254 THE ORIGIN OF HUMAN REASON 



to be fatal to his opponents), calls in the aid of other 

 writers, and, amongst them, he once more quotes from 

 Mr, Sweet * as to Primitive Man not having used 

 the copula, but only placed words in apposition. Thus, 

 he tells us, " the verb gradually came to assume the 

 purely formal function of predication." He continues, 

 " The use of verbs denoting action necessitated the 

 formation of verbs to denote * rest,' ' continuance in 

 state,' and when, in course of time, it became neces- 

 sary in certain cases to predicate permanent as well 

 as changing attributes, these words were naturally 

 employed for the purpose, and such a sentence as 

 * The sun continues bright ' was simply * The bright 

 sun ' in another form." But this is what we meant by 

 saying the simplest element of thought is a judgment. 

 The concept " bright sun " is implicitly the judgment 

 " the sun is bright." But what is meant by the expres- 

 sion, " when it became necessary " f Necessary : why, and 

 for whom t There could be no necessity save for man, 

 " the meaner," when he felt a need to give expression to 

 his " meaning." But to feel the necessity of expressing 

 his meaning, he must first have it. Therefore it is 

 manifest that the thought must have preceded the ex- 

 pression. It was not and could not have been formed 

 by a word ; but it existed, and so formed the word. 

 The same writer goes on to say that not only the order 

 but " the very idea of the distinction between subject and 

 predicate is purely linguistic, and has no foundation in 

 the mind itself In the first place, there is no necessity 

 for a subject at all : in such a sentence as * It rains ' 



* P- 315- 



