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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/44259-0.txt b/44259-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..79ab69a --- /dev/null +++ b/44259-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1084 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 44259 *** + + WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY + + (T. D. SEYMOUR) + + + + +WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY.[1] + + +Northampton, Massachusetts, half a century ago, was one of the best +examples of a typical New England town--among stately hills, on the +banks of the Connecticut River, with broad streets well shaded by great +spreading elms, with large homesteads still occupied by the descendants +of early settlers, with people of much culture and refinement who +were given to "plain living and high thinking." It was the town of +Edwards, of Dwight, of Hawley, of Stoddard, of Strong, and of many +another worthy. It was the seat of the once famous Round Hill Academy. +There, on February 9, 1827, William Dwight Whitney was born,--the +second surviving son and fourth child of Josiah Dwight Whitney and +Sarah Williston Whitney. His mother was a daughter of the Rev. Payson +Williston (Yale, 1783), of Easthampton, and sister of the Hon. Samuel +Williston, who founded Williston Seminary. His father was born in +Westfield, Mass.,--the oldest son of Abel Whitney, who was graduated at +Harvard in 1783. + +No company of brothers and sisters of any American family has been so +remarkable for scholarly attainments and achievements as that family in +Northampton: Josiah D. Whitney, Jr. (Yale, 1839), Professor of Geology +at Harvard; William D. Whitney, of Yale; James L. Whitney (Yale, 1856), +of the Boston Public Library; Henry M. Whitney (Yale, 1864), Professor +of English Literature at Beloit College; Miss Maria Whitney, the first +incumbent of the chair of Modern Languages in Smith College. + +William D. Whitney was fitted for college in his native town, and +entered the Sophomore class of Williams College in 1842, at the age of +fifteen. Tradition says that the studies of the college course were +easy to him, and that he spent most of his time in wandering over +the fields, studying geology and the habits of birds and of plants, +although he maintained the first rank for scholarship in his class. +On his graduation he pronounced the valedictory oration, on 'Literary +Biography.' + +After graduation--at eighteen, the age when most now enter college--Mr. +Whitney remained for three years in uncertainty with regard to his +life-work, meanwhile busy as teller in his father's bank. He did +not take an active part in the social life of the young people of +Northampton, but employed himself in his own pursuits. His leisure time +was given largely to the collection of birds and plants; a large and +beautiful case of birds stuffed by him at this period is in the Peabody +Museum at New Haven. His tastes for natural science were marked, and +he was more than an amateur in that field. He spent the summer of 1849 +in the United States Survey of the Lake Superior region, conducted by +his eminent brother, Josiah D. Whitney--having "under his charge the +botany, the ornithology, and the accounts." In the summer of 1873, +also, he was invited to take part in the Hayden exploring expedition in +Colorado. The Report of the Survey says that he "rendered most valuable +assistance ... in geographical work." His account of this expedition +of 1873 was published in the New York _Tribune_, and afterwards was +translated into French for a popular publication of that country, as +giving a clear view of the work of such scientific parties. He had a +brief article in the _American Journal of Science_ for the same year on +the U. S. Geological Survey of the Territories. He gave several months +of his time just before leaving home for his last visit to Europe, to +helping Professor J. D. Whitney put through the press the latter's work +on 'The Metallic Wealth of the United States.' + +His scientific experience stood him in good stead in more than one +instance of philological research and discussion. He was not tempted +to infer from linguistic data the order of succession of trees in +forests, nor astronomical facts. He was a member for several years +of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. One of +his most important publications was the annotated translation of a +Hindu treatise on astronomy--the Sūrya-Siddhānta, 1860--and one of the +longest essays in his 'Oriental and Linguistic Studies' treats of the +same subject. + +In 1848, largely under the influence and with the encouragement of his +father's pastor, the Rev. George E. Day (for a quarter of a century +after 1866 Professor of Hebrew at Yale, and at present Dean of the +Yale Divinity School), Mr. Whitney directed his attention to the study +of Sanskrit, for which he found books in the library of his elder +brother, who had recently returned from Europe. A really good mind can +find pleasure and success in any one of several different fields of +research. Not often, however, do we find such marked examples of men of +real talent manifesting distinct tastes and power in widely different +departments of learning as in the case of these two brothers. Mr. J. +D. Whitney went to Germany primarily in order to prepare himself for +mineralogical and geological work, but became interested in the study +of languages and attended (with but two fellow-listeners) a course of +lectures on Sanskrit at Berlin. He himself says that he might have +taken up philology in earnest, abandoning natural science altogether, +if immediately after his return to his home he had not received an +appointment to engage in a geological survey of a new and interesting +region under United States authority. His philological studies have +borne fruit in his 'Names and Places--Studies in Geographical and +Topographical Nomenclature,' published in 1888, and in the more than +four thousand definitions he furnished to the Century Dictionary. Mr. +W. D. Whitney certainly had great ability in the study of natural +science. Doubtless the accident of his finding various linguistic +books ready to hand, at the time when his mental powers were most +actively developing, had much to do with his turning in the direction +of philology. During the summer which he spent with his brother on +Lake Superior he had a Sanskrit grammar with him, which he studied +at odd moments when not engaged in collecting plants or computing +barometrical observations. Yale College has had another marked example +of a scholar with equal ability and tastes for widely diverse studies, +in Professor James Hadley, whose first published work was in the +department of mathematics, and of whom a high authority said that the +best mathematician in the country was spoiled when Mr. Hadley devoted +himself to Greek! + +Mr. Whitney's practical banker father was not fully satisfied with +his plan of giving himself to Oriental studies, and asked his pastor +whether a man could support himself in life by studying and teaching +Sanskrit. Dr. Day made the very wise answer that if a man had any +exact and thorough knowledge, he was likely to be able to use it. As a +Massachusetts man, the father turned naturally to Harvard as the proper +place for his son's pursuit of advanced studies, but his pastor called +his attention to the newly established department of Philosophy and the +Arts at New Haven as the only definite arrangement yet made in this +country for university work, and especially to the unique equipment of +the special department of Oriental languages. + +Before going to New Haven to study, Mr. Whitney prepared and published +in the _Bibliotheca Sacra_ an article (translated and abridged from von +Bohlen) on the 'Grammatical Structure of the Sanskrit'; and in the same +periodical, in the following year, he published a 'Comparison of the +Greek and Latin Verbs.' + +In the autumn of 1849, too late for his name to appear in the +catalogue of that year, Mr. Whitney came to Yale and studied through +the remainder of the college year under Professor Salisbury. His +associate in study was Professor James Hadley (six years older than +himself, but only three years older in college age), who had been +appointed assistant professor of Greek in 1848. The relations of the +two continued most intimate and mutually stimulating until the death +of Professor Hadley in 1872. Mr. Whitney edited a volume of Professor +Hadley's Essays, in 1873, and wrote a brief but highly appreciative +sketch of his friend for the large work entitled 'Yale College,' +published in 1879. + +Professor Salisbury was graduated at Yale in 1832. During more than +three years' residence abroad, 1836-39, he studied with De Sacy and +Garcin de Tassy in Paris and with Bopp in Berlin. In 1841 he was +invited to a professorship of the Arabic and Sanskrit languages in +Yale College, without the expectation of pecuniary compensation. This +was only nine years after the foundation of the Sanskrit professorship +(of H. H. Wilson) at Oxford, and twelve years after Lassen was made +Professor Extraordinarius at Bonn. He returned to Europe in 1842 for +a year, and read _privatissime_ Arabic with Freytag and Sanskrit with +Lassen, at Bonn. In 1846 he was made the Corresponding Secretary of +the American Oriental Society, and (to use Mr. Whitney's words) "for +some ten years Professor Salisbury was virtually the Society, doing +its work and paying its bills. He gave it standing and credit in the +world of scholars, as an organization that could originate and make +public valuable material; after such a start, it was sure of respectful +attention to whatever it might do." The Society had published nothing +before he took charge of this office. Professor Salisbury also secured +valuable Arabic and Sanskrit manuscripts and books from De Sacy's +library and elsewhere in Europe; and Professor FitzEdward Hall, then +at Benares, procured for him many expensive and important Sanskrit +publications from India. His services and generosity in procuring fonts +of Oriental type, and his wisdom in bringing the Oriental Society into +close connection with the studies of foreign missionaries, should not +be forgotten. He was the only trained Orientalist in this country, +until Mr. Whitney's return in 1853, and had an admirably equipped +library. In the Yale catalogue of 1841-42, Professor Salisbury's name +appears for the first time in the list of the faculty as Professor of +the Arabic and Sanskrit Languages and Literature. In the catalogue +of 1843-44, announcement is made that "the Professor of Arabic and +Sanskrit will give instruction on Tuesdays and Wednesdays in Arabic +grammar with the interpretation of the Korân and the Mo'allakas, and +on Fridays and Saturdays in Sanskrit grammar with the interpretation +of the laws of Manu." In the following year we are told that "the +Professor of Arabic and Sanskrit proposes to commence this year, in +the ensuing summer, a free course of lectures on the Sacred Code of +the Hindus, the Manava Dharma Sastra." In 1845 for the first time +appears a modestly-placed paragraph, saying "Instruction is also given +by the Professors to Resident Graduates, provided a sufficient number +present themselves to form a class." This was followed by the offer +of a "course of lectures on the literary history and doctrines of the +Kurân," or instruction in the elements of Sanskrit. In 1847 appeared +the formal announcement of the opening of the Department of Philosophy +and the Arts, with definite arrangements for advanced work. The +philological courses were by President Woolsey (Thucydides or Pindar), +Professor Kingsley ("in such Latin author as may be agreed upon"), +Professor Gibbs ("lectures on some points of general Philology"), and +Professor Salisbury (Arabic Grammar, and "some of the relations of the +Arabic to other of the Shemitish dialects"). + +Marvellous stories are told in student-tradition of the rapid progress +made by Mr. Whitney and Mr. Hadley--that they learned all the paradigms +of Bopp's grammar in two lessons, etc. The basis of the stories is +partly the fact that both already read simple Sanskrit with ease, +but it is certain that few teachers ever had such a class. They were +Professor Salisbury's first and last pupils in Sanskrit, but he might +well feel proud of the record. He himself says of them that "their +quickness of perception and unerring exactness of acquisition soon made +it evident that the teacher and the taught must change places." + +In 1850 Mr. Whitney went to Germany and spent three winter semesters +in studying with Weber, Bopp, and Lepsius in Berlin, and two summer +semesters at work with Roth in Tübingen. At the suggestion of Roth he +undertook with this master the publication of the Atharva-Veda, and +copied and collated the Berlin MSS of this work. In 1852 he sent to +the American Oriental Society a paper, read at their October meeting +of that year, on 'The main results of the later Vedic researches +in Germany.' A letter from Weber, dated at Berlin, Dec. 28, 1852, +is interesting in this connection on several accounts. He writes: +"I hope ere long Sanskrit studies will flourish in America more +than in England, where with the only exception of the venerable and +not-to-be-praised-enough Professor Wilson nobody seems to care for +them so much as to devote his life to them. The East India Company +certainly does all that is in its power to help the publication +of the Vedic texts, but it does not find English hands to achieve +it.... It is certainly very discouraging to see that Professor Wilson +during all the time since he got his professorship in Oxford, has not +succeeded in bringing up even one Sanskrit scholar who might claim +to be regarded as one who has done at least some little service to +our Sanskrit philology.... I have to congratulate you most heartily +on your countryman Mr. Whitney, who is now intensely engaged in +the preparations for an edition of the Atharva Samhitā in union +with Professor Roth of Tübingen. The next number of the _Indische +Studien_, too, which is now in press, contains from him tables +showing the natural relation of the four now known Samhitās of the +Veda,--an attempt in which he was greatly indebted to Professor Roth's +communications, but which still remains also a very favorable specimen +of his own assiduity and correctness." + +The following letters need little explanation. We note with interest +how soon the first followed the receipt of Weber's letter which has +just been quoted. The spirit which prompted the offer of the first +letter is certainly unusual in its generosity--not only surrendering a +professorial chair, but also providing for its endowment. The modesty +and delicacy of the reply seem as extraordinary at the present day, and +were perhaps as rare forty years ago. + +Under date of February 19, 1853, Professor Salisbury wrote to Mr. +Whitney: "... I have observed your course of study and the rapidity of +your acquisitions since you have been abroad with much interest and +have seen in this, together with what I have known otherwise of your +tastes and talents, a way opening for relief to myself which I have +long desired. The prospect has been the more pleasing to me inasmuch as +I have also seen that I might be able through you to bring new honor +to my 'alma mater.'... It is also much at heart with me to secure +... assistance to myself in editing and endeavouring in every way to +improve the Journal of the Oriental Society." Professor Salisbury +proposed that Mr. Whitney should be made "Professor of the Sanskrit and +its relations to the kindred languages, and of Sanskrit literature, in +the Department of Philosophy and the Arts in Yale College," his term of +service to begin Aug. 8, 1853;--it being understood that Mr. Whitney +would include in his instructions the teaching of modern languages +to undergraduates, and should receive the fees which were then paid +for such teaching. It was understood, further, that Mr. Whitney would +co-operate with Professor Salisbury in editing the Journal of the +Oriental Society. Professor Salisbury undertook to create a fund which +with the fees for modern-language instruction might furnish nearly the +ordinary salary of a Yale professor at that time. + +Mr. Whitney replied from Paris, on April 4, 1853. Professor Salisbury's +letter had reached him at Berlin at a time when he was engaged in +closing his work there, and "had hardly an hour for quiet thought upon +any subject." He expressed his gratitude for the kind feeling toward +him "which has had a share in the dictating of the proposal," and +continued: "Nor can I well say how much I am struck by the true and +self-forgetting zeal for the progress of Oriental studies, of which +this, like all your previous movements, affords an evidence. But ... I +am compelled to ask myself whether ... I can hope to render any such +service to Science as would be an adequate return for the kindness you +exhibit toward me; whether, finally, it would not be in me an act of +unpardonable presumption to take upon my shoulders an office which you +are desirous of throwing off.... I need not say how high and honorable +a post I regard that of a teacher at Yale to be, how many and extreme +attractions, both in a personal and in a scientific point of view, the +prospect of such a situation would have for me.... So far as my own +interests are concerned, I could find nothing in the terms which you +propose or the duties which you suggest to which to raise a moment's +objection.... All that I could bring up against the arrangement would +be that the advantage is too entirely upon my side." He desired further +time for reflection and consultation with his friends, and thought the +postponement of a decision less objectionable because he did not expect +to be able to finish his work in Europe and return before the last of +August, and then, after a three years' absence from home, desired to +spend some time with his friends. His eyes, too, had been giving him +"during the winter ground for some apprehension," and "would doubtless +be best consulted for by a period of rest and inaction." + +In Paris he was "at work on a MS of the Atharva which belongs to the +Imperial Library." "Probably it will cost me about six weeks' labor.... +Then will follow two or three months of similar labor in London and +Oxford.... During the whole winter I was compelled to neglect all other +studies; that, however, chiefly owing to the condition of my eyes, +which robbed me of about half my time. Persian and Arabic had to be +laid aside altogether, and what of time and strength I had to spare +from the Sanskrit, I devoted to the Egyptian and Coptic. I cannot +well express to you the interest which this latter branch of study +has awakened in me, and the strong desire I have felt to penetrate +further into it than the mere surface exploration which could be made +in the odd moments of a single winter. I would not, however, sell for +a very large sum the little insight into this wonderful subject which +I have already obtained, and it will be my highest pleasure to attempt +to draw it somewhat more into the circle of our Oriental inquiries +than has been generally the case hitherto.... There is nothing new of +particular interest, so far as I know, to communicate to you from the +Sanskrit world on this side of the water. The main interest attaches +to the Lexicon which is going to be really a great work, and to push +forward the whole study of that language a long way with one thrust. A +slow thrust, unfortunately, it will have to be; Prof. Roth estimates +ten years as needed for its perfection. [It was completed in 1875.] +I am going to contribute my small mite also toward it, by furnishing +to Prof. Roth the vocabulary complete of the Atharva. The latter, as +you perhaps know, has now the sole redaction of the Vedic material, +Aufrecht having left Germany. The next number of Weber's Zeitschrift +will be out now very soon, and will contain a contribution from me, a +Vedic concordance." + +Mr. Whitney reached home earlier than he had expected--about Aug. 8, +1853--and on Aug. 15 he wrote: "Although not less distrustful than +before of my ability to discharge to your satisfaction and my own +the duties of the post to which you would assign me, I should be +disposed to accept gratefully your proposals, and do my best at least +to accomplish that which such an acceptance demands of me." But Mr. +Whitney desired a modification of the plan. "I have no such knowledge +of French as would in any manner justify me in making pretensions to +ability to teach it." His estimate of his knowledge of modern languages +was lower than that of his friends. Not until 1856 did he accept the +title of "Instructor in German." A year later, after he had taken nine +months of travel and study in southern Europe, the college catalogue +calls him "Professor of Sanskrit, and Instructor in modern languages." + +The importance to American scholarship of the offer of this chair +to Professor Whitney may be better appreciated if we remember that +his predecessor still lives, and that no other chair of Sanskrit was +established in this country for about a quarter of a century. + +At a special meeting of the Corporation of Yale College, on May +10, 1854, the "Professorship of the Sanskrit and its relations to +kindred languages, and Sanskrit Literature" was established, and Mr. +Whitney was elected to hold it. The founder's desire for the range +of the department was indicated distinctly, but the shorter name of +the professorship, "Professor of Sanskrit," was used in the college +catalogues until 1869, when the words "and Comparative Philology" +were added, without indicating any change in the direction of the +incumbent's studies or in the plan of the university. + +In 1854 the announcement of philological courses in the Department of +Philosophy and the Arts covered Professor Gibbs's lectures on general +Philology, Professor Thacher's course of two hours a week in Lucretius +and in Latin Composition, Professor Hadley's course of two hours a +week in Pindar or Theocritus, and contained the following statement: +"Professor Whitney will give instruction in Sanskrit from Bopp's +Grammar and Nalus, or such other text-books as may be agreed upon, and +in the rudiments of the Ancient and Modern Persian, and of the Egyptian +languages." The last clause here reminds the reader of the enthusiasm +for the Egyptian and Coptic expressed in the letter of April 4, 1853; +and of the fact that Mr. Whitney's first 'bibliographical notice' in +the Journal of the Oriental Society discussed Lepsius's work on the +'First order of Egyptian deities,' but we read little more of these +studies, except a paper on Lepsius's Nubian Grammar in the second +volume of this JOURNAL. In 1858 Professor Whitney's announcement read: +"Professor Whitney will instruct in the Sanskrit language, and in +the History, Antiquities, and Literature of India and other Oriental +countries; also in the comparative philology of the Indo-European +languages, and the general principles of linguistic study. He will +also give instruction to such as may desire it in the modern European +languages." + +The appointment of Professor Whitney in 1854 was for five years, +with a pledge of reappointment "for life," five years later, if he +desired it. In 1859 this reappointment was made--the founder of the +chair stipulating that Professor Whitney should be free to retire +from the professorship at any time. Mr. Whitney wrote, on July 15, +1859: "My present situation in New Haven is so pleasant to me on so +many accounts, and holds out such prospects of honorable and useful +employment in the time to come, that I should exceedingly regret being +compelled to go elsewhere. Nor, although it would be in many respects +more agreeable to me to be able to devote my _whole_ time to my own +peculiar studies, do I see reason seriously to regret the division of +my labors between the ancient and the modern languages. It is both +useful and pleasant to have to do more directly with the young men in +college, and there is also the chance of influencing one and another of +them to devote his attention to higher philological study." + +During and after the Civil War, the ordinary expenses of life +increased, and Mr. Whitney's family was growing. The income which had +sufficed for the young and unmarried professor in 1854 had become +entirely insufficient for his needs, with six children, in 1870. For +his pecuniary relief he assumed additional duties of instruction in +modern languages, in connection with the Sheffield Scientific School. +His teaching of modern languages in the academic department had ceased +with the entrance upon his duties of Professor Coe, in 1867. The burden +of instructing large classes of undergraduates in the very rudiments +of French and German (each Academic student then having only thirty or +forty lessons in each subject) became more and more irksome. + +In September, 1869, Mr. Whitney received an urgent call to Harvard, +very soon after President Eliot's election to the headship of that +university, with the assurance that he should have "salary enough to +constitute a tolerable support," and should not have to teach in any +other than his own proper department. He wrote to a friend: "It is the +most tempting offer that could, so far as I know, be made me; for on +the one hand I have greatly grudged the time which I have had to steal +from Oriental and linguistic studies for German and French; and, on the +other hand, what I have received for my services to the College has not +for a good while paid more than about half my expenses.... Such a state +of things has been, of course, worrying enough, nor have I seen any +definite prospect of a change. But I am greatly attached to the College +here, and to the Scientific School, and to relatives and friends in +New Haven, and have no hope that ... I should become so wonted and so +comfortable anywhere else." + +Professor Whitney's colleagues saw how fatal his departure would be +to the advanced philological work at Yale. No definite provision had +then been made for graduate instruction in Greek, Latin, and Modern +Languages, and although Professors Hadley, Thacher, Packard, and Coe +were laboring to build up this department, their efforts received +only the slightest pecuniary compensation; they were expected to do +full work in the undergraduate department; Mr. Whitney was the only +"University professor," not only at Yale, but in the whole country. One +who is everywhere recognized as a leader in education then wrote: "I am +confident that there is no one whose intellectual influence over the +younger officers of the college is so great as Mr. Whitney's.... I have +greatly admired his influence in promoting fidelity, truth, justice, +and industry among the students, as well as his skill in promoting +their intellectual character." Another of his colleagues wrote: "I have +never known the college men so moved. The danger of losing so eminent +a man as Mr. Whitney seemed almost appalling, and I think if no other +means of retaining him could be devised, the professors themselves +would each cut off a slice from his meagre salary to make up the amount +necessary to retain him. The question seems to rise above personal +considerations and to come very near to the vital interests of the +university." + +Professor Salisbury, whose insight and generosity had brought Mr. +Whitney to Yale, was nearly concerned by the call to Cambridge, and +after less than a week's delay provided the sum needed for the full +foundation of Mr. Whitney's chair on the modern scale of salaries, +which had changed greatly since 1854, and Mr. Whitney decided to remain +in New Haven. At this time the arrangement was made that Mr. Whitney +should give regular instruction in linguistics to the undergraduate +classes of the college, and this course, at first given in the form of +lectures, as part of the required work, was amplified and continued as +an 'elective' until 1886. Mr. Whitney still continued to teach in the +Scientific School for an hour a day, saying that in no other way could +he add so easily a convenient thousand dollars a year to his income as +by teaching from eight to nine o'clock each morning; he required no +preparation for the exercise, it did not interfere with the work of his +day, and he liked to be brought into contact with the young men. + +The invitation to Harvard and the decision to remain at Yale had +attracted considerable attention and had given rise to many plans +for advanced philological instruction at New Haven. Mr. Whitney's +release from drudgery with undergraduates enabled him also to enrich +his Sanskrit and linguistic courses. In the catalogue of 1870-71 +we read: "In Philology, a somewhat regular course of higher study, +extending through two years, and leading to the degree of Doctor of +Philosophy, is offered. The leading studies of the first year will be +The general principles of linguistic science, under Professor Whitney; +the Sanskrit language, under Professor Whitney; the older Germanic +languages, especially Gothic and Anglo-Saxon, under Professor Hadley +and Mr. Lounsbury; along with higher instruction in the classical and +the modern languages, according to the special requirements of each +student, under Professors Thacher, Packard, and Coe, and Messrs. Van +Name and Lounsbury, and others. The leading studies of the second +year will be The comparative philology of the Indo-European languages +... under Professor Whitney; the history of the English language, +under Professor Hadley; along with other special branches, as during +the first year." The reward for the new enterprise of a formal +graduate school of philology came almost immediately in the form of +an unusual class of students, nearly all of whom were destined to +secure honorable distinction in their chosen work. In the list of +those who received the degree of Ph.D. in 1873 appear the names of +Lanman of Harvard, Learned of the Japanese Doshisha, Luquiens of Yale, +Manatt of Brown, Otis of the Institute of Technology, and Perrin of +Yale. Truly an unusual group! Only the year before, Professor Easton +of the University of Pennsylvania and Professor Beckwith of Trinity +College, and the year following Professor Edgren of the University of +Gothenburg, received the same degree, while soon after them President +Harper of Chicago, Professor H. P. Wright of Yale, Professor Sherman +of Nebraska, Professor Peters of the University of Pennsylvania, and +Professor Tarbell of the University of Chicago completed the graduate +course under Mr. Whitney. The service which the Semitic scholar, +Professor George E. Day, had done for Indo-European philology by +turning Professor Whitney's mind to its attractions, was in a way +repaid by the latter when he pointed out to William Rainey Harper the +great opportunity open to workers in the Semitic field; as a graduate +student at Yale, Dr. Harper gave himself to work in the field of the +Indo-European languages, but his recollection of his master's words has +had a wide influence on Semitic studies in America. Professor Whitney +was justly proud of his pupils, and was always interested in their +work. His classes in Sanskrit were not large absolutely, but frequently +he could say that more were studying this language with him than with +any other university professor in the world. + +Professor Whitney's connection with the Sheffield Scientific School +was close. He organized its department of modern languages, and was a +member of its 'Governing Board' from the time of the organization of +that body in 1872. One who has occasion to know better than all others +says that he was "a tower of strength" to the School--not only by his +instructions and by inspiring the students with the spirit of true +scholarship, but by his intelligent appreciation of the aims of the +School and his wise judgment as to the means to be used in order to +attain them. His personal liking for natural science, and training in +its methods, added the warmest sympathy to his work in connection with +this department of the University. + +In the very first communication made to Mr. Whitney with regard to his +work at Yale, attention was called to the opportunity for usefulness +in connection with the American Oriental Society, of which he was +elected a member in 1850. In 1854 his name appears in the list of the +publication committee of that Society. In 1855 he was made librarian, +and held that office until 1873. This latter post was no sinecure. In +the winter of 1853-54, on going to visit the library (then kept in +Boston), he "found it a pile of books on the floor in the corner of an +upstairs room in the Athenaeum, apparently just as it had been brought +in and dumped down from an earlier place of keeping." In the summer +of 1855 the books were removed to New Haven. The task of "arranging, +labelling, entering in the book of donations, and preparing cards" +involved "a very considerable and tedious amount of work." In 1857, on +Professor Salisbury's going abroad and resigning the office, Professor +Whitney was elected Corresponding Secretary, and continued in this +position until 1884, when he was elected President of the Society. +His resignation of this latter office was not accepted until 1890, +when for nearly four years the condition of his health had obliged +him to absent himself from its meetings. He could well say that "no +small part of his work had been done in the service of the Society"; +from 1857 to 1885, "just a half of the contents of its Journal is from +his pen." His care of the publications of others, also, was specially +difficult, in view of the peculiar danger of typographical errors and +the wide field covered by the papers; no ordinary proof-reader could +render much assistance. And not infrequently articles by those who were +unaccustomed to scientific composition needed thorough revision. On his +positively declining to be a candidate for re-election as President, +the Society adopted the following minute: "The American Oriental +Society--regretfully accepting his declination--desires to record +its deep sense of indebtedness to its retiring President, Professor +William Dwight Whitney, of New Haven. For twenty-seven years he has +served as Corresponding Secretary of the Society; for eighteen, as its +Librarian; and for six, as its President. We gratefully acknowledge the +obligation under which he has laid us by his diligent attendance at +the meetings, by his unstinted giving of time and of labor in editing +the publications and maintaining their high scientific character, by +the quality and amount of his own contributions to the _Journal_--more +than half of volumes VI-XII coming from his pen--and above all by the +inspiration of his example." + +The American Philological Association might have been a natural +off-shoot from the Oriental Society. The latter has had a +'classical-section' since 1849, of which Professor Hadley was long at +the head, of which Professor Goodwin has been the leader for nearly +a quarter of a century; and classical papers had been presented by +Professor Hadley, as that 'On the theory of Greek accent,' and by +Professor Lane, as that 'On the date of the Amphitruo of Plautus.' Many +of the early members of the Philological Association were also members +of the Oriental Society. Mr. Whitney presided over the Philological +Association at its first meeting in Poughkeepsie in 1869, and at the +Rochester meeting in 1870, as retiring President, he delivered an +address in which he sketched with great wisdom the Association's action +and work. "The association is to be just what its members shall make +it, and will not bear much managing or mastering. It must discuss the +subjects which are interesting American philologists, and with such +wisdom and knowledge as these have at command.... In every such free +and democratic body things are brought forward into public which might +better have been kept back.... The classics, of course, will occupy +the leading place; that department will be most strongly represented, +and will least need fostering, while it will call for most careful +criticism. The philology of the American aboriginal languages, on the +other hand, demands, as it has already begun to receive, the most +hearty encouragement.... Educational subjects also are closely bound up +with philology, and will necessarily receive great attention; yet there +should be a limit here; our special task is to advance the interests +of philology only, confident that education will reap its share of +the benefit." Mr. Whitney's services to the Association, and faithful +attendance upon its meetings, may be estimated from the fact that the +first sixteen volumes of the Transactions contain fourteen papers by +him printed in full, while occasionally he presented communications +which he did not care to print. At its meeting in Williamstown in July +last, the Association adopted the following minute: "The American +Philological Association, at its first meeting after the death of +Professor William D. Whitney, bears grateful testimony to the value +of the services which he rendered for the furtherance of philological +learning, and especially in connection with this Association. Fitly +chosen to be its first President, and retained for a quarter of a +century upon its Executive Committee, he never failed to take an active +part in its work, and in many ways he advanced its interests and +encouraged and assisted the studies to which its members are devoted. +The record of his life-work may be left for more full recital at +another time; but the Association takes this opportunity of testifying +to its sense of obligation to Professor Whitney's manifold and +successful labors, and of the great loss which his death has brought to +its members and to philological students throughout the world." + +Both the classical and the oriental philologists of the country have +noted Mr. Whitney's constancy in attendance on their gatherings. In +November, 1875, he apologized to the Oriental Society for his absence +from the May meeting (caused by his visit to Europe in the interest +of the edition of the Atharva-Veda), and added that it was his second +absence in twenty-one years from a meeting of the Society! His devoted +fidelity to the little Classical and Philological Society at Yale was +just as marked. A quarter of a century ago, he with Professor Hadley +and Professor Packard made that small gathering a deep source of +inspiration. Many, if not most, of his learned papers were presented +for discussion there. After the death of the lamented Professor Hadley, +which gave a sudden check to the development of Yale's advanced courses +in philology, Mr. Whitney was the mainstay of the Society, and his +regular attendance and patient attention roused to best effort each who +took part. Perhaps I ought to confess also that some of the younger +instructors and graduate students shrank from presenting papers which +might be compared with the finished scholar's elaborate productions. +At these meetings his patience must have been sorely tried; much +that was presented can have had but little interest for him; but his +courtesy was unfailing. He gave without stint of his precious time to +any undertaking which he believed to be doing, on the whole, useful +philological work. + +The first great work of Mr. Whitney's scholarship was the publication +of the Atharva-Veda-Sanhitā, undertaken in 1852 with Professor +Roth. The first volume of 458 pages, royal octavo, was published in +1855-56. In connection with this, he prepared and published in Weber's +_Indische Studien_ (vol. IV, pp. 9-64) in 1857 an 'Alphabetisches +Verzeichniss der Versanfänge der Atharva-Samhitā'; in the _Journal_ +of the American Oriental Society in 1862 (vol. VII, pp. 333-616) the +'Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya,' with text, translation and notes; in the +same _Journal_ in 1881 (vol. XII, pp. 1-383) an 'Index Verborum' to the +published text of the Atharva-Veda. He made to the A.O.S. in April, +1892, an 'Announcement' as to a second volume of the Roth-Whitney +edition of the Atharva-Veda. "The bulk of the work" of preparing notes, +indexes, etc., "was to have fallen to Professor Roth, not only because +the bulk of the work on the first volume had fallen to me [i. e. +Professor Whitney], but also because his superior learning and ability +pointed him out as the one to undertake it." But Roth's "absorption in +the great labor of the Petersburg lexicon for a long series of years +had kept his hands from the Atharva-Veda." Mr. Whitney said that he +had never lost from view the completion of the plan of publication +as originally formed. "In 1875 I spent the summer in Germany chiefly +engaged in further collating at Munich and at Tübingen the additional +manuscript material which had come to Europe since our text was +printed; and I should probably have soon taken up the work seriously, +save for having been engaged while in Germany to prepare a Sanskrit +grammar, which fully occupied the leisure of several following years. +At last in 1885-86, I had fairly started upon the execution of the +plan when failure of health reduced my working capacity to a minimum, +and rendered ultimate success very questionable. The task, however, +has never been laid wholly aside, and it is now so far advanced that +barring further loss of power, I may hope to finish it in a couple +of years or so. The plan includes critical readings upon the text"; +the readings of the Pāippalāda version; the data of the Anukramaṇī +respecting authorship, divinity, and meter of each verse; references to +the ancillary literature; extracts from the printed commentary; and, +finally, a simple literal translation. "An introduction and indexes +will give such further material as appears to be called for." Of this +work the last revision is only partially made; a few months' more labor +would have completed it; Professor Lanman, of Harvard, has undertaken +to finish the revision and to conduct the volume through the press. +Thus Professor Whitney's work closes as it began--with the Atharva-Veda. + +Perhaps Mr. Whitney's most important service to Sanskrit philology +was the preparation of his 'Sanskrit Grammar, including both the +classical language, and the older dialects, of Veda and Brahmana,' +486 pp., octavo. This was published in Leipzig in 1879, in the same +year with a German translation. He undertook this work in 1875, and +in 1878 went to Germany with his family and spent fifteen months in +writing out the grammar and preparing it for the press. He aimed "to +make a presentation of the facts of the language primarily as they +show themselves in use in the literature, and only secondarily as they +are laid down by the native grammarians"; "to include also in the +presentation the forms and constructions of the older language, as +exhibited in the Veda and Brāhmaṇa"; "to treat the language throughout +as an accented one"; "to cast all statements, classifications, and so +on, into a form consistent with the teachings of linguistic science." +"While the treatment of the facts of the language has thus been made a +historical one, within the limits of the language itself, I have not +ventured to make it comparative, by bringing in the analogous forms +and processes of other related languages. To do this, in addition to +all that was attempted beside, would have extended the work both in +content and in time of preparation, far beyond the limits assigned to +it." A second edition, revised and extended, was published ten years +later, in 1889. A 'Supplement to his Sanskrit Grammar: The Roots, +Verb-forms, and Primary Derivatives of the Sanskrit Language,' 250 pp., +was published in Leipzig in 1885. That he did not discredit and slight +the old Hindu grammarians because of any lack of acquaintance with them +is shown