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CHAPTER XVL 



PHILOSOPHY OF LAXGUAGE. 



U NDER this head it is intended to present a 

 brief and general view of those incjuiries into the 

 Origin and Progress of Language, and of Universal 

 Grapiniar, which have heen pursued with so much 

 success in modern times. These, it is heheved, 

 are in a great measure pecuhar to the period under 

 consideration ; or, at least, have been conducted 

 more extensively and more successfully than ever 

 before. 



The Origin of language is a question concern- 

 ing which disputes have heen long and warmly 

 maintained : some contending that it is an inven- 

 tion of man, gradually growing from rude inarti- 

 culate cries, into a regular, polished, and system- 

 atic form, in the progress of civilisation ; and 

 others asserting that it must have been revealed 

 from Heaven. This controversy arose many cen- 

 turies before that which is now under review; but 

 in no preceding age was it ever considered in a 

 manner so extensive, learned, and satisfactory. 

 The former opinion was defended with great zeal, 

 erudition, and ingenuity, by lord Monhoddo*, of 



* Lord Monboddo supposes that Inngiiage is not natural to man ; 

 that men sang before they spa/^c; that before they arrived at the point 

 at which language began to be used, they conversed together by 

 signs and inarticulate cries j that from these latter language was 

 gradually formed j that all languages are derived from Egypt, 

 the great source of science and cultivation ^ that the Egyptian 



