1820.] Invention of Alphabetic Writing. 365 



pound, not having another sound of sufficient resemblance with 

 Ihich to compare^t. He would, therefore, proceed to the next 

 soundm«, and would find ample scope for his sagacity in compar- 

 ing it with the six succeeding sounds : ca, ta, fa, la na, ra; 

 and surely it would not require the inspiration of heaven to 

 enable him to discover on comparing them that the sound a 

 existed in each, combined with another sound which could riot 

 be articulated without it. These indistinct sounds his mind could, 

 however, embrace and discriminate. To make sure of his dis- 

 covery he would affix a character to each, as well as to the arti- 

 culate sound with which it was combined ; and the first fruits of 

 his labour would be the letters a, m, c t,f I n r. 1 he disco- 

 very of the last mentioned letter would enable him to return to 

 the analysis of the sound which he passed over at first ; and as 

 he had succeeded in finding that ra was composed of the sounds 

 indicated by an r and an a, he would readily perceive that Ar, 

 the first syllable of Arma, was but a transposition of the same 

 sounds in the order a, r. ,. , • ^ .■ ^ „^„ 



This minute circumstance can be but little interesting at pre- 

 sent • yet no doubt it was of the highest importance to the 

 inventor of the alphabet ; for it furnished him with a test to 

 discover whether a sound were simple or compound. In attempt- 

 ing to repeat in every possible way any one of those sounds that 

 have since been called vowels, it still remains the same, and 

 cannot be inverted. It is, therefore, a simple sound. But 

 combine it with another, and the compound admits of an easy 

 inversion : ma becomes am, la becomes al. Sec. Atter this ms- 

 covery, the only difficulty that could occur in considering the 

 first column would be the analysis of syllables composed of three 

 Bounds. The first that presents itself is ram, the last syllable ot 

 iram, and this is no longer a difficulty. It has already been 

 analyzed ; and the sounds of which it is composed arranged in 

 the incipient alphabet under the characters r, a, m. 



The same simple procedure would unrave the mysteries of 

 the remaining four columns. To every sound he would affix its 

 appropriate mark ; and to every mark he would assign but the 

 power of representing one sound. No d.pthongs would enter 

 into his system. They appear it is true in the verses selected 

 from Virgil. But the 'Romans did not invent their own alpha- 

 bet; they borrowed it from the Greeks, as the Greeks borrowed 

 theirs from the Phoenicians ; who, it may be said, are indebted 

 for their alphabet to the Hebrews, as the old Hebrew or Sama- 

 ritan characters are nearly the same as the Phoenician It may 

 still, however, be considered a disputable point whether these 

 people did no[ communicate their alphabet to the Hebrews as 

 well as to the Greeks. But the original inventor of the alphabet, 

 whatever was his country, would naturally mark every sound m 

 his language by a single character; and those which are distm- 



