The Grammar of English Grammars by Goold Brown (free ebook reader .txt) 📕

2. To speak, is a moral action, the quality of which depends upon the motive, and for which we are strictly accountable. "But I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgement; for by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned."—Matt., xii, 36, 37. To listen, or to refuse to listen, is a moral action also; and there is meaning in the injunction, "Take heed what ye hear."—Mark, iv, 24. But why is it, that so much of what is spoken or written, is spoken or written in vain? Is language impotent? It is sometimes employed for purposes with respect to which it is utterly so; and often they that use it, know not how insignificant, absurd, or ill-meaning a thing they make of it. What is said, with whatever inherent force or dignity, has neither power nor value to him who does not understand it;[28] and, as Professor Duncan observes, "No word can be to any man the sign of an idea, till that idea comes to have a real existence in his mind."—Logic, p. 62. In instruction, therefore, speech ought not to be regarded as the foundation or the essence of knowledge, but as the sign of it; for knowledge has its origin in the power of sensation, or reflection, or consciousness, and not in that of recording or communicating thought. Dr. Spurzheim was not the first to suggest, "It is time to abandon the immense error of supposing that words and precepts are sufficient to call internal feelings and intellectual faculties into active exercise."—Spurzheim's Treatise on Education, p. 94.

3. But to this it may be replied, When God wills, the signs of knowledge are knowledge; and words, when he gives the ability to understand them, may, in some sense, become—"spirit and life." See John, vi, 63. Where competent intellectual faculties exist, the intelligible signs of thought do move the mind to think; and to think sometimes with deep feelings too, whether of assent or dissent, of admiration or contempt. So wonderful a thing is a rational soul, that it is hard to say to what ends the language in which it speaks, may, or may not, be sufficient. Let experience determine. We are often unable to excite in others the sentiments which we would: words succeed or fail, as they are received or resisted. But let a scornful expression be addressed to a passionate man, will not the words "call internal feelings" into action? And how do feelings differ from thoughts?[29] Hear Dr. James Rush: "The human mind is the place of representation of all the existences of nature which are brought within the scope of the senses. The representatives are called ideas. These ideas are the simple passive pictures of things, or [else] they exist with an activity, capable of so affecting the physical organs as to induce us to seek the continuance of that which produces them, or to avoid it. This active or vivid class of ideas comprehends the passions. The functions of the mind here described, exist then in different forms and degrees, from the simple idea, to the highest energy of passion: and the terms, thought, sentiment, emotion, feeling, and passion, are but the verbal signs of these degrees and forms. Nor does there appear to be any line of classification, for separating thought from passion: since simple thoughts, without changing their nature, do, from interest or incitement, often assume the colour of passion."—Philosophy of the Human Voice, p. 328.

4. Lord Kames, in the Appendix to his Elements of Criticism, divides the senses into external and internal, defining perception to be the act by which through the former we know outward objects, and consciousness the act by which through the latter we know what is within the mind. An idea, according to his definition, (which he says is precise and accurate,) is, "That perception of a real object which is raised in the mind by the power of memory." But among the real objects from which memory may raise ideas, he includes the workings of the mind itself, or whatever we remember of our former passions, emotions, thoughts, or designs. Such a definition, he imagines, might have saved Locke, Berkley, and their followers, from much vain speculation; for with the ideal systems of these philosophers, or with those of Aristotle and Des Cartes, he by no means coincides. This author says, "As ideas are the chief materials employed in reasoning and reflecting, it is of consequence that their nature and differences be understood. It appears now that ideas may be distinguished into three kinds: first, Ideas derived from original perceptions, properly termed ideas of memory; second, Ideas communicated by language or other signs; and third, Ideas of imagination. These ideas differ from each other in many respects; but chiefly in respect to their proceeding from different causes. The first kind is derived from real existences that have been objects of our senses; language is the cause of the second, or any other sign that has the same power with language; and a man's imagination is to himself the cause of the third. It is scarce [ly] necessary to add, that an idea, originally of imagination, being conveyed to others by language or any other vehicle, becomes in their mind an idea of the second kind; and again, that an idea of this kind, being afterwards recalled to the mind, becomes in that circumstance an idea of memory."—El. of Crit., Vol. ii, p. 384.

5. Whether, or how far, language is to the mind itself the instrument of thought, is a question of great importance in the philosophy of both. Our literature contains occasional assertions bearing upon this point, but I know of no full or able discussion of it.[30] Cardell's instructions proceed upon the supposition, that neither the reason of men, nor even that of superior intelligences, can ever operate independently of words. "Speech," says he, "is to the mind what action is to animal bodies. Its improvement is the improvement of our intellectual nature, and a duty to God who gave it."—Essay on Language, p. 3. Again: "An attentive investigation will show, that there is no way in which the individual mind can, within itself, to any extent, combine its ideas, but by the intervention of words. Every process of the reasoning powers, beyond the immediate perception of sensible objects, depends on the structure of speech; and, in a great degree, according to the excellence of this chief instrument of all mental operations, will be the means of personal improvement, of the social transmission of thought, and the elevation of national character. From this, it may be laid down as a broad principle, that no individual can make great advances in intellectual improvement, beyond the bounds of a ready-formed language, as the necessary means of his progress."—Ib., p. 9. These positions might easily be offset by contrary speculations of minds of equal rank; but I submit them to the reader, with the single suggestion, that the author is not remarkable for that sobriety of judgement which gives weight to opinions.

