PART III

THE CLAIMS OF ESPERANTO TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY: CONSIDERATIONS BASED ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE LANGUAGE ITSELF

I

ESPERANTO IS SCIENTIFICALLY CONSTRUCTED, AND FULFILS THE NATURAL TENDENCY IN EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE

All national languages are full of redundant and overlapping grammatical devices for expressing what could be equally well expressed by a single uniform device. They bristle with irregularities and exceptions. Their forms and phrases are largely the result of chance and partial survival, arbitrary usage, and false analogy. It is obvious that a perfectly regular artificial language is far easier to learn. But the point to be insisted on here is, that artificial simplification of language is no fantastic craze, but merely a perfect realization of a natural tendency, which the history of language shows to exist.

At first sight this may seem to conflict with what was said in Part I., chap. x. But there is no real inconsistency. As pointed out there, there is no reason to think that Nature, left to herself, would ever produce a universal language, or that a simpler language would win, in a struggle with more complex ones, on account of its simplicity. But this does not prevent there being a real natural tendency to simplification—though in natural languages this tendency is constantly thwarted, and can never produce its full effect.

How, then, is this tendency to simplification shown in the history of Aryan (Indo-European) languages? For it must be emphasized that for the purposes of this discussion history of language means history of Aryan language.

The Aryan group of languages includes Sanskrit and its descendants in the East, Greek, Latin, all modern Romance languages (French, Italian, Spanish, etc.), all Germanic languages (English, German, Scandinavian, etc.), all Slav languages (Russian, Polish, etc.)—in fact, all the principal languages of Europe, except Hungarian, Basque, and Finnish. The main tendency of this group of languages has been, technically speaking, to become analytic instead of synthetic—that is, to abandon complex systems of inflection by means of case and verbal endings, and to substitute prepositions and auxiliaries. Thus, taking Latin as the type of old synthetic Aryan language, its declension of nouns and conjugation of verbs present an enormously greater complexity of forms than are employed by English, the most advanced of the modern analytical languages, to express the same grammatical relations. For example:

Nom. mensă = a table. mensae = tables. Acc. mensam = a table. mensas = tables. Gen. mensae = of a table mensarum = of tables. Dat. mensae = to or for a mensis = to or for tables. table. Abl. mensā = by, with, or mensis = by, with, or from from a table. tables.

By the time you have learnt these various Latin case endings (_-ă_, _-am_, _-ae_, _-ae_, _-ā_; _-ae_, _-as_, _-arum_, _-is_, _-is_), you have only learnt one out of many types of declension. Passing on to the second Latin type or declension, e.g. _dominus_ = master, you have to learn a whole fresh set of case endings (_-us_, _-um_, _-i_, _-o_, _-o_; _-i_, _-os_, _-orum_, _-is_, _-is_) to express the same grammatical relations; whereas in English you apply the same set of prepositions to the word "master" without change, except for a uniform _-s_ in the plural. As there are a great many types of Latin noun, the simplification in English, effected by using invariable prepositions without inflection, is very great. It is just the same with the verb. Take the English regular verb "to love": the four forms _love_, _loves_, _loving_, _loved_, about exhaust the number of forms to be learned (omitting the second person singular, which is practically dead); the rest is done by auxiliaries, which are the same for each verb. Latin, on the other hand, possesses very numerous forms of the verb, and the whole set of numerous forms varies for each type of verb. In the aggregate the simplification in English is enormous. This process of simplification is common to all the modern Aryan languages, but they have not all made equal progress in carrying it out.

Now, it is a remarkable fact, and a very suggestive one for those who seek to trace the connexion between the course of a nation's language and its history, that the degree of progress made by the languages of Europe along their common line of evolution does on the whole, as a matter of historical fact, correspond with the respective degree of material, social, and economic advancement attained by the nations that use them. Take this question of case endings. Russia has retained a high degree of inflection in her language, having seven cases with distinct endings. These seven cases are common to the Slav languages in general; two of them (Sorbish and Slovenish) have, like Gothic and Greek, a dual number, a feature which has long passed away from the languages of Western Europe. Again, the Slav tongues decline many more of the numerals than most Aryan languages. Germany, which, until the recent formation of the German Empire, was undoubtedly a century slow by West European time, still has four cases; or, in view of the moribund dative, should we rather say three and a half? France and England manage their affairs in a universal nominative[1] (if one can give any name to a universal case), as far as nouns, adjectives, and articles are concerned. Their pronouns offer the sole survival of declension by case endings. Here France, the runner-up, is a trifle slow in the possession of a real, live dative case of the pronoun (acc. _le_, _la_, _les_; dat. _lui_, _leur_). England wins by a neck with one universal oblique case (_him_, _her_, _them_). This insidious suggestion is not meant to endanger the _entente cordiale_; even perfidious Albion would not convict the French nation of arrested development on the side-issue of pronominal atavism. Mark Twain says he paid double for a German dog, because he bought it in the dative case; but no nation need be damned for a dative. We have no use for the _coup de Jarnac_.

[1]Though historically, of course, the Low Latin universal case, from which many French, and therefore English, words are derived, was the accusative.

But consider the article. Here, if anywhere, is a test of the power of a language to move with the times. For some reason or other (the real underlying causes of these changes in language needs are obscure) modern life has need of the article, though the highly civilized Romans did very well without it. So strong is this need that, in the middle ages, when Latin was used as an international language by the learned, a definite article (_hic_ or τó) was foisted into the language. How is it with the modern world? The Slavs have remained in this matter at the point of view of the ancient world. They are articleless. Germany has a cumbrous three-gender, four-case article; France rejoices in a two-gender, one-case article with a distinct form for the plural. The ripe product of tendency, the infant heir of the eloquent ages, to whose birth the law of Aryan evolution groaned and travailed until but now, the most useful, if not the "mightiest," monosyllable "ever moulded by the lips of man," the "the," one and indeclinable, was born in the Anglo-Saxon mouth, and sublimed to its unique simplicity by Anglo-Saxon progress.

