It is once again the vexing problem of identity within variety; without a solution to this disturbing problem there can be no system, no classification.

In poetic language, in which the sign as such takes on an autonomous value, this sound symbolism becomes an actual factor and creates a sort of accompaniment to the signified.

The search for the symbolic value of phonemes, each taken as a whole, runs the risk of giving rise to ambiguous and trivial interpretations because phonemes are complex entities, bundles of different distinctive features.

Now the identification of individual sounds by phonetic observation is an artificial way of proceeding.

Languages differ essentially in what they must convey and not in what they may convey.

Semantics, or the study of meaning, remained undeveloped, while phonetics made rapid progress and even came to occupy the central place in the scientific study of language.

Every linguistic sign is located on two axes: the axis of simultaneity and that of succession.