, Greek {~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH PSILI AND OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA~}, Latin _est_? Was
the abstract "to be" onomatopoetically imitated? Often, of course, we
cannot answer such questions at all. In this case, however, it is
possible. The root _as_ in _asti_, that we now translate as _is_, means as
we see from _as-u_, breath, originally _to breathe_. Whoever likes may see
in _as_, to breathe, an imitation of hissing breath. We neither gain or
lose anything by this; for the critical step always remains to be taken
from a single imitation of a single act, to the comprehension of many such
acts, at various places, and at various times, as one and the same, which
is called abstraction or the forming of a concept.

This may appear to be a very small step, just as the first slight
deviation in a railroad track is scarcely a finger's breadth, but in time
changes the course of the train to an entirely different part of the
world. The formation of an idea, such as to be, or to become, or to take a
still simpler one, such as four or eight, appears to us to be a very small
matter, and yet it is this very small matter that distinguishes man from
the animal, that pushed man forward and left the animal behind on his old
track. Nay, more, this "concept" has caused much shaking of the head among
philosophers of all times. That one and one are two, two and two, four,
four and four, eight, eight and eight, sixteen, etc., appears to be so
very easy, that we do not understand how such things can constitute an
eternally intended distinction between man and animal. I have myself seen
an ape so well trained that as the word "seven" was spoken, he picked up
seven straws. But what is such child's play in comparison with the first
formation of the idea of seven? Do you not see that the formation of such
an abstract idea, isolating mere quantity apart from all qualities,
requires a power of abstraction such as has never been displayed by an
animal? If there were any languages now that actually had no word for
seven, it would be a valuable confirmation of this view. I doubt only,
whether the speakers of such languages could not call composition to their
aid, and attain the idea of seven by two, two, two, plus one. We still
know too little of these languages and of those who speak them. Of what
takes place in animals we know absolutely nothing, and nowhere would a
dose of agnosticism