double negation - "Can't help but think": origin and current meaning


The regular English-language column in this week's Spectator (by one 'Dot Wordsworth') examines the opaque but not uncommon construction "I can't help but be reminded of the relationship...", which has been discussed at various times here, notably at this question.


I call it "opaque" because, as Dot points out, I can't help loving you means the same as I can't but love you, which are both the opposite of I can't love you. I can't help but love you would therefore be a double negative and express lack of affection.


As mentioned by several users in the linked question, usage trumps logic and nowadays "I can't help but..." means the same as "I can't help...", while "I can't but..." though it means the same, has an archaic feel. However, nobody would say this is an obvious way for a construction to evolve, and Dot proposes the (startling to me) thesis that it was invented by the author Thomas Hall Caine.


Hall Caine was an eccentric figure, who thought he looked like Shakespeare despite a bushy red beard, and sold millions of copies of what are now regarded as potboilers. The OED's first example of the construction is "she could not help but plague the lad" from The Manxman (1894), but the columnist has found an earlier example in The Bondsman (1890).


'Dot' concludes by asking "if anyone comes across prior examples. I can't but think they exist". I have had no luck as yet, but feel my ELU colleagues might well be successful.



Answer



The earliest instance of "cannot help but"—in the modern idiomatic sense—that I've been able to find through Google Books searches is from "Dreams," an essay included in Miscellanies Upon Various Subjects by John Aubrey. Miscellanies was first published in 1696, but it is not clear how much earlier the pieces included in it were written. Aubrey died at the age of 72 in 1697. Here is the relevant text from his essay, discussing a famous dream that the Roman physician Galen had:



Gallen's three Dreams. The third more worthy of being called a Miracle, was, when being twice admonished in his Sleep to cut the Artery that lies between the Fore-Finger and the Thumb, and doing it accordingly, he was freed from a Daily Pain with which he was afflicted in that Part, where the Liver is join'd to the Midriff ; and this he has testified at the end of his Book of Venesection. 'Tis certainly a very great Example, when a Man so great as he was in the Medicinal Art, put so much confidence in a Dream as to try Experiments upon himself ; where be was to run the risque of his Life, in his own very Art. I cannot help but admire his Probity, in the next Place, that where he might have arrogated the Merit of the Invention to himself, and placed it wholly to the Account of the Subtilty and Penetration of his own Genius, he attributed it to God, to whom it was due. In this alone did the Man well deserve to purchase an Immortality to his Name and his Writings.



Also, from a letter written in 1722, reproduced in Calendar of State Papers: Colonial Series: America & West Indies, 1722–1723 (1934) [combined snippets]:



I have frequently laid matters of the greatest importance to the welfare of this Colony before your Lordships and the Secretary of State but have never been honoured with any answers to them and it is very surprizing that tho' I named Mr. Beckford to your Lordships as the cheife instrument of all our divisions and animosities and that he has as well in former Governments as mine constantly opposed whatever has been recomended for the publick service, should meet with such countenance from home as not only to be continued in his post of Comptroller of the Customs but he gives out that he has had sent him copys of my letters which I wrote to your Lordships about him. And I cannot help but observing to your Lordships that of all the gentlemen I ever recomended to be of the Council not one has been put in and those whom your Lordships have thought fit to recommend since I left England live in remote parts of the countrey and at so great a distance that it is with the greatest difficulty imaginable (let the urgency be never so great) to get a quorum together to do business.



And from Ran. Darwall, "Polly Wright: A Birth-Day Rhapsody," in The Lady's Magazine; Or, Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex (June 1776):



VII.


And, as for any simple sonnet,


For her they've such a great regard,


That they're amaz'd–"O! fye upon it!


"She sure deserves a better bard."


VIII.


And so she does, in humble fashion,


I really cannot help but own :


For her, however, my amorous passion


In rhyme shall now again be shewn.



It thus appears that "cannot help but" has been in use in English in essentially the same idiomatic sense that it has today for more than 300 years.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

verbs - "Baby is creeping" vs. "baby is crawling" in AmE

Years and years ago, I remember reading in a book on AmE usage that the phrasal turn a baby creeps before it walks was to some extent more common to AmE than to BrE, which preferred exclusively the "crawl" version. And so, I just recently checked on the accuracy of that information on NGram Viewer , and it actually was fact... more than a century ago! What I would like you to tell is if it would sound sort of weird to hear someone say today in the US that a child "creeps" before walking and running (see Synonyms ) rather than it crawls. Also, what's the story to those terms? How did "to crawl" come to prevail and supersede "to creep" to describe the way a baby moves around? As with a plant, so with a child. His mind grows by natural stages. A child creeps before he walks , sits before he stands, cries before he laughs, babbles before he talks, draws a circle before he draws a square, lies before he tells the truth, and is selfish before he
Read more

commas - Does this sentence have too many subjunctives?

