OBJECTS AND NAMES 29 



others, if we had the key to the hieroglyphs, 

 and some knowledge of the Sacred- writing ? 

 When the subject of a volume is a mystery, 

 and the greater part of it is written in an 

 unknown tongue, what advantage do we 

 derive by listlessly turning over its leaves? 

 Why should we expect the Book of Nature 

 to be different? Is it reasonable to ask 

 men to take an interest in what they do 

 not understand ? While Nature is absolutely 

 strange to us, we take little pleasure in its 

 parables, its lessons, or even its beauties. 



Apart from this, observations have no 

 value, if we are unable to attach names to 

 what we have seen. A child, when he is 

 attracted by anything of which he does not 

 know the name, invents one for himself. 

 He feels the necessity for giving names to 

 things. When our senses bring to our 

 notice an external object, and our reason 

 tells us that it differs from anything we have 

 seen before, the perception is only impressed 

 upon our memory if we attach some title 

 to the thing observed, by which we may 

 know it again. We perceive thousands of 

 objects, which pass away and leave no 



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