The Speech of Monkeys Part 6

On one occasion, this ape was induced to go aboard a steamer which lay in the harbour. The purpose was to kidnap him and carry him to Europe.

Either through fear, instinct, reason, or some other cause, this ape jumped overboard and swam ash.o.r.e, although he was naturally afraid of water. From that time on to the end of the gentleman's residence there, he a.s.sures me that whenever a steamer made its appearance in the harbour, the ape would take flight to the forest, where he would stay as long as the vessel remained in sight. He was seen from time to time, but could not be induced to return to the house until the vessel had departed.

A few years ago, I saw on board the United States receiving ship _Franklin_, a bright little monkey which was kept chained in a temporary workshop built on the gun-deck. Her chain was just long enough to allow her to reach the stove. The day was pleasant outside, but in the shade a trifle chilly. The little monk descended from the sill on which she usually sat and carefully felt the top of the stove with her hands.

Finding it slightly warm, although the fire had died out, she mounted the stove and laid the side of her head on the warm surface. She would turn first one cheek and then the other, and continued rubbing the stove with her hands. Not finding it warm enough, she jumped down on the floor, opened the stove door with her hand, and slammed it two or three times. She then picked up a stick of wood lying within reach, and tried to lift it to the stove. The stick was too heavy for her to handle, so she would lift up one end of it and drop it heavily on the floor with the evident purpose of attracting the attention of her master. Again she would open and slam the door, lift up the end of the stick and drop it, and utter a peculiar sound, showing in every possible way that she wanted a fire. She finally picked up a small stick and stuck the end of it into the ashes in the front of the stove. She knew that it was necessary to put the wood into the stove; she knew where to put it in, and, while she could not do it herself, she knew who could put it in.

Her master told me that she would gather up the shavings from the floor when they came within her reach and pile them up by the stove. He also told me that he frequently gave her a lighted match when he had prepared the fuel for building a fire, and that she would touch the match to the shavings and start the fire. She never ventured to get on the stove without first examining it to ascertain how hot it was.

Another feat which she performed was to try to remove some tar from the cup in which he gave her water and milk. The cup had been lined with tar as a sanitary measure to prevent consumption, and she was aware that the tar imparted an unpleasant taste and odour, hence she tried very hard to remove it from the cup. Was this instinct?

CHAPTER XVII.

Speech Defined--The True Nature of Speech--The Use of Speech--The Limitations of Speech.

[Sidenote: SPEECH DEFINED]

What is speech? I shall endeavour to define it in such terms as will relieve it of ambiguity, and deal with it as a known quant.i.ty in the problems of mental commerce. Speech is that form of materialised thought which is confined to oral sounds, when they are designed to convey a definite idea from mind to mind. It is, therefore, only one mode of expressing thought, and to come within the limits of speech, the sounds must be voluntary, have fixed values, and be intended to suggest to another mind a certain idea, or group of ideas, more or less complex.

The idea is one factor, and sound the other, and the two conjointly const.i.tute speech. The empty sounds alone, however modulated, having no integral value, cannot be speech, nor can the concept unexpressed be speech. Separately, the one would be noise, and the other would be thought; and they only become speech when the thought is expressed in oral sounds. Sounds which only express emotion are not speech, as emotion is not thought, although it is frequently attended by thought, and is a cause of which thought is the effect. Music expresses emotion by means of sounds, but they are not speech; and even though the sounds which express them may impart a like emotion to the hearer, they are not speech. The sounds which express crying, sighing, or laughter, may indeed be a faint suggestion of speech, since we infer from them the state of the mind attending the emotions which produce them, yet they are not truly speech. To be regarded as speech, the expression must be preceded by consciousness, and the desire to make known to another the sensation by which the expression is actuated. As the impulse can only come from within, it appears that emotion is one source from which thought is evolved, and speech is the natural issue of thought. Desire gives rise to a cla.s.s of thoughts having reference to the sensations which produce them, and such thoughts find expression in such sounds as may suggest supplying the want. As the wants of man have increased with his changing modes of life and thought, his speech has drawn upon the resources of sound to meet those increased demands for expression. It appears only reasonable to me that thought must precede in point of time and order any expression of thought, for thought is the motive of expression, and the expression of thought in oral sounds is speech.

