The text discusses the role of the tongue in speech and chewing, highlighting how it moves food with ease thanks to saliva. It explains that various muscle movements affect speech, leading to potential speech disorders such as stuttering or lisps if the tongue is too tight or loose. Additionally, solutions like using weights in the mouth are suggested for managing unruly tongue movements, emphasizing the impact of tongue size and flexibility on speech clarity.
Human Limbs.
Sharp-round. And thus suited to move the food in chewing as with a shovel or spade in the mouth to turn up and down on the teeth; this is done more easily because the food is moistened and softened by saliva in chewing.
Behind, it is broad where the hyoid bone is and then farther down. The tongue is moved by various muscles; which movement is also subject to various disorders concerning speech. They jest about someone who talks too much. No one can stay silent that has a long tongue.
More seriously, however, when the tongue is overburdened and has grown too far, or otherwise, if a person lisps, stutters, or blurs speech; and whether one speaks well or poorly, generally well, or not well because of the frenulum being too tight. If the tongue is uncertain in movement and too quick, the person has defects in babbling, muttering, stammering, and indistinct talking.
In such a case, doctors sometimes proceed by holding a chatterstone or small weight in the mouth to tame the unruly speed of the tongue and more slowly learn the initial speech movements. Those with impeded speech cannot speak smoothly without exerting some force in sound production, just as one cannot erect a rigid spear with a soft movement of the hand. But very well with a jolt. If the tongue is too thick, it causes, in all likelihood, an impeded speech. And if it is too thin and narrow, it necessarily leads to a broken language. The reason for this is not applicable in this case here gs 2-