Comparison of Tone
The number of tones in a particular variety is often counted differently in traditional Chinese grammar and in modern linguistics. This is because the four tones of Chinese grammar originally reflected final consonants rather than tone in the English sense of the word (i.e. "entering tones"), as well as tone splits which are still allophonic in for example the Wu dialects. Thus Shanghainese has five 声 shēng (phonetically distinguishable tones) but only two tonemes (phonemically distinct tones).
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“We teach boys to be such men as we are. We do not teach them to aspire to be all they can. We do not give them a training as if we believed in their noble nature. We scarce educate their bodies. We do not train the eye and the hand. We exercise their understandings to the apprehension and comparison of some facts, to a skill in numbers, in words; we aim to make accountants, attorneys, engineers; but not to make able, earnest, great- hearted men.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“If the oarsmen of a fast-moving ship suddenly cease to row, the suspension of the driving force of the oars doesn’t prevent the vessel from continuing to move on its course. And with a speech it is much the same. After he has finished reciting the document, the speaker will still be able to maintain the same tone without a break, borrowing its momentum and impulse from the passage he has just read out.”
—Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C)