GOD having designed Man for a sociable Creature, made him not only with an inclination, and under a necessity to have fellowship with those of his own kind; but furnished him also with Language, which was to be the great Instrument, and common Tye of Society. Man therefore had by Nature his Organs so fashioned, as to be fit to frame articulate Sounds, which we call Words. But this was not enough to produce Language; for Parrots, and several other Birds, will be taught to make articulate Sounds distinct enough, which yet, by no means, are capable of Language.
Besides articulate Sounds therefore, it was farther necessary, that he should be able to use these Sounds, as signs of internal Conceptions; and to make them stand as marks for the Ideas within his own Mind, whereby they might be made known to others, and the Thoughts of Mens Minds be conveyed from one to another.
But neither was this sufficient to make Words so useful as they ought to be. It is not enough for the perfection of Language, that Sounds can be made signs of Ideas, unless those signs can be so made use of, as to comprehend several particular Things: For the multiplication of Words would have perplexed their Use, had every particular thing need of a distinct name to be signified by.
Words then are made to be signs of our Ideas, and are general or particular, as the Ideas they stand for are general or particular. But besides these Names which stand for Ideas, there be others which Men have found and make use of, not to signifie any Idea, but the want or absence of some Ideas, simple or complex, or all Ideas together; such as are the Latin words, Nihil, and in English, Ignorance and Burrenness. All which negative or privative Words, cannot be said properly to belong to, or signifie no Ideas: for then they would be perfectly insignificant Sounds; but they relate to positive Ideas, and signifie their absence.
It may also lead us a little towards the Original of all our Notions and Knowledge, if we remark, how great a dependence our Words have on common sensible Ideas; and how those which are made use of, to stand for Actions and Notions quite removed from sense, have their Original, and are transferred from obvious sensible Ideas; v. g. to Imagine, Apprehend, Comprehend, Adhere, Conceive, Instill, Disgust, Disturbance, Tranquillity, &c. are all Words taken from the Operations of sensible Things, and applied to certain Modes of Thinking. Spirit, in its primary signification, is Breath; Angel, a Messenger: And I doubt not, but if we could trace them to their Originals, we should find, in all Languages, the names, which stand for Things that fall not under our Senses, to have had their first rise from sensible Ideas. By which we may give some kind of guess, what kind of Notions they were, and whence derived, which filled their Minds, who were the first Beginners of Languages; and how Nature, even in the naming of Things, unawares suggested to Men the Originals and Principles of all their Knowledge: whilst, to give Names, that might make known to others any Operations they felt in themselves, or any other Ideas, that came not under their Senses, they were fain to borrow Words from ordinary known Ideas of Sensation, by that means to make others the more easily to conceive those Operations they experimented in themselves, which made no outward sensible appearances; and then when they had got known and agreed Names, to signifie those internal Operations of their own Minds, they were sufficiently furnished to make known by Words, all their other Ideas; since they could consist of nothing, but either of outward sensible Perceptions, or of the inward Operations of their Minds about them; we having, as has been proved, no Ideas at all, but what originally come either from sensible Objects without, or what we feel within our selves, from the inward Workings of our own Spirits, which we are conscious to our selves of within.
But to understand better the use and force of Language, as subservient to Instruction and Knowledge, it will be convenient to consider, First, To what it is that Names, in the use of Language, are immediately applied. Secondly, since all (except proper) Names are general, and so stand not particularly for this or that single Thing; but for sorts and ranks of Things, it will be necessary to consider, in the next place, what the Sorts and Kinds, or, if you rather like the Latin Names, what the Species and Genera of Things are; wherein they consist; and how they come to be made. These being (as they ought) well looked into, we shall the better come to find the right use of Words; the natural Advantages and Defects of Language; and the remedies that ought to be used, to avoid the inconveniences of obscurity or uncertainty in the signification of Words, without which, it is impossible to discourse with any clearness, or order, concerning Knowledge: Which being conversant about Propositions, and those most commonly universal ones, has greater connexion with Words, than perhaps is suspected. These Considerations therefore, shall be the matter of the following Chapters.