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ed by the Rhetorical art; but it is the firm, solid, and durable body only, which is able to receive it. Indeed, it would be more than presumption, here to assert, that the study of Rhetorical rules will insure excellence in writing a discourse; in order to this, long and faithful application to study and practice are necessary, even for the brightest and most creative genius. At the same time, one of the most important objects in the education of youth is, to engage them very early in life, in such studies, as are calculated to produce a relish for the entertainments of taste. From a relish for these, to that of the discharge of the higher and more important duties of life, the transition will be natural and easy. From those minds among our youth which have this elegant and noble turn, we may cherish the most animating and pleasing hopes. On the contrary, from those who manifest an entire insensibility to the entertainments of eloquence, poetry, and the fine arts-such as music, painting, sculpture, architecture, and gardening, we can expect nothing but vulgarity and perverseness; inclinations for nothing but gratifications of an inferior order, and a capacity for only some of the lowest mechanical pursuits. And as that pithy sentence, "Ex nihillo, nihil fit," will always prove true, youth of this character ought never to be compelled to engage in the study of the liberal arts and of Rhetoric and the Belles-Lettres. For they only become objects of ridicule for students of elevated and refined taste; and a disgrace to their parents and more intelligent connexions. It is, however, to aid those of opposite character; who thirst for improvement in the higher, ornamental and useful arts,

this little compend is designed; and for this purpose the following compilation from Philosophical and Rhetorical productions is most respectfully presented.

The Origin of Language.

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Nothing, perhaps, is more evident, than the position, that our thoughts can never be considered as objects of attention, for the external senses. In order to communicate these to others, the earliest method resorted to, was undoubtedly the use of the voice and gesticulations. And, although language affords only audible signs, or arbitrary symbols of things, yet its superiority to gesture, in communication, being evinced by its greater certainty and variety-it has, from the commencement of the existence of our race, been the great and universal medium of mental intercourse.

The great similarity of the various languages used by the nations of the earth, however remote from each other, has generally been considered by the learned, as satisfactory evidence that they all are to be traced to the same origin. We indeed, cannot imagine how communities could exist, without language; and it would be folly in the extreme, to suppose that language existed in this world previously to the existence of society. To open the mouth of the dumb, and to cause their organs of speech to utter distinct and significant language, required the exercise of that powerful intelligence who made them. And hence, even heathen philosophers, have ascribed the origin of primitive language, to the invisible and unknown God-and those

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who read, and believe divine revelation, find and are satisfied with the testimony, that God, our Maker, at first furnished man with the faculties of reason and speech, and actually influenced and taught him how to exercise them in his intercourse with his Maker. We indeed, know not how great a degree of perfection, that language had, which came immediately from the allknowing God; yet it may be fairly supposed, it was not only sufficient for all the purposes of man, but was more perfect than any language ever spoken by man, since he experienced the effects of that bewildering and woful shock, which the apostacy from his Maker occasioned! It being sufficiently clear, therefore, that the exercise of the faculties, of reason and speech, must have been produced by a divine influence, and words to communicate ideas, originated from the same source, we shall, in the next extract, furnish a view of the progress of both language and writing.

Progress of Language and Writing.

When the sphere of communication became enlarged it became necessary to have names applied to particu-lar objects; and the question now is, how did they proceed in this application? Certainly, by assimilating, as much as they could, the sound of the name which they gave, to the nature of the object named; as a painter who would represent grass, must make use of a green colour; so in the infancy of language, (as some would term it) one employed in giving a name to any thing harsh or boisterous, would employ a harsh and bois

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terous sound. He could not act otherwise without of fering violence to instinctive reason, and an insult to his Maker, who had thus taught him. And hence it is, that we find wherever objects were to be distinguished, in which sound, action, or motion were included, the resemblance in the sound of the words is always obvious. Thus, in all languages, we discover a multitude of words which are evidently constituted upon this principle. And this analogy holds good in all cases, except, where neither sound nor motion are concerned; and here, the names of such objects, as are presented to the sight, and those terms which are appropriated to moral and immaterial things, it is observable, that the analogy is not always so visible. Yet, it has been the uniform sentiment of the learned, that it is not entirely lost; but that throughout the radical words of all languages, a resemblance to the object named is obvious. This principle, however, respects language in its early and most simple state; for the compiler is aware, that the boundless field which has been occupied by the nations, and which has exhibited innumerable arbitrary constructors of language, abounds with thousands, and tens of thousands, of fanciful and irregular terms, and methods of derivation and composition, which bear no resemblance, in sound, to the character of their roots, or to the thing signified. And words as we now use them, taken generally, may be considered as symbols, but not as imitations; as instituted and arbitrary, and not the natural signs of ideas. And hence, the inference, is certainly forcible, that language in its primitive and unadulterated state was, undoubtedly, more natural,

and, as it came to creatures from the infinite and allperfect God, it was more perfect than it ever has been since the confusion of intellect occasioned by the fall. It is, nevertheless, true, that language, in its progress among the nations, has become (perhaps, however from no happy necessity) more copious; as it has lost the beauty of its figurative style which was its original characteristic. That natural and vehement manner of speaking, by tones and gestures, has been extensively laid aside, and instead of natural and animated poetic instructors, we are now furnished with the professedly cool, but often dangerous philosophers -And the style of a philosopher of modern days, from its being considered more simple, cool and dispassionate, has superseded the ancient metaphorical and poetic language of men, in their intercourse with each other.

Writing, is an improvement upon speech, and, of course is of later origin.

Its characters are of two kinds: signs for words, and signs for things. The alphabetical characters which we now employ, are signs for words; and the pictures, hieroglyphics, and symbols, employed by the ancients, were signs for things.

Pictures were, doubtless, the origin of writing.Mankind, in all ages, and in all nations, have been instinctively inclined to imitation. This course would soon be employed for furnishing imperfect descriptions of events and records of their existence. Thus, to represent that one man had slain another, they painted the form of a dead man stretched upon the ground, and of his murderer standing over him, armed with some deadly weapon.

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