language formed of gestures

"The first conception of a great man, is usually a fruitful germ. Well acquainted with the French grammar, he knew that every language was a collection of signs, as a series of drawings is a collection of figures, the representation of a multitude of objects, and that the Deaf and Dumb can describe every thing by gestures, as you paint every thing with colours, or express every thing by words; he knew that every object had a form, that every form was capable of being imitated, that actions struck your sight, and that you were able to describe them by imitative gestures; he knew that words were conventional signs, and that gestures might be the same, and that there could therefore be a language formed of gestures, as there was a language of words. We can state as a probable fact, that there was a time in which man had only gestures to express the emotions and affections of his soul. He loved, wished, hoped, imagined, and reflected, and the words to express those operations still failed him. He could express the actions relative to his organs; but the dictionary of acts, purely spiritual, was not begun as yet."

Laurent Clerc, An Address Written by Mr. Clerc and Read by His Request at a Public Examination of the Pupils in the Connecticut Asylum, 1818, p. 4

op. cit., p. 37