NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN, 515 



ping time, thanks to the telegraph ! and even annihilating pain, thanks 

 to chloroform ! 



Then, alon<y with the material characters which we studied at our 

 last lecture, we now take up intellectual characters. 



It is our distinct intention, in taking up cliaracters of a nature so 

 new, still to remain exclusively on the ground of science. 



We know the existence of faculties, and we shall point out their 

 most general manifestations ; but we shall have no concern with the 

 nature of these faculties. In a word, we are not philosophers. Here, 

 as in preceding kctures, we shall remain a man of science — a natural- 

 ist, and nothing else. 



It will be impossible for me to examine these characters in detail. 

 I shall neglect several, and limit myself to saying something on lan- 

 guage, on writing, on the fundamental forms of society, on industry, 

 and on dress. 



L Language. — ^It will not be denied that the most essential of all 

 the manifestations of intelligence is language. 



"Animals have voice, man alone has speech." This phrase is from 

 an ancient philosophic naturalist — from the great Aristotle, who lived 

 some four centuries before our era ; it is as true to-day as it was more 

 than two thousand years ago. In fact, man alone possesses articulate 

 speech. 



But, you all know that the manifestations of speech vary from peo- 

 ple to people. Each of these manifestations — the languages, as we 

 call them — constitutes one of the most essential characters of the dif- 

 ferent human groups. You all know a German, a Spaniard, an Eng- 

 lishman, by his language. But this is not the limit of the scientific 

 importance of this character. Unhappily, I cannot here enter into 

 details. I shall only attempt to show you, in a few words, how the 

 study of language throws light on the history of human groups, even 

 in the case of those who have lost all historic data. 



You know that in France other languages than French are spoken, 

 and that, on all sides of us, we find the Gascon in the south, the bas- 

 Breton in Brittany, the Alsatian in Alsace, etc. Whence comes this 

 diversity of language among a people at present so remarkably homo- 

 geneous ? 



History answers this question. It teaches us that, until a certain 

 epoch, Languedoc, Alsace, Brittany, formed so many separate states, 

 having each its own language. From this fact we are enabled to 

 draw important consequences. 



When we encounter a group actually designated by a single name, 

 and when we find in this group secondary groups speaking diverse 

 languages, we may almost to a certainty conclude that formerly all 

 these secondary groups had their individual life, their political inde- 

 pendence. 



The study of language conducts us still further. 



