The Adam-man Tongue

618 Pages·2015·16.9 MB·English

by  Edmund Shaftesbury

tne
ADAM-MAN TONGUE
T NE
or MUMAN BACE
tml
BY
EDMUND SMAETESBUßY
ISSUED BY TME
ßALSTON PUBLISNING COMPANY
WASHINGTON. D. ( .
IQCO
Google
Digitized by
Copyright, 1902
by
RALSTON PUBLISHING COMPANY
All Rights Reserved
Trade-Mark
ADAM-MAN
Google
Digitized by
PREFACE
It is hardly necessary to say that the Adam-man tongue is
intended to take the place of present English among all English­
speaking people as the first step in its new progress, and, when
this shall have been accomplished, to go to all the nations of the
world as the permanent language of the human race. Such is
its mission.
Present English will be known as a classic tongue. It will be
used only for reading as a pleasure, and for historical reference;
and/in those channels, it will flow on alongside the Adam-man.
The latter will not displace the former, for the two are nearer to
each other than are the dialects of England, one to another. A
Londoner is not able to understand his own language a few
miles out from the metropolis unless he has taken the trouble tb
learn some new words and sounds; for there are parts of Eng­
land where there are dialects that vary considerably from the
speech of the great metropolis.
The first duty of America is to make Adam-man a general
language by adoption. This can be accomplished in an incredi­
bly short space of time if a concerted movement is inaugurated
in all the States and carried vigorously on to a triumphant end.
There is no real difficulty to be encountered in the study—the
only drudgery being the memorizing of words, and this is a valu­
able means of strengthening the mind. To the man or woman
who is in earnest every page of this volume will prove interesting
and even fascinating.
Google
Digitized by
INTRODUCTORY TALK
One Tongue for All Mankind
All languages must begin with an alphabet, and every alphabet
must begin with elementary sounds. Its letters should be signs
of sounds and each should represent one sound only. No alpha­
bet in the world is thus constructed except the Adam-man, as an
investigation will prove.
An elementary sound is one that is complete in itself. Thus
th as in thin, and dh as in then, are each elements. They exist
in very few alphabets. Their letter-signs are absent in Eng^sh,
but are represented by two other letters, which are th, neither of
which is the true sign of the sounds; and at their best they are
barbarisms.
On the other hand the vowel i, as in mite, is represented by one
letter only, when in fact it is a double sound composed of AH and
EE, blended in the utterance. Some modern dictionaries spell
it phonetically with the letters ai.
The English alphabet is seriously defective in that its letters
do not tell us their true sounds. There is a foundation principle
that requires a sound to appear in a letter, and no other sound to
be represented by that letter. Let us see if this is so in the Eng­
lish alphabet.
A is the first character of the system. As a character it ought
to stand for a sound, and one only; but it is made to do duty for
the following:
A as in mate.
A as in mat.
A as in mass.
A as in mar.
A as in homezvard; same as e in her.
A as in fall.
And some authors include distinctions between “fair,” “their”
and “there” in addition to the above. Why should one character
Google
Digitized by
ONE TONGUE FOR ALL MANKIND 7
be made to do the work of six or more; or even double duty?
The first step in building a universal language is to create char­
acters for all the elementary sounds.
B has its sound at all times.
C is superfluous. It is either hard or soft, as in cement and
cat. When hard it has a k sound; when soft it is s. C, there­
fore, must be omitted altogether.
D has its own sound at all times.
E has several sounds, as follows:
E as in meet.
E as in mere.
E as in met.
E as in ere.
E as in her.
F has an aspirate sound in five and if.
F has a smooth sound in of.
G soft is not elementary, and as such has no place in any alpha­
bet.
G hard has its true sound at all times.
G soft is but a j, and is a barbarism in any tongue. See J.
H is a breathing. It is easy to make and appears in many lan­
guages.
I is made to do the work of several sounds, as follows:
I as in mit.
I as in machine, being the sound of e in meet.
I as in mite, being a double sound.
I as in sir; same as e in her.
J, the same as soft G, is a barbarism. It consists of D as one
element and ZH as another element. The latter requires two
letters to represent its single sound of ZH, as in azure, and this
of itself is wrong. When we say JAR, *we utter sounds equal
to DZHAR. This may be analyzed by saying DAH—ZHAH
rapidly, blending them together as one action into JAH. Both J
and soft G should disappear from our language. It is an impos­
sible sound to most foreigners. The Germans prefer yah to j,
and the French omit the D from the combination. Thus, for gen­
tlemen, they say zhentleman; for John they say ZHON, and this
change is merely taking D from the DZH of the J. We say
DZHAR, which is jar; they say ZHAR; and this is the best they
can do with it.
Google
Digitized by
8 THE ADAM-MAN TONGUE
K has its true sound always.
L should have but one sound. It is wrong to give it a Y
effect.
M and N have true sounds.
O is made to do the work of several letters, as follows:
O as in nor or not.
O as in no or note.
O as in four or bore.
O as in word; same as e in her.
O as in oil or oyster.
O as in out or found.
O as in bought.
O as in boot.
O as in book.
P has its true sound.
Q is superfluous. With “u” it is equal to KW, as queen, or
kween; quick, or kwick; squash, or skwash. It should be elimi­
nated as a letter.
R has the following sounds:
R as in drill; a front-tongue wave.
R as in d-r-r-r-ill; being rolled.
R as in far; a middle-tongue wave.
