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modi, quæ justum volumen complere possint. Non abs re igitur fuerit Grammaticam Philosophantem a Simplici et Literaria distinguere, et Desideratam ponere.

Ad Grammaticam etiam pertinere judicamus omnia illa quæ verbis quoquo modo accidunt, qualia sunt Sonus, Mensura, Accentus. At prima illa literarum simplicium cunabula (nempe qua percussione linguæ, qua apertura oris, qua adductione labiorum, quo nisu gutturis, singularum literarum sonus generetur) ad Grammaticam non pertinent, sed portio sunt Doctrinæ de Sonis, sub Sensu et Sensibili tractanda. Sonus, de quo loquimur, Grammaticus ad Euphonias tantum pertinet et Dysphonias. Illarum quædam communes sunt. Nulla enim est lingua, quin vocalium concurrentium hiatus aut consonantium concurrentium asperitates aliquatenus refugiat. Sunt et aliæ respectivæ, quæ scilicet diversorum populorum auribus gratæ aut ingratæ accedunt. Græca lingua diphthongis scatet; Latina longe parcius. Lingua Hispanica literas tenues odit, easque statim vertit in medias.1 Linguæ quæ ex Gothis fluxere aspiratis gaudent.2 Multa sunt ejusmodi: verum hæc ipsa fortasse plus satis.

there are in Sanscrit past tenses corresponding to the Greek aorists and perfects, yet the accuracy of logical discrimination which appropriates the latter to the completed action belongs to Greek only; so too of the appropriation of the imperfect to express an uncompleted action. See Bopp, Comparative Grammar, § 513.

1 This is somewhat overstated. The Spanish generally retains the Latin tenuis at the beginning of words and often in the middle. The tendency to the flattening Bacon mentions is most marked in the case of p and b. See Diez, Grammatik der Romanischen Sprachen, i. 252., for a general table of consonantal changes in the Roman tongues. A remarkable peculiarity in Spanish is the substitution of h (now dropped in pronunciation) for the Latin f at the beginning of words. It is not however universal, and belongs to a comparatively latè period of the language, no trace of it being found, according to Diez, in the poem of the Cid.

2 Bacon no doubt refers to High and Low German. The Gothic itself

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At Mensura Verborum ingens nobis corpus artis peperit, Poësim scilicet, non quatenus ad materiam (de qua supra) sed quatenus ad stilum et figuram verborum; versus nimirum sive carmina. Circa quæ ars habetur quasi pusilla, exempla accedunt grandia et infinita. Neque tamen ars illa (quam Prosodiam Grammatici appellant) ad carminum genera et mensuras edocendas tantum restringi debeat. Adjicienda enim sunt præcepta, quod carminum genus cuique materiæ sive subjecto optime conveniat. Antiqui heroïca carmina historiis et encomiis applicaverunt; elegos querimoniis ; iambos invectivis; lyricos odis et hymnis. Neque hæc prudentia recentioribus poëtis in linguis propriis defuit. Illud reprehendendum, quod quidam antiquitatis nimium studiosi linguas modernas ad mensuras antiquas (heroïcas, elegiacas, sapphicas, &c.) traducere conati sunt;1 quas ipsarum linguarum fabrica respuit, nec minus aures exhorrent. In hujusmodi rebus sensus

judicium artis præceptis præponendum; ut ait ille,

Cœnæ fercula nostræ

Mallem convivis quam placuisse cocis.2

commonly called Moso-Gothic, but which might perhaps be as fitly called Italian-Gothic, as the existing remains of it belong probably to Italy in the time of Theodoric and his successors is much less charged with aspirates than the tongues which claim descent from it. The last editor of Ulphilas, after pointing out the prevalence of liquids and tenues, observes rather fancifully: "Our ancestors were not a mountain people; they must have dwelt on plains under a moist, mild climate." The analogy of Gothic with Sanscrit is very striking. Bopp remarks: "When I read the venerable Ulphilas, I feel as if I were reading Sanscrit."

1 This affectation prevailed about the same time in France and Italy, and a little later in England. Jodelle was the first person, according to Pasquier, who produced a French hexameter and pentameter.

Augustus von Schlegel, in his Indische Bibliothek, has an interesting essay on this subject, especially with respect to the Greek hexameter. He endeavours to determine the modifications necessary in order that it may be really naturalised in modern languages.

2 Mart. ix. 83.

Neque vero ars est, sed artis abusus, cum illa naturam non perficiat sed pervertat. Verum quod ad Poësim attinet, (sive de fabulis sive de metro loquamur) est illa (ut superius diximus) tanquam herba luxurians, sine semine nata, ex vigore ipsius terræ germinans. Quare ubique serpit, et latissime diffusa est; ut supervacuum foret de defectibus ejus sollicitum esse. De illa igitur cura est abjicienda. Quod vero ad Accentus Verborum, nil opus est de re tam pusilla dicere; nisi forte illud quis notatu dignum putet, quod accentus Verborum exquisite, accentus autem Sententiarum neutiquam in observationem venit. Attamen illud fere universo generi humano commune est, ut vocem in fine periodi submittant, in interrogatione elevent, et alia hujusmodi non pauca. Atque de Grammaticæ parte, quæ ad Locutionem spectat, hactenus.

