It is agreed that in the entire structure of these languages a metaphorical character is displayed; even such words as the names for “The Sun,” &c. are for the most part metaphorical or descriptive.
The truth and extensive application of the principle under discussion will be best understood by a perusal of Appendix A, which contains ample illustrations of the rule that while the conventional significations of words are preserved in one Language, the same words commonly occur in others in kindred metaphorical meanings. In this place, however, may be appropriately introduced one illustration derived from the various Sanscrit words for the Sun. These words, which are all considered to be descriptive or metaphorical, have obviously formed the source of the following Conventional Terms for that Luminary, which occur in Indo-Germanic languages of more modern form:
Different Words for the Sun in Sanscrit, and their distribution in other Indo-Germanic Languages.
| Sanscrit. | Persian. | Greek. | Latin. | German and English. | Welsh. |
| Hailih | Sol. (S. Hail-ih.) | Hail. | |||
| Hail-is | He-elios. | ||||
| Sura | Ser-en, A Star. | ||||
| Sunu | Sun, Sonne. | ||||
| Mihira | Mihira. |
Section II.
Second Source of Synonymes. Imitative Origin of the Elements of Human Language. Imitative Character of Ancient Languages. Imitative Origin of Language consistent with the Unity of the Human Race. Supported by Analogy. Adam Smith's Opinion that the first Elements of Language were Nouns, considered. Progress of Language in Infancy. Illustration, from Campbell's Hohenlinden, of the Influence of the Imitative Faculty on the Imagination. Progressive Growth of Language. Important Exception to the Principle of the Imitative Origin of Language. Origin of the Harsh and Open Sounds of Ancient Languages.
In its infancy, Language was metaphorical, but it was directly Imitative of surrounding objects at its birth! Hence, as will now be explained, another source of the synonymes in which Human Tongues abound!
Did man derive his language from the direct instruction of his Creator, or from the natural exercise of those faculties with which he has been endowed? For the former opinion no argument, either Scriptural or Philosophical, has ever been advanced. In favour of the latter, proofs deducible from Language, Analogy, and the actual features of the Human Mind, conspire.
In the Hebrew, and other ancient languages, Man's first imitative efforts are distinctly traceable,[88] and as we ascend from modern to earlier eras in the history of Human Tongues, and extend our comparison by including within its range a greater number of kindred dialects, we shall find—not only the features of a descriptive or metaphorical character, as [pg 100] already noticed—but also the vestiges of an imitative origin progressively increase. Thus, for example, the English words for two common birds, the “Owl” and the “Crow,” have no other effect on the ear than that of mere arbitrary or conventional terms; they have been too much abbreviated any longer to suggest distinctly the source from which they have sprung. But in the Swedish “Ul-u-la,” and the Sanscrit “Ul-u-ka,” the reiterated screams of “the bird of night” are plainly mimicked, as is the harsh guttural croak of the crow in the German “Krähe!”