Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1852-07-10
NATIONAL INTELLIGENCER.
NOTES ON NEW BOOKS.

LATHAM, NJ. D., FRS New York: D. Appleton 8
Co. 1852
2 The ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN IT'S ELEMENTS AND FoRMs
with History of it's Origin and Development BY WIN
c. FOWLER late Professor Of Rhetoric In Amherst Col
lege. New York: Harper Bros. 1851.
Ia preceding article on the subject of languag,
we endeavored to support the theory which teaches
the natural sgn6cancy of articulate sounds, or in
other words, that "artieulate sounds have natura
adaptedness to express specific IDEAS" We did not
maintain that this relation between certain soands
and their corresponding ideas be traced through
all the forms of human speech by any analysis, how
ever subtle, but we did contend that human speech
evinces, in the community Of its elementary sounds
fundamental identity which, it is the effect, il
also the proof of the unity of human nature Speech
in the abstract, is tobe regarded not SO much as
product, but rather as a producing faculty &c
adopt phrase Of the schoolmen, it is Hdtura ma
tayaa, rather than satsisu aasurafa. We must re-
gard it, says Humboldt, not SO much as dead
Jecoaea, but rather a aJegating." BY language,
however as distinguished from speech ia itself, we
mean the aggregate product of this Jeyettag faculty
in individuals The language of nation is the
mulatioa of the q experience, the WISDOM and the
genius of nation = it is the nett result Of their in
tellectual activity the image and reflex Of their
tai religious, social and political state. Language
is the concrete embodiment of the living soul in
man, the incarnation of thought, the exponent Of
human culture, insoruch that ~ the heart of PEG
pe, it has been said /" is it's mother tongue" and
as Prof Fowler observes, it is only by learning
that mother tcngue that you can know that heart
1t is only whse listening to one " thoughts that
breathe and words that burn from the lips of her
poets and her orators her historians and her drama
lists, that you hear that heart beating respon-
sire" There is class of metaphysieians who teach
that there is nothing in the intellect which has not
been before in the senses and by parity Of relation,
il may be said there is nothing in language which
has not been before in the intellect SO that we see
portrayed in the language of nation, as by moral
dag1ereotype the very form and feature of its peo-
pie Such being the case, We may naturally expect
to find the English language characteristic of the
English people; and not only this but more; it will
also be found to bear the evident traces of its hsto
rcal development and composition, Of that infusion
of foreign elements which it contains and of the
various modifying causes to which it has been sue
cesssvely subjected.
The two works above named furnish us the means
for instituting philosophical investigation of the
English language in its elements and primordial
FORMS while the strictly grammatical part of either
production leaves little to be desired in point of full
ness, in accuracy of definition or in prodgalty Of
learned illustration, The hges legum of the Ian
guage are stated and commented on with elearness
and force. Mr.. LATHAM, as We have said on another
OCCASION is prinus inter pores of all who have turned
their attention to the historical origin and develop
ment of the English tongue, while his vast eruditon
philologist, and his researches in European eth
nology, have enabled him to gather rich contribu-
tons for the q comparative grammar" of his native
tongue The felicity with which many knotty idiom
in our mother speech is Frequently eucidated in the
work before US by ray of light transmitted from
kindred language, atests at once the learning and
acumen Of the writer. Occasionally from a too great
devotion to brevity his sentences become little OBJ
scure and it not difficult to detect in his style the
influence of his German studies Heenunciates his
successive propositions many dogmatic state
ments wasting not word by wayof transition from
one passage to another that his sentences remind
the reader of Pliny's description of the style of
Seneca" arena sine calce," sand without lime
But this, which in any thing else would be fault
becomes an excellency in work which is designed
to be +" handbook for frequent and rapid refer
ence In all that relates to the history of the Eng
lish language, Mr.. LATHAM's work is far superior
TO Prof FowLER's, as he has avaied himself of the
most recent explorations tending to throw any light
on the constituencies Of our tongue; respecting
which, however there is room for still further and
closer research, as Mr.. LATHAM himself does not
seem quite satisfied to rest defnitively in all his
present conclusions. ProI. FOWLER mas gwen more
attention than Mr.. L. to the phonoogy Of the Eng
lsh language, and it is this portion Of his work
which evinces the greatest originality, and gives it,
we think, peculiar value. We especially invite the
attention Of all who are disposed to be skepca con-
corning the natural origin of human speech, to
Part III. of Prof FowLER's Grammar, in which the
elementary sounds of spoken language are accu-
rately stated their genesis explained, and their
tural gnfcancy proved by induction Of facts too
general and cogent to admit of confutation.
As Europe has been peoplcd by successive migra-
tons from the East, it becomes point of historical
and national interest to settle the original seat of
which would seem to indicate the borders of the
Black Sea, more particularly about the Crimea, as
the most probable residence Of the Teutonic people
before their migration westwards. The similarity
Of certain household words found in the Saxon,
the Gothic and the language Of Grim artary, bor-
dering on the Black Sea, would seem to render this
supposition not only plausible, but almost abso-
lutey certain. The familiar terms of brother SIS
ter, house, stool s'lver, gold, salt FISH, &C. of the
English tongue, which, with slight variations in the
spelling and pronunciation, it shares with all the
Gernanic languages in general, arc found in popu-
lar use among the Tartars, under the forms OF
broder sciccster, has u, silgir, COLT, salt, fsct
&c. ; thus showing striking coincidence Of terms
which seems quite sufficient to indicate commu
nifty Of origin. This vocabulary of common word,
could be almost indefinitely increased but our limits
preclude us from further pursuing the parallel Tn,
Celts, whom we find located most to the west it i
natural 70 suppose, were among the tribes who frs
n. A.. II II go II. l.