a popular book for builders; and which Pausanias, in his hurried tour, forgot to set down, as the proper preface to his inventory of temples.

If the Greek writers on music had not furnished us with a knowledge of the ancient scales, and of the principles that directed their construction and uses, the records of Choragic monuments, and the accounts of the Odeum would only have excited our wonder at the extraordinary power of instrumental sound. The inventive mind of Guido, instead of completing the modern scale, might have only laid its foundation, by fixing a single chord across a shell, and the finished system of modern harmony might now have been but just begun.

Such is the view we take of arts, directed by principles: or in other words, by precepts collected from experience for the execution of great and enduring works; precepts accumulated by the efforts of genius and industry, always awaiting the eventual aid of Time, who, himself never working impatiently, becomes the great wonder-worker of all intellectual, as well as of all physical creation.

The following essay exhibits an attempt to describe the constituents of speech, with a precision that may render criticism instructive, and afford to future times, the means of comprehending its discriminations.

Discussions on the subject of standard principles, in some of the arts, have always involved the question of their origin: and nature has generally been assumed as the source.

There are two conditions, under which nature affords her governing rules. In one, she is taken as the model for exact imitation, in those branches of art, which profess to copy her full and actual details; as exemplified by the faultless and exquisite artistic delineations, in the various departments of natural history. Here individual nature is the standard; and here the excellence of art consists, merely in the whole-truth of the resemblance, without the least superfluous ideal-touch. In the other, where it is the purpose of art to exalt its creations, by an imaginative correcting of what we call the exceptionable details of nature, or by a selection from her scattered constituents of beauty, the rule is the result of a congenial knowledge, and

judgment, exhibited in strong similarity among persons of equal sentiment and cultivation: which, if it does not prove conformity of taste to be the development of an invariable law of nature, in the human mind, at least affords education the means to trace the causes of beauty and deformity; and thus to ordain a satisfactory and enduring system of laws for itself.

The uses of the voice have not yet been brought under either of these conditions. Nature, or what is called nature in this case, unenlightened humanity, cannot be taken as a model for imitation in cases of individual utterance; since they never furnish a single instance, worthy, in all respects, to be copied : and from the want of a full knowledge and definite nomenclature of the constituents of speech, there has never been that clear perception of the characteristic causes of beauty and deformity, which would warrant the institution of a standard, either by the method of selection, or by that of the exalting or corrective power of the imagination. The highest achievements in statuary, painting, and the landscape, consist of those ideal forms and compositions, never perhaps found singly-existent, or purely associated in nature; but which in the estimation of Cultivated Taste, and its perfecting agency, may far surpass her individual productions.

The following analytic history of the human voice, will enable an Elocutionist of any nation, to frame a didactic system for his own native and familiar speech. Since it shows, the vocal signs of expression have a universality, coexistent with the prevalence of human feelings: and that a grammar of elocution, like that of music, must be one and the same for the whole family of man. He will also find the outline of a system of principles, I have ventured to propose, on a survey of those excellencies of utterance, which seem to me, accommodated to the temper and habits of the English ear; and which, in analogy with the above named arts, may be called the Ideal Beauty of speech.

This undertaking is indeed opposed to a vulgar error. The imperceptible nature, as it is affirmed, and the fancied infinity of the vocal movements, together with the rapid course and per

petual variation of utterance are considered as insuperable obstacles to a precise description of the detail and system of the speaking voice. This objection will be hereafter answered, otherwise than by contentious argument. But we may here, only ask, if there is no other opportunity to count the radii of a wheel than in the race; or to number and describe the individuals of a herd, except in the promiscuous mingling of their flight. Music, with its infinitude of details, would still have been a mystery, if the doctrine of its intervals and time could have been. caught, only from the multiplied combinations and rapid execution of the orchestra. The accuracy of mathematical calculation, joined with the sober patience of the ear over the slow practice of its elements, has not had more success in disclosing the system of this beautiful and luminous science, than a similar watchfulness over the deliberate movements of speech, will afford for the discovery and designation of the hitherto unrecorded functions of the voice. If there is any purpose in the works of nature, or any foredoomed efficiency of means to complete the circle of her designs, we shall find, on the development of her vocal system, some uniform and appropriate rules, within the pale of which the voice should be variously exercised, to give light to the understanding, and pleasure to the ear.

