A linguistic system is a series of differences of sound combined with a series of differences of ideas...

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

Psychologically our thought-apart from its expression in words-is only a shapeless and indistinct mass.

Without language, thought is a vague, uncharted nebula.

In general, the philological movement opened up countless sources relevant to linguistic issues, treating them in quite a different spirit from traditional grammar; for instance, the study of inscriptions and their language. But not yet in the spirit of linguistics.

A linguistic system is a series of differences of sound combined with a series of differences of ideas...

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