International Language | Page 8

Kischineff, who had been through the first great pogrom, and a most
interesting conversation ensued. Another day the neighbours were an
Indian nawab and an abbé from Madrid. Another time it was a
Bulgarian. At the first official banquet he sat next to a Finn, who
rejoiced in the name of Attila, and, but for the civilizing influence of a
universal language, might have been in the sunny south, like his
namesake of the ancient world, on a very different errand from his
present peaceful one. Yet here he was, rubbing elbows with Italians, as
if there had never been such things as Huns or a sack of Rome by
northern barbarians.
During the meal a Frenchman, finding himself near us English and
some Germans, proposed a toast to the "entente cordiale taking in
Germany," which was honoured with great enthusiasm. This is merely
an instance of the small ways in which such gatherings make for peace
and good will.
With all these people it was perfectly easy to converse in the common
tongue, pronunciation and national idiom being no bar in practice.
And this experience was general throughout the duration of the
congress. Day by day sittings were held for the transaction of all kinds
of business and the discussion of the most varied subjects. It was
impressive to see people from half the countries of the world rise from
different corners of the hall and contribute their share to the discussion
in the most matter-of-fact way. Day by day the congressists met in

social functions, debates, lectures, and sectional groups (chemical,
medical, legal, etc.) for the regulation of matters touching their special
interests. Everything was done in Esperanto, and never was there the
slightest hitch or misunderstanding, or failure to give adequate
expression to opinions owing to defects of language. The language
difficulty was annihilated.
Perhaps one of the most striking demonstrations of this return to
pre-Babel conditions was the performance of a three-part comedy by a
Frenchman, a Russian, and a Spaniard. Such a thing would inevitably
have been grotesque in any national language; but here they met on
common neutral ground. No one's accent was "foreign," and none of
the spectators possessed that mother-tongue acquaintance with
Esperanto that would lead them to feel slight divergences shocking, or
even noticeable without extreme attention to the point. Other theatrical
performances were given at Geneva, as also at Boulogne, where a play
of Molière was performed in Esperanto by actors of eight nationalities
with one rehearsal, and with full success.
In the face of these facts it is idle to oppose a universal artificial
language on the score of impossibility or inadequacy. The theoretical
pronunciation difficulty completely crumbled away before the test of
practice.
The "war-at-any-price party," the whole-hoggers à tous crins (the
juxtaposition of the two national idioms lends a certain realism, and
heightens the effect of each), are therefore driven back on their second
line of attack, if the Hibernianism may be excused. "Yes," they say,
"your language may be possible, but, after all, why not learn an existing
language, if you've got to learn one anyway?"
Now, quite apart from the obvious fact that the nations will never agree
to give the preference to the language of one of them to the prejudice of
the others, this argument involves the suggestion that an artificial
language is no easier to learn than a natural one. We thus come to the
question of ease as a qualification.
IV

THE QUESTION OF PRACTICE (continued)--AN
INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE IS EASY[1]
[1]Readers who do not care about the reasons for this, but desire
concrete proofs, may skip the next few pages and turn in to p. 20, par.
6.
People smile incredulously at the mention of an artificial language,
implying that no easy royal road can be found to language-learning of
any kind. But the odds are all the other way, and they are heavy odds.
The reason for this is quite simple, and may be briefly put as follows:
The object of language is to express thought and feeling. Every natural
language contains all kinds of complications and irregularities, which
are of no use whatever in attaining this object, but merely exist because
they happen to have grown. Their sole raison d'être is historical. In fact,
for a language without a history they are unnecessary[1]. Therefore a
universal language, whose only object is to supply to every one the
simplest possible means of expressing his thoughts and feelings in a
medium intelligible to every one else, simply leaves them out. Now, it
is precisely in these "unnecessary" complications that a large
proportion--certainly more than half--of the difficulty of learning a
foreign language consists. Therefore an artificial language, by merely
leaving them out, becomes certainly more than twice as easy to learn as
any