SECONDARY ACCENT. '
most universally changed into a short one Inproper names, as Whitchurch, Whitefield, Whit-bread, Whitlock, Whitaker, Ac . for compendious-ness and despatch being next in importance toperspicuity, when there is no danger of mistake,it is in* wonder that the organs should fall intothe shortest and easiest sounds.
617. It must, however, be observed, that thistendency to unite simples into a compound, byplacing an accent exactly where the two wordscoalesce, is still subservient to the laws of har-mony. The Greek word So new, which signifies toopine, ami from which the last syllables of ortho-doxy are derived, was never a general subjunctiveword like Xoyof and ypwjxu; and even if it had beenso, the assemblage of consonant* in the letter xwould have prevented the ear from admitting anaccent on the syllable immediately preceding, asthe x would, by this means, become diiUcult topronounce. Placing the accent, therefore, on thefirst syllable of orthodoxy, gives the organs anopportunity of laying a secondary stress upon thethird, which enables them to pronounce the wholewith distinctness and fluency : thus Galaxy undCachexy, having the accent on the first syllable,are very difficult to pronounce ; but this difficultyis removed by placing the accent a syllablehigher in the words apoplexy, ataraxy , and ano-rexy.
51b. But the numerous classes of words that soreadily adopt this enclitical accent sufficientlyprove it to be agreeable to the genius of our pro-nunciation. This will more evidently appear byadducing examples. Words in the following ter-minations have always the accent on that syl-lable where the two parts unite, that is, on theantepenultimate syllable:
In logy, as apology, ambilogy, genealogy, Ac ,
In graphy, as geography, orthography, historicgraphy, &c.
In phagus, as sarcophagus, ichthyophagus, androplwgus, Ac .
In loquy, as obloquy, soliloquy, ventriloquy, Ac .
In strophe, as catastrophe, apostrophe,anastrophe,
In meter, as geometer, barometer, thermometer, drc.
In gonat, as diagonal , octagonal, polygonal, Ac .
In vorous, as carnivorous , granivorous, piscivo-rous, Ac .
In frroits, as baccifcrous, cocdferous, somniferous,Ac .
InJiuoHS, as superfluous, mellifluous, fetlifluous,Ac .
In fluent, a* mellifluent, circumfluent, interfluent,See.
In vomous, as ignivomous,flammivomous , &c.
In parous, as viviparous, oviparous, de.iparotis, Ac .
In cracy, as theocracy , aristocracy, democracy,Ac ,
In gony, as theogony, cosmogony, hexagony, Ac .
In phony, as symphony, cacophony, colophony, Ac .
In machy, as theomachy, logomachy, sciomachy, &c.
In nomy, as economy,astronomy, Deuteronomy , Ac .
In tomy, its anatomy , lithotomy, artcriotomy , See.
in scopy, as metoposcopy, deuteroscopy, aeroscopy,See •
5\0. Some of these Greek compounds seem torefuse the antepenultimate accent, for the samereason as orthodoxy ; such as necromancy, chiro-mancy, hydromancy; and those terminating inarchy , as hierarchy, oligarchy, patriarchy : all ofwhich have the accent on the first syllable, whichgives the organs time to recover their force upontlie Lliird, and to pronounce the two consonantswith much more case than if the accent imme-diately preceded them; but periphrasis and anti-phrasis, besides their claim to the accent of theiroriginals, readily admit of the accent on the se-cond syllable, because the consonants in the twolast syllables do not conte together, and aretherefore easily pronounced after the accent.Words of more than two syllables endingin ague,ns pedagogue, dialogue, Ac . have the accent onthe muepenultimate. Orthoepy, having no con-sonant in the antepenultimate syllable, naturallythrows its accent on the first.—See Monotnachy •5’20. By this view of the enclitical terminationswe may easily perceive how readily our languagefalls into the antepenultimate accent in these
compounded polysyllables ; and that tnose ter-minations winch seem to refuse this accent, doii rather from a regard to etymology than ana-logy : thus words ending in a.vfr, as periphrasis,awyhasis, hypostasis, antiperistasis, &c. have theantepenultimate accent of their originals. Thesame may be observed of those ending in esis, ashypothesis, antithesis, parenthesis, Ac .; but exe-gesis, mathesis, auxesls, catachresis, paracentesis,aposiopesis, have the accent on the penultimatesyllable, because the vowel in this syllable islong in Greek and Latin . But all words endingin osis have the accent on the penultimate, ex-cept metamorphosis and apotheosis, which desertthe accent of their Latin originals, while those inysis are accented regularly on the antepenulti-mate in Greek, Latin , and English * as analysis,paralysis, &c. We may note, too, that every s inall these terminations is sharp and hissing.—Seethe words Exostosis and Apotheosis .
521. Words of three syllables ending in atorhave the accent on the penultimate, as spectator,collator, delator, Ac . except orator , senator, lega-tor, and barrator. But words in this termination,of more than three syllables, though they havegenerally the accent on the penultimate, are sub-ject to a diversity not easily reduced to the rule :thus navigator, propagator, dedicator, Ac . aresometimes pronounced with the accent on thefirst syllable, and sometimes on the third : but asthese words may be pronounced with an accenton both these syllables, it is of less consequenceon which syllable we place the accent when weuse only one, 528. The general rule certainlyinclines to the penultimate accent ; but as allthese words are verbal nouns, and, though gene-rally derived from Latin words of the same ter-minations, have verbs corresponding to them iv\our own language, it is very natural to preservethe accent of the verb in these words, as it givesan emphasis to the most significant part of them:thus equivocator, prevaricator, dedicator, mightbe regularly formed from the verbs to equivocate,to prevaricate, and to dedicate ; and, agreeably toanalogy, would have been written equivocater,prevaricatcr, and dedicate)’; but an affectation ofpreferring every analogy to our own has giventhese words a Latin termination, which answersno purpose but to involve our language in absur-dities : but the ear, in this case, is not quite soservile as the eye ; and though we are obliged towrite these words with or, and not cr, we gene-rally hear them pronounced as if they were form-ed from our own verbs, and not from Latin nounsin ator. But when the word has no verb in ourown language to correspond to it, the accent isthen placed with great propriety upon the a , asin Latin : thus vud'.Uor, instigator, navigator, Ac .ought to have the accent on the first syllable ;and emendator, gladiator, adulator, Ac . on thelast but one.
SECONDARY ACCENT.
522. Hitherto we have considered that accentonly which necessarily distinguishes one syl-lable in a word from the rest; and which, withvery little diversity, is adopted by all who speakthe English language.
523. The secondary accent is that stress wc mayoccasionally place upon anothci syllable, besidesthat which has the principal accent, in order topronounce every part of the word more distinct-ly, forcibly, and harmoniously. Thus this accentmay be placed on the first syllable of conversa-tion, commendation, Ac .
524. There are few authors who have not takennotice of two accents upon some of the longerpolysyllables, but none have once hinted thatone of these is not essential to the sound of theword : they seem to have supposed both accentsequally necessary, and without any other differ-ence than that one was pronounced more forciblythan the other. This mistake arose from a wantof studying the speaking voice. A knowledge ofthis would have told them that one accent onlywas essential to every word of more than onesyllable, and that the secondary stress might, ormight not, be adopted, a* distinctness, force, orharmony, should require : thus complaisant, con-