Today’s podictionary word brought to you by GoToMeeting. Try it free for 30 days by following the link www.gotomeeting.com/podcast Today enthusiasm is a good thing. Employers want their workers to be enthusiastic, teachers want their students to enthusiastic, parents want their children to be enthusiastic about one thing while kids want their parents to be enthusiastic about something else. I’m enthusiastic about etymology and I think that’s a good thing. But enthusiasm hasn’t always been greeted with such enthusiasm.  That’s because enthusiasm when it first arrived in English had a bit of a different meaning. The word enthusiasm comes from Greek and although you might not think so on the surface, it is a bit of a religious word. Inside the word enthusiasm is the Greek theos which also figures in the word theology. Theos means “god” so entheos means “god within.” In 1603 when this word was hauled into English from Latin there were tensions in English religious life.  Both sides held a bit of a feeling of “my way or the highway” and as The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy puts it, the word enthusiasm was used as a putdown to “Puritans, evangelicals, and low-church born-again zealots.” This was the more figurative meaning: they were “possessed by a god.” This derogatory meaning of enthusiasm persisted for a few centuries.  Scottish philosopher David Hume said that enthusiasts were “gloomy” and “hare-brained” and only got along with people who were as “delirious and dismal” as they were. Gradually the meaning of enthusiasm softened by being applied to less annoying people. Such is the way with words, they are sometimes applied to add strength to expression—like I’m a maniac for word histories—but when the strength isn’t actually there in the object, the word itself loses some of its edge. Having lived his live in moderation and gladly moved into retirement David Hume himself became a bit of an enthusiast, although not for religion. He was only saved by the death of a French nobleman. Hume was of moderately modest birth and rose to international fame on the strength of his writings. He prided himself in being levelheaded.  But in the 1760s he started getting fan mail from Marie-Charlotte Hippolyte de Campet de Saujon. Now Marie-Charlotte was one of the women of Paris who arranged salons where all the best and brightest French minds hung out, drank wine and had sparkling conversation. She liked his philosophizing and so did her friends. She also happened to be married to the Count of Boufflers and at the same time be the mistress of Louis François de Bourbon, prince de Conti. David Hume eventually went to Paris and at first was overwhelmed by the reception he got there. Everyone seemed to love him. He got used to the adulation and after a while imagined that the charming Marie-Charlotte loved him; he certainly seemed head over heels for her. His friends warned him he was acting the fool and he got offended, but before he could well and truly embarrass himself the count died and Marie-Charlotte set her cap to marry the prince de Conti. Less