on more company and so encrease his gaine A Science requires Method and Discipline it is not enough to be a hearer he must also excrcise himself in what he heares and reduce the precepts into practise by disputat ons repititions and conferences Thus are the Spirits heated and chafed whereby doctrine is the deeplier imprinted in our memories Sciences are like Arts to become a good Artist it is not sufficient to frequent the Shopps of the most expert artists unlesse we set our hands to work likewise How many men doe wee see daily who have assiduously and with good attention heard fâmous preachers for the space of twenty or thirty yeares and yet are not so well versed in Divinity as a Scholler of the Sorbonne who hath heard lectures there but a year by reason that the Professors in that reverend Society are Methodicall persons who after their rare expositions carefully exercise their auditors in disputation both in the Schooles privately and also in other publick Acts. And now that his Majesty hath by his establishment as it were naturalized Philosophy and made it in a manner popular methodicall we must hope that within a short time youth will besolidely learned through the care of a regular discipline For it is true both in Schoole and State business that it is not sufficient to propound good Maximes unlesse they be well maintained and punctually observed through the rules of a good government Now Sir as for these two last meanes which are of most moment namely to teach the Grammer and Discipline the Professors of the Academy cannot imploy themselves about it they have higher matters to look after and have not leisure to instruct youth In those works which proceed from them the rules of Polite writing are indeed very punctually observed but those works come not to every ones hands some few students and refined court Spirits onely make use of them and profit thereby How many Gentlemen are there in the country who neuer hear of them and if they should yet are not capable of such high reflections They never came out of their fathers houses but only to practise their exercises or to go to the wars at their return from whence it is too late for them to be instructed They are not well prepared for the reading of such books with any profit which makes them all their life time to use the British Norman or Gascoigne Dialect Which many times keeps them from comming to the Court retired at their homes in idlenesse where they bestow their times in nothing but hunting and husbandry Whereas their parents might in time send them to the City of Richelieu where for a small charge and in a little time they might be taught Sciences Languages and Exercises altogether whilst they are yet young enough and may easily forget the ill accent of their own country Language and without Labour accustome themselves to a better Pronunciation to choice and pureness of expressions So that returning afterwards into their own countrie though the Language be there extreamely corrupt they will speak good French all their life time Their companions and Tenants will follow their example men alwaies naturally inclining to novelties especially when they are according to reason and judiciously invented So shall we make way throughout the whole Kingdome for those Maximes which the Professors of the Academy shall set downe and your Eminencie shall have the glory of being the restorer both of your Native Countrie and Language The Chancellor of the Hospitall judgeing that design which now your Eminencie hath approved of would be very profitable and usefull to this Nation had an intent to erect certain French Colledges in Paris where Sciences should be taught in our mother Tongue which he judged to be fitting therefore even in those daies This famous man perceiving the abuse and error of former ages could not endure to see the French Nation which had founded so many brave Schooles and maintained so many professers to teach the Hebrew Arabick Greek Latin tongus neglect to build one for their own Since his time the Cardinall du Perron inflamed with the like zeale did againe attempt that glorious designe and sought all meanes possible to bring it to pass And last of all Monsieur de Fresne Canage willing by his example to animate us to teach Sciences in French writ an Organon in our Language to that purpose fraught with so much learning eloquence that we may boldly say he hath not only equalled but even exceeded the most excellentest Greek and Latin Authors But the compleating of this great work was reserved for your Eminency to accomplish and seems to have been deferred hitherto onely that you might have the full glory of establishing a business of so great importance This Sir will be the first fruit which the institution of your Academy in the City of Richelieu will bring forth namely the regulating and refining the Language in all the Povinces of this Kingdome which will be very advantagious for the glory of it And your Eminency will be pleased to let me tell you that there will other solid benefits accruew thereby Gentlemen will no more spend their youthfull time in unprofitable toyes they will directly learn such things as are necessary to direct guide them through the whole course of their life the mutuall duties of Society their Princes service the love of their Native Country and their due acknowledgement to your Eminencie It is a great abuse to mixe Nobility with persons of base extraction and to bring them up after the same manner for besides that it takes sordide and base inclinations unworthy its birth and such imployments as it may one day hope for it also receaveth such instructions as are not fitting for it and overburthens