ON THE PSYCHO-PHYSICAL VIEW OF NATURE. 537 



In no department of knowledge has the scientific 

 spirit worked a greater change than in the science of 

 language. With the exception of suggestions by Leibniz, 

 who clearly saw the necessity of founding the theory of 

 language on a broader basis than the small number of 

 classical and modern tongues then current afforded, 

 and of some glimpses of a correcter view such as those 

 contained in the much ridiculed writings of Lord Mon- 

 boddo, we find, up to the end of the eighteenth century, 

 hardly any attempt towards a methodical treatment of 

 the great problem. Philosophical theories and vague 

 etymologies, amounting frequently to little more than 

 punning with words, brought the subject into ridicule. 

 Herder has the great merit of having urged the im- 

 portance of the study of language and literature in 

 primitive forms l as the great gateway into anthropology 



(1751). The question attracted con- 

 siderable attention, partly through 

 the eccentricities of Lord Mon- 

 boddo, of which it has been well 

 said that they appeared more 

 ridiculous to his own than they 

 would to the present age, partly 

 through the controversy which 

 arose shortly after on the publi- 

 cation of Home Tooke's celebrated 

 "Eirett wrtpAivTo., or the Diversions 

 of Purley' (1786). Herder was 

 acquainted with Monboddo's work, 

 having occasioned a translation of 

 it to be made and written a preface 

 (1787) ; but he does not seem to 

 have taken any notice of Home 

 Tooke (1736-1812), who, as the 

 historian of the science of lang- 

 uage (Theodor Beufey, ' Geschichte 

 der Sprachwissenschaft,' Miinchen, 

 1869) says, would, for his novel 

 ideas and method, deserve to be 

 put at the entrance of the modern 

 linguistic epoch, had he been able 



to avail himself of a knowledge of 

 Sanskrit. 



1 This refers to the second great- 

 est work of Herder, his collec- 

 tion of popular songs, published 

 under the significant title of 

 " Voices of the Peoples " (' Stimmeu 

 der Volker in Liedern,' 1778), a 

 work which had the greatest in- 

 fluence on German literature as 

 well as on modern philological 

 studies. See Benfey, loc. cit., p. 

 316, &c. That the publication of 

 the ' Percy Ballads' (1765), of Mac- 

 pherson's ' Ossian,' and of Lowth's 

 ' Lectures on Hebrew Poetry ' 

 (1753), formed a great stimulus to 

 Herder in his historical and poetical 

 studies is shown by Haym in many 

 extracts and passages, also in the 

 prefaces of Herder himself and of 

 his editor, Joh. von Miiller (Herder's 

 ' Werke,' 1828, ' Zur schbnen Liter- 

 atur und Kunst,' vols. vii. and viii.) 



