Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1899-09-03
DO WE THINK ~ LANGuAGEs
Paper by IA Young Richmond Minis
ter on TIL. Question


The following article. from the pen Of
Rev. Henry Il. LOuthan, of Rich
mond, appeared IN recent issue
Of the Standard, Of Chicago Dr.
Noah K. Davis, Professor Of Logic
and Psychology I'm the University
Of Virginia IN critcsing this article
says: The difficult psychological ques-
ton IS rightly answered"
do we think I'm lansuage?' was a
question asked your correspondent some
time since While passing through "a
woodland one bright summer morning. ne
decided % test his manner Of thought.
He broke a branch from a shrub about
five feet tall The shrub was familiar TO
him. but just AT that moment he could not
recall its name. The bush resembled
very much what IS known in the noun
tains Of Virginia as the laurel. He began
% think. The small magnolia-like bloom
Of the laurel was pictured IN his mind
but still he could not remember the name
of the plant 10 which belonged the branch
he held IN his hand. He then recalled
the dying words Of Matthew T. Maury:
Boar my body through Goshen Pass
while the laurels are blooming"
Stll the name was not recalled. He
had walked. perhaps. one hundred yards
before DE thought OF ivy" the name OF
tie Df0Wtu ne lIu bfOktn. Now what
was the process OF his thinking? Upon
piucking the branch he tried 20 think Of
its name. The name did not come BY
association. within sixty seconds. he re-
called "the laurel" with it, similar size.
similar leaves. but entirely different
bloom. He recalled the bloom of the
broken branch which was then out Of
blossom. IL was of a delicate white and
pink: its corolla was about three fourths
OF an inch i'm diameter, and blossomed in
clusters. The bloom Of tho laurel was
like q tiny magnolia. with but single
blossom upon a stem. Then, upon the
wings of thought. he was in the noun
tain pass between Lexington and Goshen.
Va. thinking OF tire great man whose
body was taken from It's resting place
and borne by loving hands from the
first town 20 the second. and then back
again over the rugged laurel-guarded
road.
Had ne been thinking In language or IN
id.as2 Undo i.tl.y IN IDEAS. We have
language. because we first have ideas. and
not ideas because Of language Robert
Louis Stevenson we'll says: To hear
a strain OF music. 20 see beautiful wO-
man. a river. great city, or starry
night. IS 90 make a man despair OF his
iiiiputian arts in language Why does
ideas for which he has no wCrd to picture
. them 90 the world. How could an Edison
bring new mechanism into existence
If be depended upon language for his
Thought. for he brings the machine into
being before Ii has even a name. In
ten minutes Stevenson says that "a man
may have moro ideas than can be oX-
pressed by AN the words " Shakespeare.
By means OF words however we are
enabled 90 grasp thoughts beyond mere
example. The notion imperialism, for in
stance is too complex 20 be clearly rep
resented by an example. but We hold IL
fast by this word which IS It's sign. This
is algebrdic thinking. But after ALL
we must go back TO the protoplasm in
thinking. which is the idea, else the sym
bols i-m-p-e-r-i-a-l-i-s-m will mean no
thing To us. when the writer thought OF
the word ivy" as the name OF the branch
in his hand. IL was neither written.
spoken. nor printed: fl was not lam
guage. but was simply an idea Of that
word A. the express conveys the gold
from the mine 90 The commercial world,
but does not produce II, SO language is
Simply the medium through which man
transmits his ideas 20 his fellows.