II.] ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING. 191 



fore they have a vast multitude of characters, as many, I suppose, as 

 radical words. 



These notes of cogitations are of two sorts ; the one when the note 

 hath some similitude or congruity with . the notion ; the other ad 

 placitum, having force only by contract or acceptation. Of the former 

 sort are hieroglyphics and gestures. For as to hieroglyphics, things 

 of ancient use, and embraced chiefly by the /Egyptians, one of the 

 most ancient nations, they are but as continued impresses and 

 emblems. And as for gestures, they arc as transitory hieroglyphics, 

 and are to hieroglyphics as words spoken are to words written, in that 

 they abide not ; but they have evermore, as well as the other, an 

 affinity with the things signified ; as Pcriander, being consulted with, 

 how to preserve a tyranny newly usurped, bid the messenger attend 

 and report what he saw him do, and went into his garden and topped 

 all the highest flowers ; signifying, that it consisted in the cutting off 

 and keeping low of the nobility and grandees. Ad placitnm are the 

 characters real before mentioned, and words : although some have 

 been willing by curious inquiry, or rather by apt feigning, to have 

 derived imposition of names from reason and intendmcnt ; a specu 

 lation elegant, and, by reason it searcheth into antiquity, reverent ; 

 but sparingly mixed with truth, and of small fruit. This portion of 

 knowledge, touching the notes of things, and cogitations in general, 1 

 find not inquired, but deficient. And although it may seem of no great 

 use, considering that words and writings by letter do far excel all the 

 other ways ; yet because this part conccrncth, as it were, the mint of 

 knowledge, for words are the tokens current and accepted for conceits, 

 as moneys are for values, and that it is fit men be not ignorant that 

 moneys may be of another kind than gold and silver, 1 thought to 

 propound it to better inquiry. 



Concerning speech and words, the consideration of them hath pro 

 duced the science of Grammar ; for man still strivcth to reintegrate 

 himself in those benedictions, 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 confusion 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 per 

 fect 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 arc the footsteps and prints of 

 reason : which kinds of analogy between words and reason is handled 

 sparsitn, 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. 



Unto grammar also bclongeth, as an appendix, the consideration of 

 the accidents of words, which arc measure, sound, and elevation or 

 accent, and the sweetness and harshness of them : whence hath issued 



