GENERAL SUMMARY AXD COXCLUDIXG REMARKS. 417 



must be done by some other lines of inquiry finding similar 

 germs giving rise to similar products elsewhere. In the 

 present instance, the only place where we can look for such 

 parallel processes of evolution is in the case of the growing 

 child, which I have already considered. 



Here, then, we are in the presence of exactly the same 

 distinction with regard to the origin of Language, as we were 

 at the beginning of this treatise with regard to the origin of 

 Man. For we there saw that, while we have the most cogent 

 historical proof of the principles of evolution having governed 

 the progress of civilization, we have no such direct proof of 

 the descent of man from a brutal ancestry. And here likewise 

 we find that, so long as the light of philology is able to guide 

 us, there can be no doubt that the principles of evolution 

 have determined the gradual development of languages, in a 

 manner strictly analogous to that in which they have deter- 

 mined the ever-increasing refinement and complexity of 

 social organizations. Now, in the latter case we saw that 

 such direct evidence of evolution from lower to higher levels 

 of culture renders it well-nigh certain that the method must 

 have extended backwards beyond the historical period ; and 

 hence that such direct evidence of evolution uniformly per- 

 vading the historical period in itself furnishes a strong prima 

 facie presumption that this period was itself reached by means 

 of a similarly gradual development of human faculty. And 

 thus, also, it is in the case of language. If philology is able 

 to prove the fact of evolution in all known languages as far 

 back as the primitive roots out of which they have severall\- 

 grown, the presumption becomes exceedingly strong that 

 these earliest and simplest elements, like their later and 

 more complex products, were the result of a natural growth. 

 Or, in the words already quoted from Geiger, we cannot 

 forbear concluding that language must once have had no 

 existence at all. Nevertheless, it is important to distinguish 

 between demonstrated fact and speculative inference, however 

 strong ; and, therefore, I began by stating the stages of 

 evolution through which languages are now known to have 



