Paul Brunton Philosophic Foundation homepage > Notebooks of Paul Brunton

---

The instinctive faculty of animals and primitive men gives way in time to the thinking faculty of developed men who form concepts, invent words, and formulate phrases to accommodate what they try to express. In time the habit of thinking conditions them as it gets more strongly seated. When the need arises with further development for abstract thoughts, the words used tend to spread out their meaning, become more generalized and vague, and thus in a different way tend to limit consciousness still further. If the consciousness is to free itself from these limitations it must probe words more semantically and cut into concepts with more precision. This becomes important if the higher Truth becomes the object of a quest.

-- Notebooks Category 7: The Intellect > Chapter 5 : Semantics > # 82