Page:Critical Pronouncing Dictionary (Walker, 4th edition, London, 1806).pdf/11

Rh tongues, there is a double pronunciation; one, cursory and colloquial; the other, regular and solemn. The cursory pronunciation is always vague and uncertain, being made different, in different mouths, by negligence, unskilfulness, or affectation. The solemn pronunciation, though by no means immutable and permanent, is yet always less remote from the orthography, and less liable to capricious innovation. They have, however, generally formed their tables according to the cursory speech of those with whom they happened to converse, and, concluding that the whole nation combines to vitiate language in one manner, have often established the jargon of the lowest of the people as the model of speech. For pronunciation the best general rule is, to consider those as the most elegant speakers who deviate least from the written words."

Without any derogation from the character of Dr. Johnson, it may be asserted, that in these observations we do not perceive that justness and accuracy of thinking for which he is so remarkable. It would be doing great injustice to him, to suppose that he meant to exclude all possibility of conveying the actual pronunciation of many words that depart manifestly from their orthography, or of those that are written alike, and pronounced differently, and inversely. He has marked these differences with great propriety himself, in many places of his Dictionary; and it is to be regretted that he did not extend these remarks farther. It is impossible, therefore, he could suppose that, because the almost imperceptible glances of colloquial pronunciation were not to be caught and described by the pen, that the very perceptible difference between the initial accented syllables of money and monitor, or the final unaccented syllables of finite and infinite, could not be sufficiently marked upon paper. Cannot we show that cellar, a vault, and seller, one who sells, have exactly the same sound; or that the monosyllable full, and the first syllable of fulminate, are sounded differently, because there are some words in which solemnity will authorize a different shade of pronunciation from familiarity? Besides, that colloquial pronunciation which is perfect, is so much the language of solemn speaking, that, perhaps, there is no more difference than between the same picture painted to be viewed near and at a distance. The symmetry in both is exactly the same; and the distinction lies only in the colouring. The English Language, in this respect, seems to have a great superiority over the French, which pronounces many letters in the poetic and solemn style, that are wholly silent in the prosaic and familiar. But if a solemn and familiar pronunciation really exists in our language, is it not the business of a grammarian to mark both? And if he cannot point out the precise sound of unaccented syllables, (for these only are liable to obscurity) he may, at least, give those sounds which approach the nearest, and by this means become a little more useful than those who so liberally leave every thing to the ear and taste of the speaker.

The truth is, Dr. Johnson seems to have had a confused idea of the distinctness and indistinctness with which, on solemn or familiar occasions, we sometimes pronounce the unaccented vowels; and with respect to these, it must be owned, that his remarks are not entirely without foundation. The