Does this sentence have too many subjunctives? If it please the king, let it be decreed that they be destroyed, and I will pay 10,000 talents of silver into the hands of those who have charge of the king's business, that they may put it into the king's treasuries. I am stumped by this sentence construction. First, there is "Let it be," which is a common English idiomatic phrase, but then it follows another subjunctive. Is that to say you can actually have a subjunctive followed by another subjunctive? Also, why does the sentence use "please"? If that's the subjunctive tense there, then why is it followed by another subjunctive instead of a conditional, or maybe "Let it be" is the conditional? Lastly, I wish to know how the that is used in the sentence. Perhaps, the simplified sentence can be restated like so: Let it be decreed that they be destroyed and that they may put it into the king's treasuries. If not, maybe the simplified sent
Read more

grammatical number - Use of lone apostrophe for plural?

I've been reading William Manchester's book "American Caesar", which is about Douglas MacArthur, and I found that he uses a strange convention for pluralizing the family name. When talking about the MacArthurs as a whole, he writes MacArthur' with an apostrophe, as in "After the war, the MacArthur' lived in Tokyo while the general was proconsul" (yes, he uses that term to describe him). I have never seen or heard of a rule that would prescribe this. Manchester is a bit old-timey in his style: for example, he also writes "in behalf of" instead of "on behalf of", which is the only one I have ever seen. So perhaps this is similar. Where does he get this apostrophe from? Edit: There seems to be some difficulty finding examples, which is odd. Here is a direct link to a page from Google Books that shows the apostrophe.
Read more

etymology - Where does the phrase "doctored" originate?

This is a phrase I’m particularly confused about, because it’s used often when something is manipulated or changed. For example, sometimes images surface online that are clearly Photoshopped, but people refer to them as “doctored” images. Why use the word “doctored” here? Answer The earliest Google Books match for an instance of doctored in a transitional (or perhaps post-transitional) sense between "amended" and "adulterated" appears in William Marshall, The Rural Economy of Glocestershire; Including Its Dairy: Together with the Dairy Management of North Wiltshire, and the Management of Orchards and Fruit Liquor, in Herefordshire , volume 2 (1789): Men in general, however, whose palates are set to rough cider, consider the common sweet sort as an effeminate beverage; and rough cider, properly manufactured, is probably the most generous liquor; being deemed more wholesome, to habits in general, than sweet cider:—even when genuine. That which is drank, in the kingd
Read more

phrases - Somebody is gonna kiss the donkey

I heard this phrase when I was watching Battleship. An old man said, "Somebody is gonna kiss the donkey." I do not know what it means, I only heard it in a movie. What is this phrase mean? In Addition: I think it was Rihanna who said "Saddle Ridge will be in weapons range in five minutes," then the old man stated the phrase. Answer It is a confused attempt at a play on (for example) "kiss my ass," or, some similar phrase. It is quite common in English today that idioms get mangled.
Read more

typography - When a dagger is used to indicate a note, must it come after an asterisk?

The typographical symbol dagger (†) has several meanings. Possibly its most common use is as a footnote marker. According to You Have a Point There: A Guide to Punctuation and Its Allies ( Partridge , 1953), when it is used for this purpose, it must be used for second footnotes only; the first footnote should be indicated by an asterisk (*), the third a double dagger (‡) and further footnotes other symbols or numbers. Where does Patridge's rule fall on a scale of one to ten, where one is "this is just one guy's random opinion" and ten is "this is a widely accepted rule of English and any deviation from it is unarguably incorrect"? This question was inspired by this Meta Stack Overflow question about the use of daggers on Stack Exchange site FAQ pages . Answer The dagger (also known as an obelisk ) is properly used for the second footnote. The asterisk is for the first, and the double dagger is for the third. This is supported by several websites: And so
Read more

etymology - Origin of "s--t eating grin"

What is the origin of the phrase shit eating grin ? How did it come to mean showing smugness or self-satisfaction of an individual's actions? Answer From the Urban Dictionary: ...these uses are documented in the Oxford English Dictionary no earlier than 1957 There have been similar expressions used quite far back: In Book XXI of his History of Rome, Livy describes a Carthaginian sect of coprophages, the risus faecivorus, or shit-eating grin, being commonly displayed by its adherents. Although, its origin is undetermined, they may have been incidents which caused the invention of this phrase. Below is an excerpt: "1944 Jrnl. Nerv. & Mental Dis. XCIX. 959 Among demented patients in advanced stages of their illness,..it is not rare to see some of them grasp their own feces, chew them and eat them often with great pleasure and satisfaction (coprophagia).
Read more