Death of a Language

I was contemplating this evening, while consuming a few morsels from my 'dragons hoard' chocolate stash, how the words 'divine' and 'sinful' are almost never used now - except on dessert packaging. In that context they serve as interchangable synonyms meaning "very nice" or as the child in us would say "yummy". Anyone who is doubtful of the fact that the English language is decaying should pay attention to this one example (among many) of very powerful words being literally degraded. We are losing our ability to say anything strongly, beautifully or tenderly. In our race to find grander (and more exaggerated) superlatives, expletives and epithets we are making our speech so grossly overblown and nonsensical that we'll one day soon, I fear, cease to be able to outdo ourselves and will descend into 'communicating' in meaningless heritage-stripped emotion-driven reason-bereft babble. Not only this, but we are losing functionality as well. Can I have that last sausage we'll say; of course you can - it's sitting in front of you and there's nothing wrong with your fine motor skills. What we should ask is May I . . . But that mode of talking has been banished; it sounds too subservient, too humble (and the final deathblow while it lies on the ground - ) too old fashioned. There was a reason that people spoke as they did; contrary to the assumptions of many they weren't just trying to be posh or snobbish. They had important things to say, so they communicated them clearly, reasonably and truely. I'm not saying that they never lied or exaggerated, but merely that the language they used was appropriate to the ideas they wished to convey. This was true not so long ago. We have come a long way, but it is not a one way street. We can win back our speech and with it our minds, for we think as we speak, not the reverse. But it will be difficult and we will have to want to.