302 



MENTAL EVOLUTION IN MAN, 



towards my side of the present argument. Speaking of these 

 " demonstrative elements, which point to an object in space 

 and time, and express what we now express by then, this 

 [ = 1], that [ = there, he, she, it, &c.], near, far, above, below, 

 &c.;" he says, "in their primitive form and intention they are 

 addressed to the senses rather than to the intellect : they are 

 sensuous, not conceptual." * And elsewhere he adds, " I see 

 no reason why we should not accept them as real survivals of 

 a period of speech during which pantomime, gesture, pointing 

 with the fingers to actual things were still indispensable 

 ingredients of all conversation." \ Again, " it was one of the 

 characteristic features of Sanskrit, and the other Aryan 

 languages, that they tried to distinguish the various applica- 

 tions of a root by means of what I have called demonstrative 

 roots or elements. If they wished to distinguish the mat as 

 the product of their handiwork, from the handiwork itself, 

 they would say ' Platting — there ; ' if they wished to encourage 

 the work they would say, ' Platting— they, or you, or we.' 

 We found that what we call demonstrative roots or elements 

 must be considered as remnants of the earliest and almost 

 pantomimic phase of language, in which language was hardly 

 as yet what we mean by language, namely logos, a gathering, 

 but only a pointing." % 



It is the opinion of some philologists, however, that 

 these demonstrative elements were probably "once full or 

 predicative words, and that if we could penetrate to an earlier 

 stage of language, we should meet with the original forms of 

 which they are the maimed half-obliterated representatives." § 



• Science of Thought ^ p. 221. 



t Ibid., p. 554. 



X Ibid., 241. 



§ Sayce, Introduction, ^c, ii. 25 ; see also to the same effect, Bleek, Ursprung 

 der Sprache, 70-72 ; F. Muller, Grundriss der Sprachwisscnshaft, I., i., s. 40 ; and 

 Noire, Logos, p. 186, The chief ground of this scepticism is that it is difficult to 

 conceive how a word could ever have gained a footing if it did not from the first 

 present some independent predicative meaning. But it seems to me that the 

 force of this objection is removed if we remember the sounds which are arbitrarily 

 invented by young children and uneducated deaf-mutes, not to mention the 

 inarticulate clicks of the Bushmen. Moreover, there is nothing inimical to the 



