The most noble and profitable invention of all other, was that of SPEECH, consisting of Names or Appellations, and their Connexion; whereby men register their Thoughts; recall them when they are past; and also declare them one to another for mutuall utility and conversation; without which, there had been amongst men, neither Commonwealth, nor Society, nor Contract, nor Peace, no more than amongst Lyons, Bears, and Wolves.

Leviathan, Or the Matter, Forme, & Power of a Common-wealth Ecclesiastical and Civill. By Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury (ed. 1651)