Chap.XIV. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 27T 



that I mean melody and rhythm, fuch as that of the Greek language; 

 of which I have fpoken at great length in the fecond volume of the 

 Origin of Language *. But it was not peculiar to the Greek lan- 

 guage, but common to all the antient languages of art, fuch as the 

 Latin, and a language much more antient than either the t]treek or 

 Latin ; I mean the antient language of Egypt, which w as carried 

 to India, as I fhall (how in the fequel of this work, where it is ftill 

 preferved in the Shanfcrit language. It was alfo in the Hebrew 

 language : And it found its way acrofs the Atlantic to North Ameri- 

 ca ; where the favages, as we call them, at this day fpeak both 

 with melody and rhythm f. The Chinefe language is fo much a 

 mufical language, that it is by mufiCcd tones chiefly that it diftin- 

 guifnes the fignifications of its monofyllables ; fo that, by words not 

 exceeding 330 in number, it has contrived to exprefs all the things 

 belonging to a hfe of civility and art. But there is this material 

 difference betwixt the mufic of the Chinefe and of the Greek lan- 

 guage, that the tones in the Chinefe rife or fall above or below one 

 another, at once, as in the common mufic, fo that the intervals 

 betwixt them are perceptible by the ear; which makes their fpeakin<r 

 very much refemble chanting or fmging : Whereas the melody of 

 the Greek language proceeds by Hides, rifmg in that way to s. fifth, 

 and defcending in the fame way to the common level of fpeech ; 

 which muft have given to the pronunciation of that language a moil 

 beautiful flow, luitable to the nature of language, and dilHnguifli- 

 ing the mufic of it from common mufic. Befides thefe advantages, 

 which the mufic of the Greek language has over the Chinefe, it has 

 rhythm and the difl:lndion of long and Ihort fyllables, of v.'hich I 

 could obferve little or nothing in what I heard fpoken of the Chi- 

 nefe : 



* Book 2. chap, 4. 5. & 6. 



f See upon the fubjeft of the mufic of language, p. 117. and the paflages there re- 

 ferred to. — As to the melody of the languages of America, fee vol. VI. of Origin of 

 Language, p. 132. 



