CHAPTER ONE.

Containing a General Introduction,
 wherein is treated the Origin and Value of this Art, together with the Earliest Writers on the Subject; as well as the Present Author’s Plan.
 

Men were too little gifted, had it been given him solely to use his intellect and to work out, however cleverly, in the solitude of his own mind, the whole scheme of human knowledge, and had he not at the same time been granted the power of speech.  “But what bounds”, says Erycius Puteanus, in Orat., 13, De Palastr. Bon. Ment. “are to be placed to the subtlety of the human intellect!  After that wonder of nature or of human perseverance had lost its value, every man tried then to talk without his voice.  It was not enough to express the mind’s meaning through the medium of the voice, unless those too who were at a distance and those who were to come after us were to hear what was said.  The tongue’s activity was held by men to be wholly incomplete unless assisted by the used of the pen.”  That is, by Writing.  Now this device of writing is to a degree exact, and preeminently for this reason is it, as Pierre Gregoire, Art. Mir. Bk.XVI.c.11, has remarked, that the art of writing is held in high esteem by the Hebrews.  It is also a most wonderful device.  For if the power to express the mind’s thoughts by means of articulate words, whereof the sum makes connected sense, is a wonderful and, as the same Gregoire, De Repub., Bk.XVI.c.2, says an almost divine gift, certainly to fix fast by letters and signs the sound and sense of the fleeting voice will prove to be a power far more wonderful still, and one withal most useful not alone to the present age, but to future generations as well.  Furthermore, nothing could be more wonderful than the fact that out of such a very small number of letters, only twenty-three in all, so many different words in every language can be formed, - words every one of which is quite unlike every other, - and that, besides these, there is an almost infinite number of words not yet invented or heard, which anyone can construct for himself.  But the following fact would make the matter almost incredible, did we not see the thing with our own eyes, - the fact, namely, that the words, real or imaginary, formed simply from consonants separated by vowels, are so many in number.  If combinations formed from consonants alone could be uttered, as they can be written, Good Heavens!  what an extraordinary number of new words we could continue to make day after day!  And yet this very device of writing is not less useful than it is wonderful, as Pliny, Nat.Hist. XIII,22, has very truly said.  We know that in the use of this one thing the humanity of life, memory, and man’s immortality find their greatest support.  It serves the Humanity of Life, for by means of it we can converse with those who are far removed in place from us.  It is of service to Memory, for, according to Cassiodorus, Variar., Bk.XI., 18, in writing is preserved the faithful record of human actions.  And finally, it contributes to Immortality, since by its means we can look out for the welfare of future generations and at the same time secure a certain immortality ourselves.