It is possible to distinguish in ourselves four things: sensation,
perception, conception, and the signs by means of which we designate
objects, that is their names; these enable us to separate the one
from the other. We must not imagine that these four exist as separate
entities, “no words are possible without concepts, no concepts without
percepts, no percepts without sensations.”[28]--_Science of Thought_,
p. 2.
These four constituent elements of thought are merely four different
phases in the growth of what we call our mind.
I employ these terms because they are in use in philosophical language;
there are also many others constantly on the lips of philosophers, some
of them newly coined. This is greatly to be regretted, as much of our
confusion of thought arises from this superabundance of philosophical
terms. If such words as impression, sensation, perception, intuition,
presentation, conception, soul, reason, and many others could for a
time be banished from our philosophical dictionaries, and some only
readmitted after they had undergone a thorough purification and were
made to return to their primitive signification, an immense service
would have been rendered to mental science; as every writer defines
them as he will, or uses them without definition; and he seems to
imagine that because there are so many words, there must also be so
many variations, “Because in the German language there are two words:
_verstand_ and _vernunft_, both originally expressing the same thing,
the greatest efforts have been made to show that there is something to
be called _verstand_, totally different from what is called _vernunft_;
and as there is a _vernunft_ by the side of a _verstand_ in German,
English philosophers have been most anxious to introduce the same
distinction between understanding and reason into English”;[29] and
“because we have a name for impression, and another for sensations,
we are led to imagine that impressions do actually exist by the side
of sensations. But what was originally meant by impression was not
something beside sensation, but rather one side of sensation, namely,
the passive side, which may be spoken of by itself, but which in every
real sensation is inseparable from its active side.”[30]
All the various shades and developments of sensation were doubtless
distinguished and named for some very useful purpose; but the
inconvenience was great when the terms became too numerous. “We may
safely enjoy the wealth of language accumulated by a long line of
thinkers, if only we take care not to accept a coin for more or less
than it is really worth. We must weigh our words as the ancients often
weighed their coins, and not be deceived by their current value.”[31]
When we have bravely resolved to throw away superfluous words, we need
not imagine that we are the poorer, since we have only lost what we, in
reality, never possessed. So powerful, however, is the action of words
on thoughts, that as soon as we throw away a word, we feel ourselves
to have been robbed of the thing itself; the sun rises just the same,
though we say now that it does not rise. Those things which we call
mind, intellect, reason, memory, in fact the soul, have no existence
as such--that is apart from ourselves. This assertion may sound very
terrible to those philosophers who imagine that the dignity of man
consists in the possession of these and other powers; at last there
arises a complete mythology, a philosophic polytheism, when these are
spoken of as distinct possessions, independent powers, with limits not
very sharply defined; and however orthodox that polytheism has become,
it is never too late to protest against it. In making use of these
terms it should be understood that they represent certain modes of
action and phases of the Ego.
It is to be regretted that our modern languages have nothing to replace
the word “mind,” such as there is in the Sanscrit language, meaning
“working within.” As soon as we speak of _mind_ we cannot help thinking
of an independent something dwelling in our body, whereas by mind I
mean nothing but that working which is going on within, embracing
sensation, perception, conception, and naming, and the worker who
accomplishes this is the Ego.
Thus the Ego means nothing but consciousness of itself.
There is one word which it would be desirable to reintroduce into our
philosophical phraseology and that is Logos; it means the word and
the thought combined. Logos is a single intellectual act under two
aspects; it is an untranslatable word. We were told at school that it
was strange that the Greeks should not have distinguished between Logos
Speech and Logos Reason, and it was represented as a progress toward
clearer thought that later writers should have distinguished between
Logos the spoken word and Logos the inner thought.
But the Greeks were right: no doubt it may be an advantage to be able
to distinguish between two sides of the same thing, but that advantage
is more than neutralised if such distinction leads us to suppose that
these two sides are two different things. Let us avoid the very common
error that things which can be distinguished can therefore claim an
independent existence; we can distinguish between an orange and its
peel, but no orange can grow without peel, nor peel without the fruit.