by his own work and publications in that field. He published +not only the Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya (text, translation and notes, +in 1862), but also a similar edition of the Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, +with its commentary, the Tribhāshyaratna, in 1871. The true relations +of Hindu Grammar to the study of Sanskrit, he made clear in two +articles published in the AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY, in vols. V and +XIV. His last word on the subject was this: "I would by no means say +anything to discourage the study of Pāṇini; it is highly important and +extremely interesting and might well absorb more of the labor of the +present generation of scholars than is given to it. But I would have +it followed in a different spirit and a different method. It should be +completely abandoned as the means by which we are to learn Sanskrit. +For what the literature contains, the literature itself suffices; we +can understand it and present it vastly better than Pāṇini could. It is +the residuum of peculiar material involved in his grammar that we shall +value, and the attempt must be made to separate that from the rest of +the mass." More than twenty-five years ago he called attention to the +fact that the very title of Professor Goldstücker's paper 'On the Veda +of the Hindus and the Veda of the "German School"' involved an evident +_petitio principii_. The fair theme would have been 'The Veda of the +Hindu Schools, and the Veda of the European School: which is the true +Veda?' + +The following extracts from a review by Hillebrandt in the fifth +volume of _Bezzenberger's Beiträge_ illustrate the reception generally +accorded to the Sanskrit Grammar:--"Es handelte sich für ihn nicht +um ein tieferes studium der einheimischen indischen grammatik, auf +deren reiche beobachtungen unsere bisherigen sanskritgrammatiken +fast ausschliesslich sich stützen, sondern um die erforschung des +sprachzustandes, wie ihn die litteratur selbst aufweist.... Whitney's +eigentliche aufgabe war es, in die sanskritgrammatik die grundsätze +der linguistik durchgreifender, als bisher geschehen war, einzuführen +und die sprache als eine historisch gewordene zu betrachten. Dies +princip hatte eine beständige rücksichtsnahme auf den vedadialekt +zur voraussetzung und verlieh Whitney's buche vorzüge, welche allein +genügen würden, ihm eine hervorragende stellung unter den vorhandenen +lehrbüchern anzuweisen. Die reiche fülle neuen materials, welches +er ... aus allen teilen der vedischen litteratur herbeizog und in +instructiver weise dazu verwandte, über das allmähliche aufleben und +absterben dieses oder jenes sprachgebrauchs aufschluss zu geben, die +durch reiche beispiele und aufstellung ganzer paradigmen illustrirte +unterscheidung vedischer und klassischer flexion, die von der indischen +grammatik vernachlässigte statistische beobachtung des formenschatzes +in älterer und jüngerer litteratur--dies sind eigenschaften die es in +dieser ausdehnung mit keinem teilt." + +The Grammar provided an instrument which all Sanskrit scholars are now +thankfully using. + +Of the Supplement to the Grammar, von Bradke wrote in the third volume +of the Literaturblatt für orientalische Philologie: "So anspruchslos +das Werk auftritt, in dieser Weise konnte es nur von einem unserer +ersten Kenner der altindischen Literatursprache, und auch von einem +solchen nicht ohne lange und mühevolle Arbeit geschaffen werden." + +In this connection we should be again reminded that Professor Whitney +was one of the chief four collaborators who furnished material for +the great Sanskrit dictionary published at the expense of the Russian +government. + +In March, 1864, Mr. Whitney delivered at the Smithsonian Institution +a series of six lectures on the Principles of Linguistic +Science--probably lectures which he had given to the Sheffield +Scientific School the preceding year. This course was repeated before +the Lowell Institute and published in 1867, under the title of +'Language and the Study of Language,' 489 pages. This was translated +into German by Jolly and into Netherlandish by Vinckers. The clearness +and conciseness of the statements and the soundness of the views, +in a field where the wildest vagaries had prevailed, and where the +imagination was still allowed rather free play, were recognized on +every hand. From the time of the preparation of those lectures, Mr. +Whitney seems to have devoted to this subject more attention than he +had given before. In 1875 he published in the International Scientific +Series a similar book, in somewhat more compendious form, on the 'Life +and Growth of Language: an outline of linguistic science,' 326 pages. +This was translated into German, French, Italian, Netherlandish, and +Swedish. This last book grew out of his lectures to academic senior +classes. + +No one has done so much as Mr. Whitney to teach sound views of +linguistic science. Although the writer of this sketch has not +ventured to include a detailed discussion of his views, perhaps +mention may be made fitly of two points in which he was in advance of +his contemporaries: he was among the very first to call attention to +_analogy_ as a force in the growth of language, and the first (after +Latham in 1851) to doubt the then generally accepted view that Asia was +the original home of the Indo-Europeans. + +Papers which had been printed in the _North American Review_ and other +periodicals were collected and, with more or less revision, published +in two volumes entitled 'Oriental and Linguistic Studies,' 1873-74, pp. +417 and 432. The first volume contained papers on the Veda, the Avesta, +the science of language; the second, on the British in India, China and +the Chinese, religion and mythology, orthography and phonology, Hindu +astronomy. The author's regard for his earliest teacher in Sanskrit is +marked by his dedication of the first of the two volumes to "Professor +Edward Elbridge Salisbury, the pioneer and patron of Sanskrit studies +in America." The second volume "is affectionately dedicated" to +"Professors Rudolf Roth and Albrecht Weber, my early teachers and +lifelong friends." + +His long experience as a teacher of modern languages and as a student +of linguistics aided to fit him pre-eminently for the preparation of +grammars, readers, and vocabularies of French and German for schools +and colleges, and his systematic habits of work enabled him to prepare +these easily. This apparatus met the needs of the newly awakened +interest in modern languages in this country, and has done much to +further this interest. These books are said to be used more widely than +any others of their kind in America. Some of them are published in two +editions, full and abridged. His desire for a reasonable and truly +philological study of the English language led him to prepare for use +in schools 'Essentials of English Grammar' (1877, 260 pages), which has +been adopted extensively by the public schools of the country and is +declared, by one who knows, to have had great influence on the study of +this subject. + +Professor Whitney had assisted in the preparation of the Webster's +dictionary of 1864, rewriting the definitions of many of the important +words. This experience, his keen sense of proportion, his practical +turn of mind, his precise and concise manner of statement, his wide +and varied attainments,--all made him a peculiarly suitable person +to be the editor-in-chief of the great Century Dictionary with +which the people of this country will long associate his name. His +unfortunate illness prevented him from revising the work so carefully +as he doubtless would have done, had he been in vigorous health, and +some have thought that he should be called supervising-editor rather +than editor-in-chief. As the dictionary stands, he cannot be held +responsible for details; but his influence upon the work was strong as +well as salutary. Though he might not mark the proof for a dozen pages, +he would score the next page in a manner which set a standard, and +showed what he desired the revision of the rest to be, while the whole +body of editors followed the general lines which he had drawn. + +In the list of his writings which was drawn up by Professor Whitney in +1892, one hundred and forty-four items are enumerated; but numerous +minor articles and book notices are not included, nor his contributions +to the great Sanskrit, Webster, and Century dictionaries, nor his +oversight of the German dictionary which goes by his name. He wrote +articles for the New American Cyclopedia, Johnson's Cyclopedia, and +the Encyclopaedia Britannica. He was a frequent contributor to the +_Nation_ and other periodicals. In view of the importance and extent +of many of his publications, his diligence and intellectual fertility +are extraordinary. + +As a teacher of advanced students, Mr. Whitney was exacting. A two-hour +course under him in Sanskrit called for a larger outlay of time and +effort than a four-hour course under most other teachers. He required +precise knowledge of others as well as of himself. He was never +deceived by glittering generalities, nor satisfied with approximate +accuracy when absolute accuracy was attainable. He was modest, however, +and while he would not allow the violation of well-established +principles, yet in the translation of difficult and uncertain passages +he never insisted on the pupil's adoption of his view. + +In controversy and criticism, Mr. Whitney struck hard; his sword was +piercing, even to the sundering of joint and marrow. But he was fair; +he never misrepresented his opponent. He never lost his temper and +struck blindly. He saw so clearly the absurdities and difficulties +of a false position that he felt bound to present it as it was, yet +without any thought of giving personal offence. For example, no one +would suppose that he expected to offend his friend and teacher, Weber, +by the remark that the latter had "unwittingly put himself in the +position of one attempting to prove on philological grounds that the +precessional movement of the equinoxes is from west to east, instead +of from east to west" (Oct. 1865); but the criticism is very similar +to that (which was counted severe) on Müller (July, 1876), that "even +the aid of Main and Hinds could not keep him, in his astronomical +reasonings, from assuming that, to any given observer, the ecliptic is +identical with his own horizon." + +The only prolonged controversy in which Professor Whitney was ever +engaged was that with Professor Max Müller. His early relations +with Müller had been pleasant, and he had supported the latter's +candidacy for his chair at Oxford in 1860. His first public mention +(1867) of Müller's work on the translation of the Vedas was very +complimentary; but when the first volume of the translation appeared, +his review of it was exceedingly severe. In the fourteenth volume of +his _Indische Studien_, under the heading 'Zur Klarstellung,' Weber +gives an account of the conflict. According to him, the real source +of the controversy was Mr. Whitney's spirited reply to Müller's +criticisms on the Böhtlingk-Roth Dictionary. "Whitney hatte zwei +Vorlesungen Müller's kritisch besprochen,--scharf, wie es Whitney's +Art ist, aber ohne irgend welche persönliche Wendung, so wie sich +Gelehrte, denen es um ihre Meinung Ernst ist, zu streiten pflegen." +The occasion of the contest was the publication by Professor George +Darwin, in the _Contemporary Review_ of November, 1874, of a report +of Mr. Whitney's views. "Müller nahm sich denn auch gar nicht die +Zeit Whitney's Abhandlung selbst zu lesen, sondern trat gleich in dem +folgenden Januar-Heft der Review mit einer nur auf die Auszüge Mr. +Darwin's basirten Gegenschrift hervor." Some have wondered that Mr. +Whitney should care to follow up the matter so long, and even in 1892 +should publish a brochure of 79 pages on 'Max Müller and the Science +of Language: a Criticism.' But the question with him rose far above +personalities: the truth was at stake. His mind, accurate by both +nature and training, shrank from allowing inaccurate statements and +false principles to be floated by a charming style. Great Britain in +this generation has had more than one scholar of note whose brilliant +form of statement, ingenious theories, and varied attainments have +sufficed to give them undue authority on subjects where they made +some grievous errors. Mr. Whitney felt that the higher a scholar's +position, the greater his authority, the more careful he should be in +all matters. He was heartily vexed by attempts to overlook and avoid +the real point at issue. His vigorous spirit may have felt a certain +enjoyment in a conflict; as an intellectual athlete he could appreciate +the beauty of a keen thrust or the weight of a heavy blow; but while he +did not fear a conflict, in some cases he avoided a controversy, even +when he had been misunderstood and misrepresented. + +No sketch of Mr. Whitney's character would be complete which did not +mention his musical tastes. Music was always a source of pleasure and +recreation to him. He had a fine tenor voice; and when a young man he +was an acceptable and admired leader of the choir of Jonathan Edwards's +old church in Northampton. The story is told that his conversations +with the Rev. Dr. George E. Day, which led to his study of Sanskrit, +were more frequent and natural because of his weekly calls at the +pastor's house for the list of hymns to be sung. He was an active +member of the Mendelssohn Society of New Haven a score of years ago, +and did much to rouse the community to take interest in oratorios and +other choral music, writing for the newspapers appreciative accounts of +the works to be performed. He was prominent in securing for New Haven +concerts by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. One of the last occasions +which brought him into a public gathering was a University Chamber +Concert by the Kneisel Quartet. He was fond of singing hymns on Sunday +evenings, and while he cherished some of the old tunes of his youth, +he welcomed the introduction of the modern more ecclesiastical music. +While singing the old hymns he was as fervent and orthodox as his +Puritan ancestors. + +Mr. Whitney was no recluse, nor a typical professor in manner. He +attracted men to him and enjoyed being with them. He was not at all +emotional, however, and cared little for general society. He gave a +rather extreme view of himself in a letter written in 1869: "I am of +a more than usually reserved and unsocial nature. I avoid society as +much as I can, and am never quite comfortable in the company of any +excepting those with whom I am most nearly bound. My besetting sin +is burying myself in my books and papers, and too much overlooking +all that is outside of them,--partly from natural tendencies, partly +because I feel that in that way I shall on the whole do most good and +give most pleasure to others." His bearing was perfectly simple and +unpretentious--in short, that of a gentleman. + +Like Aristotle's "magnanimous man," he gave little heed to praise or +blame--not being elated or cast down by either. He loved learning for +its own sake and not for its reward of fame. The words which he wrote +with regard to his friend Professor James Hadley are strikingly true +of himself: "No one was ever more free from the desire to shine among +his fellows. His was a modesty entirely unfeigned, and free from every +taint of a lower feeling.... He devoted himself so entirely to truth +and virtue and duty, as he knew them, that there was left no room for +any thought of self. He neither extolled himself nor gave way unduly +to others." "He knew his power, but possessed it in the spirit of +moderation and reserve." He was eminently guileless--though by no means +a subject for imposition by others. He would have made an admirable +lawyer or statesman, but he could not have been a politician. He saw +truth clearly and abhorred anything like trickery or disingenuousness. +He was also thoroughly sane. Sentimental enthusiasm never led him to +denote as certain views which later were to be proved false. He had +few scientific retractions to make in the course of forty-five years +of publication. His statements on uncertain points were carefully +guarded. Where doubt existed, he was apt to feel it; in fact he was +called in Germany "der Skeptiker der Sprachwissenschaft." His sanity +restrained him from various excesses. His opinions on the desirability +of reform in the spelling of the English language were clear and +clearly expressed, and he was the first chairman of the committee +appointed by the Philological Association for the furtherance of this +reform in our country, but he saw so distinctly the difficulties +in the way of an abrupt change, at least for the present, that he +wasted no time in a Quixotic crusade. He was invited by the Japanese +government to prepare an opinion in regard to the adoption of English +as the official language of Japan--but he was not carried away by any +sentimental notions of English as a _Weltsprache_. His mind was like +a diamond, and his style was eminently clear and forcible. He never +strove to be eloquent, but always expressed his thoughts in the fewest +and simplest words. His was the style of a teacher rather than that of +a popular platform-lecturer, but was enlivened by a strong sense of +humor and by keen wit. + +Professor Whitney's services to science and learning were freely +recognized, both at home and abroad. He received the degree of Ph.D., +_honoris causa_, from the University of Breslau in 1865; that of LL. +D. from Williams College in 1868, from the College of William and Mary +in 1869, from Harvard in 1876, and from the University of Edinburgh in +1889; that of J.U.D. from St. Andrews University in Scotland in 1874; +that of L.H.D. from Columbia in 1887. He was a member of the National +Academy of Sciences; an honorary member of the Oriental or Asiatic +societies of Great Britain and Ireland, of Germany, of Bengal, of +Japan, and of Peking; of the Literary Societies of Leyden, of Upsala, +and of Helsingfors; fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh; member or +correspondent of the Academies of Dublin, of Turin, of Rome (_Lincei_), +of St. Petersburg, of Berlin, and of Denmark; also, correspondent of +the Institute of France; and Foreign Knight of the Prussian order _pour +le mérite_ for Science and Arts, being elected May 31, 1881, to fill +the vacancy made by the death of Thomas Carlyle. + +In 1870 the Berlin Academy of Sciences voted him the first Bopp prize +for his publication of the Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, as the chief +contribution to Sanskrit philology during the preceding three years. + +The following extracts from a brief article in the _Berliner +Nationalzeitung_, from the pen of Professor Albrecht Weber, form an +interesting companion-piece to the letter from the same scholar, +dated in December, 1852, which was quoted in the early part of this +sketch: "Der jüngst in Yalecollege verstorbene Professor William +Dwight Whitney war einer der ersten Indianisten und Sprachforscher +der Gegenwart. Seine Sanskritstudien absolvirte er bei uns in +Deutschland, hier in Berlin bei Weber und in Tübingen bei Roth. Beide +Gelehrte betrachten es als einen ihrer schönsten Ehrentitel, ihn zum +Schüler gehabt zu haben. Gleich seine erste Arbeit in den _Indischen +Studien_ ... war ein Meisterwerk und zeigte alle die Eigenschaften, +die seinen Arbeiten einen so hohen Werth verleihen sollten, Klarheit, +Sorgsamkeit, und Akribie im kleinsten Detail.... Heimgekehrt nach +Amerika, ward er der Begründer der dortigen, jetzt in reicher Blüthe +stehenden Sanskrit-Philologie, die sich besonders durch die von ihm +speziell betonte _statistische_ Methode grosse Verdienste erworben +hat, u. A. durch seine Schüler: Avery, Bloomfield, Hopkins, Lanman, +Jackson, Oertel, Perry, Smyth, Snyder, trefflich vertreten wird.... +Seine Uebersetzung eines der ältesten vorhandenen Lehrbücher der +indischen Astronomie zeigte ihn als trefflichen Rechner und Astronom. +Schärfe der Kritik, Klarheit der Darstellung, Genauigkeit der Arbeit +sind allen seinen Werken als Stempel aufgedrückt. Sein reifstes Werk +wohl ist seine 'Sanskrit-Grammatik,' ... die erste _historische_ +Darstellung derselben, gewissermassen ein _gründliches_ Résumé aus dem +grossen Petersburger Sanskrit-Wörterbuch von Böhtlingk und Roth. Seine +Arbeiten erstreckten sich im Uebrigen auf die verschiedensten Gebiete +der Sprachwissenschaft.... Deutschland verliert in ihm einen der +wärmsten Freunde, die es in Amerika hatte, Amerika einen seiner besten +Gelehrten, und die Wissenschaft im grossen und ganzen einen ihrer +ersten Koryphäen." + +On August 28, 1856, Professor Whitney married Elizabeth Wooster +Baldwin, daughter of the Hon. Roger Sherman Baldwin, of New Haven +(ex-Governor of Connecticut and U. S. Senator), great-granddaughter +of Roger Sherman, and great-great-granddaughter of President Thomas +Clap, of Yale. Six children, three sons and three daughters, were +born to them; of whom one son (the Hon. Edward B. Whitney, Assistant +Attorney-General of the U. S.) and the three daughters survive. The +daughters assisted their father in some of his later publications in +the field of modern languages, and have done literary work of their +own. + +Just after a hard summer's work, at the very beginning of the college +year in the autumn of 1886, Professor Whitney was prostrated by a +severe disorder of the heart. For a time he was forbidden by his +physician to do more than a minimum of work. He was obliged to avoid +fatigue and excitement, and was limited strictly in his physical +exercise. Those who had seen him return invigorated and exhilarated +from a ten-miles' walk in the country were deeply pained to watch his +slow, measured gait. He surprised many by his graceful submission to +restrictions which he must have felt most keenly, and his household +was still the brightest and most cheerful in the city. The gentler +side of his nature became more prominent than before. His face grew +more and more beautiful, with his white hair and beard, and delicate +fair complexion. Though not an old man, he became truly venerable in +appearance, and his presence was a real benediction to all whom he +met. He was obliged to abandon entirely his work with undergraduate +classes, but continued his classes in Sanskrit, receiving the students +in his study at his home. During most of the past year he had six of +these exercises each week. He did not abandon his other scholarly +work. During the early years of this period of weakness, the Century +Dictionary was going through the press and received his care. Every +year witnessed his publication of some scientific paper or papers. He +aided in the plans for the World's Congress of Philology, last year. +One of his intimate associates, Professor Lounsbury, has written of +him: "To me, at least, words seem inadequate to describe the quiet +heroism which gave serenity and calm to his latter days, and the +unflinching resolution with which he met and discharged every duty of a +life over which the possibility of sudden death was always casting its +shadow." + +After an illness of about two weeks, Mr. Whitney passed away from this +life, during sleep, on the morning of Thursday, June 7, 1894. + +In the death of William Dwight Whitney, this country has lost one of +her most distinguished men, one who had been recognized throughout +the world as one of the highest authorities in his department of +learning, and who had been for forty years the leader of oriental and +linguistic studies in America and the personal master of a majority of +the American scholars in his department. Yale University has lost one +of her most brilliant and able scholars, one of her wisest and most +faithful teachers, whose influence always made for diligent and honest +research and statement. His publications have had a lasting effect on +scholarship. His personal influence will long endure. In the words of +Professor Lanman, "for power of intellect, conjoined with purity of +soul and absolute genuineness of character, we shall not soon look upon +his like again." + + THOMAS DAY SEYMOUR. + +[1] The writer desires to acknowledge his special obligations to +Professor Salisbury for allowing him access to original documents, and +to Dr. Hanns Oertel for calling his attention to publications which +would otherwise have escaped his notice. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's William Dwight Whitney, by Thomas Day Seymour + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 44259 *** diff --git a/44259-h/44259-h.htm b/44259-h/44259-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..84a7665 --- /dev/null +++ b/44259-h/44259-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1259 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of William Dwight Whitney, by Thomas Day Seymour. + </title> + <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> + <style type="text/css"> + +body { + width: 80%; + margin: auto; + max-width: 40em; +} + +h1 { + margin-top: 5em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + text-align: center; + clear: both; +} + +h2 { + text-align: center; + clear: both; +} + +p { + text-indent: 1em; + text-align: justify; + margin-top: 0; + margin-bottom: 0; +} + +hr.chap { + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + width: 65% +} + +.pagenum { + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; +} + +.right {text-align: right;} + +.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + +cite.smcap { + font-style: normal; +} + +.footnotes { + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + font-size: 0.9em; +} + +.fnanchor { + vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: + none; +} + </style> + </head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 44259 ***</div> + +<h1><span class="smcap">William Dwight Whitney</span></h1> +<p class="right">(<span class="smcap">T. D. Seymour</span>)</p> + +<hr class="chap" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p> +<h2>WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></h2> + +<p>Northampton, Massachusetts, half a century ago, was one of +the best examples of a typical New England town—among +stately hills, on the banks of the Connecticut River, with broad +streets well shaded by great spreading elms, with large homesteads +still occupied by the descendants of early settlers, with +people of much culture and refinement who were given to "plain +living and high thinking." It was the town of Edwards, of +Dwight, of Hawley, of Stoddard, of Strong, and of many another +worthy. It was the seat of the once famous Round Hill Academy. +There, on February 9, 1827, William Dwight Whitney was born,—the +second surviving son and fourth child of Josiah Dwight +Whitney and Sarah Williston Whitney. His mother was a +daughter of the Rev. Payson Williston (Yale, 1783), of Easthampton, +and sister of the Hon. Samuel Williston, who founded +Williston Seminary. His father was born in Westfield, Mass.,—the +oldest son of Abel Whitney, who was graduated at Harvard +in 1783.</p> + +<p>No company of brothers and sisters of any American family +has been so remarkable for scholarly attainments and achievements +as that family in Northampton: Josiah D. Whitney, Jr. +(Yale, 1839), Professor of Geology at Harvard; William D. +Whitney, of Yale; James L. Whitney (Yale, 1856), of the Boston<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span> +Public Library; Henry M. Whitney (Yale, 1864), Professor of +English Literature at Beloit College; Miss Maria Whitney, the +first incumbent of the chair of Modern Languages in Smith +College.</p> + +<p>William D. Whitney was fitted for college in his native town, +and entered the Sophomore class of Williams College in 1842, +at the age of fifteen. Tradition says that the studies of the +college course were easy to him, and that he spent most of his +time in wandering over the fields, studying geology and the +habits of birds and of plants, although he maintained the first +rank for scholarship in his class. On his graduation he pronounced +the valedictory oration, on 'Literary Biography.'</p> + +<p>After graduation—at eighteen, the age when most now enter +college—Mr. Whitney remained for three years in uncertainty +with regard to his life-work, meanwhile busy as teller in his +father's bank. He did not take an active part in the social life of +the young people of Northampton, but employed himself in his +own pursuits. His leisure time was given largely to the collection +of birds and plants; a large and beautiful case of birds +stuffed by him at this period is in the Peabody Museum at New +Haven. His tastes for natural science were marked, and he was +more than an amateur in that field. He spent the summer of +1849 in the United States Survey of the Lake Superior region, +conducted by his eminent brother, Josiah D. Whitney—having +"under his charge the botany, the ornithology, and the accounts." +In the summer of 1873, also, he was invited to take part in the +Hayden exploring expedition in Colorado. The Report of the +Survey says that he "rendered most valuable assistance ... in +geographical work." His account of this expedition of 1873 was +published in the New York <cite>Tribune</cite>, and afterwards was translated +into French for a popular publication of that country, as +giving a clear view of the work of such scientific parties. He +had a brief article in the <cite>American Journal of Science</cite> for the +same year on the U. S. Geological Survey of the Territories. +He gave several months of his time just before leaving home for +his last visit to Europe, to helping Professor J. D. Whitney put +through the press the latter's work on 'The Metallic Wealth of +the United States.'</p> + +<p>His scientific experience stood him in good stead in more than +one instance of philological research and discussion. He was not +tempted to infer from linguistic data the order of succession of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span> +trees in forests, nor astronomical facts. He was a member for +several years of the American Association for the Advancement +of Science. One of his most important publications was the +annotated translation of a Hindu treatise on astronomy—the +Sūrya-Siddhānta, 1860—and one of the longest essays in his +'Oriental and Linguistic Studies' treats of the same subject.</p> + +<p>In 1848, largely under the influence and with the encouragement +of his father's pastor, the Rev. George E. Day (for a quarter of a +century after 1866 Professor of Hebrew at Yale, and at present +Dean of the Yale Divinity School), Mr. Whitney directed his +attention to the study of Sanskrit, for which he found books in +the library of his elder brother, who had recently returned from +Europe. A really good mind can find pleasure and success in +any one of several different fields of research. Not often, however, +do we find such marked examples of men of real talent +manifesting distinct tastes and power in widely different departments +of learning as in the case of these two brothers. Mr. J. D. +Whitney went to Germany primarily in order to prepare himself +for mineralogical and geological work, but became interested in +the study of languages and attended (with but two fellow-listeners) +a course of lectures on Sanskrit at Berlin. He himself says that +he might have taken up philology in earnest, abandoning natural +science altogether, if immediately after his return to his home he +had not received an appointment to engage in a geological survey +of a new and interesting region under United States authority. +His philological studies have borne fruit in his 'Names and +Places—Studies in Geographical and Topographical Nomenclature,' +published in 1888, and in the more than four thousand +definitions he furnished to the Century Dictionary. Mr. W. D. +Whitney certainly had great ability in the study of natural +science. Doubtless the accident of his finding various linguistic +books ready to hand, at the time when his mental powers were +most actively developing, had much to do with his turning in the +direction of philology. During the summer which he spent with +his brother on Lake Superior he had a Sanskrit grammar with +him, which he studied at odd moments when not engaged in +collecting plants or computing barometrical observations. Yale +College has had another marked example of a scholar with equal +ability and tastes for widely diverse studies, in Professor James +Hadley, whose first published work was in the department of +mathematics, and of whom a high authority said that the best<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span> +mathematician in the country was spoiled when Mr. Hadley +devoted himself to Greek!</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney's practical banker father was not fully satisfied +with his plan of giving himself to Oriental studies, and asked his +pastor whether a man could support himself in life by studying +and teaching Sanskrit. Dr. Day made the very wise answer that +if a man had any exact and thorough knowledge, he was likely +to be able to use it. As a Massachusetts man, the father turned +naturally to Harvard as the proper place for his son's pursuit of +advanced studies, but his pastor called his attention to the newly +established department of Philosophy and the Arts at New Haven +as the only definite arrangement yet made in this country for +university work, and especially to the unique equipment of the +special department of Oriental languages.</p> + +<p>Before going to New Haven to study, Mr. Whitney prepared +and published in the <cite>Bibliotheca Sacra</cite> an article (translated and +abridged from von Bohlen) on the 'Grammatical Structure of the +Sanskrit'; and in the same periodical, in the following year, he +published a 'Comparison of the Greek and Latin Verbs.'</p> + +<p>In the autumn of 1849, too late for his name to appear in the +catalogue of that year, Mr. Whitney came to Yale and studied +through the remainder of the college year under Professor Salisbury. +His associate in study was Professor James Hadley (six +years older than himself, but only three years older in college +age), who had been appointed assistant professor of Greek in +1848. The relations of the two continued most intimate and +mutually stimulating until the death of Professor Hadley in 1872. +Mr. Whitney edited a volume of Professor Hadley's Essays, in +1873, and wrote a brief but highly appreciative sketch of his +friend for the large work entitled 'Yale College,' published in 1879.</p> + +<p>Professor Salisbury was graduated at Yale in 1832. During +more than three years' residence abroad, 1836-39, he studied +with De Sacy and Garcin de Tassy in Paris and with Bopp in +Berlin. In 1841 he was invited to a professorship of the Arabic +and Sanskrit languages in Yale College, without the expectation +of pecuniary compensation. This was only nine years after the +foundation of the Sanskrit professorship (of H. H. Wilson) at +Oxford, and twelve years after Lassen was made Professor +Extraordinarius at Bonn. He returned to Europe in 1842 for a +year, and read <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">privatissime</i> Arabic with Freytag and Sanskrit +with Lassen, at Bonn. In 1846 he was made the Corresponding<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span> +Secretary of the American Oriental Society, and (to use Mr. +Whitney's words) "for some ten years Professor Salisbury was +virtually the Society, doing its work and paying its bills. He +gave it standing and credit in the world of scholars, as an organization +that could originate and make public valuable material; +after such a start, it was sure of respectful attention to whatever it +might do." The Society had published nothing before he took +charge of this office. Professor Salisbury also secured valuable +Arabic and Sanskrit manuscripts and books from De Sacy's +library and elsewhere in Europe; and Professor FitzEdward +Hall, then at Benares, procured for him many expensive and +important Sanskrit publications from India. His services and +generosity in procuring fonts of Oriental type, and his wisdom +in bringing the Oriental Society into close connection with the +studies of foreign missionaries, should not be forgotten. He was +the only trained Orientalist in this country, until Mr. Whitney's +return in 1853, and had an admirably equipped library. In the +Yale catalogue of 1841-42, Professor Salisbury's name appears +for the first time in the list of the faculty as Professor of the +Arabic and Sanskrit Languages and Literature. In the catalogue +of 1843-44, announcement is made that "the Professor of Arabic +and Sanskrit will give instruction on Tuesdays and Wednesdays +in Arabic grammar with the interpretation of the Korân and the +Mo'allakas, and on Fridays and Saturdays in Sanskrit grammar +with the interpretation of the laws of Manu." In the following +year we are told that "the Professor of Arabic and Sanskrit +proposes to commence this year, in the ensuing summer, a free +course of lectures on the Sacred Code of the Hindus, the Manava +Dharma Sastra." In 1845 for the first time appears a modestly-placed +paragraph, saying "Instruction is also given by the Professors +to Resident Graduates, provided a sufficient number +present themselves to form a class." This was followed by the +offer of a "course of lectures on the literary history and doctrines +of the Kurân," or instruction in the elements of Sanskrit. In +1847 appeared the formal announcement of the opening of the +Department of Philosophy and the Arts, with definite arrangements +for advanced work. The philological courses were by +President Woolsey (Thucydides or Pindar), Professor Kingsley +("in such Latin author as may be agreed upon"), Professor +Gibbs ("lectures on some points of general Philology"), and +Professor Salisbury (Arabic Grammar, and "some of the relations +of the Arabic to other of the Shemitish dialects").</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span></p> + +<p>Marvellous stories are told in student-tradition of the rapid +progress made by Mr. Whitney and Mr. Hadley—that they +learned all the paradigms of Bopp's grammar in two lessons, etc. +The basis of the stories is partly the fact that both already read +simple Sanskrit with ease, but it is certain that few teachers ever +had such a class. They were Professor Salisbury's first and last +pupils in Sanskrit, but he might well feel proud of the record. +He himself says of them that "their quickness of perception and +unerring exactness of acquisition soon made it evident that the +teacher and the taught must change places."</p> + +<p>In 1850 Mr. Whitney went to Germany and spent three winter +semesters in studying with Weber, Bopp, and Lepsius in Berlin, +and two summer semesters at work with Roth in Tübingen. At +the suggestion of Roth he undertook with this master the publication +of the Atharva-Veda, and copied and collated the Berlin +MSS of this work. In 1852 he sent to the American Oriental +Society a paper, read at their October meeting of that year, on +'The main results of the later Vedic researches in Germany.' A +letter from Weber, dated at Berlin, Dec. 28, 1852, is interesting +in this connection on several accounts. He writes: "I hope ere +long Sanskrit studies will flourish in America more than in +England, where with the only exception of the venerable and +not-to-be-praised-enough Professor Wilson nobody seems to care +for them so much as to devote his life to them. The East India +Company certainly does all that is in its power to help the publication +of the Vedic texts, but it does not find English hands to +achieve it.... It is certainly very discouraging to see that Professor +Wilson during all the time since he got his professorship +in Oxford, has not succeeded in bringing up even one Sanskrit +scholar who might claim to be regarded as one who has done at +least some little service to our Sanskrit philology.... I have to +congratulate you most heartily on your countryman Mr. Whitney, +who is now intensely engaged in the preparations for an edition +of the Atharva Samhitā in union with Professor Roth of Tübingen. +The next number of the <cite>Indische Studien</cite>, too, which is +now in press, contains from him tables showing the natural +relation of the four now known Samhitās of the Veda,—an +attempt in which he was greatly indebted to Professor Roth's +communications, but which still remains also a very favorable +specimen of his own assiduity and correctness."</p> + +<p>The following letters need little explanation. We note with +interest how soon the first followed the receipt of Weber's letter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span> +which has just been quoted. The spirit which prompted the offer +of the first letter is certainly unusual in its generosity—not only +surrendering a professorial chair, but also providing for its endowment. +The modesty and delicacy of the reply seem as extraordinary +at the present day, and were perhaps as rare forty years +ago.</p> + +<p>Under date of February 19, 1853, Professor Salisbury wrote to +Mr. Whitney: "... I have observed your course of study and +the rapidity of your acquisitions since you have been abroad with +much interest and have seen in this, together with what I have +known otherwise of your tastes and talents, a way opening for +relief to myself which I have long desired. The prospect has +been the more pleasing to me inasmuch as I have also seen that +I might be able through you to bring new honor to my 'alma +mater.'... It is also much at heart with me to secure ... assistance +to myself in editing and endeavouring in every way to +improve the Journal of the Oriental Society." Professor Salisbury +proposed that Mr. Whitney should be made "Professor of +the Sanskrit and its relations to the kindred languages, and of +Sanskrit literature, in the Department of Philosophy and the Arts +in Yale College," his term of service to begin Aug. 8, 1853;—it +being understood that Mr. Whitney would include in his instructions +the teaching of modern languages to undergraduates, and +should receive the fees which were then paid for such teaching. +It was understood, further, that Mr. Whitney would co-operate +with Professor Salisbury in editing the Journal of the Oriental +Society. Professor Salisbury undertook to create a fund which +with the fees for modern-language instruction might furnish +nearly the ordinary salary of a Yale professor at that time.</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney replied from Paris, on April 4, 1853. Professor +Salisbury's letter had reached him at Berlin at a time when he +was engaged in closing his work there, and "had hardly an hour +for quiet thought upon any subject." He expressed his gratitude +for the kind feeling toward him "which has had a share in the +dictating of the proposal," and continued: "Nor can I well say +how much I am struck by the true and self-forgetting zeal for the +progress of Oriental studies, of which this, like all your previous +movements, affords an evidence. But ... I am compelled to ask +myself whether ... I can hope to render any such service to +Science as would be an adequate return for the kindness you +exhibit toward me; whether, finally, it would not be in me an act<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span> +of unpardonable presumption to take upon my shoulders an office +which you are desirous of throwing off.... I need not say how +high and honorable a post I regard that of a teacher at Yale to +be, how many and extreme attractions, both in a personal and in +a scientific point of view, the prospect of such a situation would +have for me.... So far as my own interests are concerned, I +could find nothing in the terms which you propose or the duties +which you suggest to which to raise a moment's objection.... +All that I could bring up against the arrangement would be that +the advantage is too entirely upon my side." He desired further +time for reflection and consultation with his friends, and thought +the postponement of a decision less objectionable because he did +not expect to be able to finish his work in Europe and return +before the last of August, and then, after a three years' absence +from home, desired to spend some time with his friends. His +eyes, too, had been giving him "during the winter ground for +some apprehension," and "would doubtless be best consulted for +by a period of rest and inaction."