[Sidenote: NATURE OF SPEECH] Speech is not an invention, and therefore is not symbolic in its radical nature. True, that much that is symbolic has been added to it, and its bounds have been widened as men have risen in the scale of civil life, until our higher types of modern speech have departed so far from the natural modes of speech and first forms of expression, that we can rarely trace a single word to its ultimate source. And viewing it as we do from our present standpoint, it appears to be purely symbolic; but if that be so, then we must deny the first law of progress, and a.s.sign the origin of this faculty to that cla.s.s of phenomena known as miracles, which once explained by increasing the mystery what we could not understand, and served at the same time to conceal the exact magnitude of our ignorance; but as we added little by little to our stock of knowledge, such phenomena were brought within the realm of our understanding, and to-day our children are familiar with the causes of many simple effects which our forefathers dared not attempt to solve, but reverently ascribed to the immediate influence of Divinity. If speech in its ultimate nature is symbolic, what must have been the condition of man before its invention, and how did he arrive at the first term or sound of speech? He did not invent sound nor the means of making it. He did not invent thought, the thing which speech expresses, and it is no more reasonable to believe that he invented speech than to believe that he invented the faculties of sight and hearing, which are certainly the natural products of his organic nature and environments. So far as I can find through the whole range of animal life, all forms of land mammals possess vocal organs which are developed in a degree corresponding to the condition of the brain, and seem to be in every instance as capable of producing and controlling sounds as the brain is of thinking: in other words, the power of expression is in perfect keeping with the power of thinking. From my acquaintance with the animal kingdom, it is my firm belief that all mammals possess the faculty of speech in a degree commensurate with their experience and needs, and that domestic animals have a somewhat higher type of speech than their wild progenitors. Why are all forms of mammals endowed with vocal organs? Why should Nature bestow on them these organs if not designed for use? One or the other of two conclusions seems inevitable.

As a law of evolution and progress, all organs are imparted to animals for use and not for ornament. It seems consistent with what we know of Nature, to suppose that the vocal organs of these lower forms are being developed to meet a new requirement in the animal economy, or having once discharged some function necessary to the being and comfort of the animal, they are now lapsing into disuse and becoming atrophied. If they are in the course of development, it argues that the creature which possesses them must possess a rudimentary speech which is developing at a like rate into a higher type of speech. If they are in a state of decay or atrophy, it argues that the animal must have been able to speak at some former period, and that now, in losing the power of speech it is gradually losing the organ. In either case, the organs themselves would be in a state of development in harmony with the condition of the speech of the animal. [Sidenote: LIMITATIONS OF SPEECH] The function which speech discharges is the communication of ideas, and its growth must depend upon the extent of those ideas; and in all conditions of life, and in all forms of the animal kingdom, the uses of speech are confined to, and limited by the desires, thoughts, and concepts of those using it. Its extent is commensurate with requirement. To believe that there was a time in the history of the human race when man could not speak, is to destroy his ident.i.ty as man, and the romance of the _alalus_ could be justified from a scientific standpoint only as a compromise between the giants of science and superst.i.tion. Among the tribes of men whose modes of life are simple, whose wants are few, and whose knowledge is confined to their primitive condition, the number of words necessary to convey their thoughts is very limited. Among some savage races there are languages consisting of only a few hundred words at most, while as we rise in the scale of civil and domestic culture, languages become more copious and expressive as the wants become more numerous and the conditions of life more complex. As we descend from man to the lower animals, we find the types of speech degenerate just in proportion as we descend in the mental and moral plane, but it does not lose its ident.i.ty as speech. Through the whole animal kingdom from man to protozoa, types of speech differ as do the physical types to which they belong. But as the same vital processes are found throughout the whole circle of life, so the same phonetic basis is found through the whole range of speech.

