ARE LANGUAGES INSTITUTIONS? 159 



making by intention ; when, for example, an utterance of pain or 

 pleasure, formerly forced out by immediate emotion, was repeated imi- 

 tatively, no longer as a mere instinctive cry, but for the purpose of in- 

 timating to another, " I am (was, or shall be) suiFering or glad;" when 

 an angry growl, once the direct expression of passion, was reproduced 

 to signify disapprobation or threatening, and so on ; that is to say, 

 when expression for personal relief was turned into expression for 

 communication. The human intellect had the power to see what was 

 gained by this means and to try it further ; and it could follow on and 

 on, in the same course, until a whole language of signs was the result. 

 It cannot be successfully maintained that no animals are capable of 

 taking even the earliest steps in this process; if a dog stands outside 

 a door, and barks or scratches, to attract attention, and then waits for 

 some one to come and let him in, that is, in all essential respects, an 

 act of language-making ; and the dog, and some other animals, can do 

 much more than that. Here is the point to which the attention of 

 naturalists should be directed, if they wish to determine liovv far the 

 animals advance on the road to language ; to what extent are they 

 able to turn signs utterance, or gesture, or posture, or grimace to 

 account for the purpose, and with the intention, of intimating meaning. 

 To determine what definite natural cries they have is comparatively 

 nothing to the purpose, since these are not the analogue of human 

 speech ; to put the inquiry on this ground, involves the capital error 

 of attributing to the human voice a special relation to the apparatus 

 of mental action, as its natural means of expression, instead of regard- 

 ing utterance as merely that fonn of bodily activity which, on the 

 whole, is most availajjle for expression, and which, therefore, after due 

 experience of its advantages, is most availed of by man. The real 

 expressiveness of cries and exclamations lies, not in their articulate 

 elements, their vowels and consonants (if they have any), but in their 

 tones ; and we keeji these same tones as auxiliaries of the very highest 

 value to our articulate speech, when we wish to imjitress and persuade. 



Quite as much, I am sure, lies within the compass of the lower 

 animals, in the way of intentional intimation of their wishes, as in the 

 way of tool-using ; and hence the former is no more a " barrier " than 

 the latter. But the animals can go no further in the direction of de- 

 veloping their rude beginnings of expression into a language, than of 

 working up their tools into a mechanical art, with all its appliances, 

 simply because they have not the capacity ; and in this capacity of 

 indefinite development, by accumulating the results of the exercise of 

 his powers out of a condition originally as low, or welliiigh as low, 

 as that of the animals, lies the distinction of man a distinction which 

 ought to satisfy the most exacting lover of his species. 



As regards " genei'al ideas," of which Mr. Mliller arrogates to him- 

 self and his followers the monopoly, I confess to being wholly of the 

 opinion of Mr. Ellis : " Animals, to my mind, have concepts, with quite 



