Blair Collection > Vestigia celtica

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on my part ceases, the object loses its pre-
eminence ; yielding up its place of prior
interest and consequent proximity to some
other object, now nearer to my thoughts.
This instinctive adjustment of the relative
local position of the elements of primitive
" speech-matter " grows, gradually and
naturally, into the grammatical idea of a
local, or " space," relation between the
word-members of a statement or proposi-
tion. That idea of " space " relation may
long be of very limited scope and applica-
tion. It may, indeed, be acted upon as an
unconscious instinct, long before it is con-
sciously realised, or at all clearly evolved
as an idea. But potentially it is already
paramount ; is, in fact, the potential mother-
thoueht of all oframmatical relations, and of
the conscious notional distinctions to which
these grammatical distinctions give expres-
sion. The germ, the nucleated mother-cell,
if one may so speak, is there already,
waiting to be fertilised, with the widening
of my experience, acquisitions, and growing
wants and desires, for the production, pro