Verbs from nouns: Ben Franklin's take

AUE now and then erupts with renewed outrage over the conversion of nouns to verbs. Remembering those outbursts, I find it interesting to read, in William Safire's "On Language" column in today s New York Times, about Benjamin Franklin's comments on that subject. He strongly disapproved of the nouns "notice", "advocate", and "progress" being converted to verbs.

Mr Safire's article is at http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/06/magazine/06ONLANGUAGE.html . `

When I read postings condemning the conversion of nouns, I like to recall that "shovel" was a noun for a long time before it was a verb.