ABSTRACT
By way of a sub-title to this chapter, I should like to quote a short sentence from an article in The European (1-3 June 1990), by Randolph Quirk.
The implications are daunting.
I shall refer to the discourse function of this sentence from time to time, but at present I would like to draw attention to its ominous tone. The implications of trusting the text are for me extremely daunting, but also very exciting and thought-provoking.
