[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR, —One section in
your illuminating review of my book, Delphos : the Future of International Language, calls, I think, for some comment.
Your reviewer expresses agreement with my contention that the inter-language must employ the Roman alphabet, but assumes that there will be "considerable divergence of opinion" on this point. He urges that Arabic script is a form of shorthand "more scientific than our somewhat cum- bersome system of letters."
It is true that the Arabic writing is a shorthand ; but for manual writing, and only for the Semitic languages, in which the vocalization is in some cases unimportant, in others grammatical, and in others euphonic. Even Hindustani finds the Arabic characters it employs for political reasons a somewhat uncomfortable garment. In printing—and after all this is an age of printing and typewriting—the supremacy of the Roman alphabet has long been established and is demon- strated daily. A six-point type in Arabic characters would be simply impossible, but in Roman letters it is perfectly legible.
Your reviewer further observes that half the population of the world may object to the suggestion that the vocabulary of the international auxiliary medium should consist mainly of Latin words common to the Indo-European speech family. Assuming that half the world should make this objection, it must be obvious that the objectors would fail to agree amongst themselves in selecting an alternative. No common de- nominator is to be found amongst the languages of Africa, Australasia, India, China and Japan, amongst which occur, almost side by side, representatives of all the great speech families. In Asia, for instance, no similarity exists between the descendants of the Sanskrit, the Dravidian, the Munda, and the Mongolian or Turanian languages. All these appear in Asia, yet under no philological classification can they be included in a single category, as are the languages of Europe. There is, indeed, far greater divergence amongst the lan- guages of Asia than amongst those of Europe.
Since it is impossible to produce a satisfactory language compounded of elements from all the various speech families, a choice must be made. Obviously the choice must fall upon the most widely diffused member of the European speech family, because it is the vehicle of modern science, which is the maker of modern civilization. The East will gain infinitely more than it will lose by the choice, for East, like West, now depends upon modern science. All the student youth of the East is to-day engaged in the study of Latin. Latin, with Greek elements malleated by the usage of modern Europe, is established as the international language, because it is the medium universally employed by all the sciences.
The problem before us is the modernization, which entails
the simplification, of Latin. The merit of Professor Peano lies not merely in having selected Latin as the basis of the vocabu- lary of his language, but in having discarded all linguistic forms which are neither essential nor logical. In time to come the two remarkable prefaces he has written to his Vocabulario Commune will be regarded as milestones in the journey towards the inter-language.—I am, Sir, &c., E. SYLviut PAN-lam-asp.
126 High Road, Woodford Green, Esser.
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