2i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



come conscious of a percept, or of an individual object, we have to 

 comprebeiul it under something else, and thus to begin to conceive it, 

 even if it be under the most general categories of our mind. . . . Any 

 green, as soon as it is perceived as this green, is ipso facto perceived 

 as like unto other greens, and as unlike yellow and blue ; it is con- 

 ceived as something which we afterward call color." These words 

 aim to express the natural process of association which occurs in every 

 mind, indeed, and Professor Miiller's chief point is that this can not 

 take place without language. 



Let us consider for a moment the author's division of the material 

 or elements of thought into sensations, percepts, concepts, and names. 

 The question is at once suggested, Why are not names, percepts ? A 

 name is certainly a word, or set of words, and a word is nothing to 

 our intelligence except as brought or to be brought to our ear or eye 

 by the ordinary processes of sensation, and perceived by our intelli- 

 gence. "We may, it is true, invent a word by our constructive activ- 

 ity, but it is at once objectified, and when communicated to others it 

 is to them a percept. Whatever may be its offices besides, it is at 

 least this. Its additional office is by itself, or in conjunction with other 

 words, to constitute a name ; and a name is a mark or a symbol, serving 

 the double jrarpose to recall to ourselves some previous object of cog- 

 nition, and to make it known to others. This is accomplished accord- 

 ing to the laws of association and representation. Names, then, are 

 certain symbolical percepts, which, by the processes of redintegration 

 recall past experiences. Now, it is idle to say that word-percepts are 

 essential to this course of mental operation ; one green will recall an- 

 other green without any word being needed. The picture of the Matter- 

 horn before my eyes instantly brings back to me the Matterhorn as I 

 saw it from the Riffel ; this suggests the Breithorn, Monte Rosa, my 

 view from the summit of the latter, and a whole train of personal recol- 

 lections, just as infallibly and certainly as the word Matterhorn, which 

 I find on the printed page. I do not deny that in the train first sug- 

 gested words interpolate themselves ; but I maintain that the picture 

 of the Matterhorn reproduces in my mind the actual sight without 

 need of the intervention of any name, and before tlie name occurs. 

 Now, suppose that the picture be one of a mountain I have seen, but 

 of which I do not recall the name. I remember at once the visual ap- 

 pearance ; the words "mountain," "peak," "horn," "pic," "ice," etc., 

 do not come to my mind, nor does any one of them nor any word or 

 name. The sight I beheld is there, and then I try to think of the 

 name of the mountain or the locality. So that if Professor Miiller 

 means to declare that we can not represent or associate (" combine or 

 co-agitate ") except by the use of language, intending by language ar- 

 ticulate words, certainly universal experience negatives his assertion. 

 But, if under language be included everything which recalls to the 

 mind something else, his statement reduces itself to the proposition 



