Language Quote by Ferdinand de Saussure

“Time changes all things; there is no reason why language should escape this universal law”

Ferdinand de Saussure

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Language Law Reason Should Time Time Change Time changes Universal laws

More by Ferdinand de Saussure

Nearly all institutions, it might be said, are based on signs, but these signs do not directly evoke things.

Ferdinand de Saussure

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In general, the philological movement opened up countless sources relevant to linguistic issues, treating them in quite a different spirit from traditional grammar; for…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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The ultimate law of language is, dare we say, that nothing can ever reside in a single term. This is a direct consequence of…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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It is useful to the historian, among others, to be able to see the commonest forms of different phenomena, whether phonetic, morphological or other,…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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It is only since linguistics has become more aware of its object of study, i.e. perceives the whole extent of it, that it is…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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A language presupposes that all the individual users possess the organs.

Ferdinand de Saussure

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Of all social institutions language is least amenable to initiative. It blends with the life of society, and the latter, inert by nature, is…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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The business, task or object of the scientific study of languages will if possible be 1) to trace the history of all known languages.…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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The first of these phases is that of grammar, invented by the Greeks and carried on unchanged by the French. It never had any…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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Written forms obscure our view of language. They are not so much a garment as a disguise.

Ferdinand de Saussure

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Everyone, left to his own devices, forms an idea about what goes on in language which is very far from the truth.

Ferdinand de Saussure

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Linguistics will have to recognise laws operating universally in language, and in a strictly rational manner, separating general phenomena from those restricted to one…

Ferdinand de Saussure

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