damnable,' he intends by the colour of his speech to warn you that his conviction is profound, and that he is in no mood to listen to reason, so the exaggeration of 'infinite' may have special value by giving emotional colour to a sentence.
On the above principles there will be doubtful cases. For instance, was Mr. Lloyd George justified the other day in saying, _If you cut down expenditure to the lowest possible limit, the war debt would still be so enormous that ... the expenditure for this country is bound to be infinitely greater than before the war?--The Times_, Oct. 23.

THE AMERICAN INVITATION
The English reply to the American Invitation was despatched last October. The text of it is as follows:
'To Professor Fred Newton Scott.
DEAR SIR,
We thank you heartily for the letter addressed to us by Professors James Wilson Bright, Albert Stanburrough Cook, Charles Hall Grandgent, Robert Underwood Johnson, John Livingston Lowes, John Matthews Manly, Charles Grosvenor Osgood, and yourself.
We regret that so long a time should have passed before our joint reply could be despatched: but our intentions have in the meanwhile been privately made known to you. We now write to give you formal assurance of the interest and sympathy with which your proposal has been received, and to thank you for your generous suggestion that we in the mother country of our language should take the lead in furthering the project.
Since then we, both Americans and British, are in complete agreement as to our aims, we have only to decide on the best means and devise the best machinery that we can to attain them.
We feel that