Читать книгу The Origin of Thought and Speech онлайн

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Some of the studies undertaken and carried on in a tentative groping fashion, with the purpose of ascertaining the nature of that complex being man, have been placed before you. I have mentioned the more or less fantastic suppositions set forth on the subject, and I have dwelt rather more fully on a recent system, of which the fundamental portion (a magnificent scientific monument, to which experimental tests have given a solid basis) is followed by a second part which treats especially of the descent of man. The time has now come to examine the studies of a school of philosophy, which, guided by a new theory, searches in the past, and passes under review all previous conceptions, suppositions, or even misconceptions of the previous schools.

The science of language, based on the close connection between thought and speech, only dates back to the beginning of the nineteenth century. The first problem presented to it is that of origin—the origin of thought and speech in man—which two united in their essential parts, make man what he is. The means by which this science works is called comparative philology; it is by the analysis of languages—living as well as dead—that it seeks to discover the infancy of human thought. It is evident that in order to penetrate thus deeply, this analysis must follow the whole progress of speech since it first sounded; to no other school of philosophy had this idea occurred; all others ignored the fact that previous to the commencement of human language, no vestige of humanity could exist; therefore, probably, another fact had been ignored; that the only archives in which it is possible to study the history of humanity and the development of reason are those of language.