John Walker

“ Though I think every mechanical account of the organic formation of the letters rather curious than useful, yet, that nothing which can be presented to the eye may be wanting to inform the ear, I shall in this follow those who have been at the pains to trace every letter to its seat, and make us, as it were, to touch the sounds we articulate. ”

“ Even polite and literary people, who speak only from the ear, will find that this organ will, in a thousand instances, prove but a very uncertain guide, without a knowledge of those principles by which the ear itself is insensibly directed, and which, having their origin in the nature of language, operate with steadiness and regularity in the midst of the ficklest affectation and caprice. ”

“ Nothing can be more specious than this reasoning, till we look a little higher than language, and consider its object; we shall then discover, that in uniting two words under one accent, so as to form one compound term, we do but imitate the superior operations of the mind, which, in order to collect and convey knowledge, unite several simple ideas into one complex one. ”

“ The accentuation, both in Scotland and Ireland, (if by accentuation we mean the stress, and not the kind of stress) is so much the same as that of England, that I cannot recollect many words in which they differ. Indeed, if it were not so, the versification of each country would be different: for as English verse is formed by accent or stress, if this accent or stress were upon different syllables in different countries, what is verse in England would not be verse in Scotland or Ireland; and this sufficiently shows how very indefinitely the word accent is generally used. ”

“ Those who have made the progress of languages their study, will observe, it is presumed, that the broad sounds of vowels change to the slender, [12] the difficult consonants to the easier, and the long vowels to short ones. This, it is imagined, will be found to be true in all languages, as well as our own; and such alteration seems founded in the nature of man and of society. The next object to understanding a language being dispatch, it is no wonder that short sounds have been encroaching on us, and depriving us of the tune of our words for the sake of gaining time. ”

“ Locke continues, "men, in framing ideas, seek more the convenience of language and quick dispatch by short and comprehensive signs, than the true and precise nature of things; and therefore, he who has made a complex idea of a body with life, sense, and motion, with a faculty of reason joined to it, need but use the short monosyllable, man, to express all particulars that correspond to that complex idea." ”

“ But as avoiding the wrong, and seizing the right at the same instant, is perhaps too great a task for human powers, I would advise a native of Ireland, who has much of the accent, to pronounce almost all his words, and end all his sentences, with the rising slide; and a Scotchman in the same manner, to use the falling inflexion: this will, in some measure, counteract the natural propensity, and bids fairer for bringing the pupil to that nearly equal mixture of both slides which distinguishes the English speaker, than endeavouring at first to catch the agreeable variety. ”

“ As words increase in syllables, the more easily is their accent known. Nouns sometimes acquire a syllable by becoming plural; adjectives increase a syllable by being compared; and verbs by altering their tense, or becoming participles: adjectives becomes adverbs, by adding ly to them; and preposititions precede nouns or verbs without altering the accent of the word to which they are prefixed: so that when once the accent of dissyllables is known, those polysyllables, whose terminations are perfectly English, have likewise their accent invariably settled. ”

“ The k and s in the composition of x, when the accent is on them, in exercise, execute, etc. preserve their strong pure sound; but when the accent is on the second syllable, in exact, exonerate, etc. these letters slide into the duller and weaker sounds of g and z, which are easier to the organs of pronunciation. Hence not only the soft c and the s go into th, but even the t, before a diphthong, slides into the same letters when the stress is on the preceding syllable. Thus in society and satiety the c and t preserve their pure sound, because the syllables ci and ti have the accent on them ”

“ It may, indeed, be observed, that there is scarcely any thing more distinguishes a person of mean and good education than the pronunciation of the unaccented vowels. (547) (558) When vowels are under the accent, the prince, and the lowest of the people in the metropolis, with very few exceptions, pronounce them in the same manner; but the unaccented vowels in the mouth of the former have a distinct, open, and specific sound, while the latter often totally sink them, or change them into some other sound. ”

“ What method could so rigidly preserve, and so strongly convey, the sense of words, as that which always left the accent on the root, where the principal meaning of the word undoubtedly lies? But the necessities of human nature require that our thoughts should not only be conveyed with force, but with ease ”

“ So adjectives, formed by the addition of y, have the imperfect sound of g, as in the original word: thus springy, stringy, dungy, and wingy, are only the sound of e added to spring, string, dung, and wing; but the comparative and superlative adjectives, longer, stronger, and younger; longest, strongest, and youngest, have the g hard and perfectly sounded, as if written long-ger, strong-ger, young-ger, etc, where the g is hard, as in finger, linger, etc. ”

“ In the course of a critical investigation of the powers of the letters in the foregoing principles, there is scarcely a word of any difficulty or diversity of sound which has not been noticed, and the true pronunciation, with the reasons and authorities for it, pointed out; so that if the inspector should not meet with sufficient information in the Dictionary under the word, let him consult the Principles under the vowel, diphthong, or consonant, he wishes to be explained, and it is highly probable he will meet with the satisfaction he requires. ”

“ The readiness with which these words take the antepenultimate accent, the agreeable flow of sound to the ear, and the unity it preserves in the sense, are sufficient proofs of the propriety of placing the accent on this syllable, if custom were ambiguous. I do not remember to have heard the accent disputed in any word ending in ology; but orthography is not unfrequently pronounced with the accent on the first syllable, like orthodoxy. The temptation we are under to discover our knowledge of the component parts of words, is very apt to draw us into this pronunciation ”

