THE SCIENCES OF LANGUAGE AND OF ETHNOGRAPHY. 121 
nominal Christian. Science and religion, according to a 
Muhammedan saying, are twins, and if I understand the 
object of this Society, it is in order to make this twinship (if 
I may be allowed to use the expression) more real that your 
labours have been initiated, and that, under Providence, 
they have been carried to the successful results that have 
followed them both here and abroad. 
The CHarrMan (David Howard, Hsq., ¥.C.S.).—Dr. Leitner has 
given us a most interesting discourse, interesting not only in what he 
has placed before us, but also in his suggestions of what we should 
like to hear. I believe the principle that he has laid down of the 
importance of not merely studying a language, but of studying it in 
connexion with the modes of thought, habits, and life, and so forth, 
of the people, is of primary importance. You find people trying to 
understand Eastern literature in the light of Western thought, and 
importing generic terms and tenses into a language which has no 
tenses at all,and so on. I believe the principle of Dr. Leitner’s 
subject is of vital importance, and the glimpses he has given us 
of strange people and languages throw an interesting light on a 
mysterious problem, upon which I trust we shall hear a good deal 
more, from the learned author, than we have yetheard. Dr. Leitner 
is obliged to hurry away, and I am sure, on your behalf, | may 
convey to him your hearty thanks for having come here at no 
little inconvenience to himself to give us this most interesting 
address. ; 
The meeting was then adjourned. 
ee SS EL WS te hed 
REMARKS. 
Dr. Cuarrin writes as follows: ‘“ Dr. Leitner’s remarks upon what 
he called. ‘sympathy’ in investigating the speech of a little-known 
people seemed to me just and valuable. Doubtless, a consideration 
of the physical conditions, history, and habits of thought of a people 
is most important to the understanding and explaining idioms and 
forms of speech. When a Spanish Jewess, for instance, in reply to 
a polite inquiry after her well-being, says ‘sus enemigos,’—‘ your 
enemies,’ her meaning is not clear until we remember that she is 
accustomed to think and speak in an Oriental way, and unconsciously 
