Undoubtedly the noblest acquisition of mankind, perhaps the greatest advantage which we possess, is that of the faculty of speech. Without speech, man, in the midst of crowds, would be solitary. The endearments of friendship, and the communications of wisdom, alike would become unavailing; man, in fact, without speech, could hardly be accounted a rational being.
That the use of speech or language was given to Adam immediately upon his formation, we have no reason to doubt; for from the testimony of Moses it appears, that he not only gave names to every living creature, “to every beast of the field, and to every fowl of the air,” as they were brought to him, but that also as soon as Eve was made he could say—“This is now bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh,” the first sentence which is recorded of his uttering, and which is sufficient to show, that even then, he possessed a competent stock of words to declare the ideas or conceptions of his mind.
Thus was man at once rendered as superior to the brute creation, as in after times by the aid of writing, or the art of drawing those ideas into vision, he was especially distinguished from the condition of uncivilized savages. For of all the arts that contribute to the comfort and happiness of mankind, no one, perhaps, is more intimately connected with our social habits, or more closely entwined with the best and purest feelings of our nature, than that of writing. And yet to conceive or to account for the origin of an art so invaluable in its tendency to elevate and improve mankind, as that of exhibiting to sight the various conceptions of the mind, which have no corporeal forms, by means of hieroglyphics or legible characters, is still as difficult and perplexing, as in past ages it has ever proved to the sagacity of mankind. With the poet of old we have yet to enquire—
“Whence did the wondrous mystic art arise,
Of painting speech, and speaking to the eyes?
That we by tracing magic lines are taught
How to embody, and to colour thought.”
Notwithstanding the great and manifold blessings which men have received from this curious and wonderful invention, it is very remarkable, as a distinguished writer observes, that writing, which gives a sort of immortality to all other things, should, by the disposal of Divine Providence, be without any trace of the memory of its first founders. Indeed, the invention of letters and their various combinations in forming words, amounting, it is computed, to 620,448,401,733,239,439,360,000, without repeating any combination capable of being made from so small a number of letters as that now comprising our alphabet, has something so extremely ingenious and surprising in its application, that most men who have treated the subject, can hardly forbear attributing it to a divine original.
Many have conceived that the theatre of this important legacy to man was Mount Sinai. But it is observable, that previously to the arrival of the Israelites at Mount Sinai, Scripture makes mention of writing as an art already understood by Moses: “And the Lord said unto Moses, write this for a memorial.” (Exodus, 17th ch. 14th v.) Now, Moses seems to have expressed no difficulty of comprehension when he received this command, nor does anything appear to induce the slightest doubt; on the contrary, I think we may safely conclude that Moses was even then well acquainted with the art of writing, or otherwise he would have been instructed by God, as in the case of Noah, when he was required to build the Ark. And further, we find that Moses wrote all the words, and all the judgments of the Lord, contained in the twenty-first and two following chapters of the Book of Exodus, before the two written tables of stone were even so much as promised. The delivery of the tables is not mentioned till the 18th verse of the 31st chapter, after God had made an end of communing with him upon the mount. Nevertheless, I am not prepared to dispute the probability of a divine origin to so wonderful a medium, any more than I am disposed to question the possibility of its resulting merely from what Aristotle terms the Faculty of Imitation; for which, says he, men are so remarkable, even in an uncivilized state. I pass by all questions of the kind, satisfied for the present with the simple fact, that such medium does exist; that through it we become, as it were, introduced to the multitudinous throng of a world’s tenantry, while we thus learn their words, works, and ways, their History, Literature, and Arts, their Science, and Theology; and while even the mummy, recovered from the subterranean recesses of the Egyptian pyramids, may still be said to talk with us, by virtue of the roll of papyrus and its pictured inscription which he holds in his hand;