</p> + +<p>In Paris he was "at work on a MS of the Atharva which +belongs to the Imperial Library." "Probably it will cost me +about six weeks' labor.... Then will follow two or three months +of similar labor in London and Oxford.... During the whole +winter I was compelled to neglect all other studies; that, however, +chiefly owing to the condition of my eyes, which robbed +me of about half my time. Persian and Arabic had to be laid +aside altogether, and what of time and strength I had to spare +from the Sanskrit, I devoted to the Egyptian and Coptic. I +cannot well express to you the interest which this latter branch +of study has awakened in me, and the strong desire I have felt +to penetrate further into it than the mere surface exploration +which could be made in the odd moments of a single winter. I +would not, however, sell for a very large sum the little insight +into this wonderful subject which I have already obtained, and +it will be my highest pleasure to attempt to draw it somewhat +more into the circle of our Oriental inquiries than has been +generally the case hitherto.... There is nothing new of particular +interest, so far as I know, to communicate to you from +the Sanskrit world on this side of the water. The main interest +attaches to the Lexicon which is going to be really a great work, +and to push forward the whole study of that language a long way +with one thrust. A slow thrust, unfortunately, it will have to be;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span> +Prof. Roth estimates ten years as needed for its perfection. [It +was completed in 1875.] I am going to contribute my small +mite also toward it, by furnishing to Prof. Roth the vocabulary +complete of the Atharva. The latter, as you perhaps know, has +now the sole redaction of the Vedic material, Aufrecht having left +Germany. The next number of Weber's Zeitschrift will be out +now very soon, and will contain a contribution from me, a Vedic +concordance."</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney reached home earlier than he had expected—about +Aug. 8, 1853—and on Aug. 15 he wrote: "Although not +less distrustful than before of my ability to discharge to your +satisfaction and my own the duties of the post to which you +would assign me, I should be disposed to accept gratefully your +proposals, and do my best at least to accomplish that which such +an acceptance demands of me." But Mr. Whitney desired a +modification of the plan. "I have no such knowledge of French +as would in any manner justify me in making pretensions to +ability to teach it." His estimate of his knowledge of modern +languages was lower than that of his friends. Not until 1856 did +he accept the title of "Instructor in German." A year later, +after he had taken nine months of travel and study in southern +Europe, the college catalogue calls him "Professor of Sanskrit, +and Instructor in modern languages."</p> + +<p>The importance to American scholarship of the offer of this +chair to Professor Whitney may be better appreciated if we +remember that his predecessor still lives, and that no other chair +of Sanskrit was established in this country for about a quarter of +a century.</p> + +<p>At a special meeting of the Corporation of Yale College, on +May 10, 1854, the "Professorship of the Sanskrit and its relations +to kindred languages, and Sanskrit Literature" was established, +and Mr. Whitney was elected to hold it. The founder's desire +for the range of the department was indicated distinctly, but the +shorter name of the professorship, "Professor of Sanskrit," was +used in the college catalogues until 1869, when the words "and +Comparative Philology" were added, without indicating any +change in the direction of the incumbent's studies or in the plan +of the university.</p> + +<p>In 1854 the announcement of philological courses in the Department +of Philosophy and the Arts covered Professor Gibbs's +lectures on general Philology, Professor Thacher's course of two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span> +hours a week in Lucretius and in Latin Composition, Professor +Hadley's course of two hours a week in Pindar or Theocritus, +and contained the following statement: "Professor Whitney will +give instruction in Sanskrit from Bopp's Grammar and Nalus, or +such other text-books as may be agreed upon, and in the rudiments +of the Ancient and Modern Persian, and of the Egyptian +languages." The last clause here reminds the reader of the +enthusiasm for the Egyptian and Coptic expressed in the letter +of April 4, 1853; and of the fact that Mr. Whitney's first 'bibliographical +notice' in the Journal of the Oriental Society discussed +Lepsius's work on the 'First order of Egyptian deities,' but we +read little more of these studies, except a paper on Lepsius's +Nubian Grammar in the second volume of this <cite class="smcap">Journal</cite>. In +1858 Professor Whitney's announcement read: "Professor Whitney +will instruct in the Sanskrit language, and in the History, +Antiquities, and Literature of India and other Oriental countries; +also in the comparative philology of the Indo-European languages, +and the general principles of linguistic study. He will +also give instruction to such as may desire it in the modern +European languages."</p> + +<p>The appointment of Professor Whitney in 1854 was for five +years, with a pledge of reappointment "for life," five years later, +if he desired it. In 1859 this reappointment was made—the +founder of the chair stipulating that Professor Whitney should +be free to retire from the professorship at any time. Mr. +Whitney wrote, on July 15, 1859: "My present situation in New +Haven is so pleasant to me on so many accounts, and holds out +such prospects of honorable and useful employment in the time +to come, that I should exceedingly regret being compelled to go +elsewhere. Nor, although it would be in many respects more +agreeable to me to be able to devote my <em>whole</em> time to my own +peculiar studies, do I see reason seriously to regret the division +of my labors between the ancient and the modern languages. It +is both useful and pleasant to have to do more directly with the +young men in college, and there is also the chance of influencing +one and another of them to devote his attention to higher +philological study."</p> + +<p>During and after the Civil War, the ordinary expenses of life +increased, and Mr. Whitney's family was growing. The income +which had sufficed for the young and unmarried professor in +1854 had become entirely insufficient for his needs, with six<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> +children, in 1870. For his pecuniary relief he assumed additional +duties of instruction in modern languages, in connection with the +Sheffield Scientific School. His teaching of modern languages in +the academic department had ceased with the entrance upon his +duties of Professor Coe, in 1867. The burden of instructing +large classes of undergraduates in the very rudiments of French +and German (each Academic student then having only thirty or +forty lessons in each subject) became more and more irksome.</p> + +<p>In September, 1869, Mr. Whitney received an urgent call to +Harvard, very soon after President Eliot's election to the headship +of that university, with the assurance that he should have "salary +enough to constitute a tolerable support," and should not have +to teach in any other than his own proper department. He +wrote to a friend: "It is the most tempting offer that could, so +far as I know, be made me; for on the one hand I have greatly +grudged the time which I have had to steal from Oriental and +linguistic studies for German and French; and, on the other +hand, what I have received for my services to the College has not +for a good while paid more than about half my expenses.... +Such a state of things has been, of course, worrying enough, nor +have I seen any definite prospect of a change. But I am greatly +attached to the College here, and to the Scientific School, and to +relatives and friends in New Haven, and have no hope that ... I +should become so wonted and so comfortable anywhere else."</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney's colleagues saw how fatal his departure +would be to the advanced philological work at Yale. No definite +provision had then been made for graduate instruction in Greek, +Latin, and Modern Languages, and although Professors Hadley, +Thacher, Packard, and Coe were laboring to build up this department, +their efforts received only the slightest pecuniary compensation; +they were expected to do full work in the undergraduate +department; Mr. Whitney was the only "University professor," not +only at Yale, but in the whole country. One who is everywhere +recognized as a leader in education then wrote: "I am confident +that there is no one whose intellectual influence over the younger +officers of the college is so great as Mr. Whitney's.... I have +greatly admired his influence in promoting fidelity, truth, justice, +and industry among the students, as well as his skill in promoting +their intellectual character." Another of his colleagues wrote: +"I have never known the college men so moved. The danger +of losing so eminent a man as Mr. Whitney seemed almost<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span> +appalling, and I think if no other means of retaining him could +be devised, the professors themselves would each cut off a slice +from his meagre salary to make up the amount necessary to +retain him. The question seems to rise above personal considerations +and to come very near to the vital interests of the university."</p> + +<p>Professor Salisbury, whose insight and generosity had brought +Mr. Whitney to Yale, was nearly concerned by the call to Cambridge, +and after less than a week's delay provided the sum +needed for the full foundation of Mr. Whitney's chair on the +modern scale of salaries, which had changed greatly since 1854, +and Mr. Whitney decided to remain in New Haven. At this +time the arrangement was made that Mr. Whitney should give +regular instruction in linguistics to the undergraduate classes of +the college, and this course, at first given in the form of lectures, +as part of the required work, was amplified and continued as an +'elective' until 1886. Mr. Whitney still continued to teach in the +Scientific School for an hour a day, saying that in no other way +could he add so easily a convenient thousand dollars a year to his +income as by teaching from eight to nine o'clock each morning; +he required no preparation for the exercise, it did not interfere +with the work of his day, and he liked to be brought into contact +with the young men.</p> + +<p>The invitation to Harvard and the decision to remain at Yale +had attracted considerable attention and had given rise to many +plans for advanced philological instruction at New Haven. Mr. +Whitney's release from drudgery with undergraduates enabled +him also to enrich his Sanskrit and linguistic courses. In the +catalogue of 1870-71 we read: "In Philology, a somewhat regular +course of higher study, extending through two years, and leading +to the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, is offered. The leading +studies of the first year will be The general principles of linguistic +science, under Professor Whitney; the Sanskrit language, under +Professor Whitney; the older Germanic languages, especially +Gothic and Anglo-Saxon, under Professor Hadley and Mr. +Lounsbury; along with higher instruction in the classical and +the modern languages, according to the special requirements of +each student, under Professors Thacher, Packard, and Coe, and +Messrs. Van Name and Lounsbury, and others. The leading +studies of the second year will be The comparative philology of +the Indo-European languages ... under Professor Whitney; the +history of the English language, under Professor Hadley; along<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span> +with other special branches, as during the first year." The reward +for the new enterprise of a formal graduate school of philology +came almost immediately in the form of an unusual class of +students, nearly all of whom were destined to secure honorable +distinction in their chosen work. In the list of those who received +the degree of Ph.D. in 1873 appear the names of Lanman of +Harvard, Learned of the Japanese Doshisha, Luquiens of Yale, +Manatt of Brown, Otis of the Institute of Technology, and Perrin +of Yale. Truly an unusual group! Only the year before, Professor +Easton of the University of Pennsylvania and Professor +Beckwith of Trinity College, and the year following Professor +Edgren of the University of Gothenburg, received the same +degree, while soon after them President Harper of Chicago, Professor +H. P. Wright of Yale, Professor Sherman of Nebraska, +Professor Peters of the University of Pennsylvania, and Professor +Tarbell of the University of Chicago completed the graduate +course under Mr. Whitney. The service which the Semitic +scholar, Professor George E. Day, had done for Indo-European +philology by turning Professor Whitney's mind to its attractions, +was in a way repaid by the latter when he pointed out to William +Rainey Harper the great opportunity open to workers in the +Semitic field; as a graduate student at Yale, Dr. Harper gave +himself to work in the field of the Indo-European languages, but +his recollection of his master's words has had a wide influence on +Semitic studies in America. Professor Whitney was justly proud +of his pupils, and was always interested in their work. His +classes in Sanskrit were not large absolutely, but frequently he +could say that more were studying this language with him than +with any other university professor in the world.</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney's connection with the Sheffield Scientific +School was close. He organized its department of modern languages, +and was a member of its 'Governing Board' from the +time of the organization of that body in 1872. One who has +occasion to know better than all others says that he was "a tower +of strength" to the School—not only by his instructions and by +inspiring the students with the spirit of true scholarship, but by +his intelligent appreciation of the aims of the School and his wise +judgment as to the means to be used in order to attain them. +His personal liking for natural science, and training in its methods, +added the warmest sympathy to his work in connection with this +department of the University.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the very first communication made to Mr. Whitney with +regard to his work at Yale, attention was called to the opportunity +for usefulness in connection with the American Oriental +Society, of which he was elected a member in 1850. In 1854 his +name appears in the list of the publication committee of that +Society. In 1855 he was made librarian, and held that office +until 1873. This latter post was no sinecure. In the winter of +1853-54, on going to visit the library (then kept in Boston), he +"found it a pile of books on the floor in the corner of an upstairs +room in the Athenaeum, apparently just as it had been brought +in and dumped down from an earlier place of keeping." In the +summer of 1855 the books were removed to New Haven. The +task of "arranging, labelling, entering in the book of donations, +and preparing cards" involved "a very considerable and tedious +amount of work." In 1857, on Professor Salisbury's going abroad +and resigning the office, Professor Whitney was elected Corresponding +Secretary, and continued in this position until 1884, +when he was elected President of the Society. His resignation +of this latter office was not accepted until 1890, when for nearly +four years the condition of his health had obliged him to absent +himself from its meetings. He could well say that "no small +part of his work had been done in the service of the Society"; +from 1857 to 1885, "just a half of the contents of its Journal is +from his pen." His care of the publications of others, also, was +specially difficult, in view of the peculiar danger of typographical +errors and the wide field covered by the papers; no ordinary +proof-reader could render much assistance. And not infrequently +articles by those who were unaccustomed to scientific composition +needed thorough revision. On his positively declining to be a +candidate for re-election as President, the Society adopted the +following minute: "The American Oriental Society—regretfully +accepting his declination—desires to record its deep sense of +indebtedness to its retiring President, Professor William Dwight +Whitney, of New Haven. For twenty-seven years he has served +as Corresponding Secretary of the Society; for eighteen, as its +Librarian; and for six, as its President. We gratefully acknowledge +the obligation under which he has laid us by his diligent +attendance at the meetings, by his unstinted giving of time and +of labor in editing the publications and maintaining their high +scientific character, by the quality and amount of his own contributions +to the <cite>Journal</cite>—more than half of volumes VI-XII<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span> +coming from his pen—and above all by the inspiration of his +example."</p> + +<p>The American Philological Association might have been a +natural off-shoot from the Oriental Society. The latter has had +a 'classical-section' since 1849, of which Professor Hadley was +long at the head, of which Professor Goodwin has been the leader +for nearly a quarter of a century; and classical papers had been +presented by Professor Hadley, as that 'On the theory of Greek +accent,' and by Professor Lane, as that 'On the date of the +Amphitruo of Plautus.' Many of the early members of the +Philological Association were also members of the Oriental +Society. Mr. Whitney presided over the Philological Association +at its first meeting in Poughkeepsie in 1869, and at the +Rochester meeting in 1870, as retiring President, he delivered an +address in which he sketched with great wisdom the Association's +action and work. "The association is to be just what its members +shall make it, and will not bear much managing or mastering. It +must discuss the subjects which are interesting American philologists, +and with such wisdom and knowledge as these have at +command.... In every such free and democratic body things +are brought forward into public which might better have been +kept back.... The classics, of course, will occupy the leading +place; that department will be most strongly represented, and +will least need fostering, while it will call for most careful criticism. +The philology of the American aboriginal languages, on the other +hand, demands, as it has already begun to receive, the most +hearty encouragement.... Educational subjects also are closely +bound up with philology, and will necessarily receive great attention; +yet there should be a limit here; our special task is to +advance the interests of philology only, confident that education +will reap its share of the benefit." Mr. Whitney's services to the +Association, and faithful attendance upon its meetings, may be +estimated from the fact that the first sixteen volumes of the +Transactions contain fourteen papers by him printed in full, while +occasionally he presented communications which he did not care +to print. At its meeting in Williamstown in July last, the Association +adopted the following minute: "The American Philological +Association, at its first meeting after the death of Professor +William D. Whitney, bears grateful testimony to the value of the +services which he rendered for the furtherance of philological +learning, and especially in connection with this Association.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span> +Fitly chosen to be its first President, and retained for a quarter +of a century upon its Executive Committee, he never failed to +take an active part in its work, and in many ways he advanced +its interests and encouraged and assisted the studies to which its +members are devoted. The record of his life-work may be left +for more full recital at another time; but the Association takes +this opportunity of testifying to its sense of obligation to Professor +Whitney's manifold and successful labors, and of the great loss +which his death has brought to its members and to philological +students throughout the world."</p> + +<p>Both the classical and the oriental philologists of the country +have noted Mr. Whitney's constancy in attendance on their +gatherings. In November, 1875, he apologized to the Oriental +Society for his absence from the May meeting (caused by his +visit to Europe in the interest of the edition of the Atharva-Veda), +and added that it was his second absence in twenty-one +years from a meeting of the Society! His devoted fidelity to the +little Classical and Philological Society at Yale was just as marked. +A quarter of a century ago, he with Professor Hadley and Professor +Packard made that small gathering a deep source of inspiration. +Many, if not most, of his learned papers were presented +for discussion there. After the death of the lamented Professor +Hadley, which gave a sudden check to the development of Yale's +advanced courses in philology, Mr. Whitney was the mainstay of +the Society, and his regular attendance and patient attention +roused to best effort each who took part. Perhaps I ought to +confess also that some of the younger instructors and graduate +students shrank from presenting papers which might be compared +with the finished scholar's elaborate productions. At these meetings +his patience must have been sorely tried; much that was +presented can have had but little interest for him; but his courtesy +was unfailing. He gave without stint of his precious time to any +undertaking which he believed to be doing, on the whole, useful +philological work.</p> + +<p>The first great work of Mr. Whitney's scholarship was the +publication of the Atharva-Veda-Sanhitā, undertaken in 1852 +with Professor Roth. The first volume of 458 pages, royal +octavo, was published in 1855-56. In connection with this, he +prepared and published in Weber's <cite>Indische Studien</cite> (vol. IV, +pp. 9-64) in 1857 an 'Alphabetisches Verzeichniss der Versanfänge +der Atharva-Samhitā'; in the <cite>Journal</cite> of the American<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span> +Oriental Society in 1862 (vol. VII, pp. 333-616) the 'Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya,' +with text, translation and notes; in the same +<cite>Journal</cite> in 1881 (vol. XII, pp. 1-383) an 'Index Verborum' to +the published text of the Atharva-Veda. He made to the A.O.S. +in April, 1892, an 'Announcement' as to a second volume of the +Roth-Whitney edition of the Atharva-Veda. "The bulk of the +work" of preparing notes, indexes, etc., "was to have fallen to +Professor Roth, not only because the bulk of the work on the +first volume had fallen to me [i. e. Professor Whitney], but also +because his superior learning and ability pointed him out as the +one to undertake it." But Roth's "absorption in the great labor +of the Petersburg lexicon for a long series of years had kept his +hands from the Atharva-Veda." Mr. Whitney said that he had +never lost from view the completion of the plan of publication as +originally formed. "In 1875 I spent the summer in Germany +chiefly engaged in further collating at Munich and at Tübingen +the additional manuscript material which had come to Europe +since our text was printed; and I should probably have soon +taken up the work seriously, save for having been engaged while +in Germany to prepare a Sanskrit grammar, which fully occupied +the leisure of several following years. At last in 1885-86, I had +fairly started upon the execution of the plan when failure of +health reduced my working capacity to a minimum, and rendered +ultimate success very questionable. The task, however, has never +been laid wholly aside, and it is now so far advanced that barring +further loss of power, I may hope to finish it in a couple of years +or so. The plan includes critical readings upon the text"; the +readings of the Pāippalāda version; the data of the Anukramaṇī +respecting authorship, divinity, and meter of each verse; references +to the ancillary literature; extracts from the printed commentary; +and, finally, a simple literal translation. "An introduction +and indexes will give such further material as appears to be +called for." Of this work the last revision is only partially made; +a few months' more labor would have completed it; Professor +Lanman, of Harvard, has undertaken to finish the revision and +to conduct the volume through the press. Thus Professor +Whitney's work closes as it began—with the Atharva-Veda.</p> + +<p>Perhaps Mr. Whitney's most important service to Sanskrit +philology was the preparation of his 'Sanskrit Grammar, including +both the classical language, and the older dialects, of Veda +and Brahmana,' 486 pp., octavo. This was published in Leipzig<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span> +in 1879, in the same year with a German translation. He undertook +this work in 1875, and in 1878 went to Germany with his +family and spent fifteen months in writing out the grammar and +preparing it for the press. He aimed "to make a presentation of +the facts of the language primarily as they show themselves in +use in the literature, and only secondarily as they are laid down +by the native grammarians"; "to include also in the presentation +the forms and constructions of the older language, as exhibited in +the Veda and Brāhmaṇa"; "to treat the language throughout as +an accented one"; "to cast all statements, classifications, and so +on, into a form consistent with the teachings of linguistic science." +"While the treatment of the facts of the language has thus been +made a historical one, within the limits of the language itself, I +have not ventured to make it comparative, by bringing in the +analogous forms and processes of other related languages. To +do this, in addition to all that was attempted beside, would have +extended the work both in content and in time of preparation, far +beyond the limits assigned to it." A second edition, revised and +extended, was published ten years later, in 1889. A 'Supplement +to his Sanskrit Grammar: The Roots, Verb-forms, and Primary +Derivatives of the Sanskrit Language,' 250 pp., was published in +Leipzig in 1885. That he did not discredit and slight the old +Hindu grammarians because of any lack of acquaintance with +them is shown by his own work and publications in that field. +He published not only the Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya (text, +translation and notes, in 1862), but also a similar edition of the +Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, with its commentary, the Tribhāshyaratna, +in 1871. The true relations of Hindu Grammar to the study of +Sanskrit, he made clear in two articles published in the <cite class="smcap">American +Journal of Philology</cite>, in vols. V and XIV. His last word on +the subject was this: "I would by no means say anything to +discourage the study of Pāṇini; it is highly important and +extremely interesting and might well absorb more of the labor +of the present generation of scholars than is given to it. But I +would have it followed in a different spirit and a different method. +It should be completely abandoned as the means by which we +are to learn Sanskrit. For what the literature contains, the literature +itself suffices; we can understand it and present it vastly +better than Pāṇini could. It is the residuum of peculiar material +involved in his grammar that we shall value, and the attempt +must be made to separate that from the rest of the mass." More<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span> +than twenty-five years ago he called attention to the fact that the +very title of Professor Goldstücker's paper 'On the Veda of the +Hindus and the Veda of the "German School"' involved an +evident <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">petitio principii</i>. The fair theme would have been 'The +Veda of the Hindu Schools, and the Veda of the European +School: which is the true Veda?'</p> + +<p>The following extracts from a review by Hillebrandt in the fifth +volume of <cite>Bezzenberger's Beiträge</cite> illustrate the reception generally +accorded to the Sanskrit Grammar:—<span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"Es handelte sich +für ihn nicht um ein tieferes studium der einheimischen indischen +grammatik, auf deren reiche beobachtungen unsere bisherigen +sanskritgrammatiken fast ausschliesslich sich stützen, sondern +um die erforschung des sprachzustandes, wie ihn die litteratur +selbst aufweist.... Whitney's eigentliche aufgabe war es, in die +sanskritgrammatik die grundsätze der linguistik durchgreifender, +als bisher geschehen war, einzuführen und die sprache als eine +historisch gewordene zu betrachten. Dies princip hatte eine +beständige rücksichtsnahme auf den vedadialekt zur voraussetzung +und verlieh Whitney's buche vorzüge, welche allein genügen +würden, ihm eine hervorragende stellung unter den vorhandenen +lehrbüchern anzuweisen. Die reiche fülle neuen materials, +welches er ... aus allen teilen der vedischen litteratur herbeizog +und in instructiver weise dazu verwandte, über das allmähliche +aufleben und absterben dieses oder jenes sprachgebrauchs aufschluss +zu geben, die durch reiche beispiele und aufstellung ganzer +paradigmen illustrirte unterscheidung vedischer und klassischer +flexion, die von der indischen grammatik vernachlässigte statistische +beobachtung des formenschatzes in älterer und jüngerer +litteratur—dies sind eigenschaften die es in dieser ausdehnung +mit keinem teilt."</span></p> + +<p>The Grammar provided an instrument which all Sanskrit +scholars are now thankfully using.</p> + +<p>Of the Supplement to the Grammar, von Bradke wrote in the +third volume of the Literaturblatt für orientalische Philologie: +<span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"So anspruchslos das Werk auftritt, in dieser Weise konnte es +nur von einem unserer ersten Kenner der altindischen Literatursprache, +und auch von einem solchen nicht ohne lange und +mühevolle Arbeit geschaffen werden."</span></p> + +<p>In this connection we should be again reminded that Professor +Whitney was one of the chief four collaborators who furnished +material for the great Sanskrit dictionary published at the expense +of the Russian government.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span></p> + +<p>In March, 1864, Mr. Whitney delivered at the Smithsonian +Institution a series of six lectures on the Principles of Linguistic +Science—probably lectures which he had given to the Sheffield +Scientific School the preceding year. This course was repeated +before the Lowell Institute and published in 1867, under the title +of 'Language and the Study of Language,' 489 pages. This +was translated into German by Jolly and into Netherlandish by +Vinckers. The clearness and conciseness of the statements and +the soundness of the views, in a field where the wildest vagaries +had prevailed, and where the imagination was still allowed rather +free play, were recognized on every hand. From the time of the +preparation of those lectures, Mr. Whitney seems to have devoted +to this subject more attention than he had given before. In 1875 +he published in the International Scientific Series a similar book, +in somewhat more compendious form, on the 'Life and Growth +of Language: an outline of linguistic science,' 326 pages. This +was translated into German, French, Italian, Netherlandish, and +Swedish. This last book grew out of his lectures to academic +senior classes.</p> + +<p>No one has done so much as Mr. Whitney to teach sound +views of linguistic science. Although the writer of this sketch +has not ventured to include a detailed discussion of his views, +perhaps mention may be made fitly of two points in which he +was in advance of his contemporaries: he was among the very +first to call attention to <em>analogy</em> as a force in the growth of +language, and the first (after Latham in 1851) to doubt the then +generally accepted view that Asia was the original home of the +Indo-Europeans.</p> + +<p>Papers which had been printed in the <cite>North American Review</cite> +and other periodicals were collected and, with more or less revision, +published in two volumes entitled 'Oriental and Linguistic +Studies,' 1873-74, pp. 417 and 432. The first volume contained +papers on the Veda, the Avesta, the science of language; the +second, on the British in India, China and the Chinese, religion +and mythology, orthography and phonology, Hindu astronomy. +The author's regard for his earliest teacher in Sanskrit is marked +by his dedication of the first of the two volumes to "Professor +Edward Elbridge Salisbury, the pioneer and patron of Sanskrit +studies in America." The second volume "is affectionately +dedicated" to "Professors Rudolf Roth and Albrecht Weber, +my early teachers and lifelong friends."</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span></p> + +<p>His long experience as a teacher of modern languages and as +a student of linguistics aided to fit him pre-eminently for the +preparation of grammars, readers, and vocabularies of French +and German for schools and colleges, and his systematic habits +of work enabled him to prepare these easily. This apparatus +met the needs of the newly awakened interest in modern languages +in this country, and has done much to further this interest. +These books are said to be used more widely than any others of +their kind in America. Some of them are published in two +editions, full and abridged. His desire for a reasonable and truly +philological study of the English language led him to prepare for +use in schools 'Essentials of English Grammar' (1877, 260 pages), +which has been adopted extensively by the public schools of the +country and is declared, by one who knows, to have had great +influence on the study of this subject.</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney had assisted in the preparation of the +Webster's dictionary of 1864, rewriting the definitions of many +of the important words. This experience, his keen sense of +proportion, his practical turn of mind, his precise and concise +manner of statement, his wide and varied attainments,—all made +him a peculiarly suitable person to be the editor-in-chief of the +great Century Dictionary with which the people of this country +will long associate his name. His unfortunate illness prevented +him from revising the work so carefully as he doubtless would +have done, had he been in vigorous health, and some have +thought that he should be called supervising-editor rather than +editor-in-chief. As the dictionary stands, he cannot be held +responsible for details; but his influence upon the work was +strong as well as salutary. Though he might not mark the proof +for a dozen pages, he would score the next page in a manner +which set a standard, and showed what he desired the revision of +the rest to be, while the whole body of editors followed the +general lines which he had drawn.</p> + +<p>In the list of his writings which was drawn up by Professor +Whitney in 1892, one hundred and forty-four items are enumerated; +but numerous minor articles and book notices are not +included, nor his contributions to the great Sanskrit, Webster, +and Century dictionaries, nor his oversight of the German dictionary +which goes by his name. He wrote articles for the New +American Cyclopedia, Johnson's Cyclopedia, and the Encyclopaedia +Britannica. He was a frequent contributor to the <cite>Nation</cite><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span> +and other periodicals. In view of the importance and extent of +many of his publications, his diligence and intellectual fertility +are extraordinary.</p> + +<p>As a teacher of advanced students, Mr. Whitney was exacting. +A two-hour course under him in Sanskrit called for a larger +outlay of time and effort than a four-hour course under most +other teachers. He required precise knowledge of others as well +as of himself. He was never deceived by glittering generalities, +nor satisfied with approximate accuracy when absolute accuracy +was attainable. He was modest, however, and while he would +not allow the violation of well-established principles, yet in the +translation of difficult and uncertain passages he never insisted +on the pupil's adoption of his view.</p> + +<p>In controversy and criticism, Mr. Whitney struck hard; his +sword was piercing, even to the sundering of joint and marrow. +But he was fair; he never misrepresented his opponent. He +never lost his temper and struck blindly. He saw so clearly the +absurdities and difficulties of a false position that he felt bound to +present it as it was, yet without any thought of giving personal +offence. For example, no one would suppose that he expected to +offend his friend and teacher, Weber, by the remark that the latter +had "unwittingly put himself in the position of one attempting to +prove on philological grounds that the precessional movement +of the equinoxes is from west to east, instead of from east to +west" (Oct. 1865); but the criticism is very similar to that (which +was counted severe) on Müller (July, 1876), that "even the aid +of Main and Hinds could not keep him, in his astronomical +reasonings, from assuming that, to any given observer, the +ecliptic is identical with his own horizon."</p> + +<p>The only prolonged controversy in which Professor Whitney +was ever engaged was that with Professor Max Müller. His +early relations with Müller had been pleasant, and he had supported +the latter's candidacy for his chair at Oxford in 1860. +His first public mention (1867) of Müller's work on the translation +of the Vedas was very complimentary; but when the first +volume of the translation appeared, his review of it was exceedingly +severe. In the fourteenth volume of his <cite>Indische Studien</cite>, +under the heading 'Zur Klarstellung,' Weber gives an account of +the conflict. According to him, the real source of the controversy +was Mr. Whitney's spirited reply to Müller's criticisms on +the Böhtlingk-Roth Dictionary. <span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"Whitney hatte zwei Vorlesungen</span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> +<span lang="de" xml:lang="de">Müller's kritisch besprochen,—scharf, wie es Whitney's +Art ist, aber ohne irgend welche persönliche Wendung, so wie +sich Gelehrte, denen es um ihre Meinung Ernst ist, zu streiten +pflegen."</span> The occasion of the contest was the publication by +Professor George Darwin, in the <cite>Contemporary Review</cite> of November, +1874, of a report of Mr. Whitney's views. "Müller nahm +sich denn auch gar nicht die Zeit Whitney's Abhandlung selbst +zu lesen, sondern trat gleich in dem folgenden Januar-Heft der +Review mit einer nur auf die Auszüge Mr. Darwin's basirten +Gegenschrift hervor." Some have wondered that Mr. Whitney +should care to follow up the matter so long, and even in 1892 +should publish a brochure of 79 pages on 'Max Müller and the +Science of Language: a Criticism.' But the question with him +rose far above personalities: the truth was at stake. His mind, +accurate by both nature and training, shrank from allowing inaccurate +statements and false principles to be floated by a charming +style. Great Britain in this generation has had more than one +scholar of note whose brilliant form of statement, ingenious +theories, and varied attainments have sufficed to give them undue +authority on subjects where they made some grievous errors. Mr. +Whitney felt that the higher a scholar's position, the greater his +authority, the more careful he should be in all matters. He was +heartily vexed by attempts to overlook and avoid the real point +at issue. His vigorous spirit may have felt a certain enjoyment +in a conflict; as an intellectual athlete he could appreciate the +beauty of a keen thrust or the weight of a heavy blow; but while +he did not fear a conflict, in some cases he avoided a controversy, +even when he had been misunderstood and misrepresented.</p> + +<p>No sketch of Mr. Whitney's character would be complete which +did not mention his musical tastes. Music was always a source +of pleasure and recreation to him. He had a fine tenor voice; +and when a young man he was an acceptable and admired leader +of the choir of Jonathan Edwards's old church in Northampton. +The story is told that his conversations with the Rev. Dr. +George E. Day, which led to his study of Sanskrit, were more +frequent and natural because of his weekly calls at the pastor's +house for the list of hymns to be sung. He was an active +member of the Mendelssohn Society of New Haven a score of +years ago, and did much to rouse the community to take interest +in oratorios and other choral music, writing for the newspapers +appreciative accounts of the works to be performed. He was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span> +prominent in securing for New Haven concerts by the Boston +Symphony Orchestra. One of the last occasions which brought +him into a public gathering was a University Chamber Concert +by the Kneisel Quartet. He was fond of singing hymns on +Sunday evenings, and while he cherished some of the old tunes +of his youth, he welcomed the introduction of the modern more +ecclesiastical music. While singing the old hymns he was as +fervent and orthodox as his Puritan ancestors.</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney was no recluse, nor a typical professor in manner. +He attracted men to him and enjoyed being with them. He was +not at all emotional, however, and cared little for general society. +He gave a rather extreme view of himself in a letter written in +1869: "I am of a more than usually reserved and unsocial nature. +I avoid society as much as I can, and am never quite comfortable +in the company of any excepting those with whom I am most +nearly bound. My besetting sin is burying myself in my books +and papers, and too much overlooking all that is outside of them,—partly +from natural tendencies, partly because I feel that in that +way I shall on the whole do most good and give most pleasure +to others." His bearing was perfectly simple and unpretentious—in +short, that of a gentleman.</p> + +<p>Like Aristotle's "magnanimous man," he gave little heed to +praise or blame—not being elated or cast down by either. He +loved learning for its own sake and not for its reward of fame. +The words which he wrote with regard to his friend Professor +James Hadley are strikingly true of himself: "No one was ever +more free from the desire to shine among his fellows. His was a +modesty entirely unfeigned, and free from every taint of a lower +feeling.... He devoted himself so entirely to truth and virtue and +duty, as he knew them, that there was left no room for any thought +of self. He neither extolled himself nor gave way unduly to others." +"He knew his power, but possessed it in the spirit of moderation +and reserve." He was eminently guileless—though by no means +a subject for imposition by others. He would have made an +admirable lawyer or statesman, but he could not have been a +politician. He saw truth clearly and abhorred anything like +trickery or disingenuousness. He was also thoroughly sane. +Sentimental enthusiasm never led him to denote as certain views +which later were to be proved false. He had few scientific retractions +to make in the course of forty-five years of publication. +His statements on uncertain points were carefully guarded.