Language, in its most extensive sense, implies those signs by which men
and brutes communicate to each other their thoughts, affections, and
desires.
Language may be divided, 1. into natural and artificial; 2. into spoken
and written.
NATURAL LANGUAGE, consists in the use of those natural signs which
different animals employ in communicating their feelings one to another.
The meaning of these signs all perfectly understand by the principles of
their nature. This language is common both to man and brute. The
elements of natural language in man, may be reduced to three kinds;
modulations of the voice, gestures, and features. By means of these, two
savages who have no common, artificial language, can communicate their
thoughts in a manner quite intelligible: they can ask and refuse, affirm
and deny, threaten and supplicate; they can traffick, enter into
contracts, and plight their faith. The language of brutes consists in
the use of those _inarticulate_ sounds by which they express their
thoughts and affections. Thus, the chirping of a bird, the bleating of a
lamb, the neighing of a horse, and the growling, whining, and barking of
a dog, are the language of those animals, respectively.
ARTIFICIAL LANGUAGE consists in the use of words, by means of which
mankind are enabled to communicate their thoughts to one another.--In
order to assist you in comprehending what is meant by the term _word,_ I
will endeavor to illustrate the meaning of the term.
_Idea_. The _notices_ which we gain by sensation and perception, and
which are treasured up in the mind to be the materials of thinking and
knowledge, are denominated ideas. For example, when you place your hand
upon a piece of ice, a sensation is excited which we call _coldness_.
That faculty which notices this sensation or change produced in the
mind, is called _perception;_ and the abstract notice itself, or notion
you form of this sensation, is denominated an _idea_. This being
premised, we will now proceed to the consideration of words.
_Words_ are _articulate_ sounds, used by common consent, not as natural,
but as artificial, signs of our ideas. Words have no meaning in
themselves. They are merely the artificial representatives of those
ideas affixed to them by compact or agreement among those who use them.
In English, for instance, to a particular kind of metal we assign the
name _gold;_ not because there is, in that sound, any peculiar aptness
which suggests the idea we wish to convey, but the application of that
sound to the idea signified, is an act altogether arbitrary. Were there
any natural connexion between the sound and the thing signified, the
word _gold_ would convey the same idea to the people of other countries
as it does to ourselves. But such is not the fact. Other nations make
use of different sounds to signify the same thing. Thus, _aurum_ denotes
the same idea in Latin, and _or_ in French. Hence it follows, that it is
by custom only we learn to annex particular ideas to particular sounds.
SPOKEN LANGUAGE or speech is made up of articulate sounds uttered by the
human voice.
_The voice_ is formed by air which, after it passes through the glottis,
(a small aperture in the upper part of the wind-pipe,) is modulated by
the action of the throat, palate, teeth, tongue, lips, and nostrils.
WRITTEN LANGUAGE. The elements of written language consist of letters or
characters, which, by common consent and general usage, are combined
into words, and thus made the ocular representatives of the articulate
sounds uttered by the voice.
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