But while these scholars classed Greek with Latin, others, such as Grassmann and Sonne, pointed out striking peculiarities which Greek shares with Sanskrit, and with Sanskrit only, as, for instance, the augment, the voiceless aspirates, the _alpha privativum_ (a, not an), the +mâ+ and μή _prohibitivum_, the +tara+ and τερο as the suffix of the comparative, and some others. A most decided divergence of opinion manifested itself as touching the real relation of Greek and Latin. While some regarded these languages not only as sisters, but as twins, others were not inclined to concede to them any closer relationship than that which unites all the members of the Aryan family. While this conflict of opinions lasts (and they are not mere assertions, but opinions supported by arguments), it is clear that it would be premature to establish any historical conclusions, such, for instance, as that the Slaves remained longer united with the Indians and Persians than the Greeks, Romans, Germans, and Celts; or, if we follow Professor Sonne, that the Greeks remained longer united with the Indians than the other Aryan nations. I must confess that I doubt whether the whole problem admits of a scientific solution. If in a large family of languages we discover closer coincidences between some languages than between others, this is no more than we should expect, according to the working of what I call the Dialectic Process. All these languages sprang up and grew and diverged, before they were finally separated; some retained one form, others another, so that even the apparently most distant members of the same family might, on certain points, preserve relics in common which were lost in all the other dialects, and _vice versâ_. No two languages, not even Lithuanian and Old Slavonic, are so closely united as Sanskrit and Zend, which share together even technical terms, connected with a complicated sacrificial ceremonial. Yet there are words occurring in Zend, and absent in Sanskrit, which crop up again sometimes in Greek, sometimes in Latin, sometimes in German.[4] As soon as we attempt to draw from such coincidences and divergences historical conclusions as to the earlier or later separation of the nations who developed these languages, we fall into contradictions like those which I pointed out just now between Bopp, Grimm, Schleicher, Ebel, Grassmann, Sonne, and others. Much depends, in all scientific researches, on seeing that the question is properly put. To me the question, whether the closer relations between certain independent dialects furnish evidence as to the successive times of their separation, seems, by its very nature, fruitless. Nor have the answers been at all satisfactory. After a number of coincidences between the various members of the Aryan family have been carefully collected, we know no more in the end than what we knew at first, viz., that all the Aryan dialects are closely connected with each other. We know--