The general law of progress in language could be illustrated equally well from the history of genders as exhibited in various languages. We are here only dealing with Aryan languages, but, merely by way of illustration, it may be mentioned that a primitive African language offers seven "genders," or grammatical categories requiring the same kind of concords as genders. In Europe we pass westward from the three genders of Germany, curving through feminine and masculine France (_place aux dames!_) to monogendric Britain. Only linguistic arbitrary gender is here referred to; this has nothing to do with suffragettes or "defeminization."

Again, take agreement of adjectives. In the ancient world, whether Greek, Latin, Gothic, or Anglo-Saxon, adjectives had to follow nouns through all the mazes of case and number inflection, and had also to agree in gender. In this matter German has gone ahead of French, in that its adjectives do not submit to change of form in order to indicate agreement, when they are used predicatively (e.g. "ein gut_er_ Mann"; "der gut_e_ Mann"; but "der Mann ist gut"). But English has distanced the field, and was alone in at the death of the old concords, which moistened our childhood's dry Latin _with_ tears.

Whatever test be applied, the common tendency towards simplification, from synthesis to analysis, is there; and in its every manifestation English has gone farthest among the great literary languages. It is necessary to add this qualification—"among the great literary languages"—because, in this process of simplification, English has a very curious rival, and possibly a superior, in the _Taal_ of South Africa. The curious thing is that a local dialect should have shown itself so progressive, seeing that the distinctive note of most dialects is conservatism, their chief characteristics being local survivals.[1] It is probable that the advanced degree of simplification attained by the Taal is the result of deliberate and conscious adaptation of their language by the original settlers to the needs of the natives. Just as Englishmen speak Pidgin-English to coolies in the East, so the old trekkers must have removed irregularities and concords from their Dutch, so that the Kaffirs could understand it. If this is so, it is another illustration of the essential feature that an international language must possess. Even the Boer farmers, under the stress of practical necessity, grasped the need of simplification.

[1]Of course a difference must be expected between a dialect spoken by a miscellaneous set of settlers in a foreign land and one in use as an indigenous growth from father to son. But the _habitants_, as the French settlers in Quebec are called, who, like the Boers, are mainly a pastoral and primitive people, have retained an antiquated form of French, with no simplification.

The natural tendency towards elimination of exceptions is also strongly marked in the speech of the uneducated. Miss Loane, who has had life-long experience of nursing work among the poorest classes in England, tabulates (_The Queen's Poor_, p. 112) the points in which at the present day the language of the poor differs from that of the middle and upper classes. Under the heading of grammar she singles out specially superabundance of negatives, and then proceeds: "Other grammatical errors. These are nearly all on the lines of simplification. It is correct to say 'myself, herself, yourself, ourselves.' Very well: let us complete the list with 'hisself' and 'theirselves.' Most verbs are regular: why not all? Let us say 'comed' and 'goed,' 'seed' and 'bringed' and 'teached.'" Miss Loane probably exaggerates with her "nearly all." For instance, as regards the uneducated form of the past tense of "to come," surely "come" is a commoner form than "comed." Similarly the illiterate for "I did" is "I done," not "I doed," which would be the regular simplification. But the natural tendency is certainly there, and it is strong.

Precisely the same tendency is observable in the present development of literary languages. They have all inherited many irregular verbal conjugations from the past as part of their national property, and these, by the nature of the case, comprise most of the commonest words in the language, because the most used is the most subject to abbreviation and modification. But these irregular types of inflection have long been dead, in the sense that they are fossilized survivals, incapable of propagating their kind. When a new word is admitted into the language, it is conjugated regularly. Thus, though we still say "I go—I went; I run—I ran," because we cannot help ourselves, when we are free to choose we say, "I cycle—I cycled; I wire—I wired"; just as the French say "télégraphier," and not "télégraphir," -oir, or -re.

Considering the strength of this stream of natural tendency, it seems a most natural thing to start again, for international purposes, with a form of simplified Aryan language, and, being free from the dead hand of the past, to set up the simplest forms of conjugation, etc., and make every word in the language conform to them.

Indeed, this question of artificial simplification of language has of late years emerged from the scholar's study and become a matter of practical politics, even as regards the leading national languages. Within the last few years there have been official edicts in France and Germany, embodying reforms either in spelling or grammar, with the sole object of simplifying. The latest attempt at linguistic jerrymandering has been the somewhat autocratic document of President Roosevelt. He has found that there are limits to what the American people will stand even from him, and it seems likely to remain a dead letter. But there is not the smallest doubt that the English language is heavily handicapped by its eccentric vowel pronunciation and its spelling that has failed to keep pace with the development of the language. The same is true, though in a lesser degree, of the spelling and pronunciation of French. Since the whole theory of spelling—and, until a few hundred years ago, its practice too—consisted in nothing else but an attempt to represent simply and accurately the spoken word, most unprejudiced people would admit that simplification is in principle advisable. But the practical difficulties in the way of simplification of a national language are almost prohibitive. It is hard to see that there are any such obstacles in the way of the adoption of a simple and perfectly phonetic international artificial language. We dislike change because it is change, and new things because they are new. We go on suffering from a movable Easter, which most practically inconveniences great numbers of people and interests, and seems to benefit no one at all, simply because it is no one's business to change it. If once the public could be got to examine seriously the case for an artificial international language, they could hardly fail to recognize what an easy, simple, and _natural_ thing it is, and how soon it would pay off all capital sunk in its universal adoption, and be pure profit.

NOTE

This seems the best place to deal with a criticism of Esperanto which has an air of plausibility. It is urged that Esperanto does not carry the process of simplification far enough, and that in two important points it shows a retrograde tendency to revert to a more primitive stage of language, already left behind by the most advanced natural languages. These points are:

(1) The possession of an accusative case. (2) The agreement of adjectives.