Let it not be supposed that I am such a bigoted upholder of the
unity of the Ego as to wish to see all these names banished from our
philosophical dictionaries. Let us use the word Sense when speaking
of the Ego as perceiving. Let us use Intellect when the Ego is simply
conceiving; and the word language when it is speaking; let us even use
the word _memory_ when we wish to speak of the partial permanence of
the work done by sensation, perception, and conception; and let us use
Reason or Reasoning for the process which produces what the logicians
call propositions and syllogisms; but let us never forget that neither
to remember nor to reason implies the possession of a thing called
reason or memory. All our mental life will remain just the same though
we deny the existence of the terms which obscure our vision; let us
hold fast to the existence of the Ego, it exists in its entity, it only
is the worker, and it receives its highest expression in the Logos.
This truth, that thought and language are inseparable, that thought
without language is as impossible as language without thought has
only recently been affirmed by comparative philologists. Many learned
writers are still unwilling to admit that ideas without words are
impossible though at the same time they are quite willing to concede
that words are impossible without concepts.[32]
We possess an immense number of books on logic, yet we are met
everywhere by the same vagueness on this subject. John Stuart Mill
speaks of language as one of the principal elements or helps of
thought, but he never mentions any other instruments. This lack is
probably owing to the unfortunate influence of modern languages
which have two words, the one for language, the other for thought;
this gives the impression that there is a substantial instead of an
apparent difference between the two; it is also owing to the dislike
of philosophers to allow that all which is most lofty, most spiritual
in us should be dependent on such miserable crutches as words are
supposed to be. Yet it is evident that we cannot advance one step
towards philosophy without acknowledging the fact that we think in
words and words only. This thought would be less difficult to grasp
if we defined clearly what are thoughts. Sensation, pain, pleasure,
dreaming, or willing cannot be called true thought, but variations of
inward activity; in the same way as shrieks, howls, or even the sounds
of real words, taken from a foreign language, are no more language
than our emotions are thoughts. The word Logos expresses this, since
it had originally the two meanings of gathering and combining, and so
became the proper name of all that we call reason; but as it also means
language, it tells us that the process of gathering and combining,
which begins with sensation and passes on to perception and conception,
reaches its full perfection only when the inward activity takes form in
the Logos or speech.
Language therefore is not as has been often imagined, thought plus
sound; but thought is really language minus sound; words are the
external symbols of thought, sounding symbols when we articulate in
a loud voice, but mute when we confine ourselves to merely thinking
them, since it is a fact that we think in words, and it is not possible
to think otherwise. The possession of a language is shown even in the
tracing of whole sentences by ideographic signs, which need not be
pronounced at all, or as in the astronomical signs in our almanacks
which may be pronounced differently in different languages: or we
may substitute algebraic signs for words; we could as well calculate
without numbers as apply our reason without words I have freely and
fully admitted that thoughts may exist without words, because other
signs may take the place of words between persons speaking different
languages possibly between deaf and dumb people. Five fingers held
up are quite sufficient to convey the concept of five, thus the hand
may become the sign for five, both hands for ten, hands and feet for
twenty. In America and Australia where many dialects are spoken this
method has attained a great degree of perfection, but we notice that
in all cases under review each one thinks in his own language and then
translates his thought into pantomime.
A final fact adduced against the theory that it is impossible to think
without language, which was very popular, is that deaf and dumb people
cannot speak, and yet can think; this argument has no great value, as
it is now averred that “a man born dumb who had always lived among
deaf and dumb people, and had not been taught to express thoughts by
signs would be capable of few higher intellectual manifestations than a
monkey or an elephant; and this in spite of the fact that no naturalist
could distinguish any difference between the size of their brains and
those belonging to men who could speak.” For deaf mutes to be able to
think and reason, they must have learned from those who use words, then
only can they substitute other signs for their words and concepts.
Still Professor Huxley accords to these unfortunate men certain
intellectual heritages derived from their parents.
These are some of the chief points in the science of language. The
fundamental law which this science lays down of the unity of thought
and speech is a torch which may throw light on the origin of man.
FOOTNOTES:
[28] Max Müller says: “I use percept instead of presentation, because
it is better understood in English.”--_Science of Thought_, p. 2.
[29] Max Müller’s _Science of Thought_, p. 72.
[30] _Ibid._, p. 17.
[31] _Ibid._, p. 75.
[32] _Science of Thought_, p. 30.