It would be similarly a surprise to many to be told that when a visitor leaves a house,

or takes his leave, even though the intention is similar, namely that of taking his

departure, the two words nevertheless are totally unrelated. In the former instance leave

is simply old English leven "to quit" and so depart. But "to take leave" is the old English

leve, permission, and akin to life, be-lieve and love.

When we say that some antiquated or superstitious belief is "exploded" we naturally

think of a spent bomb, or of an explosion that has "blown the argument to bits". This is

quite beside the original meaning of the figure. The word really retains the meaning of

the Latin ex-plodere i.e. ex-plaudere, to drive or hoot off the stage an unpopular actor,

the direct opposite of "applaud".  Milton says that Enoch was "exploded" by his

unbelieving contemporaries, but Milton never intended the thought that because Enoch

was "not found" that he had been "blown to bits".

The number of examples of false analogies and misinterpretations could be multiplied

to many pages, but sufficient has been indicated to show that great care must be exercised

in coming to a conclusion concerning the etymology of any word or phrase, lest by

coming to a false conclusion we should be found building our doctrinal teaching upon

sand. The examples of false analogy and misinterpretation have been selected from the

many that are given in the book The Folk and their Word-Lore by A. Smythe Palmer,

D.D.

The reader is advised to check the etymology offered by any dictionary that may be

employed, or any book that is read, by such a work as The Concise etymological

Dictionary of the English language by W. W. Skeat.

We have suggested that in the pursuit of "meaning" the activities of the mind can be

reduced to six stages or processes. The first three being Sensation, Memory, Reason, and

then limiting our investigation to the "meaning" of Holy Scripture, we have another three

steps or links, Revelation, Translation and Interpretation. Let us give attention to these

essential steps, and begin, where all must and do begin with "sensation".

Human language occasionally manifests by a sudden gleam, by a momentary relation

of words, the underlying basis of all thinking. This is seen in the fact that in English the

word "sense" has two meanings. The first meaning that which limits the meaning of the

word "sense" to the five senses, sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch, the second

meaning that which indicates the ultimate goal of "sense" that is "meaning", as when we

say "the sense of this remark is . . . . .", "Take the sense or the meaning" or as in

Neh. 8: 8 "They read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense". So

also we speak of a person who fainted, that he is "senseless" referring only to the