30 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 



est of acquisition. Those who speak it belong to the most energetic of 

 all the races, and are everywhere, by might, or craft, or commercial 

 enterprise, or philanthropic action, rapidly extending the area over 

 which it is to be spoken. It is the language of liberty, of poetry, of 

 inventions. It should be made accessible to all. Rapp, a person 

 qualified to judge and to pronounce in the matter of languages, 

 says : — ' Although the French is become the common language, in 

 a diplomatic and social sense, it has never acquired a firm footing 

 in extensive regions out of Europe. The English, on the contrary, 

 may pass for the universal tongue out of Europe ; and by its bold 

 fusion and consequent decomposition of the forms of its Gothic and 

 Roman elements, this idiom has acquired an incomparable fluency, 

 and appears especially destined by nature, more than any one of the 

 living, to undertake that part. Were not the impediment of a bizarre, 

 antiquated orthography in the way, the universality of this language 

 would be still more apparent ; and it may, perhaps, be said to be for- 

 tunate for us other Europeans, that the Englishman has not made the 

 discovery.' * 



" The reform proposed by the author or authors of Phonotypy is 

 simply the laying down and carrying out this most philosophical prin- 

 ciple, — that each sound of the language should be re'presented by one 

 and only one sign, and that each sign should constantly represent one 

 sound. This principle is obviously the one on which every alphabet 

 should be formed, and it is therefore, as the basis of the reform, a 

 principle entirely satisfactory to the mind. 



" In the analysis of the sounds of the language, aid has been sought 

 and obtained from all accessible sources ; from Wilkins, Sir William 

 Jones, Dr. Franklin, Rapp, and especially Ellis ; from the alphabets of 

 other languages ; from the structure of the organs of articulation, and from 

 the construction of those ingenious philosophical instruments which have 

 been contrived to imitate the sounds of language. Professor Wheat- 

 stone, taking advantage of all which has been done by Kratzenstein, 

 Kempelen, and Professor Willis, contrived a simple tube, fitted with a 

 reed and blown by means of bellows, which, of a certain length, gave the 

 vowel I (ee) ; of another definite length, the vowel E (a) ; of another, the 

 vowel A (ah) ; of another, O; and of another, indefinite, U (oo) ; and 

 being gradually drawn out while blown, gave the series I, E, A, O, U, 



* K. M. Rapp, PhysioJogie der Sprache, as quoted by a writer in the Phonotyp- 

 ic Journal, Vol. III., p. 249. 



