Cato, in Sallust, Catil. lii., “Jam pridem equidem nos vera rerum
vocabula amisimus; quia bona aliena largiri, liberalitas; malarum
rerum audacia fortitudo vocatur; eo respublica in extremo sita est.’ Tacitus, Ann. XIV. 21, “Pluribus ipsa licentia placebat, ac tamen
honesta nomina praetendebant.’ Shakespeare finds the thievish mind saying, “convey the wise it
call,” Merry Wives, Act ι. Sc. 3; and the Witches in Macbeth
the eternal verities: “Fair is foul, and foul is ” On the
other hand, Achilles declares, Hom. ΙΙ. IX. 312:
 ἐχθρὸς γάρ μοι κεῖνος ὁμῶς Ἀίδαο πύλῃσιν, ὅς χ’ ἕτερον μὲν κεύθῃ ἐνὶ φρεσίν, ἄλλο δὲ εἴπῃ. The allusion in ‘Cyprian’ De ’ngulan’tate ’eomm is worth
adding: when the writer speaks of those “qui secundum verbum lsaiae
amaritudinem pro dulcedine devorantes, nudam foeditatem velamento
boni nominis tegunt.” Trench, On the Study of Words, constantly points the moral;
he quotes Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, Act ιιι. Sc. ι, “Words are
grown so false, I am loath to prove reason with them”: and
“The mixture of those things by speech which by nature are divided,
is the mother of all error.”