Essays on Life 



most happy illustration," and he proceeds to 

 quote the following, also from Sir William 

 Hamilton, which he declares to be even hap- 

 pier still. 



"You have all heard," says Sir William 

 Hamilton, "of the process of tunnelling 

 through a sandbank. In this operation it is 

 impossible to succeed unless every foot, nay, 

 almost every inch of our progress be secured 

 by an arch of masonry before we attempt the 

 excavation of another. Now language is to 

 the mind precisely what the arch is to the 

 tunnel. The power of thinking and the power 

 of excavation are not dependent on the words 

 in the one case or on the mason- work in the 

 other ; but without these subsidiaries neither 

 could be carried on beyond its rudimentary 

 commencement. Though, therefore, we allow 

 that every movement forward in language 

 must be determined by an antecedent move- 

 ment forward in thought, still, unless thought 

 be accompanied at each point of its evolutions 

 by a corresponding evolution of language, its 

 further development is arrested." 



Man has evolved an articulate language, 



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