I Cannot comply with your desire—a regular dissertation is above me——but if you will take my thoughts as they occur, the honour of methodizing them shall be yours.

Languages are termed rough and smooth, weak or expressive, frequently without reason.—As these are comparative terms, they change their application according to circumstances. The French is said to be a smooth or rough language, when compared with the German or Italian. Perhaps this is true, and yet we should not determine too hastily. In appearance, there are more vowels in the Italian language than in the French; but in pronunciation the French lose many Consonants, and the Italians none: and yet in French, so great is the irregularity of that language, many consonants are pronounced which are not written——smoothness or roughness must therefore depend on the ear alone, yet how far a Language is weak or expressive, may be treated of and determined with precision.

Every sentence may be considered as the picture of an idea; the quicker that picture is presented to the mind, the stronger is its Impression. That language then which is shortest, is the most expressive. If we should fix on any language as being in general the most concise, yet, if in some instances it is more diffuse than another, then, in those instances the latter is most expressive. This, I believe, is an universal rule, and without exception.

Let us for the present suppose Latin to be more expressive, because shorter, than any modern language, and compare it with English in some examples, just as they occur. Captus oculis and coecus—are used for the same thing—the last is more expressive than the first, and both less so than blind: a single syllable does the office of many. How much more forcibly does it strike us to be told that our friend is dead, than mortuus est, or Mors continuo ipsum occupavit? This last is indeed poetical, if we suppose death a person. Tho’ I just now said that Latin was closer in its expression than any modern language, it was only in compliance with common opinion; for I have great reason to believe that it yields in this respect to English: The latin hexameter and Terence’s line being with ease included in our heroic verse, which is not so long by many syllables. There have been many pieces of English poetry translated into Latin, and, in general nothing can read more dead and unanimated. In the eighth volume of the Spectator is a translation of the famous soliloquy in the Play of Cato—compare it with the original, and observe how the same thought is strong in English and weak in Latin, occasioned entirely by its being close in one language, and diffuse in the other: for, as much as one sentence exceeds another in length, in the same proportion does it fail in expression.

Translations, most commonly, are more verbose than their original, which is one reason for their weakness; whenever they are less so, they are stronger. Suppose we should find in a French author these phrases, Un Canon de neuf livres de Balle—Un Vaisseau du Roi du quatre vingt dix Pieces du Canon; and they were rendered into English by a nine-pounder—A ninety-gun ship—is not the translation more spirited than the original? I purposely chose a phrase with as little matter in it as possible, where the meaning could not be mistaken, and in which there was no variety of expression, that the trial might be fairer. I have heard that the German is an expressive language—it may be so, I do not understand it; but I can perceive that, for the most part, the words are very long, which makes against its being so. French, and Italian particularly, are much more diffuse than English. Translations from these languages have often a force that the originals wanted; and this not owing to the English being a stronger language in sound, as some have imagined, but to strength occasioned by brevity.

Perhaps it may be imagined, that those words which carry their signification with them should be most expressive, whether long or short; that is, when they are derived from, or compounded of known words, which express that signification. But this is not so. When we say adieu, farewell—we mean no more than a ceremony at parting.—No one considers adieu as a recommendation to God, or farewell as a wish for happiness.—Frequent use destroys all idea of derivation. But if we speak a compound or self-significative word that is not common, we perceive the derivation of it. Thus if a Londoner says butter-milk, he has an idea of something compounded of butter and milk; but to an Irishman or Hollander, it is as simple an idea as either of the words taken separately, is to us.

It is but late that our orthography was fixed even in the most common words. Two hundred years ago, every person spelt as he liked: a privilege enjoyed still later than that period by “royal and noble authors,” who seem, in this instance, to claim the liberty enjoyed by their ancestors. Since the time orthography has been thought of some consequence, we have attended partly to pronunciation, tho’ chiefly to derivation. But, in some cases, where we should altogether have spelt according to derivation, we have taken pronunciation for our guide. And this has occasioned some confusion; for instance naught is bad—nought is nothing; these terms were long confounded, and even now are not kept perfectly distinct, which has occasioned ought to be written aught. Wrapt is envelloped—rapt is hurried away, or totally possessed: the first of these is frequently used for the last, by some of our modern poets. Marry is an asseveration—marry, to give in marriage—the spelling these words the same, confounds them together; we should have preserved for the first, the real word mary. It was a common thing formerly to swear by Mary, the a in which was pronounced broad, as the Priests of that time did the Latin Maria, from whom the common people took the pronunciation. In one of the pieces in the first volume of the collection of old plays, it frequently occurs, and is spelt as a proper name, Marie. Permit me to observe, that the Editor, by modernizing the spelling in the other volumes, has prevented their being made this use of, as they might have shewed the progress of orthography as well as of dramatic poetry.

In the reign of James the first were many attempts to reduce orthography altogether to pronunciation. In our time we have seen some attempts to bring it altogether from derivation—but surely both were wrong. Whoever reads Howel’s letters, or Dr. Newton’s Milton, will see, that by a partial principle too generally adopted, they have made of the English language “a very fantastical banquet—just so many strange dishes!”

There are many inversions of phrases used in poetry which are contrary to the genius of our language. In the translation of the Iliad there frequently occurs “thunders the sky”——“totters the ground,” meaning that “the sky thunders” and “the ground totters.” This change of position has the authority of some of our best poets, tho’ it frequently obscures the sense, and sometimes makes it directly contrary to what is intended to be expressed. Our language does not, with ease, admit of the nominative after the verb. If we read, tho’ in poetry, “shakes the ground” we do not readily understand that “the ground shakes,” but rather refer to some antecedent nominative that has produced this effect. To adopt the construction of the ancient languages is as awkward as to adopt their measures. You will understand this to be meant as a general observation, the truth of which is not destroyed by a few exceptions where the inversion may be happily used. The sense in these verses of Pope “halts” as much by Roman construction, as the Rhythmus in Sidney does by “Roman feet.”

In reading Latin and Greek we are obliged to keep the sense suspended until we come to the end of the period, but it is not so in any modern language that I know of, except now and then in Italian poetry; so that there is a sameness of construction in all of them when compared with the ancient languages. Now, this suspension of the sense is surely no advantage, therefore if it were possible to make English like Latin and Greek in this respect, it would hurt the language.

In another letter I may possibly resume this subject.

I am, &c.