text:  He will also see that the termination _ness_ has not the ridiculous meaning assigned it by the learned namely "the top or the foot of a hill" (I forget which ) but that it literally means _the being_ (_en-esse_ ) so that _happiness_ was first _en-esse-happy_ (the being happy the thing happy ) after which _en-esse_ became contracted to _ness_ and so fell behind happy making _happiness_