PHILOVOGY. This word, as a technical name for a branch of knowledge, has gone through various phases of meaning. Originally signifying the love of talk or discourse, and then, in a more restricted sense, the love of philosophical conversation such as is exhibited in the dialogues of Plato. it came, in the later period of Greek literature, to mean the study and knowledge of books, and of the history and other science contained in them. In this sense it passed over to the Romans, under whom the name of philolo gists was applied to men distinguished for universal learning, more especially to the grammatici, whose chief occupation of editing and illustrating the classic poets, natu rally led them to this multifarions knowledge; and when INIartianus Capella (1.v.) in Me 5111 c. composed his eneyelowedia (q.v.) or curriculum of education, embracing the "seven liberal arts" (gnu mar, dialectic. rhetoric, music, arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy). lie designates the collective whole by the name of philology. What is known us the revival of literature after the dark ages, is nothing else than the revival of the ancient philology. But when men, instead of looking only at what had been written, began to examine the world for themselves, and enlarge the bounds of sci ence, it became impossible for one man to cultivate the whole round of knowledge, and the term philology was by degrees restricted to a knowledge-of the languages, his tory. laws, etc., of the ancient world (by which the Greek and Homan world was chiefly thought ot), or, more narrowly still, to the study merely of the languages—of grammar, criticism. mol interpretation. A more complete conception of philology, as an inde pendent branch of knowledge, was that of F. A. Wolf, who assigned as its field all that belongs to the life of the ancient peoples; and tire e conception is still further extended by Meld], who makes it almost sytionymous with history—its problem being the reproduc tion of the past ; in this sense, the word is applicable to all peoples at all periods of their history, so that we are beginning to have an Indian philology, a German philology, a Slavic philology. no less than a classic philology. The fullest and most systematic
exposition of what philology in this sense ought to embrace, has been given by G. Haase in Erceb and Grilber's Ency., 3d sect., VOL Of philology, even iii its widest sense, the study of language was always, and neces sarily, it fuudamental part; and, in the usual sense of the word, It has been the chief part—often nearly the whole. For a long time after the revival of learning, the classic writers were studied chiefly for their language and style, and those of them that did not come up to an imaginary standard of purity were despised and neglected, however val uable they might be for their matter. But although great and even undue attention was thus given to language, it was only as an instrument.. as means to an end. The philol ogist studied a language hi order to he able to understand it and use it—to get at the thoughts conveyed in it, or to convey his own thoughts with force and elegance to others. This is the object of the grammars, dictionaries, annotated editions, and criticisms, which consi it me the chief pail of philological literature. But within recent years, philol ogy has entered npon a new phase, or radicr a new study has sprung up alongside of the old. As the naturalist investigates a class of objects not with a view II) them to use, bat to untlemland their nature, and classify them; so the new school of philologists examii:e and compare the structures of the various languages, and arrange them in classes and families, with the ultimate view of arriving at some theory cf language in general—i:s mode of origin and growth. The comparison of the structure of two or inure laugh iges is called comparative grammar, and the whole of this new branch of study is sometimes designated as comparative philology; but it seems better to leave the old field in possession of the old name, and in contradistinction to philology as the prac tical knowledge of languages, to speak of the study of language as a phenomenon per se, us the science of language, The German term sprackenkuncle. and the French lia yuistique, have more especial reference to the naturalist, or classificatory aspect of the study.