IV
Linguistics in General
Words can not be satisfactorily studied by themselves. Important as they are, separately considered and in their relations with each other, their categories and their wider kinship are even more important if one would pry into the secret of their significations. Although the popular conception of language is that it is merely a mass of words capable of combination according to rule, at need and will, it really is much more than the whole bulk of nomenclature in the world.
Language is a social institution of a special nature; and its peculiar province is to express ideas by means of a nicely organized system of signs. Thus the science of language embraces the study of signs employed by the intellec-
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