Note 2 — VI.

It is worthy of remark that eminent philologists maintain that the oldest languages used the same word for expressing quite general antitheses. In C. Abel’s essay, “Ueber den Gegensinn der Urworter” (1884), the following examples of such words in English are given: “gleam—gloom”; “to lock—loch”; “down—The Downs”; “to step—to stop.” In his essay on “The Origin of Language” (“Linguistic Essays,” p. 240), Abel says: “When the Englishman says ‘without,’ is not his judgment based upon the comparative juxtaposition of two opposites, ‘with’ and ‘out’; ‘with’ itself originally meant ‘without,’ as may still be seen in ‘withdraw.’ ‘Bid’ includes the opposite sense of giving and of proffering” (Abel, “The English Verbs of Command,” “Linguistic Essays,” p. 104; see also Freud, “Ueber den Gegensinn der Urworte”: Jahrbuch für Psychoanalytische und Psychopathologische Forschungen, Band ii., part i., p. 179).—Translator.