HERMES:

OR

A PHILOSOPHICAL INQUIRY CONCERNING

UNIVERSAL GRAMMAR.

BOOK I.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION.-DESIGN OF THE WHOLE.

Ir men by nature had been framed for solitude, they had never felt an impulse to converse one with another; and if, like lower animals, they had been by nature irrational, they could not have recognised the proper subjects of discourse. Since speech, then, is the joint energy of our best and noblest faculties," (that is to say, of our reason, and our social affection,) being withal our peculiar ornament and distinction, as men; those inquiries may surely be deemed interesting, as well as liberal, which either search how speech may be naturally resolved, or how, when resolved, it may be again combined.

Here a large field for speculating opens before us. before us. We may either behold speech, as divided into its constituent parts, as a statue may be divided into its several limbs; or else, as resolved into its matter and form, as the same statue may be resolved into its marble and figure.

These different analysings or resolutions constitute what we call "philosophical or universal grammar."b

When we have viewed speech thus analyzed, we may then consider it as compounded. And here, in the first place, we may contemplate that synthesis, which, by combining simple

a See p. 58 to 66. See also note z, p. 61, and note d, p. 66.

b Grammaticam etiam bipartitam ponemus, ut alia sit literaria, alia philosophica, etc. Bacon, de Augm. Scient. vi. 1. And soon after he adds, Verumtamen hac ipsa re moniti, cogitatione complexi sumus grammaticam quandam, quæ non analogiam verborum ad invicem, sed analogiam inter verba et res sive rationem sedulo inquirat.

C

• Aristotle says, Τῶν δὲ κατὰ μηδεμίαν συμπλοκὴν λεγομένων οὐδὲν οὔτε ἀληθὲς οὔτε ψευδές ἐστιν· οἷον ἄνθρωπος, λεῦκος, Tpéxei, VIK: "Of those words which are spoken without connexion, there is no one either true or false; as, for instance, man, white, runneth, conquereth." Cat. c. iv. So again, in the beginning of his treatise De Interpretatione: Περὶ γὰρ σύνθεσιν καὶ δι αίρεσιν ἔστι τὸ ψευδός τε καὶ τὸ ἀληθές:

terms, produces a truth; then, by combining two truths, produces a third; and thus others, and others, in continued demonstration, till we are led, as by a road, into the regions of science.

Now this is that superior and most excellent synthesis which alone applies itself to our intellect or reason; and which, to conduct according to rule, constitutes the art of logic.

d

After this we may turn to those inferior compositions, which are productive of the pathetic and the pleasant, in all their kinds. These latter compositions aspire not to the intellect; but being addressed to the imagination, the affections, and the sense, become, from their different heightenings, either rhetoric or poetry.

Nor need we necessarily view these arts distinctly and apart; we may observe, if we please, how perfectly they coincide. Grammar is equally requisite to every one of the rest: and though logie may, indeed, subsist without rhetoric or poetry, yet so necessary to these last is a sound and correct logic, that without it they are no better than warbling trifles.

Now all these inquiries, (as we have said already,) and such others arising from them as are of still sublimer contemplations, (of which, in the sequel, there may be possibly not a few,) may with justice be deemed inquiries, both interesting and liberal.

"True and false are seen in composition and division." Composition makes affirmative truth, division makes negative; yet both alike bring terms together, and so far, therefore, may be called synthetical.

d Ammonius, in his comment on the treatise Пepì 'Epunveías, p. 53, gives the following extract from Theophrastus; which is here inserted at length, as well for the excellence of the matter, as because it is not (I believe) elsewhere extant.

Διττῆς γὰρ οὔσης τοῦ λόγου σχέσεως, (καθ ̓ ἃ διώρισεν ὁ φιλόσοφος Θεόφραστος) τῆς τε πρὸς τοὺς ἀκροωμένους, οἷς καὶ σημαίνει τι, καὶ τῆς πρὸς τὰ πράγματα, ὑπὲρ ὧν ὁ λέγων πεῖσαι προτίθηται τοὺς ἀκροωμένους, περὶ μὲν οὖν τὴν σχέσιν αὐτοῦ τὴν πρὸς τοὺς ἀκροατὰς καταγίνονται ποιητικὴ καὶ ῥητορικὴ, διότι ἔργον αὐταῖς ἐκλέγεσθαι τὰ σεμνότερα τῶν ὀνομάτων, ἀλλὰ μὴ τὰ κοινὰ καὶ δεδημευμένα, καὶ ταῦτα ἐναρμονίως συμπλέκειν ἀλλήλοις, ὥστε διὰ τού των καὶ τῶν τούτοις ἑπομένων, οἷον σαφηνείας, γλυκύτητος, καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἰδεῶν, ἔτι τε μακρολογίας, καὶ βραχυλογίας, κατὰ καιρὸν πάντων παραλαμβανομένων, οἶσαι τε τὸν ἀκροατὴν, καὶ ἐκπλῆξαι. καὶ πρὸς τὴν πείθω χειρωθέντα ἔχειν· τῆς δέ γε πρὸς τὰ πράγματα τοῦ λόγου σχέσεως ὁ φιλόσοφος προηγουμένως ἐπιμελήσεται, τό τε ψεῦδος διελέγχων, καὶ τὸ ἀληθὲς ἀποδεικ vós. "The relation of speech being twofold, (as the philosopher Theophrastus hath