CHAPTER XVIII.

The Motives of Speech--Expression--The Beginning of Human Speech--The Present Condition of Speech.

In vital economy, the search-light of science has found the protoplasm which from our present state of knowledge seems to be the first point of contact between elemental matter and the vital force. What secrets of biology remain unknown within the realm of life, only those who live in the future may ever know. In the first condition of vitalised matter we find the evidence of autonomy. Whatever may be the ultimate force which actuates this monad, the manifestations of its presence and the result of its energy are seen externally. Whatever may be the nature of that force which imparts motion to matter, the first impulse of the biod is to secure food or to a.s.sociate itself with a unit of its own kind. This is perhaps the first act of volition within the sphere of life, the first expression of some internal want, and is the first faint suggestion of a consciousness, however feeble; and I may add with propriety, that it is my opinion that the vital and psychic forces operate in a manner not unlike the electric and chemical forces. They appear to polarise, and in this condition act on matter in harmony with that great law of Nature under which positive repels positive and attracts negative, and _vice versa_. We shall not attempt to follow the tedious steps of progress from inanimate matter to man, but begin with those intermediate forms which are so far developed as to utter sounds and understand the sounds of others. We will deal only with tangible facts as we find them. From whatever source expression may arise, or at whatever point it may appear, it is prompted by desire or some kindred emotion, either positive or negative.

[Sidenote: MODES OF EXPRESSION]

At the point where we begin to discuss this question there are two distinct modes of expression, either one of which can be used without the other. But I may mention here a cogent fact, that in the lower forms of life the normal mode of expression is by signs with supplemental sounds. In the higher forms, expression is by sounds, and signs are supplemental. And from the lower to the higher forms this transition is in harmony with the development of physical types. It occurs to me that signs were the first form of expression, and that sounds were first used to call attention to the sign made; and by an a.s.sociation of ideas the sounds became a factor of expression, and were used to emphasise signs.

As we ascend the scale of life, sounds become more abundant, and signs less significant, and in the middle types they appear to be of nearly equal value, while in the higher tribes of man sounds are the normal mode of expression, and signs or gestures are used to emphasise them; and thus we see that signs and sounds in the development of the faculty of expression have quite changed places. This is consistent with the observed facts within the limits of human speech. There are tribes of mankind whose language is scarcely intelligible among themselves unless accompanied by signs; and it is said of some of the African tribes that their gestures are more eloquent than their speech. It appears to me consistent to believe that speech appears in the animal organism simultaneously with the vocal organs, and that the desire of expression must have preceded this. [Sidenote: PRESENT CONDITION OF SPEECH] The condition of the vocal organs depends upon the type of speech which they are used to utter, and the speech depends upon the quality of thought it is intended to express. That type of speech used by the Caucasian race within the s.p.a.ce of a few centuries has developed from a vocabulary limited to a few thousand words into the polished languages of modern Europe, comprising new types and tens of thousands of new words, until to-day our own language contains more than two hundred and twenty thousand words, very few of which, however, if any, are entirely new.

The phonetic elements on which is built up this huge vocabulary do not very greatly exceed in number those found in the lowest types of human speech in the world. The total number of these sounds does not much exceed two score in the highest forms of human speech; and about half this number can be shown as the vocal products of some species of the lower animals. Some philologists claim that the blending of consonant and vowel sounds is the mark which distinguishes human speech from the sounds uttered by the lower animals. To show how poorly this gigantic superstructure of fossilised science is supported by the facts, I have developed such effects in the phonograph from a basis of sounds purely mechanical, and without the aid of any part of the vocal apparatus of man or animal. The sounds from which I have developed such results were neither vowel nor consonant as those sounds are defined, but simply prolonged musical notes. In another chapter will be found some of the experiments which I have performed with the phonograph in the investigation of sounds of various kinds. If I am allowed to think for myself at all, I am not ready to accept as final some of the dogmas on the theory of sound which have long been held and taught, and many of which remain orthodox for no other reason than that no one has denied them. I am not ready at this point to spring upon the world any new theory of sound, but I am quite ready to refuse to believe some of the tenets set forth in the creeds of philology.

