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Untitled Article
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As language is the vehicle of thought , —it must undergo two important changes with the progress of civilisation ; 1 st , an iacrease of its actual volume by the addition of new words proportionate to the increased number of ideas which it is required te
express ; and 2 ndly , a more exact discrimination in the meaning of terms already in use , in order to adjust them to the more precise conceptions , which are entertained of the nature of their respective objects . As men ' s ideas expand and define themselves , the inadequacy of the corresponding terms begins to be felt ; and the want must be obviated either by the substitution of new terms , or by the assignment of a more enlarged and exact signification to those previously introduced .
In the case of a new science , such as chemistry or mineralogy the objects and relations of which lie altogether beyond the ordinary circle of thought and observation , the former of these expedients is resorted to ; and the adoption of a nomenclature , fitted to express with exactness a completely novel class of ideas ., becomes , after a certain stage of advancement , indispensable to
the further progress of the science . But when the subject , in which the deficiency of the existing vocabulary is experienced , relates to ideas with which men have long been conversant , and when its increased demands upon language arise from the general developement of the popular mind—the same end is accomplished by rendering more precise or more general the meaning of the terms , that have been already appropr iated to it . For , in this case , the introduction of a new word would occasion too violent
a disruption between the conceptions of the present and former generations ; would render one portion of society , in which the new word had obtained currency , unintelligible to the other , into which it had not yet penetrated ; and , by severing the unperceived thread of association , which runs through and connects from beginning to end the successive changes of meaning , which a word in general circulation continually undergoes , would deform
the structure of a language with a great number of sudden breaks and interruptions ; and deprive it of one of if s most important uses to the philosophical student , as a faithful exponent of the progress of manners and opinion . Of such terms the significance grows silently with the growth of thought ; their change at any particular period , from what they were a short time before , beiug hardly discernible ; although , at wider intervals , the disparity becomes conspicuous .
It is of service , therefore , to the proper classification of our ideas , to attempt from time to time to define the limits and fix the application of terms which are in daily use , but of which th * exact import does not appear to be generally apprehended . In
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6 N THE APPLICATION Of THE TEEMS POETRY , SCIENCE , AJTO PHILOSOPHY .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1834, page 323, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2633/page/11/
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