In an exactly similar way the preterite of the verb to speak stands thus--
bera-i . . . speech of me == I spoke bera-d . . . speech of thee bera-z . . . speech of him bera-my . . speech of us bera-dy . . speech of you bera-zy . . speech of them
In the Fiji language _loma_ means "heart" or "will;" and _loma-qu_ (heart of me) may, according to the connection, signify either "my heart or will," or "I will."
In the inflected languages the affixes are so amalgamated with the root and otherwise obliterated that there is no such direct evidence of their nature; but a great many facts tend to show that the structure of the verb was originally the same as in the agglutinate family.
If this analysis of the verb is correct, the affirmation of existence found no expression in the early stages of language; _the real copula connecting the subject with the predicate was the proposition contained in the oblique case of the pronominal affix_.--_F._]
[Editor's footnote 54: The interesting and important philological facts adduced by Mr. Findlater, confirm and illustrate in a very striking manner the doctrine in the text, of the radical distinction between the functions of the copula in predication, and those of the substantive verb; by shewing that many languages have no substantive verb, no verb expressive of mere *existence, and yet signify their predications by other means; and that probably all languages began without a substantive verb, though they must always have had predications.
The confusion between these two different functions in the European languages, and the ambiguity of the verb To Be, which fulfils them both, are among the most important of the minor philosophical truths to which attention has been called by the author of the Analysis. As in the case of many other luminous thoughts, an approach is found to have been made to it by previous thinkers. Hobbes, though he did not reach it, came very close to it, and it was still more distinctly anticipated by Laromiguière, though without any sufficient perception of its value. It occurs in a criticism on a passage of Pascal, and in the following words. "Quand on dit, l'être est, _etc._ le mot _est_, ou le verbe, n'exprime pas la même chose que le mot être, sujet de la définition. Si j'énonce la proposition suivante: Dieu est existant, je ne voudrais pas dire assurément, Dieu existe existant: cela ne ferait pas un sens; de même, si je dis que Virgile est poëte, je ne veux pas donner à entendre que Virgile existe. Le verbe _est_, dans la proposition, n'exprime donc pas l'existence réelle; il n'exprime qu'un rapport spécial entre le sujet et l'attribut, le rapport du contenant au contenu," &c. (Leçons de Philosophie, 7^{ me} ed. vol. i. p. 307.) Having thus hit upon an unobvious truth in the course of an argument directed to another purpose, he passes on and takes no further notice of it.