Brasil.

In conclusion, I wish to register my opinion as an unbiased student of the whole movement for the adoption of an international language that Esperanto has nothing to fear from any rival scheme—present, past, or future.

Of upward of 150 different projects that have seen the light since the seventeenth century, not one was born with a life worth saving but Esperanto; not one has ever attained one-hundredth part the power and vogue and vitality that Esperanto has achieved.

One only of all these schemes has ever come prominently before the public before Esperanto came into the field, Volapük, and this failed of its own defects.

One only among some 20 or 30 imitations of Esperanto, namely, Ido, succeeded for a time in creating a diversion in the Esperanto camp. If Volapük died of its defects, it is permissible to say that Ido never lived on account of its numerous authors' everlasting chase after theoretical perfection, each one having a different opinion—and changing the same with every wind—as to what constitutes perfection in every one of a thousand features of a human language. Accordingly, the Idoists have altered their mock Esperanto a hundred times in six years, so that no one has been able to keep track of the changes, and the adherents of the secession themselves have never been able to learn, speak, and use the language.

During these six years Esperanto has succeeded in establishing itself and getting a firm hold in every civilized country from China to Peru and from Greenland to Zanzibar, because it is a live and growing language, perfect in so far that it is endowed from the start with all the power of evolution without the need of any internal changes in its wonderfully simple structure.

Here are a few quotations from great thinkers as to the need for an auxiliary language:

The diversity of languages is fatal for genius and progress. If there were a universal language, we should save a third of life. (Leibnitz.)

The interrelationships of the peoples are so great that they most certainly need a universal language. (Montesquieu.)

One of the greatest torments of life is the diversity of language. (Voltaire.)

What an immeasurable profit it would be for the human race if we were able to intercommunicate by means of one language. (Volney.)

It seems to me quite possible—probable even—than

an artificial language to be universally used will be greed upon. (Herbert Spencer.)

The learning of many languages fills the memory with words instead of facts and thoughts, and this is a vessel which, with every person, can only contain certain limited amount of records. Therefore the learning of many languages is injudicious, inasmuch as it arouses the belief in the possession of dexterity, and, as a matter of fact, it lends a kind of delusive importance to social intercourse. It is also injurious in that it opposes the acquirement of solid knowledge and the intention to win the respect of men in an honest way. Finally, it is the ax which is laid at the root of a delicate sense of language in our mother tongue, which thereby is incurably injured and destroyed. The two nations which have produced the greatest stylists, the Greeks and the French, learned no foreign languages; but as human intercourse grows more cosmopolitan, and as, for instance, a good merchant in London must now be able to read and write eight languages, the learning of many tongues has certainly become a necessary evil; but which, when finally carried to an extreme, will compel mankind to find a remedy, and in some far off future there will be a new language used at first as a language of commerce, then as a language of intellectual intercourse, then for all, as surely as some time or other there will be aviation. Why else should philology have studied the laws of language for a whole century and have estimated the necessary, the valuable, and the successful portion of each separate language? (Nietsche.)

In this connection it may be well to repeat once more that Esperanto is only an "auxiliary" language. Nobody dreams of it being a "universal language."

EXAMPLES OF ESPERANTO.

Simpla, fleksebla, belsona, vere internacia en siaj elementoj¹, la lingvo Esperanto prezentas al la mondo civilizita la sole veran solvon² de lingvo internacia: ĉar³, tre facila por homoj nemulte instruitaj, Esperanto estas komprenata sen peno de la personoj bone edukitaj. Mil faktoj atestas la meriton praktikan de la nomita lingvo.

¹"j" has the sound of English "y", as in boy, and is the sign for the plural of nouns and adjectives.

²"n" is the mark of the accusative or object of the verb.

³The diacritic sign ^ occurs on c, g, h, j, s and has the force of an h after the first and the last—ch, sh. ĝ is pronounced like English g in George, which g without sign has the value of g in good. ĵ is pronounced like s in pleasure, while j simple has the sound of y in yes, esp. jes. ĥ occurs rarely and is doomed to disappear in favor of k.

Kaj se vi preĝas, vi ne devas esti kiel la hipokrituloj, kiuj volonte staras kaj preĝas en la lernejoj, kaj apud la anguloj de la stratetoj; por ke ili estu vidataj de la homoj. Vere, mi diras al vi: Ili ricevis sian pagon. Sed se vi preĝas, iru en la ĉambreton kaj fermu la pordon, kaj preĝu al via patro en la kaŝito, kaj via patro, kiu vidas en la kaŝiton, rekompencos ĝin al vi publike. Kaj se vi preĝas, vi ne devas multe babili, kiel la idolistoj, ĉar ili opinias ke ĝi estos akceptata, se ili faras multe da paroloj. Tial vi ne devas simili al ili. Via patro scias, kion vi bezonas, antaŭ ol vi petas lin. Tial vi devas preĝi tiamaniere. Patro nia en la ĉielo. Via nomo estu sanktigata. Via regno venu. Via volo fariĝu sur la tero, kiel en la ĉielo. Nian panon ĉiutagan donu al ni hodiaŭ. Kaj pardonu al ni niajn kulpojn, kiel ni pardonas niajn kulpulojn. Kaj ne konduku nin en tenton, sed savu nin de la malbono. Ĉar via estas la regno, kaj la forto, kaj la gloro en eterneco. Amen. Ĉar se vi pardonos al la homoj iliajn kulpojn, tiam via ĉiela patro pardonos ankaŭ al vi. Sed se vi ne pardonos al la homoj iliajn kulpojn, tiam via ĉiela patro ankaŭ ne pardonos al vi viajn kulpojn. (La Evangelio Sankta Mateo VI, 5-16.)