@JenLucPiquant It’s well known that Newton was an avid user of Thomas Shelton’s shorthand writing system as were other men of letters at the time. I highly suspect that his efforts at a new language stemmed from this influence as well as the growing trends in not only classifying things (Linnaeus quickly followed Newton’s time period), but the growing popularity at the time of philology (the Brothers Grimm also immediately followed this time period).
Many of these shorthand systems were built upon the ars memorativa tradition dating back to ancient Greece. Though both shorthand and ars memorativa are out of fashion now, I’ve discovered a direct link between the two which dates directly to Gregg Shorthand in the 1880's and has strong ties dating back to the 1400's, if not earlier. Those interested in the connection between these as a sketch of the stenography of Newton and others are encouraged to read The Mnemonic Major System and Gregg Shorthand Have the Same Underlying Structure [http:/