Philological Proofs of the Original Unity and Recent Origin of the Human RaceJohnes, Arthur James
History
Philological Proofs of the Original Unity and Recent Origin of the Human Race
Johnes, Arthur James
Ethnology; Human beings -- Origin; Language and languages; Monogenism and polygenism
In the works of Horne Tooke and others it has been abundantly shown that
Pronouns are merely Nouns, viz. Names of the Human Species, “Man, Woman,”
&c. In other words they belong to a section of the terms of the First
Class.
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Hence it will be manifest that an analysis, completely embracing numerous
specimens of nouns of the First Class, virtually embraces also numerous
specimens of words of the Four other Classes, which, together with the
First, compose the principal elements of Human Language. For it must be
observed that—
Though the African nouns belonging to the First Class form the
only basis or subject of inquiry, the inquiry itself will be found
to embrace an extended comparison of those nouns with the kindred
terms of the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Classes, which are
discoverable in the languages of the other three continents.
Finally, a principle must here be stated and applied, which will be more
fully illustrated hereafter.
The names of Objects can be shown in a great variety of instances
to be identical with Verbs or terms descriptive of some dominant
or conspicuous quality which those Objects display.
This remark applies even to the terms for the Members of the Human Frame,
and other Objects of which the names are included in the First Class of
Words,—as appears by abundant illustrations in works of authority and
research confined to an investigation of the European languages. But the
same truth may be much more clearly and unequivocally demonstrated even by
the most cursory examination of more ancient and therefore more primitive
tongues, such as the Hebrew and the Sanscrit. The application of this
principle will be found to unfold a wide range of facts serving to connect
the languages of Africa with those of the other Continents; the same
terms, which present themselves as Nouns or Conventional names in the
languages of Africa, occurring in a great variety of examples in those of
the other continents, unaltered or very slightly changed in sound,
fulfilling the functions of the corresponding _descriptive_ terms or
verbs. Here it may be remarked that the descriptive or metaphorical
character, which originally belonged to nouns, and the various modes in
which the same objects are susceptible of description, may be viewed as
the source of these numerous names for the same objects. But this is a
subject which will be more fully discussed in a subsequent part of this
work.
The following examples will serve to illustrate at once the principle last
stated, and also another principle before suggested, viz. that “The
Hand”(24) and its perceptions have metaphorically given names in many
instances—not only to the faculties of the Mind,—but also to the other
perceptive organs and their functions. For further illustrations, see
Appendix A, p. 65, and the subsequent pages.
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