Ae Me Ue. S: 27s 
Ne 
“ however, are mutes: b he fays, is no letter—-J think he 
aight have claffed it with his mutes; at the idea of fpeak- 
ing and hearing of which, reafon revolts.—If 4 be rejeted 
asaletter, merely ‘becaufe it is a mark of afpiration, th 
k,p, ¢and © ought as well to be omitted, becaufe they are 
only marks of afpiration: ©, f, ©, s are alfo afpirates, but 
more forcibly made than the former. If a letter” 
neceflary to mark the fimpleft afpirate, there is 
rence between heating a cake and eating it; but 
a dot be neceflary to mark it, and if in every other inftance 
that dot have the fame fignification, it would be as much 
a letter as any other chara@ter; for every mark which is 
pronounced, diftinguifhing thereby one word from another, 
is really a letter, becaufe, it fubje€ts to the eye what the ear 
requires of the voice.—I do not however confider accents, 
‘of which the French and fome other nations are fo liberal, 
as letters, but as notes by which the high found of par- 
ticular letters may be direGted. 
He makes nine vowels—but there does not appear to 
‘be any difference between the found of his fecond a, as in 
hate, and his firft e as in bet, exceptin length; for, fub- 
ftitute the laft for the firft, and the word et will make by 
prolongation Aeet, written at prefent bate-—His third ¢ 
as in beer, appears to be precifely the firft z as in fit, for by 
lengthening the z in ft we make fit, written feet; (beer, 
biar; beet, biz,) nor can we make it otherwife. 
He follows the Scotch mode of naming the confonants, 
by placing before each a common vowel, inftead of adopt- 
ing the more irrational plan of the Englifh, who fome= 
times put the vowel before, and fometimes after the cha- 
racter to give it a mame: but here is the rock of error, 
upon which all grammarians have ftruck, who have at- 
tempted to give a rational account of the formation of lan- 
Mm 2 guage, 
