Particularly of the LETTER 2 IF MA. 139 



If a farther apology ftill be requifite for a long difcourfe upon 

 a fubje(3 feemingly fo frivolous as a fingle letter, I might deny 

 that the fubjedl is frivolous. Nothing, it might be faid, is fri- 

 volous, which has for its obje6l an inveftigation into the moft 

 minute caufes of the cultivation of that faculty, vsrhich, next 

 to our intellectual powers, is the mod important the human 

 fpecies enjoys ; without which indeed our intelledtual powers 

 themfelves would, in a great meafure, be deflitute of the means 

 of improvement, but with the elegant and corredl ufe of which, 

 elegance and corredlnefs in fcience muil ever go hand in band. 

 I may add, that it is an exercife furely of no illiberal fort, to 

 explore, and to produce to view, thofe marks of minute atten- 

 tion which the mofl accomplifhed people in the world beftowed 

 upon the conftituent elements of their language, and which 

 contributed to render that language of all others the nobleft in 

 every refped, and to all thofe who attain to a knowledge of it, 

 the objed of enthufiaftic admiration. 



P A R T II. 



ALTHOUGH the letter STy^M-a be of fuch eflential ufe in 

 the infledlions of the Greek language, as I have endea- 

 voured to explain, yet when it happens, either in profe or in 

 poetry, to be frequently introduced without neceflity, the re- 



S 2 peated 



' imo addo, Imperatores. Me s sal a orator, e clariffiml Corvordm gente, non librum 

 integrum De unica literJ S compofuit ? et cum laude quidem nominis fui, adeo fine 

 fraude. Claddhts Imperator, quanta cura, et paenfe dicam ambitione, tre? novas 

 literas invexit. iifque Romanam linguam auxit ? non alia, quam fi totidem regnis im- 

 perii fines. Jam Caesar ille Julius De Ana/ogia. id eft de infimis Grammaticorum 

 ineptiis, binos libros conicripfit : et triumphales illas epulas variare et interllinguere 



' non erubuit fchoUca iftS dape." Lipsios de reSia prenunc. Ling, Lat. 