Quod ad Scriptionem attinet, ea aut Alphabeto Vulgari perficitur (quod ubique recipitur), aut Occulto et Privato, de quo inter singulos convenit; quod Ciphras vocant. At Orthographia Vulgaris etiam controversiam et quæstionem nobis peperit; utrum scilicet eodem verba scribere oporteat quo pronunciantur modo, an potius ex more consueto? At illa scriptio quæ reformata videri possit, (ut scilicet scriptio pronunciationi consona sit,) est ex genere inutilium subtilitatum. Nam et ipsa pronunciatio quotidie gliscit, nec constans est ; et derivationes verborum, præsertim ex linguis extraneis, prorsus obscurantur. Denique cum ex more recepto scripta morem pronunciandi nullo modo impediant, sed liberam relinquant, quorsum attinet ista novatio?1

1 Every living language is continually changing; and the orthography gradually follows changes of pronunciation. But to make the pronunciation of the present moment the standard of orthography is to set aside as far as possible the historical element in the development of the language,

Ad Ciphras igitur veniendum. Earum genera haud pauca sunt: Ciphræ simplices; Ciphræ non-significanand thus greatly to diminish its value as a record of the progress of human thought, not to mention the effect which such a system would have in making works composed before the era of the last reformation unintelligible.

[I cannot help thinking that Bacon would have pronounced a less confident judgment on this question, if it had occurred to him that a system of notation might be contrived which should not only represent the pronunciation of the particular time, but accompany all changes of pronunciation which time might introduce; so that the written word should be at all times a true description of the spoken word. For this purpose, nothing more is required than an alphabet containing as many distinct characters as there are distinguishable elementary sounds in the language, so that the same sound may always be represented by the same character or combination of characters, and no combination of characters may be used to represent more than one combination of sounds. Against a reform of orthography founded upon such a reconstruction of the alphabet, it appears to me that none of the objections either in the text or in the note can be justly urged. With regard to the history of the past, everything would remain as it is. A dictionary containing the old and new spelling of every word in the language would effectually preserve its etymological history (so far as our present orthography does preserve it) up to the present time. For the future, pronunciation would still be free to change, and orthography would still follow; but the changes of pronunciation would be less rapid and capricious, and the corresponding changes of orthography would be not gradual but immediate. Pronunciation would change, not according to fashion or accident, but according to the laws of nature; and each change would be registered as it came in the printed records of the language. All this would surely be a great advantage, whether we regard language as a medium of communication, for which it serves best when it is most uniform and constant, or as a record of the progress of human thought, for which it serves the better in proportion as capricious and accidental changes are excluded and natural changes marked and registered.

Bacon was probably thinking of some particular scheme proposed in his own day, in which the existing alphabet was to be used. Many such partial schemes of orthographical reform have been attempted from time to time, all of which may be justly condemned as "useless subtilties," not because the thing aimed at — ut scilicet scriptiv pronunciationi consona sit —

1 See, for an account of these ciphers, the appendix at the end of the volume. Bacon's biliteral cipher (see infrà, p. 422.) seems, as I have there pointed out, to be connected with one which had been given by Porta, which also depends on the principle of which the Electric Telegraph is now a familiar illustration, that any number of things may be denoted by combinations of two signs, as in the binary scale of numeration.

tibus characteribus intermixtæ; Ciphræ duplices literas uno charactere complexæ; Ciphræ Rotæ; Ciphræ Clavis; Ciphræ Verborum; aliæ. Virtutes autem in Ciphris requirendæ tres sunt; ut sint expeditæ, non nimis operosæ ad scribendum; ut sint fidæ, et nullo modo. pateant ad deciphrandum; addo denique, ut, si fieri possit, suspicione vacent. Si enim epistolæ in manus eorum devenient qui in eos qui scribunt, aut ad quos scribuntur, potestatem habeant, tametsi Ciphra ipsa fida sit et deciphratu impossibilis, tamen subjicitur hæc res examini et quæstioni; nisi Ciphra sit ejusmodi, quæ

would be useless if accomplished, but because, without such a reconstruction of the alphabet as should enable us to assign to each distinct sound a distinct character, the thing cannot be accomplished. With an alphabet of only twenty-six letters, it is impossible to make the spelling of English represent the pronunciation, because there are more than twenty-six distinct sounds used in English speech. It has recently been shown, however, that with an alphabet of only forty letters, every sound used in speaking good English may be represented accurately enough for all practical purposes; and a few more would probably include all the sounds of all the classical languages in Europe.

Two or three alphabets of this kind have been suggested within the last hundred years. There was one proposed by Benjamin Franklin, another by Dr. William Young, another by Sir John Herschell. But the first serious attempt to bring such an alphabet into general use, and fairly to meet and overcome all the practical as well as all the theoretical difficulties, was made by Mr. Alexander Ellis and Mr. Isaac Pitman in 1848. And there can be no doubt that by means of their alphabet every English word now in use may be so written that the spelling shall contain a sufficient direction for the pronunciation. Nor is there any reason to apprehend that it would ever be necessary to remodel it, since, however the fashion of pronunciation may change, it is not likely that any new elementary sounds will be developed; and therefore, though we might have to spell some of our words differently, we should still be able to spell them out of the same alphabet.

As for the fear that, if such a reformation were adopted, works composed previously would become unintelligible, it has been ascertained by many experiments that children who have learned to read books printed phonetically in the new alphabet easily teach themselves to read books printed in the ordinary way; and therefore, even if the new system should become universal for all new books, no one would have any difficulty in mastering the old ones.-J. S.]

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