MIGRATIONS, MIXTURES, PROGRESS. word is a maximum, and it strikes the vowel with a force of utterance due to the sense of the whole word. According as the common essence takes the place of the radical idea (Book I., chap. iv., 6-8), the whole idea of the word becomes more concentrated at the maximum point, and prompts additional expression where the accent strikes the word. The accented vowel, if it be i or u, tends to be not only accented but opened, to e or o, so as to be a fuller utterance; in French it is half opened, so as to become ei (changed to oi) or ou, but u becomes o before a nasal; if it be e or o, it gets additional force from being preceded by a compression (Def. 26) which produces the closer vowel i or u, so that it becomes ie or uo, ue in Spanish; if it be a the compression tends to change a to e, but more frequently in French than in the other languages; a remains unchanged before m and n, into which it passes as a nasalisation. In position before two consonants these leave less room for addition to the accented vowel; but in Spanish and Wallachian this is not such a bar to the increase as in the others. The long vowels do not admit of increase like the short ones; but in French is apt to become ei changed to oi, and ō to become ou changed to eu. lachian can subjoin a to e and o, short, long, and in position.1 Wal Owing to the vocalic character of Romance utterance a vowel in contact with a consonant affects the utterance of the consonant as in Celtic (Gram. Sk., VI. 93), so that it is apt to be uttered with the volition present to utter the vowel, the vowel which is to follow the consonant making itself felt before it. This is increased by the additional expression accompanying accentuation before the consonant; so that by attraction of i from a following syllable a is often changed to ai, ei, ie, or e.1 The absorption of the word into the accented syllable which arose from the growing singleness of the idea was accompanied by an abbreviation after the accented syllable, which is especially remarkable in French and Provençal,2 21. In Celtic also, as in Romance (12), the neuter gender was given up, so that in modern Celtic all nouns are either masculine or feminine (Gram. Sk., VI. 109). This agrees with the easy passive character of the Celt, who dominated nature less than the Teuton (preceding chapter, XIII.) The loss of the cases of the noun in British (Gram. Sk., VI. 113) is doubtless due to foreign influence (Book I., chap. iv., 4), from which Irish was comparatively free. Perhaps the influence of Roman civilisation was in part the cause of the greater softness of British utterance (preceding chapter, XV. 2), according to Book I., chap. iv., 9. To foreign influence also doubtless is due the auxiliary prefixes of the verb in Celtic (Gram. Sk., VII. 117). Celtic also developed an article (ibid. 109, 110, 130) in the growing generality of thought (above, 2, 10). 22. The Teutonic weak declension (Gram. Sk., VI. 144) appears 1 Diez, i. p. 146–172. 2 Ibid. p. 197. MIGRATIONS, MIXTURES, PROGRESS. from the nature of the nouns affected with it to be due to the attraction of thought to the associations of the noun from its present connections; which weakens that part of the substantive idea in which the substantive object is thought as in the connections of the fact (Def. 4), and renders necessary an arthritic element to put it in connection. It was therefore developed by the growing generality of thought and the tendency to substitute a common essence for the radical idea, according to Book I., chap. iv., 6. The weak conjugation in Teutonic (Gram. Sk., VI. 159) is another consequence of the same cause, by virtue of which, as in Romance (above, 15), the radical part in becoming a common essence lost its verbal succession, and this had to be subjoined. It is probably to the influence of foreign speakers not accustomed to a relative pronoun that the cumbrous expression of the relative in Teutonic is due (Gram. Sk., VI. 156). But it is very remarkable that Teutonic, like modern Greek, and no doubt from the same cause, developed a stronger relative (9), and that as this was 7005 in Greek, so it was hvēleiks (qualis) in Teutonic (Gram. Sk., VI. 154). Probably to the influence of the northern nations, who had only a past and a present tense (preceding chapter, V. 1), the loss of the future is due; for in Gothic and Old High German the Greek and Latin future is rendered by the present (Gram. Sk., VI. 157). Such an influence would also promote the use of auxiliary verbs (ibid. 162), according to Book I., chap. iv., 4; and the loss of the passive voice (ibid. 167). The growing generality of thought required an article in all the Teutonic languages; and in Norse, as in Wallachian (above, 10), it was suffixed to the noun (Gram. Sk., VI. 171). 23. The Slavonic, and still more the Lithuanian numerals, as if comparatively little used, remained particular, so as to be less abstracted from the objects numbered (ibid. 183, 212; see preceding chapter, XIII. 4). But also throughout Lithuanian and Slavonic there are fewer marks of growing generality of thought than in the other modern Indo-European languages. The inflections of nouns and verbs are less weakened and reduced in these than in the others; they retain the dual number; and they have only a partially developed article (Gram. Sk., VI. 184, 188, 195, 207, 208, 214-216, 223). There would seem to be a narrower range of ideas, and therefore less growth of general associations with the nominal or verbal stem, tending to weaken in the idea of the word the particularities of the present instance, or to require a particularising element. 