In this paper it is pointed out that some Dutch 19th and 20th-century linguists reacted rather critically to the rise and dominance of German historical-comparative grammar. Among other things, it can be shown that Dutch 19th-century linguists were giving prominence to the living language, and were continuing the trend of ‘general grammar’, discussing questions of a theoretical nature and rejecting the Schleicherian concept of language as an organism. This was definitely was not the prerogative of J.N. Madvig, Michel Bréal and other non-German scholars.
It has been remarked that such a critical reaction to the conceptions of the German historical school occurred quite regularly and my findings seem to corroborate this claim. Among other things, the idea of language as something comparable to a living organism was dismissed by Dutch linguists as early as the late 1850's, and no scholar in Holland has defended it since. In this connection I would like to give the Dutch linguists more credit than they have received as a result of their publishing in the language of a small nation and of the fact that their critical remarks have been put forward in a less coherent way than for instance Bréal's were
