During the voluntary recall of
words in speech and thought by virtue of the intimate association tracts
connecting the grey matter of the whole speech zone, it is not a single
part of this zone which is in action, but the whole of it; and when we
assign to definite parts of the speech zone different functions in
connection with language, we really refer to areas in which the process is
most active or is primarily initiated, for the whole brain is in action
just as it is in the recognition of an object which we see, hear, feel, or
move. What really comes before us is contributed more by the mind itself
than by the present object.
There is, however, a direct functional association between the auditory and
glosso-kinaesthetic (sense of movement of the tongue) centres on the one
hand and the visual and cheiro-kinaesthetic (sense of movement of the hand)
on the other. No less intimate must be the connection between the auditory
word-centre and the visual word-centre; they must necessarily be called
into association actively in successive units of time, as in reading aloud
or writing from dictation. Educated deaf mutes think with revived visual
symbols either of lips or fingers. Words are to a great extent symbols
whereby we carry on thought, and thinking becomes more elaborate and
complex as we rise in the scale of civilisation, because more and more are
verbal symbols instituted for concrete visual images.
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