Chapter XII: Section III

_Application of these Conclusions to the Question of the Unity of
the Human Race._

It may be objected that if language were in its origin imitative, the identity of the various languages of the globe shown in this work may be accounted for on that principle, without ascribing that important fact to an original unity of race. But an answer to this objection is involved in the following passage from the Mithridates of Adelung and Vater:

“In those instances in which the sound imitated is very definite and invariable, the imitation is so likewise (as in that of the name of the Cuckoo, which is nearly the same in all languages). But this is seldom the case. Generally the natural sound is very variable; hence one people imitates one, and another a different change. A very striking example occurs in the names for Thunder. Distinct as this natural sound is, the impressions which it makes on the ear are very variable, and it has accordingly given rise to a great number of different names, which all betray, nevertheless, their origin in Nature. In my Ancient History of the German Language I have adduced, in proof of this proposition, 353 of these names from the European languages.”

It appears, then, that the principle that language was imitative in its origin does not involve the inference that there is for that reason a tendency in human language to Unity. On the contrary, this principle leads, as has been shown, to the very opposite conclusion. Hence features of affinity displayed by different Tongues must be referred to original unity of race.