[...] the principle of analysis shall be adequate.
- Hjelmslev (1961), a pag.22

[...] we reach a conclusion which is most important for an understanding of the principle of analysis: both the object under examination and its parts have existence only by virtue of these dependences; the whole of the object under examination can be defined only by their sum total; and each of its parts can be defined only by the dependences joining it to other coordinated parts, to the whole, and to its parts of the next degree, and by the sum of the dependences that these parts of the next degree contract with each other [...] That is to say, objects can be described only with their help and can be defined and grasped scientifically only in this way.
- Hjelmslev (1961), a pag.22-23

Since linguistic theory starts from the text as its datum and attempts to show the way to a self-consistent and exhaustive description of it through an analysis – a deductive progression from class to component and component of component [...] – the deepest strata of its definiton system [...] must treat this principle of analysis. They must establish the nature of the analysis and the concepts that enter into it.
- Hjelmslev (1961), a pag.21