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CONSIDERATIONS

CONCERNING THE FIRST

FORMATION OF LANGUAGES,

&c. &c.

TH

HE affignation of particular names to denote particular objects, that is, the inftitution of nouns fubftantive, would, probably, be one of the firft fteps towards the formation of language. Two favages, who had never been taught to fpeak, but had been bred up remote from the focieties of men, would naturally begin to form that language by which they would endeavour to make their mutual wants intelligible to each other, by uttering certain founds, whenever they meant to denote certain objects. Thofe objects only which were moft familiar to them, and which they had most frequent occafion to mention would have particular names affigned to them. The particular cave whofe covering fheltered them from the wea ther, the particular tree whofe fruit relieved their hunger, the particular fountain whofe

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water allayed their thirft, would firft be denominated by the words cave, tree, fountain, or by whatever other appellations they might think proper, in that primitive jargon, to mark them. Afterwards, when the more enlarged experience of thefe favages had led them to observe, and their neceffary occafions obliged them to make mention of other caves, and other trees, and other fountains, they would naturally beftow, upon each of those new objects, the fame name, by which they had been accuftomed to exprefs the fimilar object they were firft acquainted with. The new objects had none of them any name of its own, but each of them exactly refembled another object, which had fuch an appellation. It was impoffible that thofe favages could behold the new objects, without recollecting the old ones; and the name of the old ones, to which the new bore fo clofe a refemblance. When they had occafion, therefore, to mention, or to point out to each other, any of the new objects, they would naturally utter the name of the correfpondent old one, of which the idea could not fail, at that inftant, to prefent itself to their memory in the ftrongest and livelieft manner. And thus, thofe words, which were originally the proper names of individuals, would each of them infenfibly become the common name of a multitude, A child that is just learning

to

to fpeak, calls every perfon who comes to the house its papa or its mama; and thus beftows upon the whole fpecies thofe names which it had been taught to apply to two individuals. I have known a clown, who did not know the proper name of the river which ran by his own door. It was the river, he faid, and he never heard any other name for it. His experience, it feems, had not led him to obferve any other river. The general word river, therefore, was, it is evident, in his acceptance of it, a proper name, fignifying an individual object. If this perfon had been carried to another river, would he not readily have called it a river? Could we fuppofe any perfon living on the banks of the Thames fo ignorant, as not to know the general word river, but to be acquainted only with the particular word Thames, if he was brought to any other river, would he not readily call it a Thames? This, in reality, is no more than what they, who are well acquainted with the general word, are very apt to do. An Englishman, describing any great tiver which he may have seen in fome foreign country, naturally fays, that it is another Thames. The Spaniards, when they firft arrived upon the coaft of Mexico, and obferved the wealth, populoufnefs, and habitations of that fine country, fo much fuperior to the favage nations which they had been vifiting for fome time

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time before, cried out, that it was another Spain. Hence it was called New Spain; and this name has ftuck to that unfortunate country ever fince. We fay, in the fame manner, of a hero, that he is an Alexander; of an orator, that he is a Cicero; of a philofopher, that he is a Newton. This way of fpeaking, which the grammarians call an Antonomafia, and which is ftill extremely common, though now not at all neceffary, demonftrates how much mankind are naturally difpofed to give to one object the name of any other, which nearly refembles it, and thus to denominate a multitude, by what originally was intended to exprefs an individual.

It is this application of the name of an individual to a great multitude of objects, whofe refemblance naturally recalls the idea of that individual, and of the name which expreffes it, that feems originally to have given occafion to the formation of thofe claffes and affortments, which, in the fchools, are called genera and fpecies, and of which the ingenious and eloquent M. Rouffeau of Geneva * finds himfelf fo much at a lofs to account for the origin. What conftitutes a fpecies is merely a number of objects, bearing a certain degree of refemblance to one ano

*Origine de l'Inegalité. Partie Premiere, p. 376, 377. Edition d'Amfterdam des Oeuvres diverfes de J. J. Rouffeau.

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ther, and on that account denominated by a fingle appellation, which may be applied to exprefs any one of them.

When the greater part of objects had thus been arranged under their proper claffes and affortments, diftinguished by fuch general names, it was impoffible that the greater part of that almost infinite number of individuals, comprehended under each particular affort ment or fpecies, could have any peculiar or proper names of their own, diftinct from the general name of the fpecies. When there was occafion, therefore, to mention any particular object, it often became neceffary to distinguish it from the other objects comprehended under the fame general name, either, first, by its peculiar qualities; or, fecondly, by the peculiar relation which it ftood in to fome other things. Hence the neceffary origin of two other fets of words, of which the one fhould exprefs quality; the other, relation.

Nouns adjective are the words which exprefs quality confidered as qualifying, or, as the schoolmen fay, in concrete with, fome particular fubject. fubject. Thus the word green expreffes a certain quality confidered as qualifying, or as in concrete with, the particular fubject to which it may be applied. Words of this kind, it is evident, may ferve to dif tinguish particular objects from others comprehended under the fame general appellation.

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