settled it,) one to the hearers, to whom it explains something, and one to the things, concerning which the speaker proposes to persuade his hearers; with respect to the first relation, that which regards the hearers, are employed poetry and rhetoric. Thus it becomes the business of these two, to select the most respectable words, and not those that are common, and of vulgar use, and to connect such words harmoniously one with another; so as through these things and their consequences, such as perspicuity, delicacy, and the other forms of eloquence, together with copiousness and brevity, all employed in their proper season, to lead the hearer, and strike him, and hold him vanquished by the power of persuasion. On the contrary, as to the relation of speech to things, here the philosopher will be found to have a principal employ, as well in re futing the false, as in demonstrating the

true.

Sanctius speaks elegantly on the same subject: Creavit Deus hominem rationis participem ; cui, quia sociabilem esse voluit, magno pro munere dedit sermonem. Sermoni autem perficiendo tres opifices adhibuit. Prima est grammatica, quae ab oratione solæcismos et barbarismos expellit ; secunda dialectica, quæ in sermonis veritate versatur; tertia rhetorica, quæ ornatum sermonis tantum exquirit. Min. l. i. c. 2.

At present we shall postpone the whole synthetical part, (that is to say, logic and rhetoric,) and confine ourselves to the analytical; that is to say, universal grammar. In this we shall follow the order that we have above laid down: first dividing speech, as a whole, into its constituent parts; then resolving it, as a composite, into its matter and form: two methods of analysis very different in their kind, and which lead to a variety of very different speculations.

Should any one object, that, in the course of our inquiry, we sometimes descend to things which appear trivial and low, let him look upon the effects to which those things contribute, then, from the dignity of the consequences, let him honour the principles.

The following story may not improperly be here inserted. "When the fame of Heraclitus was celebrated throughout Greece, there were certain persons that had a curiosity to see so great a man. They came, and, as it happened, found him warming himself in a kitchen. The meanness of the place occasioned them to stop; upon which the philosopher thus accosted them- Enter (says he) boldly, for here, too, there are gods.""e

We shall only add, that as there is no part of nature too mean for the divine presence; so there is no kind of subject, having its foundation in nature, that is below the dignity of a philosophical inquiry.

CHAPTER II.

CONCERNING THE ANALYSING OF SPEECH INTO ITS SMALLEST PARTS.

THOSE things which are first to nature, are not first to man. Nature begins from causes, and thence descends to effects: human perceptions first open upon effects, and thence, by slow degrees, ascend to causes. Often had mankind seen the sun in eclipse, before they knew its cause to be the moon's interposition; much oftener had they seen those unceasing revolutions of summer and winter, of day and night, before they knew the cause to be the earth's double motion. Even in matters of art and human crea

e See Aristot. de Part. Animal. 1. i. c. 5. This distinction of "first to man," and "first to nature," was greatly regarded in the Peripatetic philosophy. See Aristot. Phys. Auscult. 1. i. c. 1. Themistius's Comment on the same, Poster. Analyt. 1. i. c. 2. De Anima, 1. ii. c. 2. It leads us, when properly regarded, to a very important distinction between intelligence divine, and intelligence human. God may be said to view the first, as first, and the last, as last; that

is, he views effects through causes in their natural order. Man views the last as first, and the first as last; that is, he views causes through effects, in an inverse order. And hence the meaning of that passage in Aristotle, "NoTep yàp Tà Tŵv VUKTEрídwv oμματα πρὸς τὸ φέγγος ἔχει τὸ μεθ ̓ ἡμέραν, οὕτω καὶ τῆς ἡμετέρας ψυχῆς ὁ νοῦς πρὸς τὰ τῇ φύσει φανερώτατα πάντων: “Απ are the eyes of bats to the light of the day, so is man's intelligence to those objects

tion, if we except a few artists and critical observers; the rest look no higher than to the practice and mere work, knowing nothing of those principles on which the whole depends.

