MEMOIR OF PELTIER. 161 



often not liavino- the time to review what he had written ; but here, as else- 

 where, his ideas are not at fault. 



Retiring from trade at the age of thirty-one, Peltier resolved to educate him- 

 self anew. He had doubtless read much, worked much, and exercised his mind 

 on a variety of subjects ; but he had never pursued a regular course of study 

 He determined, therefore, as the first step to make himself master of Latin, and 

 at the same time to teach it to his little son, then aged seven years, and whom 

 he had, since his sixth year, taught English, "Wishing at the same time that 

 he taught the Latin to perfect the child's English, he bought several English 

 and Latin grammars ; but what was his surprise in examining them to find that 

 they differed essentially from the French and Latin ! This diflerence was the 

 more singular inasmuch as these grammars, both teaching the same language, 

 should have been entirely alike. 



Peltier, not content with remarking this difference, set himself to work to 

 ascertain the cause, which he found to be that both English and French confine 

 themselves to rules for translating their language into Latin. Now when the 

 Romans taught their children the rules of Latin grammar, it was by rules deduced 

 from granrmar in general, and not by telling them that such and such a turn of 

 phrase in French or English should be rendered in such or such manner in Latin. 

 Thus when we teach our children French, we do so independently of all foreign 

 languages. 



When Peltier had once seen this defect, he resolved to write for his son a 

 gi'ammar in which all the rules of the Latin language should be given in 

 English, It was in 1816 that he undertook this work; somewhat later he took 

 it up again, but in French; the change from one grammar to the other being 

 but a small matter, the same language being taught in both, and the same rules 

 given. He worked at this for some time, and made considerable progress; but 

 it is far from being complete. 



When this work was somewhat advanced, Peltier began to write an introduc- 

 tion for it. Now grammar being the art of expressing one's thoughts according 

 to certain rules, he discoursed, in this introduction, of ideas, their origin and trans- 

 formations, thus passing from grammar to ideology. At first it was only his 

 intention to write an introduction, but little by little his plan enlarged, as the 

 constant necessity arose of mounting higher into causes in order better to explain 

 effects. It was first an introduction of a few pages ; it very soon became an 

 entne work. He abandoned it several times, but always seemed irresistibly 

 drawn to take it up again. 



It was his conviction that all the phenomena of the formation of ideas could 

 and should be reduced to the simple undulation of the nervous fluid. The sen- 

 sation composed, 1st, of the impression made on an organ, 2d, of the transmission 

 of this impression to the brain, 3d, of the perception eflFected by the brain, was 

 only, according to him, an undulation wrought in the nervous fluid, the starting 

 point of which is any given organ, the stopping point tho encephalon; when 

 afterwards this undulation returns from the brain to the organ impressed, it 

 becomes attention ; when it returns from the brain to an ensemble of muscles, 

 and is designed to cause motion, it becomes will. Memory he describes as a 

 succession of undulations, similar in nature, and acting upon each other; Avhile 

 judgment is the sensation of the difference between I (molj previously impressed 

 in a certain manner, and I fmoij afterwards impressed otherwise. 



It is far from my intention here to enter into any detail on this subject. Suf- 

 fice it to say that ideology is one of the sciences on which he was most often 

 engaged, and in which ho has advanced the newest and most original ideas. 

 Unfortunately his work on the subject is very far from being finished. 



Prepositions are the most difficult parts of speech to define, and have very 

 much perplexed all grammarians. Expressing the relations of persons and 

 things to each other, they form one of the most abstract points of grammar. 

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