LECTURE X.
ON VERBS.
A philosophical axiom. — Manner of expressing action. — Things taken for granted. — Simple facts must be known. — Must never deviate from the truth. — Every cause will have an effect. — An example of an intransitive verb. — Objects expressed or implied. — All language eliptical. — Intransitive verbs examined. — I run. — I walk. — To step. — Birds fly. — It rains. — The fire burns. — The sun shines. — To smile. — Eat and drink. — Miscellaneous examples. — Evils of false teaching. — A change is demanded. — These principles apply universally. — Their importance.
We have made some general remarks on the power, cause, and means, necessary in the production of action. We now approach nearer to the application of these principles as observed in the immediate agency and effects which precede and follow action, and as connected with the verb.
It is an axiom in philosophy which cannot be controverted, that every effect is the product of a prior cause, and that every cause will necessarily produce a corresponding effect. This fact has always existed and will forever remain unchanged. It applies universally in physical, mental, and moral science; to God or man; to angels or to atoms; in time or thro eternity. No language can be constructed which does not accord with it, for no ideas can be gained but by an observance of its manifestations in the material or spiritual universe. The manner of expressing this cause and effect may differ in different nations or by people of the same nation, but the fact remains unaltered, and so far as understood the idea is the same. In the case of the horse mentioned in a former lecture,[12] the idea was the same, but the manner of expressing it different. Let that horse walk, lay down, roll over, rise up, shake himself, rear, or stand still, all present will observe the same attitude of the horse, and will form the same ideas of his positions. Some will doubtless inquire more minutely into the cause and means by which these various actions are produced, what muscles are employed, what supports are rendered by the bones; and the whole regulated by the will of the horse, and their conclusions may be quite opposite. But this has nothing to do with the obvious fact expressed by the words above; or, more properly, it is not necessary to enter into a minute detail of these minor considerations, these secret springs of motion, in order to relate the actions of the horse. For were we to do this we should be required to go back, step by step, and find the causes still more numerous, latent, and perplexing. The pursuit of causes would lead us beyond the mere organization of the horse, his muscular energy, and voluntary action; for gravitation has no small service to perform in the accomplishment of these results; as well as other principles. Let gravitation be removed, and how could the horse lay down? He could roll over as well in the air as upon the ground. But the particular notice of these things is unnecessary in the construction of language to express the actions of the horse; for he stands as the obvious agent of the whole, and the effects are seen to follow—the horse is laid down, his body is rolled over, the fore part of it is reared up, himself is shaken, and the whole feat is produced by the direction of his master.
Allow me to recal an idea we considered in a former lecture. I said no action as such could be known distinct from the thing which acts; that action as such is not perceptible, and that all things act, according to the ability they possess. To illustrate this idea: Take a magnet and lower it down over a piece of iron, till it attracts it to itself and holds it suspended there. If you are not in possession of a magnet you can make one at your pleasure, by the following process. Lay your knife blade on a flat iron, or any hard, smooth surface; let another take the old tongs or other iron which have stood erect for a considerable length of time, and draw it upon the blade for a minute or more. A magnetic power will be conveyed from the tongs to the blade sufficient to take up a common needle. The tongs themselves may be manufactured into a most perfect magnet. Now as the knife holds the needle suspended beneath it you perceive there must be an action, a power, and cause exerted beyond our comprehension. Let the magnetic power be extracted from the blade, and the needle will drop to the floor. A common unmagnetized blade will not raise and hold a needle as this does. How those tongs come in possession of such astonishing power; by what process it is there retained; the power and means of transmission of a part of it to the knife blade, and the reason of the phenomena you now behold—an inanimate blade drawing to itself and there holding this needle suspended—will probably long remain unknown to mortals. But that such are the facts, incontestibly true, none will deny, for the evidence is before us. Now fix your attention on that needle. There is an active and acting principle in that as well as in the magnetized blade; for the blade will not attract a splinter of wood, of whalebone, or piece of glass, tho equal in size and weight. It will have no operation on them. Then it is by a sort of mutual affinity, a reciprocity of attachment, between the blade and needle, that this phenomena is produced.
To apply this illustration you have only to reverse the case—turn the knife and needle over—and see all things attracted to the earth by the law of gravitation, a principle abiding in all matter. All that renders the exhibition of the magnet curious or wonderful is that it is an uncommon condition of things, an apparent counteraction of the regular laws of nature. But we should know that the same sublime principle is constantly operating thro out universal nature. Let that be suspended, cease its active operations for a moment, and our own earth will be decomposed into particles; the sun, moon and stars will dissolve and mingle with the common dust; all creation will crumble into atoms, and one vast ocean of darkness and chaos will fill the immensity of space.
Are you then prepared to deny the principles for which we are contending? I think you will not; but accede the ground, that such being the fact, true in nature, language, correctly explained, is only the medium by which the ideas of these great truths, may be conveyed from one mind to another, and must correspond therewith. If language is the sign of ideas, and ideas are the impressions of things, it follows of necessity, that no language can be employed unless it corresponds with these natural laws, or first principles. The untutored child cannot talk of these things, nor comprehend our meaning till clearly explained to it. But some people act as tho they thought children must first acquire a knowledge of words, and then begin to learn what such words mean. This is putting the "cart before the horse."