Now, it must be borne in mind that the business of a universal language is, not to adhere pedantically to any philological theory, not to make a fetish of principle, not to strive after any theoretical perfection in the observance of certain laws of construction, but—simply to be easy. The principle of simplification is an admirable one, because it furthers this end, and for this reason only. The moment it ceases to do so, it must give way before a higher canon, which demands that an international language shall offer the greatest ease, combined with efficiency, for the greatest number. The fact that a scientific study of language reveals a strong natural tendency towards simplification, and that this tendency has in certain languages assumed certain forms, is not in itself a proof that an artificial language is bound to follow the historical lines of evolution in every detail. It will follow them just so far as, and no farther than, they conduce to its paramount end—greatest ease for greatest number, plus maximum of efficiency. In constructing an international language, the question then becomes, in each case that comes up for decision: How far does the proposed simplification conduce to ease without sacrificing efficiency? Does the cost of retention (reckoned in terms of sacrifice of ease) of the unsimplified form outweigh the advantages (reckoned in terms of efficiency) it confers, and which would be lost if it was simplified out of existence? Let us then examine briefly the two points criticised, remembering that the main function of the argument from history of language is, not to deduce therefrom hard-and-fast rules for the construction of international language, but to remove the unreasoning prejudice of numerous objectors, who cannot pardon the international language for being "artificial," i.e. consciously simplified.

(1) _The Accusative Case_

This is formed in Esperanto by adding the letter _-n_. This one form is universal for nouns, adjectives, and pronouns singular and plural. Ex.:

Nom. _bona patro_ (good father), plural, _bonaj patroj_. Acc. _bonan patron_ " _bonajn patrojn_.

Suppose one were to suppress this _-n_.

(_a_) Cost of retention of unsimplified form: Remembering to add this _-n_.

(_b_) Advantages of retention: The flexibility of the language is enormously increased; the words can be put in any order without obscuring or changing the sense. Ex.: _La patro amas sian filon_ = the father loves his son. _Sian filon amas la patro_ (in English "his son loves the father" has a different sense). _Amas la patro sian filon_ (= the father _loves_ his son, but...). _La patro sian filon amas_. _Sian filon la patro amas_ (= it is his son that the father loves).

In every case the Esperanto sentence is perfectly clear, the meaning is the same, but great scope is afforded for emphasis and shades of gradation. Further, every nation is enabled to arrange the words as suits it best, without becoming less intelligible to other nations. Readers of Greek and Latin know the enormous advantage of free word order. For purposes of rendering the spirit and swing of national works of literature in Esperanto, and for facilitating the writing of verse, the accusative is a priceless boon. Is the price too high?

N.B.—Those people who are most apt to omit the _-n_ of the accusative, having no accusative in their own language, generally make their meaning perfectly clear without it, because they are accustomed to indicate the objective case by the order in which they place their words. They make a mistake of Esperanto by omitting the _-n_, but they are understood, which is the essential.

(2) _The Agreement of Adjectives_

Adjectives in Esperanto agree with their substantives in number and case. Ex.: _bona patro_, _bonan patron_, _bonaj patroj_, _bonajn patrojn_.

Suppose one were to suppress agreement of adjectives.

(_a_) Cost of retention of agreement: Remembering to add _-j_ for the plural and _-n_ for the accusative.

(_b_) Advantages of retention: Greater clearness; conformity with the usage of the majority of languages; euphony.

Esperanto has wisely adopted full, vocalic, syllabic endings for words. Contrast Esp. _bon-o_ with French _bon_, Eng. _good_, Germ. _gut_. By this means Esperanto is not only rendered slower, more harmonious, and easier of comprehension; it is also able to denote the parts of speech clearly to eye and ear by their form. Thus final _-o_ bespeaks a noun; _-a_, an adjective; _-e_, an adverb; _-i_, an infinitive, etc.

Now, since all adjectives end in syllabic _-a_, it is much harder to keep them uninflected than if they ended with a consonant like the Eng. "good." To talk about _bona patroj_ would not only seem a hideous barbarism to all Latin peoples, whose languages Esperanto most resembles, but it would also offend the bulk of Northerners. After a very little practice it is really easier to say _bonaj patroj_ than _bona patroj_. The assimilation of termination tempts the ear and tongue.

The grammar is also simplified. For if adjectives agreeing with nouns and pronouns expressed were invariable, it would probably be necessary to introduce special rules to meet the case of adjectives standing as nouns, or where the qualified word was suppressed.

Again, is the price too high compared to the advantages?

II

ESPERANTO FROM AN EDUCATIONAL POINT OF VIEW—IT WILL AID THE LEARNING OF OTHER LANGUAGES AND STIMULATE INTELLIGENCE

(1) Esperanto takes a natural place at the beginning of the sequence of languages, upon which is founded the scheme of language-teaching in the Reform Schools of Germany, and in some of the more progressive English schools.

The principle involved in this scheme is that of orderly progression from the easier to the more difficult. Only one foreign language is begun at a time. The easiest language in the school curriculum is begun first. Enough hours per week are devoted to this language to allow of decent progress being made. When the pupils have a fair grip of the elements of one language, another is begun. The bulk of the school language-teaching hours are now devoted to the new language, and sufficient weekly hours are given to the language already learnt to avoid backsliding at least. Thus in a German school of the new type the linguistic hours are devoted in the lowest classes to the mother-tongue. When the pupils have some idea what language means, and have acquired some notion of grammar, they are given a school year or two of French. After this Latin is begun in the upper part of the school, and Greek at a corresponding interval after Latin.

Now, it is one of the commonest complaints of teachers in our secondary schools that they have to begin teaching Latin or French to boys who have no knowledge whatever of grammar. Fancy the hopelessness of trying to teach an English boy the construction of a Latin or French sentence when he does not know what a relative or demonstrative pronoun means! This is the fate of so many a master that quite a number of them resign themselves to giving up a good part of their French or Latin hour to endeavouring to imbue their flock with some notions of grammar in general. They naturally try to appeal to their boys through the medium of their own language. But those who have incautiously upset their class from the frying-pan of _qui_, _quae_, _quod_, into the fire of English demonstrative and relative pronouns get a foretaste of the fire that dieth not. _Facilis descensus Averni._ Happy if they do not lose heart, and step downward from the fire to ashes—reinforced with sackcloth.

"I contend that that 'that' that that gentleman said was right." This is the "abstract and brief chronicle" of their woes—sometimes, indeed, the epitaph of their pedagogical career, if they are too sickened of the Sisiphean task of trying to teach grammar on insufficient basis. And this use, or abuse, of the hardworked word "that" is only an extreme case which illustrates the difficulty of teaching grammar to babes, through the medium of a language honeycombed with synonyms, homonyms, exceptions, and other pitfalls (can you be honeycombed with a pitfall?)—a language which seems to take a perverse delight in breaking all its own rules and generally scoring off the beginner. And for the dull beginner, what language does not seem to conform to this type? Answer: Esperanto.

