6 PROF. BLACKIE ON THE PRINCIPLE OF ONOMATOPOEIA IN LANGUAGE. 



intensity of their energy. The second fact is, that between sounds and certain 

 feelings and ideas, not accompanied by any sound, there are certain strong analo- 

 gies, such as that which the blind man indicated, when he said that he thought 

 scarlet colour was like the sound of a trumpet ; and these analogies, taken advan- 

 tage of by the dexterous and economic framers of language, would necessarily 

 lead to the designation of a number of ideas expressive of noiseless vision or 

 touch, by words possessing some vocal and audible analogy. The third fact is, 

 that all external impressions made upon our senses, which, if not the cause, are 

 certainly one of the necessary factors of all human knowledge, are never expressed 

 without the production of certain pleasant or unpleasant feelings, and certain 

 affection of the nervous system, on which the utterance of articulate sound de- 

 pends ; and as effects always correspond to causes, it cannot but be that the vocal 

 utterance from within educed by any strong impression from without, shall in 

 some way or other represent the character of the source from which it sprang. 

 Let us examine these three facts separately, and see to what classes of results 

 in the formation of language they unavoidably lead. Take the word Kill to be- 

 gin with. You ask what connection is there between the sound of this word and 

 the action signified ? I reply, that I do not know, because there are many 

 words in all languages, derivative both in meaning and form, whose original type 

 is not now recoverable ; but there is another English word, slay, signifying the 

 same thing, the original form of which is the German word, schlagen, to strike, 

 and here I distinctly see a phonic congruity between the rough action signified, 

 and the rough word Schlag, by which it is expressed. The act of striking is 

 generally accompanied by a hard, sharp noise; and so, hard, sharp syllables, 

 as in the English words, knock, rap, are used to express that act. Or take the 

 Sanscrit root mar, of which Muller has made so much, and who does not see 

 that it expresses something rude and harsh, as much as the English word crush, 

 and the French word ecraser? In the same way the root ar, signifying to 

 plough, and which appears in the Hebrew pN the earth, as well as in the Greek 

 adverb %«£*, is evidently a phonetic expression of the rough sound of earth or 

 gravel when stirred, containing a combination of letters which, when inverted, 

 appears in gravel, grain, yt>u<pu, scratch, -xucdeeu. 



In the same way, actions accompanied by slender soft sounds are expressed by 

 weak vowels, as to creep, to sneak, and to slink. Is it not also plain, that 

 whether we take the Greek xxiima or the English steal, we find that these words 

 are so formed as to present a dramatic contrast to d^dfy and rob, which signify 

 the same kind of abstraction, accompanied with violence and noise ? And if you 

 say that the Latin fur does not express anything of this kind, I thank you for the 

 observation, and reply that the Greek verb p«^«, from which fur is derived, does 

 not originally imply the silent stealthiness of felonious appropriation, but rather 

 the sudden, rude act, by which a thief is apprehended. Contrast with these 



