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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[AUGUST, 1899.
Further, since words are varied in form by the addition of affixes, and since affixes may be attached to words in an altered or unaltered form, formative languages are divisible into agglutinative languages, or those that add affixes without alteration; and into synthetic languages, or those that add affixes with alteration. And lastly, since affixes may be prefixes, infixes, or suffixes, agglutinative and synthetic languages are each divisible into (1) pre-mutative, or those that prefix their affixes; (2) intro-mutative, or those that infix them; and (3) post-mutative, or those that suffix them.
Thus does it seem to me that the inductive argument can be carried onwards to a clear and definite apprehension of the birth and growth of the phenomena presented by the varieties of human speech, i. e., by languages. But as is the case with every other natural growth, no language can have ever been left to develop itself alone. and thus do we get the phenomenon of connected languages, which may be defined as those that differ from each other by varying the respective forms and positions, but not the meanings, of their words. And since the variation of form is effected by the addition of altered er unaltered affixes, connected languages can vary the forms of the affixes without materially varying those of the roots and stems of their words. In this way they become divisible into groups, or those whose stems are common, and into families, or those whose roots are common.
It is also against natural conditions for any language to develop only in one direction, or without subjection to outside influences, and so it is that we find languages developing on more than one line and belonging strictly to more than one class, but in every such case the language has what is commonly called its genius cr peculiar constitution, i. e., it belongs primarily to one class and secondarily to the others.
I have always thought, and I believe it could be proved, that every language must conform to some part or other of the theory above indicated in outline, and in that case the theory would be truly what I have ventured to call it "A Theory of Universal Grammar." That such a theory, exists in nature and only awaits unearthing, I have no doubt whatever. Mankind, when untrammelled by teaching,' acts on an instinctive assumption of its existence, for children and adults alike always learn a language in the same way if left to themselves: They copy the enunciation of complete sentences from experts in it to start with, learning to divide up and vary the sentences so acquired afterwards, and this is not only the surest but also the quickest way of mastering a foreign tongue correctly. Its rules of grammar, as stated in books about it, are mastered later on, and in every case where they only are studied there comes about that book knowledge of the language, which is everywhere by instinct acknowledged to be a matter apart from and inferior to the practical or true knowledge. I use the term 'true' here, because, unless this is possessed, whatever knowledge may be acquired fails to fulfil its object of finding a new mode of communicating with one's fellow man.
But it seems to me that if the laws laid down in the set Grammars were to follow closely on the laws instinctively obeyed by the untutored man, and to do no violence to what he feels to be the logical sequence of ideas, the divorce between practical and linguistic knowledge -- between knowledge by the ear and knowledge by the eye would not be so complete as it is nowadays. And not only that, if the laws could be stated in the manner above suggested, they could be more readily grasped and better retained in the memory, and languages would consequently be more quickly, more thoroughly, and more easily learned, both by children and adults, than is now practicable. Looked at thus, the matter becomes one of the greatest practical importance.
This is what I have attempted to achieve in stating my theory; but, assuming it to be fundamentally right and correctly worked out, it will be observed that it reverses the accepted order of teaching, alters many accepted definitions, and, while admitting much that is usually taught, it both adds and omits many details. Taken all round, it is a wide departure from orthodox teaching. Hence the interest that Mr. Portman's efforts possess for myself.
