Even death does not wholly obliterate the manifestation of the passions. Ure relates an instance of hideous expression in the face of a murderer, influenced after death by galvanic action, in which rage, horror, despair, anguish, and ghastly smiles, surpassed the wildest representations of a Fuseli or a Kean.

severe

113. Animals are capable of communicating to each other by particular sounds and gestures their pleasures and pains. They judge of our thoughts by our gestures. "I have," says a writer on natural history, referring to his dog,-" watched the effect which a change in my countenance would produce. If I frown or look the effect is instantly seen by the ears dropping, and the eye showing unhappiness, together with a doubtful movement of the tail. If I afterwards smile and look pleased, the tail wags joyously, the eyes are filled with delight, and the ears are even expressive of happiness." The shepherd's dog understands the sign, the voice, the look, of his master. He collects the scattered sheep at the slightest signal, separates any one that is indicated from the rest of the flock, drives them wherever he is told, and keeps them all the while under perfect control. "One of my boys," says Wilson the naturalist," caught I set about drawing it . . . I had intended to kill it, ... but happening to spill a few drops of water near where it was tied, it lapped it up with such eagerness, and looked in my face with such an eye of supplicating fervour as perfectly overcame me; I immediately restored it to liberty." The expression in the countenance of some Arab horses is scarcely credible to those who have not witnessed it. Their thoughts are depicted in their eyes, and in the movements of their jaws, lips, and nostrils; with as much certainty as the mental emotions on a child's face. (See Appendix Note H.)

a mouse;

SECT. IX.-LANGUAGE ORAL.

114. Having thus considered of the direct modes by which we acquire information, we have now to treat of those which are indirect, namely, vocal sounds received by the ear, and signs received by the eye. And first of spoken language. Between man and the external world there is obviously a real and an arbitrary connexion. The real one, arising from the direct action or influence of beings and things, is universal and lasting. The arbitrary connexion between man and the external world, through

the medium of vocal sounds and signs, is, as to any dialect, local and temporary. Language is, however, the great instrument by which the mind acts; but it cannot cause perception as sensation does. It can only recal the ideas which have been connected with perceptions.

115. By the first or second of the modes, elsewhere mentioned (13), either man or animals may be influenced. But though some animals are acted on by certain words merely as sounds, the action is altogether different from the effect of language on the human mind. This alone is able to comprehend to any considerable extent the association of ideas. On earth man alone is formed for society in the highest sense of that term. Hence the necessity of language, oral and written, to enable society, and, therefore, all its members, to make a continual intellectual and moral progress. Speech "is the last seal of dignity impressed by Deity upon his most favoured earthly creature; and proves even more certainly than does his upright form, the glance of his eye, or the intelligence of his countenance, that he was made in the image of God."

116. All language is necessarily matter of compact. Those who speak the same dialect tacitly agree that certain words shall stand for certain things. Thus the English word hat and the French word chapeau stand for an article worn by Europeans. But for this compact the words hat and chapeau would have no more reference to the article they designate than to any other thing.

117. The voice of man and of other animals is formed by certain organs between the lips and the lungs, and the mouth serves to publish our words. The different organs not only answer the purpose of speech, but those also of mastication and respiration. Nature is careful to do nothing in vain. Speech gives the mouth an animation superior to every other part of the face. Every word, every articulation, produces different motions of the lips; and however rapid the action, it is easy to distinguish them from each other. In the use of vocal language, we have action, tone, emphasis, and gesture.

118. Spoken language has a great superiority over written language in point of energy. The voice of the living speaker makes a much stronger impression than can be made by the perusal of any thing written. Oral language is, therefore, necessary to the due improvement of the intellect and the cultivation of the affections. Hence the ear is considered by some of more

importance than the eye.

"To communicate to every one around

us in a single moment the happiness which we feel ourselves; when the heart which we love is weighed down, . . . . to have it in our power, by a few simple sounds, to convert anguish itself into rapture, these assuredly are no slight advantages.'

119. There is nothing that arouses our attention, or impresses our feelings, more quickly than sounds. Whether it is the tone of sorrow, the note of joy, the voices of a multitude, the roar of the winds or the waters, or the soft inflections of the breeze, we are awakened to that sense of pleasure or pain which sounds create. The Most High thus addresses Job:—

"Hast thou an arm, like God?

Or canst thou thunder with a voice like Him."

And David thus speaks:

"The Lord thundered from heaven,

And the Most High uttered His voice."

