Picture-writing and its contraction, which is denominated the simple hiero glyphic, must be very inadequate for the purposes of communication. The figura tive hieroglyphic would soon be adopted; for oral language must have made some progress, before the use of permanent vi sible communication would be found ne cessary, and, consequently, must have given metaphorical meanings to the names of sensible objects. We here speak of hieroglyphics as intended for the purposes of communicating, not of conceal ing knowledge. It was long thought that the latter was the first and only purpose. Warburton has proved that this was not their first use, but that which was made of them in a later period, particularly when the invention of letters had ren dered the former purpose unnecessary. The simple hieroglyphic was, where the delineation of part of the object or action represented the whole. Thus the an cient Egyptians painted a man's two feet in water, to denote a fuller ; smoke as cending, to denote fire ; two hands, one holding a buckler, the other a bow, to de note a battle. The figurative hierogly phic was of two kinds : one, where the instrument, real or supposed, was used to denote the performer, or the thing per formed : the other, where one object was used to represent another, which had some real or supposed resemblance to it. Egyptian examples of the first kind are, all eye and a sceptre, to signify a king ; a sword, a bloody tyrant ; the mouth, to denote speech or voice ; the sun and moon, as a symbol for succession of time; an eye placed in an eminent position, for the omniscience of God. Examples of the second are, a dog's head (as among the Chinese, a dog's voice), to denote sorrow ; dew falling from heaven to de note science. To these may be added, as a mixed example, the inscription on the temple of Minerva at Sais ; where are found, engraved on the vestibule, the figures of an infant, an old man, a hawk and a fish, and a river horse ; the hawk and fish were the symbol for hatred, and the river horse for impudence : so that the literal translation would be, "young and old bate impudence," or still more literally, " old man, infant, hatred, im pudence." The Scythian king sent to Darius, a mouse, a frog, a bird, a dart, and a plough : if he had sent their delinea tions, it would have formed a similar spe cimen of the hieroglyphic.
Hieroglyphics would frequently be founded on the figures to which use had given currency in oral language. The procedure of the mind is the same in both ; and they would mutually influence each other. With respect to the simple hieroglyphic, as that was a mere con traction of the full delineation in picture writing, the only similarity we must ex pect to find in language is the contrac tion of words. Both were intended for the purpose of facilitating communica tion, by increasing its rapidity.
The first use of hieroglyphics was, to preserve the memory of events and insti tutions ; such symbols, therefore, would first be adopted as were of obvious inter pretation ; viz: those which were found ed on prevailing opinions ; as, the hyena, for a man bearing his distresses with for titude, and rising superior to them, be cause the skin of that animal was suppos ed to render the wearer dauntless and invulnerable ; on those founded on oral language, which would be intelligible, when the analogies which gave rise to them were forgotten. By degrees they were employed for the more refined pur poses of philosophy ; and the analogies on which they were founded, would re. quire an acquaintance with the sciences from which they were deduced. Still nothing was done for concealment : at last superstition appropriated their use ; and after the invention of letters, they were employed to keep the mysteries of the priesthood from the eyes of the pro fane vulgar. Their symbols were now formed of far-fetched resemblances ; a cat was used to denote the moon, from the sup posed contraction or dilatation of the pu pil of her eye, at different parts of the lunation. In common hieroglyphics, E gypt was denoted by a crocodile ; in the sacred, by a heart on a burning censor. One animal, or other sensible object, was used to denote a variety of qualities ; and the same idea was denoted by various hieroglyphics. This has attached to the whole hieroglyphical system the charac ter of mystery : when we trace the pro gress of the Chinese language, we shall have additional proofs of the injustice of this opinion.
The exact manlier of delineation would be tedious and voluminous. The more use was made of visible communication, the more we may expect to find the cha racter, originally significant, become a mere arbitrary mark. In the early stages of the Egyptian hieroglyphics, considera ble attention was paid to the outline and filling up of their figures. Afterwards a rude outline was sufficient ; and this was changed, for the convenience of the writer, till it lost every resemblance to the object it originally represented. Many changes in our own written charac ter might be adduced, illustrative of this change from the delineation to the cur sive hieroglyphic. The mark for and, for instance, was once the correct pic ture of et ; some forms show its origin, as &; at present, in writing at least, it bears no features of resemblanae to its original. The use of the cursive hiero glyphic would take off the attention from the symbol, and fix it upon the thing sig. nified : a progress which we equally ob serve in oral language, where words, ori ginally denotements of sensible objects, became the names for mental qualities bearing some resemblance to what they before signified, and in many instances have been appropriated to the mental quality, without any reference to the ori ginal meaning.
Visible characters having become arbi trary marks for ideas or words, two pro cesses were pursued by different dis tricts of Asia and Africa : the one was, to consider these characters as signs for sounds, and, by their intervention, of ideas ; the other; as signs for ideas with out any reference to sounds. The latter was the procedure of the Chinese ; the former, of all nations who used alphabeti cal characters.
076 the Chinese Language.
`We come now to the consideration of a language singular in all its parts, and possessed of such peculiar features that it well deserves our attention. The writ ten. language of the Chinese has passed through all the gradations which we have described : and from their pictures, char actershave become mere arbitrary marks; these are employed, not as signs for sounds, but for ideas ; and their combi nations and changes 'have no correspond ing combinations and changes in the spo ken language of China. Before the time of their first emperor, Fohi, the Chinese arc supposed to have employed knotted cords, like the Peruvians. Fohi intro duced in their place horizontal lines ; (see Plate Miscel. fig. 14.) some whole, others divided ; and by their combination in threes, formed the text of the most an cient Chinese work, called "Ye King." On these trigrams numerous commenta ries have been written, some as early as 1100 years before Christ : they are sup posed to contain, in a few lines, the most sublime truths, and are employed in di vination ; but they are still unintelligi ble., By Xin-nung, the successor of Fohi, sixty-four hexagrams (like those in fig. 15), were invented, which are supposed to contain the whole circle of human knowledge. It is thought that these characters were taken from the knotted cords, and it seems to us probable that they expressed no more. The time of their invention (which is carried back to the age of Noah), and their apparent in adequacy to represent more than num bers, renders it highly improbable that they were intended to denote the mys teries of philosophy. The present nu merals of the Chinese have an equal right to be esteemed the •mysterious denote ments of science. Whatever be the just ness of this idea, it is certain that these trigrams and hexagrams are not the ori gin of the present Chinese character. In numerous instances, the progress can be traced from pictures or symbols to the present form ; in some the connecting steps are lost, but the general inference is still a just one. The present form sel dom presents any traces of its original. Tien (fig. 16), heaven, has no longer a natural or symbolical resemblance to the object ; hut it was first represented by three curved lines (as in fig. 17), and, through the various changes in fig 18, it has arrived at its present form. Several other examples are given in the Philos. Trans. vol. lix.