Those old latin roots

It's a pity they dropped teaching latin roots, because they give great insight into the proper meaning of so many of our everyday words.

I am (not) surprised at how frequently today "humility" is regarded as belonging to someone of a shrinking violet personality.

The latin root is "humus", ground or earth.  Hence a humble person is one who is grounded, down to earth, feet on the ground.  Nothing shrinking violet about that!  A humble person is one who knows his(her) place in the scheme of things, who has a realistic opinion of him(her)self, and sees the world with unbiased view.

Interestingly, the word has declined in use in English.  Google tracks its peak of use in 1825.  In 2000 it was used with less than 10% of the frequency in 1825.  Clearly not a virtue of choice in today's world!