Let it be observed, in the first place, that there is no antagonism between the two hypotheses in question—the latter, indeed, being merely an extension of the former. For the latter adopts all Mr. Darwin’s views as to the importance of instinctive cries, danger-signals, &c., for the higher development of sign-making in that “ape-like animal” which was the brutal progenitor of Homo alalus.[323] Moreover, our hypothesis is entitled to assume, with Mr. Darwin’s, that this anthropoid ape was presumably not only more intelligent than any of the few surviving species, but also much more social. And this is an important point to insist upon, because it is obvious that the conditions of social life are also the prime conditions to any considerable advance upon the sign-making faculty as this occurs in existing apes. The only respect, therefore, in which the two hypotheses differ is in the one supposing that the faculty of articulate sign-making was a much later product of evolution than it is taken to have been by the other. That is to say, while Mr. Darwin’s hypothesis regards the commencement of articulation as a necessary condition to any considerable advance upon the receptual intelligence of our brutal ancestry, the present hypothesis regards it as more probable that this receptual intelligence was largely developed by gesture and vocal signs, before the latter can be said to have become properly articulate—the result being that a creature rather more human than “ape-like” was evolved, who, nevertheless, was still able to communicate with his fellows only by means of gesture-signs and vocal tones.
My reasons for regarding this hypothesis as more probable than the other are these.
First of all, on grounds of psychology, I see no reason to doubt that the receptual intelligence of an already intelligent and highly social species of anthropoid ape would admit of considerable advance upon that of any existing species without the aid of articulation—social habits making all the difference as to the development of sign-making with its consequent reaction upon mental development. Next, for these early stages of advance, I do not see that articulate sign-making would have conferred any considerable advantage over a further development of the more natural systems. For, so long as the only co-operation required had reference to comparatively simple actions, the language of tone and gesture would have admitted of sufficient development to have met all requirements. Lastly, if we take the growing child as an index of psychogenesis in the race, there can be no doubt that it points to a comparatively late origin of the faculty of articulation. Remembering the general tendency of ontogenesis to foreshorten the history of phylogenesis, it is, I think, most suggestive that—notwithstanding its readiness to imitate, and notwithstanding its being surrounded by spoken language—the infant does not begin to use articulate signs until long after it has been able to express many of its receptual ideas in the language of tone and gesture. It will be remembered that I have already laid stress upon the astonishing degree of elaboration which this form of language undergoes in the case of children who are late in beginning to speak (see pp. 220). And although it might be scarcely justifiable to take these cases as possibly representative of the semiotic language of Homo alalus (seeing that the child of to-day inherits the cerebrum of Homo sapiens); still I think it is no less certain that we should err on the opposite side, if we were to take the case of a child who is precocious in the matter of speech as a fair index of the grade of mental evolution at the time when articulation first began in the race (seeing that the history of the latter is probably foreshortened in that of the former). Yet, even if we were to do this, for the sake of argument, the result would still be most strongly to indicate that long before our remote ancestors were able to use articulate speech, they were immeasurably in advance of all existing brutes in their semiotic use of tone and gesture. For even a precocious child does not begin to make any considerable use of words as signs until it is well on into its second year, while usually this stage is not reached until the third. And, at whatever age it is reached, the general intelligence of the child is not only much in advance of that of any existing brute, but the direction in which this advance is most conspicuous is just the direction where, in the present connection, it is most suggestive—namely, in that of natural sign-making by tone and gesture.
In view, then, of these several considerations, I am disposed to think that the progress of mental evolution from the brute to the man most probably took place by some such stages as the following.