Heresy is the author of progress, and I confess myself a heretic on many of the current doctrines of the science of sounds.

CHAPTER XIX.

Language embraces Speech--Speech, Words, Grammar, and Rhetoric.

A definition of the word speech as used in this particular work is given elsewhere, and by this definition the word is used only in that sense which limits it to the sphere of oral sounds. It is that form of language which addresses itself only to the ear. The sounds which const.i.tute it may be supplemented by signs or gestures, but such signs are only adjuncts, and are not to be regarded as an integral part of speech in its true sense. Speech cannot be acquired by those forms of life which occupy the lowest horizons of the animal kingdom, and have no organs with which to produce sound. In the light of modern use and acceptation language, broadly interpreted, includes all modes and means of communication between mind and mind. It therefore includes speech as one form, while signs or gestures const.i.tute another form. Writing in all its various modes is another form of language. It may be subst.i.tuted for either speech or gestures, but it does not thereby become speech in a literal sense, but within itself it const.i.tutes another form of language. There seems to be some vague and subtle method of communication found in certain spheres of life which is called telepathy. While it is a mere ghost of language, so to speak, it has an ident.i.ty which cannot be denied. This may perhaps be called another form of language.

[Sidenote: LANGUAGE EMBRACES SPEECH]

By some eminent men of letters it is claimed that speech was invented, and therefore cannot be universally the same; and this is proven by the fact that different tribes of men have different tongues. They do not appear to realise, that to the first cardinal sounds of speech so much has been added age by age, by slow accretions, that the radex of speech is but a mere drop in the great ocean of sounds. The mobility of speech is such as to make it more susceptible to change than matter is; and yet we find that, by the laws of change, man has been evolved from a less complex state of matter, and that in these latter years he can only be identified as the descendant of his prototype by the most scrutinising care, and by picking up the dropped st.i.tches in the great fabric of Nature. To ill.u.s.trate the slow and imperceptible, yet never ceasing, never failing process of evolution, we may imagine a man picking up a single grain of sand at a certain point and carrying it a distance of a thousand feet, where he deposits it at another certain point; returning, takes a second grain of sand from the same place as he secured the first, and carries it to the point at which he deposited the first, and thus continues through his life. At his death his son succeeds him in the task, and continues through his life, and at the death of this man his son succeeds; and thus in turn each one succeeds the other through a million generations. Supposing the wind and rain left these grains of sand unmolested during this long lapse of time, it is evident that at the place from which the sand was taken there would be a hole, and where it was deposited there would be a hill. It is by such slight changes that Nature does her work; and thus it is that speech, as well as matter, has been transformed from what it was to what it is. The physical basis of life retains its ident.i.ty through all those varied forms, from protozoa to the highest type; and so the phonetic basis of speech adheres through all the changing modes of thought and expression.

Speech is the highest type of language and the most accurate mode of expression, and belongs only to the higher forms of the animal kingdom.

It has pa.s.sed through all inferior horizons coinciding with the mental, moral, and social planes through which man has pa.s.sed in the course of his evolution.

[Sidenote: SPEECH AND WORDS]

Words are the factors of speech and the highest development of that faculty. A word may be composed of one or more sounds so articulated as to preclude any interval of time between the utterance of any two of them, as "tune," in which the sounds appear to overlap and blend into each other. A single word may signify more than a single thing, and sometimes will suggest to the mind a category or group of connected thoughts, as "eat" or "telegraph," and such is the value of many of our words. This is especially true of words which combine two roots; but such a combination is usually found only in the higher types of human speech. But in these higher types words bear such relations to each other that we cannot well convey a complete idea with a single word; and hence it is that in the modes of expression used by man, each separate statement consists of two or more words bearing certain relations to each other, and these are often qualified by other words of less importance. This redundancy is due to the higher and more complex modes of thought used by man; and it is on such a state of facts that we have founded that branch of science called grammar, which would be of little use among those forms which occupy the planes of life inferior to man, and it is found of little use among the lower tribes of man, where it does not exist in any written form. Grammar does not make language, but serves as a kind of anchor by which the dialects of human speech are somewhat unified and made more stable; and to this is due in some measure the fact that savage tongues and dialects are more susceptible to change in their structure, while the phonetic basis upon which they rest remains the same.

