Their acuteness, their ascending form, indicate the weakness, and
physical sorrow of man. When the child recognizes the tender cares of
its mother, its voice becomes less shrill and broken; its tones have a
less acute range, and are more poised and even. The larynx, which is
very impressionable and the thermometer of the sensitive life, becomes
modified, and produces sounds and inflections in perfect unison with the
sentiments they convey.
All this, which man expresses in an imitative fashion, is numbered,
weighed and measured, and forms an admirable harmony. This language
through the larynx is universal, and common to all sensitive beings. It
is universal with animals as with man. Animals give the identical sounds
in similar positions.
The infant, delighted at being mounted on a table, and calling his
mother to admire him, rises to the fourth note of the scale. If his
delight becomes more lively, to the sixth; if the mother is less pleased
than he would have her, he ascends to the third minor to express his
displeasure. Quietude is expressed by the fourth note.
Every situation has its interval, its corresponding inflection, its
corresponding note: this is a mathematical language.
Why this magnificent concert God has arranged in our midst if it has no
auditors? If God had made us only intelligent beings, he would have
given us speech alone and without inflections. Let us further illustrate
the role of inflection.
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