Starting from the highly intelligent and social species of anthropoid ape as pictured by Darwin, we can imagine that this animal was accustomed to use its voice freely for the expression of its emotions, uttering of danger-signals, and singing.[324] Possibly enough, also, it may have been sufficiently intelligent to use a few imitative sounds in the arbitrary way that Mr. Darwin suggests; and certainly sooner or later the receptual life of this social animal must have advanced far enough to have become comparable with that of an infant at about two years of age. That is to say, this animal, although not yet having begun to use articulate signs, must have advanced far enough in the conventional use of natural signs (or signs with a natural origin in tone and gesture, whether spontaneous only or intentionally imitative), to have admitted of a tolerably free exchange of receptual ideas, such as would be concerned in animal wants, and even, perhaps, in the simplest forms of co-operative action.[325] Next, I think it probable that the advance of receptual intelligence which would have been occasioned by this advance in sign-making, would in turn have led to a further development of the latter—the two thus acting and re-acting on one another, until the language of tone and gesture became gradually raised to the level of imperfect pantomime, as in children before they begin to use words. At this stage, however, or even before it, I think very probably vowel-sounds must have been employed in tone-language, if not also a few of the consonants. And I think this not only on account of the analogy furnished by an infant already alluded to, but also because in the case of a “singing” animal, intelligent enough to be constantly using its voice for semiotic purposes, and therefore employing a variety of more or less conventional tones, including clicks, it seems almost necessary that some of the vowel sounds—and possibly also some of the consonants—should have been brought into use. But, be this as it may, eventually the action and reaction of receptual intelligence and conventional sign-making must have ended in so far developing the former as to have admitted of the breaking up (or articulation) of vocal sounds, as the only direction in which any further improvement of vocal sign-making was possible. I think it not improbable that this important stage in the development of speech was greatly assisted by the already-existing habit of articulating musical notes, supposing our progenitors to have resembled the gibbons or the chimpanzees in this respect. But long after this first rude beginning of articulate speech, the language of tone and gesture would have continued as much the most important machinery of communication: the half-human creature now before our imagination would probably have struck us as a wonderful adept at making significant sounds and movements both as to number and variety; but in all probability we should scarcely have been able to notice the already-developing germ of articulation. Nor do I believe that, if we were able to strike in again upon the history thousands of years later, we should find that pantomime had been superseded by speech. On the contrary, I believe we should find that although considerable progress had been made in the former, so that the object then before us might appear deserving of being classed as Homo, we should also feel that he must needs still be distinguished by the addition alalus. Lastly, I believe that this most interesting creature probably lived for an inconceivably long time before his faculty of articulate sign-making had developed sufficiently far to begin to starve out the more primitive and more natural systems; and I believe that, even after this starving-out process did begin, another inconceivable lapse of time must have been required for such progress to have eventually transformed Homo alalus into Homo sapiens.
It is now time to consider a branch of this hypothesis which has been suggested by the philologist Professor Noiré, to which allusion has already been made in an earlier chapter.[326]
Before Mr. Darwin had published his views, Professor Noiré had elaborated a theory of the origin of speech which was substantially the same as that which I have already quoted from the Descent of Man.[327] The only difference between the two was that, while Darwin referred the origin of articulate speech from instinctive cries, &c., to the anthropoid apes, Noiré referred it to a being already human. In other words, Noiré adopted what I have here called the third hypothesis, which assumes a speechless form of man as anterior to the existing form.[328] But, as a result of further deliberation, Noiré came to the conclusion that “the objects of fear and trembling and dismay are even now the least appropriate to enter into the pure, clear, and tranquil sphere of speech-thought, or to supply the first germs of it.” Accordingly, he discarded the view that these germs were to be sought in instinctive cries and danger calls, in favour of the hypothesis that articulation had its origin in sounds which are made by bodies of men when engaged in common occupations. Having already explained the elements of this Yo-he-ho theory, it will here be enough to repeat that I think there is probably some measure of truth in it; although I likewise think it self-evident that this cannot have been the only source of aboriginal speech. In what proportion this branch of onomatopœia was concerned in the genesis of aboriginal words—supposing it to have been concerned at all—we have now no means of even conjecturing. But seeing that there are so many other sources of onomatopœia supplied by Nature, and that these other sources are so apparent in all existing languages, while the one suggested by Noiré has not left a record of its occurrence in any language,—seeing these things, I conclude, as before stated, that at best the Yo-he-ho principle can be accredited with but a small proportional part in the aboriginal genesis of language.[329] Therefore, with respect to this hypothesis I have only three remarks to make: (1) that it is plainly but a special branch of the general onomatopoetic theory; (2) that, as such, it not improbably presents some measure of truth; and (3) that, consequently, it ought to be regarded—not as it is regarded by its author Noiré and its advocate Max Müller, namely, as the sole explanation of the origin of speech, but—as representing only one among many other ways in which, during many ages, many communities of vociferous though hitherto speechless men may have slowly evolved the art of making articulate signs.
