148 
Omphalos : An Attempt to Untie the Geological Knot By Philip Henry 
Gosse, Esq., F.R.S., Vice-President V.I. From the Author. 
Man: Mis true Nature and Ministry. From the French of De Saint- 
Martin. Translated by E. B. Penney, Esq., M. V L From the Translator. 
Theosophic Correspondence of St. Martin and the Baron de Liebestorf. 
From the same. 
The Conformation of the Material by the Spiritual , and Holiness of Beauty. 
By W. Cave Thomas, Esq., M.V.I. From the Author. 
The Biblical Antiquity of Man ; or, Man not older than the A damic Creation. 
By the Rev. S. Lucas, F.G.S. From Alexander McArthur, Esq. , M. V.I. 
The Rev. Dr. Thornton then read the following Paper : 
. ON COMPARATIVE PHILOLOGY , WITH REFERENCE 
TO THE THEORIES OF MAN’S ORIGIN . By the 
Eey. Robinson Thornton, D.D., Head Master of Epsom 
College. 
I T may seem presumptuous to commence my task with a 
criticism of a term which is universally employed by 
scholars ; but I cannot help expressing some regret at the 
title I am compelled to use. The word philology is, to my 
mind, inexpressive, and therefore unfortunate. According to 
analogy, it must signify (< the science of friends,” not “ the 
science of humam speech.” Nor, if we look to the ordinary 
classical meaning of the Greek, shall we find it more appro- 
priate. The word (f)iXo\oyog is used by Plato to signify f fond 
of learned discussion;” Isocrates employs <pi\o\oyla in the 
abstract sense of fondness for such discussion ; while m 
Plutarch and Athenseus the word sometimes means ^talka- 
tive,” sometimes fond of historical and scholastic pursuits ” 
—in short, what we should express by “ a literary man.” The 
ancient Greeks, with whom it was not common to know any 
language but their own — who seem to have been, in fact, 
slaves to their own rich and varied tongue — had no idea of 
a science of speech. Cratylus is by no means an anticipator 
of Rask and Bopp, of Grimm and Muller. The science is one 
of modem days : it is not a century old. Linguists there 
may have been, like Charles V., or Mithridates, who could 
converse with most of their subjects in their own tongue ; 
linguists like Hickes, who drew up regular grammars, in 
