264 OPERATIONS SUBSIDIARY TO INDUCTION. 



consciousness of all that is signified by it. In this respect 

 those languages have an immense advantage which form their 

 compounds and derivatives from native roots, like the German, 

 and not from those of a foreign or dead language, as is so 

 much the case with English, French, and Italian : and the 

 best are those which form them according to fixed analogies, 

 corresponding to the relations between the ideas to be ex 

 pressed. All languages do this more or less, but especially, 

 among modern European languages, the German ; while even 

 that is inferior to the Greek, in which the relation between 

 the meaning of a derivative word and that of its primitive is 

 in general clearly marked by its mode of formation ; except in 

 the case of words compounded with prepositions, which are 

 often, in both those languages, extremely anomalous. 



But all that can be done, by the mode of constructing 

 words, to prevent them from degenerating into sounds passing 

 through the mind without any distinct apprehension of what 

 they signify, is far too little for the necessity of the case. 

 Words, however well constructed originally, are always tend 

 ing, like coins, to have their inscription worn off by passing 

 from hand to hand ; and the only possible mode of reviving 

 it is to be ever stamping it afresh, by living in the habitual 

 contemplation of the phenomena themselves, and not resting 

 in our familiarity with the words that express them. If any 

 one, having possessed himself of the laws of phenomena as 

 recorded in words, whether delivered to him originally by 

 others, or even found out by himself, is content from thence 

 forth to live among these formulae, to think exclusively of 

 them, and of applying them to cases as they arise, without 

 keeping up his acquaintance with the realities from which 

 these laws were collected not only will he continually fail in 

 his practical efforts, because he will apply his formulae without 

 duly considering whether, in this case and in that, other laws 

 of nature do not modify or supersede them ; but the formula? 

 themselves will progressively lose their meaning to him, and 

 he will cease at last even to be capable of recognising with 

 certainty whether a case falls within the contemplation of his 