Probably it will be objected to this third hypothesis, in all its branches, that it amounts to a petetio principii: Homo alalus, it may be said, is Homo postulatus. To this I answer, Not so. The question raised has been raised expressly and exclusively on the faculty of conceptual speech, and it is conceded that of this faculty there can have been no earlier phase than that of articulation. Consequently, if my opponents assume that prior to the appearance of this earliest phase it is impossible that any hitherto speechless animal should have been erect in attitude, intelligent enough to chip flints, or greatly in advance of other animals in the matter of making indicative gesture-signs, assisted by vocal tones,—if my opponents assume all this, it is they who are endeavouring to beg the question. For they are merely assuming, in the most arbitrary way, that the faculty of conceptual thought is necessary in order that an animal already semi-erect, should become more erect; in order that an animal already intelligent enough to use stones for cracking nuts and opening oysters, should not only (as at present) choose the most appropriate stones for the purpose, but begin to fashion them for these or other purposes; in order that an animal already more apt than any other in the use of gesture and vocal signs, should advance considerably along the same line of psychical improvement.[330] The hypothesis that such a considerable advance might have gradually taken place, up to the psychological level supposed, may or may not be true; but, at least, it does not beg the question. The question is whether the distinctively human faculty of conceptual ideation differs in kind or in degree from the lower faculty of receptual ideation; and my present suggestion amounts to nothing more than a supposition that receptual ideation may have been developed in the animal kingdom to some such level as it reaches in a child who is late in beginning to speak.[331] If any opponent should object to this suggestion on the score of its appearing to beg the question, he must remember that this question only arises—in accordance with his own argument—at the place where the faculty of sign-making ministers to that of introspective thought. The question as to how far the lower faculties of mind admit of being developed apart from (or, as I believe, antecedent to) the occurrence of introspective thought, is obviously quite a distinct question. And it is a question that can only be answered by observation. Now, I have already shown that in the case of intelligent animals—and still more in that of a growing child—the faculties of receptual ideation do admit of being wrought up to an astonishing degree of adaptive efficiency, without the possibility of their having been in any way indebted to the distinctively human faculty of conceptual thought.
On the whole, then, it seems to me probable, on grounds of psychology alone, that the developmental history of intelligence in our race so far resembled this history in the growing child that, prior to the advent of speech, receptual ideation had attained a much higher level of perfection than it now presents in any animal—so much so, indeed, that the adult creature presenting it might well have merited the name of Homo alalus. And, as we shall see in my next volume, this inference on psychological grounds is corroborated by certain inferences which may reasonably be drawn from some other classes of facts. But in now for the present taking leave of this question, I desire again to repeat, that it has nothing to do with my main argument. For it makes no essential difference to my case whether the faculty of speech was early or late in making its first appearance. Under either alternative, so soon as the denotative stage of articulation had been reached by our progenitors in the way already sketched on its psychological side, the next stage would have consisted in an extension of denotative signs into connotative signs. As we have now seen, by a large accumulation of evidence, this extension of denotative into connotative signs is rendered inevitable through the principle of sensuous association. In other words, I have adduced what can only be deemed a superabundance of facts to prove that, in the first-talking child and even in the parrot, originally denotative names of particular objects are spontaneously extended to other objects sensuously perceived to be like in kind. And no less superabundantly have I proved that this process of connotative extension is antecedent to the rise of conceptual thought, and, therefore, to that of true denomination. The limits to which such purely receptual connotation may extend, I have shown to be determined by the degree of development which has been reached by the faculties of purely receptual apprehension. In the parrot this degree of development is but low; in the dog and monkey considerably higher (though, unfortunately, these animals are not able to give any articulate expression to their receptual apprehensions); in the child of two years it is higher still. But, as before shown, no antagonist can afford to allege that in any of these cases there is a difference of kind between the mental faculties that are respectively involved; because his argument on psychological grounds can only stand upon the basis of conceptual cognition, which, in turn, can only stand upon the basis of self-consciousness; and this is demonstrably absent in the child until long after the time when denotative names are connotatively extended by the receptual intelligence of the child itself.
Thus, there can be no reasonable question that it is psychologically possible for Homo sapiens to have had an ancestry, which—whether already partly human or still simian—was able to carry denotation to a high level of connotation, without the need of cognition belonging to the order conceptual. Whether the signs were then made by tone and gesture alone, or likewise by articulate sounds, is also, psychologically considered, immaterial. In either case connotation would have followed denotation up to whatever point the higher receptual (“pre-conceptual”) intelligence of such an ancestry was able to take cognizance of simple analogies. And this psychological possibility becomes on other grounds a probability of the highest order, so soon as we know of any independent evidence touching the corporeal evolution of man from a simian ancestry.