and criticism. We do not, however, maintain that every one should make himself a scientific philologer. In the first place, it is not every one who is qualified by capacity and taste to become a scholar: some particular faculties are needed for the successful study of dead languages, as well as for a profitable employment of one's time in the docks of London and Liverpool, or in the manufactories of Birmingham and Elberfeld: it is also a question of time, for no one can make himself acquainted with the wide range of subjects which philology in its scientific cultivation includes, so thoroughly and perfectly as to become a competent teacher of immediate learners, and, by his writings, of the world, without years of patient study and earnest thought; in a word, he must make philology his profession, and if his fellow-men set any value upon his labours he will live by this as he might by any other business. But in a civilized state of society every one ought to learn so much of philology, that is, he should have such an acquaintance with the vehicle of his thoughts, as may enable him to acquire a habit of method in the way of practical teaching. The mistake into which we have fallen in this country does not consist in our making classics and mathematics the basis of our education, nor even in obliging all to attempt what few can attain, but in making boys learn by rote like parrots instead of learning by reflexion like men. We repeat that man is a thinking being, and that his education. as such consists in giving him a power and a habit of arranging his thoughts. The learning of Latin and Greek is profitable so far as it is made a lesson on the analogy of language; and we are convinced that the youth of this country would gain more from two years exercise in the rigorous discrimination of the like and unlike in the Greek language alone, than by spending ten years, as many do, in overloading their memory with a mass of crude facts, into the chaos of which the untutored intellect cannot penetrate. And, if any one's profession is to be that of a scholar, he will not be the longer in getting to the end of his journey because he has spent more time than some of his fellow-travellers in making himself thoroughly acquainted with the route. We now proceed to inquire, what is the state of scholarship in reference to the objects which give it importance and value. CHAPTER II. THE HISTORY AND PRESENT STATE OF PHILOLOGY. I. Classical Philology. 17 Origin and causes of philological studies. 18 Scholastic philosophy. Nominalism. 19 Occham's grammatical logic. 20 Reformation connected with nominalism. 21 Revival of literature in Italy. 22 Invention of printing. 23 Progress of learning in Germany. 24 In France. 25 In England. 26 In Holland. 27 Progress of scholarship. 28 Bentley. 29 Modern German literature in connexion with scholarship. Heyne. F. A. Wolf and Niebuhr. Reiz. Buttmann and Hermann. K. O. Müller and Welcker. Schleiermacher and Savigny. 30 Merits and defects of German literature. 31 Verbal criticism in England. 32 Prospects of classical scholarship in this country. II. Comparative Philology. 33 It did not emanate from the old classical scholarship. 34 The true method of proceeding was first pointed out by Leibnitz. 35 Study of Zend and Sanscrit. 36 Sanscrit scholarship, and its connexion with comparative philology. Rask, Bopp and Grimm. William Humboldt and A. W. Schlegel. 37 Progress of comparative philology in England. F. Rosen. Prichard and Garnett. Prinsep and Rawlinson. III. Combination of Classical Scholarship with Comparative Philology. 38 Advantages which the former would derive from such a combination. 39 An application of the old classical and critical spirit would be not less advantageous for comparative philology. 40 Philological design of the present work; how far anticipated by Buttmann's Lexilogus and Grammar. form a proper estimate of the present condition of philological knowledge, we should at least be acquainted with the circumstances in which the study originated, and with the principal changes which it has undergone up to our time. An adequate discussion of this subject would, however, far exceed the limits of an introductory chapter*. All that we propose to attempt in this place is first to point out, as briefly as possible, the more prominent and striking features that have marked the progress of those grammatical and critical studies which constitute our modern scholarship; then to indicate the rise and progress of comparative philology; and lastly to plead for a closer connexion between these two departments of linguistic study. 17 To The importance, which, for the last three hundred years has been attached to philological studies, is at once accounted for and justified by that cessation of all literary exertion for a long *For a more complete history of philology the reader is referred to a special article on the subject in the eighth edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. xvII. period, which ensued upon the overthrow of the Western Empire. The rude vigour of barbarism had triumphed over the languishing energies of civilization, and it seemed as if the last rays of mental culture had faded away in the prison of Boethius, as if some sudden paralysis had seized upon the general mind of Europe, as if men had drunk of the waters of oblivion, or had lost irrecoverably the key to those treasures of learning, wisdom, and genius, which the old world had amassed for their use. Rapid as was the downfall of literature, it must be recollected that many causes had been gradually operating to produce it, some of which continued their agency to prevent its revival. Among these not the least efficacious was the influence of the Romish Church, the subjection of the less cultivated laity to the growing power and greater intelligence of the clergy, and the prejudices which these last entertained, as well from motives of interest as from scruples of religion, against the learning of