Nice

Archdeacon Hare remarks of the use, or rather misuse, of this word: "That stupid vulgarism by which we use the word nice to denote almost every mode of approbation, for almost every variety of quality, and, from sheer poverty of thought, or fear of saying anything definite, wrap up everything indiscriminately in this characterle domino, speaking at the same breath of a nice cheese-cake, a nice tragedy, a nice sermon, a nice day, a nice country, as if a universal deluge of niaiserie —for nice seems originally to have been only niais —had whelmed the whole island." Nice is as good a word as any other in its place, but its place is not everywhere. We talk very properly about a nice distinction, a nice discrimination, a nice calculation, a nice point, and about a person's being nice , and over- nice , and the like; but we certainly ought not to talk about "Othello's" being a nice tragedy, about Salvini's being a nice actor, or New York bay's being a nice harbor. [23]