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> +Where doubt existed, he was apt to feel it; in fact he was called +in Germany "der Skeptiker der Sprachwissenschaft." His sanity +restrained him from various excesses. His opinions on the desirability +of reform in the spelling of the English language were +clear and clearly expressed, and he was the first chairman of the +committee appointed by the Philological Association for the +furtherance of this reform in our country, but he saw so distinctly +the difficulties in the way of an abrupt change, at least for the +present, that he wasted no time in a Quixotic crusade. He was +invited by the Japanese government to prepare an opinion in +regard to the adoption of English as the official language of +Japan—but he was not carried away by any sentimental notions +of English as a <i lang="de" xml:lang="de">Weltsprache</i>. His mind was like a diamond, and +his style was eminently clear and forcible. He never strove to be +eloquent, but always expressed his thoughts in the fewest and +simplest words. His was the style of a teacher rather than that +of a popular platform-lecturer, but was enlivened by a strong +sense of humor and by keen wit.</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney's services to science and learning were freely +recognized, both at home and abroad. He received the degree +of Ph.D., <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">honoris causa</i>, from the University of Breslau in 1865; +that of LL. D. from Williams College in 1868, from the College +of William and Mary in 1869, from Harvard in 1876, and from +the University of Edinburgh in 1889; that of J.U.D. from St. +Andrews University in Scotland in 1874; that of L.H.D. from +Columbia in 1887. He was a member of the National Academy +of Sciences; an honorary member of the Oriental or Asiatic +societies of Great Britain and Ireland, of Germany, of Bengal, +of Japan, and of Peking; of the Literary Societies of Leyden, +of Upsala, and of Helsingfors; fellow of the Royal Society of +Edinburgh; member or correspondent of the Academies of +Dublin, of Turin, of Rome (<i lang="it" xml:lang="it">Lincei</i>), of St. Petersburg, of Berlin, +and of Denmark; also, correspondent of the Institute of France; +and Foreign Knight of the Prussian order <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">pour le mérite</i> for +Science and Arts, being elected May 31, 1881, to fill the vacancy +made by the death of Thomas Carlyle.</p> + +<p>In 1870 the Berlin Academy of Sciences voted him the first +Bopp prize for his publication of the Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, as +the chief contribution to Sanskrit philology during the preceding +three years.</p> + +<p>The following extracts from a brief article in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span> +<cite>Berliner Nationalzeitung</cite>, from the pen of Professor Albrecht Weber, +form an interesting companion-piece to the letter from the same +scholar, dated in December, 1852, which was quoted in the early +part of this sketch: <span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"Der jüngst in Yalecollege verstorbene Professor +William Dwight Whitney war einer der ersten Indianisten +und Sprachforscher der Gegenwart. Seine Sanskritstudien absolvirte +er bei uns in Deutschland, hier in Berlin bei Weber und in +Tübingen bei Roth. Beide Gelehrte betrachten es als einen ihrer +schönsten Ehrentitel, ihn zum Schüler gehabt zu haben. Gleich +seine erste Arbeit in den <cite>Indischen Studien</cite> ... war ein Meisterwerk +und zeigte alle die Eigenschaften, die seinen Arbeiten einen +so hohen Werth verleihen sollten, Klarheit, Sorgsamkeit, und +Akribie im kleinsten Detail.... Heimgekehrt nach Amerika, +ward er der Begründer der dortigen, jetzt in reicher Blüthe +stehenden Sanskrit-Philologie, die sich besonders durch die von +ihm speziell betonte <em>statistische</em> Methode grosse Verdienste +erworben hat, u. A. durch seine Schüler: Avery, Bloomfield, +Hopkins, Lanman, Jackson, Oertel, Perry, Smyth, Snyder, trefflich +vertreten wird.... Seine Uebersetzung eines der ältesten +vorhandenen Lehrbücher der indischen Astronomie zeigte ihn als +trefflichen Rechner und Astronom. Schärfe der Kritik, Klarheit +der Darstellung, Genauigkeit der Arbeit sind allen seinen Werken +als Stempel aufgedrückt. Sein reifstes Werk wohl ist seine +'Sanskrit-Grammatik,' ... die erste <em>historische</em> Darstellung derselben, +gewissermassen ein <em>gründliches</em> Résumé aus dem grossen +Petersburger Sanskrit-Wörterbuch von Böhtlingk und Roth. +Seine Arbeiten erstreckten sich im Uebrigen auf die verschiedensten +Gebiete der Sprachwissenschaft.... Deutschland verliert +in ihm einen der wärmsten Freunde, die es in Amerika hatte, +Amerika einen seiner besten Gelehrten, und die Wissenschaft im +grossen und ganzen einen ihrer ersten Koryphäen."</span></p> + +<p>On August 28, 1856, Professor Whitney married Elizabeth +Wooster Baldwin, daughter of the Hon. Roger Sherman Baldwin, +of New Haven (ex-Governor of Connecticut and U. S. Senator), +great-granddaughter of Roger Sherman, and great-great-granddaughter +of President Thomas Clap, of Yale. Six children, three +sons and three daughters, were born to them; of whom one son +(the Hon. Edward B. Whitney, Assistant Attorney-General of +the U. S.) and the three daughters survive. The daughters +assisted their father in some of his later publications in the field +of modern languages, and have done literary work of their own.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></p> + +<p>Just after a hard summer's work, at the very beginning of the +college year in the autumn of 1886, Professor Whitney was prostrated +by a severe disorder of the heart. For a time he was +forbidden by his physician to do more than a minimum of work. +He was obliged to avoid fatigue and excitement, and was limited +strictly in his physical exercise. Those who had seen him return +invigorated and exhilarated from a ten-miles' walk in the country +were deeply pained to watch his slow, measured gait. He surprised +many by his graceful submission to restrictions which he +must have felt most keenly, and his household was still the +brightest and most cheerful in the city. The gentler side of his +nature became more prominent than before. His face grew more +and more beautiful, with his white hair and beard, and delicate +fair complexion. Though not an old man, he became truly +venerable in appearance, and his presence was a real benediction +to all whom he met. He was obliged to abandon entirely his +work with undergraduate classes, but continued his classes in +Sanskrit, receiving the students in his study at his home. During +most of the past year he had six of these exercises each week. +He did not abandon his other scholarly work. During the early +years of this period of weakness, the Century Dictionary was +going through the press and received his care. Every year +witnessed his publication of some scientific paper or papers. He +aided in the plans for the World's Congress of Philology, last +year. One of his intimate associates, Professor Lounsbury, has +written of him: "To me, at least, words seem inadequate to +describe the quiet heroism which gave serenity and calm to his +latter days, and the unflinching resolution with which he met and +discharged every duty of a life over which the possibility of +sudden death was always casting its shadow."</p> + +<p>After an illness of about two weeks, Mr. Whitney passed away +from this life, during sleep, on the morning of Thursday, June 7, +1894.</p> + +<p>In the death of William Dwight Whitney, this country has lost +one of her most distinguished men, one who had been recognized +throughout the world as one of the highest authorities in his +department of learning, and who had been for forty years the +leader of oriental and linguistic studies in America and the +personal master of a majority of the American scholars in his +department. Yale University has lost one of her most brilliant +and able scholars, one of her wisest and most faithful teachers,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> +whose influence always made for diligent and honest research +and statement. His publications have had a lasting effect on +scholarship. His personal influence will long endure. In the +words of Professor Lanman, "for power of intellect, conjoined +with purity of soul and absolute genuineness of character, we +shall not soon look upon his like again."</p> + +<p class="right smcap">Thomas Day Seymour.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"> +<p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1">[1]</a> The writer desires to acknowledge his special obligations to Professor +Salisbury for allowing him access to original documents, and to Dr. Hanns +Oertel for calling his attention to publications which would otherwise have +escaped his notice.</p> +</div> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 44259 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/44259-h/images/cover.jpg b/44259-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a43e600 --- /dev/null +++ b/44259-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..455a250 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #44259 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44259) diff --git a/old/44259-0.txt b/old/44259-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..07d9954 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/44259-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1476 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of William Dwight Whitney, by Thomas Day Seymour + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: William Dwight Whitney + +Author: Thomas Day Seymour + +Release Date: November 23, 2013 [EBook #44259] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY *** + + + + +Produced by Mark C. Orton, Marc-Andre Seekamp and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + + + WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY + + (T. D. SEYMOUR) + + + + +WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY.[1] + + +Northampton, Massachusetts, half a century ago, was one of the best +examples of a typical New England town--among stately hills, on the +banks of the Connecticut River, with broad streets well shaded by great +spreading elms, with large homesteads still occupied by the descendants +of early settlers, with people of much culture and refinement who +were given to "plain living and high thinking." It was the town of +Edwards, of Dwight, of Hawley, of Stoddard, of Strong, and of many +another worthy. It was the seat of the once famous Round Hill Academy. +There, on February 9, 1827, William Dwight Whitney was born,--the +second surviving son and fourth child of Josiah Dwight Whitney and +Sarah Williston Whitney. His mother was a daughter of the Rev. Payson +Williston (Yale, 1783), of Easthampton, and sister of the Hon. Samuel +Williston, who founded Williston Seminary. His father was born in +Westfield, Mass.,--the oldest son of Abel Whitney, who was graduated at +Harvard in 1783. + +No company of brothers and sisters of any American family has been so +remarkable for scholarly attainments and achievements as that family in +Northampton: Josiah D. Whitney, Jr. (Yale, 1839), Professor of Geology +at Harvard; William D. Whitney, of Yale; James L. Whitney (Yale, 1856), +of the Boston Public Library; Henry M. Whitney (Yale, 1864), Professor +of English Literature at Beloit College; Miss Maria Whitney, the first +incumbent of the chair of Modern Languages in Smith College. + +William D. Whitney was fitted for college in his native town, and +entered the Sophomore class of Williams College in 1842, at the age of +fifteen. Tradition says that the studies of the college course were +easy to him, and that he spent most of his time in wandering over +the fields, studying geology and the habits of birds and of plants, +although he maintained the first rank for scholarship in his class. +On his graduation he pronounced the valedictory oration, on 'Literary +Biography.' + +After graduation--at eighteen, the age when most now enter college--Mr. +Whitney remained for three years in uncertainty with regard to his +life-work, meanwhile busy as teller in his father's bank. He did +not take an active part in the social life of the young people of +Northampton, but employed himself in his own pursuits. His leisure time +was given largely to the collection of birds and plants; a large and +beautiful case of birds stuffed by him at this period is in the Peabody +Museum at New Haven. His tastes for natural science were marked, and +he was more than an amateur in that field. He spent the summer of 1849 +in the United States Survey of the Lake Superior region, conducted by +his eminent brother, Josiah D. Whitney--having "under his charge the +botany, the ornithology, and the accounts." In the summer of 1873, +also, he was invited to take part in the Hayden exploring expedition in +Colorado. The Report of the Survey says that he "rendered most valuable +assistance ... in geographical work." His account of this expedition +of 1873 was published in the New York _Tribune_, and afterwards was +translated into French for a popular publication of that country, as +giving a clear view of the work of such scientific parties. He had a +brief article in the _American Journal of Science_ for the same year on +the U. S. Geological Survey of the Territories. He gave several months +of his time just before leaving home for his last visit to Europe, to +helping Professor J. D. Whitney put through the press the latter's work +on 'The Metallic Wealth of the United States.' + +His scientific experience stood him in good stead in more than one +instance of philological research and discussion. He was not tempted +to infer from linguistic data the order of succession of trees in +forests, nor astronomical facts. He was a member for several years +of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. One of +his most important publications was the annotated translation of a +Hindu treatise on astronomy--the Sūrya-Siddhānta, 1860--and one of the +longest essays in his 'Oriental and Linguistic Studies' treats of the +same subject. + +In 1848, largely under the influence and with the encouragement of his +father's pastor, the Rev. George E. Day (for a quarter of a century +after 1866 Professor of Hebrew at Yale, and at present Dean of the +Yale Divinity School), Mr. Whitney directed his attention to the study +of Sanskrit, for which he found books in the library of his elder +brother, who had recently returned from Europe. A really good mind can +find pleasure and success in any one of several different fields of +research. Not often, however, do we find such marked examples of men of +real talent manifesting distinct tastes and power in widely different +departments of learning as in the case of these two brothers. Mr. J. +D. Whitney went to Germany primarily in order to prepare himself for +mineralogical and geological work, but became interested in the study +of languages and attended (with but two fellow-listeners) a course of +lectures on Sanskrit at Berlin. He himself says that he might have +taken up philology in earnest, abandoning natural science altogether, +if immediately after his return to his home he had not received an +appointment to engage in a geological survey of a new and interesting +region under United States authority. His philological studies have +borne fruit in his 'Names and Places--Studies in Geographical and +Topographical Nomenclature,' published in 1888, and in the more than +four thousand definitions he furnished to the Century Dictionary. Mr. +W. D. Whitney certainly had great ability in the study of natural +science. Doubtless the accident of his finding various linguistic +books ready to hand, at the time when his mental powers were most +actively developing, had much to do with his turning in the direction +of philology. During the summer which he spent with his brother on +Lake Superior he had a Sanskrit grammar with him, which he studied +at odd moments when not engaged in collecting plants or computing +barometrical observations. Yale College has had another marked example +of a scholar with equal ability and tastes for widely diverse studies, +in Professor James Hadley, whose first published work was in the +department of mathematics, and of whom a high authority said that the +best mathematician in the country was spoiled when Mr. Hadley devoted +himself to Greek! + +Mr. Whitney's practical banker father was not fully satisfied with +his plan of giving himself to Oriental studies, and asked his pastor +whether a man could support himself in life by studying and teaching +Sanskrit. Dr. Day made the very wise answer that if a man had any +exact and thorough knowledge, he was likely to be able to use it. As a +Massachusetts man, the father turned naturally to Harvard as the proper +place for his son's pursuit of advanced studies, but his pastor called +his attention to the newly established department of Philosophy and the +Arts at New Haven as the only definite arrangement yet made in this +country for university work, and especially to the unique equipment of +the special department of Oriental languages. + +Before going to New Haven to study, Mr. Whitney prepared and published +in the _Bibliotheca Sacra_ an article (translated and abridged from von +Bohlen) on the 'Grammatical Structure of the Sanskrit'; and in the same +periodical, in the following year, he published a 'Comparison of the +Greek and Latin Verbs.' + +In the autumn of 1849, too late for his name to appear in the +catalogue of that year, Mr. Whitney came to Yale and studied through +the remainder of the college year under Professor Salisbury. His +associate in study was Professor James Hadley (six years older than +himself, but only three years older in college age), who had been +appointed assistant professor of Greek in 1848. The relations of the +two continued most intimate and mutually stimulating until the death +of Professor Hadley in 1872. Mr. Whitney edited a volume of Professor +Hadley's Essays, in 1873, and wrote a brief but highly appreciative +sketch of his friend for the large work entitled 'Yale College,' +published in 1879. + +Professor Salisbury was graduated at Yale in 1832. During more than +three years' residence abroad, 1836-39, he studied with De Sacy and +Garcin de Tassy in Paris and with Bopp in Berlin. In 1841 he was +invited to a professorship of the Arabic and Sanskrit languages in +Yale College, without the expectation of pecuniary compensation. This +was only nine years after the foundation of the Sanskrit professorship +(of H. H. Wilson) at Oxford, and twelve years after Lassen was made +Professor Extraordinarius at Bonn. He returned to Europe in 1842 for +a year, and read _privatissime_ Arabic with Freytag and Sanskrit with +Lassen, at Bonn. In 1846 he was made the Corresponding Secretary of +the American Oriental Society, and (to use Mr. Whitney's words) "for +some ten years Professor Salisbury was virtually the Society, doing +its work and paying its bills. He gave it standing and credit in the +world of scholars, as an organization that could originate and make +public valuable material; after such a start, it was sure of respectful +attention to whatever it might do." The Society had published nothing +before he took charge of this office. Professor Salisbury also secured +valuable Arabic and Sanskrit manuscripts and books from De Sacy's +library and elsewhere in Europe; and Professor FitzEdward Hall, then +at Benares, procured for him many expensive and important Sanskrit +publications from India. His services and generosity in procuring fonts +of Oriental type, and his wisdom in bringing the Oriental Society into +close connection with the studies of foreign missionaries, should not +be forgotten. He was the only trained Orientalist in this country, +until Mr. Whitney's return in 1853, and had an admirably equipped +library. In the Yale catalogue of 1841-42, Professor Salisbury's name +appears for the first time in the list of the faculty as Professor of +the Arabic and Sanskrit Languages and Literature. In the catalogue +of 1843-44, announcement is made that "the Professor of Arabic and +Sanskrit will give instruction on Tuesdays and Wednesdays in Arabic +grammar with the interpretation of the Korân and the Mo'allakas, and +on Fridays and Saturdays in Sanskrit grammar with the interpretation +of the laws of Manu." In the following year we are told that "the +Professor of Arabic and Sanskrit proposes to commence this year, in +the ensuing summer, a free course of lectures on the Sacred Code of +the Hindus, the Manava Dharma Sastra." In 1845 for the first time +appears a modestly-placed paragraph, saying "Instruction is also given +by the Professors to Resident Graduates, provided a sufficient number +present themselves to form a class." This was followed by the offer +of a "course of lectures on the literary history and doctrines of the +Kurân," or instruction in the elements of Sanskrit. In 1847 appeared +the formal announcement of the opening of the Department of Philosophy +and the Arts, with definite arrangements for advanced work. The +philological courses were by President Woolsey (Thucydides or Pindar), +Professor Kingsley ("in such Latin author as may be agreed upon"), +Professor Gibbs ("lectures on some points of general Philology"), and +Professor Salisbury (Arabic Grammar, and "some of the relations of the +Arabic to other of the Shemitish dialects"). + +Marvellous stories are told in student-tradition of the rapid progress +made by Mr. Whitney and Mr. Hadley--that they learned all the paradigms +of Bopp's grammar in two lessons, etc. The basis of the stories is +partly the fact that both already read simple Sanskrit with ease, +but it is certain that few teachers ever had such a class. They were +Professor Salisbury's first and last pupils in Sanskrit, but he might +well feel proud of the record. He himself says of them that "their +quickness of perception and unerring exactness of acquisition soon made +it evident that the teacher and the taught must change places." + +In 1850 Mr. Whitney went to Germany and spent three winter semesters +in studying with Weber, Bopp, and Lepsius in Berlin, and two summer +semesters at work with Roth in Tübingen. At the suggestion of Roth he +undertook with this master the publication of the Atharva-Veda, and +copied and collated the Berlin MSS of this work. In 1852 he sent to +the American Oriental Society a paper, read at their October meeting +of that year, on 'The main results of the later Vedic researches +in Germany.' A letter from Weber, dated at Berlin, Dec. 28, 1852, +is interesting in this connection on several accounts. He writes: +"I hope ere long Sanskrit studies will flourish in America more +than in England, where with the only exception of the venerable and +not-to-be-praised-enough Professor Wilson nobody seems to care for +them so much as to devote his life to them. The East India Company +certainly does all that is in its power to help the publication +of the Vedic texts, but it does not find English hands to achieve +it.... It is certainly very discouraging to see that Professor Wilson +during all the time since he got his professorship in Oxford, has not +succeeded in bringing up even one Sanskrit scholar who might claim +to be regarded as one who has done at least some little service to +our Sanskrit philology.... I have to congratulate you most heartily +on your countryman Mr. Whitney, who is now intensely engaged in +the preparations for an edition of the Atharva Samhitā in union +with Professor Roth of Tübingen. The next number of the _Indische +Studien_, too, which is now in press, contains from him tables +showing the natural relation of the four now known Samhitās of the +Veda,--an attempt in which he was greatly indebted to Professor Roth's +communications, but which still remains also a very favorable specimen +of his own assiduity and correctness." + +The following letters need little explanation. We note with interest +how soon the first followed the receipt of Weber's letter which has +just been quoted. The spirit which prompted the offer of the first +letter is certainly unusual in its generosity--not only surrendering a +professorial chair, but also providing for its endowment. The modesty +and delicacy of the reply seem as extraordinary at the present day, and +were perhaps as rare forty years ago. + +Under date of February 19, 1853, Professor Salisbury wrote to Mr. +Whitney: "... I have observed your course of study and the rapidity of +your acquisitions since you have been abroad with much interest and +have seen in this, together with what I have known otherwise of your +tastes and talents, a way opening for relief to myself which I have +long desired. The prospect has been the more pleasing to me inasmuch as +I have also seen that I might be able through you to bring new honor +to my 'alma mater.'... It is also much at heart with me to secure +... assistance to myself in editing and endeavouring in every way to +improve the Journal of the Oriental Society." Professor Salisbury +proposed that Mr. Whitney should be made "Professor of the Sanskrit and +its relations to the kindred languages, and of Sanskrit literature, in +the Department of Philosophy and the Arts in Yale College," his term of +service to begin Aug. 8, 1853;--it being understood that Mr. Whitney +would include in his instructions the teaching of modern languages +to undergraduates, and should receive the fees which were then paid +for such teaching. It was understood, further, that Mr. Whitney would +co-operate with Professor Salisbury in editing the Journal of the +Oriental Society. Professor Salisbury undertook to create a fund which +with the fees for modern-language instruction might furnish nearly the +ordinary salary of a Yale professor at that time. + +Mr. Whitney replied from Paris, on April 4, 1853. Professor Salisbury's +letter had reached him at Berlin at a time when he was engaged in +closing his work there, and "had hardly an hour for quiet thought upon +any subject." He expressed his gratitude for the kind feeling toward +him "which has had a share in the dictating of the proposal," and +continued: "Nor can I well say how much I am struck by the true and +self-forgetting zeal for the progress of Oriental studies, of which +this, like all your previous movements, affords an evidence. But ... I +am compelled to ask myself whether ... I can hope to render any such +service to Science as would be an adequate return for the kindness you +exhibit toward me; whether, finally, it would not be in me an act of +unpardonable presumption to take upon my shoulders an office which you +are desirous of throwing off.... I need not say how high and honorable +a post I regard that of a teacher at Yale to be, how many and extreme +attractions, both in a personal and in a scientific point of view, the +prospect of such a situation would have for me.... So far as my own +interests are concerned, I could find nothing in the terms which you +propose or the duties which you suggest to which to raise a moment's +objection.... All that I could bring up against the arrangement would +be that the advantage is too entirely upon my side." He desired further +time for reflection and consultation with his friends, and thought the +postponement of a decision less objectionable because he did not expect +to be able to finish his work in Europe and return before the last of +August, and then, after a three years' absence from home, desired to +spend some time with his friends. His eyes, too, had been giving him +"during the winter ground for some apprehension," and "would doubtless +be best consulted for by a period of rest and inaction." + +In Paris he was "at work on a MS of the Atharva which belongs to the +Imperial Library." "Probably it will cost me about six weeks' labor.... +Then will follow two or three months of similar labor in London and +Oxford.... During the whole winter I was compelled to neglect all other +studies; that, however, chiefly owing to the condition of my eyes, +which robbed me of about half my time. Persian and Arabic had to be +laid aside altogether, and what of time and strength I had to spare +from the Sanskrit, I devoted to the Egyptian and Coptic. I cannot +well express to you the interest which this latter branch of study +has awakened in me, and the strong desire I have felt to penetrate +further into it than the mere surface exploration which could be made +in the odd moments of a single winter. I would not, however, sell for +a very large sum the little insight into this wonderful subject which +I have already obtained, and it will be my highest pleasure to attempt +to draw it somewhat more into the circle of our Oriental inquiries +than has been generally the case hitherto.... There is nothing new of +particular interest, so far as I know, to communicate to you from the +Sanskrit world on this side of the water. The main interest attaches +to the Lexicon which is going to be really a great work, and to push +forward the whole study of that language a long way with one thrust. A +slow thrust, unfortunately, it will have to be; Prof. Roth estimates +ten years as needed for its perfection. [It was completed in 1875.] +I am going to contribute my small mite also toward it, by furnishing +to Prof. Roth the vocabulary complete of the Atharva. The latter, as +you perhaps know, has now the sole redaction of the Vedic material, +Aufrecht having left Germany. The next number of Weber's Zeitschrift +will be out now very soon, and will contain a contribution from me, a +Vedic concordance." + +Mr. Whitney reached home earlier than he had expected--about Aug. 8, +1853--and on Aug. 15 he wrote: "Although not less distrustful than +before of my ability to discharge to your satisfaction and my own +the duties of the post to which you would assign me, I should be +disposed to accept gratefully your proposals, and do my best at least +to accomplish that which such an acceptance demands of me." But Mr. +Whitney desired a modification of the plan. "I have no such knowledge +of French as would in any manner justify me in making pretensions to +ability to teach it." His estimate of his knowledge of modern languages +was lower than that of his friends. Not until 1856 did he accept the +title of "Instructor in German." A year later, after he had taken nine +months of travel and study in southern Europe, the college catalogue +calls him "Professor of Sanskrit, and Instructor in modern languages." + +The importance to American scholarship of the offer of this chair +to Professor Whitney may be better appreciated if we remember that +his predecessor still lives, and that no other chair of Sanskrit was +established in this country for about a quarter of a century. + +At a special meeting of the Corporation of Yale College, on May +10, 1854, the "Professorship of the Sanskrit and its relations to +kindred languages, and Sanskrit Literature" was established, and Mr. +Whitney was elected to hold it. The founder's desire for the range +of the department was indicated distinctly, but the shorter name of +the professorship, "Professor of Sanskrit," was used in the college +catalogues until 1869, when the words "and Comparative Philology" +were added, without indicating any change in the direction of the +incumbent's studies or in the plan of the university. + +In 1854 the announcement of philological courses in the Department of +Philosophy and the Arts covered Professor Gibbs's lectures on general +Philology, Professor Thacher's course of two hours a week in Lucretius +and in Latin Composition, Professor Hadley's course of two hours a +week in Pindar or Theocritus, and contained the following statement: +"Professor Whitney will give instruction in Sanskrit from Bopp's +Grammar and Nalus, or such other text-books as may be agreed upon, and +in the rudiments of the Ancient and Modern Persian, and of the Egyptian +languages." The last clause here reminds the reader of the enthusiasm +for the Egyptian and Coptic expressed in the letter of April 4, 1853; +and of the fact that Mr. Whitney's first 'bibliographical notice' in +the Journal of the Oriental Society discussed Lepsius's work on the +'First order of Egyptian deities,' but we read little more of these +studies, except a paper on Lepsius's Nubian Grammar in the second +volume of this JOURNAL. In 1858 Professor Whitney's announcement read: +"Professor Whitney will instruct in the Sanskrit language, and in +the History, Antiquities, and Literature of India and other Oriental +countries; also in the comparative philology of the Indo-European +languages, and the general principles of linguistic study. He will +also give instruction to such as may desire it in the modern European +languages." + +The appointment of Professor Whitney in 1854 was for five years, +with a pledge of reappointment "for life," five years later, if he +desired it. In 1859 this reappointment was made--the founder of the +chair stipulating that Professor Whitney should be free to retire +from the professorship at any time. Mr. Whitney wrote, on July 15, +1859: "My present situation in New Haven is so pleasant to me on so +many accounts, and holds out such prospects of honorable and useful +employment in the time to come, that I should exceedingly regret being +compelled to go elsewhere. Nor, although it would be in many respects +more agreeable to me to be able to devote my _whole_ time to my own +peculiar studies, do I see reason seriously to regret the division of +my labors between the ancient and the modern languages. It is both +useful and pleasant to have to do more directly with the young men in +college, and there is also the chance of influencing one and another of +them to devote his attention to higher philological study." + +During and after the Civil War, the ordinary expenses of life +increased, and Mr. Whitney's family was growing. The income which had +sufficed for the young and unmarried professor in 1854 had become +entirely insufficient for his needs, with six children, in 1870. For +his pecuniary relief he assumed additional duties of instruction in +modern languages, in connection with the Sheffield Scientific School. +His teaching of modern languages in the academic department had ceased +with the entrance upon his duties of Professor Coe, in 1867. The burden +of instructing large classes of undergraduates in the very rudiments +of French and German (each Academic student then having only thirty or +forty lessons in each subject) became more and more irksome. + +In September, 1869, Mr. Whitney received an urgent call to Harvard, +very soon after President Eliot's election to the headship of that +university, with the assurance that he should have "salary enough to +constitute a tolerable support," and should not have to teach in any +other than his own proper department. He wrote to a friend: "It is the +most tempting offer that could, so far as I know, be made me; for on +the one hand I have greatly grudged the time which I have had to steal +from Oriental and linguistic studies for German and French; and, on the +other hand, what I have received for my services to the College has not +for a good while paid more than about half my expenses.... Such a state +of things has been, of course, worrying enough, nor have I seen any +definite prospect of a change. But I am greatly attached to the College +here, and to the Scientific School, and to relatives and friends in +New Haven, and have no hope that ... I should become so wonted and so +comfortable anywhere else." + +Professor Whitney's colleagues saw how fatal his departure would be +to the advanced philological work at Yale. No definite provision had +then been made for graduate instruction in Greek, Latin, and Modern +Languages, and although Professors Hadley, Thacher, Packard, and Coe +were laboring to build up this department, their efforts received +only the slightest pecuniary compensation; they were expected to do +full work in the undergraduate department; Mr. Whitney was the only +"University professor," not only at Yale, but in the whole country. One +who is everywhere recognized as a leader in education then wrote: "I am +confident that there is no one whose intellectual influence over the +younger officers of the college is so great as Mr. Whitney's.... I have +greatly admired his influence in promoting fidelity, truth, justice, +and industry among the students, as well as his skill in promoting +their intellectual character." Another of his colleagues wrote: "I have +never known the college men so moved. The danger of losing so eminent +a man as Mr. Whitney seemed almost appalling, and I think if no other +means of retaining him could be devised, the professors themselves +would each cut off a slice from his meagre salary to make up the amount +necessary to retain him. The question seems to rise above personal +considerations and to come very near to the vital interests of the +university." + +Professor Salisbury, whose insight and generosity had brought Mr. +Whitney to Yale, was nearly concerned by the call to Cambridge, and +after less than a week's delay provided the sum needed for the full +foundation of Mr. Whitney's chair on the modern scale of salaries, +which had changed greatly since 1854, and Mr. Whitney decided to remain +in New Haven. At this time the arrangement was made that Mr. Whitney +should give regular instruction in linguistics to the undergraduate +classes of the college, and this course, at first given in the form of +lectures, as part of the required work, was amplified and continued as +an 'elective' until 1886. Mr. Whitney still continued to teach in the +Scientific School for an hour a day, saying that in no other way could +he add so easily a convenient thousand dollars a year to his income as +by teaching from eight to nine o'clock each morning; he required no +preparation for the exercise, it did not interfere with the work of his +day, and he liked to be brought into contact with the young men. + +The invitation to Harvard and the decision to remain at Yale had +attracted considerable attention and had given rise to many plans +for advanced philological instruction at New Haven. Mr. Whitney's +release from drudgery with undergraduates enabled him also to enrich +his Sanskrit and linguistic courses. In the catalogue of 1870-71 +we read: "In Philology, a somewhat regular course of higher study, +extending through two years, and leading to the degree of Doctor of +Philosophy, is offered. The leading studies of the first year will be +The general principles of linguistic science, under Professor Whitney; +the Sanskrit language, under Professor Whitney; the older Germanic +languages, especially Gothic and Anglo-Saxon, under Professor Hadley +and Mr. Lounsbury; along with higher instruction in the classical and +the modern languages, according to the special requirements of each +student, under Professors Thacher, Packard, and Coe, and Messrs. Van +Name and Lounsbury, and others. The leading studies of the second +year will be The comparative philology of the Indo-European languages +... under Professor Whitney; the history of the English language, +under Professor Hadley; along with other special branches, as during +the first year." The reward for the new enterprise of a formal +graduate school of philology came almost immediately in the form of +an unusual class of students, nearly all of whom were destined to +secure honorable distinction in their chosen work. In the list of +those who received the degree of Ph.D. in 1873 appear the names of +Lanman of Harvard, Learned of the Japanese Doshisha, Luquiens of Yale, +Manatt of Brown, Otis of the Institute of Technology, and Perrin of +Yale. Truly an unusual group! Only the year before, Professor Easton +of the University of Pennsylvania and Professor Beckwith of Trinity +College, and the year following Professor Edgren of the University of +Gothenburg, received the same degree, while soon after them President +Harper of Chicago, Professor H. P. Wright of Yale, Professor Sherman +of Nebraska, Professor Peters of the University of Pennsylvania, and +Professor Tarbell of the University of Chicago completed the graduate +course under Mr. Whitney. The service which the Semitic scholar, +Professor George E. Day, had done for Indo-European philology by +turning Professor Whitney's mind to its attractions, was in a way +repaid by the latter when he pointed out to William Rainey Harper the +great opportunity open to workers in the Semitic field; as a graduate +student at Yale, Dr. Harper gave himself to work in the field of the +Indo-European languages, but his recollection of his master's words has +had a wide influence on Semitic studies in America. Professor Whitney +was justly proud of his pupils, and was always interested in their +work. His classes in Sanskrit were not large absolutely, but frequently +he could say that more were studying this language with him than with +any other university professor in the world. + +Professor Whitney's connection with the Sheffield Scientific School +was close. He organized its department of modern languages, and was a +member of its 'Governing Board' from the time of the organization of +that body in 1872. One who has occasion to know better than all others +says that he was "a tower of strength" to the School--not only by his +instructions and by inspiring the students with the spirit of true +scholarship, but by his intelligent appreciation of the aims of the +School and his wise judgment as to the means to be used in order to +attain them. His personal liking for natural science, and training in +its methods, added the warmest sympathy to his work in connection with +this department of the University. + +In the very first communication made to Mr. Whitney with regard to his +work at Yale, attention was called to the opportunity for usefulness +in connection with the American Oriental Society, of which he was +elected a member in 1850. In 1854 his name appears in the list of the +publication committee of that Society. In 1855 he was made librarian, +and held that office until 1873. This latter post was no sinecure. In +the winter of 1853-54, on going to visit the library (then kept in +Boston), he "found it a pile of books on the floor in the corner of an +upstairs room in the Athenaeum, apparently just as it had been brought +in and dumped down from an earlier place of keeping." In the summer +of 1855 the books were removed to New Haven. The task of "arranging, +labelling, entering in the book of donations, and preparing cards" +involved "a very considerable and tedious amount of work." In 1857, on +Professor Salisbury's going abroad and resigning the office, Professor +Whitney was elected Corresponding Secretary, and continued in this +position until 1884, when he was elected President of the Society. +His resignation of this latter office was not accepted until 1890, +when for nearly four years the condition of his health had obliged +him to absent himself from its meetings. He could well say that "no +small part of his work had been done in the service of the Society"; +from 1857 to 1885, "just a half of the contents of its Journal is from +his pen." His care of the publications of others, also, was specially +difficult, in view of the peculiar danger of typographical errors and +the wide field covered by the papers; no ordinary proof-reader could +render much