JOHN HORNE TOOKE 1S PHILOSOPHI OF LANGUAGE JOHN HORNE '1'000 • S PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGI b;y Barbara J. .Albu .l thesis subllitted to the Facult;y of Graduate Studies and Research in partial taltilment of the reqmirements tor the degree of Maater of Arts. Departaent of Philosophy, HcGill University, Montreal. April, 196$ • PREFACE Professor Raymond Klibansky suggested John Horne Tooke 1s philosopby of language as a thesis topic. He directed me to many of the JIOre illportant sources, and examined and copied out material in the British Museum 1lhich would have been otherwise unavailable to me. I aa most gratetul also for the many stylistic suggestions resulting from his patient perusal of the manuscript as well as for his pointed questions 1lhich have helped me see the subject more clearly-. I thank my father-in-law, Victor Claude Jlbu, who sent tome a microfilm of the British Museum cow of John Locke's !!! Essay Concerning Human Understanding in which are contained Horne Tooke's manuscript notes. Also, I thank: my husband, Anthony Leopold Jl.bu, who read the manuscript and suggested im.prov•ents in the style. Mrs. Marilyn Verhagen produced the typescript with both admirable accuracy and despatch. The spelling of Greek, Gothie, md .Anglo-saxon words has been r011.8Jlized throughout. I have consulted, but not listed separately elsewhere, several general reference works including the British Museum Catalogue, the Dictionary ~National Biography, !!!,! Caabridge Historz ot English Literature, !!!! C•bridge Bibliograp;g of English Literature, and the Enczclopaedia Brita:nnica. The details of all other books and articles used have been given fully in each case in the footnote to the first reference to that book or article. TABIB OF CONTENTS I INTRODUCTION................................................... 1 A References to John Home Tooke •s Philosophy ~ Language Wbich Bave Appeared During· the Twentieth CentU1'7 ..... •• •• •••• •• ••• •• •• 1 B The Influence John Home Tooke 1 s Work Exercised•••••••••••••••• 3 C The Signiticance o.f Borne Tooke's Theor,r o.f Language••••••••••• 12 D Some Textua1 and Interpretive Difficultt.es Met in Reading Borne Tooke 1s Works•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 14 E The Present Thesis Out1ined•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 20 II BIOGRAPHY •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 21 III THE DEVELOPMmT OF HORNE 'IDOKE 1S INTEREST IN LANGUAGE •• •• ••• • • • 26 IV HORNE TOOKE'S EXPERIMBBTA.L TES!' OF AN A PRIORI THEORY OF SPEEŒ 43 V HORNE TOOKE 1S THEORY OF LANGUAGE••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 47 A Speech and the •Manner o.f Signification'••••••••••••••••••••••• 47 B The Notion o.f •Force'•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 52 C Substitutions and Abbreviations•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 66 D Two Necessar.f Parts of Speech•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 76 VI OONCLUDING REMARKS CONCERNING HORNE TOOKE'S THmRY OF LlNGtJAGE. 83 VII BIBLIOGRAPHY •••••• ~···••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 92 • ••• Words ••• are the neceasar,y channel through wbich his (the philosopher'~ most precious liquors must flow.• Diversions ~ Pnrlez, p. 165. I INTRODUCTION John Home 'l'ooke's philosophy of language is worth examiniDg because, although his work has been infiuential, and although there is much of intrinsic interest in what he wrote - particularlJ' for many of the questions discussed b7 philosopher& recentl7 - still, he ba& seldom been mentioned in English philosophical circ1es during this centur.y.1 A References to John Horne Tooke•s Phi1o&OphY .2!, Language libich !!!!!. Appeared During .:!":!!.! Twentieth Century In 1923 C.K. Ogden and I.A. Richards included Home Tooke among those writers froa whom. they bad derived 1 instruction and occasionally amuseaent 1. 2 Beyond characterising Horne Tooke • s theorz as an example of the philologica] approach to the science of symboliD, they said notbing explicit about his philosopby. Minnie Clare Yarborough included in ber biographz of John Horne Tooke a chapter in which she SWIID.&rized his theorz of language and quoted many estimates of his importance. She cœcluded, 'The principles 11hieh 1 John Borne, in 1782 upon the request ot his trieD.d Willia Tooke vhose property he bad saved in a lawsuit, by libelling the Speaker ot the House of Commons, added the surname 1Tooke' to his own, thus, •John Horne Tooke' (Dictio~2f National Biogr!Phy). I have reterred to him as 'Horne Tooke•, in part fo oving the •John Horne, atterwards Horne Tooke' of the British Museum catalogue. This practice is not universal. Even atter 1782 his name appearëdin indices as simplJ' 'Horne', whereas a few years later he became sometimes simp1y •Tooke'. 