148 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



of them hath produced the science of grammar. For 

 man still strive th to reintegrate himself in those bene- 

 dictions, from which by his fault he hath been deprived ; 

 and as he hath striven against the first general curse by 

 the invention of all other arts, so hath he sought to come 

 forth of the second general curse (which was the con- 

 fusion of tongues) by the art of grammar ; whereof the 

 use in a mother tongue is small, in a foreign tongue 

 more ; but most in such foreign tongues as have ceased 

 to be vulgar tongues, and are turned only to learned 

 tongues. The duty of it is of two natures : the one 

 popular, which is for the speedy and perfect attaining 

 languages, as well for intercourse of speech as for 

 understanding of authors ; the other philosophical, 

 examining the power and nature of words, as they are 

 the footsteps and prints of reason : which kind of 

 analogy between words and reason is handled sparsim, 

 brokenly though not entirely ; and therefore I cannot 

 report it deficient, though I think it very worthy to be 

 reduced into a science by itself. 



5. Unto grammar also belongeth, as an appendix, the 

 consideration of the accidents of words ; which are 

 measure, sound, and elevation or accent, and the 

 sweetness and harshness of them ; whence hath issued 

 some curious observations in rhetoric, but chiefly poesy, 

 as we consider it, in respect of the verse and not of the 

 argument. Wherein though men in learned tongues 

 do tie themselves to the ancient measures, yet in modern 

 languages it seemeth to me as free to make new mea- 

 sures of verses as of dances : for a dance is a measured 

 pace, as a verse is a measured speech. In these things 

 the sense is better judge than the art ; 



Coenae fercula nostrae 

 Mallem convivis quam placuisse cocis. 



And of the servile expressing antiquity in an unlike 

 and an unfit subject, it is well said, ' Quod tempore 

 antiquum videtur, id incongruitate est maxime novum.' 



6. For ciphers, they are commonly in letters, or 

 alphabets, but may be in words. The kinds of ciphers 



