superficial in their knowledge, as well as slovenly
in their practice; and that many vain composers of books have proved
themselves _despisers_ of this study, by the abundance of their
inaccuracies, and the obviousness of their solecisms.

OBS. 2.--Some grammarians have taught that the word _language_ is of much
broader signification, than that which is given to it in the definition
above. I confine it to speech and writing. For the propriety of this
limitation, and against those authors who describe the thing otherwise, I
appeal to the common sense of mankind. One late writer defines it thus:
"LANGUAGE is _any means_ by which one _person_ communicates his _ideas_ to
_another_."--_Sanders's Spelling-Book_, p. 7. The following is the
explanation of an other slack thinker: "One may, by speaking or by writing,
(and sometimes _by motions_,) communicate his thoughts to others. _The
process_ by which this is done, is called LANGUAGE.--_Language_ is _the
expression_ of thought _and feeling_."--_S. W. Clark's Practical Gram._, p.
7. Dr. Webster goes much further, and says, "LANGUAGE, in its most
extensive sense, is the instrument or means of communicating ideas _and
affections_ of the mind _and body_, from one _animal to another_. In this
sense, _brutes possess the power of language_; for by various inarticulate
sounds, they make known their wants, desires, and sufferings."--
_Philosophical Gram._, p. 11; _Improved Gram._, p. 5. This latter
definition the author of that vain book, "_the District School_," has
adopted in his chapter on Grammar. Sheridan, the celebrated actor and
orthoepist, though he seems to confine language to the human species, gives
it such an extension as to make words no necessary part of its essence.
"The first thought," says he, "that would occur to every one, who had not
properly considered the point, is, that language is composed of words. And
yet, this is so far from being an adequate idea of language, that the point
in which most men think its very essence to consist, is not even a
necessary property of language. For language, in its full extent, means,
any way or method whatsoever, by which _all that passes in the mind of one
man_, may be manifested to another."--_Sheridan's Lectures on Elocution_,
p. 129. Again: "I have already _shown_, that words are, in their own
nature, _no essential part of language_, and are only considered so through
custom."--_Ib._ p. 135.

OBS. 3.--According to S. Kirkham's