lexicographers have not even suspected that _sagesse_ was for
_sage-esse_ (sage-etre,) so short-sighted is man without the
light of science; then much less did they suspect that for _to
be_, and _to go_ there was, whilst languages were yet in their
infancy, but one word. The learned, from their not knowing that
_sagesse_ is for _sage-esse_, must have lost discovering the
etymology of a vast number of words in all languages. Thus, all
the French words ending in _esse_, as, caresse, finesse, paresse,
&c., have never been accounted for; and, in like manner, the
etymology of all English words ending in _ess_ and _ness_, as,
car_ess_, happi_ness_, &c., has been unknown. But here the
reader, as he has not yet seen how we are to discover in words
their own definitions, may say, that though he can admit _caress_
and _caresse_ to be for _cara_ or _carus esse_ (to be dear,) and
_finesse_ to be for _fin-esse_ (etre fin,) he cannot so readily
allow _paresse_ and _happiness_ to be accounted for after a
similar manner, since _paresse_ must hence become _par-esse_, and
_happiness_, _happin-esse_, which words _par_ and _happin_ here
offer no meaning. But a little farther on, he will know that
_par_ here signifies _on the ground_; so that _paresse_ literally
means _on the ground to be_, that is, to be lying down, or doing
nothing. He will also see, that the termination _ness_ has not
the ridiculous meaning assigned it by the learned, namely, "the
top or the foot of a hill" (I forget which,) but that it
literally means _the being_ (_en-esse_,) so that _happiness_ was
first _en-esse-happy_, (the being happy, the thing happy,) after
which, _en-esse_ became contracted to _ness_, and so fell behind
happy, making _happiness_.

"Here, not to perplex the reader's and my own mind, by the
considering of too many things at once, I am really obliged to
turn my view from the many important discoveries that rush upon
me, all emanating out of this little word _be_, or _go_, (no
matter which we call it,) in order merely to show how verbs in
Latin have, from this single word, formed their endings."

By and by it appears that if we are so much indebted to the Latin for
their verb _esse_, the Latin is no less indebted to us for our verb
_am_.

"But I have not shown by what artific