On an Universal writien Characier. 283 
able. Hence the Russian sees that neobhodimosét 
conveys the clear idea of necessity, or of something 
that cannot be shunned or avoided by going round 
it, or out of its way. To translate it into English, 
some such word as unwalkaboutableness would be 
produced. It is evident, that to the mere English 
reader the words catalogue, philosophy, philology, 
biography, astronomy, preposition, expedition, and 
many others, are as much arbitrary signs as neob- 
hodimost would be, were any person to take it into 
his head to introduce it into our tongue. There is 
this exception, however, that the terminational sign 
added to the foreign words I have mentioned, being 
in some of them purely English, the class to which 
the idea denoted by them belongs is understood, 
though the meaning of the word is not. We can 
only perceive that these words express some general 
idea, defined by the meaning of the constituent 
parts of which the compounds are formed. nf 
The other class of arbitrary signs of oral lan- 
guage are, we have said, of a very different nature 
from those which denote simple ideas only. This 
Class is not so numerous as the other, and may of 
course be more easily represented by visible marks. 
The great advantages that arise from this simple 
contrivance of rude men, if we believe language a 
human invention (which, indeed, the apparent ne 
cessity of a thorough knowledge of the nature and 
relation of things, to the first inventors of this beau~ 
