6 Harry K. Wolfe, 



names. Not only are comparatively few sensations provided 

 with names, but the distribution of these names is not in pro- 

 portion to the delicacy of sense-discrimination. The sense of 

 tone is, perhaps, even finer than that of color, yet it has not 

 nearly as many terms in common use. The relation between 

 the vocabularies of sight and hearing is peculiar. In sound 

 there are few words for absolute pitch or intensity ; but there 

 is an exact method of comparing and determining sensations 

 with very slight variations. Though the nomenclature of 

 music is technical, it is extensive and definite. More names 

 for color than for sound are in general use ; yet these are not 

 so well determined, and to different people represent differ- 

 ent ideas. Even the methods of science are insufficient to 

 determine with satisfactory accuracy a criterion and scale in 

 color. Sounds differ in intensity, purity, and quality; and 

 colors have no other modes of variations. Sound forms a 

 continuous scale in all these particulars ; and color has pre- 

 cisely the same characteristics. The distinctness of the one 

 and the vagueness of the other are, nevertheless, clear to all 

 observers. This may depend upon the predominating influ- 

 ence of the rate of vibration which, in sound, is perhaps more 

 directly apprehended, as well as objectively more easily deter- 

 mined. The larger number of common names for color than 

 for sound may be owing to the demand ; the greater accuracy 

 of the terms denoting sounds may depend upon the relative 

 simplicity of auditory sensations. 



In the growth of vocabularies there appears to be a ten- 

 dency to unite individual names into groups designated by 

 class-words, and these into still higher groups. In these 

 larger divisions there is a tendency to s|Decialize by limiting 

 the class-words. If the first names denoted individuals, it 

 is evident that the generalizing tendency began very early. 

 This progress towards the more general was accompanied by 

 a process of degeneralization approaching individualization, 

 which was carried forward not merely by means of new words, 

 but also by limiting the extension of the general term. 



If we seek the conditions fixing the extent and accuracy of 



210 



