Hieroghjphical Fragments, 93 



and on the character of the English language, which seems to 

 approach, in its simplicity, as you have yourself observed, to 

 the natural structure of the oldest languages, immediately 

 related to the hieroglyphical form of representation. I fear, 

 however, that I must apologize to you for the want of method 

 with which I shall be obliged at present to throw my fragments 

 together: but it may be allowable to make some difference 

 between a letter and a finished essay. 



Hieroglyphics, in their primitive form, are scarcely to be 

 considered in any case as simply a mode of expressing an oral 

 language : they may be a direct and independent representation 

 of our thoughts, that is, of recollections, or sentiments, or 

 intentions, collateral to the representation of the same thoughts 

 by the language of sounds. We find, in many of the Egyptian 

 monuments, a double expression of the same sense : first, a 

 simple picture, for instance, of a votary presenting a vase to a 

 sitting deity ; each characterized by some peculiarity of form, 

 and each distinguished also by a name written over him ; and 

 this may be called a pure hieroglyphical representation, though 

 it scarcely amounts to a language, any more than the look of 

 love is a language of a lover. But we universally find that 

 the tablet is accompanied by a greater variety of characters 

 which certainly do constitute a language, although we know 

 little or nothing of the sounds of that language ; but its import 

 is, that ** such a king offers a vase to the deity;" and on the 

 other side, that " the deity grants to the king health and 

 strength, and beauty and riches, and dominion and power." It 

 is common to see, in these inscriptions, a number of characters 

 introduced, which are evidently identical with some of those 

 in the tablets: and however some of them may occasion- 

 ally have been employed phonetically, there can be no question 

 of the nature of the changes which their employment must 

 have gone through before they assumed the character of sounds : 

 but this is altogether a separate consideration, and foreign to 

 the present purpose. 



Now it is obvious that objects, delineated with the intention 

 of representing the originals to the eye by their form, must 

 necessarily be nouns substantive ; and that the picture, con- 

 taining no verb whatever, can scarcely be said to constitute 