2 c.K. Ogden and I.A. Richards, The Meani!l of Meaning, eighth edition (New York, 1946), p. II. --- -- 2. Tooke advanced vere sound ~d suggestive, but a deficiency of knovledge led him. to erroneous asser.tions. His vork vas completed just before the daw of the new era in pbi1ological research. By the middle of the nineteenth century the investigations of Bopp, Grimm, and Pott bad raised the stuey of language to the rank of a science. Had Tooke been familiar Vith the funda.mentals of Modern Comparative Philology, his theories vould have undergone some radical changes. His discoveries, hovever, were far in advance of his predecessors' • As the originator of· an ingenious syste11. of language study, he occupies a unique position in the history of philology' • 3 Miss Yarborough 1 s estimate recapitulates in its main point that of Leslie Stephen. He bad vritten of 'Horne Tooke's '*Diversions of 0 Purley 1 which is a premature attempt to apply philological enquiries to the histor,y of thougbt•.4 Of more philosophical interest are two recent references to his vork. In the first, Willard van Orman Quine considered briefly Horne Tooke's semantic reductionism.5 In the second, Anthony Quinton placed Horne Tooke•s vork in the pre-bistory of linguistic philosophy.6 3 Minnie Clare Yarborough, ~ Horne Tooke (New York, 1926), P• 145. 4 Lesli~ Stephen, History of !nglish Thought .!!!. the Eighteenth Century, third edJ.tion (London, 1902}, I, ~B-59. 5 Willard Van Orman Quine, From a Lo~ical Point of Vi ev, second edition revised (Ne.w York and Evanston, c: 1 1), pp. 38-39.- . 6 Raymond K1ibansk.y, editor, PhilosoPhl ~the Mid•Centu;r! Survez (Firenze, 1958), II, 153. 3. The onl.7 modern attempt at a eritieal estiaate, b;r Otto :runke, is in Gerun and uavailable in English translation. Fanke gaTe a one­ sided view ot Horne Tooke's philosoph;r as a pre-scientitie philolog;r conditioned b;r hie· Weltansehauung.7 B !!'!! Intl•ence !2!!! Home Tooke 1 s ~ Exereiaed Both graaaariana and philosophera read Horne Tooke • s conclusions eoneerning language. In 1778, Horne Tooke published im. -A Letter --to John Durming, lsq. the first resulta of his researeh eoneerning language. 8 A few IIIDnths later Da.gald St81Jart noticed Horne Tooke's Letter, 1in a course of lectures on Moral Philosoph;r, lihich (at a Terr earl;r period of BfT lite, and while stUl Protessor ot Matheaaties) I delivered at the Universit;r ot Ed.inburgh, during the absence of Dr. Ferguson in North AMriea.•9 Although Stewart opposed what he consid.ered to be tbe uterialiatic iaplications of Horne Tooke 1s theories, he ade use of the notions of' 1 abbreviation• md ~~despateh • which vere central to Horne Tooke 1 s thought.lO 7 Otto Funke, ID&lische Sprachphilosophie !!, splteren !!• Jahrhundert (Bern, 1934), pp. 86, 89• 8 John Horne Tooke, ! Letter ~ i2!!! J!!nn:i~, Bsq. (LondGn, 1778). This work vas included b7 Horne Tooke 1 a editor, chard TëV"lor, in ali the editions of Home Toote•s vork 1ihich he, TllJ'lor edited. Subsequent references to it will be to •Letter•, · to, the page nUilbering of Ta;rlor 1s 1840 edition. 9 Da.gald Stewart, &leaents of the Philosopbz' of' the Huan Mind IV. 38, 11ote 1. 'l'he te:x:t is that ôt Sir iill1811 H811ilton. 1sedition, TiieCOlleeted Works .!! !!lald Stewart (Edinburgh, 18S4-186o). - 10 Stewart, IV. 17 • 1 4. Noah Webster 1 a contem.porar;y even more renowned, at least in North America, al8o made use of Horne Tooke•s theories in a series of lectures. Horne Tooke bad published a more developed version in 1786, under the title Epea Pteroenta, !!: the Diversions E!, Purlez.n Noah Webster dealt with Horne Tooke' s work in his fourth r Dissertation' , as he travelled lecturing between Richmond, Virginia, and Portsmouth, New Hampshire, during 1785 and 1786. These Dissertations were both reported in the newspapers and later published in book fora. He said, ' ••• the discovery of the true theory of the construction of language, seelll8 to have been reserved tor Mr. Horne Tooke, author of' the "Diversions of Purler' •.12 Webster misinterpreted Horne Tooke's theories. The noun vas not the principal part of speech f'or Horne Tooke, as Webster had claimed; nor vere the prepositions, conjunctions, and adverbs, to be classitied as abbreviations; nor did the verb express action and existence. Througbout his later Dissertations, Webster paraphrased Horne Tooke's work. The anonymous author of an article entitled •English Orthoep:r' 1 reterring to the effect Horne Tooke's work had on his contemporaries, wrote, • ••• this first onset of Tooke •••produced a shock which was then severelT telt, and .from which the followers ot Johnson have not yet entirely llJohn H9rne Tooke, Epea Pteroenta, ~,!!!!Diversions~ Parlefo (London_, 1786) • For his use of H0118r' s phrase 1 w.i.Dged words, see page • 1 Purlez• vas the name of the estate of William Tooke which Horne Tooke ac(Jlired for hiliiBelt much later. References to the work will be to Diversions, to the version edited by Richard Taylor (London 1840). 1~oah Webster, Dissertations on the English Language, reprinted {Gainesville, Florida, 1951). -- 5. recovered' •13 S81lue1 Johnson vas not hillself' aortal.l.y vounded, although be ha.d. notieed Horne Tooke. Jut befcre Letter appeared in 1778, Horne Tooke had been imprisoned fo1lowing a trial .