vii ACQUISITION OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES 375 



discussed, the learning of foreign languages, my view on 

 which is further developed by Schleicher. On the latter sub- 

 ject he says : l "If language really depends on particular 

 adjustments in the brain and vocal organs, how is a man able 

 to acquire any other or even several other languages besides 

 his own ? To which I might . . . answer that a man can 

 learn to walk on all fours, or even on the hands alone, and 

 yet no one will doubt that our natural mode of progression 

 is determined by our bodily structure, and is the expression 

 of that structure. But let us examine into the objection 

 more minutely. The first question to be asked is, Whether a 

 foreign language is ever perfectly acquired and appropriated ? 

 I doubt this, and at most will only admit it to be possible 

 when a man exchanges his native language for another in 

 early childhood." In that case, however, the person in ques- 

 tion would be a different person, for his brain and vocal 

 organs would develop in another direction. It is further to 

 be considered, in talking of the acquisition of European lan- 

 guages, that all the Indogermanic languages belong to the 

 same family, and, regarded broadly, are species of the same 

 language. " But show me the man who thinks and speaks 

 with perfectly equal facility in German and Chinese, or in 

 the New Zealand and Cherokese tongue, or in Arabian and 

 Hottentot, or in any other two languages differing in their 

 fundamental constitution. I do not believe such a man 

 exists, any more than I believe that any individual will ever 

 be able to walk with equal agility and comfort on all fours 

 and on his two feet. It is often even impossible to us to pro- 

 nounce sounds peculiar to foreign languages, or even to distin- 

 guish these with our ears correctly and exactly." He con- 

 cludes, therefore, that a given vocal organ, like every other 

 kind of organ, has a definite function, which is, and remains, 

 always natural to it. 



1 Ueber die Bedeutung der Sprache, etc. 



