statuary, composer, landscape improver and actor, have reached the spring of congenial perception, in those who reflect upon their works, and drawn therefrom an everduring approbation.

Though future times will probably break down the mischievous distinction, which assigns a different kind of logic to different departments of knowledge; and will subject all nature and art equally to the simple and sufficient process of observation and classification: still it may well seem to the present age, that between the perception of beauty in the arts, and of the accidents of mathematical quantity, there is little similarity. But I am aware of no other reason for the acknowledged certainty of the relationships of magnitude and number, than the general consent of those who inquire into them. We agree upon them, because we all use the same rigid rule of observation, (call it reasoning here if you will;) and because we can embrace and contemplate all the premises which are involved in a conclusion. It is trifling to urge, that the properties of a conic section would still exist as truths, though they might never be demonstrated. Truth is a term invented for the uses of a percipient being; and the question before us is of knowledge, not of notions. Otherwise we might, with like proof of an eternal rule of taste, assert that the proportions of a Greek column existed unhewn and unseen in the quarry;— like that conceit of old, which declared that the Venus of Gnidos was not the work of Praxiteles; since nature herself had concreted the boundary surface of its beauty: the artist having only produced the fragments of his chisel, and the dust of his file. I speak here against an unlimited assertion of the variableness of the principles of taste, and the apathy evinced by a neglect to discover or establish them; not of an equality in precision between them and the truths of the exact sciences.

If I have rightly considered the disputed subject of taste, its controversies consist of the differences of the ignorant with artists, and with one another; and rarely of the variance of educated and intelligent artists among themselves. If the latter fail in setting their authority, or in extending the benefits of their principles over the presumptuous part of the multitude, it does not prove that a standard may not belong to the arts, or that artists do not enjoy the delightful effects of it; but that there is more assuming vanity in the world than fellowship in

knowledge. Silence or modest inquiry is the duty of the ignorant; and where neither is performed, nature seems, in their cases, to have departed from her plan in animal creation, by not withholding from them the litigious faculty of speech.

These differences can not, of themselves, call in question the authority of principles in the arts. Most of the phenomena of cause and effect, in Natural Philosophy, are as obvious as proofs of the properties of curves, by the most exact calculus. Still pretenders, in every condition of life, are constantly trespassing within the bounds of this science, by the absurdity of their reasonings with each other, on points of natural knowledge. Knaves exhibit their Perpetual Motions, and the whole host of learned and unlearned credulity can not change the influence. of those principles, which at once determine the impossibility.

There is a wholesome kind of conviction on the minds of fools, which forces them to confess their want of knowledge in mathematics, if they have not studied that science. But taste, say they, is natural, therefore every one should have his own. It is true, every one knows what will please himself, in his ignorance: but the wise only know what will please the intelligent, in their education.

In thus advocating the necessity of precepts for the government of an art, I deprecate any inference that it is designed to fix an unalterable standard. Established principles should not be, as the barrier of a flood, which in protecting from inroad, restrictively prevents the opportunities of further conquest, but as the guide and escort of the arts, to acquisitions of wider glory. With the exception of the misused principle of variety, I can not name an art which has not been supported and advanced by their adoption. The search after novelty, or variety by succession, as it may be called, has, through the restless designs of vanity, and the influence of unguarded patronage, ruined more arts than all the wasting efforts of barbarism and time.

The high accomplishments in Elocution are supposed to be, universally, the unacquired gifts of genius, and to consist of powers and graces beyond the reach of art.' So seem the plainest services of arithmetic to a savage: and so, to the slave, seem all the ways of music, which modern art has so accurately penned as to time and tune and momentary grace. Ignorance

knows not what has been done; indolence thinks nothing can be done; and both uniting, borrow from the abused eloquence of poetry, an aphorism to justify supineness of inquiry.

It has been said that a discovery of the full resources of the arts afford the means of debasement, or of perversion from their original purposes. This indeed has sometimes been the case. By an extension of the powers of musical execution, in the voice and on instruments, this art is, through misused mechanical skill, and the waywardness of undiscerning patronage, frequently exercised to the indifference or disgust of those, whose approbation would be durable; and to the thoughtless satisfaction of those whom the caprice of ignorance may urge equally to support or to destroy.

