OF LANGUAGES. 



29 



these two branches are well studied, the results derived 

 from their investigation will coincide, and will, when joined 

 together, constitute the true basis of the science of language. 

 Were a medical man to consult the external symptoms only 

 which he perceives on his patient, and to try to mitigate or 

 heal the disease without possessing any knowledge of the 

 human body, and unaware of the origin and the seat of the 

 complaint, could he arrive at a true estimate of the nature 

 of the disease and effectually cure it ? 



So long as the external signs alone are considered the 

 proper starting-points, so long will linguistic inquiries fail 

 to reach the ultimate aim, for the offshoots are mistaken 

 for the roots, and the results are investigated instead of the 

 causes which produced them. Two points at least are 

 required to define the direction of a straight line ; at least 

 two, if not more points must be known, in order to assign 

 to a language its place and rank in the kingdom of speech. 



Having thus contended that the mental agencies at work 

 for the development of an idiom manifest themselves by the 

 manner in which they are expressed, this assertion must, in 

 order to be proved, be supported by evidence, and a search 

 be consequently instituted to ascertain whether words or 

 expressions are still extant which afford sufficient means 

 for such investigations. As the analysis of a rock or soil 

 informs us of its chemical constituents and reveals to us its 

 nature, so also will a critical examination of primitive words 

 provide us with material for a psychological classification of 

 languages. 



CHAPTER IV. 



ON THE IMPORTANCE OF TERMS OF KINSHIP. 

 It may be assumed as a fact that in those mysterious 

 days when men began first to use speech as a medium of 

 intercourse, there prevailed a certain simplicity or rather 