its mind uselessely all the remainder of their lives True it is that if parents did predestinate their children to be Churchmen Lawyers Physitians or to live continually within the precinct of a Library then it is fitting to have them to know the secrets of the Greek and Latin tongue the Origine and Etymologie of words and make them famous Criticks because the Fathers of the Church the Civill Law and the Authors of Physick are written in those Languages and are not yet translated into French But in a gentleman that meanes to wear a sword by his side these things are needlesse and the knowledge of these Languages would make him never the fitter for his countries service Why doe Parents neglect to send their children to colledges and let them lye at home till they be of age to learn Exercises in the meane time their youth is spent in idlenesse their memory and understanding growes weak through want of employment become as it were languishing faculties Others will not send them to the Academies as well by reason of the excessive charge as also because they are not there instructed in learning They learn indeed to ride dance and fence which makes
Colleges wherein they have spent the prime of their youth they seeme to be strangers in their owne countrie and retaine the ill tones and unsavory pronunciations of their severall provinces which afterwards they can never leave so that after fifteene or twenty yeares study they speake like the vulgar and common sort of people and never become eloquent in the French tongue whatsoe ver profession they follow The selfe same thing is the reason why it is impossible for us to become truely learned because that to be right Philosophers we must of necessity doe as they did in ancient times namely make use of a popular usuall and nationall mother tougue For though the names which we learne even from the breast be not more significant then the other yet because that long custome hath made them familiar unto us and as it were naturall the Ideas or images of the names and of the things insinuating themselves into us joyntly at one time the former through the eares and the latter through the eyes and are joyned and inseparablie vnited in our memory and knit together by so perfect a sympathy and strict covenant that it is impossible to thinke upon the one without remembring the other and whilst the love of these two Ideas is reciprocall and they are faithfull to each other they ingender knowledge and polite speech in our mindes but if either of them violates the I awes of this sacred union suffers it self to be transported to illegal Objects they produce nothing but barbarism confusion Now this mis-understanding happeneth chiefly two waies either when the understanding abandoning the consideration of faire and solid truth seeks only after frivolous chimericall things or when it addicts it self to strange languages which are but servants contemns his mother tongue which is his true spouse and imitates Polygamie which is familiar to some Nations where Concubines are preferred before the Lawfull Wife Which cannot chuse but be very prejudiciall to discourse because that on the one side the images of those things which are not can engender in our minds nothing but false spuirous notions such as blind men have of colours of which they know only the name on the other side the idea of one only thing comming to unite it self in the memory to the Ideas and images of so many strange differing words alters confounds not only the species of the mother tongue but also breeds so great a confusion in the species of other languages that in stead of stirring up the Image of a Spanish word and uttering of it oftentimes it stirrs up and utters some Italian or French words thence it comes that those who have learn'd many languages cannot chuse sōtimes but confound mix thē together The Ideas of things and of names have been freely bestowed upon us at one time the former by nature and the latter by our nurses to make us capable of discourse and communication but be cause the Ideas of names commonly make not so deepe an impression in us as the Ideas of things we ought to practise them carefully from our tender age and strengthen them in such sort by frequent repetition that the memorie may not labour more in preserving and uttering them then it doth in conceiving the Ideas of things otherwise we shall never obtain in the faculty of well speaking but shall still be troubled with conceiving and not have power to bring forth which is one of the greatest disasters and troubles that can befall our mindes And to make it appear that we may longer and easier remember the species of things then the names of them we find by experience that every man is oftentimes troubled to remember some names which he hath almost daily uttered and yet shall not easily forget the species of a thing which he hath once or twice attentively marked and observed Finally experience teacheth us that he tongue and the thought doe alwaies retain somewhat of the quality of the climate Which is the cause that a Greek or Italian thought that hath alwaies even from its infancy been brought up and nourished with its own Country language as with a sister hath more relation and conformity to and with it then with any other and that a Science which consists all in word and thought is never naturall nor can enter or take any deep root in the spirit unlesse it be taught in the mother tongue That is the reason why when we speak French our words come from us easilie and a polite phrase is uttered by us as sudainly as a well conceived thought whereas in a Greek or Latin discourse wee must continually attend to the choice of terms