A full knowledge of the principles and practice of an art, enables an industrious and ambitious votary to approach perfection; whilst idle followers are contented with the defaults of imitation. With most men the labour of the mind, equally with that of the body, ceases with the removal of its necessity; and the shameless dependance on the intellectual alms of others is not less common, than the populous growth of pauperism upon the increasing provisions of benevolence. The unbounded distributions of genius, prompt to excuses for indolence and to claims for succour, and the empire itself of the art, at last falls under the insurrection and anarchy of its former servile dependants.

I am thus ready to admit that a full analysis of speech, together with the establishment of a system of principles in the art, will not always exempt it from abuse or ruin. But I can not therefore, refrain from recommending a mode of cultivation, which must ensure the highest satisfaction, whilst the art remains uncorrupted, and which, by the record of its definitions and method, will afford the best means for any needed restoration.

Perhaps I am not wrong in asserting that the art of speaking well, does not consist of those accidents, which, by arbitrary use, are apt to lead to debasement. Some of the fine arts may receive the addition of Ornament, properly so called; which holding but a separable relationship to its subject or principal, leaves taste to order the degree of its application, or its total

exclusion. The art of speaking is subject to no such conditions. The embodying of sense by sound, and the coloring of feeling by its expressive modes, are fixed in their amenity by the unalterable instincts of nature, or the satisfactory decisions of convention. All addition to the numbered signs of its language is redundancy, and all misplaced utterance is affectation.

The following history of the voice is addressed especially to those who pursue science with attention and perseverance; who prefer its useful accuracy to its ostentation; who are satisfied with the few-but fit audience;'-and who know, from their own happy experience, that exactness of knowledge is the bright felicity of intellect. To inquirers of this character, I need not say that even the rapid flight of speech may be more easily followed, when the general principles of its movement are understood. The hesitation of the ear will be prompted by the mind, and we shall more readily discern what is, by knowing what ought to be.

After the preceding representation of our limited knowledge of the functions of the voice, and upon the promises of a more extended and precise analysis, the reader must not be surprised to find, in the following essay, a new and copious nomenclature. When unnamed additions are made to the system and detail of an art, terms must be invented for them; and even when its known phenomena are exhibited under varied relationships, the purpose of description is less perplexed by the novelty of terms, than by an attempt to give another application or meaning to former names.

Many of the varieties of pitch having been accurately designated and clearly arranged in music, I have freely transferred its applicable nomenclature to the description of speech: and whenever a language has been purposely framed, I have endeavoured to make it, by direct or metaphorical use, purely explanatory of the nature of the vocal functions.

Although I have gone deeply into the philosophical analysis of speech, and have spared no pains or detail in illustrating whatever might, from its novelty otherwise be obscure; I have not pretended to make specific application of the principles of intonation, to all the styles of the reading and speaking voice.

This assumption of the discipline and practice of the habitual teacher, is beyond my design. I have treated the subject in that general manner which is best suited to a limited command of time. The full development of an art must be the work of many, and of their lives. I have here given the result of the leisure of about three years, snatched from the daily duty of extensive professional occupation. If in discharging the duties of that profession, I have selected from its physiological department, a subject of inquiry which gives its ultimate services in another art, I have not therein forgotten that nature, who never is ungrateful to the eyes that watch her, has still her secrets in the human frame, yet to be told for the health or happiness of man: the future search after which, may not be without success, and will not be without the satisfaction experienced in conducting these offered scrutinies of the tongue and ear.

The reception which may await the following work, can be of no important interest to me. By taking care to antedate the season of its rewards and punishments, I have already found them in the varied pleasure and perplexity of its accomplishment. I leave it therefore for the service of him who may in future desire to read the history of his voice. The system here exhibited will satisfy much of his curiosity: for I feel assured, by the result of the rigid mode of observation employed throughout the inquiry, that if science should ever come to one consent on this point, it will not differ essentially from the ensuing record. The world has long asked for light on this subject. It may not choose to accept it now: but having idly suffered its own opportunity for discovery to go by, it must, under any capricious postponement, at last receive it here.

Sir Joshua Reynolds has a pretty thought on the labours of ambition and the choice of fame. I do not remember his words exactly; but he figures the present age and posterity as rivals, -and those who receive the favour of the one, as being outcasts from the other. This condition, while it allows a full but transient satisfaction to the zeal which works only for a present reward, does not exclude all prospect from those who are contented in the anticipation of deferred success.-Truth,