Thus, in speech, for example: all men, even the lowest, can speak their mother-tongue; yet, how many of this multitude can neither write, nor even read? How many of those, who are thus far literate, know nothing of that grammar which respects the genius of their own language? How few, then, must be those who know grammar universal; that grammar which, without regarding the several idioms of particular languages, only respects those principles that are essential to them all?

It is our present design to inquire about this grammar; in doing which we shall follow the order consonant to human perception, as being for that reason the more easy to be understood.

We shall begin, therefore, first from a period or sentence, that combination in speech which is obvious to all; and thence pass, if possible, to those its primary parts, which, however essential, are only obvious to a few.

With respect, therefore, to the different species of sentences, who is there so ignorant, as, if we address him in his mothertongue, not to know when it is we assert, and when we question; when it is we command, and when we pray or wish?

For example, when we read in Shakspeare,"

or in Milton,h

The man that hath no music in himself,

And is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons;

O friends, I hear the tread of nimble feet,
Hasting this way;

it is obvious that these are assertive sentences, one founded upon judgment, the other upon sensation.

When the witch in Macbeth says to her companions,

When shall we three meet again,
In thunder, lightning, or in rain?

this it is evident is an interrogative sentence.

that are by nature the brightest and most conspicuous of all things." Metaph. 1. ii. c. 1. See also I. vii. c. 4. and Ethic. Nicom. 1. i. c. 4. Ammonius, reasoning in the same way, says, very pertinently to the subject of this treatise, 'Ayannτòv tŷ àv0рwπív? púσei, èk τῶν ἀτελεστέρων καὶ συνθέτων ἐπὶ τὰ ἀπλούστερα καὶ τελειότερα προϊέναι· τὰ γὰρ συνθέτα μᾶλλον συνήθη ἡμῖν, καὶ γνωριμώτερα· οὕτω γοῦν καὶ ὁ παῖς εἶραι μὲν λόγον, καὶ εἰπεῖν, Σωκράτης περιπατεῖ, οἶδε· τοῦτον δὲ ἀναλύσαι εἰς ὄνομα καὶ ῥῆμα, καὶ ταῦτα εἰς συλλαβὰς, κἀκεῖνα εἰς στοιχεῖα, οὐκέτι: “Human nature may be well

contented to advance from the more imperfect and complex, to the more simple and perfect; for the complex subjects are more familiar to us, and better known. Thus, therefore, it is, that even a child knows how to put a sentence together, and say, Socrates walketh ; but how to resolve this sentence into a noun and verb, and these again into syllables, and syllables into letters or elements, here he is at a loss.” Am. in Com. de Prædic. P. 29.

Merchant of Venice.

h Paradise Lost, iv. 866.

When Macbeth says to the ghost of Banquo,

Hence, horrible shadow!

Unreal mockery, hence!

he speaks an imperative sentence, founded upon the passion of hatred.

When Milton says, in the character of his Allegro,

Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee

Jest and youthful jollity,

he, too, speaks an imperative sentence, though founded on the passion, not of hatred, but of love.

When, in the beginning of the Paradise Lost, we read the following address:

And chiefly thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer,
Before all temples the upright heart, and pure,
Instruct me, for thou know'st .....

this is not to be called an imperative sentence, though perhaps it bear the same form, but rather (if I may use the word) it is a sentence precative or optative.

What, then, shall we say? Are sentences to be quoted in this manner without ceasing; all differing from each other in their stamp and character? Are they no way reducible to certain definite classes? If not, they can be no objects of rational comprehension. Let us however try.

It is a phrase often applied to a man, when speaking, that "he speaks his mind;" as much as to say, that his speech or discourse is a publishing of some energy or motion of his soul. So it, indeed, is in every one that speaks, excepting alone the dissembler or hypocrite; and he, too, as far as possible, affects the appear

ance.

Now the powers of the soul (over and above the mere nutritive) may be included, all of them, in those of perception, and those of volition. By the powers of perception, I mean the senses and the intellect; by the powers of volition, I mean, in an extended sense, not only the will, but the several passions and appetites; in short, all that moves to action, whether rational or irrational.

If, then, the leading powers of the soul be these two, it is plain that every speech or sentence, as far as it exhibits the soul, must of course respect one or other of these.

If we assert, then is it a sentence which respects the powers of perception. For what, indeed, is to assert, if we consider the examples above alleged, but to publish some perception either of the senses or the intellect?

Again, if we interrogate, if we command, if we pray, or if we wish, (which, in terms of art, is to speak sentences interrogative, imperative, precative, or optative,) what do we but publish so many different volitions? For who is it that questions?

i Vid. Aristot. de An. ii. 4.