studying upon every word we utter which turmoiles our mind and hinders it from employing it selfe with full liberty in the indagation of a truth which is also the cause that we do not easilie forget our Mother tongue whereas strange languages are as soone blotted out of our memories as we give over the use of them and the professors thereof no sooner discontinue the practise but they lose that habit which they had obtained with so much labour and difficultie Ever fince the Creation of the World untill about the time of Charles the great all the Nations of the Earth Gaules Egystians Persians and Grecians taught Sciences in Nationall and Mother tongues and if they did borrow any help of forraigne Languages they were such as were still in use and had their course among the learned who were consulted with as so many Oracles and besides it was but only untill such time that their owne Language was brought to perfection and they had invented termes enough for Sciences But this great Bruce being chosen King of the Romans absolute in a great part of Europe and considering that the Language was extreamly corrupted in the Roman Empire through the incursions of the Barbarians and espcially in these Western parts so that it was almost impossible to regulate it and in it to teach Sciences which he savoured as much as any Monarch in the World he judged it more expedient at that time to reestablish the Latin tongue every where and restore it to its purenesse then to refine and bring in use that Latin which was usuall in his time To this end he set up Vniversities caused all Pleas and acts to be pleaded and set down in Latin Questionlesse nis intentions were commendable and Noble yet they had no prosperous successe For he suppressed a certaine mixt Language which was then popular and might easily have been made perfect and compleat and yet did not revive the antient Roman tongue which was quite dead and extinguished Which occasioned a mighty disorder because that out of the corruption of one Language there were three framed which in a small time grew so different one from another that they could not be understood but onely by those who particularly professed them For then the French Spanish and Italian Grammarians
us of the best time we have to attain to learning All Languages ought to be learned by practice and not by precepts and wee finde by experience that the Dutch and Switzers which come to dwell in France amongst us cause their Language to continue in their own private families and their children are brought up in it without violence or precepts Nations frame every day amongst themselves new speeches naturally and as it were unawares and yet these numberless Greek and Latin teachers cannot in seven or eight hundred yeares make these Languages familiar in any Colledge nor bring youth to speake them naturally But yet wee neede not marvell if Languages follow the order of Generations of which we never see the beginning nor ending and as we can not raise them up again to their spring and origine so it is impossible to hinder them from descending and wearing away The Egyptians reproved the Grecians who came to studie amongst them saying they remaine in continuall infancie all their life time without Knowledge or discourse because they did not profit by their instructions and could not all under one learne a forraign Language though it were usuall both in the Masters and the Schollers mouthes and apprehend the Mysteries of their Doctrines But as soone as the Grecians began to learne and teach Philosophie in their own proper and naturall tongue they soon went beyond the Egyptians who were their masters in all manner of learning and afterward began to contemn all other Languages holding the Romans Spaniards and Carthaginians for barbarous Nations because they had not Sciences in their own proper Idioms Whereas if they had still learned Philosophie in the Chaldean and Egyptian Languages they had continued in their infancy for ever By this meanes all those Nations which studied Philosophie in their own mother tongue became betimes solid in learning and eloquent and have left behind them solid and eloquent workes Galen studying in his own tongue happily attained to perfection and was both a Mathematician a Philosopher and a Physician in fifteen or sixteen yeares as well as diverse others of his time and contrariwise those Nations which taught and do teach in obsolet Languages never taste the sweet of Sciences the very entrance thereinto seeming to them craggy and ine acceslible and if at last they attainethereunto it is with infinite labour and although they be learned yet are they barbarous in their manners actions and words How many learned men are there amongst us that cannot speak French and when they should come to the chaire to read or the barre to plead they wonder they must again the second time learne their Grammar which is almost impossible for them to doe because their memory faileth them and they have gotten such a continuall habit of their evill Provinciall accent and termes which are notusuall in Court nor will passe in gentile companies For the same was the reason why whilest they pleaded and preached in Latin here in France the pulpets and bâ—rres swarmed with grosse ignorant and barbarous persons But as soon as they began to speak French we have had such rare Preachers and famous Advocates that the French eloquence which may yet be stiled to be but in its infancie may contest either with Greek or Latin Advocates indeed had more reason then any others to retaine and preserve the use of the Latin tongue because most of our Lawes are derived from it the Roman Law was compiled in it in