THE AMERICAN SYSTEM OF EDUCATION.

A

HAND-BOOK

OF

ANGLO-SAXON DERIVATIVES,

ON THE

BASIS OF THE HAND-BOOK

OF

ANGLO-SAXON ROOT-WORDS.

IN THREE PARTS.

First Part.

MATERIALS OF ANGLO-SAXON DERIVATIVES.

Second Part.

STUDIES IN ANGLO-SAXON DERIVATIVES.

Third Part.

THE BEGINNING OF WORDS.

"The terins which occur most frequently in discourse, or which recall the most vivid conceptions, are
Anglo-Saxon."-Edin, Rev.

"Great, verily, was the glory of the English tongue betore the Norman conquest,”—Camden,

Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1854,

By D. APPLETON & COMPANY,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

INTRODUCTION.

THE LITERARY ASSOCIATION

TO THE

READER OF THE HAND-BOOK OF ANGLO-SAXON DERIVATIVES.

THE Literary Association, anticipating the inquiries which this work must awaken, introduce themselves at once to the reader. The following statement, it is hoped, will meet all such inquiries.

The Association was called into existence by the increased interest that has marked the history of education in our country for the last ten years. This interest was canvassed, and its literary results subjected to a rigid examination. Text-books, and especially the principles on which they are constructed, were carefully investigated.

At the close of this investigation, which was carried on for years by an individual member devoted to the work of education, the Association was formed, and, though profoundly impressed by the activity of the American mind in this department of letters, could not avoid the conviction that school-books had not been prepared with sufficient reference to the laws of the human mind.

With this impression, the Association proceeded to review the field of labor. They proceeded anew to interrogate the human mind, and ascertain its general laws. They freely discussed such questions as these: "Does the mind grow? Is its growth the unfolding of native energies? How does it grow? By what laws? By what methods? For instance, How does the human mind acquire language?"

In answering the last question, it was ascertained that the mind first acquires the names of things, or nouns; next, the names of qualities, or adjectives; and then, the names of actions, or verbs; and that this seems to be a law of the human mind.

The Hand-Book of Anglo-Saxon Derivatives grew out of the discovery of this and other