Universal Writing Systems: Philosophical Languages and Humanist Rhetoric in Seventeenth-Century England

Quidditas Volume 11 Article 8 1990 Universal Writing Systems: Philosophical Languages and Humanist Rhetoric in Seventeenth-Century England Grant M. Boswell Brigham Young University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/rmmra Part of the Comparative Literature Commons, History Commons, Philosophy Commons, and the Renaissance Studies Commons Recommended Citation Boswell, Grant M. (1990) "Universal Writing Systems: Philosophical Languages and Humanist Rhetoric in Seventeenth-Century England," Quidditas: Vol. 11 , Article 8. Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/rmmra/vol11/iss1/8 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Quidditas by an authorized editor of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. ]RMMRA II (1990) Universal Writing Systems: Philosophical Languages and Humanist Rhetoric in Seventeenth-Century England by Grant M. Boswell Brigham Young University INTRODUCTION THE EARLY RENAISSANCE, like the Hellenic Age and the Golden Age of Roman literature, was epistemologically oriented to the discursory practices of rhetoric rather than to the rational methods of philosophy. 1 This pref erence resulted from the widespread adoption oflinguistic presuppositions upon which humanist rhetoric was based. By the end of the seventeenth century, however, the underlying principles of humanism had been replaced. The discursory competence that humanism had sought to develop had become devalued, and in its place other epistemological systems had arisen. Francis Bacon, the Royal Society, Rene Descartes, Isaac Newton, and John Locke all offered epistemological principles that had a more philosophical appearance and that explicitly or implicitly renounced humanism and rhetoric. 2 In this environment the linguistic presuppositions of humanism were challenged and the way prepared for planned languages. In order to understand the impact of language-planning efforts on the history of rhetoric in the seventeenth century, we must first understand the role of rhetoric and humanism, for, as Jose Rico Verdu says, the history of rhetoric is the history of humanism.3 Many fifteenth-century humanists repugned the title of philosopher for grammarian or rhetorician and took up the practice of rhetoric and poetry.4 Humanists considered language to GRANT M. BOSWELL be a conventional means by which people came to agree about what was significant in their lives and world, and their agreement regarding what was worth knowing affected what they believed and how they acted. The lan guage competence the Renaissance schools sought to give students reflected these ideals. 5 The schools ratified the prestige of rhetoric by making rhe torical competence the goal of education. Education was to inculcate vir tue and eloquence and extirpate their opposites, vice and barbarousness.6 The well-educated man would be ready with stores of wisdom collected from assiduous reading to be employed in any situation that might arise. He was to apply his competence in rhetoric, moving others to belief and ~ction that would serve the state, church, and humanity. 7 In this sense rhetoric occupied a preeminent place in humanist education and thus was the metalinguistic discipline in the schools. 8 Having made explicit what was central to humanist language educa tion prior to the seventeenth century, I now want to trace, evaluate, and contrast the ways in which the seventeenth-century English language planners turned away from their humanist heritage and therefore traditional rhetoric. LINGUISTIC CONTEXT The seventeenth century was not conscious of the epistemological principles that at first valued and later devalued rhetoric because, like any age, the century was preoccupied with the more pressing matters of politics, economics, religion, and education. The decline of humanist rhetoric might be traced by analyzing any of these disciplines, but since humanists were in general committed to learning and its assimilation and dissemination through language, I will focus on language-planning efforts, particularly on universal writing schemes, in order to trace the relationship between what was happening in the seventeenth-century linguistic context and how it affected the principles that underlay humanism. Seventeenth-century English grammar schools occupy the center of a major dispute concerning the ideals, goals, and practices of education. There were many sides to the debate, but the issues can be summarized as follows: Was it better to use the standard texts or develop new ones? Was it better to retain traditional teaching practices or develop new ones? Was grammar the best approach to learning a language? What were the alternatives? Was Latin the best language to be taught in the schools? Was classical literature 128 UNIVERSAL WRITING SYSTEMS the most useful subject matter for schools? Those involved in these disputes were more concerned with the particular issues at hand than they were with the epistemological foundation of humanism. They approached their tasks of reforming and shoring up language education without realizing the effect their actions might have on the humanist values they espoused. Nevertheless, their actions did have consequences. The decisions, alterations, and reforms they made eroded the foundation of humanism and with it traditional rhetoric.9 The pedagogical problems of the grammar schools shaped linguistic attitudes of the seventeenth century because for most people the schools provided the first conscious encounter with learning languages. Despite all other factors that contributed to language reform, the justification most frequently made for reform was couched in educational terms. Most of the reforms were directed at the learned languages, especially Latin, and it is not surprising to see the extent to which Latin learning lost prestige during the century, opening the way for alternative languages to be considered, among which universal writing schemes became important. In addition to the dissatisfaction with the way Latin was taught in the schools, Latin lost prestige as the language of learning for several other reasons. Some Puritans attacked the pagan fables and follies students were forced to read. John Webster, among other Puritans, was vociferously anticlassical in his viewpoint. The influence of Protestant radicals, how ever, was mollified by other Puritans who regarded the classics as aid to education. In his survey of grammar schools, Foster Watson concludes that although religious influence was the primary force behind curricular change, the radical Puritans were tempered by other, more moderate, co-religionists who wanted merely to deemphasize classical literature by adding religious readings to the curriculum. 10 Thus classical learning became subservient to religious training. Such influence, however, though a factor, was not the sole cause for the decline of Latin. In addition, changing sociological and political structures made English increasingly important for education, commerce, and government. The number of English schools increased dramatically in response to the prac tical need for English-language instruction. Many Puritan reformers did not want to do away with the grammar schools as much as to provide education for the poor in the form of charity schools. These schools, which would become common in the eighteenth century, can be traced to such 129 GRANT M. BOSWELL seventeenth-century reformers as John Dury and William Petry, the latter proposing ergastula literaria, or literary workhouses, where poor children could be taught to read and write English while learning a trade. 11 Con sequently, Latin also had to contend with the ever increasing importance of the vernacular. Also, during the seventeenth century many were eager to recover the lost language of Adam, believing that it held the key to the relationship between words and things. There were several candidates for the Edenic language. Hebrew was the favorite, although some argued that Latin, Greek, Egyptian, or other languages were the original. One faction even proposed Teutonic as the first human language. 12 Language planners stated explicitly their intention to remedy the confusion of tongues at Babel and restore a common language that the earth might again be of one tongue. Insofar as other languages were regarded as the language of Adam, Latin enjoyed less claim to universaliry. The rise of science also influenced language reform. Baconian empiri cism replaced deductive philosophy with an inductive method. The Baconian method began with observation of particulars, proceeded to classify and categorize; then it generalized about the common properties in each of the divisions. This method necessitated clarity and precision so as to make the classifications accurate and distinct. Since this enterprise was essentially taxonomic, it required an accurate and precise language to describe the categories. 13 Moreover, the Royal Society of Science was also eager to develop a scientific language to complement the scientific method. As a result of their interests in precise language, Royal Society scientists promoted the plain style and discouraged the stylistic exuberance of the age. Yet, however hard they tried, the scientists could not avoid the problems of natural language. They found that even Latin was plagued with the same problems as the vulgar tongues. It was ambiguous

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