Cc A@aMmins 301 
rates, have fuch particular affinities, not only with each 
other, but with fome of the other letters, that it is not 
difficult to compofe fyllables which contain fix different 
letters, joined by a fingle common vowel only; but, as foon 
as the voice has glided through a certain unity of founds, 
every additional change becomes another fyllable.. When a 
word, of two or three fyltables, is compofed of any of the 
ftopt founds and their afpirates,. they are pronounced in 
the firft fyllable as the organs /eave the pofitions ufed in 
producing thefe founds; .and in the fecond fyllable they. 
form the foundsas they advance to, and juft before they 
arrive at, their true pofitions; the third fyllable takes ano- 
ther flexion, and islike the firft, &c. as in. gib--bak--kad--. 
dupt. By this, feveral hiatus: are avoided, though the. 
fyllables divide themfelves naturally, and without effort. 
There appear to be lawsto govern the divifion of words,. 
if we examine fome; for there are few nations which have 
adopted a particular fet of letters, that would not make the. 
fame divifions if certain words were prefented; again,. 
there are words that would not. warrant any fuch conclu- 
fion; therefore we muft confider their divifion. into fylla-. 
bles, arbitrary inmany inftances; and a multiplicity of rules: 
would.rather perplex and confound, than enlighten. . 
ACCENTS; . 
Ought only to be placed where a ftrefs of the voice is 
abfolutely requifite, to denote.a difference in the letter or 
fyllable, and which would otherwife be unintelligible, or 
would give a.difgufting tone; but if words be* properly 
written 
Tt is faid, in an extract from the journals of the Royal Society, refpecting a letter froma Jefuie 
at Pekin in China (Philofophical Tranfactions, Vol. 59, page 494) that ‘‘the Chinefe 
«“tongue counts but about 330 words.—From hence the Europeans conclude, that it is barren, 
‘¢-monotone, andhard to underftand. But they ought to know that the four accents called—~ 
‘ping, uni (even), chung, élevé (raifed), iv diminué (Jeffened), jou, rentrant, (returning ), 
Stigyltiply almoft every word into feur, by an inflexion of voice which it is as difficult to make 
‘ 
an ~ 
