S44 The Study of Living Languages, [no. 4, new series, 
Nothing but a long continued exercise of the ear and the organs 
of speech upon a great variety of actual expressions can give either 
that quickness at hearing and pronouncing, or that facility of cor- 
rectly combining the words, which are essential to their effective 
colloquial use. 
It must be particularly observed thatc*his first set of sentences 
thus acquired implies much more than might appear from the first 
glance, namely, there is involved in it as it were the whole pro- 
nunciation of the language ; for a mf-n who can pronounce freely 
and correctly 100 words will have little difficulty in pronouncing 
all the rest : 2nd, a knowledge of all the inflexions of the nouns 
and verbs : 3rd, the mode of combining and arranging the different 
parts of speech. 
Thus, though only 100 words are used, some real and considera- 
ble progress has already been made in the knowledge of the lan- 
guage. 
This first set of sentences should not be laid aside till they are 
so perfectly familiar, that almost any one of them can be repeated 
with the utmost readiness, on the English translation being uttered. 
Nothing whatever will be gained by meddling with new materials 
till these first are thoroughly wrought into the student, and made 
as much part of himself as the words and expressions of his own 
language. 
The second set of words and sentences must be read over and 
thoroughly appropriated in the same way as the first. 
Probably these first 250 words with their sentences may be mas- 
tered in a month of steady study of 3 or 4 hours a day, and 750 
additional words with about 3,000 longer sentences in another 
month, completing the first 1,000 words in two months. After the 
thorough grounding which this will give in every respect, in pro- 
nunciatioR-, in exp^^ession, in hearing, in grammar, &c., the additions 
will be made with much greater rapidity. 
Every thing depends upon this first grounding being through 
and complete. Nothing but such repetitions will accomplish this 
object — there is no other way of doing it. 
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