[Sidenote: GRAMMAR AND RHETORIC]

In the more refined tongues of human speech, we go beyond that code of laws called grammar and amplify them into rhetoric. This branch of the science of speech could find no place among the lower types, as the words are few from which they may select; and so exact and arbitrary is the meaning of each one, and so uniform the relations, that no great variety of expression can be made with such a limited vocabulary. Their eloquence is in their brevity of speech. But while the types of speech used by the lower primates occupy a plane so low in the scale, they are as truly speech as the vocal organs that produce the sounds are truly vocal organs. Life is life, in what form soever it is found. It is not less real in the mollusc than in the man. The same is true of emotion, of thought, of expression, and of speech. Life, emotion, thought, expression, and speech began in embryo, and have developed co-ordinately with all the faculties possessed by man. They are as dependent upon each other as matter is on force, and as inseparable as light from energy.

Speech is the physical manifestation of which thought is the ultimate force; it is a spoke in the chariot-wheels of consciousness; it is the body of which thought is the soul.

CHAPTER XX.

Life and Consciousness--Consciousness and Emotion--Emotion and Thought--Thought and Expression--Expression and Speech--The Vocal Organs and Sound--Speech in City and Country--Music, Pa.s.sions, and Taste--Life and Reason.

At the beginning of life there is a consciousness which is not more feeble than is the life with which it is a.s.sociated; and as that spark of life kindles into a flame, so that spark of consciousness kindles into the "ego," and nowhere can a line be drawn at which it may be said "here consciousness first intercepted life." But as the living form develops organs and members, through the agency of the vital force, whatever that may be, so consciousness develops into desires, emotion and thought. Where shall the line be drawn which separates these attributes? Standing in the centre, we look around and see the horizon touching the plain on every side, and this appears to us as a great circle, the centre of which is always occupied by the observer, and from our standpoint we imagine that everything between us and that horizon must be that distance from the centre; but as we move our point of view from place to place, we move the circle with us, and yet we cannot find the boundary line which marks this circle at any time. In a manner not unlike this we pa.s.s from centre to centre of the circles of life, and carry with us the circle, so that at no one point do we ever appear to be much closer to the horizon than we were at any other point.

[Sidenote: LIFE AND CONSCIOUSNESS]

The cla.s.sification of genera and species is in a great degree arbitrary; but much less so than are these abstract characters of life and mind.

There is nowhere a line at which emotion stops and thought begins; there is nowhere a line at which thought stops and expression begins; there is nowhere a line at which expression stops and speech begins. These blend into each other so that only by comparing the extremes can we discern a difference.

The tenets of metaphysics have heretofore been made to harmonise with the tenets of theology, and hence it is that we have learned to follow the laws laid down by others and not to think for ourselves. It has been as much a heresy to gainsay the dogmas of science as those of religion until recently; and even now the tender-footed doctors guard their theories with a vigilance and jealousy worthy of the angel that guarded the gates of Eden.

[Sidenote: CONSCIOUSNESS AND EMOTION]

Why should it be thought strange that monkeys talk? They see, hear, love, hate, think, and act by the same means and to the same end as man does. They experience pain and pleasure, to express which they cry and laugh just as man does. If the voluntary sounds they make do not mean something, why may those creatures not as well be dumb? If they do mean something, why may we not determine what that meaning is? It is true that their language is quite meagre and suited only to a low plane of life, but it may be the cytula from which all human speech proceeds, or it may be the inferior fruit borne upon the same great tree of speech.

