356 MENTAL EVOLUTION IN MAN. 



are engaged, and, moreover, to beg it in the teeth of every 

 antecedent probability, as well as of every actual analogy, to 

 which appeal can possibly be made. If it be true — and who 

 will venture to doubt it ? — that " language diminishes the 

 further we look back, in such a way that we cannot forbear 

 concluding it must once have had no existence at all," will 

 it be maintained that the man-like being who was then unable 

 to communicate with his fellows by means of any words at 

 all was gifted with self-consciousness? Should so absurd a 

 statement be ventured, it would be fatal to the argument of 

 my adversaries ; for the statement would imply, either that 

 concepts may exist without names, or that self-consciousness 

 may exist without concepts. The truth of the matter is that 

 philology has proved, in a singularly complete manner, the 

 origin and gradual development in time, first of pre-conceptual 

 communication, and next of the self-consciousness which sup- 

 plied the basis of conceptual predication. No wonder, there- 

 fore, as Professor Max Miillcr somewhat naively observes, 

 " it may be said that the first step in the formation of names 

 and concepts is very imperfect. So it is." Truly "to name 

 the act of carrying by a root formed from sounds which 

 accompany the act of carrying a heavy load, is a far more 

 primitive act than to fix an attribute by a name " conceptu- 

 ally applied. So primitive, indeed, is nomination of this 

 kind, that I defy any one to show wherein it differs psycho- 

 logically from what I have called the denotation of a young 

 child, or even of a talking bird. 



And, having reduced the matter to this issue so far as the 

 results of philology are concerned, I may fitly conclude by 

 briefly indicating the principal point which appears to 

 divide my opinions from those of the eminent philologist 

 just alluded to— if not also from those of the majority of my 

 psychological opponents. Briefly, the point is that on the 

 other side an unwarrantable assumption is made — to wit, that 

 conceptual thought is an antecedent condition, sine qua non, 

 to any and every act of bestowing a name ; and, a fortiori^ to 

 any and every act of predication. This is the fundamental 



