VERBAL PARADOXES.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 698, 24 December 1909, Page 11

VERBAL PARADOXES.

■ i Lady Wolby, in ,:hor ■ stimulating > volume,"What is Moaning ?" ( lias ,a chapter on the ~~ subject, of ambiguity' in its' virions "senses, and ; !:":!? forms; ■ Herein wo mark • that, discord may,' in one senso; ■bo d<s.: ;' : . ; •cribed as the condition of true music, of which'v ' tho essence is significant and ordered harmony. So ambiguity, of which writer and reader aro ': v:i equally aware, and which is adaptivo.and meets ■ ' ' ! new emergency, is the condition of tho highest forms of ..expression,. May wo not. placo' similar category : other ..forms of '. expression which are manifestly intended to attract and .' aronso. attention? Tlio momentary iiilcllectual titillation that it excited by.^an...apparent, con-.v-.i 1 tradiction, often with 'its humoroils'.W grotesque. side, may possibly bo the expression of a muOd "1 \yhich for thj moment is.'pent tip? by, tho resist- ' anco. of an invisiblo barrier, anil; is beaten baek 1 . * oil itself,, as it were, under the''Urgent need ol I an immediate outlet.; Suoh inifeht, bo an ex-planation-of tho magnificent' instanco of'■"»":>•'■■■ verbally identical proposition—l AM That 1 AM—a form, that is to; bo found oven jn tho homely saw and, adage,- e.g;, ''nous verroris co!-':: quo nous verrons." But ,when' wb-.como'to the verbal paradox, it is often somewhat difficult itnagino the. mental, .attitude'- of; tho speaker, though it -is often amusing. to;{endeiivour:: to ;V5 track the thought home, onu to try and detect : how, far. .tho : transgression.: of. formal law is .. deliberate and. how far'unconscious.- When - lluskin. expressed the belief that no : truo dis- % ciple of his would ever boja .lluskinian, aru wo to placo him in tho 'same- Class with tho im. ' i'- ; passioned curato who. uttered-.his unalterable; conviction that "a condition of crisis is normal" s'i'S? in the English Church P Must wo place Tenny- ; son when ho wrote/'a lie which is half a (ruth . . is ever tlio blackest of lies"-'by:the side of statesman who cynically observed! "I ani their leader j-1 must follow them-" p. It was not' ani'J vIrishman, we think, who said that the of tho sexes-is .tho, supremacy of-.wor.ien, though ',5 it was-probably an Englishman: who that- tho 'Scotsman Is. never at.homo; milcs< Tio< is 'abroad. : Theso excellcnt .instnlices are i by Mr,. Macleane.in, his-'lieasoii*, Thought, Ainlw" Language,' and; a fnrthw%cdUoct:6n is ipi-o- : ' : :l vided ill Mt<appendix for the ,enteHaiii->-c!> ' tho reader.; Here wo, find;. R'oljrspierro.V - ;i ;: ' .Way to avoid obstacles is to : 'criish'-theVi i 'n;i(h i .Sancho- Panza's sententiolis ."Jleu'. hit .'• .i.,).- ' made themj and sometimes'n ijrpat. Owl .n'oi ■. £>*,■'',®' IsLord; Morley\s,'' r ilniirovidciit 't!\vik''' i i ■ .ranked'as ail. epigram or,a-verbftl ■ .Westminster Gazette." ■