ii8 ANALOGY of GREEK LErrERS; 



tongues has prevailed ever fince the early ages of the world; 

 .ind fuch of them as have ceafed to be fpoken would have foon 

 perifhed, had they not been committed to writing ; by which 

 means, fome of them have farvived the wreck of nations, and 

 the other vicilhtudes of human afHiirs. Of thefe, though 

 their genuine pronunciation be now, in a "great meafure, loft, 

 we are ftill able, after a confiderable degree of pains, not only 

 to underftand the meaning, but even to perceive the beauties ; 

 and, among the various forts of inftrudlion which they convey, 

 we derive from them many eflential advantages in improving 

 and polilhing our own language. 



To none have we been more indebted in thefe refpe(5ls, than 

 to the language of the ancient Greeks. As this is acknow- 

 ledged, by all who have fludied it, to be the moft perfe(5t*j 

 fo the analogy perceived from an attentive obfervation of its 

 flrudlure, even in the moft minute* parts, is of all others the 

 moft complete and beautiful. Whence the Greeks borrowed 

 their alphabet, which they ufed with fuch fuccefs, I am not 

 here to enquire. That it did not originate with themfelves, is 

 univerfally agreed among the learned f . But it is no lefs cer- 

 tain, 



» See Mr Harris's elegant encomium of the Greeks and their language, of which he 

 was the great and rational admirer. Hermes, Book HI. Chap. 5. Alfo, Dr Gregort 

 Sharpe, in the Preface to his Origin and StruBure of the Greek Tongue. 



\ It is the uniform opinion of ancient authors, that the Greek alphabet at firft con- 

 lifted only of fixteen letters, which were imported out of Phoenicia into Greece by the 

 celebrated Cadmus. [See Herodot. Terpftchor. cap. 58. 'Plutarch. 5)w/)o/; lib. 9. 

 Iren. lib. I. cap. 12. Lucan. Pharf. lib. HI. See alio, Dr Wilkins's KJjay,f. H.] 

 Thefe fixteen letters, called K-xiu.r,ix y^oifi^axas, and fometimes aii^ifrx Ka'fia, were the 

 two fliort vowels with the three «nf//i;>cj ,• the three fmooth and the three intermediate 

 mute confonants ; and the four liquids, with the folitary Tiyuo. Palamedes is faid to 

 have added the three afpirated mutes, and the double confonant Si, at the time of the 

 Trojan war. And Simonides is fuppofed afterwards to have invented the two other 

 double confonants and the two long vowels. See Montfaucon. P/j/<ro^r. Gr. p. 115, 

 116, ny. And fee an enumeration of the authors who have written on this fubjeft in 

 Theophili Christoph. Harles Introd. in Hiji, Ling. Gr. Proleg. p. viii. feqq. Alttn- 

 hurg. \']l'i. 8t;o. 



