344 On the Sterns of an tJmverfal or PhUofiphkal Language. 



of experiments, fuch a-s the weight of the air, &c. If we open his book on the proprrerg 

 of the fciences, we fliall find the notion of a pafigraphy in the chapter entitled The Inflru- 

 ment of Difcourfe. " It is pofTibleto invent fuch figns," fays he, " for the communication 

 of our thoughts, that people of different languages may, by tliis means, untlerflaad each 

 other ; and that each may read immediately, in his own language, a book which fliall be 

 written in another." But Bacon did not think of confining this to twelve charafters : on 

 the contrary, he requires a gieat number, at lead as many as the number of radical words j 

 on which head he quotes the example of the Chinefe ; " and although," adds he, " our 

 alphabet may appear more commodious than this method of writing, the thing itfelf is never- 

 thelefs well deferving of attention. The problem relates to the fignsby wliich thoughtb may 

 be rendered current ; and as money may be ftruck of other materials as well as gold and 

 filver, it is polhble likewife to difcover other figns of things as well as letters and words*." 



Des Cartes, in his third letter to father Mcrfennus, difcufles the invention of a French- 

 man, whom he does not name, but who, by means of a certain language and an artificial 

 writing, pretended to underfland all the different idioms. He remarks on this fubje£t, that 

 it would be very poflible to compofe a fhort and convenient grammar, with general figns» 

 which {liould render all foreign languages intelligible. Here are already two works on the 

 pafigraphic art ; but we fhall proceed to exhibit circumflances of a more pofitive nature. 



In the year i66i, John Joachim Becher publifhed a Latin folio, the title of which was 

 *' Charaflers for the Univerfal Knowledge of Languages: a Steganographic Invention 1 itherto 

 unheard of" t« This unheard of invention was no other thing than what is now announced 

 to us under the name of Pafigraphy ; it is a method of making one's felf underftood by all 

 foreigners by writing in one's own language, and alfo of comprehending what they write in 

 theirs. It was truly at that time a thing unheard of ; for Becher, being the firfl; who had 

 given a complete treatife on this art, may be confidered as the inventor. He begins hia 

 work by a fet of very delicate and highly interefting obfervations upon general grammar, 

 and the fundamental relations of all languages with regard to each other. He gives a 

 learned comparative table of the relations and harmony of the Latin, the Greek, the He- 

 brew, the Arabian, the Sclavonian, the French, and the German. This work cannot be 

 too highly efteemed, and afl'uredly was not unknown to the author of the work Du tnonde 

 primitif. A Latin diiSionary then follows, in which every word correfponds with one or 

 more Arabic numeral figures arbitrarily taken. Every number is aflumed as diftinftive, 

 or denoting the fame word in all languages ; and confequcntly nothing more is required 

 than to compofe a diftionary for each, finiilar to that which he has given for the Latin. 

 There is likewife a table of declenfions and conjugations, which prefents certain determi- 

 nate numbers for all the cafes, moods, tenfes, or perfons. By means of this general difpo- 

 Ction, when a Frenchman is defirous of writing to a German the following phrafe, La 

 guerre ijl un grand mal (war is a great evil), he feeks in his index, guerre^ etre, gratid, mal \ 

 and he writes the correfpondent numbers, 



J3) 33» 67, 68. 



♦ T have tranflated from ray original, infleaJ of recurring to the book of chancellor Bacon, which I do not 

 pcffefs The paffages marked as quotation, are not therefore the words of Bacon, but his fenfe. N. 



f The author has not given thcLatin title of this work. I have therefore tranflated his Freneh title word 

 lor word. N. 



The 



