480 TraTisactions, — Miscellaneous. 



appearance ;' where he leaves out the green, or, at all events, does not 

 clearly define it. In the Edda, too, the rainbow is explained to be a tri- 

 coloured bridge. 



" Democritus and the Pythagoreans assumed four fundamental colours, 

 black, white, red, and yelloiv, a conception which for a long time obtained in 

 antiquity. Nay, ancient writers (Cicero, Phny, and Quintilian) state it as 

 a positive fact that the Greek painters, down to the time of Alexander, 

 employed only those four colours. * * * The Chinese have since olden 

 • times assumed five colours, viz., green in addition to the foregoing." — 

 (Gieger, loc. cit.) 



And so Max Miiller. — " There is hardly a book now in which we do not 

 read of the blue sky. But in the ancient hymns of the Veda, so full of the 

 dawn, the sun, and the sky, the blue sky is never mentioned; in the Zenda- 

 vesta the blue sky is never mentioned ; in Homer the blue sky is never 

 mentioned ; in the Old and even in the New Testament the blue sky is 

 never mentioned. It has been asked whether we should recognize in this 

 a physiological development of our senses, or a gradual increase of words 

 capable of expressing finer distinctions of light. No one is likely 'to contend 

 that the irritations of our organs of sense, which produce sensation, as dis- 

 tinguished from perception, were different thousands of years ago from what 

 they are now. They are the same for all men, the same even for certain 

 animals, for we know that there are insects which react very strongly against 

 differences of colour. * * * Democritus knew of four colours, viz., black 

 and white, which he treated as colours, red and yellow. Are ive to say that 

 he did not see the blue of the sky because he never called it bhie, but either dark or 

 bright? * * * In common Arabic, as Palgrave tells us, the names of 

 green, black, and brown, are constantly confounded to the present day. It 

 is well known that among savage nations we seldom find distinct words for 

 blue and black ; but we shall find the same indefiniteness of expression 

 when we inquire into the antecedents of our own language. Though blue 

 now does no longer mean black, we see in such expressions as ' to beat 

 black and blue ' the closeness of the two colours. * * * As languages 

 advance, more and more distinctions are introduced, but the variety of 

 colours always stands before us as a real infinite. * * As no conception 

 is possible without a name, I shall probably be asked to produce from the 

 dictionaries of Veddas and Papuas any word to express the infinite ; and 

 the absence of such a word, even among more highly civilized races, will be 

 considered a sufficient answer to my theory. Let me, therefore, say once 

 more that I entirely reject such an opinion. * * * The infinite was 

 present from the very beginning in all finite perceptions, just as the blue 

 colour was, though we find no name for it in the dictionaries of Veddas and 



