THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE 233 



degenerated into dashes — a lingual form of the 

 modern impressionism. 



When writing was fully evolved, this height was 

 only the starting-point for some new development. 

 Every summit in Evolution is the base of some, 

 grander peak. Speech, whether by writing or by 

 spoken word, is too crude and slow to keep pace 

 with the needs of the now swiftly ascending mind. 

 Man's larger life demands a further specialization of 

 this power. He learned to speak at first because 

 he could not convey his thoughts to his wife at 

 the other side of the wood. It was Space that 

 made him speak. He now learns to speak better 

 because he cannot convey his thoughts to the other 

 end of the world. This new distance-language 

 began again at the beginning, just as all Language 

 does, by employing signs. Man invented the tele- 

 graph — a little needle which makes signs to some 

 one at the other side of the world. The telegraph 

 is a gesture-language, and is therefore only a primi- 

 tive stage. Man found this out and from signs went 

 on to sounds — he invented the telephone. By all the 

 traditions of Evolution this marvellous instrument 

 ought to be, and is even now on the verge of being, 

 the vehicle of the distance-language of the future. 



Is this the end ? It is by no means likely. 

 The mind is feeling about already for more per- 



