Sanscrit Writing and Language. 83 



primary vocalization. There was, consequently, no other quarter from which he 

 could have learned the use of vowel designation except from Greek writing ; 

 and he, as well as the Jew, must have had his notions on the subject suggested 

 to him immediately from that writing. Accordingly, his translation of the Bible 

 affords very decisive evidence that, when he made it, he had only the Septuagint 

 version, and not the Hebrew Scriptures, in his possession ; and, in further cor- 

 roboration of this view af the case, it may be observed, that the vocal part of the 

 syllabic powers of his alphabet has an obvious affinity to the vowels of the Greek 

 system. For although all vowel sounds equally admit of an open and close state, 

 yet in both those systems the distinction is made in the denotation of only two of 

 them ; while one of the vowels so distinguished (e) is the same in each system, 

 and the total number of vowels In each is also the same. On the other hand, the 

 Ethiopic syllabary in its primitive state, it is plain, was derived either immediately 

 or remotely from the ancient Hebrew one. Before the vocalization of either 

 system had taken place their corresponding elements must evidently have been 

 used in the same manner with powers that were precisely similar ; and even still 

 above half of those elements are called by names that are very nearly the same. 

 The difference In the shapes of the characters Is no objection to this connexion 

 between the two alphabets ; some few of the corresponding ones are like each 

 other, when the more ancient forms of the Hebrew letters are referred to ; and If 

 still older elements of each series were extant, their similarity would probably be 

 yet more striking. Besides In tracing a connexion of the kind, we must look for 

 the proof of it far more in the powers than in the shapes of the characters which 

 are compared. Thus our numeric figures, though different in form from the 

 Indian ones, are on all sides admitted to be thence derived, because they are 

 employed in the same way, and their values are regulated by the same principle. 

 And still further It may upon this point be observed, that there are several 

 alphabets, confessedly derived from the Sanscrit one, from which, notwithstand- 

 ing, they wholly differ in the shapes of their letters. Again the difference 

 in the order of the letters of same name does not bear against the Hebrew 

 origin of the Ethiopic system ; for there is as great a difference at present in 

 point of arrangement between the Hebrew and Arabic letters which correspond 

 with each other, and yet from their being used with the same numeric powers, 

 it is plain that their order must likewise have originally been the same. 



L 2 



