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force upon a certain fyllable of a word which diftinguishes it from the reft; but that accent has no reference to inflexions of voice, and for that reason the word is ufed by us in the fingular number. *Others have imagined, that we have two accents, the grave and acute; but in the definition of thefe, they feem only to mean that the latter has a greater degree of force than the former. Thus, for want of the fimple distinction of the rifing and falling flide of the voice, with which every accented fyllable must neceffarily be pronounced, the nature of our own accent feems as obfcure, and as little understood, as that of the Greeks and Romans: and it is to this obfcurity we owe the fuppofed impropriety of calling a dialect by the name of accent; for though there are other differences in the Scotch and Irish pronunciation of English befides this, it is to the difference of accent that the chief diverfity is owing: if we understand accent only as force or ftrefs, there is, indeed, the slightest difference imaginable; fince in both these kingdoms the ftrefs is (to the exception of very few words indeed) laid on the fame fyllable as in England; and, for this reason, the laws of poetry are exactly the fame in all but if we divide accent into grave and acute, and call the acute, the ftrefs with the rifing inflexion, and the grave, the ftrefs, with the falling inflexion, we fhall then fee the propriety of faying, fuch a one fpeaks with the Irish or Scotch accent; for though the Irish. place the stress precisely on the fame fyllable as the English, it is often with a different in

* Essay on the Harmony of Language. Robson, 1774.

flexion; and the fame may be faid of the Scotch. Thus the Scotch pronounce the far greater part of their words with the acute accent, or rifing inflexion, and the Irish as conftantly make ufe of the grave accent, or falling inflexion, while the English obferve pretty nearly a due mixture of each. If we pronounce a fentence in thefe three different modes, it may, perhaps, fuggeft to the ear the truth of the foregoing obfervations.

Scotch.

éxercise and témperance ftréngthen the conftitution.

Irifb.

èxercife and temperance ftrèngthen the conftitution.

English.

èxercife and temperance ftrengthen the constitution.

If these observations are juft, the Irish ought to habituate themfelves to a more frequent ufe of the rifing inflexion, and the Scotch to the falling, in order to acquire what is not (from this view of the fubject) improperly called the English accent.

But, befides the two fimple accents, which, from the rifing or falling inflexion they adopt, may be called the acute and the grave; there are two other accents compounded of these, which may be called the rifing and falling circumflexes. These are totally unknown to the moderns: but are fo inherent in the nature of the human voice, and fo demonftrable upon experiment, as to defy contradiction. See Preface to this work, in the Notes.

EMPHASIS.

Introduction to the Theory of Emphasis.

EMPHASI

MPHASIS, in the moft ufual fenfe of the word, is that ftrefs with which certain words are pronounced, fo as to be distinguished from the rest of the fentence. Among the number of words we make use of in difcourfe, there will always be fome which are more neceffary to be understood than others: those things with which we suppose our hearers to be pre-acquainted, we exprefs by fuch a fubordination of ftrefs as is fuitable to the small importance of things already understood; while thofe of which our hearers are either not fully informed, or which they might poffibly mifconceive, are enforced with fuch an increase of stress as makes it impoffible for the hearer to overlook or mistake them. Thus, as in a picture, the more effential parts of a sentence are raised, as it were, from the level of speaking; and the lefs neceffary are, by this means, funk into a comparative obfcurity.

From this general idea of emphasis, it will readily appear of how much confequence it is to readers and speakers not to be mistaken in it; the neceffity of diftinguishing the emphatical words from the reft, has made writers on this fubject extremely folicitous to give fuch rules for placing the emphafis, as may, in some measure, facilitate this difficult part of elocution: but few have gone farther than to tell us, that we must place the emphasis on that word

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