A philosophical amusement upon the language of beasts / Written originally in French. By Father Bougeant ... , now confined at La Fleche on account of this work.
- Bougeant, père, 1690-1743. Amusement philosophique sur le langage des bêtes
- Date:
- 1739
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A philosophical amusement upon the language of beasts / Written originally in French. By Father Bougeant ... , now confined at La Fleche on account of this work. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![136 ] fefs that Nature, had fhe indowed them with the Faculty of Speaking, would have given them a needlefs Talent. But wherever two Beads fhall fland in an habitual Need of each other, and form among them a lading Society, they of necedity mud fpeak to each other. How is it to be con¬ ceived, that two Sparrows in the Heat of their Lud, or in the Cares attending the bringing up of their Family, have not a thoufand Things to fay to each other ? This would be the Place of inlivening our Subjed by curious Particularities. But my Intention is not to make a philofophical Work degenerate into Budbonry. You fee I infid upon none but folid Arguments, and I fay it is impoffible in the Order of Nature, that a Sparrow who loves his Wife, has not, in order to perfuade her, a Language full of Ëxpreffion and Tendernels. He mud fcold her when fhe plays the Coquet : He mud menace the Sparks that come to cajole her : He mud be able to under- ftand her when die calls him : He mud, while fhe is adiduoufly fitting on her Brood, be able to pro¬ vide Necedfaries for her, and difcern whether it is iome Food fhe asks for, or Feathers to repair her Ned ; for all which Things a Language is necedfary. Many Beads, one will fay, have not a fettled and permanent Houfhold like Birds: (For by the bye Birds are the Model of conjugal Condancy and Fidelity:) This I very well know, and their Number is even very great. Such are Dogs, Horiès, Deer, and almod all Quadrupeds, Fidies and Reptiles. But I fhall always infid upon a Principle granted and acknowledged as certain. Nature is too much like herfelf in Productions of one and the fame Genus, to have put between ]§eads lb elîèntial a Difference or that of fpeaking ■' QV](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b30376166_0044.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
