The Science of Thought, Vol. 2

Excerpt from The Science of Thought, Vol. 2 It may be objected, no doubt, that all that has hitherto been suggested on the origin of roots and concepts is theory only, or a mere outline of the general purposes which the roots of any language might be made to serve, provided always that such roots exist, and that they possess the peculiar character which has been ascribed to them. It is easy to say that all roots must express acts, and more particularly such simple acts as constitute the daily occupations of a primitive society. The question is, Is it so, and can we by historical evidence prove that it was so in any of the languages best known to ourselves? In order to answer this question perfectly, we ought, if possible, to analyze the dictionary of a whole family of languages, the Semitic or Aryan, and show that the original meanings of their roots are really such as we have postulated. Hebrew has been reduced to about 500 roots, but it would be desirable that some professed Semitic scholar should undertake to collect the roots for the whole Semitic family in its widest sense. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.