In other words, it would seem that, for the grinding of grammar and the advancement of sound learning in the initial stage, there is nothing like an absolutely uniform and regular language,[1] a _type tongue_, something that corresponds in the linguistic hierarchy to Euclid or the first rules of arithmetic in the mathematical, something clear, consistent, self-evident, and of universal application.

[1]Cf. Sir Oliver Lodge: "It would certainly appear that for this purpose [i.e. educative language-learning for children] the fully inflected ancient languages are best and most satisfactory; if they were still more complete and regular, like Esperanto, they would be better still to begin with" (_School Teaching and School Reform_, p. 21: chapter on Curricula and Methods).

Take our sentence again: "I contend that that 'that' that that gentleman said was right." If our beginner has imbibed his first notions of grammar through the medium of a type language, in which a noun is always a noun, and is stamped as such by its form (this, by the way, is an enormous aid in making the thing clear to children); in which an adjective is always an adjective, and is stamped as such by its form; and so on through all the other parts of speech,—when the teacher comes to analyse the sentence given, he will be able to explain it by reference to the known forms of the regular key-language. He will point out that of the "thats": the first is the Esperanto _ke_ (which is final, because _ke_ never means anything else); the second is _tiu_ (at once revealed by its form to be a demonstrative), the fourth _kiu_, and so on. As for the third "that," which _is_ rather hard for a child to grasp, he will be able to make it into a noun in form by merely adding _-o_ to the Esperanto equivalent for any "that" required. He will not be doing violence to the language; for Esperanto consists of roots, which habitually do duty as noun, verb, adjective, etc., according to the termination added. Those who know the value of the concrete and tangible in dealing with children will grasp the significance of the new possibilities that are thus for the first time opened up to language-teachers.

To sum up: Natural languages are all hard, and the beginner can never go far enough to get a rule fixed soundly in his mind without meeting exceptions which puzzle and confuse him. Esperanto is as clear, logical, and consistent as arithmetic, and, like arithmetic, depends more upon intelligence than upon memory work. If Esperanto were adopted as the first foreign language to be taught in schools, and all grammatical teaching were postponed until Esperanto had been begun, and then given entirely through the medium of Esperanto until a sound notion of grammatical rules and categories had been instilled, it would probably be found that the subsequent task of learning natural languages would be facilitated and abridged. From the very start it would be possible to prevent certain common errors and confusions, that tend to become engrained in juvenile minds by the fluctuating or contradictory usage of their own language, to their great let and hindrance in the subsequent stages of language-learning. The skeleton outline of grammatical theory with concrete examples afforded by Esperanto would shield against vitiating initial mistakes, in much the same way as the use of a scientific phonetic alphabet, when a foreign language is presented for the first time to the English beginner in written form, shields him against carrying over his native mixed vowel system to languages which use the same letters as English, but give quite a different value to them. In both cases[1] the essentials of the new instrument of learning are the same—that it be of universal application, that it be sufficiently different from the mother-tongue or alphabet to prevent confusion by association of ideas, that each of the new forms or letters convey only one idea or sound respectively, and that this idea or sound be always and only conveyed by that form or letter.

[1]i.e. scientific regular type grammar and scientific regular phonetic alphabet.

(2) From a psychological point of view Esperanto would be a rewarding subject of study for children.

The above remarks on sequence of languages show that, by placing Esperanto first in the language curriculum, justice is done to the psychological maxim: from the easier to the harder, from the regular to the exceptional. It may further be argued (_a_) that Esperanto is educative in the real sense of the word, i.e. suitable for drawing out and developing the reasoning powers; (_b_) that it would act as a stimulus, and by its ease set a higher standard of attainment in language-learning.

(_a_) Amidst all the discussion of "educationists" about methods, curricula, sequence of studies, and the rest, one fundamental fact continues to face the teacher when he gets down to business; and that is, that he has got to make the taught think for themselves. In proportion as his teaching makes them contribute their share of effort will it be fruitful. This is, of course, the merest truism, sometimes dignified in the current pedagogical slang by the name of "self-activity," or the like. But whatever new bottles the theorists, and their extreme left wing the faddists, may choose to serve up our old wine in, the fact is there: children have got to be made to use their own brains. The eternal question that faces the teacher is, how to provide problems that children really can work out by using their own brains. The trouble about history, geography, English literature, and such subjects is that the subject-matter of the problems they offer for solution lies beyond the experience of the young, and to a large extent beyond their reasoning powers. In teaching all such subjects there is accordingly the perpetual danger that the real work done may degenerate into mere memory work, or parrot-like cramming of notes or dates.

The same difficulty is encountered in science teaching. Heuristic methods have been devised to meet the difficulty. Though they are no doubt psychologically sound, they tend to be very slow in results; hence the common jibe that a boy may learn as much by them in five years as he could learn out of a shilling text-book in a term.

The old argument that "mental gymnastics" are best supplied by Latin is sound to the extent that Latin really does furnish a perpetual series of small problems that have to be solved by the aid of grammar and dictionary, but which do involve real mental effort, since mere mechanical looking out of words does not suffice for their elucidation. But for various reasons, such as the remoteness of the ancient world in time, place, modes of thought, etc., Latin tends to be too hard and not interesting enough for the average boy. He gets discouraged, and develops a habit of only working enough to keep out of trouble with the school authorities, and is apt to leave school with an unintelligent attitude towards intellectual things in general. This is the result of early drudging at a subject in which progress is very slow, and which by its nature is uncongenial. The great desideratum is a linguistic subject which shall at once inculcate a feeling for language (German _Sprachgefühl_), and yet be easy enough to admit of rapid progress. Nothing keeps alive the quickening zest that makes learning fruitful like the consciousness of making rapid progress.

Hitherto arithmetic and Euclid have been the ideal subjects for providing the kind of problem required—one that can be worked out with certainty by the aid of rule and use of brain, without calling for knowledge or experience that the child cannot have. The facts are self-evident, and follow from principles, without involving any extraneous acquaintance with life or literature, and no deadening memory work is required. If only there were some analogous subject on the literary side, to give a general grip of principles, uncomplicated by any arbitrary element, what a boon it would be! and what a sound preparation for real and more advanced linguistic study for those who showed aptitude for this line! Arithmetic and Euclid both really depend upon common sense; but partly owing to their abstract nature, and partly because they are always classed as "mathematics," they seem to contain something repellent to many literary or linguistic types of mind.

