52 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



are modified for mode, tense, number, and person, contain 

 adverbial and connective elements. 



In like manner many of the lexical elements of the Eng- 

 lish language contain more than one part of speech : " To 

 ascend " is to go up ; " " to descend " is to go down ; and " to 

 depart " is to go from. 



Thus it is seen that the English language is also synthetic 

 in that its parts of speech are not completely differentiated. 

 The English, then, differs in this respect from an Indian 

 language only in degree. 



In most Indian tongues no pure predicant has been differ- 

 entiated, but in some the verb to be, or predicant, has been 

 slightly developed,' chiefly to affirm existence in a place. 



It will thus be seen that by the criterion of organization 

 Indian tongues are of very low grade. 



It need but to be affirmed that by the criterion of semato- 

 logic content Indian languages are of a very low grade. 

 Therefore, the frequently-expressed opinion that the lan- 

 guages of barbaric peoples have a more highly organized 

 grammatic structure than the languages of civilized peoples 

 has its complete refutation. 



It is worthy of remark that all paradigmatic inflection 

 in a civilized tongue is a relic of its barbaric condition. 

 When the parts of speech are fully differentiated and the 

 process of placement fully specialized, so that the order of 

 words in sentences has its full significance, no useful pur- 

 pose is subserved by inflection. 



Economy in speech is the force by which its development 

 has been accomplished, and it divides itself properly into 

 economy of utterance and economy of thought. Economy 

 of utterance has had to do with the phonic constitution of 

 words ; economy of thought has developed the sentence. 



All paradigmatic inflection requires unnecessary thought. 

 In the clause " if he was here," " if" fully expresses the sub- 

 junctive condition, and it is quite unnecessary to express it 

 a second time by using another form of the verb " to be.' 

 And so the people who are using the English language are 



