Page:Proposals for a missionary alphabet; submitted to the Alphabetical Conferences held at the residence of Chevalier Bunsen in January 1854 (IA cu31924100210388).pdf/64

 The first question, taking a type, for instance, of the Sanskrit alphabet, would be, "What is its most usual and most original value? If this be fixed, then, "Is there another type which has a better claim to this value?" If so, their claims must be weighed and adjusted. When this question is settled, and the physiological category is found under which the Sanskrit type has its proper place, we have then to look for the exponent of this physiological category in the Missionary alphabet, and henceforth always to transliterate the one by the other.

The following lists will show how some of the Arian, Semitic, and Turanian languages have been transliterated, and how all these alphabets and their transcriptions can be expressed by means of the Missionary alphabet. Objections, I am aware, can hardly fail to be raised on several points, because the original character of several Hebrew, Arabic, and Sanskrit letters has been so frequently controverted. If the disputed value of these letters can be clearly settled by argument, be it so; and it will then never be difficult to find the exponent of that physiological category to which it has been adjudged. Failing this, the question should be decided by authority or agreement; for, of two views which are equally plausible, we must, for practical purposes, manifestly confine ourselves to one.