LAXGU \GES OF THE BURMA EMPIRE. £-21 



dictionaries, it is by no means the leaft affinity ; for 

 our organs being only capable of pronouncing a cer- 

 tain, and that a very limited number of founds, it is 

 to be expected, according to the common courfc of 

 chance, that two nations.,- in a few inftances, will ap- 

 ply the fame found to cxprefs the fame idea. It ought 

 alio to be obferved, that in tracing the radical affini- 

 ties of languages, terms of art, men's names, religious 

 and law phrafes, are, of all words, the moft improper ; 

 as they arc liable conflantly to be communicated by 

 adventitious circumftances from one race of men to 

 another. What connection of blood have we, Euro- 

 peans, with the Jews, from whom a very great propor- 

 tion of our names and religious terms are derived ? Or 

 what connection have the natives of Bengal with th« 

 Arabs or Rnglijh, from whom they have derived moil 

 of their law and political terms ? With the former they 

 have not even had political connection ; as the phrafes 

 in queilion.were derived to them through the medium 

 of the Per/Jans and Tartars. Two languages, there- 

 fore, ought only to be conlidered as radically the fame, 

 when,, of a certain number of common words chofen by 

 accident, the greater number have a clear and diftincl 

 refemblance. A circumftance, to which, if antiqua- 

 rians had been attentive, they would have been laved 

 from the greater part of that etymological folly, which 

 has fo often expofed their pleaiing fcience to the juft 

 ridicule of mankind. 



In the orthography I have had much difficulty. 

 Two people will feldom write in the fame way, any 

 word or language with which they are unacquainted. 

 I have attempted merely to convey to the Rjigl'ijh 

 reader, without any minute attention to accent, or 

 fmall variations of vowels, a found fimilar to that 

 pronounced ; nor have I paid any attention 

 to the orthography of the natives. This, in the 

 Burma language, I might have done; but as I am. 

 not acquainted with the writing of tlie other tribes I 



O 3 thought 