assistance. And not infrequently articles by those who were +unaccustomed to scientific composition needed thorough revision. On his +positively declining to be a candidate for re-election as President, +the Society adopted the following minute: "The American Oriental +Society--regretfully accepting his declination--desires to record +its deep sense of indebtedness to its retiring President, Professor +William Dwight Whitney, of New Haven. For twenty-seven years he has +served as Corresponding Secretary of the Society; for eighteen, as its +Librarian; and for six, as its President. We gratefully acknowledge the +obligation under which he has laid us by his diligent attendance at +the meetings, by his unstinted giving of time and of labor in editing +the publications and maintaining their high scientific character, by +the quality and amount of his own contributions to the _Journal_--more +than half of volumes VI-XII coming from his pen--and above all by the +inspiration of his example." + +The American Philological Association might have been a natural +off-shoot from the Oriental Society. The latter has had a +'classical-section' since 1849, of which Professor Hadley was long at +the head, of which Professor Goodwin has been the leader for nearly +a quarter of a century; and classical papers had been presented by +Professor Hadley, as that 'On the theory of Greek accent,' and by +Professor Lane, as that 'On the date of the Amphitruo of Plautus.' Many +of the early members of the Philological Association were also members +of the Oriental Society. Mr. Whitney presided over the Philological +Association at its first meeting in Poughkeepsie in 1869, and at the +Rochester meeting in 1870, as retiring President, he delivered an +address in which he sketched with great wisdom the Association's action +and work. "The association is to be just what its members shall make +it, and will not bear much managing or mastering. It must discuss the +subjects which are interesting American philologists, and with such +wisdom and knowledge as these have at command.... In every such free +and democratic body things are brought forward into public which might +better have been kept back.... The classics, of course, will occupy +the leading place; that department will be most strongly represented, +and will least need fostering, while it will call for most careful +criticism. The philology of the American aboriginal languages, on the +other hand, demands, as it has already begun to receive, the most +hearty encouragement.... Educational subjects also are closely bound up +with philology, and will necessarily receive great attention; yet there +should be a limit here; our special task is to advance the interests +of philology only, confident that education will reap its share of +the benefit." Mr. Whitney's services to the Association, and faithful +attendance upon its meetings, may be estimated from the fact that the +first sixteen volumes of the Transactions contain fourteen papers by +him printed in full, while occasionally he presented communications +which he did not care to print. At its meeting in Williamstown in July +last, the Association adopted the following minute: "The American +Philological Association, at its first meeting after the death of +Professor William D. Whitney, bears grateful testimony to the value +of the services which he rendered for the furtherance of philological +learning, and especially in connection with this Association. Fitly +chosen to be its first President, and retained for a quarter of a +century upon its Executive Committee, he never failed to take an active +part in its work, and in many ways he advanced its interests and +encouraged and assisted the studies to which its members are devoted. +The record of his life-work may be left for more full recital at +another time; but the Association takes this opportunity of testifying +to its sense of obligation to Professor Whitney's manifold and +successful labors, and of the great loss which his death has brought to +its members and to philological students throughout the world." + +Both the classical and the oriental philologists of the country have +noted Mr. Whitney's constancy in attendance on their gatherings. In +November, 1875, he apologized to the Oriental Society for his absence +from the May meeting (caused by his visit to Europe in the interest +of the edition of the Atharva-Veda), and added that it was his second +absence in twenty-one years from a meeting of the Society! His devoted +fidelity to the little Classical and Philological Society at Yale was +just as marked. A quarter of a century ago, he with Professor Hadley +and Professor Packard made that small gathering a deep source of +inspiration. Many, if not most, of his learned papers were presented +for discussion there. After the death of the lamented Professor Hadley, +which gave a sudden check to the development of Yale's advanced courses +in philology, Mr. Whitney was the mainstay of the Society, and his +regular attendance and patient attention roused to best effort each who +took part. Perhaps I ought to confess also that some of the younger +instructors and graduate students shrank from presenting papers which +might be compared with the finished scholar's elaborate productions. +At these meetings his patience must have been sorely tried; much +that was presented can have had but little interest for him; but his +courtesy was unfailing. He gave without stint of his precious time to +any undertaking which he believed to be doing, on the whole, useful +philological work. + +The first great work of Mr. Whitney's scholarship was the publication +of the Atharva-Veda-Sanhitā, undertaken in 1852 with Professor +Roth. The first volume of 458 pages, royal octavo, was published in +1855-56. In connection with this, he prepared and published in Weber's +_Indische Studien_ (vol. IV, pp. 9-64) in 1857 an 'Alphabetisches +Verzeichniss der Versanfänge der Atharva-Samhitā'; in the _Journal_ +of the American Oriental Society in 1862 (vol. VII, pp. 333-616) the +'Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya,' with text, translation and notes; in the +same _Journal_ in 1881 (vol. XII, pp. 1-383) an 'Index Verborum' to the +published text of the Atharva-Veda. He made to the A.O.S. in April, +1892, an 'Announcement' as to a second volume of the Roth-Whitney +edition of the Atharva-Veda. "The bulk of the work" of preparing notes, +indexes, etc., "was to have fallen to Professor Roth, not only because +the bulk of the work on the first volume had fallen to me [i. e. +Professor Whitney], but also because his superior learning and ability +pointed him out as the one to undertake it." But Roth's "absorption in +the great labor of the Petersburg lexicon for a long series of years +had kept his hands from the Atharva-Veda." Mr. Whitney said that he +had never lost from view the completion of the plan of publication +as originally formed. "In 1875 I spent the summer in Germany chiefly +engaged in further collating at Munich and at Tübingen the additional +manuscript material which had come to Europe since our text was +printed; and I should probably have soon taken up the work seriously, +save for having been engaged while in Germany to prepare a Sanskrit +grammar, which fully occupied the leisure of several following years. +At last in 1885-86, I had fairly started upon the execution of the +plan when failure of health reduced my working capacity to a minimum, +and rendered ultimate success very questionable. The task, however, +has never been laid wholly aside, and it is now so far advanced that +barring further loss of power, I may hope to finish it in a couple +of years or so. The plan includes critical readings upon the text"; +the readings of the Pāippalāda version; the data of the Anukramaṇī +respecting authorship, divinity, and meter of each verse; references to +the ancillary literature; extracts from the printed commentary; and, +finally, a simple literal translation. "An introduction and indexes +will give such further material as appears to be called for." Of this +work the last revision is only partially made; a few months' more labor +would have completed it; Professor Lanman, of Harvard, has undertaken +to finish the revision and to conduct the volume through the press. +Thus Professor Whitney's work closes as it began--with the Atharva-Veda. + +Perhaps Mr. Whitney's most important service to Sanskrit philology +was the preparation of his 'Sanskrit Grammar, including both the +classical language, and the older dialects, of Veda and Brahmana,' +486 pp., octavo. This was published in Leipzig in 1879, in the same +year with a German translation. He undertook this work in 1875, and +in 1878 went to Germany with his family and spent fifteen months in +writing out the grammar and preparing it for the press. He aimed "to +make a presentation of the facts of the language primarily as they +show themselves in use in the literature, and only secondarily as they +are laid down by the native grammarians"; "to include also in the +presentation the forms and constructions of the older language, as +exhibited in the Veda and Brāhmaṇa"; "to treat the language throughout +as an accented one"; "to cast all statements, classifications, and so +on, into a form consistent with the teachings of linguistic science." +"While the treatment of the facts of the language has thus been made a +historical one, within the limits of the language itself, I have not +ventured to make it comparative, by bringing in the analogous forms +and processes of other related languages. To do this, in addition to +all that was attempted beside, would have extended the work both in +content and in time of preparation, far beyond the limits assigned to +it." A second edition, revised and extended, was published ten years +later, in 1889. A 'Supplement to his Sanskrit Grammar: The Roots, +Verb-forms, and Primary Derivatives of the Sanskrit Language,' 250 pp., +was published in Leipzig in 1885. That he did not discredit and slight +the old Hindu grammarians because of any lack of acquaintance with them +is shown by his own work and publications in that field. He published +not only the Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya (text, translation and notes, +in 1862), but also a similar edition of the Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, +with its commentary, the Tribhāshyaratna, in 1871. The true relations +of Hindu Grammar to the study of Sanskrit, he made clear in two +articles published in the AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY, in vols. V and +XIV. His last word on the subject was this: "I would by no means say +anything to discourage the study of Pāṇini; it is highly important and +extremely interesting and might well absorb more of the labor of the +present generation of scholars than is given to it. But I would have +it followed in a different spirit and a different method. It should be +completely abandoned as the means by which we are to learn Sanskrit. +For what the literature contains, the literature itself suffices; we +can understand it and present it vastly better than Pāṇini could. It is +the residuum of peculiar material involved in his grammar that we shall +value, and the attempt must be made to separate that from the rest of +the mass." More than twenty-five years ago he called attention to the +fact that the very title of Professor Goldstücker's paper 'On the Veda +of the Hindus and the Veda of the "German School"' involved an evident +_petitio principii_. The fair theme would have been 'The Veda of the +Hindu Schools, and the Veda of the European School: which is the true +Veda?' + +The following extracts from a review by Hillebrandt in the fifth +volume of _Bezzenberger's Beiträge_ illustrate the reception generally +accorded to the Sanskrit Grammar:--"Es handelte sich für ihn nicht +um ein tieferes studium der einheimischen indischen grammatik, auf +deren reiche beobachtungen unsere bisherigen sanskritgrammatiken +fast ausschliesslich sich stützen, sondern um die erforschung des +sprachzustandes, wie ihn die litteratur selbst aufweist.... Whitney's +eigentliche aufgabe war es, in die sanskritgrammatik die grundsätze +der linguistik durchgreifender, als bisher geschehen war, einzuführen +und die sprache als eine historisch gewordene zu betrachten. Dies +princip hatte eine beständige rücksichtsnahme auf den vedadialekt +zur voraussetzung und verlieh Whitney's buche vorzüge, welche allein +genügen würden, ihm eine hervorragende stellung unter den vorhandenen +lehrbüchern anzuweisen. Die reiche fülle neuen materials, welches +er ... aus allen teilen der vedischen litteratur herbeizog und in +instructiver weise dazu verwandte, über das allmähliche aufleben und +absterben dieses oder jenes sprachgebrauchs aufschluss zu geben, die +durch reiche beispiele und aufstellung ganzer paradigmen illustrirte +unterscheidung vedischer und klassischer flexion, die von der indischen +grammatik vernachlässigte statistische beobachtung des formenschatzes +in älterer und jüngerer litteratur--dies sind eigenschaften die es in +dieser ausdehnung mit keinem teilt." + +The Grammar provided an instrument which all Sanskrit scholars are now +thankfully using. + +Of the Supplement to the Grammar, von Bradke wrote in the third volume +of the Literaturblatt für orientalische Philologie: "So anspruchslos +das Werk auftritt, in dieser Weise konnte es nur von einem unserer +ersten Kenner der altindischen Literatursprache, und auch von einem +solchen nicht ohne lange und mühevolle Arbeit geschaffen werden." + +In this connection we should be again reminded that Professor Whitney +was one of the chief four collaborators who furnished material for +the great Sanskrit dictionary published at the expense of the Russian +government. + +In March, 1864, Mr. Whitney delivered at the Smithsonian Institution +a series of six lectures on the Principles of Linguistic +Science--probably lectures which he had given to the Sheffield +Scientific School the preceding year. This course was repeated before +the Lowell Institute and published in 1867, under the title of +'Language and the Study of Language,' 489 pages. This was translated +into German by Jolly and into Netherlandish by Vinckers. The clearness +and conciseness of the statements and the soundness of the views, +in a field where the wildest vagaries had prevailed, and where the +imagination was still allowed rather free play, were recognized on +every hand. From the time of the preparation of those lectures, Mr. +Whitney seems to have devoted to this subject more attention than he +had given before. In 1875 he published in the International Scientific +Series a similar book, in somewhat more compendious form, on the 'Life +and Growth of Language: an outline of linguistic science,' 326 pages. +This was translated into German, French, Italian, Netherlandish, and +Swedish. This last book grew out of his lectures to academic senior +classes. + +No one has done so much as Mr. Whitney to teach sound views of +linguistic science. Although the writer of this sketch has not +ventured to include a detailed discussion of his views, perhaps +mention may be made fitly of two points in which he was in advance of +his contemporaries: he was among the very first to call attention to +_analogy_ as a force in the growth of language, and the first (after +Latham in 1851) to doubt the then generally accepted view that Asia was +the original home of the Indo-Europeans. + +Papers which had been printed in the _North American Review_ and other +periodicals were collected and, with more or less revision, published +in two volumes entitled 'Oriental and Linguistic Studies,' 1873-74, pp. +417 and 432. The first volume contained papers on the Veda, the Avesta, +the science of language; the second, on the British in India, China and +the Chinese, religion and mythology, orthography and phonology, Hindu +astronomy. The author's regard for his earliest teacher in Sanskrit is +marked by his dedication of the first of the two volumes to "Professor +Edward Elbridge Salisbury, the pioneer and patron of Sanskrit studies +in America." The second volume "is affectionately dedicated" to +"Professors Rudolf Roth and Albrecht Weber, my early teachers and +lifelong friends." + +His long experience as a teacher of modern languages and as a student +of linguistics aided to fit him pre-eminently for the preparation of +grammars, readers, and vocabularies of French and German for schools +and colleges, and his systematic habits of work enabled him to prepare +these easily. This apparatus met the needs of the newly awakened +interest in modern languages in this country, and has done much to +further this interest. These books are said to be used more widely than +any others of their kind in America. Some of them are published in two +editions, full and abridged. His desire for a reasonable and truly +philological study of the English language led him to prepare for use +in schools 'Essentials of English Grammar' (1877, 260 pages), which has +been adopted extensively by the public schools of the country and is +declared, by one who knows, to have had great influence on the study of +this subject. + +Professor Whitney had assisted in the preparation of the Webster's +dictionary of 1864, rewriting the definitions of many of the important +words. This experience, his keen sense of proportion, his practical +turn of mind, his precise and concise manner of statement, his wide +and varied attainments,--all made him a peculiarly suitable person +to be the editor-in-chief of the great Century Dictionary with +which the people of this country will long associate his name. His +unfortunate illness prevented him from revising the work so carefully +as he doubtless would have done, had he been in vigorous health, and +some have thought that he should be called supervising-editor rather +than editor-in-chief. As the dictionary stands, he cannot be held +responsible for details; but his influence upon the work was strong as +well as salutary. Though he might not mark the proof for a dozen pages, +he would score the next page in a manner which set a standard, and +showed what he desired the revision of the rest to be, while the whole +body of editors followed the general lines which he had drawn. + +In the list of his writings which was drawn up by Professor Whitney in +1892, one hundred and forty-four items are enumerated; but numerous +minor articles and book notices are not included, nor his contributions +to the great Sanskrit, Webster, and Century dictionaries, nor his +oversight of the German dictionary which goes by his name. He wrote +articles for the New American Cyclopedia, Johnson's Cyclopedia, and +the Encyclopaedia Britannica. He was a frequent contributor to the +_Nation_ and other periodicals. In view of the importance and extent +of many of his publications, his diligence and intellectual fertility +are extraordinary. + +As a teacher of advanced students, Mr. Whitney was exacting. A two-hour +course under him in Sanskrit called for a larger outlay of time and +effort than a four-hour course under most other teachers. He required +precise knowledge of others as well as of himself. He was never +deceived by glittering generalities, nor satisfied with approximate +accuracy when absolute accuracy was attainable. He was modest, however, +and while he would not allow the violation of well-established +principles, yet in the translation of difficult and uncertain passages +he never insisted on the pupil's adoption of his view. + +In controversy and criticism, Mr. Whitney struck hard; his sword was +piercing, even to the sundering of joint and marrow. But he was fair; +he never misrepresented his opponent. He never lost his temper and +struck blindly. He saw so clearly the absurdities and difficulties +of a false position that he felt bound to present it as it was, yet +without any thought of giving personal offence. For example, no one +would suppose that he expected to offend his friend and teacher, Weber, +by the remark that the latter had "unwittingly put himself in the +position of one attempting to prove on philological grounds that the +precessional movement of the equinoxes is from west to east, instead +of from east to west" (Oct. 1865); but the criticism is very similar +to that (which was counted severe) on Müller (July, 1876), that "even +the aid of Main and Hinds could not keep him, in his astronomical +reasonings, from assuming that, to any given observer, the ecliptic is +identical with his own horizon." + +The only prolonged controversy in which Professor Whitney was ever +engaged was that with Professor Max Müller. His early relations +with Müller had been pleasant, and he had supported the latter's +candidacy for his chair at Oxford in 1860. His first public mention +(1867) of Müller's work on the translation of the Vedas was very +complimentary; but when the first volume of the translation appeared, +his review of it was exceedingly severe. In the fourteenth volume of +his _Indische Studien_, under the heading 'Zur Klarstellung,' Weber +gives an account of the conflict. According to him, the real source +of the controversy was Mr. Whitney's spirited reply to Müller's +criticisms on the Böhtlingk-Roth Dictionary. "Whitney hatte zwei +Vorlesungen Müller's kritisch besprochen,--scharf, wie es Whitney's +Art ist, aber ohne irgend welche persönliche Wendung, so wie sich +Gelehrte, denen es um ihre Meinung Ernst ist, zu streiten pflegen." +The occasion of the contest was the publication by Professor George +Darwin, in the _Contemporary Review_ of November, 1874, of a report +of Mr. Whitney's views. "Müller nahm sich denn auch gar nicht die +Zeit Whitney's Abhandlung selbst zu lesen, sondern trat gleich in dem +folgenden Januar-Heft der Review mit einer nur auf die Auszüge Mr. +Darwin's basirten Gegenschrift hervor." Some have wondered that Mr. +Whitney should care to follow up the matter so long, and even in 1892 +should publish a brochure of 79 pages on 'Max Müller and the Science +of Language: a Criticism.' But the question with him rose far above +personalities: the truth was at stake. His mind, accurate by both +nature and training, shrank from allowing inaccurate statements and +false principles to be floated by a charming style. Great Britain in +this generation has had more than one scholar of note whose brilliant +form of statement, ingenious theories, and varied attainments have +sufficed to give them undue authority on subjects where they made +some grievous errors. Mr. Whitney felt that the higher a scholar's +position, the greater his authority, the more careful he should be in +all matters. He was heartily vexed by attempts to overlook and avoid +the real point at issue. His vigorous spirit may have felt a certain +enjoyment in a conflict; as an intellectual athlete he could appreciate +the beauty of a keen thrust or the weight of a heavy blow; but while he +did not fear a conflict, in some cases he avoided a controversy, even +when he had been misunderstood and misrepresented. + +No sketch of Mr. Whitney's character would be complete which did not +mention his musical tastes. Music was always a source of pleasure and +recreation to him. He had a fine tenor voice; and when a young man he +was an acceptable and admired leader of the choir of Jonathan Edwards's +old church in Northampton. The story is told that his conversations +with the Rev. Dr. George E. Day, which led to his study of Sanskrit, +were more frequent and natural because of his weekly calls at the +pastor's house for the list of hymns to be sung. He was an active +member of the Mendelssohn Society of New Haven a score of years ago, +and did much to rouse the community to take interest in oratorios and +other choral music, writing for the newspapers appreciative accounts of +the works to be performed. He was prominent in securing for New Haven +concerts by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. One of the last occasions +which brought him into a public gathering was a University Chamber +Concert by the Kneisel Quartet. He was fond of singing hymns on Sunday +evenings, and while he cherished some of the old tunes of his youth, +he welcomed the introduction of the modern more ecclesiastical music. +While singing the old hymns he was as fervent and orthodox as his +Puritan ancestors. + +Mr. Whitney was no recluse, nor a typical professor in manner. He +attracted men to him and enjoyed being with them. He was not at all +emotional, however, and cared little for general society. He gave a +rather extreme view of himself in a letter written in 1869: "I am of +a more than usually reserved and unsocial nature. I avoid society as +much as I can, and am never quite comfortable in the company of any +excepting those with whom I am most nearly bound. My besetting sin +is burying myself in my books and papers, and too much overlooking +all that is outside of them,--partly from natural tendencies, partly +because I feel that in that way I shall on the whole do most good and +give most pleasure to others." His bearing was perfectly simple and +unpretentious--in short, that of a gentleman. + +Like Aristotle's "magnanimous man," he gave little heed to praise or +blame--not being elated or cast down by either. He loved learning for +its own sake and not for its reward of fame. The words which he wrote +with regard to his friend Professor James Hadley are strikingly true +of himself: "No one was ever more free from the desire to shine among +his fellows. His was a modesty entirely unfeigned, and free from every +taint of a lower feeling.... He devoted himself so entirely to truth +and virtue and duty, as he knew them, that there was left no room for +any thought of self. He neither extolled himself nor gave way unduly +to others." "He knew his power, but possessed it in the spirit of +moderation and reserve." He was eminently guileless--though by no means +a subject for imposition by others. He would have made an admirable +lawyer or statesman, but he could not have been a politician. He saw +truth clearly and abhorred anything like trickery or disingenuousness. +He was also thoroughly sane. Sentimental enthusiasm never led him to +denote as certain views which later were to be proved false. He had +few scientific retractions to make in the course of forty-five years +of publication. His statements on uncertain points were carefully +guarded. Where doubt existed, he was apt to feel it; in fact he was +called in Germany "der Skeptiker der Sprachwissenschaft." His sanity +restrained him from various excesses. His opinions on the desirability +of reform in the spelling of the English language were clear and +clearly expressed, and he was the first chairman of the committee +appointed by the Philological Association for the furtherance of this +reform in our country, but he saw so distinctly the difficulties +in the way of an abrupt change, at least for the present, that he +wasted no time in a Quixotic crusade. He was invited by the Japanese +government to prepare an opinion in regard to the adoption of English +as the official language of Japan--but he was not carried away by any +sentimental notions of English as a _Weltsprache_. His mind was like +a diamond, and his style was eminently clear and forcible. He never +strove to be eloquent, but always expressed his thoughts in the fewest +and simplest words. His was the style of a teacher rather than that of +a popular platform-lecturer, but was enlivened by a strong sense of +humor and by keen wit. + +Professor Whitney's services to science and learning were freely +recognized, both at home and abroad. He received the degree of Ph.D., +_honoris causa_, from the University of Breslau in 1865; that of LL. +D. from Williams College in 1868, from the College of William and Mary +in 1869, from Harvard in 1876, and from the University of Edinburgh in +1889; that of J.U.D. from St. Andrews University in Scotland in 1874; +that of L.H.D. from Columbia in 1887. He was a member of the National +Academy of Sciences; an honorary member of the Oriental or Asiatic +societies of Great Britain and Ireland, of Germany, of Bengal, of +Japan, and of Peking; of the Literary Societies of Leyden, of Upsala, +and of Helsingfors; fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh; member or +correspondent of the Academies of Dublin, of Turin, of Rome (_Lincei_), +of St. Petersburg, of Berlin, and of Denmark; also, correspondent of +the Institute of France; and Foreign Knight of the Prussian order _pour +le mérite_ for Science and Arts, being elected May 31, 1881, to fill +the vacancy made by the death of Thomas Carlyle. + +In 1870 the Berlin Academy of Sciences voted him the first Bopp prize +for his publication of the Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, as the chief +contribution to Sanskrit philology during the preceding three years. + +The following extracts from a brief article in the _Berliner +Nationalzeitung_, from the pen of Professor Albrecht Weber, form an +interesting companion-piece to the letter from the same scholar, +dated in December, 1852, which was quoted in the early part of this +sketch: "Der jüngst in Yalecollege verstorbene Professor William +Dwight Whitney war einer der ersten Indianisten und Sprachforscher +der Gegenwart. Seine Sanskritstudien absolvirte er bei uns in +Deutschland, hier in Berlin bei Weber und in Tübingen bei Roth. Beide +Gelehrte betrachten es als einen ihrer schönsten Ehrentitel, ihn zum +Schüler gehabt zu haben. Gleich seine erste Arbeit in den _Indischen +Studien_ ... war ein Meisterwerk und zeigte alle die Eigenschaften, +die seinen Arbeiten einen so hohen Werth verleihen sollten, Klarheit, +Sorgsamkeit, und Akribie im kleinsten Detail.... Heimgekehrt nach +Amerika, ward er der Begründer der dortigen, jetzt in reicher Blüthe +stehenden Sanskrit-Philologie, die sich besonders durch die von ihm +speziell betonte _statistische_ Methode grosse Verdienste erworben +hat, u. A. durch seine Schüler: Avery, Bloomfield, Hopkins, Lanman, +Jackson, Oertel, Perry, Smyth, Snyder, trefflich vertreten wird.... +Seine Uebersetzung eines der ältesten vorhandenen Lehrbücher der +indischen Astronomie zeigte ihn als trefflichen Rechner und Astronom. +Schärfe der Kritik, Klarheit der Darstellung, Genauigkeit der Arbeit +sind allen seinen Werken als Stempel aufgedrückt. Sein reifstes Werk +wohl ist seine 'Sanskrit-Grammatik,' ... die erste _historische_ +Darstellung derselben, gewissermassen ein _gründliches_ Résumé aus dem +grossen Petersburger Sanskrit-Wörterbuch von Böhtlingk und Roth. Seine +Arbeiten erstreckten sich im Uebrigen auf die verschiedensten Gebiete +der Sprachwissenschaft.... Deutschland verliert in ihm einen der +wärmsten Freunde, die es in Amerika hatte, Amerika einen seiner besten +Gelehrten, und die Wissenschaft im grossen und ganzen einen ihrer +ersten Koryphäen." + +On August 28, 1856, Professor Whitney married Elizabeth Wooster +Baldwin, daughter of the Hon. Roger Sherman Baldwin, of New Haven +(ex-Governor of Connecticut and U. S. Senator), great-granddaughter +of Roger Sherman, and great-great-granddaughter of President Thomas +Clap, of Yale. Six children, three sons and three daughters, were +born to them; of whom one son (the Hon. Edward B. Whitney, Assistant +Attorney-General of the U. S.) and the three daughters survive. The +daughters assisted their father in some of his later publications in +the field of modern languages, and have done literary work of their +own. + +Just after a hard summer's work, at the very beginning of the college +year in the autumn of 1886, Professor Whitney was prostrated by a +severe disorder of the heart. For a time he was forbidden by his +physician to do more than a minimum of work. He was obliged to avoid +fatigue and excitement, and was limited strictly in his physical +exercise. Those who had seen him return invigorated and exhilarated +from a ten-miles' walk in the country were deeply pained to watch his +slow, measured gait. He surprised many by his graceful submission to +restrictions which he must have felt most keenly, and his household +was still the brightest and most cheerful in the city. The gentler +side of his nature became more prominent than before. His face grew +more and more beautiful, with his white hair and beard, and delicate +fair complexion. Though not an old man, he became truly venerable in +appearance, and his presence was a real benediction to all whom he +met. He was obliged to abandon entirely his work with undergraduate +classes, but continued his classes in Sanskrit, receiving the students +in his study at his home. During most of the past year he had six of +these exercises each week. He did not abandon his other scholarly +work. During the early years of this period of weakness, the Century +Dictionary was going through the press and received his care. Every +year witnessed his publication of some scientific paper or papers. He +aided in the plans for the World's Congress of Philology, last year. +One of his intimate associates, Professor Lounsbury, has written of +him: "To me, at least, words seem inadequate to describe the quiet +heroism which gave serenity and calm to his latter days, and the +unflinching resolution with which he met and discharged every duty of a +life over which the possibility of sudden death was always casting its +shadow." + +After an illness of about two weeks, Mr. Whitney passed away from this +life, during sleep, on the morning of Thursday, June 7, 1894. + +In the death of William Dwight Whitney, this country has lost one of +her most distinguished men, one who had been recognized throughout +the world as one of the highest authorities in his department of +learning, and who had been for forty years the leader of oriental and +linguistic studies in America and the personal master of a majority of +the American scholars in his department. Yale University has lost one +of her most brilliant and able scholars, one of her wisest and most +faithful teachers, whose influence always made for diligent and honest +research and statement. His publications have had a lasting effect on +scholarship. His personal influence will long endure. In the words of +Professor Lanman, "for power of intellect, conjoined with purity of +soul and absolute genuineness of character, we shall not soon look upon +his like again." + + THOMAS DAY SEYMOUR. + +[1] The writer desires to acknowledge his special obligations to +Professor Salisbury for allowing him access to original documents, and +to Dr. Hanns Oertel for calling his attention to publications which +would otherwise have escaped his notice. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's William Dwight Whitney, by Thomas Day Seymour + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY *** + +***** This file should be named 44259-0.txt or 44259-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/4/4/2/5/44259/ + +Produced by Mark C. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + diff --git a/old/44259-0.zip b/old/44259-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..c2b617b --- /dev/null +++ b/old/44259-0.zip diff --git a/old/44259-8.txt b/old/44259-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..40111aa --- /dev/null +++ b/old/44259-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1476 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of William Dwight Whitney, by Thomas Day Seymour + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: William Dwight Whitney + +Author: Thomas Day Seymour + +Release Date: November 23, 2013 [EBook #44259] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY *** + + + + +Produced by Mark C. Orton, Marc-Andre Seekamp and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + + + WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY + + (T. D. SEYMOUR) + + + + +WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY.[1] + + +Northampton, Massachusetts, half a century ago, was one of the best +examples of a typical New England town--among stately hills, on the +banks of the Connecticut River, with broad streets well shaded by great +spreading elms, with large homesteads still occupied by the descendants +of early settlers, with people of much culture and refinement who +were given to "plain living and high thinking." It was the town of +Edwards, of Dwight, of Hawley, of Stoddard, of Strong, and of many +another worthy. It was the seat of the once famous Round Hill Academy. +There, on February 9, 1827, William Dwight Whitney was born,--the +second surviving son and fourth child of Josiah Dwight Whitney and +Sarah Williston Whitney. His mother was a daughter of the Rev. Payson +Williston (Yale, 1783), of Easthampton, and sister of the Hon. Samuel +Williston, who founded Williston Seminary. His father was born in +Westfield, Mass.,--the oldest son of Abel Whitney, who was graduated at +Harvard in 1783. + +No company of brothers and sisters of any American family has been so +remarkable for scholarly attainments and achievements as that family in +Northampton: Josiah D. Whitney, Jr. (Yale, 1839), Professor of Geology +at Harvard; William D. Whitney, of Yale; James L. Whitney (Yale, 1856), +of the Boston Public Library; Henry M. Whitney (Yale, 1864), Professor +of English Literature at Beloit College; Miss Maria Whitney, the first +incumbent of the chair of Modern Languages in Smith College. + +William D. Whitney was fitted for college in his native town, and +entered the Sophomore class of Williams College in 1842, at the age of +fifteen. Tradition says that the studies of the college course were +easy to him, and that he spent most of his time in wandering over +the fields, studying geology and the habits of birds and of plants, +although he maintained the first rank for scholarship in his class. +On his graduation he pronounced the valedictory oration, on 'Literary +Biography.' + +After graduation--at eighteen, the age when most now enter college--Mr. +Whitney remained for three years in uncertainty with regard to his +life-work, meanwhile busy as teller in his father's bank. He did +not take an active part in the social life of the young people of +Northampton, but employed himself in his own pursuits. His leisure time +was given largely to the collection of birds and plants; a large and +beautiful case of birds stuffed by him at this period is in the Peabody +Museum at New Haven. His tastes for natural science were marked, and +he was more than an amateur in that field. He spent the summer of 1849 +in the United States Survey of the Lake Superior region, conducted by +his eminent brother, Josiah D. Whitney--having "under his charge the +botany, the ornithology, and the accounts." In the summer of 1873, +also, he was invited to take part in the Hayden exploring expedition in +Colorado. The Report of the Survey says that he "rendered most valuable +assistance ... in geographical work." His account of this expedition +of 1873 was published in the New York _Tribune_, and afterwards was +translated into French for a popular publication of that country, as +giving a clear view of the work of such scientific parties. He had a +brief article in the _American Journal of Science_ for the same year on +the U. S. Geological Survey of the Territories. He gave several months +of his time just before leaving home for his last visit to Europe, to +helping Professor J. D. Whitney put through the press the latter's work +on 'The Metallic Wealth of the United States.' + +His scientific experience stood him in good stead in more than one +instance of philological research and discussion. He was not tempted +to infer from linguistic data the order of succession of trees in +forests, nor astronomical facts. He was a member for several years +of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. One of +his most important publications was the annotated translation of a +Hindu treatise on astronomy--the Surya-Siddhanta, 1860--and one of the +longest essays in his 'Oriental and Linguistic Studies' treats of the +same subject. + +In 1848, largely under the influence and with the encouragement of his +father's pastor, the Rev. George E. Day (for a quarter of a century +after 1866 Professor of Hebrew at Yale, and at present Dean of the +Yale Divinity School), Mr. Whitney directed his attention to the study +of Sanskrit, for which he found books in the library of his elder +brother, who had recently returned from Europe. A really good mind can +find pleasure and success in any one of several different fields of +research. Not often, however, do we find such marked examples of men of +real talent manifesting distinct tastes and power in widely different +departments of learning as in the case of these two brothers. Mr. J. +D. Whitney went to Germany primarily in order to prepare himself for +mineralogical and geological work, but became interested in the study +of languages and attended (with but two fellow-listeners) a course of +lectures on Sanskrit at Berlin. He himself says that he might have +taken up philology in earnest, abandoning natural science altogether, +if immediately after his return to his home he had not received an +appointment to engage in a geological survey of a new and interesting +region under United States authority. His philological studies have +borne fruit in his 'Names and Places--Studies in Geographical and +Topographical Nomenclature,' published in 1888, and in the more than +four thousand definitions he furnished to the Century Dictionary. Mr. +W. D. Whitney certainly had great ability in the study of natural +science. Doubtless the accident of his finding various linguistic +books ready to hand, at the time when his mental powers were most +actively developing, had much to do with his turning in the direction +of philology. During the summer which he spent with his brother on +Lake Superior he had a Sanskrit grammar with him, which he studied +at odd moments when not engaged in collecting plants or computing +barometrical observations. Yale College has had another marked example +of a scholar with equal ability and tastes for widely diverse studies, +in Professor James Hadley, whose first published work was in the +department of mathematics, and of whom a high authority said that the +best mathematician in the country was spoiled when Mr. Hadley devoted +himself to Greek! + +Mr. Whitney's practical banker father was not fully satisfied with +his plan of giving himself to Oriental studies, and asked his pastor +whether a man could support himself in life by studying and teaching +Sanskrit. Dr. Day made the very wise answer that if a man had any +exact and thorough knowledge, he was likely to be able to use it. As a +Massachusetts man, the father turned naturally to Harvard as the proper +place for his son's pursuit of advanced studies, but his pastor called +his attention to the newly established department of Philosophy and the +Arts at New Haven as the only definite arrangement yet made in this +country for university work, and especially to the unique equipment of +the special department of Oriental languages. + +Before going to New Haven to study, Mr. Whitney prepared and published +in the _Bibliotheca Sacra_ an article (translated and abridged from von +Bohlen) on the 'Grammatical Structure of the Sanskrit'; and in the same +periodical, in the following year, he published a 'Comparison of the +Greek and Latin Verbs.' + +In the autumn of 1849, too late for his name to appear in the +catalogue of that year, Mr. Whitney came to Yale and studied through +the remainder of the college year under Professor Salisbury. His +associate in study was Professor James Hadley (six years older than +himself, but only three years older in college age), who had been +appointed assistant professor of Greek in 1848. The relations of the +two continued most intimate and mutually stimulating until the death +of Professor Hadley in 1872. Mr. Whitney edited a volume of Professor +Hadley's Essays, in 1873, and wrote a brief but highly appreciative +sketch of his friend for the large work entitled 