With the invention of a perfectly regular and logically constructed language, a concrete embodiment of the chief principles of language structure, we have offered us for the first time the hitherto missing linguistic equivalent of arithmetic or Euclid. In a regular language, just because everything goes by rule, problems can be set and worked out analogous to sums in arithmetic and riders in Euclid. Given the necessary roots and rules, the learner can manufacture the necessary vocabulary and produce the answer with the same logical inevitability; and he has to use his brains to apply his rules, instead of merely copying words out of a dictionary, or depending upon his memory for them.

In this way all that part of language-study which tends to be dead weight in teaching the young is got rid of in one fell swoop, and this though the language taught and learnt is a highly developed instrument for reading, writing, speaking, and literary expression. This dead weight includes most of the unintelligent memorizing, all exceptions, all complicated systems of declension and conjugation, all irregular comparison of adjectives and adverbs, all syntactical subtleties (cf. the sequence of tenses, oratio obliqua, the syntax of subordinate clauses, in Latin; and the famous conditional sentences, with the no less notorious _ού_ and _μή_ in Greek), all conflicting and illogical uses of auxiliaries (cf. _etre_ and _avoir_ in French, and _sein_ and _haben_ in German), besides a host of other old enemies. Some of these things of course are not wholly memory work, especially the syntax, which involves a real feeling for language. But these would be much better postponed until one easy foreign language has been learnt thoroughly. Every multilinguist knows that each foreign language is easier to learn than the last. With a perfectly regular artificial language you can make so much progress in a short time that you can use it freely for practical purposes. Yet it does not come of itself, like the mother-tongue. _This free manipulation of a consciously acquired language is the very best training for forming a feeling for language_—far better than weary stumbling over the baby stages of a hard language. When you can read, write, and speak one very easy artificial language, which you have had to learn as a foreign one, then is the time when you can profitably tackle the difficulties of natural language, appreciating the niceties of syntax, and realizing, by comparison with your normal key-language, in what points natural languages are merely arbitrary and have to be learnt by heart. Those who have early conquered the grammar and syntax of any foreign language, but have had to put in years of hard (largely memory) work before they could write or speak, e.g., Latin Latin, French French, or German German, will realize the saving effected, when they are told that Esperanto has no idiom, no arbitrary usage. The combination of words is not governed, as in natural languages, by tradition (which tradition has to be assimilated in the sweat of the brow), but is free, the only limits being common sense, common grammar, and lucidity.

To those who do not know Esperanto it may seem a dark saying that language riders can be worked out in the same way as geometrical ones. To understand this some knowledge of the language is necessary (for sample problems see Appendix A, p. 200). But for the sake of making the argument intelligible it may here be stated that one of the labour-saving, vocabulary-saving devices of Esperanto is the employment of a number of suffixes with fixed meaning, that can be added to any root. Thus:

The suffix _-ej-_ denotes place. " " _-il-_ " instrument. " " _-ig-_ " causation. Final _-o_ denotes a noun.

Given this and the root _san-_ (cf. Lat. _sanus_), containing the idea of health, form words for "to heal" (_san-ig-i_ = to cause to be well); "medicine" (_san-ig-il-o_ = instrument of healing); "hospital" (_san-ig-ej-o_ = place of healing), etc.

This is merely an example. The combinations and permutations are infinite; they give a healthy knowledge of word-building, and can be used in putting whole pages of carefully prepared idiomatic English into Esperanto. Practical experience shows that, given the necessary crude roots, the necessary suffixes, and a one-page grammar of the Esperanto language, an intelligent person can produce in Esperanto a translation of a page of idiomatic English, not Ollendorfian phrases, _without having learnt Esperanto_.

(_b_) Experience also shows that the intelligent one thoroughly enjoys himself while doing so; and having done so, experiences a thrill of exhilaration almost amounting to awe at having made a better translation into a language he has never learnt than he could make into a national language that he has learnt for years, e.g. Latin, French, or German.

And what is exhilaration in the dry tree may be sustained working keenness in the green. The stimulus to the young mind of progress swift and sure is immense. A child who has learnt to read, write, and speak Esperanto in six months, as is very possible within the natural limits of power of expression imposed by his age, not only has a sound working knowledge of grammatical categories and forms, which will stand him in good stead in subsequent language-learning; he has also a quite different attitude of mind—_une tout autre mentalité_, to use recent jargon—towards foreign languages. His only experience of learning one has been that he did so with the object and result of being able to read, write, and speak it within a reasonable time. "By so much the greater and more resounding the slump into actuality," you will say, "when he comes to grapple with his next." Perhaps. But even so, the habit of acquiring fresh words and forms for immediate use must surely tell—not to mention that he will incidentally have acquired a very useful Romance vocabulary, and a wholly admirable French lucidity of construction.

(3) And this question of lucidity brings us to the third great educational advantage of Esperanto. Its opponents—without having ever learnt it to see—have urged that its preciseness will debauch the literary sense. Surely the exact opposite is the fact. _Le style c'est l'homme_, and the essence of true style is that a man should give accurate expression to his thoughts. The French wit, satirizing vapid fine writing, said that language was given to man to enable him to conceal his thought. There is no more potent instrument for obscuring or concealing thought than the ready-made phrase. Take up many a piece of journalese or other slipshod writing, and note how often the conventional phrase or word slips from under the pen, meaning nothing in particular. The very conventionality disguises from writer and reader the confusion or absolute lack of idea it serves to cloak. Both are lulled by the familiar sound of the set phrase or word and glide easily over them. On the other hand, in using a language in which you construct a good deal of your vocabulary according to logical rule _tout en marchant_, it is impossible to avoid thinking, at each moment, exactly what you do mean. Where there is no idiom, no arbitrary usage, no ready-made phrase, there is also far less danger of yielding to a fatal facility.

