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of the restitution of all things," mentioned in Acts iii. 21, which refer to the Lord's second coming. To give it the sense the Doctor understands, he also places the comma after the word "me," instead of after " regeneration;" and thus the passage is made to read as follows,- "Ye which have followed me, at the renovation when the Son of Man shall sit on the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon thrones," &c.

Seeing the clear light which the passage in Luke throws on that above cited from Matthew, it becomes a certainty that Dr. Campbell is in error, and how has it happened that he has fallen into it, considering his learning and general acuteness? It is answered, because his religious system gave him no rational idea of man's regeneration, and no idea whatever of the Lord's regeneration or glorification of his Humanity by temptations, and, of course, no idea of the analogy existing between the two. So true it is that the Holy Word cannot be understood without doctrine, nor rightly interpreted except by those who are first made acquainted with the general principles of doctrine, or truth, which it contains, and according to which it is written.

The members of the New Church cannot be sufficiently thankful for this passage in Matthew, because it identifies the process first passed through by the Lord as the "first-begotten from the [spiritually] dead," with the corresponding process since passed through by his true disciples, by describing both processes by the same term, namely, "regeneration." At the same time the members of the New Church have their warrant, nevertheless, for calling that process, in respect to the Lord, " glorification, because he himself, on other occasions, so named it, as when he prayed, saying "Father, glorify thy name" (meaning by "name" his Humanity). Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again." (John xii. 28.) Thus, while the word "regeneration" is applied in common to the process passed through by man and to that passed through by the Lord, as the spiritually "first-born of many brethren," it indicates clearly that the process, as to its kind, is alike in both cases; and while, nevertheless, the word "glorified" is exclusively applied to himself by the Lord, it is thus indicated that in the two processes there is a difference as to degree; for when the Lord's Humanity was fully glorified, it had become Divine, but man's nature, by regeneration, becomes only spiritual.

May every member of the New Church be found seeking in the first place, regeneration, that is, "the kingdom of God and his righteousness," as the " one thing needful!"

ΑΜΕΝ.

213

THE DEPENDENCE OF LANGUAGE UPON CORRES

PONDENCES.

(Continued from page 180.)

27. The elements of language we believe to have been wholly derived in the beginning from the sounds connected with material nature. Man imitated these sounds, and gradually condensed them into compact and expressive words.

At first sight this may appear but an unprolific and ignoble source for language to have been procured from, yet as the instrument provided for the purpose by the Divine Love and Wisdom, nothing could in reality be more ample in extent, or in design more elegant and finished. God's wonderful works, it has been well observed, are not the less wonderful because effected by simple contrivances; on the contrary, they only become to thinking men, so much the more admirable. No 'miracles-literally things to be admired,'-ever appealed so powerfully to the hearts of those who are disposed to recognize God's emphasis as much in nature as beyond it, as the unpretending yet incomparable arrangements instituted for the working out of the intentions of his benevolent and far-seeing providence. And of these arrangements we nowhere have a more striking or beautiful example than in the fact before us.

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28. What were these sounds, specifically? They are easily identified. They are every one extant, and the air is as full of them to-day as it was six thousand years ago. Setting aside for a moment the infinite capacity for modulation of the human voice, (which as regards the inarticulate and untutored expressions of the feelings is of course to be regarded as one of the sources of natural sounds'), those which are associated simply with the lower forms of life, and with the inanimate creation, are themselves as numerous as they are beautiful. Hence they form one of the most charming attributes of the country, filling it with melody at all seasons, and giving vitality and cheerfulness to its remotest and loneliest wilds. Doubtless to thousands of the dwellers in towns and cities the sounds we are speaking of are nearly or quite unknown. The possessions of such are of another order altogether. But the lover of nature in her solitudes knows full well what are the intonations of the sea, the singing of the various kinds of birds, the gentle rustle of the leaves when the wind visits the dells, and the heavy rushing of the same wind when it sways the tall and sturdy trees. The hum of insects in the sultry air of summer, and the courteous

echo', the dash of the waterfall,-the purl, the ripple, the gush, the gurgle and the murmur of streams and springs, are every one of them sounds which fall upon his ear as tones of true music, and with the sweetness and familiarity of a sister's sunny laugh. How beautiful are the poets' uses of these artless and unrivalled voices! Thus by Virgil—

'Deinde satis fluvium inducit, rivosque sequentes;
Et, cum exustus ager morientibus æstuat herbis,
Ecce, supercilio clivosi tramitis undam
Elicit. Illa cadens raucum per levia murmur
Saxa ciet, scatebrisque arentia temperat arva."

