58 Philosophical Society of London, 



In commencing his sixth lecture, Mr. Wright particU. 

 larised the most prominent defects and difficulties of speech 

 which strike us in others, or affect ourselves. He seemed 

 decidedly of opinion, that norte of these arise (with certain 

 individual exceptions) from natural malconformation, but 

 are the result of the bad example which persons may have 

 had in their early childhood. " Children receive the first 

 impressions of language by imitation, and are sure to copy 

 articulate defects of mothers, nurses, and any who may be 

 suffered to prattle their ' soft nonsense' to them. I repeat, 

 (he continued) that the greater part of solecisms and im- 

 pediments originate in the indolence, or ignorance, of per- 

 sons concerned in the management of children." 



Precise directions for the obviating these faults of articu- 

 lation followed, of somewhat too diffuse^a^nature for our 

 recollection ; but from the attention the learned gentleman 

 appears to have devoted to the physiological branch of his 

 profession, we readily confide in their efficacy. After citing 

 the well-known and illustrious example of Demosthenes, 

 whose ardent and unwearied genius surmounted every im- 

 pediment of nature or habit, Mr. Wright delivered a strong 

 exhortation to the student to persevere in his arduous task. 

 Having dismissed the topic of impediments in articula- 

 tion, the lecturer proceeded to give an important view of 

 the necessity of a due adjustment of accentuation, which 

 he pronounced inseparable from the art of persuasion.— 

 *' Accentuation has been defined by grammarians to bear 

 the same relation to words as emphases do to sentences ; 

 but, as there are many words in sentences unaccentuated, 

 and whole sentences unmarked by emphases, our gram- 

 matical definition of accentuation is therefore imperfect — 

 * Exercise and temperance strengthen the constitution.* 

 *And' and 'the' are words without accents ; and as there 

 is no opposition in the sentence, (emphasis suggesting the 

 idea of contradistinction,) neither of the words is emphatic. 

 Now if we call *(Exerci»e|' a simple word, ' land temper- 

 anccl' a rhetorical word,* tsJrengthtni' another simple word, 

 and 'I the consiitution|' another rhetorical word, we perceive 

 the propriety of calling accentuation a sudden upward or 

 downward percussion of the voice, distinguishable not in all 

 words, but in those classes above denominated simple and 

 rhetorical. The term simple seems properly to apply to 

 such words as are pronounced with established accentua- 

 tion, whilt the latter suitably adheres to a certain principle 

 pf combination." 

 *' The regulation of accent and quantity as applied to 



word-S 



