CHAPTER XVIII

SPECIAL PROCESSES IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF MEANING: RADIATION, ETC.

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EVERYBODY has envied the magician's talent of being in two places at once. Words, in the development of their several meanings, seem to have mastered the trick. Power, for example, is almost ubiquitous in its special senses. Thus it may signify (1) control over one's subordinates, sway (the power of the king'); (2) delegated authority ('the envoy exceeded his powers'); (3) physical strength (all the power of his muscles'); (4) mechanical energy (water-power,' steam-power,' 'the power is shut off'); (5) one of the so-called 'mechanical powers' (as a lever); (6) moral or intellectual force; (7) a person of influence (a power in the community'); (8) one of the great nations of the world (the concert of the powers'); (9) a mathematical conception (the fourth power of 6'); (10) an army' or 'troop' of soldiers (now obsolete; but cf. force and forces); (11) an effective quality of style in writing or oratory (a writer of great power'). Yet in all these vagarious specializations, the primary meaning' of power, the state of being able' to do something (O. Fr. pouer, modern pouvoir, to be able,' from L.L. potere 1), is still present, so that we may almost say that the word accomplishes the feat of being in eleven

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1 Which supplanted the classical posse in Low Latin.

more or less widely separated places at the same time without ceasing to hold its original position.

The phenomenon is familiar enough. One finds it illustrated on every page of a large dictionary. Yet its significance is disguised by the necessary limitations of printing. The lexicographer must put the primary meaning at the head, and arrange the others below it in an unbroken series. Yet his fifteenth special sense may bear as close a relation to the primary meaning as the fifth. It would be more logical to arrange the whole article in the form of a sunburst or a starfish. Radiation is the true history of this process. The simplest meaning stands at the centre, and the secondary meanings proceed out of it in every direction like rays. Each of them is independent of all the rest, and may be traced back to the central signification as if there were no other derivative meaning in existence. 1

Thus in the case of power, the various senses may be arranged in a kind of diagram. (See p. 261.)

Each of the derived senses, it will be seen, might easily have developed from the central meaning 'to be able' without regard to any of the others. Consequently, any one of them might go out of use without affecting the others in the slightest degree.

If we study these radiating senses of power, we immediately perceive that they do not all come from the central idea by the same process. Thus 'sway' (of a ruler) is mere specialization. The sense of 'effectiveness' (in style) is both specialized and figurative. The writer's diction is, as it were, personified, and has attributed to it the ability to move the thoughts or feelings of his readers. It is actually the writer who has power, but the idea is 1 See A. Darmesteter, La Vie des Mots, 2d ed., pp. 73–6.

easily ascribed (by transference)1 to the implement by means of which he exerts it. Again, when a man is called 'a power in the community,' we have the very common use of the abstract for the concrete. The same is true when a nation is called a power, or when the term is applied to a lever or a pulley. Some of our special meanings might be derived from one or another of their fellows rather than from the central idea of be able.' Thus 'mental or moral power' (No. 6) may be a figurative use

of muscular power' (No: 3), and, more probably, the concrete sense of lever' or 'wheel-and-axle' (No. 5) may come from the abstract mechanical power' (No. 4); but we will ignore these minor considerations for the moment. The word head affords a good example of radiation. We may regard as the central meaning that with which we are most familiar, a part of the body. From this we get (1) the 'top' of anything, literally or figuratively, 1 See Chapter XIX.

whether it resembles a head in shape (as the head of a cane, a pin, or a nail), or merely in position or preeminence (as the head of a page, the head of the table, the head of the hall); (2) figuratively, ‘leadership,' or concretely, ‘a leader' (the head of the army, the head of the school); (3) the 'head' of a coin (the side on which the ruler's head is stamped); (4) the 'source' of a stream, 'spring,' 'well-head,' fountain-head'; (5) the hydraulic sense ('head of water'); (6) a 'promontory,' as Flamborough Head, Beechy Head; (7) an armed force,' 'a troop' (now obsolete); (8) a single person or individual, as in 'five head of cattle'; (9) the 'main points,' as in 'the heads of a discourse' (also 'notes' of such points); (10) mental power, 'intellectual force.'

Here again there is no reason for deriving any of our ten special senses from any other. They are mutually independent, each proceeding in a direct line from the central or primary meaning of head.

The main process of radiation is so simple that it is useless to multiply examples. We may proceed, therefore, to scrutinize its operations in certain matters of detail.

In the first place, we observe that any derived meaning may itself become the source of one or more further derivatives. It may even act as a centre whence such derivatives radiate in considerable numbers, precisely as if it were the primary sense of the word.

Thus, in the case of head, the sense of the 'top' of anything immediately divides into that which resembles a human head in (1) shape, or (2) position merely. And each of these senses may radiate in several directions. Thus from (1) we have the head of a pin, of a nail, of a barrel, of an ulcer, ‘a bud' (in Shakspere); from (2) the head of a table, of a hall, of a printed page, of a subscrip

tion-list. And some of these meanings may also be further developed. The head of the table,' for instance, may indicate position, or may be transferred to the person who sits in that position. From the head of an ulcer, we have the disagreeable figure (so common that its literal meaning is quite forgotten), 'to come to a head' for 'to mature' —as in 'his plan came to a head,' and Prospero's 'Now does my project gather to a head' in The Tempest.

Sense No. 2, the forefront of a body of persons, the 'leader,' cannot be altogether separated from No. 1. But it may come perfectly well from the central meaning. In every animal but man the head actually precedes the rest of the body as the creature moves. At all events, the sense of leadership' or 'leader' (it is impossible to keep them apart) has given rise to an infinity of particular applications and idiomatic phrases. The head of a procession, of an army, of a class, of a revolt, of a 'reform movement,' of a new school of philosophy — these phrases all suggest personal leadership, but in different degrees and very various relations to the persons who are led, so that they may all be regarded as radiating from a common

centre.

By a succession of radiations the development of meanings may become almost infinitely complex. No dictionary can ever register a tithe of them, for, so long as a language is alive, every speaker is constantly making new specialized applications of its words. Each particular definition in the fullest lexicon represents, after all, not so much a single meaning as a little group of connected ideas, unconsciously agreed upon in a vague way by the consensus of those who use the language. The limits of the definition must always be vague, and even within these limits there is large scope for variety.