Take an instance or two. In the Prayer Book occurs the phrase "Fulfil, O Lord, our desires and petitions." At Sunday lunch a mixed party of people, after attending morning service, were asked how they would render into Esperanto the word "desires." They nearly all plumped for _deziraĵo_. Now, the Esperanto root for "desire" is _dezir-_. By adding _-o_ it becomes a noun = the act of desiring, a desire. By adding the suffix _-aĵ_, and then _-o_, it becomes concrete = a desire- (i.e. desired) thing, a desire. A reference to the dictionary showed that the English word "desire" has both these meanings, but none of these people had a sufficiently accurate idea of the use of language to realize this. It was only when a gentleman passed his plate for a second helping of beef, and was asked which he expected to be fulfilled—the beef, or his aspiration for beef—that he, under the stimulus of hunger, adopted the rendering _dezir-o_, thereby saving at once his bacon and his additional beef.

It is not of course necessary for people to define pedantically to themselves the meaning of every word they use, but surely it must conduce to clear thinking to use a language in which you are perpetually called upon, if you are writing seriously, to make just the mental effort necessary to think what you do mean.

Again, consider the use of prepositions. This is, in nearly all national languages, extremely fluctuating and arbitrary. Take a few English phrases showing the use of the prepositions "at" and "with." "At seven o'clock"; "at any price"; "at all times"; "at the worst"; "let it go at that"; "I should say at a guess," etc. "Come with me"; "write with a pen"; "he came with a rush"; "things are different with us"; "with a twinkle in his eye"; "with God all things are possible," etc. Try to turn these phrases into any language you think you know; the odds are that you will find yourself "up against it pretty badly." The fact is, that prepositions are very frequently used on no logical plan, not at all according to any fixed or universal meaning; all that can be said about them in a given phrase is that they are used there because they are used. To remember their equivalents in other languages hard memory work and much phrase-learning is necessary. In Esperanto all that is necessary is: first, to become clear as to the exact meaning; secondly, to pick the preposition that conveys it. There is no doubt, as the Esperanto prepositions are fixed in sense, on the "one word one meaning" plan. The point is, that there is no memory searching, often so utterly vain, for there are few people indeed who can write a few pages of the most familiar foreign languages without getting their prepositions all wrong, and having "foreigner" stamped large all across their efforts. In Esperanto, provided you have a clear mind and know your grammar, _you are right_. No arbitrary usage defeats your efforts and makes discouraging jargon of your literary attempts.

This training in clear thought, the first requisite for all good writing, is surely sound practical pedagogics. By the time you can give up conscious word-building in Esperanto, and use words and phrases by rote, you have done enough bracing thinking to teach you caution in the use of the ready-made phrase and horror of the vague word.

Fools make phrases, and wise men shun them. Here is a phrase-free language: need we shun it?

III

COMPARATIVE TABLES ILLUSTRATING LABOUR SAVED IN LEARNING ESPERANTO AS CONTRASTED WITH OTHER LANGUAGES

(_a_) WORD-BUILDING

The following tables are meant to give some idea of the number and variety of different ideas that can be expressed by a single Esperanto root, with the addition of affixes (prefixes and suffixes). By reading the English, French, and German columns downwards, the reader will see how many different roots and periphrases these languages employ in order to express the same ideas.

As the affixes have fixed meanings, they only have to be learnt once for all, and many of them (e.g. _-ist_, _-in_, _re-_) are already familiar. When once acquired, they can be used in unending permutation and combination with different roots and each other. The tables below are by no means exhaustive of what can be done with the roots _san-_ and _lern-_. They are merely illustrative. By referring to the full table of affixes in Part IV, Chapter IV, the reader can go on forming new compounds _ad libitum_: e.g. san-o, san-a, san-e, san-i, saneco, sanilo, sanulo, malsane, malsani, saneti, malsaneti, sanadi, eksani, eksaniĝi, saninda, sanindi, sanindulo, sanaĵo, sanaĵero, sanilo, sanigilo, sanigilejo, sanigilujo, sanigilisto, malsanemeco, remalsano, remalsanigo, sanila, malsanulino, sanistinedzo, sanilingo, sanigestro, sanigestrino, sanigema, sanega, sanigega, gesanantoj, saniĝontoj, sanigistido, sanigejano... and so on (kaj tiel plu).

* * * * *

AFFIX ESPERANTO ENGLISH

san-a healthy mal- (opposite) mal-san-a ill ne (not) ne-san-a unwell -ig (causative) san-ig-i to heal san-ig-a salutary re- (again) re-san-ig-a restorative -iĝ (becoming) san-iĝ-i to be convalescent re-san-iĝ-a getting well again -ig mal-san-ig-a sickening (transitive) -iĝ mal-san-iĝ-a sickening (intransitive) -ist (agent) san-ig-ist-o doctor -ej (place) san-ig-ej-o hospital -ul (characteristic) mal-san-ul-o invalid -ebl (possibility) (mal)-san-ig-ebl-a (in)curable -ar (collective) mal-san-ul-ar-o hospital inmates ge- (both sexes) ge-mal-san-ul-ar-o all the men and women patients -in (feminine) san-ig-ist-in-o a lady doctor -edz (married) san-ig-ist-edz-in-o a doctor's wife

AFFIX ESPERANTO FRENCH

san-a bien portant mal- (opposite) mal-san-a malade ne (not) ne-san-a (un peu) souffrant -ig (causative) san-ig-i guérir san-ig-a salutaire re- (again) re-san-ig-a restaurant -iĝ (becoming) san-iĝ-i etre convalescent re-san-iĝ-a en train de se rétablir -ig mal-san-ig-a écoeurant (qui rend malade) -iĝ mal-san-iĝ-a languissant -ist (agent) san-ig-ist-o médecin -ej (place) san-ig-ej-o hôpital -ul (characteristic) mal-san-ul-o un malade -ebl (possibility) (mal)-san-ig-ebl-a (in)curable -ar (collective) mal-san-ul-ar-o ensemble des malades ge- (both sexes) ge-mal-san-ul-ar-o les malades hommes et femmes -in (feminine) san-ig-ist-in-o un médecin femme -edz (married) san-ig-ist-edz-in-o une femme de médecin

