Meaning of ‘The exercise ends as it begins’

Meaning of ‘The exercise ends as it begins’

The passage below is from A History of the Index by Dennis Duncan.

The book is called An Orthographie, conteyning the due order and reason, howe to write or paint thimage of mannes voice, most like to the life of nature, and its author is John Hart. Hart’s Orthographie is a call for spelling reform that would bring writing into line with pronunciation. Because Hart is at pains to transcribe how people spoke in the sixteenth century, his book is a key text for the modern Shakespeare in Original Pronunciation movement. Fittingly, Hart seems to find an echo – albeit not a very sympathetic one – in Love’s Labour’s Lost, when the ludicrous Holofernes complains that people should pronounce words exactly as they’re spelled:

such rackers of orthography, as to speak ‘dout’ sine b, when he should say ‘doubt’; ‘det’, when he should pronounce ‘debt’, –d, e, b, t, not d, e, t: he clepeth a calf ‘cauf’; half, ‘hauf’; neighbour vocatur ‘nebor’; neigh abbreviated ‘ne’. This is abhominable –which he would call abominable. (Act 5, Scene 1)

Hart, by contrast, wants us to write the way we talk, and, to show what he means, his small book contains an analysis of spoken English establishing the sounds people actually use. Many of these, of course, are already represented by letter forms in the roman alphabet, but Hart notes that some letters are surplus to requirements: goodbye j, w, y, c and q. More significantly, Hart finds that there are certain sounds which can’t be divided into smaller units, but which don’t already have their own letters. Therefore, a few additional characters need to be invented for sounds like sh and th (both voiced, as in then, and unvoiced, as in thin).

To show he means business, the final third of Hart’s book is written entirely in his simplified orthography. This is a nifty trick: if readers want to finish the book they will have to engage with the writing system, and thus (hopefully) discover that it is not nearly as confusing as it looks. When it comes to the index, Hart includes this note about how his new alphabet should be ordered (Figure 6). For a translation, see the footnote.fn1

fn1 An advertisement touching the order of the following table.

Because the vowels and consonants are divided into such parts as before, this table doth keep them in the like order: to-wit first a, e, i, o, u, and then the four pairs which are made with a stopping breath: to wit b, p: d, t: g, k: and j, ch. Then the other three thoroughly breathed pairs, to wit th [voiced, as in then], th [unvoiced, as in thin]: v, f: and z, s. Then the 5 semi-vocals l, m, n, r, and [syllabic] l, and the two breaths sh, and h: also, for that in the order before used, these new letters are not comprehended. Wherefore this table is placed and set in such order as followeth.

Figure 6: Prefatory paragraph to the index in Hart’s Orthographie.

The exercise ends as it begins, by reminding readers that the index that follows will be arranged according to new principles. The alphabetical order is not one which readers will have learned at school. Hart states that the table is ‘placed and set’ following the rules of his new orthography. It is, in other words, a new-spelling native (niu-speling n?tiv), born under the new dispensation. In this, Hart has saved himself some strenuous effort. Switching, after the fact, between two orderings – two alphabets – can be a problematic process.

The passage above is very long, but my question is centered on the last paragraph. To show the context of the last paragraph I suggest this long passage. Sorry about the trouble you take for reading all this.

I have several questions for the last paragraph.

First, I have two problems on the ‘The exercise ends as it begins’.

One, I cannot figure out the meaning of ‘The exercise’ in this context. I cannot bring out any wild guessings.

Two, how can ‘the exercise’ ends as it begins? I know what it means if I read a sentence as ‘A piece of music ends as it begins.’ A music can end as (soon as) it begins. But ‘the exercise’? That’s beyond my comprehension.

Second, I have two no less serious problems with ‘after the fact’ than the first one.

One, I cannot figure out what ‘the fact’ represent in this context. Not any assumptions, either.

Two, the meaning of ‘after’. Sine I cannot grasp the contextual meaning of ‘the fact’ I don’t have any specific meaning of ‘after’, and ultimately the combined phrase of the two, ‘after the fact’ is just a Greek to me.

(If I exclude this phrase, the sentence reads much easier to me. Actually I don't understand the author's intention for this phrase.)

Third, is the underlined ‘the index’ the same with ‘this table’ of the previous paragraph?

Finally last, of ‘a new-spelling native (niu-speling n?tiv), born under the new dispensation’, does the underlined ‘native’ modify ‘a new-spelling’? If so, does it not overlaps with ‘born’ that follows ‘native’? Or does it have any special meaning that I don’t know of?

Thanks for all your troubles you take for this absurdly long questions. Thanks.