'Yale College,' +published in 1879. + +Professor Salisbury was graduated at Yale in 1832. During more than +three years' residence abroad, 1836-39, he studied with De Sacy and +Garcin de Tassy in Paris and with Bopp in Berlin. In 1841 he was +invited to a professorship of the Arabic and Sanskrit languages in +Yale College, without the expectation of pecuniary compensation. This +was only nine years after the foundation of the Sanskrit professorship +(of H. H. Wilson) at Oxford, and twelve years after Lassen was made +Professor Extraordinarius at Bonn. He returned to Europe in 1842 for +a year, and read _privatissime_ Arabic with Freytag and Sanskrit with +Lassen, at Bonn. In 1846 he was made the Corresponding Secretary of +the American Oriental Society, and (to use Mr. Whitney's words) "for +some ten years Professor Salisbury was virtually the Society, doing +its work and paying its bills. He gave it standing and credit in the +world of scholars, as an organization that could originate and make +public valuable material; after such a start, it was sure of respectful +attention to whatever it might do." The Society had published nothing +before he took charge of this office. Professor Salisbury also secured +valuable Arabic and Sanskrit manuscripts and books from De Sacy's +library and elsewhere in Europe; and Professor FitzEdward Hall, then +at Benares, procured for him many expensive and important Sanskrit +publications from India. His services and generosity in procuring fonts +of Oriental type, and his wisdom in bringing the Oriental Society into +close connection with the studies of foreign missionaries, should not +be forgotten. He was the only trained Orientalist in this country, +until Mr. Whitney's return in 1853, and had an admirably equipped +library. In the Yale catalogue of 1841-42, Professor Salisbury's name +appears for the first time in the list of the faculty as Professor of +the Arabic and Sanskrit Languages and Literature. In the catalogue +of 1843-44, announcement is made that "the Professor of Arabic and +Sanskrit will give instruction on Tuesdays and Wednesdays in Arabic +grammar with the interpretation of the Korn and the Mo'allakas, and +on Fridays and Saturdays in Sanskrit grammar with the interpretation +of the laws of Manu." In the following year we are told that "the +Professor of Arabic and Sanskrit proposes to commence this year, in +the ensuing summer, a free course of lectures on the Sacred Code of +the Hindus, the Manava Dharma Sastra." In 1845 for the first time +appears a modestly-placed paragraph, saying "Instruction is also given +by the Professors to Resident Graduates, provided a sufficient number +present themselves to form a class." This was followed by the offer +of a "course of lectures on the literary history and doctrines of the +Kurn," or instruction in the elements of Sanskrit. In 1847 appeared +the formal announcement of the opening of the Department of Philosophy +and the Arts, with definite arrangements for advanced work. The +philological courses were by President Woolsey (Thucydides or Pindar), +Professor Kingsley ("in such Latin author as may be agreed upon"), +Professor Gibbs ("lectures on some points of general Philology"), and +Professor Salisbury (Arabic Grammar, and "some of the relations of the +Arabic to other of the Shemitish dialects"). + +Marvellous stories are told in student-tradition of the rapid progress +made by Mr. Whitney and Mr. Hadley--that they learned all the paradigms +of Bopp's grammar in two lessons, etc. The basis of the stories is +partly the fact that both already read simple Sanskrit with ease, +but it is certain that few teachers ever had such a class. They were +Professor Salisbury's first and last pupils in Sanskrit, but he might +well feel proud of the record. He himself says of them that "their +quickness of perception and unerring exactness of acquisition soon made +it evident that the teacher and the taught must change places." + +In 1850 Mr. Whitney went to Germany and spent three winter semesters +in studying with Weber, Bopp, and Lepsius in Berlin, and two summer +semesters at work with Roth in Tbingen. At the suggestion of Roth he +undertook with this master the publication of the Atharva-Veda, and +copied and collated the Berlin MSS of this work. In 1852 he sent to +the American Oriental Society a paper, read at their October meeting +of that year, on 'The main results of the later Vedic researches +in Germany.' A letter from Weber, dated at Berlin, Dec. 28, 1852, +is interesting in this connection on several accounts. He writes: +"I hope ere long Sanskrit studies will flourish in America more +than in England, where with the only exception of the venerable and +not-to-be-praised-enough Professor Wilson nobody seems to care for +them so much as to devote his life to them. The East India Company +certainly does all that is in its power to help the publication +of the Vedic texts, but it does not find English hands to achieve +it.... It is certainly very discouraging to see that Professor Wilson +during all the time since he got his professorship in Oxford, has not +succeeded in bringing up even one Sanskrit scholar who might claim +to be regarded as one who has done at least some little service to +our Sanskrit philology.... I have to congratulate you most heartily +on your countryman Mr. Whitney, who is now intensely engaged in +the preparations for an edition of the Atharva Samhita in union +with Professor Roth of Tbingen. The next number of the _Indische +Studien_, too, which is now in press, contains from him tables +showing the natural relation of the four now known Samhitas of the +Veda,--an attempt in which he was greatly indebted to Professor Roth's +communications, but which still remains also a very favorable specimen +of his own assiduity and correctness." + +The following letters need little explanation. We note with interest +how soon the first followed the receipt of Weber's letter which has +just been quoted. The spirit which prompted the offer of the first +letter is certainly unusual in its generosity--not only surrendering a +professorial chair, but also providing for its endowment. The modesty +and delicacy of the reply seem as extraordinary at the present day, and +were perhaps as rare forty years ago. + +Under date of February 19, 1853, Professor Salisbury wrote to Mr. +Whitney: "... I have observed your course of study and the rapidity of +your acquisitions since you have been abroad with much interest and +have seen in this, together with what I have known otherwise of your +tastes and talents, a way opening for relief to myself which I have +long desired. The prospect has been the more pleasing to me inasmuch as +I have also seen that I might be able through you to bring new honor +to my 'alma mater.'... It is also much at heart with me to secure +... assistance to myself in editing and endeavouring in every way to +improve the Journal of the Oriental Society." Professor Salisbury +proposed that Mr. Whitney should be made "Professor of the Sanskrit and +its relations to the kindred languages, and of Sanskrit literature, in +the Department of Philosophy and the Arts in Yale College," his term of +service to begin Aug. 8, 1853;--it being understood that Mr. Whitney +would include in his instructions the teaching of modern languages +to undergraduates, and should receive the fees which were then paid +for such teaching. It was understood, further, that Mr. Whitney would +co-operate with Professor Salisbury in editing the Journal of the +Oriental Society. Professor Salisbury undertook to create a fund which +with the fees for modern-language instruction might furnish nearly the +ordinary salary of a Yale professor at that time. + +Mr. Whitney replied from Paris, on April 4, 1853. Professor Salisbury's +letter had reached him at Berlin at a time when he was engaged in +closing his work there, and "had hardly an hour for quiet thought upon +any subject." He expressed his gratitude for the kind feeling toward +him "which has had a share in the dictating of the proposal," and +continued: "Nor can I well say how much I am struck by the true and +self-forgetting zeal for the progress of Oriental studies, of which +this, like all your previous movements, affords an evidence. But ... I +am compelled to ask myself whether ... I can hope to render any such +service to Science as would be an adequate return for the kindness you +exhibit toward me; whether, finally, it would not be in me an act of +unpardonable presumption to take upon my shoulders an office which you +are desirous of throwing off.... I need not say how high and honorable +a post I regard that of a teacher at Yale to be, how many and extreme +attractions, both in a personal and in a scientific point of view, the +prospect of such a situation would have for me.... So far as my own +interests are concerned, I could find nothing in the terms which you +propose or the duties which you suggest to which to raise a moment's +objection.... All that I could bring up against the arrangement would +be that the advantage is too entirely upon my side." He desired further +time for reflection and consultation with his friends, and thought the +postponement of a decision less objectionable because he did not expect +to be able to finish his work in Europe and return before the last of +August, and then, after a three years' absence from home, desired to +spend some time with his friends. His eyes, too, had been giving him +"during the winter ground for some apprehension," and "would doubtless +be best consulted for by a period of rest and inaction." + +In Paris he was "at work on a MS of the Atharva which belongs to the +Imperial Library." "Probably it will cost me about six weeks' labor.... +Then will follow two or three months of similar labor in London and +Oxford.... During the whole winter I was compelled to neglect all other +studies; that, however, chiefly owing to the condition of my eyes, +which robbed me of about half my time. Persian and Arabic had to be +laid aside altogether, and what of time and strength I had to spare +from the Sanskrit, I devoted to the Egyptian and Coptic. I cannot +well express to you the interest which this latter branch of study +has awakened in me, and the strong desire I have felt to penetrate +further into it than the mere surface exploration which could be made +in the odd moments of a single winter. I would not, however, sell for +a very large sum the little insight into this wonderful subject which +I have already obtained, and it will be my highest pleasure to attempt +to draw it somewhat more into the circle of our Oriental inquiries +than has been generally the case hitherto.... There is nothing new of +particular interest, so far as I know, to communicate to you from the +Sanskrit world on this side of the water. The main interest attaches +to the Lexicon which is going to be really a great work, and to push +forward the whole study of that language a long way with one thrust. A +slow thrust, unfortunately, it will have to be; Prof. Roth estimates +ten years as needed for its perfection. [It was completed in 1875.] +I am going to contribute my small mite also toward it, by furnishing +to Prof. Roth the vocabulary complete of the Atharva. The latter, as +you perhaps know, has now the sole redaction of the Vedic material, +Aufrecht having left Germany. The next number of Weber's Zeitschrift +will be out now very soon, and will contain a contribution from me, a +Vedic concordance." + +Mr. Whitney reached home earlier than he had expected--about Aug. 8, +1853--and on Aug. 15 he wrote: "Although not less distrustful than +before of my ability to discharge to your satisfaction and my own +the duties of the post to which you would assign me, I should be +disposed to accept gratefully your proposals, and do my best at least +to accomplish that which such an acceptance demands of me." But Mr. +Whitney desired a modification of the plan. "I have no such knowledge +of French as would in any manner justify me in making pretensions to +ability to teach it." His estimate of his knowledge of modern languages +was lower than that of his friends. Not until 1856 did he accept the +title of "Instructor in German." A year later, after he had taken nine +months of travel and study in southern Europe, the college catalogue +calls him "Professor of Sanskrit, and Instructor in modern languages." + +The importance to American scholarship of the offer of this chair +to Professor Whitney may be better appreciated if we remember that +his predecessor still lives, and that no other chair of Sanskrit was +established in this country for about a quarter of a century. + +At a special meeting of the Corporation of Yale College, on May +10, 1854, the "Professorship of the Sanskrit and its relations to +kindred languages, and Sanskrit Literature" was established, and Mr. +Whitney was elected to hold it. The founder's desire for the range +of the department was indicated distinctly, but the shorter name of +the professorship, "Professor of Sanskrit," was used in the college +catalogues until 1869, when the words "and Comparative Philology" +were added, without indicating any change in the direction of the +incumbent's studies or in the plan of the university. + +In 1854 the announcement of philological courses in the Department of +Philosophy and the Arts covered Professor Gibbs's lectures on general +Philology, Professor Thacher's course of two hours a week in Lucretius +and in Latin Composition, Professor Hadley's course of two hours a +week in Pindar or Theocritus, and contained the following statement: +"Professor Whitney will give instruction in Sanskrit from Bopp's +Grammar and Nalus, or such other text-books as may be agreed upon, and +in the rudiments of the Ancient and Modern Persian, and of the Egyptian +languages." The last clause here reminds the reader of the enthusiasm +for the Egyptian and Coptic expressed in the letter of April 4, 1853; +and of the fact that Mr. Whitney's first 'bibliographical notice' in +the Journal of the Oriental Society discussed Lepsius's work on the +'First order of Egyptian deities,' but we read little more of these +studies, except a paper on Lepsius's Nubian Grammar in the second +volume of this JOURNAL. In 1858 Professor Whitney's announcement read: +"Professor Whitney will instruct in the Sanskrit language, and in +the History, Antiquities, and Literature of India and other Oriental +countries; also in the comparative philology of the Indo-European +languages, and the general principles of linguistic study. He will +also give instruction to such as may desire it in the modern European +languages." + +The appointment of Professor Whitney in 1854 was for five years, +with a pledge of reappointment "for life," five years later, if he +desired it. In 1859 this reappointment was made--the founder of the +chair stipulating that Professor Whitney should be free to retire +from the professorship at any time. Mr. Whitney wrote, on July 15, +1859: "My present situation in New Haven is so pleasant to me on so +many accounts, and holds out such prospects of honorable and useful +employment in the time to come, that I should exceedingly regret being +compelled to go elsewhere. Nor, although it would be in many respects +more agreeable to me to be able to devote my _whole_ time to my own +peculiar studies, do I see reason seriously to regret the division of +my labors between the ancient and the modern languages. It is both +useful and pleasant to have to do more directly with the young men in +college, and there is also the chance of influencing one and another of +them to devote his attention to higher philological study." + +During and after the Civil War, the ordinary expenses of life +increased, and Mr. Whitney's family was growing. The income which had +sufficed for the young and unmarried professor in 1854 had become +entirely insufficient for his needs, with six children, in 1870. For +his pecuniary relief he assumed additional duties of instruction in +modern languages, in connection with the Sheffield Scientific School. +His teaching of modern languages in the academic department had ceased +with the entrance upon his duties of Professor Coe, in 1867. The burden +of instructing large classes of undergraduates in the very rudiments +of French and German (each Academic student then having only thirty or +forty lessons in each subject) became more and more irksome. + +In September, 1869, Mr. Whitney received an urgent call to Harvard, +very soon after President Eliot's election to the headship of that +university, with the assurance that he should have "salary enough to +constitute a tolerable support," and should not have to teach in any +other than his own proper department. He wrote to a friend: "It is the +most tempting offer that could, so far as I know, be made me; for on +the one hand I have greatly grudged the time which I have had to steal +from Oriental and linguistic studies for German and French; and, on the +other hand, what I have received for my services to the College has not +for a good while paid more than about half my expenses.... Such a state +of things has been, of course, worrying enough, nor have I seen any +definite prospect of a change. But I am greatly attached to the College +here, and to the Scientific School, and to relatives and friends in +New Haven, and have no hope that ... I should become so wonted and so +comfortable anywhere else." + +Professor Whitney's colleagues saw how fatal his departure would be +to the advanced philological work at Yale. No definite provision had +then been made for graduate instruction in Greek, Latin, and Modern +Languages, and although Professors Hadley, Thacher, Packard, and Coe +were laboring to build up this department, their efforts received +only the slightest pecuniary compensation; they were expected to do +full work in the undergraduate department; Mr. Whitney was the only +"University professor," not only at Yale, but in the whole country. One +who is everywhere recognized as a leader in education then wrote: "I am +confident that there is no one whose intellectual influence over the +younger officers of the college is so great as Mr. Whitney's.... I have +greatly admired his influence in promoting fidelity, truth, justice, +and industry among the students, as well as his skill in promoting +their intellectual character." Another of his colleagues wrote: "I have +never known the college men so moved. The danger of losing so eminent +a man as Mr. Whitney seemed almost appalling, and I think if no other +means of retaining him could be devised, the professors themselves +would each cut off a slice from his meagre salary to make up the amount +necessary to retain him. The question seems to rise above personal +considerations and to come very near to the vital interests of the +university." + +Professor Salisbury, whose insight and generosity had brought Mr. +Whitney to Yale, was nearly concerned by the call to Cambridge, and +after less than a week's delay provided the sum needed for the full +foundation of Mr. Whitney's chair on the modern scale of salaries, +which had changed greatly since 1854, and Mr. Whitney decided to remain +in New Haven. At this time the arrangement was made that Mr. Whitney +should give regular instruction in linguistics to the undergraduate +classes of the college, and this course, at first given in the form of +lectures, as part of the required work, was amplified and continued as +an 'elective' until 1886. Mr. Whitney still continued to teach in the +Scientific School for an hour a day, saying that in no other way could +he add so easily a convenient thousand dollars a year to his income as +by teaching from eight to nine o'clock each morning; he required no +preparation for the exercise, it did not interfere with the work of his +day, and he liked to be brought into contact with the young men. + +The invitation to Harvard and the decision to remain at Yale had +attracted considerable attention and had given rise to many plans +for advanced philological instruction at New Haven. Mr. Whitney's +release from drudgery with undergraduates enabled him also to enrich +his Sanskrit and linguistic courses. In the catalogue of 1870-71 +we read: "In Philology, a somewhat regular course of higher study, +extending through two years, and leading to the degree of Doctor of +Philosophy, is offered. The leading studies of the first year will be +The general principles of linguistic science, under Professor Whitney; +the Sanskrit language, under Professor Whitney; the older Germanic +languages, especially Gothic and Anglo-Saxon, under Professor Hadley +and Mr. Lounsbury; along with higher instruction in the classical and +the modern languages, according to the special requirements of each +student, under Professors Thacher, Packard, and Coe, and Messrs. Van +Name and Lounsbury, and others. The leading studies of the second +year will be The comparative philology of the Indo-European languages +... under Professor Whitney; the history of the English language, +under Professor Hadley; along with other special branches, as during +the first year." The reward for the new enterprise of a formal +graduate school of philology came almost immediately in the form of +an unusual class of students, nearly all of whom were destined to +secure honorable distinction in their chosen work. In the list of +those who received the degree of Ph.D. in 1873 appear the names of +Lanman of Harvard, Learned of the Japanese Doshisha, Luquiens of Yale, +Manatt of Brown, Otis of the Institute of Technology, and Perrin of +Yale. Truly an unusual group! Only the year before, Professor Easton +of the University of Pennsylvania and Professor Beckwith of Trinity +College, and the year following Professor Edgren of the University of +Gothenburg, received the same degree, while soon after them President +Harper of Chicago, Professor H. P. Wright of Yale, Professor Sherman +of Nebraska, Professor Peters of the University of Pennsylvania, and +Professor Tarbell of the University of Chicago completed the graduate +course under Mr. Whitney. The service which the Semitic scholar, +Professor George E. Day, had done for Indo-European philology by +turning Professor Whitney's mind to its attractions, was in a way +repaid by the latter when he pointed out to William Rainey Harper the +great opportunity open to workers in the Semitic field; as a graduate +student at Yale, Dr. Harper gave himself to work in the field of the +Indo-European languages, but his recollection of his master's words has +had a wide influence on Semitic studies in America. Professor Whitney +was justly proud of his pupils, and was always interested in their +work. His classes in Sanskrit were not large absolutely, but frequently +he could say that more were studying this language with him than with +any other university professor in the world. + +Professor Whitney's connection with the Sheffield Scientific School +was close. He organized its department of modern languages, and was a +member of its 'Governing Board' from the time of the organization of +that body in 1872. One who has occasion to know better than all others +says that he was "a tower of strength" to the School--not only by his +instructions and by inspiring the students with the spirit of true +scholarship, but by his intelligent appreciation of the aims of the +School and his wise judgment as to the means to be used in order to +attain them. His personal liking for natural science, and training in +its methods, added the warmest sympathy to his work in connection with +this department of the University. + +In the very first communication made to Mr. Whitney with regard to his +work at Yale, attention was called to the opportunity for usefulness +in connection with the American Oriental Society, of which he was +elected a member in 1850. In 1854 his name appears in the list of the +publication committee of that Society. In 1855 he was made librarian, +and held that office until 1873. This latter post was no sinecure. In +the winter of 1853-54, on going to visit the library (then kept in +Boston), he "found it a pile of books on the floor in the corner of an +upstairs room in the Athenaeum, apparently just as it had been brought +in and dumped down from an earlier place of keeping." In the summer +of 1855 the books were removed to New Haven. The task of "arranging, +labelling, entering in the book of donations, and preparing cards" +involved "a very considerable and tedious amount of work." In 1857, on +Professor Salisbury's going abroad and resigning the office, Professor +Whitney was elected Corresponding Secretary, and continued in this +position until 1884, when he was elected President of the Society. +His resignation of this latter office was not accepted until 1890, +when for nearly four years the condition of his health had obliged +him to absent himself from its meetings. He could well say that "no +small part of his work had been done in the service of the Society"; +from 1857 to 1885, "just a half of the contents of its Journal is from +his pen." His care of the publications of others, also, was specially +difficult, in view of the peculiar danger of typographical errors and +the wide field covered by the papers; no ordinary proof-reader could +render much assistance. And not infrequently articles by those who were +unaccustomed to scientific composition needed thorough revision. On his +positively declining to be a candidate for re-election as President, +the Society adopted the following minute: "The American Oriental +Society--regretfully accepting his declination--desires to record +its deep sense of indebtedness to its retiring President, Professor +William Dwight Whitney, of New Haven. For twenty-seven years he has +served as Corresponding Secretary of the Society; for eighteen, as its +Librarian; and for six, as its President. We gratefully acknowledge the +obligation under which he has laid us by his diligent attendance at +the meetings, by his unstinted giving of time and of labor in editing +the publications and maintaining their high scientific character, by +the quality and amount of his own contributions to the _Journal_--more +than half of volumes VI-XII coming from his pen--and above all by the +inspiration of his example." + +The American Philological Association might have been a natural +off-shoot from the Oriental Society. The latter has had a +'classical-section' since 1849, of which Professor Hadley was long at +the head, of which Professor Goodwin has been the leader for nearly +a quarter of a century; and classical papers had been presented by +Professor Hadley, as that 'On the theory of Greek accent,' and by +Professor Lane, as that 'On the date of the Amphitruo of Plautus.' Many +of the early members of the Philological Association were also members +of the Oriental Society. Mr. Whitney presided over the Philological +Association at its first meeting in Poughkeepsie in 1869, and at the +Rochester meeting in 1870, as retiring President, he delivered an +address in which he sketched with great wisdom the Association's action +and work. "The association is to be just what its members shall make +it, and will not bear much managing or mastering. It must discuss the +subjects which are interesting American philologists, and with such +wisdom and knowledge as these have at command.... In every such free +and democratic body things are brought forward into public which might +better have been kept back.... The classics, of course, will occupy +the leading place; that department will be most strongly represented, +and will least need fostering, while it will call for most careful +criticism. The philology of the American aboriginal languages, on the +other hand, demands, as it has already begun to receive, the most +hearty encouragement.... Educational subjects also are closely bound up +with philology, and will necessarily receive great attention; yet there +should be a limit here; our special task is to advance the interests +of philology only, confident that education will reap its share of +the benefit." Mr. Whitney's services to the Association, and faithful +attendance upon its meetings, may be estimated from the fact that the +first sixteen volumes of the Transactions contain fourteen papers by +him printed in full, while occasionally he presented communications +which he did not care to print. At its meeting in Williamstown in July +last, the Association adopted the following minute: "The American +Philological Association, at its first meeting after the death of +Professor William D. Whitney, bears grateful testimony to the value +of the services which he rendered for the furtherance of philological +learning, and especially in connection with this Association. Fitly +chosen to be its first President, and retained for a quarter of a +century upon its Executive Committee, he never failed to take an active +part in its work, and in many ways he advanced its interests and +encouraged and assisted the studies to which its members are devoted. +The record of his life-work may be left for more full recital at +another time; but the Association takes this opportunity of testifying +to its sense of obligation to Professor Whitney's manifold and +successful labors, and of the great loss which his death has brought to +its members and to philological students throughout the world." + +Both the classical and the oriental philologists of the country have +noted Mr. Whitney's constancy in attendance on their gatherings. In +November, 1875, he apologized to the Oriental Society for his absence +from the May meeting (caused by his visit to Europe in the interest +of the edition of the Atharva-Veda), and added that it was his second +absence in twenty-one years from a meeting of the Society! His devoted +fidelity to the little Classical and Philological Society at Yale was +just as marked. A quarter of a century ago, he with Professor Hadley +and Professor Packard made that small gathering a deep source of +inspiration. Many, if not most, of his learned papers were presented +for discussion there. After the death of the lamented Professor Hadley, +which gave a sudden check to the development of Yale's advanced courses +in philology, Mr. Whitney was the mainstay of the Society, and his +regular attendance and patient attention roused to best effort each who +took part. Perhaps I ought to confess also that some of the younger +instructors and graduate students shrank from presenting papers which +might be compared with the finished scholar's elaborate productions. +At these meetings his patience must have been sorely tried; much +that was presented can have had but little interest for him; but his +courtesy was unfailing. He gave without stint of his precious time to +any undertaking which he believed to be doing, on the whole, useful +philological work. + +The first great work of Mr. Whitney's scholarship was the publication +of the Atharva-Veda-Sanhita, undertaken in 1852 with Professor +Roth. The first volume of 458 pages, royal octavo, was published in +1855-56. In connection with this, he prepared and published in Weber's +_Indische Studien_ (vol. IV, pp. 9-64) in 1857 an 'Alphabetisches +Verzeichniss der Versanfnge der Atharva-Samhita'; in the _Journal_ +of the American Oriental Society in 1862 (vol. VII, pp. 333-616) the +'Atharva-Veda-Pratiakhya,' with text, translation and notes; in the +same _Journal_ in 1881 (vol. XII, pp. 1-383) an 'Index Verborum' to the +published text of the Atharva-Veda. He made to the A.O.S. in April, +1892, an 'Announcement' as to a second volume of the Roth-Whitney +edition of the Atharva-Veda. "The bulk of the work" of preparing notes, +indexes, etc., "was to have fallen to Professor Roth, not only because +the bulk of the work on the first volume had fallen to me [i. e. +Professor Whitney], but also because his superior learning and ability +pointed him out as the one to undertake it." But Roth's "absorption in +the great labor of the Petersburg lexicon for a long series of years +had kept his hands from the Atharva-Veda." Mr. Whitney said that he +had never lost from view the completion of the plan of publication +as originally formed. "In 1875 I spent the summer in Germany chiefly +engaged in further collating at Munich and at Tbingen the additional +manuscript material which had come to Europe since our text was +printed; and I should probably have soon taken up the work seriously, +save for having been engaged while in Germany to prepare a Sanskrit +grammar, which fully occupied the leisure of several following years. +At last in 1885-86, I had fairly started upon the execution of the +plan when failure of health reduced my working capacity to a minimum, +and rendered ultimate success very questionable. The task, however, +has never been laid wholly aside, and it is now so far advanced that +barring further loss of power, I may hope to finish it in a couple +of years or so. The plan includes critical readings upon the text"; +the readings of the Paippalada version; the data of the Anukramani +respecting authorship, divinity, and meter of each verse; references to +the ancillary literature; extracts from the printed commentary; and, +finally, a simple literal translation. "An introduction and indexes +will give such further material as appears to be called for." Of this +work the last revision is only partially made; a few months' more labor +would have completed it; Professor Lanman, of Harvard, has undertaken +to finish the revision and to conduct the volume through the press. +Thus Professor Whitney's work closes as it began--with the Atharva-Veda. + +Perhaps Mr. Whitney's most important service to Sanskrit philology +was the preparation of his 'Sanskrit Grammar, including both the +classical language, and the older dialects, of Veda and Brahmana,' +486 pp., octavo. This was published in Leipzig in 1879, in the same +year with a German translation. He undertook this work in 1875, and +in 1878 went to Germany with his family and spent fifteen months in +writing out the grammar and preparing it for the press. He aimed "to +make a presentation of the facts of the language primarily as they +show themselves in use in the literature, and only secondarily as they +are laid down by the native grammarians"; "to include also in the +presentation the forms and constructions of the older language, as +exhibited in the Veda and Brahmana"; "to treat the language throughout +as an accented one"; "to cast all statements, classifications, and so +on, into a form consistent with the teachings of linguistic science." +"While the treatment of the facts of the language has thus been made a +historical one, within the limits of the language itself, I have not +ventured to make it comparative, by bringing in the analogous forms +and processes of other related languages. To do this, in addition to +all that was attempted beside, would have extended the work both in +content and in time of preparation, far beyond the limits assigned to +it." A second edition, revised and extended, was published ten years +later, in 1889. A 'Supplement to his Sanskrit Grammar: The Roots, +Verb-forms, and Primary Derivatives of the Sanskrit Language,' 250 pp., +was published in Leipzig in 1885. That he did not discredit and slight +the old Hindu grammarians because of any lack of acquaintance with them +is shown by his own work and publications in that field. He published +not only the Atharva-Veda-Pratiakhya (text, translation and notes, +in 1862), but also a similar edition of the Taittiriya-Pratiakhya, +with its commentary, the Tribhashyaratna, in 1871. The true relations +of Hindu Grammar to the study of Sanskrit, he made clear in two +articles published in the AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY, in vols. V and +XIV. His last word on the subject was this: "I would by no means say +anything to discourage the study of Panini; it is highly important and +extremely interesting and might well absorb more of the labor of the +present generation of scholars than is given to it. But I would have +it followed in a different spirit and a different method. It should be +completely abandoned as the means by which we are to learn Sanskrit. +For what the literature contains, the literature itself suffices; we +can understand it and present it vastly better than Panini could. It is +the residuum of peculiar material involved in his grammar that we shall +value, and the attempt must be made to separate that from the rest of +the mass." More than twenty-five years ago he called attention to the +fact that the very title of Professor Goldstcker's paper 'On the Veda +of the Hindus and the Veda of the "German School"' involved an evident +_petitio principii_. The fair theme would have been 'The Veda of the +Hindu Schools, and the Veda of the European School: which is the true +Veda?' + +The following extracts from a review by Hillebrandt in the fifth +volume of _Bezzenberger's Beitrge_ illustrate the reception generally +accorded to the Sanskrit Grammar:--"Es handelte sich fr ihn nicht +um ein tieferes studium der einheimischen indischen grammatik, auf +deren reiche beobachtungen unsere bisherigen sanskritgrammatiken +fast ausschliesslich sich sttzen, sondern um die erforschung des +sprachzustandes, wie ihn die litteratur selbst aufweist.... Whitney's +eigentliche aufgabe war es, in die sanskritgrammatik die grundstze +der linguistik durchgreifender, als bisher geschehen war, einzufhren +und die sprache als eine historisch gewordene zu betrachten. Dies +princip hatte eine bestndige rcksichtsnahme auf den vedadialekt +zur voraussetzung und verlieh Whitney's buche vorzge, welche allein +gengen wrden, ihm eine hervorragende stellung unter den vorhandenen +lehrbchern anzuweisen. Die reiche flle neuen materials, welches +er ... aus allen teilen der vedischen litteratur herbeizog und in +instructiver weise dazu verwandte, ber das allmhliche aufleben und +absterben dieses oder jenes sprachgebrauchs aufschluss zu geben, die +durch reiche beispiele und aufstellung ganzer paradigmen illustrirte +unterscheidung vedischer und klassischer flexion, die von der indischen +grammatik vernachlssigte statistische beobachtung des formenschatzes +in lterer und jngerer litteratur--dies sind eigenschaften die es in +dieser ausdehnung mit keinem teilt." + +The Grammar provided an instrument which all Sanskrit scholars are now +thankfully using. + +Of the Supplement to the Grammar, von Bradke wrote in the third volume +of the Literaturblatt fr orientalische Philologie: "So anspruchslos +das Werk auftritt, in dieser Weise konnte es nur von einem unserer +ersten Kenner der altindischen Literatursprache, und auch von einem +solchen nicht ohne lange und mhevolle Arbeit geschaffen werden." + +In this connection we should be again reminded that Professor Whitney +was one of the chief four collaborators who furnished material for +the great Sanskrit dictionary published at the expense of the Russian +government. + +In March, 1864, Mr. Whitney delivered at the Smithsonian Institution +a series of six lectures on the Principles of Linguistic +Science--probably lectures which he had given to the Sheffield +Scientific School the preceding year. This course was repeated before +the Lowell Institute and published in 1867, under the title of +'Language and the Study of Language,' 489 pages. This was translated +into German by Jolly and into Netherlandish by Vinckers. The clearness +and conciseness of the statements and the soundness of the views, +in a field where the wildest vagaries had prevailed, and where the +imagination was still allowed rather free play, were recognized on +every hand. From the time of the preparation of those lectures, Mr. +Whitney seems to have devoted to this subject more attention than he +had given before. In 1875 he published in the International Scientific +Series a similar book, in somewhat more compendious form, on the 'Life +and Growth of Language: an outline of linguistic science,' 326 pages. +This was translated into German, French, Italian, Netherlandish, and +Swedish. This last book grew out of his lectures to academic senior +classes. + +No one has done so much as Mr. Whitney to teach sound views of +linguistic science. Although the writer of this sketch has not +ventured to include a detailed discussion of his views, perhaps +mention may be made fitly of two points in which he was in advance of +his contemporaries: he was among the very first to call attention to +_analogy_ as a force in the growth of language, and the first (after +Latham in 1851) to doubt the then generally accepted view that Asia was +the original home of the Indo-Europeans. + +Papers which had been printed in the _North American Review_ and other +periodicals were collected and, with more or less revision, published +in two volumes entitled 'Oriental and Linguistic Studies,' 1873-74, pp. +417 and 432. The first volume contained papers on the Veda, the Avesta, +the science of language; the second, on the British in India, China and +the Chinese, religion and mythology, orthography and phonology, Hindu +astronomy. The author's regard for his earliest teacher in Sanskrit is +marked by his dedication of the first of the two volumes to "Professor +Edward Elbridge Salisbury, the pioneer and patron of Sanskrit studies +in America." The second volume "is affectionately dedicated" to +"Professors Rudolf Roth and Albrecht Weber, my early teachers and +lifelong friends." + +His long experience as a teacher of modern languages and as a student +of linguistics aided to fit him pre-eminently for the preparation of +grammars, readers, and vocabularies of French and German for schools +and colleges, and his systematic habits of work enabled him to prepare +these easily. This apparatus met the needs of the newly awakened +interest in modern languages in this country, and has done much to +further this interest. These books are said to be used more widely than +any others of their kind in America. Some of them are published in two +editions, full and abridged. His desire for a reasonable and truly +philological study of the English language led him to prepare for use +in schools 'Essentials of English Grammar' (1877, 260 pages), which has +been adopted extensively by the public schools of the country and is +declared, by one who knows, to have had great influence on the study of +this subject. + +Professor Whitney had assisted in the preparation of the Webster's +dictionary of 1864, rewriting the definitions of many of the important +words. This experience, his keen sense of proportion, his practical +turn of mind, his precise and concise manner of statement, his wide +and varied attainments,--all made him a peculiarly suitable person +to be the editor-in-chief of the great Century Dictionary with +which the people of this country will long associate his name. His +unfortunate illness prevented him from revising the work so carefully +as he doubtless would have done, had he been in vigorous health, and +some have thought that he should be called supervising-editor rather +than editor-in-chief. As the dictionary stands, he cannot be held +responsible for details; but his influence upon the work was strong as +well as salutary. Though he might not mark the proof for a dozen pages, +he would score the next page in a manner which set a standard, and +showed what he desired the revision of the rest to be, while the whole +body of editors followed the general lines which he had drawn. + +In the list of his writings which was drawn up by Professor Whitney in +1892, one hundred and forty-four items are enumerated; but numerous +minor articles and book notices are not included, nor his contributions +to the great Sanskrit, Webster, and Century dictionaries, nor his +oversight of the German dictionary which goes by his name. He wrote +articles for the New American Cyclopedia, Johnson's Cyclopedia, and +the Encyclopaedia Britannica. He was a frequent contributor to the +_Nation_ and other periodicals. In view of the importance and extent +of many of his publications, his diligence and intellectual fertility +are extraordinary. + +As a teacher of advanced students, Mr. Whitney was exacting. A two-hour +course under him in Sanskrit called for a larger outlay of time and +effort than a four-hour course under most other teachers. He required +precise knowledge of others as well as of himself. He was never +deceived by glittering generalities, nor satisfied with approximate +accuracy when absolute accuracy was attainable. He was modest, however, +and while he would not allow the violation of well-established +principles, yet in the translation of difficult and uncertain passages +he never insisted on the pupil's adoption of his view. + +In controversy and criticism, Mr. Whitney struck hard; his sword was +piercing, even to the sundering of joint and marrow. But he was fair; +he never misrepresented his opponent. He never lost his temper and +struck blindly. He saw so clearly the absurdities and difficulties +of a false position that he felt bound to present it as it was, yet +without any thought of giving personal offence. For example, no one +would suppose that he expected to offend his friend and teacher, Weber, +by the remark that the latter had "unwittingly put himself in the +position of one attempting to prove on philological grounds that the +precessional movement of the equinoxes is from west to east, instead +of from east to west" (Oct. 1865); but the criticism is very similar +to that (which was counted severe) on Mller (July, 1876), that "even +the aid of Main and Hinds could not keep him, in his astronomical +reasonings, from assuming that, to any given observer, the ecliptic is +identical with his own horizon." + +The only prolonged controversy in which Professor Whitney was ever +engaged was that with Professor Max Mller. His early relations +with Mller had been pleasant, and he had supported the latter's +candidacy for his chair at Oxford in 1860. His first public mention +(1867) of Mller's work on the translation of the Vedas was very +complimentary; but when the first volume of the translation appeared, +his review of it was exceedingly severe. In the fourteenth volume of +his _Indische Studien_, under the heading 'Zur Klarstellung,' Weber +gives an account of the conflict. According to him, the real source +of the controversy was Mr. Whitney's spirited reply to Mller's +criticisms on the Bhtlingk-Roth Dictionary. "Whitney hatte zwei +Vorlesungen Mller's kritisch besprochen,--scharf, wie es Whitney's +Art ist, aber ohne irgend welche persnliche Wendung, so wie sich +Gelehrte, denen es um ihre Meinung Ernst ist, zu streiten pflegen." +The occasion of the contest was the publication by Professor George +Darwin, in the _Contemporary Review_ of November, 1874, of a report +of Mr. Whitney's views. "Mller nahm sich denn auch gar nicht die +Zeit Whitney's Abhandlung selbst zu lesen, sondern trat gleich in dem +folgenden Januar-Heft der Review mit einer nur auf die Auszge Mr. +Darwin's basirten Gegenschrift hervor." Some have wondered that Mr. +Whitney should care to follow up the matter so long, and even in 1892 +should publish a brochure of 79 pages on 'Max Mller and the Science +of Language: a Criticism.' But the question with him rose far above +personalities: the truth was at stake. His mind, accurate by both +nature and training, shrank from allowing inaccurate statements and +false principles to be floated by a charming style. Great Britain in +this generation has had more than one scholar of note whose brilliant +form of statement, ingenious theories, and varied attainments have +sufficed to give them undue authority on subjects where they made +some grievous errors. Mr. Whitney felt that the higher a scholar's +position, the greater his authority, the more careful he should be in +all matters. He was heartily vexed by attempts to overlook and avoid +the real point at issue. His vigorous spirit may have felt a certain +enjoyment in a conflict; as an intellectual athlete he could appreciate +the beauty of a keen thrust or the weight of a heavy blow; but while he +did not fear a conflict, in some cases he avoided a controversy, even +when he had been misunderstood and misrepresented. + +No sketch of Mr. Whitney's character would be complete which did not +mention his musical tastes. Music was always a source of pleasure and +recreation to him. He had a fine tenor voice; and when a young man he +was an acceptable and admired leader of the choir of Jonathan Edwards's +old church in Northampton. The story is told that his conversations +with the Rev. Dr. George E. Day, which led to his study of Sanskrit, +were more frequent and natural because of his weekly calls at the +pastor's house for the list of hymns to be sung. He was an active +member of the Mendelssohn Society of New Haven a score of years ago, +and did much to rouse the community to take interest in oratorios and +other choral music, writing for the newspapers appreciative accounts of +the works to be performed. He was prominent in securing for New Haven +concerts by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. One of the last occasions +which brought him into a public gathering was a University Chamber +Concert by the Kneisel Quartet. He was fond of singing hymns on Sunday +evenings, and while he cherished some of the old tunes of his youth, +he welcomed the introduction of the modern more ecclesiastical music. +While singing the old hymns he was as fervent and orthodox as his +Puritan ancestors. + +Mr. Whitney was no recluse, nor a typical professor in manner. He +attracted men to him and enjoyed being with them. He was not at all +emotional, however, and cared little for general society. He gave a +rather extreme view of himself in a letter written in 1869: "I am of +a more than usually reserved and unsocial nature. I avoid society as +much as I can, and am never quite comfortable in the company of any +excepting those with whom I am most nearly bound. My besetting sin +is burying myself in my books and papers, and too much overlooking +all that is outside of them,--partly from natural tendencies, partly +because I feel that in that way I shall on the whole do most good and +give most pleasure to others." His bearing was perfectly simple and +unpretentious--in short, that of a gentleman. + +Like Aristotle's "magnanimous man," he gave little heed to praise or +blame--not being elated or cast down by either. He loved learning for +its own sake and not for its reward of fame. The words which he wrote +with regard to his friend Professor James Hadley are strikingly true +of himself: "No one was ever more free from the desire to shine among +his fellows. His was a modesty entirely unfeigned, and free from every +taint of a lower feeling.... He devoted himself so entirely to truth +and virtue and duty, as he knew them, that there was left no room for +any thought of self. He neither extolled himself nor gave way unduly +to others." "He knew his power, but possessed it in the spirit of +moderation and reserve." He was eminently guileless--though by no means +a subject for imposition by others. He would have made an admirable +lawyer or statesman, but he could not have been a politician. He saw +truth clearly and abhorred anything like trickery or disingenuousness. +He was also thoroughly sane. Sentimental enthusiasm never led him to +denote as certain views which later were to be proved false. He had +few scientific retractions to make in the course of forty-five years +of publication. His statements on uncertain points were carefully +guarded. Where doubt existed, he was apt to feel it; in fact he was +called in Germany "der Skeptiker der Sprachwissenschaft." His sanity +restrained him from various excesses. His opinions on the desirability +of reform in the spelling of the English language were clear and +clearly expressed, and he was the first chairman of the committee +appointed by the Philological Association for the furtherance of this +reform in our country, but he saw so distinctly the difficulties +in the way of an abrupt change, at least for the present, that he +wasted no time in a Quixotic crusade. He was invited by the Japanese +government to prepare an opinion in regard to the adoption of English +as the official language of Japan--but he was not carried away by any +sentimental notions of English as a _Weltsprache_. His mind was like +a diamond, and his style was eminently clear and forcible. He never +strove to be eloquent, but always expressed his thoughts in the fewest +and simplest words. His was the style of a teacher rather than that of +a popular platform-lecturer, but was enlivened by a strong sense of +humor and by keen wit. + +Professor Whitney's services to science and learning were freely +recognized, both at home and abroad. He received the degree of Ph.D., +_honoris causa_, from the University of Breslau in 1865; that of LL. +D. from Williams College in 1868, from the College of William and Mary +in 1869, from Harvard in 1876, and from the University of Edinburgh in +1889; that of J.U.D. from St. Andrews University in Scotland in 1874; +that of L.H.D. from Columbia in 1887. He was a member of the National +Academy of Sciences; an honorary member of the Oriental or Asiatic +societies of Great Britain and Ireland, of Germany, of Bengal, of +Japan, and of Peking; of the Literary Societies of Leyden, of Upsala, +and of Helsingfors; fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh; member or +correspondent of the Academies of Dublin, of Turin, of Rome (_Lincei_), +of St. Petersburg, of Berlin, and of Denmark; also, correspondent of +the Institute of France; and Foreign Knight of the Prussian order _pour +le mrite_ for Science and Arts, being elected May 31, 1881, to fill +the vacancy made by the death of Thomas Carlyle. + +In 1870 the Berlin Academy of Sciences voted him the first Bopp prize +for his publication of the Taittiriya-Pratiakhya, as the chief +contribution to Sanskrit philology during the preceding three years. + +The following extracts from a brief article in the _Berliner +Nationalzeitung_, from the pen of Professor Albrecht Weber, form an +interesting companion-piece to the letter from the same scholar, +dated in December, 1852, which was quoted in the early part of this +sketch: "Der jngst in Yalecollege verstorbene Professor William +Dwight Whitney war einer der ersten Indianisten und Sprachforscher +der Gegenwart. Seine Sanskritstudien absolvirte er bei uns in +Deutschland, hier in Berlin bei Weber und in Tbingen bei Roth. Beide +Gelehrte betrachten es als einen ihrer schnsten Ehrentitel, ihn zum +Schler gehabt zu haben. Gleich seine erste Arbeit in den _Indischen +Studien_ ... war ein Meisterwerk und zeigte alle die Eigenschaften, +die seinen Arbeiten einen so hohen Werth verleihen sollten, Klarheit, +Sorgsamkeit, und Akribie im kleinsten Detail.... Heimgekehrt nach +Amerika, ward er der Begrnder der dortigen, jetzt in reicher Blthe +stehenden Sanskrit-Philologie, die sich besonders durch die von ihm +speziell betonte _statistische_ Methode grosse Verdienste erworben +hat, u. A. durch seine Schler: Avery, Bloomfield, Hopkins, Lanman, +Jackson, Oertel, Perry, Smyth, Snyder, trefflich vertreten wird.... +Seine Uebersetzung eines der ltesten vorhandenen Lehrbcher der +indischen Astronomie zeigte ihn als trefflichen Rechner und Astronom. +Schrfe der Kritik, Klarheit der Darstellung, Genauigkeit der Arbeit +sind allen seinen Werken als Stempel aufgedrckt. Sein reifstes Werk +wohl ist seine 'Sanskrit-Grammatik,' ... die erste _historische_ +Darstellung derselben, gewissermassen ein _grndliches_ Rsum aus dem +grossen Petersburger Sanskrit-Wrterbuch von Bhtlingk und Roth. Seine +Arbeiten erstreckten sich im Uebrigen auf die verschiedensten Gebiete +der Sprachwissenschaft.... Deutschland verliert in ihm einen der +wrmsten Freunde, die es in Amerika hatte, Amerika einen seiner besten +Gelehrten, und die Wissenschaft im grossen und ganzen einen ihrer +ersten Koryphen." + +On August 28, 1856, Professor Whitney married Elizabeth Wooster +Baldwin, daughter of the Hon. Roger Sherman Baldwin, of New Haven +(ex-Governor of Connecticut and U. S. Senator), great-granddaughter +of Roger Sherman, and great-great-granddaughter of President Thomas +Clap, of Yale. Six children, three sons and three daughters, were +born to them; of whom one son (the Hon. Edward B. Whitney, Assistant +Attorney-General of the U. S.) and the three daughters survive. The +daughters assisted their father in some of his later publications in +the field of modern languages, and have done literary work of their +own. + +Just after a hard summer's work, at the very beginning of the college +year in the autumn of 1886, Professor Whitney was prostrated by a +severe disorder of the heart. For a time he was forbidden by his +physician to do more than a minimum of work. He was obliged to avoid +fatigue and excitement, and was limited strictly in his physical +exercise. Those who had seen him return invigorated and exhilarated +from a ten-miles' walk in the country were deeply pained to watch his +slow, measured gait. He surprised many by his graceful submission to +restrictions which he must have felt most keenly, and his household +was still the brightest and most cheerful in the city. The gentler +side of his nature became more prominent than before. His face grew +more and more beautiful, with his white hair and beard, and delicate +fair complexion. Though not an old man, he became truly venerable in +appearance, and his presence was a real benediction to all whom he +met. He was obliged to abandon entirely his work with undergraduate +classes, but continued his classes in Sanskrit, receiving the students +in his study at his home. During most of the past year he had six of +these exercises each week. He did not abandon his other scholarly +work. During the early years of this period of weakness, the Century +Dictionary was going through the press and received his care. Every +year witnessed his publication of some scientific paper or papers. He +aided in the plans for the World's Congress of Philology, last year. +One of his intimate associates, Professor Lounsbury, has written of +him: "To me, at least, words seem inadequate to describe the quiet +heroism which gave serenity and calm to his latter days, and the +unflinching resolution with which he met and discharged every duty of a +life over which the possibility of sudden death was always casting its +shadow." + +After an illness of about two weeks, Mr. Whitney passed away from this +life, during sleep, on the morning of Thursday, June 7, 1894. + +In the death of William Dwight Whitney, this country has lost one of +her most distinguished men, one who had been recognized throughout +the world as one of the highest authorities in his department of +learning, and who had been for forty years the leader of oriental and +linguistic studies in America and the personal master of a majority of +the American scholars in his department. Yale University has lost one +of her most brilliant and able scholars, one of her wisest and most +faithful teachers, whose influence always made for diligent and honest +research and statement. His publications have had a lasting effect on +scholarship. His personal influence will long endure. In the words of +Professor Lanman, "for power of intellect, conjoined with purity of +soul and absolute genuineness of character, we shall not soon look upon +his like again." + + THOMAS DAY SEYMOUR. + +[1] The writer desires to acknowledge his special obligations to +Professor Salisbury for allowing him access to original documents, and +to Dr. Hanns Oertel for calling his attention to publications which +would otherwise have escaped his notice. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's William Dwight Whitney, by Thomas Day Seymour + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY *** + +***** This file should be named 44259-8.txt or 44259-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/4/4/2/5/44259/ + +Produced by Mark C. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: William Dwight Whitney + +Author: Thomas Day Seymour + +Release Date: November 23, 2013 [EBook #44259] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY *** + + + + +Produced by Mark C. Orton, Marc-Andre Seekamp and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1><span class="smcap">William Dwight Whitney</span></h1> +<p class="right">(<span class="smcap">T. D. Seymour</span>)</p> + +<hr class="chap" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p> +<h2>WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></h2> + +<p>Northampton, Massachusetts, half a century ago, was one of +the best examples of a typical New England town—among +stately hills, on the banks of the Connecticut River, with broad +streets well shaded by great spreading elms, with large homesteads +still occupied by the descendants of early settlers, with +people of much culture and refinement who were given to "plain +living and high thinking." It was the town of Edwards, of +Dwight, of Hawley, of Stoddard, of Strong, and of many another +worthy. It was the seat of the once famous Round Hill Academy. +There, on February 9, 1827, William Dwight Whitney was born,—the +second surviving son and fourth child of Josiah Dwight +Whitney and Sarah Williston Whitney. His mother was a +daughter of the Rev. Payson Williston (Yale, 1783), of Easthampton, +and sister of the Hon. Samuel Williston, who founded +Williston Seminary. His father was born in Westfield, Mass.,—the +oldest son of Abel Whitney, who was graduated at Harvard +in 1783.</p> + +<p>No company of brothers and sisters of any American family +has been so remarkable for scholarly attainments and achievements +as that family in Northampton: Josiah D. Whitney, Jr. +(Yale, 1839), Professor of Geology at Harvard; William D. +Whitney, of Yale; James L. Whitney (Yale, 1856), of the Boston<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span> +Public Library; Henry M. Whitney (Yale, 1864), Professor of +English Literature at Beloit College; Miss Maria Whitney, the +first incumbent of the chair of Modern Languages in Smith +College.</p> + +<p>William D. Whitney was fitted for college in his native town, +and entered the Sophomore class of Williams College in 1842, +at the age of fifteen. Tradition says that the studies of the +college course were easy to him, and that he spent most of his +time in wandering over the fields, studying geology and the +habits of birds and of plants, although he maintained the first +rank for scholarship in his class. On his graduation he pronounced +the valedictory oration, on 'Literary Biography.'</p> + +<p>After graduation—at eighteen, the age when most now enter +college—Mr. Whitney remained for three years in uncertainty +with regard to his life-work, meanwhile busy as teller in his +father's bank. He did not take an active part in the social life of +the young people of Northampton, but employed himself in his +own pursuits. His leisure time was given largely to the collection +of birds and plants; a large and beautiful case of birds +stuffed by him at this period is in the Peabody Museum at New +Haven. His tastes for natural science were marked, and he was +more than an amateur in that field. He spent the summer of +1849 in the United States Survey of the Lake Superior region, +conducted by his eminent brother, Josiah D. Whitney—having +"under his charge the botany, the ornithology, and the accounts." +In the summer of 1873, also, he was invited to take part in the +Hayden exploring expedition in Colorado. The Report of the +Survey says that he "rendered most valuable assistance ... in +geographical work." His account of this expedition of 1873 was +published in the New York <cite>Tribune</cite>, and afterwards was translated +into French for a popular publication of that country, as +giving a clear view of the work of such scientific parties. He +had a brief article in the <cite>American Journal of Science</cite> for the +same year on the U. S. Geological Survey of the Territories. +He gave several months of his time just before leaving home for +his last visit to Europe, to helping Professor J. D. Whitney put +through the press the latter's work on 'The Metallic Wealth of +the United States.'</p> + +<p>His scientific experience stood him in good stead in more than +one instance of philological research and discussion. He was not +tempted to infer from linguistic data the order of succession of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span> +trees in forests, nor astronomical facts. He was a member for +several years of the American Association for the Advancement +of Science. One of his most important publications was the +annotated translation of a Hindu treatise on astronomy—the +Sūrya-Siddhānta, 1860—and one of the longest essays in his +'Oriental and Linguistic Studies' treats of the same subject.</p> + +<p>In 1848, largely under the influence and with the encouragement +of his father's pastor, the Rev. George E. Day (for a quarter of a +century after 1866 Professor of Hebrew at Yale, and at present +Dean of the Yale Divinity School), Mr. Whitney directed his +attention to the study of Sanskrit, for which he found books in +the library of his elder brother, who had recently returned from +Europe. A really good mind can find pleasure and success in +any one of several different fields of research. Not often, however, +do we find such marked examples of men of real talent +manifesting distinct tastes and power in widely different departments +of learning as in the case of these two brothers. Mr. J. D. +Whitney went to Germany primarily in order to prepare himself +for mineralogical and geological work, but became interested in +the study of languages and attended (with but two fellow-listeners) +a course of lectures on Sanskrit at Berlin. He himself says that +he might have taken up philology in earnest, abandoning natural +science altogether, if immediately after his return to his home he +had not received an appointment to engage in a geological survey +of a new and interesting region under United States authority. +His philological studies have borne fruit in his 'Names and +Places—Studies in Geographical and Topographical Nomenclature,' +published in 1888, and in the more than four thousand +definitions he furnished to the Century Dictionary. Mr. W. D. +Whitney certainly had great ability in the study of natural +science. Doubtless the accident of his finding various linguistic +books ready to hand, at the time when his mental powers were +most actively developing, had much to do with his turning in the +direction of philology. During the summer which he spent with +his brother on Lake Superior he had a Sanskrit grammar with +him, which he studied at odd moments when not engaged in +collecting plants or computing barometrical observations. Yale +College has had another marked example of a scholar with equal +ability and tastes for widely diverse studies, in Professor James +Hadley, whose first published work was in the department of +mathematics, and of whom a high authority said that the best<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span> +mathematician in the country was spoiled when Mr. Hadley +devoted himself to Greek!</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney's practical banker father was not fully satisfied +with his plan of giving himself to Oriental studies, and asked his +pastor whether a man could support himself in life by studying +and teaching Sanskrit. Dr. Day made the very wise answer that +if a man had any exact and thorough knowledge, he was likely +to be able to use it. As a Massachusetts man, the father turned +naturally to Harvard as the proper place for his son's pursuit of +advanced studies, but his pastor called his attention to the newly +established department of Philosophy and the Arts at New Haven +as the only definite arrangement yet made in this country for +university work, and especially to the unique equipment of the +special department of Oriental languages.</p> + +<p>Before going to New Haven to study, Mr. Whitney prepared +and published in the <cite>Bibliotheca Sacra</cite> an article (translated and +abridged from von Bohlen) on the 'Grammatical Structure of the +Sanskrit'; and in the same periodical, in the following year, he +published a 'Comparison of the Greek and Latin Verbs.'</p> + +<p>In the autumn of 1849, too late for his name to appear in the +catalogue of that year, Mr. Whitney came to Yale and studied +through the remainder of the college year under Professor Salisbury. +His associate in study was Professor James Hadley (six +years older than himself, but only three years older in college +age), who had been appointed assistant professor of Greek in +1848. The relations of the two continued most intimate and +mutually stimulating until the death of Professor Hadley in 1872. +Mr. Whitney edited a volume of Professor Hadley's Essays, in +1873, and wrote a brief but highly appreciative sketch of his +friend for the large work entitled 'Yale College,' published in 1879.</p> + +<p>Professor Salisbury was graduated at Yale in 1832. During +more than three years' residence abroad, 1836-39, he studied +with De Sacy and Garcin de Tassy in Paris and with Bopp in +Berlin. In 1841 he was invited to a professorship of the Arabic +and Sanskrit languages in Yale College, without the expectation +of pecuniary compensation. This was only nine years after the +foundation of the Sanskrit professorship (of H. H. Wilson) at +Oxford, and twelve years after Lassen was made Professor +Extraordinarius at Bonn. He returned to Europe in 1842 for a +year, and read <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">privatissime</i> Arabic with Freytag and Sanskrit +with Lassen, at Bonn. In 1846 he was made the Corresponding<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span> +Secretary of the American Oriental Society, and (to use Mr. +Whitney's words) "for some ten years Professor Salisbury was +virtually the Society, doing its work and paying its bills. He +gave it standing and credit in the world of scholars, as an organization +that could originate and make public valuable material; +after such a start, it was sure of respectful attention to whatever it +might do." The Society had published nothing before he took +charge of this office. Professor Salisbury also secured valuable +Arabic and Sanskrit manuscripts and books from De Sacy's +library and elsewhere in Europe; and Professor FitzEdward +Hall, then at Benares, procured for him many expensive and +important Sanskrit publications from India. His services and +generosity in procuring fonts of Oriental type, and his wisdom +in bringing the Oriental Society into close connection with the +studies of foreign missionaries, should not be forgotten. He was +the only trained Orientalist in this country, until Mr. Whitney's +return in 1853, and had an admirably equipped library. In the +Yale catalogue of 1841-42, Professor Salisbury's name appears +for the first time in the list of the faculty as Professor of the +Arabic and Sanskrit Languages and Literature. In the catalogue +of 1843-44, announcement is made that "the Professor of Arabic +and Sanskrit will give instruction on Tuesdays and Wednesdays +in Arabic grammar with the interpretation of the Korân and the +Mo'allakas, and on Fridays and Saturdays in Sanskrit grammar +with the interpretation of the laws of Manu." In the following +year we are told that "the Professor of Arabic and Sanskrit +proposes to commence this year, in the ensuing summer, a free +course of lectures on the Sacred Code of the Hindus, the Manava +Dharma Sastra." In 1845 for the first time appears a modestly-placed +paragraph, saying "Instruction is also given by the Professors +to Resident Graduates, provided a sufficient number +present themselves to form a class." This was followed by the +offer of a "course of lectures on the literary history and doctrines +of the Kurân," or instruction in the elements of Sanskrit. In +1847 appeared the formal announcement of the opening of the +Department of Philosophy and the Arts, with definite arrangements +for advanced work. The philological courses were by +President Woolsey (Thucydides or Pindar), Professor Kingsley +("in such Latin author as may be agreed upon"), Professor +Gibbs ("lectures on some points of general Philology"), and +Professor Salisbury (Arabic Grammar, and "some of the relations +of the Arabic to other of the Shemitish dialects").</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span></p> + +<p>Marvellous stories are told in student-tradition of the rapid +progress made by Mr. Whitney and Mr. Hadley—that they +learned all the paradigms of Bopp's grammar in two lessons, etc. +The basis of the stories is partly the fact that both already read +simple Sanskrit with ease, but it is certain that few teachers ever +had such a class. They were Professor Salisbury's first and last +pupils in Sanskrit, but he might well feel proud of the record. +He himself says of them that "their quickness of perception and +unerring exactness of acquisition soon made it evident that the +teacher and the taught must change places."</p> + +<p>In 1850 Mr. Whitney went to Germany and spent three winter +semesters in studying with Weber, Bopp, and Lepsius in Berlin, +and two summer semesters at work with Roth in Tübingen. At +the suggestion of Roth he undertook with this master the publication +of the Atharva-Veda, and copied and collated the Berlin +MSS of this work. In 1852 he sent to the American Oriental +Society a paper, read at their October meeting of that year, on +'The main results of the later Vedic researches in Germany.' A +letter from Weber, dated at Berlin, Dec. 28, 1852, is interesting +in this connection on several accounts. He writes: "I hope ere +long Sanskrit studies will flourish in America more than in +England, where with the only exception of the venerable and +not-to-be-praised-enough Professor Wilson nobody seems to care +for them so much as to devote his life to them. The East India +Company certainly does all that is in its power to help the publication +of the Vedic texts, but it does not find English hands to +achieve it.... It is certainly very discouraging to see that Professor +Wilson during all the time since he got his professorship +in Oxford, has not succeeded in bringing up even one Sanskrit +scholar who might claim to be regarded as one who has done at +least some little service to our Sanskrit philology.... I have to +congratulate you most heartily on your countryman Mr. Whitney, +who is now intensely engaged in the preparations for an edition +of the Atharva Samhitā in union with Professor Roth of Tübingen. +The next number of the <cite>Indische Studien</cite>, too, which is +now in press, contains from him tables showing the natural +relation of the four now known Samhitās of the Veda,—an +attempt in which he was greatly indebted to Professor Roth's +communications, but which still remains also a very favorable +specimen of his own assiduity and correctness."</p> + +<p>The following letters need little explanation. We note with +interest how soon the first followed the receipt of Weber's letter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span> +which has just been quoted. The spirit which prompted the offer +of the first letter is certainly unusual in its generosity—not only +surrendering a professorial chair, but also providing for its endowment. +The modesty and delicacy of the reply seem as extraordinary +at the present day, and were perhaps as rare forty years +ago.</p> + +<p>Under date of February 19, 1853, Professor Salisbury wrote to +Mr. Whitney: "... I have observed your course of study and +the rapidity of your acquisitions since you have been abroad with +much interest and have seen in this, together with what I have +known otherwise of your tastes and talents, a way opening for +relief to myself which I have long desired. The prospect has +been the more pleasing to me inasmuch as I have also seen that +I might be able through you to bring new honor to my 'alma +mater.'... It is also much at heart with me to secure ... assistance +to myself in editing and endeavouring in every way to +improve the Journal of the Oriental Society." Professor Salisbury +proposed that Mr. Whitney should be made "Professor of +the Sanskrit and its relations to the kindred languages, and of +Sanskrit literature, in the Department of Philosophy and the Arts +in Yale College," his term of service to begin Aug. 8, 1853;—it +being understood that Mr. Whitney would include in his instructions +the teaching of modern languages to undergraduates, and +should receive the fees which were then paid for such teaching. +It was understood, further, that Mr. Whitney would co-operate +with Professor Salisbury in editing the Journal of the Oriental +Society. Professor Salisbury undertook to create a fund which +with the fees for modern-language instruction might furnish +nearly the ordinary salary of a Yale professor at that time.</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney replied from Paris, on April 4, 1853. Professor +Salisbury's letter had reached him at Berlin at a time when he +was engaged in closing his work there, and "had hardly an hour +for quiet thought upon any subject." He expressed his gratitude +for the kind feeling toward him "which has had a share in the +dictating of the proposal," and continued: "Nor can I well say +how much I am struck by the true and self-forgetting zeal for the +progress of Oriental studies, of which this, like all your previous +movements, affords an evidence. But ... I am compelled to ask +myself whether ... I can hope to render any such service to +Science as would be an adequate return for the kindness you +exhibit toward me; whether, finally, it would not be in me an act<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span> +of unpardonable presumption to take upon my shoulders an office +which you are desirous of throwing off.... I need not say how +high and honorable a post I regard that of a teacher at Yale to +be, how many and extreme attractions, both in a personal and in +a scientific point of view, the prospect of such a situation would +have for me.... So far as my own interests are concerned, I +could find nothing in the terms which you propose or the duties +which you suggest to which to raise a moment's objection.... +All that I could bring up against the arrangement would be that +the advantage is too entirely upon my side." He desired further +time for reflection and consultation with his friends, and thought +the postponement of a decision less objectionable because he did +not expect to be able to finish his work in Europe and return +before the last of August, and then, after a three years' absence +from home, desired to spend some time with his friends. His +eyes, too, had been giving him "during the winter ground for +some apprehension," and "would doubtless be best consulted for +by a period of rest and inaction."</p> + +<p>In Paris he was "at work on a MS of the Atharva which +belongs to the Imperial Library." "Probably it will cost me +about six weeks' labor.... Then will follow two or three months +of similar labor in London and Oxford.... During the whole +winter I was compelled to neglect all other studies; that, however, +chiefly owing to the condition of my eyes, which robbed +me of about half my time. Persian and Arabic had to be laid +aside altogether, and what of time and strength I had to spare +from the Sanskrit, I devoted to the Egyptian and Coptic. I +cannot well express to you the interest which this latter branch +of study has awakened in me, and the strong desire I have felt +to penetrate further into it than the mere surface exploration +which could be made in the odd moments of a single winter. I +would not, however, sell for a very large sum the little insight +into this wonderful subject which I have already obtained, and +it will be my highest pleasure to attempt to draw it somewhat +more into the circle of our Oriental inquiries than has been +generally the case hitherto.... There is nothing new of particular +interest, so far as I know, to communicate to you from +the Sanskrit world on this side of the water. The main interest +attaches to the Lexicon which is going to be really a great work, +and to push forward the whole study of that language a long way +with one thrust. A slow thrust, unfortunately, it will have to be;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span> +Prof. Roth estimates ten years as needed for its perfection. [It +was completed in 1875.] I am going to contribute my small +mite also toward it, by furnishing to Prof. Roth the vocabulary +complete of the Atharva. The latter, as you perhaps know, has +now the sole redaction of the Vedic material, Aufrecht having left +Germany. The next number of Weber's Zeitschrift will be out +now very soon, and will contain a contribution from me, a Vedic +concordance."</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney reached home earlier than he had expected—about +Aug. 8, 1853—and on Aug. 15 he wrote: "Although not +less distrustful than before of my ability to discharge to your +satisfaction and my own the duties of the post to which you +would assign me, I should be disposed to accept gratefully your +proposals, and do my best at least to accomplish that which such +an acceptance demands of me." But Mr. Whitney desired a +modification of the plan. "I have no such knowledge of French +as would in any manner justify me in making pretensions to +ability to teach it." His estimate of his knowledge of modern +languages was lower than that of his friends. Not until 1856 did +he accept the title of "Instructor in German." A year later, +after he had taken nine months of travel and study in southern +Europe, the college catalogue calls him "Professor of Sanskrit, +and Instructor in modern languages."</p> + +<p>The importance to American scholarship of the offer of this +chair to Professor Whitney may be better appreciated if we +remember that his predecessor still lives, and that no other chair +of Sanskrit was established in this country for about a quarter of +a century.</p> + +<p>At a special meeting of the Corporation of Yale College, on +May 10, 1854, the "Professorship of the Sanskrit and its relations +to kindred languages, and Sanskrit Literature" was established, +and Mr. Whitney was elected to hold it. The founder's desire +for the range of the department was indicated distinctly, but the +shorter name of the professorship, "Professor of Sanskrit," was +used in the college catalogues until 1869, when the words "and +Comparative Philology" were added, without indicating any +change in the direction of the incumbent's studies or in the plan +of the university.</p> + +<p>In 1854 the announcement of philological courses in the Department +of Philosophy and the Arts covered Professor Gibbs's +lectures on general Philology, Professor Thacher's course of two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span> +hours a week in Lucretius and in Latin Composition, Professor +Hadley's course of two hours a week in Pindar or Theocritus, +and contained the following statement: "Professor Whitney will +give instruction in Sanskrit from Bopp's Grammar and Nalus, or +such other text-books as may be agreed upon, and in the rudiments +of the Ancient and Modern Persian, and of the Egyptian +languages." The last clause here reminds the reader of the +enthusiasm for the Egyptian and Coptic expressed in the letter +of April 4, 1853; and of the fact that Mr. Whitney's first 'bibliographical +notice' in the Journal of the Oriental Society discussed +Lepsius's work on the 'First order of Egyptian deities,' but we +read little more of these studies, except a paper on Lepsius's +Nubian Grammar in the second volume of this <cite class="smcap">Journal</cite>. In +1858 Professor Whitney's announcement read: "Professor Whitney +will instruct in the Sanskrit language, and in the History, +Antiquities, and Literature of India and other Oriental countries; +also in the comparative philology of the Indo-European languages, +and the general principles of linguistic study. He will +also give instruction to such as may desire it in the modern +European languages."</p> + +<p>The appointment of Professor Whitney in 1854 was for five +years, with a pledge of reappointment "for life," five years later, +if he desired it. In 1859 this reappointment was made—the +founder of the chair stipulating that Professor Whitney should +be free to retire from the professorship at any time. Mr. +Whitney wrote, on July 15, 1859: "My present situation in New +Haven is so pleasant to me on so many accounts, and holds out +such prospects of honorable and useful employment in the time +to come, that I should exceedingly regret being compelled to go +elsewhere. Nor, although it would be in many respects more +agreeable to me to be able to devote my <em>whole</em> time to my own +peculiar studies, do I see reason seriously to regret the division +of my labors between the ancient and the modern languages. It +is both useful and pleasant to have to do more directly with the +young men in college, and there is also the chance of influencing +one and another of them to devote his attention to higher +philological study."</p> + +<p>During and after the Civil War, the ordinary expenses of life +increased, and Mr. Whitney's family was growing. The income +which had sufficed for the young and unmarried professor in +1854 had become entirely insufficient for his needs, with six<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> +children, in 1870. For his pecuniary relief he assumed additional +duties of instruction in modern languages, in connection with the +Sheffield Scientific School. His teaching of modern languages in +the academic department had ceased with the entrance upon his +duties of Professor Coe, in 1867. The burden of instructing +large classes of undergraduates in the very rudiments of French +and German (each Academic student then having only thirty or +forty lessons in each subject) became more and more irksome.</p> + +<p>In September, 1869, Mr. Whitney received an urgent call to +Harvard, very soon after President Eliot's election to the headship +of that university, with the assurance that he should have "salary +enough to constitute a tolerable support," and should not have +to teach in any other than his own proper department. He +wrote to a friend: "It is the most tempting offer that could, so +far as I know, be made me; for on the one hand I have greatly +grudged the time which I have had to steal from Oriental and +linguistic studies for German and French; and, on the other +hand, what I have received for my services to the College has not +for a good while paid more than about half my expenses.... +Such a state of things has been, of course, worrying enough, nor +have I seen any definite prospect of a change. But I am greatly +attached to the College here, and to the Scientific School, and to +relatives and friends in New Haven, and have no hope that ... I +should become so wonted and so comfortable anywhere else."</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney's colleagues saw how fatal his departure +would be to the advanced philological work at Yale. No definite +provision had then been made for graduate instruction in Greek, +Latin, and Modern Languages, and although Professors Hadley, +Thacher, Packard, and Coe were laboring to build up this department, +their efforts received only the slightest pecuniary compensation; +they were expected to do full work in the undergraduate +department; Mr. Whitney was the only "University professor," not +only at Yale, but in the whole country. One who is everywhere +recognized as a leader in education then wrote: "I am confident +that there is no one whose intellectual influence over the younger +officers of the college is so great as Mr. Whitney's.... I have +greatly admired his influence in promoting fidelity, truth, justice, +and industry among the students, as well as his skill in promoting +their intellectual character." Another of his colleagues wrote: +"I have never known the college men so moved. The danger +of losing so eminent a man as Mr. Whitney seemed almost<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span> +appalling, and I think if no other means of retaining him could +be devised, the professors themselves would each cut off a slice +from his meagre salary to make up the amount necessary to +retain him. The question seems to rise above personal considerations +and to come very near to the vital interests of the university."