exquisite termes and it hath been so carefully polished and refined by the Roman Senate both in civill and criminall matters that one may say it was the first and perfectest schoole of eloquence that ever was and that the Greek which hath so many other excellencies is in this point inferiour to it and hath been forced in matters of Law to borrow many Latin words and cloth them in a Greek habit Yer they were the first who thorow a generous desire to serve their Country and honour their Nation did cast off the Latin our Language being indebted to them for its politenesse and elegancie and I admire that this their rare example seconded with such a happy successe hath not obliged Philosophers Mathemâ—â—icians and Physicians to forsake their barbarous termes and remnants of Latin to joyn with the Lawyers in the compleating of their own mother tongue Man is born for Sciences whereof he hath the seed within himself and to the end that he may discourse in his infancie and lose no time nature as soone as hee comes out of his cradle gratifies him with meanes neceslary for him to become learned causing him to suck and draw his own native tongue together with his nurses milke when he is not yet capable of any thing else that he may enter into his Philosophie as soon as he hath the very first degree of reason And that our common mother Nature hath not destinated us to learn languages we may perceive by this that the older we grow the more unfit we are for the attaining of them and a man who is come to a perfect and mature age shall labour more to attain one Language then a child in learning three or four severall ones Besides Sciences trouble not the mind as Languages doe and the more a man learneâ—h the apter he is to learn Sciences having such a relation to one another and being so linked together that they lend mutuall assistance to one another they are sisters which live in perfect unitie without any misunderstanding finding a joint habitation in our mind as it were in their fathers house which conceiving every where objects of the same kind needs but one Image to comprehend all those things which are of the same nature Wheras the Memorie by reason of the diversity of Languages is saine to burthen itself with an infinite number of specificall nominations which trouble one another and make a horrible confusion in that facultie And furthermore we find by experience that those who have many Languages are never so fitting for sublime meditations and deep discourses and that to be a sound Philosopher it is better to speak but one and have the understanding at libertie and free from the great intricacie of strange words The Egyptian Greek and Arabian Philosophers considering that Nature repleat both with goodnesse and wisdom did bring up children all at once to the Knowledge both of names and things and that she did suggest unto uâ— words according as she inspired us with thoughts did also at the same time respect as well the one as the other and were equally carefull of instructing children in well speaking and in doctrine As soon as the light of reason began to appear they sowed into the memory as in a fruitful soil the seeds and principles of Knowledge which served for a guide and conduct of their life so that good and wholsome Maxims taking deep root in the understanding did in processe of time fructifie and increase there whereby former
and more from its primitive purenesse at last was divided into the Italian Spanish French and severall other tongues As for the last and the three first those who are well read in Histories know they never had the termes of Sciences the fourth onely namely the Mixt had that priviledge towards its declining and it was not long a nationall Language nor had not age or time enough to be brought to the height of its perfections And now Latin is made use of but only in some parts of Europe where it is so subjest to the corrupt pronuâ—ciation of severall Nations that a French man can hardly understand a Germans Latine nor an Italian an Irish mans c. And besides the Latine tongue is now so defective that we can hardly expresse our selves in it the tearmes of all Arts and Sciences being so farre altered hat they have no relation to the Language as was in former times And lastly the knowledge of severall tongues is no way availeable to Philosophie and if a man could speake all manner of Languages he would be never the more rationall for that nor more fitting to learn Sciences then he that hath no more but his owne mother tongue It were much to be wished for the satisfaction of men the concord of Nations the communicating of thoughts that there were but one language in the world then were it easie to travail into farr countries there would be great facility in commerce and the whole world would be as it were but one state But since so much happinesse is not to be hoped for we are at least bound to refine our owne language and make it uniforme throughout our whole Kingdome Which if we doe and fit it so that we may teach Sciences in it it will grow in as great repute as other Languages were and forraigne Nations will come to us as they formerly did into Greece and Aegypt to learne Sciences It may be objected that the Latine hath a kinde of prerogative above other languages which it holdeth by a publick and universall right that former ages did with such a religious reverence worship and observe the use of it and some moderne writers as Mirandula Erasmus Fernelius Cardanus Scaliger Ramus Alciat Cuiacius Molineus Crassot have left us many accurates writing therin of all which we should lose the benefit and reading if we had no other language but French But if we consider on the other