I was having dinner at this restaurant down the street last night.
Having a drink at the bar.
A saturday night sort of deal.
I started speaking to these people about...Latin.
What a surprise.
I know, I thought that, too.
The guy says to me, "Why Latin?"
And I say to him, well, ever see that comic strip "Cathy"?
One time she's saying hello to her dog.
And her dog thinks to itself, "I love you anyway, even if you have a one dimensional nose."
That's what someone who studies Latin CAGSE's way gets for themselves.
A dog's nose?
Something that.
It is the linguistic equivalent.
When you take Latin and truly study it inside out, outside in, you are developing your linguistic sensibility, sensitivity.
You can sense things in English that before were just, well, words on a page.
Suddenly, instead of looking at just a two dimensional piece of paper on which are written two dimensional letters making up words, the words begin to speak in a way you never heard them before.
They leap off the page.
Each word has a story to tell.
Meaning to establish.
Do you get this just from studying English?
No. Most folks who study and teach English are enamored of ideas, plots, themes, symbols.
They miss the fundamental lesson that Latin offers:
you want to understand those ideas, plots, themes, symbols, you had best understand the bare bones, the nuts and bolts, the manner in which meaning is established.
Then, and only then, will the ideas, plots, themes, symbols have real meaning.
Until then, it's just a breath of hot air.
Or two.