The accurate sciences and the fine arts, without regard to the specific claims of each, have been set in wider opposition than is altogether justified, by a view of the grounds of their respective truths. The careless argument assumes that taste is merely a variable feeling, and has no rule of grandeur, grace, and beauty, in the selected or imaginative uses of form, color, and sound. If there is a general agreement among persons of equal taste and education in the arts, this agreement must be founded on some universal principle of the cultivated intellect. The consent therefore, arising out of the nature of the mind, gives a character of truth to the principles of taste, analogous at least to that, which by a like law of the mind, in a universal consent on the subject of abstract relationships, forms the full and unquestionable truth of the accurate sciences. Under this view of the foundation of the principles of the fine arts, we must

find the scale of their truth, as that of the truth of the exact sciences, in the measure of the agreement of those who cultivate them. He who knows that all men find the same properties in a circle, may learn, by a similar induction, that when the mind is cleared of its human rubbish,-particular excellencies of the painter, poet, architect, orator, statuary, composer, landscape improver, and actor, will universally reach the spring of congenial perception, in those who observe and reflect upon their works, and draw therefrom a stream of ever-during approbation. The claim to accuracy of knowledge, is the inherent right of every art. It is not consistent with the law of nature, that Truth, upon her simple and impartial seat within the mind, should have her favorites; let all be equally strict and studious, and she will reward them all alike.

Though future times may possibly break down the mischievous distinction, which assigns a different kind of logic to different departments of knowledge: and may 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 ratios of mathematical quantity, there is little similarity. But there is perhaps, 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 pursue a like connected train of observation, call it reasoning here if you will: because we employ the same precision of terms: because we are more dispassionate in our observations and comparisons, on this subject, than on others that touch the pride, and vanity, and interests of mankind: because we more strictly contemplate the succession, and more comprehensively embrace the scope of premises involved in a conclusion: and finally, not because we employ, on the exact sciences, a different mental method, for the mind has only one method, but because the more ambitious and worldly attractions of other subjects of knowledge, have left these sciences to the retired and self-satisfied occupation of more strict and patient inquirers. It is trifling, to urge, that the properties of a conic

section are eternal entities, quite independent of our accidental perception of them, and that they would still exist as truths, though they might never be demonstrated. Truth is a term not wanted by nature, and only invented for the uses of a disputatious and imperfectly-percipient being. Besides, the question before us is of knowledge, not of notions. Otherwise we might, with like proof of an abstract and eternal rule of taste, assert that the proportions of a Greek column existed throughout all time, unhewn and unseen in the quarry; like that conceit of old which declared,- the Venus of Gnidos was not the work of Praxiteles since nature herself had concreted within the marble, the boundary but hidden surface of its beauty: the artist, when the statue came to light, 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 not with the presumption, even to feign for them, a comparison with any established principle of the exact sciences. But there are no degrees in truth: therefore, every mathematical inquiry, which remains without proof or solution, must submit to its logical classification with the precepts of the arts: though happily distinguished from them, in being free from the interference of Ignorance and Conceit. And yet I may remark, in anticipation of what will be shown hereafter, that the Art of Speech, in three of its important modes, namely, Time, with its measurable moments; Intonation, with its measurable intervals; and Force, with its measurable degrees; though not admissible within the pale of exact calculation, is yet upon its border: and when, through future cultivation, it shall take its destined place among the liberal arts, it will be found, at least beside Architecture and Music, if indeed, from its principles of intonation being broadly founded in nature, it may not claim to be before them.

Controversies on points, involving the leading principles of taste, are generally, contentions of the ignorant with artists, or with one another; and rarely to any great degree, of the differences of educated and intelligent artists among themselves. If the latter fail in setting their authority, or in extending the