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Previous Thread Next Thread Print Thread ...must needs..;. #124710 03/06/2004 9:50 PM Joined: Jan 2001 Posts: 13,858 wwh Carpal Tunnel wwh Carpal Tunnel Joined: Jan 2001 Posts: 13,858 I can't explain the grammar of this. Can you? I have never written a sentence this long! In the heyday of youthful greediness and ambition, when the mind, dazzled by the vastness and variety of the universe, must needs know everything, or rather know about everything, at once and on the spot, too many are apt, as I have been in past years, to complain of Cambridge studies as too dry and narrow: but as time teaches the student, year by year, what is really required for an understanding of the objects with which he meets, he begins to find that his University, in as far as he has really received her teaching into himself, has given him, in her criticism, her mathematics, above all, in Plato, something which all the popular knowledge, the lectures and institutions of the day, and even good books themselves, cannot give, a boon more precious than learning; namely, the art of learning. Copy Link to Clipboard Share Post on Facebook Share Post on Twitter Re: ...must needs..;. #124711 03/06/2004 10:03 PM Joined: Jan 2001 Posts: 13,858 wwh Carpal Tunnel wwh Carpal Tunnel Joined: Jan 2001 Posts: 13,858 Good old Google. I found this, which helps, in Quinion. I still couldn't explain it to somebody else. NEEDS MUST WHEN THE DEVIL DRIVES [Q] From Jonathan Harpaz, Israel: “Does the following expression/idiom exist: needs must when the devil drives? If so, is it British or American and when did it originate?” [A] The expression does exist, and as it happens is one of the older proverbs in the language, somewhat predating the USA. Shakespeare uses it in All’s Well that Ends Well: “My poor body, madam, requires it: I am driven on by the flesh; and he must needs go that the devil drives”. However, it is actually older—the earliest I can find is in John Lydgate’s Assembly of Gods, written about 1420: “He must nedys go that the deuell dryves”. The form you quote is the usual modern one, but it isn’t so easy to understand, as it is abbreviated and includes needs must, which is an semi-archaic fixed phrase meaning “necessity compels”. The Shakespearean wording makes the meaning clearer: if the devil drives you, you have no choice but to go, or in other words, sometimes events compel you to do something you would much rather not. Copy Link to Clipboard Share Post on Facebook Share Post on Twitter Re: ...must needs..;. #124712 03/07/2004 3:03 PM Joined: Dec 2000 Posts: 13,803 Faldage Carpal Tunnel Faldage Carpal Tunnel Joined: Dec 2000 Posts: 13,803 Don't have quite the breath control to dive into that sentence and come up alive on the other end, but I've always taken the phrase must needs to mean must, of necessity. Is that what you're looking for Dr Bill? Copy Link to Clipboard Share Post on Facebook Share Post on Twitter Re: ...must needs..;. #124713 03/07/2004 3:35 PM Joined: Jan 2001 Posts: 13,858 wwh Carpal Tunnel wwh Carpal Tunnel Joined: Jan 2001 Posts: 13,858 Dear Faldage: my problem was that I didn't recognize a quote from Shakespeare, and was unable to construe it as modern English. Copy Link to Clipboard Share Post on Facebook Share Post on Twitter Moderated by  Jackie  Hop To General Topics ------  Information and announcements  Q&A about words  Wordplay and fun  Words and languages in schools  Miscellany  Weekly Themes  Looking for (writers, speakers,... (Old) Weekly themes. (have been... ------  Words from medicine  Beheading words  Meta-words  Words from classical mythology  Animal Safari  Words with unusual etymologies  Eponyms or words derived from p...  Loanwords from German  English as a global language Print Thread Switch to Threaded Mode Show Likes Link Copied to Clipboard View Profile Private Message Follow User Forum Posts Like Summary View Profile Private Message Follow User Forum Posts Like Summary View Profile Private Message Website Follow User Forum Posts Like Summary View Profile Private Message Follow User Forum Posts Like Summary

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