mation itself, and especially the works of the great Reformer, added to this general interest, a newly awakened feeling of the sacredness of national tongues. Translations of the Vulgate into the vernacular were attempted in most of the protestant countries, and for this purpose, great labor and profound erudition were spent upon the study of modern languages. The insight into the properties and diversities of languages, thus obtained, was, however, not as yet applied to other than special and immediate ends, and no attempt was made to reduce such knowledge to general principles. Language was, still, only a useful instrument for social conversation and literary amusement or instruction, but not considered as having intrinsic value, or as a proper object of scientific inquiry. Of the profound ignorance which prevailed even at a much later period--the beginning of last century on this subject, no more striking proof can probably be found, than the remarkable forgery of the so-called Psalmanazaar. That the Church countenanced him as a converted native of Formosa, blind zeal and pious self-deception might excuse, and that he plundered the wealthy and deceived the credulous, will not astonish those who observe the power of assurance over credulity, and notice the success of Lamas in the East and Mormons in the West, even in these days of boasted enlightenment. But it must seem strange to us, that a youth of scarcely sixteen years could find credence for a new language, with a new alphabet, a new grammar, and new sounds—all his own invention--before a board consisting of the first English scholars of the time. The secret lay, partly at least, in the argument with which these judges justified their belief, that the version of the catechism, which Psalmanazaar had laid before

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them, was truly written in a new, but real and grammatical language: because it resembled no other! Still more recently, J. Barrois in his curious and highly interesting work on Dactylology, gravely informs his readers that German is only Persian written in Latin characters, and that the inhabitants of Lapland speak, even now, the popular Hebrew of ancient times!

Comparative Philology must, in fact, be considered as an almost entirely new branch of knowledge, long since sketched out and pursued to a certain extent, but treated as a science only in quite recent times. It is now no longer a crude aggregate of isolated facts, much less of uncritical and arbitrary etymological conjectures, which any dilettante thinks he may be allowed to handle in his own way. These have been replaced by a scientific mode of research, implying a definite method and a consciousness of clear and productive principles of investigation. Comparative Philology may be said to hold to former attempts, the same relation that our chemistry and astronomy hold to the alchymy and astrology of former ages. Established upon a new, solid basis, it has asserted and made good its claims to be considered one of the sciences, that form the noblest subject, for intellectual labor, and are destined largely to add to the daily increasing realm in which the mind of man reigns supreme.

Young, and of comparatively modern date, the Science of Language has, still, already led to results surpassing the most sanguine hopes. A proper idea of the exalted dignity of language, as the most direct outward manifestation of man's divine mind, has taken the place of vague notions and absurd surmises. Shrewd devices and random guesses have given way before a

philosophic knowledge of the admirable structure of language, and a better acquaintance with its history. Societies have been formed, and chairs established in universities, for the critical study of modern as well as of ancient languages; men like Bunsen, Grimm and Humboldt, have lent their time and their genius to aid the new science.

Etymology is, by authority, taught by more than ten professors in German gymnasia; England has its well-known masters of this branch of science; France boasts of five almost perfect grammars of her language, besides the "Grammaire Nationale," and the monographies on dialect, orthoepy, homonymes, and synonymes. Reviews for modern Philology in Switzerland and on the Rhine, and publications of academies established for that special purpose, are as numerous as important. Virginia had, thanks to the wise foresight of Mr. Jefferson, already in 1825, a chair of Anglo-Saxon and Comparative Philology, and distant Iceland even, claims our admiration for the learned works of her great linguist, Dr. Egilsson, whose recent death his native country deplores not more than the whole learned world.

Modern investigators have, in the pursuit of such studies, deciphered the memorials of ancient nations, engraven on the monuments of proud cities, and the rocks in the desert. Their brilliant success emboldened intrepid travellers to pass through hostile nations and dangerous climes, in order to bring home treasures like those obtained by the brave Arnaud, who penetrated in the disguise of a Mussulman, to the very city over which the Queen of Sheba once ruled, and there copied the famous Himyaritic inscriptions, engraven on the gigantic works

MODERN RESEARCHES.

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erected by the great Balkis herself. Men of all ranks and occupations engaged in the novel and promising pursuit, and works like that of Balbi, could be compiled from material collected in all parts of the inhabited globe. Thus were African glossaries collected at Tunis and New Orleans, by Seetzen at Cairo, Oldendorp in the West Indies, and Mrs. Hannah Kilham at Sierra Leone! It was no longer enough to guess with Lichtenstein at the meaning of Babylonian inscriptions, from a certain similarity in the shape of letters, and a supposed analogy in the sound of words with Shemitic idioms, but rules were laid down and principles established to guide the student in what Lepsius calls Monumental Criticism. Collateral researches in history and physiology were made to combine with mere philological observations, and the results thus obtained, subjected to a rigid analysis. Thence the science led upwards to higher views of language, itself a far greater work than all the works it contains. Language was, and is now, studied as the noblest and most characteristic manifestation of the human mind, as the great instrument by which the word of God and the law of man speaks, by which alone the sciences flourish, the arts live, and nations can foster love, honor, and true glory.

CHAPTER VII.

LITERATURE OF COMPARATIVE PHILOLOGY.

Greek Authors-Cæsar and Cicero-The Alexandrians and Byzantines-J. O. Scaliger-Collections of Lord's Prayers-Poça, Du Cange, and HervasBacon and Locke.

A SCIENCE of such recent date can, of course, hardly be said to possess a literature as yet, and the few masterly works which have called it into life and established its claims are, themselves, more an earnest of future usefulness and importance, than evidences of already obtained success. Before the present century, the literature of the world had little more than occasional allusions, accidental hints, and some few fragments, relating to this new branch of knowledge. In the works of the Ancients, we find it barely alluded to. The simple statement of the existing difference in languages, and a more careful enumeration of certain varieties, are all that we find in the oldest of literary annalsthe Chinese. If their chronology can be relied on, they may be said to have, here also, made a beginning long before Europe. They have, however, as usually, remained content with this instructive and general apprehension of facts, to which they ascribed no other importance than that of curiosity, and this once satisfied, no further researches seem to have been made.

Greek philosophers and historians furnish the first material,