120. The human voice, in its tone and accent, is more pure and sonorous than any power of sound which distinguishes the vocal animals. In some countries it is but a slight step to move from euphony of speech into the beauties of song. The voice is susceptible of high cultivation, and on proper attention being paid to it depends much of the silvery tone that delights. There is a charming manner of pronouncing our language rarely heard but in the conversation of accomplished women. This may in some degree be attributed to their knowledge of Italian and music, and, more than this, to their superiority of articulation. We are told of the ancient Greek orators, that foreigners, though they did not understand their language, used to listen with pleasure on account of the harmony of their utterance.

121. In our intercourse with each other we have principally to declare the existence or non-existence of things and beings, their attributes and qualities, with the action or influence of these on the part of some, and the endurance or passion on the part of others: we require also to intimate the relations of things and beings. For these purposes, according to some grammarians, three great classes of words only are necessary, namely, 1. substantives, to designate things and beings; 2. attributives, to express action, &c.; 3. particles, to express relations. In English.grammar the noun and pronoun belong to the first; the adjective, verb, and adverb to the second; and the article, preposition, interjection, and conjunction to the third. The most important class is

the second; and of these the verb. The languages of modern Europe require the assistance of prepositions and adverbs; but the Arabs are, by characteristic letters, able to dispense with them, and to render with precision the finest shades of thought. Hence the energy and precision of the Arabic. Thus in some languages a separate word is required for most of our ideas. In other dialects, existence, action, and passion are expressed in one word. In other languages, again, more than these is expressed in a single term. Those, says Quintilian, that duly study grammar, “will there discover such refinement and subtilty of matter as is not only proper to sharpen the understandings of young men, but sufficient to give exercise for the most profound knowledge."

122. Our ideas must principally have reference to something affirmed, as, I read; or denied, as, I have not written; or inquired about, as, Will you walk? And language is divisible into sentences, as, I have not spoken; into words, as, have, not and spoken ; and into letters, as, spoken. Suppose it is said that James walked from the house to the field. Here James, house, and feld are substantives; walked is an attributive; from, the, and to are particles. There can be no sentence without a substantive and an attributive. And there are few sentences with but one of each, or without particles. The words James, walked, house, and field have by themselves no meaning. If they are connected by the particles, a grammatical sentence is made. Thus it is to principles, apparently so trivial as about twenty elementary sounds or signs, we owe that variety of words which have been sufficient to explain the sentiments of so vast a multitude as all the past and present generations of mankind. The aggregate of the letters of which a language is composed is called its alphabet. All the words of any spoken language are made by a very limited number of articulations. All is combination.

123. In speaking no monysyllable can be addressed by one person and attended to by another, but what is conséquent on one train of thought in the mind of the speaker, and precedent to another train in the mind of the hearer. The application of any one word and of all words spoken is therefore dependent on the connexion in the sentences uttered by the speaker, and the continuation of this connexion in the mind of the hearer. If A were to ask B, which are some of the greatest minds England has produced? and the reply were to be Newton, Locke, Shakespeare, Milton, &c.; or if another question were asked, namely, what do

you think of Locke? the idea as to this writer, arising in the mind of B, would probably be very different in one case to what it would be in the other; from the manner in which the word Locke is connected with what precedes and what follows it in each sentence. As language by which we think is wholly regulated by connexion, so also must necessarily be, as has been intimated, our thoughts (15-122).

124. To the connecting power we also owe all figurative language. When mankind had the fewest words language was most figurative. In the Old Testament we find guilt expressed by a spotted garment; misery by drinking the cup of astonishment; vain pursuits by feeding on ashes; a wicked life by a crooked path, &c. "We speak," says the younger Racine, "a figurative language whenever we are animated by passion.... We have only to listen to a dispute between women of the lowest rank, . . . . what an abundance of figures do they use!"

....

125. By the application of language music becomes intelligible. "A fine instrumental symphony, well performed, is like an oration delivered with propriety, but in an unknown tongue. It may affect us a little, but conveys no determinate feeling. We are alarmed perhaps, or melted, or soothed, but it is very imperfectly; because we know not why. The singer by taking up the same air and applying words to it, immediately translates the oration into our own language; then all uncertainty vanishes; the fancy is filled with determinate ideas." Music also is thus significant only from association.

126. Moses informs us that the rudiments of oral language were begun under the Divine superintendence by the parent of mankind (Gen. ii. 19.) We may humbly conjecture that God sufficiently instructed our first parents to invent whatever language they required, leaving it to be subsequently enlarged. In naming sensible objects those sounds must have been adopted which were thought most appropriate. Intellectual and moral terms were probably derived from the names of sensible objects considered to be most analogous. As the terms increased in subsequent times, the many fanciful and irregular modes of derivation adopted caused the analogy not to be easily discoverable. But we consider that all the words ever used in any dialect and in all languages have been derived from that spoken by our first parents. We cannot suppose that any word in any language has ever been adopted from the first age of the world to the present hour, without some connexion with words that preceded it.

Nor can