[266] Hist. des Langues Sém. 490, 491. Whenever passages are in semi-inverted commas, it will be understood that they are almost directly translated from the author referred to.
[267] The accounts of various missionaries among the New Zealanders, American Indians, and aboriginal Australians, give a strange and mournful confirmation of these assertions.
[268] That there is more probability in favour of English becoming prevalent throughout the globe, than in favour of any other language acquiring a future universality, is admitted by all who have studied the subject. See Benloew, Aperçu Général, p. 92. Grimm, Ueber der Ursprung, p. 50. Russian is another language which probably has a great future.
[269] Benloew, Aperçu Général, p. 91.
[270] Aids to Reflection, p. 1.
[271] Mill’s Logic, ii. 221.
[272] These thoughts are admirably developed in a beautiful Essay on the Abstract Idea of the New Testament, by Mr. Jowett (ii. 90). See, too, W. von Humboldt’s tract Ueber d. Entstehen d. grammat. Formen und ihren Einfluss auf die Ideenentwickelung, as well as the chapter Ueber die Verschiedenheit des Menschlichen Sprachbaues, which forms the introduction to the treatise on the Kawi language.
[273] “Q. Ennius tria corda se habere dicebat, quod loqui Græce et Latine et Osce sciret.”—A. Gell.
[274] Rückert.
[275] “Il disoit et répétoit souvent, quand il tomboit sur la beauté des langues, ... qu’autant de langues que l’homme sçait parler, autant de fois est il homme.”—Brantôme.