Nearly all Europeans, even including the English, roll the r,
but Americans are losing the action as well as the last form or
middle-tongue wave.
S should have but one sound. It is too often given the z
effect, as
S in refuse, busy, etc., which is wrong.
S in its true sound appears in assist, miss, ask, sin, and such.
T has its true sound.
U, like all other vowels, is made to do the duty of several, as
follows:
U as in pun.
U as in puny or tune.
U as in butcher; same as oo in book.
U as in lute.
U as in fur, burr; same as e in her.
V has its true sound.
W is true in such uses as well, will, wan, wind, etc.
Google
Digitized by
ONE TONGUE FOR ALL MANKIND 9
W is a vowel when it follows a, e or o in the same syllable, as
law, equal to lau, as in laud; or few, equal to feu; also cow, equal
to cou, as in couch. Low is equal to lo; the w being entirely
silent.
X is superfluous. It is merely KS.
Y is true before a vowel, as in yet, yam, young, and others.
Y is a vowel after a consonant in the same syllable, as by, try,
folly, etc. It is merely an i in such a case.
W and Y as vowels are superfluous.
Let us now commit to memory the following divisions:
1. The barbarisms are: G soft, J, TH and DH (as in thin
and then), and CH. The last sound, CH, we have not mentioned
as it does not appear in the alphabet. It is only the aspirate form
of J, and is equal to TSH. J is DZH as DZHIN or GIN, while
CH is TSH as TSHIN or CHIN. It is a puzzle to all foreigners.
WH, as in when, is also a barbarism.
2. The superfluities are: C soft, C hard, Q, X and W and
Y when vowels.
3. The true consonants are: B, D, F, G hard, H, K, L,
M, N, P, R, S, T, V, W, Y and Z. These seventeen, together
with certain other elementary sounds, must constitute the conso­
nants of a universal language. The others are:
SH as in show and sure.
ZH as in azure and leisure; French Jean.
NG as in sing, ink, bang. This is an elementary sound, and,
while we are compelled to spell it with two letters, N and G, it
contains neither one of them.
We thus have twenty true consonants, all of which will, of
necessity, appear in any universal language that is to be regarded
as perfect. To each of these there must be given a fixed char­
acter. There will be no real increase of the consonant part of the
present alphabet; but a decided decrease, for we now hav.e twenty-
one consonants and such added characters as th, ch, wh, sh, and
ng, which are even more inconvenient than single characters
would be, making a total of twenty-six consonants now in use,
for which there will be but twenty in the new alphabet. With
the vowels it is not so easy to give a reduced number.
The vowels mu9t be discovered from the mouth positions.
There are in English fourteen of these and three doubles, making
Google
Digitized by
10 THE ADAM-MAN TONGUE
a total of seventeen; but the doubles may be easily made from
their elements and there is one of the vowel sounds that is a bar­
barism. This is the obscure sound of a as in dance, mass, and
soda. It is of no value. Three others are unnecessary. Allow­
ing one vowel character for each of the true sounds we find it
necessary to employ ten vowels; to which there are to be added
three blended sounds that are easily made by all human beings;
thus giving a vowel-alphabet of thirteen sounds and as many
corresponding characters.
These, with the consonants, furnish a complete alphabet of
thirty-three sounds and as many characters.
Google
Digitized by
LESSON ONE
The Adam-man Tongue
EXPLANATION OF THE NAME ADAM-MAN.
1. The adoption of the name given to the Universal Language
came about so gradually that it can hardly be regarded as the
result of a fixed purpose. In the development of the work no
name was sought until the one now in use had become familiar
and could not easily be discarded.
2. A language is pure when its alphabet is free from defects,
its sounds uniform and its words regular in construction. It
makes no difference whether it contains a thousand, a hundred
thousand, or a million words.
3. Tracing the ancestry of English in the direction of its origin
as far as it is possible to go, a steady tendency sets in toward a
perfect alphabet and a pure tongue. The roots that form the
basis of modern speech are as old as the race.
4. This fact is well known to students of philology. Max
Müller says: “Many words still live in India and England that
witnessed the first separation of the northern and southern
Aryans, and these are witnesses not to be shaken by any cross­
examination. The terms for God, for horse, for father, mother,
son, daughter, for dog and cow, for heart and tears, for axe and
tree and other words, identical in all the Indo-European idioms,
are like the watchwords of soldiers.”
5. These primitive roots and terms form the elementary struc­
ture of the Adam-man tongue, and hence arose the use of the
most primitive name in history—Adam. This name includes, in
the Hebrew language, not only the specific man, Adam, but also
the race itself of which Adam was a member.
6. In the Universal Language the only purpose in employing
the word Adam as a part of its name is because it is symbolic of
its primitive foundation.
Google
Digitized by
12 THE ADAM-MAN TONGUE
7. The word man stands for the race or the human family as
well as for the individual.
8. These explanations are made in anticipation of inquiries as
to the reason why the word Adam-man is used, and they will
enable students to answer the same inquiries elsewhere.
9. In brief, the Adam-man tongue is the language of man (the
human race) founded upon the primitive (Adam) roots and
terms that are the watchwords of universal speech.
10. While the vocabulary is vastly larger to-day than in the
early era, its elementary sounds are unchanged. They admit of
unlimited expansion.
Google
Digitized by