24. One of the most interesting illustrations of the principles of Book I., chap. iv., is what has been called the umlaut in the Teutonic languages (ibid. 142, 173). This appeared only in later times, when the inflections were going to decay. It was a partial absorption of a formative element into the accented syllable of the root, and is quite analogous to the strengthening of the accented vowel in Romance (above, 20), owing to the concentration of the idea which the word expressed. The same cause is operative in both VOL. II. 2 B MIGRATIONS, MIXTURES, PROGRESS. cases; the growing singleness of idea as a common essence took the place of the old radical idea and became more concentrated as the race advanced in knowledge, arts, and civilisation (Book I., chap. iv., 8). The difference of the result in Teutonic from what it was in Romance was due to the more spreading action of Teutonic thought in consequence of which the formative element came to affect the root even through an intervening syllable (Gram. Sk., VI. 142, 173). And thus the principles of Book L., chap. iv., are found to explain the great changes to be traced in the history of language where the mental power of the race admits, and its migrations and progress have been such as promote, a marked generality of idea; as those of the other chapters of that Book have been found to be general laws governing the structure of language so far as the information available in this work enables them to be tested. APPENDIX: Comparison of the Mental Powers of Man with the Intelligence of Lower Vertebrate Animals. LANGUAGE is the prerogative of man, and a study of its principles would hardly be complete at the present day without an effort to see what light it throws on man's essential superiority in thought to all other creatures. For at the present day Darwin's theory of evolution has given a new interest to the comparison of the powers of the human mind with the intelligence which is manifested by the lower animals. The importance, however, of such a study is quite irrespective of that theory, and it may be carried on without any reference to the question of the origin of species. For whatever view may be taken of that question, the fact is patent that comparative anatomy and comparative physiology set before us a great course of development in structure and function from the lowest animal to the highest, whether we conceive that this is due to distinct acts of creation or to natural laws of evolution. And it is equally a matter of fact that a thorough scientific knowledge of a structure or a function in any species of animals can be obtained only by the comparative method, which studies them in the light of the great series of animal development. Now mind as a power in human nature, and the brain as its instrument, form no exception to this rule. For though thought be not regarded as a function of the brain, yet it is the function of the brain to minister to the acts of thought, so that cerebral action is the condition of mental action. Between these two actions there must be an exact correspondence; so that both must be studied if we would understand either. And that study must be carried through the series of animal life, so far as this can be done, in order that it may have a solid basis. When the correspondences of cerebral structure and animal intelligence have been ascertained, we shall have the outlines of a truly scientific psychology legible in the structure of the human brain. This, however, is at present a distant prospect. Before it is realised, the development of intelligence in the lower animals must be known in order to be compared with the development of the brain. And though the latter is well known, of the former scarcely anything is known with the scrutinising analysis which is necessary. For just as in the study of the human mind, the great effort is to distinguish the essential powers of the mind from the mere association of mental states; so in the study of animal intelligence the great effort must be to distinguish its powers from those congenital associations which are called instinct. Mere observation without such analysis is misleading; for there is scarcely any action of the rational faculties of man which may not be simulated by animal instinct. And it may be long before this attractive field of investigation has been at all adequately worked. Meanwhile, however, our views of truth must be harmonised with the best knowledge that we have, and provisional anticipations formed of what seems likely to prove true. Such a provisional anticipation the present writer ventured to offer in a paper published in the Journal of Anatomy and Physiology for November 1874. And though it is so meagre and imperfect, he subjoins it entire with some slight corrections and additions as preparatory to the consideration of what it is that makes language peculiar to man. ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE POWERS OF THOUGHT IN VERTEBRATE ANIMALS IN CONNECTION WITH THE DEVELOPMENT OF THEIR BRAIN. Although Mind can never be identified with Matter, nor the acts and states of the mind reduced to acts and states of the brain, yet as the latter are the physical antecedents of the former, the study of the one class of phenomena is calculated to give light and guidance in the study of the other. The object of the present paper is to consider some general outlines of the development of the powers of thought in vertebrate animals in connection with the development of their brain, in the hope that such a general view may throw some light, both on the powers of the mind and on the functions of the brain. An obvious characteristic of mental action in the lower animals as compared with the higher is, that it is to so large an extent instinctive. Now the nature of such instinctive action as involves thought may be well studied in the case of the beaver, though his mental action is not limited to instincts. The following is an instructive account given by Mr. Broderip of one which he kept in his house. I quote it from Dr. Carpenter's work on "Mental Physiology," p. 92. "The building instinct showed itself immediately it was let out of its cage and materials were placed in its way; and this before it had been a week in its new quarters. Its strength even before it was half grown was great. It would drag along a large sweeping-brush or a warming-pan, grasping the handle with its teeth, so that the load came over its shoulder, and advancing in an oblique direction till it arrived at the point where it wished to place it. The long and large materials were always taken first and two of the longest were generally laid crosswise, with one of the ends of each touching the wall, and the other end projecting out into the room. The area formed by the cross-brushes and the wall he would fill up with hand-brushes, rush-baskets, boots, books, sticks, cloths, dried turf, or anything portable. As the work grew high he supported himself on his tail, |