COMPLETE GUIDE ΤΟ STENOGRAPHY, OR AN ENTIRE NEW SYSTEM OF WRITING SHORT HAND. FOR THE USE OF SCHOOLS AND PRIVATE TUITION. BY T. TOWNDROW, PROFESSOR AND TEACHER OF STENOGRAPHY. "Despair of nothing you would attain, SECOND EDITION. NEW HAVEN: HEZEKIAH HOWE. NEW YORK-JOCELYN, DARLING & CO. 1832. 1862, & Nov. 18, Gift of Richard Green Parker, Esq. B4355.32 of Cambridge. (Classof 1817.) Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1832, by THOMAS TOWNDROW, in the Clerk's office, of the District Court of Connecticut. Printed by Hezekiah Howe. PREFACE. THE Author takes great pleasure in laying before the public, a second edition of his Complete Guide to Stenography, or an entire new system of writing Short-Hand; founded on principles more simple and comprehensive, than any that has heretofore made its appearance. The author can, with confidence, assure the purchaser of this second edition of his work, that the whole has been carefully revised, and such additional illustrations and plates of examples have been introduced, as his diligence has enabled him to procure. The system which most simplifies the art, and renders it more easily acquired and practised, must be regarded as preferable; and this edition, small as it may appear, will be found to possess those advantages, and it is believed, to contain all that is requisite to produce an accomplished short hand writer. Indeed, the author has made it his incessant study to render the system not only the most easy to be comprehended and learned, but to bring its acquisition within the pecuniary means of every inquiring and intelligent young person. To those masters who have introduced this treatise into their schools, the author considers himself under particular obligations, and he doubts not that an art of such confessed utility, and easy acquirement, will, in a short time, become as generally practised by those preparing for College or other professional studies, as common writing. Those instructors who have not yet become acquainted with the utility of this manual as a class book, are respectfully invited to examine it, and inform themselves of the many and great advantages arising from the practice of Stenography, which are thus eloquently and forcibly stated by Mr. Gawtress, in his excellent introduction to Byrom. "A practical acquaintance with this art is highly favorable to the improvement of the mind, invigorating all its faculties, and drawing forth all its resources. The close attention that is requisite in following the voice of a speaker induces habits of patience, perseverance, and watchfulness, which will gradually extend themselves to other pursuits and avocations, and at length inure the writer to exercise them on every occasion in life. When writing in public, it will also be absolutely necessary to distinguish and adhere to the train of thought which runs through the discourse, and to observe the modes of its connexion. This will naturally have a tendency to endue the mind with quickness of apprehension, and will impart an habitual readiness and distinctness of perception, as well as a methodical simplicity of arrangement, which cannot fail to conduce greatly to mental superiority. The judgment will be strengthened and the taste refined; and the practitioner will by degrees become habituated to seize the original and leading parts of a discourse or harangue, and to reject whatever is common-place, trivial, or uninteresting. . "The advantages of short-hand, in cases where secrecy is required, are sufficiently obvious. It is true, that when a system is made public, this effect is partially destroyed. Yet it seldom happens that stenographic memorandums fall into the hands of those who can read them; and when the writer has any reason to anticipate such an occurrence, it will be easy, after learning a good system, so to transpose a few of the Arbitraries, as to render the writing illegible to all but himself. "The facility it affords to the acquisition of learning, ought to render it an indispensable branch in the education of youth. To be enabled to treasure up for future study, the substance of lectures, sermons, &c., is an accomplishment attended with such evident advantages, that it stands in no need of recommendation. Nor is it a matter of small importance, that by this Art the youthful student is furnished with an easy means of making a number of valuable extracts in the moments of leisure, and thus lay up a stock of knowledge for his future occasions. "The memory is also improved by the practice of Stenography. The obligation the writer is under to retain in his mind the last sentence of the speaker, at the same time he is attending to the following one, must be highly beneficial to that faculty, which more than any owes its improvement to exercise. And so much are the powers of retention strengthened and expanded by this exertion, that a practical Stenographer will frequently recollect more without writing, than a person unacquainted with the Art could copy in the time by the use of common hand." "The rapidity with which it enables a person to commit his own thoughts to the safety of manuscript, also renders it an object peculiarly worthy of regard. By this means a thousand ideas which daily strike us, and which are lost before we can record them in the usual way, may be snatched from destruction, and preserved till mature deliberation can ripen and perfect them." The following extract is from the pen of T. CAMPBELL, Esq., Lord Rector of Glasgow University. "I should exhort all young men to learn that most useful Art, SHORTHAND WRITING; an Art which, I believe, will one day be studied as universally as common writing, and which will abridge the labor of penmanship, to a degree that will materially quicken the intercourse of human thought." NEW HAVEN, 1832. |