e, has been so frequently urged, and is so obvious in itself, that
none but those who have been themselves neglected, will be likely to
disregard the claims of their children in this respect.[98] But surely an
accurate knowledge of the ordinary powers of the letters would be vastly
more common, were there not much hereditary negligence respecting the
manner in which these important rudiments are learned. The utterance of the
illiterate may exhibit wit and native talent, but it is always more or less
barbarous, because it is not aided by a knowledge of orthography. For
pronunciation and orthography, however they may seem, in our language
especially, to be often at variance, are certainly correlative: a true
knowledge of either tends to the preservation of both. Each of the letters
represents some one or more of the elementary sounds, exclusive of the
rest; and each of the elementary sounds, though several of them are
occasionally transferred, has some one or two letters to which it most
properly or most frequently belongs. But borrowed, as our language has
been, from a great variety of sources, to which it is desirable ever to
retain the means of tracing it, there is certainly much apparent lack of
correspondence between its oral and its written form. Still the
discrepancies are few, when compared with the instances of exact
conformity; and, if they are, as I suppose they are, unavoidable, it is as
useless to complain of the trouble they occasion, as it is to think of
forcing a reconciliation. The wranglers in this controversy, can never
agree among themselves, whether orthography shall conform to pronunciation,
or pronunciation to orthography. Nor does any one of them well know how our
language would either sound or look, were he himself appointed sole arbiter
of all variances between our spelling and our speech.

OBS. 3.--"Language," says Dr. Rush, "was long ago analyzed into its
alphabetic elements. Wherever this analysis is known, the art of teaching
language has, with the best success, been conducted upon the rudimental
method." * * * "The art of reading consists in having all the vocal
elements under complete command, that they may be properly applied, for the
vivid and elegant delineation of the sense and sentiment of
discourse."--_Philosophy of the Voice_, p. 346. Again, of "the
pronunciation of the alphabetic elements," he says, "The least deviation
_from the assumed standard_ converts the listener into the critic