TRANSMUTABLE. 215 



rious species of cats do not differ more than the 

 languages of the Spaniard, Italian, Portuguese, 

 Wallachian, and lihoetian, do from each other, 

 although they are all derived from the "fossil" 

 Latin. 



This is a kind of reasoning which is sufficiently 

 intelligible to illustrate an assumed fact, and al- 

 though it by no means either proves it, or gives 

 it a greater plausibility, still there is nothing 

 that one could exactly lay hold of on the ground 

 of false analogy. But the question is carried 

 further, and we are told that because eight lan- 

 guages more ancient still, including the Latin, 

 point to a common origin, which was to them 

 what the Latin is to the six mentioned; there- 

 fore we may be justified in supposing that all 

 the classes of the vertebrate animals point to the 

 existence of some older type, now extinct, from 

 which they were all developed. 



When he carries his argument to this point, 

 he leaves the ground of possibility, and his 

 analogy fails. So long as there was no change 

 of type, the variations in a. family may be illus- 

 trated, by the variations in a language. But as 

 language is merely a function, it is impossible 

 that the analogy will hold good when applied to 

 u total change of structure. There is nothing 

 difficult to conceive in the variation of language. 

 That at one time there was but one, we may 

 be perfectly certain, and that it has varied into 

 all the languages of the world is equally true, 

 and this may be taken fairly enough to shew 



