9–10
Lycinus
Then, as you cannot feel the difference between ‘deprecate’ and ‘depreciate,’ shall we conclude that you are an ignoramus?
Purist
Outrageous insolence!
Lycinus
Outrageous? I shall be, ere much, if I go on talking to you.—Now I should have said that ‘ere much’ was a blunder, but it does not strike you so.
Purist
Oh, stop, for goodness’ sake! Look here, try this way; I want to get my profit out of it too.
Purist
Suppose you were to go through all the blunders you say I have missed, and tell me what is the right thing for each.
Lycinus
Good gracious, no; it would take us till midnight. No; you can look those out for yourself. Meanwhile, we had better take fresh ones, as we have only a quarter of an hour (by the way, never pronounce the ‘h’ in hour; that sounds dreadful). Then as to that outrage which you say I have committed upon you; if I were to speak of an outrage committed against you, that would be another thing.
Lycinus
Yes; an outrage upon you must be committed upon you personally, in the shape of blows, interference with your liberty, or the like. An outrage agaiust you is upon something that belongs to you; he who does an outrage upon your wife, child, friend, or slave, does it against you. This distinction, however, does not apply to inanimate things. An ‘outrage against’
a legitimate phrase with them, as when Plato talks in the Symposium of an outrage against a proverb.
Lycinus
Do you also see that the exchange of one for the other is a solecism?
Purist
Yes, I shall know that for the future.
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