</p> + +<p>Professor Salisbury, whose insight and generosity had brought +Mr. Whitney to Yale, was nearly concerned by the call to Cambridge, +and after less than a week's delay provided the sum +needed for the full foundation of Mr. Whitney's chair on the +modern scale of salaries, which had changed greatly since 1854, +and Mr. Whitney decided to remain in New Haven. At this +time the arrangement was made that Mr. Whitney should give +regular instruction in linguistics to the undergraduate classes of +the college, and this course, at first given in the form of lectures, +as part of the required work, was amplified and continued as an +'elective' until 1886. Mr. Whitney still continued to teach in the +Scientific School for an hour a day, saying that in no other way +could he add so easily a convenient thousand dollars a year to his +income as by teaching from eight to nine o'clock each morning; +he required no preparation for the exercise, it did not interfere +with the work of his day, and he liked to be brought into contact +with the young men.</p> + +<p>The invitation to Harvard and the decision to remain at Yale +had attracted considerable attention and had given rise to many +plans for advanced philological instruction at New Haven. Mr. +Whitney's release from drudgery with undergraduates enabled +him also to enrich his Sanskrit and linguistic courses. In the +catalogue of 1870-71 we read: "In Philology, a somewhat regular +course of higher study, extending through two years, and leading +to the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, is offered. The leading +studies of the first year will be The general principles of linguistic +science, under Professor Whitney; the Sanskrit language, under +Professor Whitney; the older Germanic languages, especially +Gothic and Anglo-Saxon, under Professor Hadley and Mr. +Lounsbury; along with higher instruction in the classical and +the modern languages, according to the special requirements of +each student, under Professors Thacher, Packard, and Coe, and +Messrs. Van Name and Lounsbury, and others. The leading +studies of the second year will be The comparative philology of +the Indo-European languages ... under Professor Whitney; the +history of the English language, under Professor Hadley; along<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span> +with other special branches, as during the first year." The reward +for the new enterprise of a formal graduate school of philology +came almost immediately in the form of an unusual class of +students, nearly all of whom were destined to secure honorable +distinction in their chosen work. In the list of those who received +the degree of Ph.D. in 1873 appear the names of Lanman of +Harvard, Learned of the Japanese Doshisha, Luquiens of Yale, +Manatt of Brown, Otis of the Institute of Technology, and Perrin +of Yale. Truly an unusual group! Only the year before, Professor +Easton of the University of Pennsylvania and Professor +Beckwith of Trinity College, and the year following Professor +Edgren of the University of Gothenburg, received the same +degree, while soon after them President Harper of Chicago, Professor +H. P. Wright of Yale, Professor Sherman of Nebraska, +Professor Peters of the University of Pennsylvania, and Professor +Tarbell of the University of Chicago completed the graduate +course under Mr. Whitney. The service which the Semitic +scholar, Professor George E. Day, had done for Indo-European +philology by turning Professor Whitney's mind to its attractions, +was in a way repaid by the latter when he pointed out to William +Rainey Harper the great opportunity open to workers in the +Semitic field; as a graduate student at Yale, Dr. Harper gave +himself to work in the field of the Indo-European languages, but +his recollection of his master's words has had a wide influence on +Semitic studies in America. Professor Whitney was justly proud +of his pupils, and was always interested in their work. His +classes in Sanskrit were not large absolutely, but frequently he +could say that more were studying this language with him than +with any other university professor in the world.</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney's connection with the Sheffield Scientific +School was close. He organized its department of modern languages, +and was a member of its 'Governing Board' from the +time of the organization of that body in 1872. One who has +occasion to know better than all others says that he was "a tower +of strength" to the School—not only by his instructions and by +inspiring the students with the spirit of true scholarship, but by +his intelligent appreciation of the aims of the School and his wise +judgment as to the means to be used in order to attain them. +His personal liking for natural science, and training in its methods, +added the warmest sympathy to his work in connection with this +department of the University.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the very first communication made to Mr. Whitney with +regard to his work at Yale, attention was called to the opportunity +for usefulness in connection with the American Oriental +Society, of which he was elected a member in 1850. In 1854 his +name appears in the list of the publication committee of that +Society. In 1855 he was made librarian, and held that office +until 1873. This latter post was no sinecure. In the winter of +1853-54, on going to visit the library (then kept in Boston), he +"found it a pile of books on the floor in the corner of an upstairs +room in the Athenaeum, apparently just as it had been brought +in and dumped down from an earlier place of keeping." In the +summer of 1855 the books were removed to New Haven. The +task of "arranging, labelling, entering in the book of donations, +and preparing cards" involved "a very considerable and tedious +amount of work." In 1857, on Professor Salisbury's going abroad +and resigning the office, Professor Whitney was elected Corresponding +Secretary, and continued in this position until 1884, +when he was elected President of the Society. His resignation +of this latter office was not accepted until 1890, when for nearly +four years the condition of his health had obliged him to absent +himself from its meetings. He could well say that "no small +part of his work had been done in the service of the Society"; +from 1857 to 1885, "just a half of the contents of its Journal is +from his pen." His care of the publications of others, also, was +specially difficult, in view of the peculiar danger of typographical +errors and the wide field covered by the papers; no ordinary +proof-reader could render much assistance. And not infrequently +articles by those who were unaccustomed to scientific composition +needed thorough revision. On his positively declining to be a +candidate for re-election as President, the Society adopted the +following minute: "The American Oriental Society—regretfully +accepting his declination—desires to record its deep sense of +indebtedness to its retiring President, Professor William Dwight +Whitney, of New Haven. For twenty-seven years he has served +as Corresponding Secretary of the Society; for eighteen, as its +Librarian; and for six, as its President. We gratefully acknowledge +the obligation under which he has laid us by his diligent +attendance at the meetings, by his unstinted giving of time and +of labor in editing the publications and maintaining their high +scientific character, by the quality and amount of his own contributions +to the <cite>Journal</cite>—more than half of volumes VI-XII<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span> +coming from his pen—and above all by the inspiration of his +example."</p> + +<p>The American Philological Association might have been a +natural off-shoot from the Oriental Society. The latter has had +a 'classical-section' since 1849, of which Professor Hadley was +long at the head, of which Professor Goodwin has been the leader +for nearly a quarter of a century; and classical papers had been +presented by Professor Hadley, as that 'On the theory of Greek +accent,' and by Professor Lane, as that 'On the date of the +Amphitruo of Plautus.' Many of the early members of the +Philological Association were also members of the Oriental +Society. Mr. Whitney presided over the Philological Association +at its first meeting in Poughkeepsie in 1869, and at the +Rochester meeting in 1870, as retiring President, he delivered an +address in which he sketched with great wisdom the Association's +action and work. "The association is to be just what its members +shall make it, and will not bear much managing or mastering. It +must discuss the subjects which are interesting American philologists, +and with such wisdom and knowledge as these have at +command.... In every such free and democratic body things +are brought forward into public which might better have been +kept back.... The classics, of course, will occupy the leading +place; that department will be most strongly represented, and +will least need fostering, while it will call for most careful criticism. +The philology of the American aboriginal languages, on the other +hand, demands, as it has already begun to receive, the most +hearty encouragement.... Educational subjects also are closely +bound up with philology, and will necessarily receive great attention; +yet there should be a limit here; our special task is to +advance the interests of philology only, confident that education +will reap its share of the benefit." Mr. Whitney's services to the +Association, and faithful attendance upon its meetings, may be +estimated from the fact that the first sixteen volumes of the +Transactions contain fourteen papers by him printed in full, while +occasionally he presented communications which he did not care +to print. At its meeting in Williamstown in July last, the Association +adopted the following minute: "The American Philological +Association, at its first meeting after the death of Professor +William D. Whitney, bears grateful testimony to the value of the +services which he rendered for the furtherance of philological +learning, and especially in connection with this Association.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span> +Fitly chosen to be its first President, and retained for a quarter +of a century upon its Executive Committee, he never failed to +take an active part in its work, and in many ways he advanced +its interests and encouraged and assisted the studies to which its +members are devoted. The record of his life-work may be left +for more full recital at another time; but the Association takes +this opportunity of testifying to its sense of obligation to Professor +Whitney's manifold and successful labors, and of the great loss +which his death has brought to its members and to philological +students throughout the world."</p> + +<p>Both the classical and the oriental philologists of the country +have noted Mr. Whitney's constancy in attendance on their +gatherings. In November, 1875, he apologized to the Oriental +Society for his absence from the May meeting (caused by his +visit to Europe in the interest of the edition of the Atharva-Veda), +and added that it was his second absence in twenty-one +years from a meeting of the Society! His devoted fidelity to the +little Classical and Philological Society at Yale was just as marked. +A quarter of a century ago, he with Professor Hadley and Professor +Packard made that small gathering a deep source of inspiration. +Many, if not most, of his learned papers were presented +for discussion there. After the death of the lamented Professor +Hadley, which gave a sudden check to the development of Yale's +advanced courses in philology, Mr. Whitney was the mainstay of +the Society, and his regular attendance and patient attention +roused to best effort each who took part. Perhaps I ought to +confess also that some of the younger instructors and graduate +students shrank from presenting papers which might be compared +with the finished scholar's elaborate productions. At these meetings +his patience must have been sorely tried; much that was +presented can have had but little interest for him; but his courtesy +was unfailing. He gave without stint of his precious time to any +undertaking which he believed to be doing, on the whole, useful +philological work.</p> + +<p>The first great work of Mr. Whitney's scholarship was the +publication of the Atharva-Veda-Sanhitā, undertaken in 1852 +with Professor Roth. The first volume of 458 pages, royal +octavo, was published in 1855-56. In connection with this, he +prepared and published in Weber's <cite>Indische Studien</cite> (vol. IV, +pp. 9-64) in 1857 an 'Alphabetisches Verzeichniss der Versanfänge +der Atharva-Samhitā'; in the <cite>Journal</cite> of the American<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span> +Oriental Society in 1862 (vol. VII, pp. 333-616) the 'Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya,' +with text, translation and notes; in the same +<cite>Journal</cite> in 1881 (vol. XII, pp. 1-383) an 'Index Verborum' to +the published text of the Atharva-Veda. He made to the A.O.S. +in April, 1892, an 'Announcement' as to a second volume of the +Roth-Whitney edition of the Atharva-Veda. "The bulk of the +work" of preparing notes, indexes, etc., "was to have fallen to +Professor Roth, not only because the bulk of the work on the +first volume had fallen to me [i. e. Professor Whitney], but also +because his superior learning and ability pointed him out as the +one to undertake it." But Roth's "absorption in the great labor +of the Petersburg lexicon for a long series of years had kept his +hands from the Atharva-Veda." Mr. Whitney said that he had +never lost from view the completion of the plan of publication as +originally formed. "In 1875 I spent the summer in Germany +chiefly engaged in further collating at Munich and at Tübingen +the additional manuscript material which had come to Europe +since our text was printed; and I should probably have soon +taken up the work seriously, save for having been engaged while +in Germany to prepare a Sanskrit grammar, which fully occupied +the leisure of several following years. At last in 1885-86, I had +fairly started upon the execution of the plan when failure of +health reduced my working capacity to a minimum, and rendered +ultimate success very questionable. The task, however, has never +been laid wholly aside, and it is now so far advanced that barring +further loss of power, I may hope to finish it in a couple of years +or so. The plan includes critical readings upon the text"; the +readings of the Pāippalāda version; the data of the Anukramaṇī +respecting authorship, divinity, and meter of each verse; references +to the ancillary literature; extracts from the printed commentary; +and, finally, a simple literal translation. "An introduction +and indexes will give such further material as appears to be +called for." Of this work the last revision is only partially made; +a few months' more labor would have completed it; Professor +Lanman, of Harvard, has undertaken to finish the revision and +to conduct the volume through the press. Thus Professor +Whitney's work closes as it began—with the Atharva-Veda.</p> + +<p>Perhaps Mr. Whitney's most important service to Sanskrit +philology was the preparation of his 'Sanskrit Grammar, including +both the classical language, and the older dialects, of Veda +and Brahmana,' 486 pp., octavo. This was published in Leipzig<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span> +in 1879, in the same year with a German translation. He undertook +this work in 1875, and in 1878 went to Germany with his +family and spent fifteen months in writing out the grammar and +preparing it for the press. He aimed "to make a presentation of +the facts of the language primarily as they show themselves in +use in the literature, and only secondarily as they are laid down +by the native grammarians"; "to include also in the presentation +the forms and constructions of the older language, as exhibited in +the Veda and Brāhmaṇa"; "to treat the language throughout as +an accented one"; "to cast all statements, classifications, and so +on, into a form consistent with the teachings of linguistic science." +"While the treatment of the facts of the language has thus been +made a historical one, within the limits of the language itself, I +have not ventured to make it comparative, by bringing in the +analogous forms and processes of other related languages. To +do this, in addition to all that was attempted beside, would have +extended the work both in content and in time of preparation, far +beyond the limits assigned to it." A second edition, revised and +extended, was published ten years later, in 1889. A 'Supplement +to his Sanskrit Grammar: The Roots, Verb-forms, and Primary +Derivatives of the Sanskrit Language,' 250 pp., was published in +Leipzig in 1885. That he did not discredit and slight the old +Hindu grammarians because of any lack of acquaintance with +them is shown by his own work and publications in that field. +He published not only the Atharva-Veda-Prātiçākhya (text, +translation and notes, in 1862), but also a similar edition of the +Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, with its commentary, the Tribhāshyaratna, +in 1871. The true relations of Hindu Grammar to the study of +Sanskrit, he made clear in two articles published in the <cite class="smcap">American +Journal of Philology</cite>, in vols. V and XIV. His last word on +the subject was this: "I would by no means say anything to +discourage the study of Pāṇini; it is highly important and +extremely interesting and might well absorb more of the labor +of the present generation of scholars than is given to it. But I +would have it followed in a different spirit and a different method. +It should be completely abandoned as the means by which we +are to learn Sanskrit. For what the literature contains, the literature +itself suffices; we can understand it and present it vastly +better than Pāṇini could. It is the residuum of peculiar material +involved in his grammar that we shall value, and the attempt +must be made to separate that from the rest of the mass." More<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span> +than twenty-five years ago he called attention to the fact that the +very title of Professor Goldstücker's paper 'On the Veda of the +Hindus and the Veda of the "German School"' involved an +evident <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">petitio principii</i>. The fair theme would have been 'The +Veda of the Hindu Schools, and the Veda of the European +School: which is the true Veda?'</p> + +<p>The following extracts from a review by Hillebrandt in the fifth +volume of <cite>Bezzenberger's Beiträge</cite> illustrate the reception generally +accorded to the Sanskrit Grammar:—<span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"Es handelte sich +für ihn nicht um ein tieferes studium der einheimischen indischen +grammatik, auf deren reiche beobachtungen unsere bisherigen +sanskritgrammatiken fast ausschliesslich sich stützen, sondern +um die erforschung des sprachzustandes, wie ihn die litteratur +selbst aufweist.... Whitney's eigentliche aufgabe war es, in die +sanskritgrammatik die grundsätze der linguistik durchgreifender, +als bisher geschehen war, einzuführen und die sprache als eine +historisch gewordene zu betrachten. Dies princip hatte eine +beständige rücksichtsnahme auf den vedadialekt zur voraussetzung +und verlieh Whitney's buche vorzüge, welche allein genügen +würden, ihm eine hervorragende stellung unter den vorhandenen +lehrbüchern anzuweisen. Die reiche fülle neuen materials, +welches er ... aus allen teilen der vedischen litteratur herbeizog +und in instructiver weise dazu verwandte, über das allmähliche +aufleben und absterben dieses oder jenes sprachgebrauchs aufschluss +zu geben, die durch reiche beispiele und aufstellung ganzer +paradigmen illustrirte unterscheidung vedischer und klassischer +flexion, die von der indischen grammatik vernachlässigte statistische +beobachtung des formenschatzes in älterer und jüngerer +litteratur—dies sind eigenschaften die es in dieser ausdehnung +mit keinem teilt."</span></p> + +<p>The Grammar provided an instrument which all Sanskrit +scholars are now thankfully using.</p> + +<p>Of the Supplement to the Grammar, von Bradke wrote in the +third volume of the Literaturblatt für orientalische Philologie: +<span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"So anspruchslos das Werk auftritt, in dieser Weise konnte es +nur von einem unserer ersten Kenner der altindischen Literatursprache, +und auch von einem solchen nicht ohne lange und +mühevolle Arbeit geschaffen werden."</span></p> + +<p>In this connection we should be again reminded that Professor +Whitney was one of the chief four collaborators who furnished +material for the great Sanskrit dictionary published at the expense +of the Russian government.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span></p> + +<p>In March, 1864, Mr. Whitney delivered at the Smithsonian +Institution a series of six lectures on the Principles of Linguistic +Science—probably lectures which he had given to the Sheffield +Scientific School the preceding year. This course was repeated +before the Lowell Institute and published in 1867, under the title +of 'Language and the Study of Language,' 489 pages. This +was translated into German by Jolly and into Netherlandish by +Vinckers. The clearness and conciseness of the statements and +the soundness of the views, in a field where the wildest vagaries +had prevailed, and where the imagination was still allowed rather +free play, were recognized on every hand. From the time of the +preparation of those lectures, Mr. Whitney seems to have devoted +to this subject more attention than he had given before. In 1875 +he published in the International Scientific Series a similar book, +in somewhat more compendious form, on the 'Life and Growth +of Language: an outline of linguistic science,' 326 pages. This +was translated into German, French, Italian, Netherlandish, and +Swedish. This last book grew out of his lectures to academic +senior classes.</p> + +<p>No one has done so much as Mr. Whitney to teach sound +views of linguistic science. Although the writer of this sketch +has not ventured to include a detailed discussion of his views, +perhaps mention may be made fitly of two points in which he +was in advance of his contemporaries: he was among the very +first to call attention to <em>analogy</em> as a force in the growth of +language, and the first (after Latham in 1851) to doubt the then +generally accepted view that Asia was the original home of the +Indo-Europeans.</p> + +<p>Papers which had been printed in the <cite>North American Review</cite> +and other periodicals were collected and, with more or less revision, +published in two volumes entitled 'Oriental and Linguistic +Studies,' 1873-74, pp. 417 and 432. The first volume contained +papers on the Veda, the Avesta, the science of language; the +second, on the British in India, China and the Chinese, religion +and mythology, orthography and phonology, Hindu astronomy. +The author's regard for his earliest teacher in Sanskrit is marked +by his dedication of the first of the two volumes to "Professor +Edward Elbridge Salisbury, the pioneer and patron of Sanskrit +studies in America." The second volume "is affectionately +dedicated" to "Professors Rudolf Roth and Albrecht Weber, +my early teachers and lifelong friends."</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span></p> + +<p>His long experience as a teacher of modern languages and as +a student of linguistics aided to fit him pre-eminently for the +preparation of grammars, readers, and vocabularies of French +and German for schools and colleges, and his systematic habits +of work enabled him to prepare these easily. This apparatus +met the needs of the newly awakened interest in modern languages +in this country, and has done much to further this interest. +These books are said to be used more widely than any others of +their kind in America. Some of them are published in two +editions, full and abridged. His desire for a reasonable and truly +philological study of the English language led him to prepare for +use in schools 'Essentials of English Grammar' (1877, 260 pages), +which has been adopted extensively by the public schools of the +country and is declared, by one who knows, to have had great +influence on the study of this subject.</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney had assisted in the preparation of the +Webster's dictionary of 1864, rewriting the definitions of many +of the important words. This experience, his keen sense of +proportion, his practical turn of mind, his precise and concise +manner of statement, his wide and varied attainments,—all made +him a peculiarly suitable person to be the editor-in-chief of the +great Century Dictionary with which the people of this country +will long associate his name. His unfortunate illness prevented +him from revising the work so carefully as he doubtless would +have done, had he been in vigorous health, and some have +thought that he should be called supervising-editor rather than +editor-in-chief. As the dictionary stands, he cannot be held +responsible for details; but his influence upon the work was +strong as well as salutary. Though he might not mark the proof +for a dozen pages, he would score the next page in a manner +which set a standard, and showed what he desired the revision of +the rest to be, while the whole body of editors followed the +general lines which he had drawn.</p> + +<p>In the list of his writings which was drawn up by Professor +Whitney in 1892, one hundred and forty-four items are enumerated; +but numerous minor articles and book notices are not +included, nor his contributions to the great Sanskrit, Webster, +and Century dictionaries, nor his oversight of the German dictionary +which goes by his name. He wrote articles for the New +American Cyclopedia, Johnson's Cyclopedia, and the Encyclopaedia +Britannica. He was a frequent contributor to the <cite>Nation</cite><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span> +and other periodicals. In view of the importance and extent of +many of his publications, his diligence and intellectual fertility +are extraordinary.</p> + +<p>As a teacher of advanced students, Mr. Whitney was exacting. +A two-hour course under him in Sanskrit called for a larger +outlay of time and effort than a four-hour course under most +other teachers. He required precise knowledge of others as well +as of himself. He was never deceived by glittering generalities, +nor satisfied with approximate accuracy when absolute accuracy +was attainable. He was modest, however, and while he would +not allow the violation of well-established principles, yet in the +translation of difficult and uncertain passages he never insisted +on the pupil's adoption of his view.</p> + +<p>In controversy and criticism, Mr. Whitney struck hard; his +sword was piercing, even to the sundering of joint and marrow. +But he was fair; he never misrepresented his opponent. He +never lost his temper and struck blindly. He saw so clearly the +absurdities and difficulties of a false position that he felt bound to +present it as it was, yet without any thought of giving personal +offence. For example, no one would suppose that he expected to +offend his friend and teacher, Weber, by the remark that the latter +had "unwittingly put himself in the position of one attempting to +prove on philological grounds that the precessional movement +of the equinoxes is from west to east, instead of from east to +west" (Oct. 1865); but the criticism is very similar to that (which +was counted severe) on Müller (July, 1876), that "even the aid +of Main and Hinds could not keep him, in his astronomical +reasonings, from assuming that, to any given observer, the +ecliptic is identical with his own horizon."</p> + +<p>The only prolonged controversy in which Professor Whitney +was ever engaged was that with Professor Max Müller. His +early relations with Müller had been pleasant, and he had supported +the latter's candidacy for his chair at Oxford in 1860. +His first public mention (1867) of Müller's work on the translation +of the Vedas was very complimentary; but when the first +volume of the translation appeared, his review of it was exceedingly +severe. In the fourteenth volume of his <cite>Indische Studien</cite>, +under the heading 'Zur Klarstellung,' Weber gives an account of +the conflict. According to him, the real source of the controversy +was Mr. Whitney's spirited reply to Müller's criticisms on +the Böhtlingk-Roth Dictionary. <span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"Whitney hatte zwei Vorlesungen</span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> +<span lang="de" xml:lang="de">Müller's kritisch besprochen,—scharf, wie es Whitney's +Art ist, aber ohne irgend welche persönliche Wendung, so wie +sich Gelehrte, denen es um ihre Meinung Ernst ist, zu streiten +pflegen."</span> The occasion of the contest was the publication by +Professor George Darwin, in the <cite>Contemporary Review</cite> of November, +1874, of a report of Mr. Whitney's views. "Müller nahm +sich denn auch gar nicht die Zeit Whitney's Abhandlung selbst +zu lesen, sondern trat gleich in dem folgenden Januar-Heft der +Review mit einer nur auf die Auszüge Mr. Darwin's basirten +Gegenschrift hervor." Some have wondered that Mr. Whitney +should care to follow up the matter so long, and even in 1892 +should publish a brochure of 79 pages on 'Max Müller and the +Science of Language: a Criticism.' But the question with him +rose far above personalities: the truth was at stake. His mind, +accurate by both nature and training, shrank from allowing inaccurate +statements and false principles to be floated by a charming +style. Great Britain in this generation has had more than one +scholar of note whose brilliant form of statement, ingenious +theories, and varied attainments have sufficed to give them undue +authority on subjects where they made some grievous errors. Mr. +Whitney felt that the higher a scholar's position, the greater his +authority, the more careful he should be in all matters. He was +heartily vexed by attempts to overlook and avoid the real point +at issue. His vigorous spirit may have felt a certain enjoyment +in a conflict; as an intellectual athlete he could appreciate the +beauty of a keen thrust or the weight of a heavy blow; but while +he did not fear a conflict, in some cases he avoided a controversy, +even when he had been misunderstood and misrepresented.</p> + +<p>No sketch of Mr. Whitney's character would be complete which +did not mention his musical tastes. Music was always a source +of pleasure and recreation to him. He had a fine tenor voice; +and when a young man he was an acceptable and admired leader +of the choir of Jonathan Edwards's old church in Northampton. +The story is told that his conversations with the Rev. Dr. +George E. Day, which led to his study of Sanskrit, were more +frequent and natural because of his weekly calls at the pastor's +house for the list of hymns to be sung. He was an active +member of the Mendelssohn Society of New Haven a score of +years ago, and did much to rouse the community to take interest +in oratorios and other choral music, writing for the newspapers +appreciative accounts of the works to be performed. He was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span> +prominent in securing for New Haven concerts by the Boston +Symphony Orchestra. One of the last occasions which brought +him into a public gathering was a University Chamber Concert +by the Kneisel Quartet. He was fond of singing hymns on +Sunday evenings, and while he cherished some of the old tunes +of his youth, he welcomed the introduction of the modern more +ecclesiastical music. While singing the old hymns he was as +fervent and orthodox as his Puritan ancestors.</p> + +<p>Mr. Whitney was no recluse, nor a typical professor in manner. +He attracted men to him and enjoyed being with them. He was +not at all emotional, however, and cared little for general society. +He gave a rather extreme view of himself in a letter written in +1869: "I am of a more than usually reserved and unsocial nature. +I avoid society as much as I can, and am never quite comfortable +in the company of any excepting those with whom I am most +nearly bound. My besetting sin is burying myself in my books +and papers, and too much overlooking all that is outside of them,—partly +from natural tendencies, partly because I feel that in that +way I shall on the whole do most good and give most pleasure +to others." His bearing was perfectly simple and unpretentious—in +short, that of a gentleman.</p> + +<p>Like Aristotle's "magnanimous man," he gave little heed to +praise or blame—not being elated or cast down by either. He +loved learning for its own sake and not for its reward of fame. +The words which he wrote with regard to his friend Professor +James Hadley are strikingly true of himself: "No one was ever +more free from the desire to shine among his fellows. His was a +modesty entirely unfeigned, and free from every taint of a lower +feeling.... He devoted himself so entirely to truth and virtue and +duty, as he knew them, that there was left no room for any thought +of self. He neither extolled himself nor gave way unduly to others." +"He knew his power, but possessed it in the spirit of moderation +and reserve." He was eminently guileless—though by no means +a subject for imposition by others. He would have made an +admirable lawyer or statesman, but he could not have been a +politician. He saw truth clearly and abhorred anything like +trickery or disingenuousness. He was also thoroughly sane. +Sentimental enthusiasm never led him to denote as certain views +which later were to be proved false. He had few scientific retractions +to make in the course of forty-five years of publication. +His statements on uncertain points were carefully guarded.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> +Where doubt existed, he was apt to feel it; in fact he was called +in Germany "der Skeptiker der Sprachwissenschaft." His sanity +restrained him from various excesses. His opinions on the desirability +of reform in the spelling of the English language were +clear and clearly expressed, and he was the first chairman of the +committee appointed by the Philological Association for the +furtherance of this reform in our country, but he saw so distinctly +the difficulties in the way of an abrupt change, at least for the +present, that he wasted no time in a Quixotic crusade. He was +invited by the Japanese government to prepare an opinion in +regard to the adoption of English as the official language of +Japan—but he was not carried away by any sentimental notions +of English as a <i lang="de" xml:lang="de">Weltsprache</i>. His mind was like a diamond, and +his style was eminently clear and forcible. He never strove to be +eloquent, but always expressed his thoughts in the fewest and +simplest words. His was the style of a teacher rather than that +of a popular platform-lecturer, but was enlivened by a strong +sense of humor and by keen wit.</p> + +<p>Professor Whitney's services to science and learning were freely +recognized, both at home and abroad. He received the degree +of Ph.D., <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">honoris causa</i>, from the University of Breslau in 1865; +that of LL. D. from Williams College in 1868, from the College +of William and Mary in 1869, from Harvard in 1876, and from +the University of Edinburgh in 1889; that of J.U.D. from St. +Andrews University in Scotland in 1874; that of L.H.D. from +Columbia in 1887. He was a member of the National Academy +of Sciences; an honorary member of the Oriental or Asiatic +societies of Great Britain and Ireland, of Germany, of Bengal, +of Japan, and of Peking; of the Literary Societies of Leyden, +of Upsala, and of Helsingfors; fellow of the Royal Society of +Edinburgh; member or correspondent of the Academies of +Dublin, of Turin, of Rome (<i lang="it" xml:lang="it">Lincei</i>), of St. Petersburg, of Berlin, +and of Denmark; also, correspondent of the Institute of France; +and Foreign Knight of the Prussian order <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">pour le mérite</i> for +Science and Arts, being elected May 31, 1881, to fill the vacancy +made by the death of Thomas Carlyle.</p> + +<p>In 1870 the Berlin Academy of Sciences voted him the first +Bopp prize for his publication of the Tāittirīya-Prātiçākhya, as +the chief contribution to Sanskrit philology during the preceding +three years.</p> + +<p>The following extracts from a brief article in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span> +<cite>Berliner Nationalzeitung</cite>, from the pen of Professor Albrecht Weber, +form an interesting companion-piece to the letter from the same +scholar, dated in December, 1852, which was quoted in the early +part of this sketch: <span lang="de" xml:lang="de">"Der jüngst in Yalecollege verstorbene Professor +William Dwight Whitney war einer der ersten Indianisten +und Sprachforscher der Gegenwart. Seine Sanskritstudien absolvirte +er bei uns in Deutschland, hier in Berlin bei Weber und in +Tübingen bei Roth. Beide Gelehrte betrachten es als einen ihrer +schönsten Ehrentitel, ihn zum Schüler gehabt zu haben. Gleich +seine erste Arbeit in den <cite>Indischen Studien</cite> ... war ein Meisterwerk +und zeigte alle die Eigenschaften, die seinen Arbeiten einen +so hohen Werth verleihen sollten, Klarheit, Sorgsamkeit, und +Akribie im kleinsten Detail.... Heimgekehrt nach Amerika, +ward er der Begründer der dortigen, jetzt in reicher Blüthe +stehenden Sanskrit-Philologie, die sich besonders durch die von +ihm speziell betonte <em>statistische</em> Methode grosse Verdienste +erworben hat, u. A. durch seine Schüler: Avery, Bloomfield, +Hopkins, Lanman, Jackson, Oertel, Perry, Smyth, Snyder, trefflich +vertreten wird.... Seine Uebersetzung eines der ältesten +vorhandenen Lehrbücher der indischen Astronomie zeigte ihn als +trefflichen Rechner und Astronom. Schärfe der Kritik, Klarheit +der Darstellung, Genauigkeit der Arbeit sind allen seinen Werken +als Stempel aufgedrückt. Sein reifstes Werk wohl ist seine +'Sanskrit-Grammatik,' ... die erste <em>historische</em> Darstellung derselben, +gewissermassen ein <em>gründliches</em> Résumé aus dem grossen +Petersburger Sanskrit-Wörterbuch von Böhtlingk und Roth. +Seine Arbeiten erstreckten sich im Uebrigen auf die verschiedensten +Gebiete der Sprachwissenschaft.... Deutschland verliert +in ihm einen der wärmsten Freunde, die es in Amerika hatte, +Amerika einen seiner besten Gelehrten, und die Wissenschaft im +grossen und ganzen einen ihrer ersten Koryphäen."</span></p> + +<p>On August 28, 1856, Professor Whitney married Elizabeth +Wooster Baldwin, daughter of the Hon. Roger Sherman Baldwin, +of New Haven (ex-Governor of Connecticut and U. S. Senator), +great-granddaughter of Roger Sherman, and great-great-granddaughter +of President Thomas Clap, of Yale. Six children, three +sons and three daughters, were born to them; of whom one son +(the Hon. Edward B. Whitney, Assistant Attorney-General of +the U. S.) and the three daughters survive. The daughters +assisted their father in some of his later publications in the field +of modern languages, and have done literary work of their own.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></p> + +<p>Just after a hard summer's work, at the very beginning of the +college year in the autumn of 1886, Professor Whitney was prostrated +by a severe disorder of the heart. For a time he was +forbidden by his physician to do more than a minimum of work. +He was obliged to avoid fatigue and excitement, and was limited +strictly in his physical exercise. Those who had seen him return +invigorated and exhilarated from a ten-miles' walk in the country +were deeply pained to watch his slow, measured gait. He surprised +many by his graceful submission to restrictions which he +must have felt most keenly, and his household was still the +brightest and most cheerful in the city. The gentler side of his +nature became more prominent than before. His face grew more +and more beautiful, with his white hair and beard, and delicate +fair complexion. Though not an old man, he became truly +venerable in appearance, and his presence was a real benediction +to all whom he met. He was obliged to abandon entirely his +work with undergraduate classes, but continued his classes in +Sanskrit, receiving the students in his study at his home. During +most of the past year he had six of these exercises each week. +He did not abandon his other scholarly work. During the early +years of this period of weakness, the Century Dictionary was +going through the press and received his care. Every year +witnessed his publication of some scientific paper or papers. He +aided in the plans for the World's Congress of Philology, last +year. One of his intimate associates, Professor Lounsbury, has +written of him: "To me, at least, words seem inadequate to +describe the quiet heroism which gave serenity and calm to his +latter days, and the unflinching resolution with which he met and +discharged every duty of a life over which the possibility of +sudden death was always casting its shadow."</p> + +<p>After an illness of about two weeks, Mr. Whitney passed away +from this life, during sleep, on the morning of Thursday, June 7, +1894.</p> + +<p>In the death of William Dwight Whitney, this country has lost +one of her most distinguished men, one who had been recognized +throughout the world as one of the highest authorities in his +department of learning, and who had been for forty years the +leader of oriental and linguistic studies in America and the +personal master of a majority of the American scholars in his +department. Yale University has lost one of her most brilliant +and able scholars, one of her wisest and most faithful teachers,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> +whose influence always made for diligent and honest research +and statement. His publications have had a lasting effect on +scholarship. His personal influence will long endure. In the +words of Professor Lanman, "for power of intellect, conjoined +with purity of soul and absolute genuineness of character, we +shall not soon look upon his like again."</p> + +<p class="right smcap">Thomas Day Seymour.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"> +<p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1">[1]</a> The writer desires to acknowledge his special obligations to Professor +Salisbury for allowing him access to original documents, and to Dr. Hanns +Oertel for calling his attention to publications which would otherwise have +escaped his notice.</p> +</div> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's William Dwight Whitney, by Thomas Day Seymour + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILLIAM DWIGHT WHITNEY *** + +***** This file should be named 44259-h.htm or 44259-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/4/4/2/5/44259/ + +Produced by Mark C. 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