236 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



from thousands to a very small number. The Aryan theory proceeds 

 on the principle that all languages are to be traced to a certain residu- 

 um called u Hoots." Some languages either are so, or are made to be so 

 by grammarians. The copious Sanskrit is said to be traceable to some 

 1,900 roots, all monosyllables. The languages to which I have myself 

 given special attention are certainly not traceable to any such roots. 

 In their simplest form, a few of the words of these languages are mon- 

 osyllables, but the great majority are dissyllabic or trissyllabic, without 

 any recondite sense whatever. But were the Aryan, or Indo-Euro- 

 pean, hypothesis as true as I believe it to be baseless, I cannot see 

 how it illustrates, or, indeed, can have any possible bearing at all on 

 the theory of the transmutation of species by natural selection, the 

 progress of which is so slow if, indeed, there be any progress at all, 

 that no satisfactory evidence of it has yet been produced. The 

 changes in language, on the contrary, are due to forces in unceasing 

 and active operation, and the evidences are patent and abundant. 

 They consist of social progress, and of the intermixture of languages 

 through conquest, commercial intercourse, and religious conversions. 

 Sir Charles Lyell attaches more value than I can do to the fact, that 

 philologists have not agreed as to what constitutes a language and 

 what a dialect. Following the philosophers of Germany, his object 

 would seem to be to reduce all languages to a small number of primor- 

 dial ones, in the same manner as the authors of the theory of the 

 transmutation of species would reduce all species to a few monads. If 

 there were any truth in the Aryan theory, which is here again advo- 

 cated, it would of necessity follow that there would be no language at 

 all in Western Asia or Europe, ancient or modern, and that Sanskrit, 

 Greek, Latin, with all the modern languages, would be reduced to the 

 rank of mere dialects or subdivisions of one primordial tongue, --the 

 airy, fabulous Aryan, the mere creature of Teutonic imagination. I 

 cannot give my belief to so monstrous a fiction, or see how it can be a 

 parallel to the transmutation of species by natural selection. Changes 

 in language are the exclusive work of man ; those in species by natu- 

 ral selection, if they have any existence at all, the spontaneous work 

 of nature, unaided by man, and in operation long before he was cre- 

 ated. I come now to offer a few remarks on the work of Prof. Hux- 

 ley. The professor compares man j&vith the apes, placing them anatom- 

 ically and physiologically in the same category ; and here I must 

 premise that the views which I have to offer are more of a popular 

 than scientific character*. To begin with the brain: even if there were 

 no material structural difference between the brain of man and that 

 of the most man-like ape, what would be the practical value of 

 the resemblance, when the working of the two brains is of a nature so 

 utterly different, - -less an affair of degree than of absolute quality? 

 The brains of the dog and elephant bear no resemblance to the brain 

 of man or ape, or even to those of each other ; yet the dog and ele- 

 phant are equal, if not, indeed, superior in sagacity, to the most man- 

 like ape. The brain of the wolf is anatomically the same with that 

 of the dog ; but what a vast difference in the Avorking of the two 

 brains ! The common hog is an animal of great intelligence, and 

 wants only a pair of hands like the ape's to enable him to make a dis- 

 play of it equal if not superior to that of the most anthropoid monkey. 



