Читать книгу The Origin of Thought and Speech онлайн

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But this concession, I think, we may make to Darwin; that even in the sphere of mental activities we can never entirely separate ourselves from the brute creation. We experience in ourselves a certain condition of mind, where fancies alternate with passing agitation; these proceed from intense, but confused emotions. This condition does not allow of clear explanation even to ourselves, since it has nothing in common with true thought, which is inseparable from the consciousness of objects, and therefore is lacking in words with which to express itself. To Mendelssohn this mental condition was perfectly known, and he says, “It is exactly at that moment when language is impotent to express the experiences of the soul, that the sphere of music opens to us; if all that passes in us were capable of being expressed in words, I should write no more music.”

A flock of birds about to migrate, all follow an unanimous impulse in uttering at starting a few high clear notes, perhaps impelled by an unknown motive, their inclinations and wills find collective expression therein, by a mutual impulse which comes from soundless depths of the life of the senses, carrying all before it. This universal sympathy, however difficult to explain, is one of the noblest possessions of the inferior animals; even the aptitude they display for certain mechanical acts of labour does not stand on the same level; but in the vocal manifestations of birds there is no indication of true thought, the basis of real language.