REASON IN THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE. 471 



The first book put into their hands is a grammar, the most abstract, 

 the most fatiguing, the most unintelligible book that can be imagined, 

 while, at the same time, it is the most useless at the beginning of the 

 study, when the pupil has not yet gained a knowledge of the facts on 

 which it rests. Contrary to reason, the grammar treats of words that 

 occupy the attention before the ideas they represent. It is but a col- 

 lection of rules and definitions, more or less obscure, incomprehensible, 

 and inapplicable, as preparatory study. 



If, as reason teaches, the art of reading is the first object of this 

 study, grammar is not the least help in securing this end : it does not 

 give the meaning of phrases and words, the only difficulty in begin- 

 ning to read a foreign language. The thought of the author, in other 

 words, the translation that interprets it, not the grammatical condition 

 of the words, should be the first object of consideration with the be- 

 ginner. He might know the grammar from beginning to end without 

 understanding a word of the language. It certainly is not the art of 

 reading, and cannot be the introduction to the study of language. 

 The method that gives priority to the arts of speaking and writing 

 has recourse to grammar at first ; for, in default of example, rules are 

 the only guides of study. But in reading, as in listening, the phrase 

 presents itself, as a whole, to the mind ; rules which coordinate the 

 composition have no force until its parts are understood. It is, in 

 fact, by language that we comprehend the grammar, not by grammar 

 that we comprehend language. 



Admitting that grammar teaches to speak and write correctly, 

 that is not teaching to speak and write, but only to do them correctly ; 

 in other words, to avoid or correct errors that might glide into expres- 

 sion and thought. It is, therefore, necessary to begin by speaking or 

 by writing, to get any advantage from the rules of grammar. 



In beginning with grammar, children do not see its utility, and 

 are disgusted. They are neither interested nor profited, because they 

 do not give it their attention. On the contrary, what interest gram- 

 mar awakens, when, in place of presenting it dead, so to say, in an ab- 

 stract manner, it is made to arise from the phraseology, rousing the 

 curiosity, leading to the generalization of facts through observation 

 and reflection, and so opening a vast field to the intellect ! 



Of all the means that tradition and routine have established in 

 teaching language, grammar is, perhaps, the most prejudicial in re- 

 tarding practical knowledge. By a deplorable violation of the laws 

 of Nature, substituting synthesis for analysis, putting precept before 

 example, theory before practice, grammar is made the base of lan- 

 guage. The minds of children are loaded with principles and theories, 

 roots of words and their etymologies, as if they were all to be philolo- 

 gists and teachers of languages. 



Grammar indicates, only in a limited way, the received usage ; 

 there are many idiomatic expressions concerning which it is no help. 