6. We have seen, among the citations in a former chapter, that Sanctius says, "Names are the signs, and as it were the instruments, of things." But what he meant by "instrumenta rerum" is not very apparent. Dr. Adam says, "The principles of grammar may be traced from the progress of the mind in the acquisition of language. Children first express their feelings by motions and gestures of the body, by cries and tears. This is[31] the language of nature, and therefore universal. It fitly represents[32] the quickness of sentiment and thought, which are as instantaneous as the impression of light on the eye. Hence we always express our stronger feelings by these natural signs. But when we want to make known to others the particular conceptions of the mind, we must represent them by parts, we must divide and analyze them. We express each part by certain signs,[33] and join these together, according to the order of their relations. Thus words are both the instrument and signs[34] the division of thought."—Preface to Latin Gram.

7. The utterance of words, or the making of signs of any sort, requires time;[35] but it is here suggested by Dr. Adam, that sentiment and thought, though susceptible of being retained or recalled, naturally flash upon the mind with immeasurable quickness.[36] If so, they must originate in something more spiritual than language. The Doctor does not affirm that words are the instruments of thought, but of the division of thought. But it is manifest, that if they effect this, they are not the only instruments by means of which the same thing may be done. The deaf and dumb, though uninstructed and utterly ignorant of language, can think; and can, by rude signs of their own inventing, manifest a similar division, corresponding to the individuality of things. And what else can be meant by "the division of thought," than our notion of objects, as existing severally, or as being distinguishable into parts? There can, I think, be no such division respecting that which is perfectly pure and indivisible in its essence; and, I would ask, is not simple continuity apt to exclude it from our conception of every thing which appears with uniform coherence? Dr. Beattie says, "It appears to me, that, as all things are individuals, all thoughts must be so too."—Moral Science, Chap, i, Sec. 1. If, then, our thoughts are thus divided, and consequently, as this author infers, have not in themselves any of that generality which belongs to the signification of common nouns, there is little need of any instrument to divide them further: the mind rather needs help, as Cardell suggests, "to combine its ideas." [37]

8. So far as language is a work of art, and not a thing conferred or imposed upon us by nature, there surely can be in it neither division nor union that was not first in the intellect for the manifestation of which it was formed. First, with respect to generalization. "The human mind," says Harris, "by an energy as spontaneous and familiar to its nature, as the seeing of colour is familiar to the eye, discerns at once what in many is one, what in things dissimilar and different is similar and the same."—Hermes, p. 362. Secondly, with respect to division. Mechanical separations are limited: "But the mind surmounts all power of concretion; and can place in the simplest manner every attribute by itself; convex without concave; colour without superficies; superficies without body; and body without its accidents: as distinctly each one, as though they had never been united. And thus it is, that it penetrates into the recesses of all things, not only dividing them as wholes, into their more conspicuous parts, but persisting till it even separate those elementary principles which, being blended together after a more mysterious manner, are united in the minutest part as much as in the mightiest whole."—Harris's Hermes, p. 307.

9. It is remarkable that this philosopher, who had so sublime conceptions of the powers of the human mind, and who has displayed such extraordinary acuteness in his investigations, has represented the formation of words, or the utterance of language, as equalling in speed the progress of our very thoughts; while, as we have seen, an other author, of great name, avers, that thought is "as instantaneous as the impression of light on the eye." Philosophy here too evidently nods. In showing the advantage of words, as compared with pictures, Harris says, "If we consider the ease and speed with which words are formed,-an ease which knows no trouble or fatigue, and a speed which equals the progress of our very thoughts,[38]—we may plainly perceive an answer to the question here proposed, Why, in the common intercourse of men with men, imitations have been rejected, and symbols preferred."—Hermes, p. 336. Let us hear a third man, of equal note: "Words have been called winged; and they well deserve that name, when their abbreviations are compared with the progress which speech could make without these inventions; but, compared with the rapidity of thought, they have not the smallest claim to that title. Philosophers have calculated the difference of velocity between sound and light; but who will attempt to calculate the difference between speech and thought!"—Horne Tooke's Epea Pteroenta, Vol. i, p. 23.

10. It is certain, that, in the admirable economy of the creation, natures subordinate are made, in a wonderful manner, subservient to the operations of the higher; and that, accordingly, our first ideas are such as are conceived of things external and sensible. Hence all men whose intellect appeals only to external sense, are prone to a philosophy which reverses the order of things pertaining to the mind, and tends to materialism, if not to atheism. "But"—to refer again to Harris—"the intellectual scheme which never forgets