The organs of sensation in these creatures are modelled by the same design as those of man, are adapted to the same uses, and discharge the same functions. Then why should the vocal powers alone be abnormal, except in a degree measured by the difference of place which they occupy in the scale of Nature?

Social intercourse among men has been the chief means of developing human speech, and we find a true index to its condition in the social status of the different races of mankind; and by coming closer home, we find that even in different communities of the same race and within the limits of the same nation, a difference in the accuracy and volume of speech, which is measured by the difference of social culture. We find in rural districts, spa.r.s.ely peopled and remote from the great centres of population, that speech is less polished and the number of words used greatly reduced in comparison to the same language used in the great cities and more populous communities, where, by reason of contact with each other and the constant use of speech, the vocal powers are much more developed and the command of language very much improved. This same law of development, inversely applied, would lead us in a direct line down through Nature, rank by rank, and we would find it a reliable unit of measure throughout the whole perspective of development. The faculties of music, taste, and reason are measured by a like unit. It is difficult to trace the musical powers of animals, since music does not contribute to the comfort or development of types and only affords pleasure to the intellectual being, and hence is only an accomplishment obeying no rule of normal growth.

[Sidenote: THE FACULTY OF REASON]

As the use of the natural sense of taste makes possible the choice of nourishment, and all forms of life are thus sustained, the natural taste becomes an important factor of their comfort, and upon this physical basis rests, perhaps, the whole superstructure of ethics. The first idea of ownership is doubtless found in the possession of food; and this right of property is protected by the unwritten laws of incipient life.

The faculty of reason, which man has arrogated to himself, is only limited by that dim line which bounds the vital sphere and sheds its rays through all the kingdom of life, from that point where the vital spark first lights the monad, through all the labyrinths of change, to man in the full pride of his divinity, standing upon the threshold of the angelic state. It is not by the exercise of reason that water flows down hill, or that matter obeys the law of gravity; but in the exercise of autonomy, however feeble may be the motive, reason guides the act.

The power of this faculty is measured by the development of others, and there is no point between the two extremes at which reason intercepts life. The degree in which all the powers of sense and faculty are developed determines the horizon of the thing which possesses them. The aggregation of powers to act const.i.tutes life; and the aggregation of powers to guide the action const.i.tutes reason.

[Sidenote: ALL MAMMALS REASON]

Leaving the realm of metaphysics and returning to the order of primates, to which we shall confine our present work, I shall resume by repeating that not only do primates have the faculty of speech, but the whole family of mammals have some form of speech which is in keeping with their conditions of life. In addition to this declaration, I a.s.sert that all mammals reason by the same means and to the same ends, but not to the same degree. The reason which controls the conduct of a man is just the same in kind as that which prompts the ape. The latter cannot carry the process to such a great extent, but _microsophic_ pedants have not shown in what respect the methods differ only in degree. That same faculty which guided man to tame the winds of commerce, taught the nautilus to lift its tentacles and embrace the pa.s.sing breeze. Yet we are told that reason guides the man and instinct guides the nautilus.

These are but two names for light; the one is dawn, the other noon, but both are light. I cannot see in what respect the light of a lamp differs from that of a bonfire except in volume; they are the products of the same forces in Nature, acting through the same media, and, becoming causes, produce the same effects. That psychic spark which dimly glows in the animal bursts into a blaze of effulgence in man. The one differs from the other just as a single ray of sunlight differs from the glaring light of noon. [Sidenote: EFFECTS OF ONE GREAT CAUSE] If man could disabuse his mind of that contempt for things below his plane of life, and hush the siren voice of self-conceit, his better senses might be touched by the eloquence of truth. But while the va.s.sals of his empty pride control his mind, the plainest facts appeal to him in vain, and all the cogency of proof is lost. He is unwilling to forego that vain belief that he is Nature's idol, and that he is a duplicate of Deity.