[227] Sayce, Introduction, &c., i. 121.
[228] Science of Thought, p. 242.
[229] Garnett, Philolo. Essays, p. 87.
[230] Ibid., 77, 78.
[231] Farrar, Origin of Language, p. 99. The passage continues, “We might have conjectured this from the fact already noticed, that children learn to speak of themselves in the third person—i.e. regard themselves as objects—long before they acquire the power of representing their material selves as the instrument of an abstract entity.” He also alludes to “some admirable remarks to this effect in Mr. F. Whalley Harper’s excellent book on the Power of Greek Tenses;” and recurs to the subject in his more recently published Chapters on Language, p. 62. I could quote other authorities who have commented upon this philological peculiarity of early pronouns; but will only add the following in order to show how the peculiarity in question may continue to survive even in languages still spoken. “The Malay ulun, ‘I,’ is still ‘a man’ in Lampong, and the Kawi ugwang, ‘I,’ cannot be separated from nwang, ‘a man’” (Sayce, Introduction, ii. 26). Lastly, Wundt has pointed out that this impersonal form of speech is distinctive, not only of early pronominal elements, but also of early forms of predication. For instance, “Die ersten Urtheile, die in das Bewusstsein hereinbrechen, subjektlose Urtheile sind, und dass die Prädikate derselben stets eine sinnliche Vorstellung ausdrücken. ‘Es leuchtet es glänzt, es tönt,’—solcher Art sind die Urtheile, die der Mensch zuerst denkt und zuerst ausspricht. Jenes Prädikat, dass sogleich bei der Wahrnehmung eines Gegenstandes sich aufdrängt, wird zur Bezeichnung des Gegenstandes selber. ‘Das Leuchtende, Glänzende, Tönende,’—solcher Art find die Wörter, die ursprünglich in der Sprache gebildet werden” (loc. cit., ii. 377).
[232] Science of Thought, p. 221.
[233] Ibid., p. 554.
[234] Ibid., 241.
[235] Sayce, Introduction, &c., ii. 25; see also to the same effect, Bleek, Ursprung der Sprache, 70-72; F. Müller, Grundriss der Sprachwissenshaft, I., i., s. 40; and Noiré, Logos, p. 186. The chief ground of this scepticism is that it is difficult to conceive how a word could ever have gained a footing if it did not from the first present some independent predicative meaning. But it seems to me that the force of this objection is removed if we remember the sounds which are arbitrarily invented by young children and uneducated deaf-mutes, not to mention the inarticulate clicks of the Bushmen. Moreover, there is nothing inimical to the pronominal theory in the supposition that pronominal elements, even of the most aboriginal kind, were survivals of still more primitive sentence-words—a supposition which would of course remove the difficulty in question. But, as explained in the text, this difficulty, even if it could not be thus met, would really not be one of any importance to my exposition.
[236] Introduction, &c., i. 117.