side that by meanes of translation we may appropiate unto our selves any Authours workes and that as soone as we have refined and polished our native tongue we may translate any either ancient or moderne this objection will be of no great weight There may againe be objected that the structure of the Greeke Latine tongues is more regular and they may furnish us with larger meanes of expressing our thoughts But though it be farre from us to lay any imputation or blame upon those noble Languages yet we may lawfully say that their excellencie consists but in artificiall beauties and that their ornaments are more necessary for Poets and Orators then for Philosophers who will have the perfection of Languages to consist in having proper names for all known things with which expressions our tongue is very well furnished and if it be wanting in any thing it hath been our Ancestors fault who have contemned their mother tongue which default we must now amend by our owne care And why are Plato Aristotle Plutarch Tullie and Senecaes workes in such great esteeme and credit it is not for their elegancie which is but an Axcessorie but because they have beene good Philosophers and have had perfect knowledge of vertue and Sciences It is therefore that Libraries are filled with their workes all solid spirits desire to reade them not for their Eloquence Rethoricall fluency Languages indeed have divers kindes of perfections some excell in abundancie of words to expresse their thoughts And those Nations which have the greatest knowledge of Divine and Naturall things and of Arts and Sciences have also a more rich and abounding Language And therein the first and imposed Language was most excellent it having a proper name for every mine ral or mixt that was in the world Some againe excell in the framing of parts of speeche when the Nownes and Verbs are well composed and the Tenses and Cases have their just terminations which make the beauty and variety of phrases and is a most rare ornament to a Language and therein the Greek Latine are much to be commended And some againe excell in sweetnesse of words pleasantnesse facility of pronunciation For the number of termes it is true that there are some wanting in the French for want of refining and polishing of it and because in stead of inventing names in our owne mother tongue for such things as we are newly come to the knowledge of we have improperly taken them out of the Greeke and Latine whereby they are not popular nor intelligible But if Sciences were once brought in and taught amongst us in our owne mother tongue that defect would soon be supplied and amended seeing our Alphabet well known and regulated is questionlesse more large and enriched with nine or ten letters and fifteene or sixteen diphthonges more then the Greeke Latine Italian or many more as we shall make it largely appeare in our Grammer wherein we will propose the meanes of shortning our French Orthographie and make it wholie conformable to the pronunciation which will make the reading thereof much more easie as well for strangers as our owne Countrimen As for the structure and frame of it we must confesse that it hath this defect common with other Languages which decline their Nounes by Articles and conjugate their Verbes with the help and assistance of the Substantive and Auxiliarie Verbe namely to speak in meeter often and want variety of terminations and this is the point wherein we must chiefly labour in the reformation of our language it being impossible for it otherwise to be perfect in all points compleate which those great Poets who lived in Charles the ninth and Henry the thirds time held to be absolutely necessary And though it be not so curiously regulated yet it doth not so much disquiet and trouble the mind by the transposing of words as artificiall languages doe but contrariwise in imitation of naturall ones it expresseth things in the same orders as they come into the minde and is more proper easie for Philosophie neither hath it so many Heteroclites irregular words as the Greeke and â—atine have As for the sweetnesse and facility of it strangers themselves will confesse and certaine it is that it goeth beyond any other language therein and that for two reasons The first is because it makes an excellent conjunction of betters and composition of words terminating them alternatively in Vowels Consonants and sometimes Diphthonges whereas the Italian words end for the most part in Voweâ—ls
themselves Outward speech being a thing necessary onely to impart our thoughts to others and not to speak to our selves who understand our own thoughts without expressing them outwardly They should therefore to finde out the effect of so rare a curiositie have put a great number of children rather then one or two together Whereupon wee must observe that if Nature seem to have done man great prejudice and much hindred the communication of Nations by giving them absolute power to make so many Languages She hath also given him power and meanes to obviate that inconvenience making him politick where by he might find that to make up most perfect Societies and Common-wealths happy he should carefully suppresse all particular Languages to bring in generall and common speeches amongst all Nations Now this great variety proceeds from two Originall causes Namely the indifferency and infinitenesse of words They are indifferent because Naturally they signifie nothing and are equally proper to signifie any thing They are almost infinite because there results an infinite number not onely of words but also of Languages out of the conjunction and copulation of letters and syllables whereof one alone may signifie