The Line or Cord is the instrument of measuring, and as such is again the type of Science, as the Ball or Globe is the type of Nature; the Line, the type of strictness, straightness, stretchedness, exactness; and the lump or aggregative form, that of Freedom from Constraint, Solution, as of the water-drop, and of Absolute-ness (ab, from, and solvere, to free). The Relative repeats The Abstract; and The Absolute, in Philosophy, repeats The Concrete. The Relative has for its type Two, or di-termination (dis or di, Two, and termini, ends); and the Absolute has for its type One, [Greek: to hen] of the Greeks. Existence, embodying The Absolute and The Relative; the one and the two; has for its type Three; and the all-sided aspect of Universal Being which distinguishes and yet combines these three aspects of Being, is Tri-Unity, or the Three in One.
The Trinism, or third story of ascension in the constitution of things, again divides into Two Branches, the first of which accords with Duism (music, line, science, mind, man), and the second with Unism (oral speech, globe, nature, world).
In respect to Language, the division here made distributes Song (as the higher type, including all music) into two great departments; as, 1. Composition, and 2. Performance, or the Songas a Thing, and Singing as an Act. Song as a whole is the analogue in language of the totality of Human Achievement, in the distribution of the total Universe, as shown above. The same division applied here distinguishes the permanent product of human activity, the book or the statue, from the performance of man—the action of the author or sculptor. It is the distinction of the Latins between 1. Res, and 2. Res gestæ.
Dismissing for the present the higher domain of Language, which is Song, we reduce the scope of investigation to the lower and middle divisions, namely: 1. To Oral Speech, and 2. To Music; and, in the distribution of the Universe at large, to the corresponding lower and middle divisions, namely: 1. The World (Nature), and 2. Man (Mind).
Oral Speech, the Nature-department of language, separates, grammatically, into two grand Subdivisions, as follows: 1. Analysis, The Elements of Language, namely, The Alphabetic and Syllabic distribution of Language, culminating in Word-Building;—The Word in Language being The Individual in that Domain; and, 2. Synthesis, Construction, the Grammatical Domain proper, including the Parts of Speech and their Syntax, or their putting together in a Structure or Lingual Construction.
The first of these is the Domain of the Elementality of Language, and corresponds with and illustrates what Kant denominates Quality; as the name of one of the groups of three in his table of the twelve Categories of the Understanding. This group of Quality includes 1. Affirmation; 2. Negation; and 3. Limitation. By Affirmation is meant the Positive Element or Factor of Being; by Negation, the Negative Element; and by Limitation is meant the Articulation, that is to say, the jointing or joining of the Positive and Negative Elements, in a seam or ridge, which is the existential reality, arising from the positive (quasi-negative) and the negative grounds of Being.
The Positive Element or Factor of Oral Speech, the Absolute Reality or 'Affirmation' of Language, is Vocal Utterance, or, specifically, the kind of Sound called Vowel.
The Negative Element or Factor of Oral Speech, the 'Negation' of Kant, as illustrated in the Speech Domain, is Silence; the Silences or Intervals of Rest which intervene between Sounds (and, by repetition, between Syllables, Words, Sentences, and the still larger divisions of Speech).
The Limitational Element of Oral Speech is Consonantism, or, specifically, the Consonant Sounds, which for that reason are otherwise denominated Articulations, or jointings; as they are the breaks of the otherwise continuous vocal utterance of Vowel Sound, and, at the same time, the joinings between the fragments of Vowel Sound, namely, the Vowels, and the surrounding and intervening medium of Silence. The Consonants thus become, in a sense, the Bony Structure, or Skeleton of Speech, the most prominent part, that which furnishes the fossil remains of Language, which are investigated by the Comparative Philologists.
Sound, the Positive Element or Factor, the Affirmation, the Eternal Yea, the Absolute Reality, is the Something of Speech.