SCIENCE AND CULTURE 23 



cially, has been made of the origin of science, 

 it is this: the essential and continuous part 

 which the original activity of the mind has 

 played and plays, both in the formation and 

 elaboration of scientific concepts and in es- 

 tablishing the relations of phenomena to those 

 concepts. I would be glad to apply to all 

 science the theory which I have seen my mas- 

 ter M. Michel Breal sustain in regard to lan- 

 guage. Against those who assume to explain 

 the phenomena of language by purely me- 

 chanical laws immanent in language itself, to 

 wit: by simple invariable connections of ele- 

 mentary linguistic phenomena, Michel Breal 

 sustains the proposition that the mind, for its 

 own ends and by its own activity, with its 

 capacity for trying, for groping its way, for 

 choice, for adaptation, for aesthetic arrange- 

 ment, for improving, is the true creator and 

 modifier of language. Mens agitat molem: 

 Mind moves the whole. Doubtless it would 

 be possible, to some extent, to reduce any 

 given language to a fixed mechanical system, 

 so that its constitution could be more easily 

 taught to students whose memory was better 