“ Is it not absurd to hesitate a moment at writing all the verbs with the e final ? This is a departure from our great lexicographer, which he himself would approve, as nothing but inadvertency could have led him into this unmeaning irregularity.—It may not be improper to observe here, that those substantives which in the singular end with th sharp, adopt the th flat in the plural, as path, paTHs; bath, baTHs, etc. Such a propensity is there to slide into the flat sound of s, that we frequently hear this sound in the genitive case, as My wive's portion, for my wife's portion. ”

“ Johnson has observed, that though nouns have often the accent on the latter, yet verbs have it seldom on the former syllable; those nouns which, in the common order of language, must have preceded the verbs, often transmit this accent to the verbs they form, and inversely: thus the noun water must have preceded the verb to water, as the verb to correspond must have preceded the noun correspondent; and to pursue must claim priority to pursuit. ”

“ Accent and Quantity, the great efficients of pronunciation, are seldom mistaken by people of education in the Capital; but the great bulk of the nation, and those who form the most important part in it, are without these advantages, and therefore want such a guide to direct them as is here offered. ”

“ When we place the accent on the first syllable, say our opponents, we give a kind of subordinate stress to the third syllable graph: by which means the word is divided into its primitives ορθὸς and γράφω, and those distinct ideas it contains, are preserved, which must necessarily be confounded by the contrary mode; and that pronunciation of compounds, say they, must certainly be the best which best preserves the import of the simples. ”

“ This is so agreeable to English analogy, that in words derived from the Latin, where the penultimate vowel, followed by a single consonant, is long, and consequently has the accent, we almost always neglect this exception, as it may be called, in the Latin language, and fall into our own general rule of accenting the antepenultimate. Nor is it unworthy of being remarked, that when we neglect the accent of the original, it is almost always to place it at least a syllable higher ”

“ Scarcely any reason can be given why custom prefers one sound to the other in some words; and why, in others, we may use either one or the other indiscriminately. It is strongly to be presumed that the i and y, in this situation, particularly the last, was generally pronounced long by our ancestors, but that custom has gradually inclined to the shorter sound as more readily pronounced, and as more like the sound of these letters when they end a syllable after the accent ”

“ The first distinction of sound that seems to obtrude itself upon us when we utter the vowels, is a long and a short sound according to the greater or less duration of time taken up in pronouncing them. ”

“ The o in the compounds of solve, as dissolve, absolve, resolve, seem the only words where a somewhat longer sound of the o is agreeable to polite pronunciation: on the contrary, when the o ends a syllable, immediately before or after the accent, as in po-lite, im-po-tent, etc. there is an elegance in giving it the open sound nearly as long as in po-lar, and po-tent, etc. ”

“ It may, perhaps, be worthy of notice, that when n is followed by k, the k has a finished or complete sound, as in link, think, etc. but when n is followed by hard g, the g has an unfinished or imperfect sound, as in hang, bang, etc. where we may observe the tongue to rest upon the palate in the sound of g; but when this letter is carried off to articulate another syllable, its sound is completed, as in anger and Bangor, (the name of a town) where the sound of g may be perceived to be very different from the noun hanger, (a sword) and banger (one who beats or bangs.) ”

“ It can scarcely be supposed that the most experienced speaker has heard every word in the language, and the whole circle of sciences pronounced exactly as it ought to be; and if this be the case, he must sometimes have recourse to the principles of pronunciation when his ear is either uninformed or unfaithful. ”

“ Ben Jonson, in his Grammar, says it is sounded firm in the beginning of words, and more liquid in the middle and ends, as in rarer, riper; and so in the Latin. The rough r is formed by jarring the tip of the tongue against the roof of the mouth near the fore teeth: the smooth r is a vibration of the lower part of the tongue, near the root, against the inward region of the palate, near the entrance of the throat. This latter r is that which marks the pronunciation of England, and the former that of Ireland. ”

“ In sword and answer it is always silent. In two it mingles with its kindred sound, and the number two is pronounced like the adverb too. In the prepositions toward and towards, the w is dropped, as if written toard and toards, rhyming with hoard and hoards; but in the adjectives and adverbs toward and towardly, froward and frowardly the w is heard distinctly. It is sometimes dropped in the last syllable of awkward, as if written awkard; but this pronunciation is vulgar. ”

“ The single fiat, at first impressed on the chaos, seems to operate on languages; which, from the simplicity and paucity of their principles, and the extent and power of their combinations, prove the goodness, wisdom, and omnipotence of their origin. ”

“ Thus in di-ameter, di-urnal, etc. the first syllable is equivalent to the verb to die. A corrupt, foreign manner of pronouncing these words may sometimes mince the i into e, as if the words were written de-ametur, de-urnal, etc. but this is disgusting to every just English ear, and contrary to the whole current of analogy. Besides, the vowel that ends and the vowel that begins a syllable are, by pronouncing the i long, kept more distinct, and not suffered to coalesce, as they are apt to do if i has its slender sound. ”