Can you say "Mesopotamia"?

[Joel S. Berson]

At 11/19/2012 01:32 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> From Neil Postman's _Amusing Ourselves to Death_  (and wotta way to go!)
>(N.Y.: Viking Penguin, 1985), p. 54:
>
>"Of [George] Whitefield [1714 -1770, American evangelist] it was said that
>by merely pronouncing the word 'Mesopotamia,' he evoked tears in his
>audience."

The parsimonious Ben Franklin went skeptically to hear Whitefield
preach, and was so steadily impressed that he contributed first the
coppers in his pocket, then the silver, and finally all the
gold.  Franklin does not mention Mesopotamia, however.

Joel


>Cf. "moist." ( A different kind of tears, to be sure.)
>
>JL
>
>--
>"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org