[...] it is quite impossible to show [...] that more than a negligible proportion of the elements of speech or anything at all of its formal apparatus is derivable from an onomatopoetic source.
- Sapir (1921), a pag.8

The fundamental groundwork of language -the development of a clear-cut phonetic system, the specific association of speech elements with concepts, and the delicate provision for the formal expression of all manner of relations - all this meets us rigidly perfected and systematized in every language known to us.
- Sapir (1921), a pag.22

The element 'b' ('-s', '-ing', '-er') is the indicator of a subsidiary and [...] a more abstract concept; in the widest sense of the word 'form,' it puts upon the fundamental concept a formal limitation.
- Sapir (1921), a pag.25

In a great many languages composition is confined to [...] the delimiting function, that is, of the two or more compounded elements one is given a [...] qualified significance by the others, which contribute nothing to the formal build of the sentence.
- Sapir (1921), a pag.66

If all the phonetic changes brought about by the phonetic drift were allowed to stand, [...] most languages would present such irregularities of morphological contour as to lose touch with their formal ground-plan.
- Sapir (1921), a pag.187

Such words as 'credible', 'certitude', [...] are entirely welcome in English because [...] their formal analysis [...] is not a necessary act of the unconscious mind...
- Sapir (1921), a pag.196