By Shakspere

'He lay along

**

Under an oak, whose antique root peeps out
Above the stream that brawls along this wood.'+

Milton

'As one whose drought

Byron

Yet scarce allay'd, still eyes the current stream,
Whose liquid murmur heard, new thirst excites."+

'Bubbling from the base

Of the cleft statue, with a gentle leap

The rill runs o'er, and round, fern, flowers, and ivy creep.'§

But we must cease from quoting, and resume our often-quitted path. Besides such sounds as we have indicated, and their immediate kindred, there is a very large class connected with external nature, which though less euphonious, are better known, because matters of daily notice. Such are the sounds produced by concussions, the clashing and friction of hard bodies, and the sonorous vibrations of metallic substances. And thirdly, there is the large class of sounds immediately produced by man himself, comprehending the infinitely varied modulations of his voice, just now alluded to, under the different impulses which prompt him to use it, either designedly or instinctively.

29. Now in early times, when men had no hereditary language such as we possess, but were required to frame one for themselves, it is perfectly reasonable to infer that these various sounds would be the media they would make use of. Condensed into words, they would first be used for the names of the objects producing or associated with them. In slightly altered forms the same terms would then be extended to the qualities and the actions of those objects. Thence they would be ex

* Georgic I., 106-110.
Paradise Lost.-Book VII.

As You Like It.-Act II., scene 1.

§ Childe Harold, IV., 116.

tended to analogous objects, qualities, and actions; and eventually they would be applied to the corresponding qualities and circumstances connected with man's own nature, every new application being dictated by that innate perception of the analogies of things which is a universal element of mind. They would be made distinctive as glossarial terms, by means of slight changes and additions, similar to those pointed out in the case of wit and its derivatives, every primitive serving as a separate nucleus or centre, round which a large family would rapidly accumulate. The secondary terms would not be materially different at first from the original elementary word, but in course of time, the latter would become more and more changed and hidden by successive graftings, and at last would be almost totally obscured. The progeny then having no longer any obvious parent, would come to be regarded as so many arbitrary and independent terms. This is the condition of language as it now exists.

In the development of this history, we thus have practical illustration of the beautiful truth that sounds have their correspondences with the affections and mind of man the same as visible objects, the latter forming the proximate correspondences whereby the principle admits of being traced. "There are so many voices in the world," says the Apostle, "and none of them is without signification."*

30. These are no wild fancies, nor hasty conclusions. The proofs, as we shall now proceed to exhibit, are innumerable. In modern languages, such of them as point to the origin of the elementary terms are necessarily few and obscure, but in ancient ones they are equally clear and abundant when looked for on philosophical principles. For as the chemist, in analyzing compound bodies, searches for the base by means of the ascertained laws of chemical combination, so must the seeker after the roots of words avail himself of the laws which philology has revealed, if he would dig successfully. Mere guessing or speculation serves but to lead astray. Doctrine, here, as in every other case, is the only guide to truth. The illustrations of this portion of our subject will consequently have to be mainly drawn from the dead languages. We shall nevertheless constantly endeavour to shew that the principles which they will verify, have been in operation in all ages; and that they are therefore to be classed with those fundamental laws of human action referred to in section 16, as enabling us, when they are once determined, to judge with certainty of the conduct of men living at periods from which neither history nor tradition has descended to us. If we succeed, our theory of the origin of language will consequently * 1 Corinthians, xiv. 10.

be supported not only by the testimony of antiquity, but by the facts of personal knowledge.

31. What particular sounds would be first made use of as the elements of words, it is manifestly impossible to say. Indeed we may safely

conclude that no one class of sounds would be selected to commence with, and that when these had been used, another would be taken, and so on with the various kinds in succession, for this would imply not only an exact and complete fore-knowledge, on the part of the framers of language, of the entire work that had to be accomplished, but also an intimate familiarity with all the sounds of nature. So far from this being the case, the only idea of language possible to the framers of its rudiments, would be the one which they would form from their individual and existing necessities. Accordingly the several kinds of sounds would be adopted indiscriminately. They would be taken-one kind at this moment, another at the next, according to their suitability or adaptedness to meet the specific desire or necessity of the would-be speaker, his object being of course to make himself understood, and not to frame an elaborate language for future generations. It is very well for modern philologists to classify sounds, and to observe their relation to language as developed; but man, when constructing language, would recognize nothing more than their individual values. Accordingly, if it was an animal that the incipient speaker wished to designate, he would imitate its cry; if an emotion of his own being, such as sorrow or merriment, he would use the sound naturally associated with that emotion; . if an inanimate object, such as the sea, or the wind, or a fountain, then the sound produced by that object; and if it gave forth no sound, then he would name it from the object nearest resembling it. We are speaking now, it will be remembered, simply of root-words,—the elementary terms used to denote physical objects and physical acts. The words thus formed would immediately be taken up by the persons to whom they were addressed, because every one from his own experience would perceive the propriety of their application; and thus in a very little while they would become incorporated with the colloquial which the community was mutually engaged in forming.

32. The ancient languages abound with words which were evidently formed exactly in this way. Whether they were transmitted from the first framers of language to the nations in whose literary records we now find them, or whether they were constructed at later periods, of course it is impossible to decide. And it is quite immaterial, seeing that they indubitably establish the fact that such a mode of forming words was extensively used in early times, when no one will deny that all proceed

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