all things one after another even as well as one onely thing may receive all manner of names successively according as men shall be willing to apply them unto it The number of letters which are dayly used is not yet well known nor regulated Men seeme to have been very carelesse in not ordering a matter of such importance for if they had well examined the nature of the Alphabet they might have had it a great deal more full and copious But howsoever as it is we have twentie or two and twentie letters which are now in use And is it not a thing worthy to be admired to see so many Languages built upon so small a foundation and by the copulation and transposition of so few letters so great a number of words made to which men unawares accustoming themselves have framed so many particular Languages From whence wee must necessarily conclude that all of them proceeding from one beginning they are essentially equall and cannot any way differ but onely in the quantity of termes whereof they are composed Wherefore all men have equall Power and Right to give names to such things as yet have none especially Philosophers to whom it belongs to invent names to represent things rightly and set them in a due course they have full power to set downe termes for Sciences and Arts to make themselves intell gible and communicate their learning to others Wee may likewise in imitation of the Greekes and Romans borrow of our neighbour Languages some termes which may be wanting in our own for although for a time they passe for strangers yet after some few years they are naturalized and conform themselves so well to the tone of the Nation that there is no difference to be found in them The Romans did not alwaies strive to translate into â—atin all Greek words as Rhetorick Musick Arithmetick Geometrie Astrologie Philosophie Chirurgerie and most of the names of Sciences and Arts of Figures of Herbes of Diseases and many other things They have been content to adopt them and admit them into their community Knowing that all words both Greek and other are of common right and belong to all Nations equally who desire to make use of them and that all â—anguages lend borrow words to and from each other continually For though it be not manifestly known that the Greekes borrowed the termes of Sciences from other Nations yet it is credible that they brought them with them out of Egypt where they went to study and that the Egyptians likewise borrowed them from some other more ancient Nation which might invent them when they first invented Philosophie And if this dependencie be odious to free our selves from it wee need but alter the Etymologie imitating learned Varro therein who being ashamed that so many Latin words should descend from the Greek for the honour of his Nation derived them from other severall Languages of Italie When one doth not indeed understand the signification of a strange word he may have recourse to the Originall but when it is once come into custome it is no more needfull the meanest artist knowing the signification thereof as well as the greatest Doctor As for example the common people do not know that the words Chirurgerie Apoplexie and Prophesie are Greek words and yet they understand as well what they meane as he that hath studied the Greek Grammer twenty yeares Finally Pilots have found out termes enough for Sea affaires Architects for Architecture and so have all other Artists for their severall Arts. And is it not a shame that Philosophers have not in so many ages found a way in France to invent necessarie words for our French Philosophie It is certaine that when Gunnes Printing and other new Arts were first invented the Authors thereof had no proper termes for them and yet now we have abundance And when King Francis the first commanded all to plead in the Mother tongue the people which belonged to the Courts of Justice were at first astonished at it and some did even despaire of going forward in their profession Yet we see how in a short time they have found out as many termes as ever the Greeke or Roman law had and would to God they had not invented so many Likewise about a bundred yeares since all Poetrie lay as it were dead in French and especially Comick Poems were so barren and dull that none did scarce dare to shew themselves upon the Stage Yet by little and little they have been so adorned and beautified especially now of late daies they have thorow your Eminencies beneficence so increased in Elegancie and Politenesse that the Theaters Eccho with acclamations and applauses If our Language were now as barren and imperfect as heretofore it hath beene I must confesse our enterprise would at first be somewhat hard and difficult But it is now enriched and hath abundancie of words to explaine our thoughts They now can reade publick Lectures of Philosophie and Mathematicks in the mother tongue and Divines can unfold the deepe mysteries of Divinity therein and make them intelligible even to the plainest and dullest understandings But against all these reasons they will peradventure alleadge that those who study Philosophy in French never came to be absolute Philosophers But that is not through the defect of the Language or of Philosophy it self but rather through want of method Those who learne it in Latin privately profit not a whit more The reason is because that those masters which teach privately in chambers endeavour nothing but onely to please and content their auditors reading lectures full of cavills and ostentation no way tending to solid instruction This schooling is but a kind of pastime even as in Comedies where the Actor seeks onely to tickle the itching eares of the hearers to draw