The first of these phases is that of grammar, invented by the Greeks and carried on unchanged by the French. It never had any philosophical view of a language as such.

Within speech, words are subject to a kind of relation that is independent of the first and based on their linkage: these are syntagmatic relations, of which I have spoken.

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

Speech has both an individual and a social side, and we cannot conceive of one without the other.

The critical principle demanded an examination, for instance, of the contribution of different periods, thus to some extent embarking on historical linguistics.

The very special place that a language occupies among institutions is undeniable, but there is much more to be said-, a comparison would tend rather to bring out the differences.

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