Page:Proofs of the Enquiry into Homer's Life and Writings.pdf/28

Rh H o m e r s Life and Writings.

i< Sec

SECTION

III.

SO m E of the wisest and most knowing of the Ancients ascribe the first civilizing of Mankind to the Invention of Speech. ' By means of that Faculty, says the learned 5 7* -socrates, which is implanted in us, to persuade ' Arts : And in short almost all the Inventions ' of Men are owing to the Power of Speech.' Dtodorus the Sicilian describes it more particularly : 4 It is said, that the first Men, who appeared P. 33. ' manner; and, like the Beasts of the Woods, ' Taste they could find, and with such Fruits ' as the Trees afford without Culture: Taught ' by Necessity, they ran to one another's As* sistance when attacked by the wild Beasts ; ' and the Voice or Sounds which they uttered, ' being at first confused, and of no signification, ' by little and little they learned to articulate
 * one another, and to declare mutually the In' clinations of our Minds, we were not only de' livered from our first wild and brutal Way of
 * living, but, having entered into Societies, we
 * founded Cities, established Laivs, and invented
 * in the World, lived in a wild and disorderly
 * used to range about in quest of Food ; they
 * sustained themselves with Herbs of the mildest
 * tbeir Words'

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