the heathen world; so that, after the crisis had taken place, the Church carefully appropriated to herself the little learning that still struggled for existence, and the papal authority was openly opposed to the diffusion of secular knowledge. Accordingly, when, notwithstanding this prostration of mental culture, the literary spirit revived after nearly a thousand years of darkness or doubtful light, and the mind, awaking like Epimenides from its long slumber, found all things altered but itself, men turned eagerly to the written monuments of the former waking and thinking world; and the grammatical studies necessary for the understanding of these works constituted that philology or scholarship which has ever since formed the basis of education. As the Romish Church throve by the ignorance which it fostered, so it fell by means of the learning which it had always opposed. The causes which produced modern scholarship were identical with those which brought about the Reformation of religion. Of these the most important were the three following: the overthrow of the scholastic realism, and the introduction of rationalism, or a philological spirit, by the Nominalists; the reproduction of the classical authors in Italy, and the revival of the study of Greek, which created a learned class in Europe; and the invention of printing, which by multiplying books imparted to the bulk of the laity the effects of the two former causes, the rationalism and learning of the thinking part of mankind. It will be proper to make a few remarks on each of these causes. 18 The grammatical studies, which the Romans had borrowed from the Greeks, and which they had reduced to such an excellent system, were utterly lost in the dark ages. If one needed a proof of this, it would be sufficient to refer to the fact that the languages of those nations which had been most exposed to the influence of Roman literature, and which had for the most part adopted the Latin idiom, degenerated into a barbarous jargon without inflexions or syntax. A certain amount of education was necessary for the clergy, but, though Grammatica formed a part of the trivium in the seven arts which were then taught, this term did not signify rational grammar, but merely an acquaintance with the Latin of the schools. The nature, however, of some of the Romish doctrines necessitated a mixture of metaphysics with theology. In this mixture originated the scholastic philosophy, which was simply an attempt to prove, by what they knew of Aristotle's logic, the necessary union of reason and orthodoxy. It was only by such an instrument as the quasi-realism of their Aristotle, that they could establish those points of faith which constituted the difficulty of the Romish creed. It was necessary that the mere abstractions of common language should be considered as objective realities, for it was about these abstractions alone that they argued; and, as there were some clear-headed men among them who could not accept this position, there arose a dispute in the schools, of which the real point under discussion was, whether the scholastic philosophy had any authentic basis or not. This dispute is commonly known as the question about Universals, or the controversy between the Realists and the Nominalists; the former of whom considered universal ideas as pre-existent in the mind of God and man (ante rem), and the latter as simple abstractions of the understanding from the objects of the senses (post rem). Now as it was about the universals alone that the scholastics reasoned, it followed, that, if the universals were mere words, they could not pretend to establish anything by their argumentation, and consequently the whole system would be overthrown. We can, therefore, easily understand why the nominalists were so violently persecuted, and why they were considered as little better than heretics; for, if orthodoxy rested upon scholastic realism, those who undermined the one contributed not a little to the downfall of the other. Roscelinus, the first opponent of the realists, went into the opposite extreme of ultra-nominalism*, and as he was confuted without much difficulty by Abelard and the other conceptualists, his efforts did not avail much to the overthrow of the system. It was reserved for our countryman, William of Occham, to effect this. Without running into any paradoxical absurdities, he showed in a straightforward manner that words are instruments of reasoning, not objects of science, and set up the grounds of rational grammar against realism, which had overlooked the fact that logic has nothing to do with the particular significations of words, but only with their methodical arrangement. 19 The Nominalism of Occham, however, was not merely a reassertion of grammar; it was an overthrow of that worship of words which was so important a part of the idolatry of the time. As it is one of the objects of this work to maintain the opinions which Occham advocated, both against the symbolical realism, which is still prevalent, and against the ultra-nominalism which now and then makes its appearance, we shall offer no apology for giving a statement of views so much in accordance with our own as his are; at the same time it is but due to the sturdy Franciscan, who is little thought about by the thousands who are reaping the benefit of his labours, to give as nearly as possible in his own words the important principles which he so opportunely revived, and by which he earned the titles bestowed upon him by his editor Marcus de Benevento-logicorum acutissimus, sacræ scholæ invictissimorum Nominalium inceptor, in omni disciplinarum genere Doctor plusquam subtilis. It will be sufficient to give the statements in his Summa totius logicæ * We apply this term to the doctrines of those philosophers who, like Cratylus, Hobbes, and Horne Tooke, not only reduced universals to mere names, but even made truth to consist in names, for which reason Leibnitz has called Hobbes plusquam nominalis. |