This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1855. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER IV. THE FORM OF SPEECH. 1. A Definition having been given of the matter of speech, the next point is to elucidate its form. Of this also the general principle was stated in the same place, as the operation of the rational faculty, or that part of the mind which apprehends the relations of ideas, upon the raw material of significant sound, that is, a vocabulary of informal terms speaking only to the imagination. Such operation of the understanding of course must find adequate expression. And so we find in the structure of language a two-fold element interspersed. Every grammatical word, in short, or perfect part of speech in its full constituent development, is a compound of two particles at the least, of which the one is the sign of a bare idea, the other is definitive of its grammatical properties. The one is an objective element, and expresses the subject-matter upon which the understanding is employed; the other is wholly subjective, and heterogeneous, and expresses a conception of the mind in relation to it. The aggregate of the one is the whole expressed matter, the other the whole expressed form of every sentence. I believe I may call this a discovery, for I have never met with it elsewhere"; while I see on the contrary that the want of this adjusting principle has occasioned a parallax in the observations of greater minds than I choose to mention as in error in their speculations upon this subject; all of whom, as far as I am aware, both ancient and modern, at least in respect of the philosophy of the subject, have regarded such compound processes as speaketh and learning as the ultimate particles of speech, and the signs of a simple conception; and they have constructed their systems of the philosophy of speech upon that mistaken foundatio...

ISBN-13: 9781150004209 ISBN-10: 1150004207 Publisher: General Books Publish Date: February 2012 Page Count: 54 Related Categories Books > History > General