AFFIX ESPERANTO GERMAN

san-a gesund mal- (opposite) mal-san-a krank ne (not) ne-san-a unwohl -ig (causative) san-ig-i heilen san-ig-a heilsam re- (again) re-san-ig-a wiederherstellend -iĝ (becoming) san-iĝ-i sich erholen re-san-iĝ-a genesend -ig mal-san-ig-a ekelhaft (krank machend) -iĝ mal-san-iĝ-a siechend -ist (agent) san-ig-ist-o Arzt -ej (place) san-ig-ej-o Krankenhaus -ul (characteristic) mal-san-ul-o ein Kranker -ebl (possibility) (mal)-san-ig-ebl-a (un)heilbar -ar (collective) mal-san-ul-ar-o Gesamtheit der Kranken ge- (both sexes) ge-mal-san-ul-ar-o die Kranken beider Geschlechter -in (feminine) san-ig-ist-in-o Arztin -edz (married) san-ig-ist-edz-in-o Frau des Arztes

* * * * *

AFFIX ESPERANTO ENGLISH

lern-i to learn -ig (causative) lern-ig-i to teach lern-ig-a educative -ej (place) lernej-o school -ant (pres. part.) lern-ant-o pupil ge- (of both sexes) ge-lern-ant-oj pupils of both sexes -ar (collective) lern-ant-ar-o class -an (appertaining) lern-ej-an-o schoolboy -in (feminine) lern-ej-an-in-o schoolgirl -estr (chief) lern-ej-estr-o headmaster -ist (agent) lern-ej-ist-o schoolmaster lern-ej-ist-in-o schoolmistress -aĵo (concrete) lern-aĵ-o (learnt-stuff) subject lern-aĵ-ar-o curriculum -em (inclination) lern-em-a studious mal- (opposite) mal-lern-em-a idle -ig (causative) lern-em-ig-i to stimulate lern-ig-o instruction (act) lern-ig-aĵ-o instruction (teaching given)

AFFIX ESPERANTO FRENCH

lern-i apprendre -ig (causative) lern-ig-i enseigner lern-ig-a éducateur -ej (place) lernej-o école -ant (pres. part.) lern-ant-o élève ge- (of both sexes) ge-lern-ant-oj élèves des deux sexes -ar (collective) lern-ant-ar-o classe -an (appertaining) lern-ej-an-o écolier -in (feminine) lern-ej-an-in-o ecolière -estr (chief) lern-ej-estr-o proviseur -ist (agent) lern-ej-ist-o instituteur (professeur) lern-ej-ist-in-o institutrice -aĵo (concrete) lern-aĵ-o (learnt-stuff) matière d'enseignement lern-aĵ-ar-o ensemble des matièress d'enseignement -em (inclination) lern-em-a appliqué mal- (opposite) mal-lern-em-a paresseux -ig (causative) lern-em-ig-i mettre en train lern-ig-o instruction lern-ig-aĵ-o enseignement

AFFIX ESPERANTO GERMAN

lern-i lernen -ig (causative) lern-ig-i lehren lern-ig-a erzieherisch -ej (place) lernej-o Schule -ant (pres. part.) lern-ant-o Schüler ge- (of both sexes) ge-lern-ant-oj Schüler and Schülerinnen -ar (collective) lern-ant-ar-o Klasse -an (appertaining) lern-ej-an-o Schulknabe -in (feminine) lern-ej-an-in-o Schulmädchen -estr (chief) lern-ej-estr-o Direktor -ist (agent) lern-ej-ist-o Lehrer lern-ej-ist-in-o Lehrerin -aĵo (concrete) lern-aĵ-o (learnt-stuff) Lehrstoff lern-aĵ-ar-o (Studien)- Laufbahn Schulprogramm -em (inclination) lern-em-a fleissig mal- (opposite) mal-lern-em-a faul -ig (causative) lern-em-ig-i anregen lern-ig-o das Unterrichten lern-ig-aĵ-o Unterricht

* * * * *

(_b_) PARTICIPLES AND AUXILIARIES

The following table illustrates the perfect simplicity and terseness of the Esperanto verb.

Every tense, active and passive, is formed with never more than two words. Every shade of meaning (continued, potential, etc., action) is expressed by these two words, of which one is the single auxiliary _esti_ (itself conjugated regularly). The double auxiliary—"to be" and "to have"—which infests most modern languages, with all its train of confusing and often illogical distinctions (cf. French _je suis allé_, but _j'ai couru_), disappears. Contrast the simplicity of _amota_ with the cumbersome periphrasis _about to be loved_; or the perfect ease and clearness of _vi estus amita_ with the treble-barrelled German _Sie würden geliebt worden sein_.

This simplicity of the Esperanto verb is entirely due to its full participial system. There are six participles, present, past, and future active and passive, each complete in one word. The only natural Aryan language (of those commonly studied) that compares with Esperanto in this respect is Greek; and it is precisely the fulness of the Greek participial system that lends to the language a great part of that flexibility which all ages have agreed in admiring in it pre-eminently. Take a page of Plato or any other Greek author, and count the number of participles and note their use. They will be found more numerous and more delicately effective than in other languages. Esperanto can do all this; and it can do it without any of the complexity of form and irregularity that makes the learning of Greek verbs such a hard task. Bearing in mind the three characteristic vowels of the three tenses—present _-a_, past _-i_, future _-o_ (common to finite tenses and participles)—the proverbial schoolboy, and the dullest at that, could hardly make the learning of the Esperanto participles last him half an hour.

It would be easy to go on filling page after page with the simplifications effected by Esperanto, but these will not fail to strike the learner after a very brief acquaintance with the language. But attention ought to be drawn to one more particularly clever device—the form of asking questions. An Esperanto statement is converted into a question without any inversion of subject and verb or any change at all, except the addition of the interrogative particle _ĉu_. In this Esperanto agrees with Japanese. But whereas Japanese adds its particle _ka_ at the end of the sentence, the Esperanto _ĉu_ stands first in its clause. Thus when, speaking Esperanto, you wish to ask a question, you begin by shouting out _ĉu_, an admirably distinctive monosyllable which cannot be confused with any other word in the language. By this means you get your interlocutor prepared and attending, and you can then frame your question at leisure.

Contrast Esperanto and English in the ease with which they respectively convert a statement into a question.

English: You went—did you go?

Esperanto: Vi iris—ĉu vi iris?

This particle may be considered the equivalent of the initial mark of interrogation used in Spanish, and serves to remove all complications in connexion with word order.

* * * * *

ESPERANTO ENGLISH

amanta loving aminta having loved amonta about to love amata being loved amita (having been) loved amota about to be loved mi estas aminta I have loved vi estis aminta you had loved li estas amanta he is loving ŝi estis amata she was being loved ni estos amintaj we shall have loved vi estas amataj you are loved ili estas amitaj they have been loved mi estus aminta I should have loved vi estus amita you would have been loved li estas foririnta he has gone away ili estus foririntaj they would have gone away

ESPERANTO FRENCH

amanta aimant aminta ayant aimé amonta devant aimer amata étant aimé amita (ayant été) aimé amota devant être aimé mi estas aminta j'ai aimé vi estis aminta vous aviez aimé li estas amanta il est aimant ŝi estis amata elle était en train d'être aimée ni estos amintaj nous aurons aimé vi estas amataj vous êtes aimés ili estas amitaj ils ont été aimés mi estus aminta j'aurais aimé vi estus amita vous auriez été aimé li estas foririnta il s'en est allé ili estus foririntaj il s'en seraient allés

ESPERANTO GERMAN

amanta liebend aminta der geliebt hat amonta der lieben wird amata der geliebt wird amita der geliebt worden ist amota der geliebt werden soll mi estas aminta ich habe geliebt vi estis aminta Sie hatten geliebt li estas amanta er ist liebend ŝi estis amata sie war im Zuge geliebt zu werden ni estos amintaj wir werden geliebt haben vi estas amataj Sie werden geliebt ili estas amitaj sie sind geliebt worden mi estus aminta ich würde geliebt haben vi estus amita Sie würden geliebt worden sein li estas foririnta er ist fortgegangen ili estus foririntaj sie würden fortgegangen sein

* * * * *

This chapter on labour-saving may fitly conclude with an estimate of the amount of mere memorizing work to be done in Esperanto. Since this is almost _nil_ for grammar, syntax, and idiom, and since there are no irregularities or exceptions, the memory work is, broadly speaking, reduced to learning the affixes, the table of correlatives, and a certain number of new roots. This number is astonishingly small. Here is an estimate made by Prof. Macloskie, of Princeton, U.S.A.:

Number of roots new to an English boy without Latin, about 600* " " " " " with " " 300 " " " a college teacher " 100

*i.e. about one-third of the whole number in the _Fundamento_.

IV

HOW ESPERANTO CAN BE USED AS A CODE LANGUAGE TO COMMUNICATE WITH PERSONS WHO HAVE NEVER LEARNT IT

Technically speaking, Esperanto combines the characteristics of an inflected language with those of an agglutinative one. This means that the syllables used as inflexions (_-o_, _-a_, _-e_, _-as_, _-is_, _-os_, _-ant-_, _-int-_, _-ont-_, etc.), being invariable and of universal application, can also be regarded as separate words. And as separate words they all figure in the dictionary, under their initial letters. Thus anything written in Esperanto can be deciphered by the simple process of looking out words and parts of words in the dictionary. For examples, see pieces 1 and 2 in the specimens of Esperanto, pp. 167-8 [Part IV, Chapter II], and read the Note at the beginning of Part IV. As the Esperanto dictionary only consists of a few pages, it can be easily carried in the pocket-book or waistcoat pocket.

Thus, while to the educated person of Aryan speech Esperanto presents the natural appearance of an ordinary inflected language, one who belongs by speech to another lingual family, or any one who has never heard of Esperanto, can regard every inflected word as a compound of invariable elements. By turning over very few pages he can determine the meaning and use of each element, and therefore, by putting them together, he can arrive at the sense of the compound word, e.g. _lav'ist'in'o_. Look out _lav-_, and you find "wash"; look out _-ist_, and you find it expresses the person who does an action; look out _-in_, and you find it expresses the feminine; look out _-o_, and you find it denotes a noun. Put the whole together, and you get "female who does washing, laundress."

Suppose you are going on an ocean voyage, and you expect to be shut up for weeks in a ship with persons of many nationalities. You take with you keys to Esperanto, price one halfpenny each, in various languages. You wish to tackle a Russian. Write your Esperanto sentence clearly and put the paper in his hand. At the same time hand him a Russian key to Esperanto, pointing to the following paragraph (in Russian) on the outside:

"Everything written in the international language can be translated by the help of this vocabulary. If several words together express but a single idea, they are written in one word, but separated by apostrophes; e.g. _frat'in'o_, though a single idea, is yet composed of three words, which must be looked for separately in the vocabulary."

After he has got over his shock of surprise, your Russian, if a man of ordinary education, will make out your sentence in a very short time by using the key.

As an example Dr. Zamenhof gives the following sentence: "Mi ne sci'as kie mi las'is la baston'o'n: Ĉu vi ĝi'n ne vid'is?" With the vocabulary this sentence will work out as follows:

Mi mi = I I ne ne = not not sci'as sci = know as = sign of present tense do know kie kie = where where mi mi = I I las'is las = leave is = sign of past tense have left la la = the the baston'o'n baston = stick o = sign of a noun n = sign of objective case stick ĉu ĉu = whether, sign of question whether vi vi = you you ĝi'n ĝi = it n = sign of objective case it ne ne = not not vid'is vid = leave is = sign of past tense have seen

It is obvious that no natural language can be used in the same way as a code to be deciphered with a small key.

German French

Ich I je I weiss white ne not nicht not sais ? wo where pas step ich I où where den ? j'ai ? Stock stick laissé ? gelassen dispassionate la the habe: property: canne: reed: haben to have ne not Sie she, they, you, l'avez ? ihn ? vous you nicht not pas step gesehen ? vu ? ?

If your Russian wishes to reply, hand him a Russian-Esperanto vocabulary, pointing to the following paragraph on the outside:

"To express anything by means of this vocabulary, in the international language, look for the words required in the vocabulary itself; and for the terminations necessary to distinguish the grammatical forms, look in the grammatical appendix, under the respective headings of the parts of speech which you desire to express."

The whole of the grammatical structure is explained in a few lines in this appendix, so the grammar can be looked out as easily as the root words.