The weekly register. [volume] (Point Pleasant, Va. [W. Va.]) 1862-1909, 1889-05-15
The Language Of The Futurc.

l.
The Language Of The Future.
In these post-centennial days,
says the New York Herald, is in
tercsting to remember that with the
first colony established in Virginia
the Anglo Saxon, hitherto penned
up almost entirely within his Is
land stronghold, began that career
! of acquisition, conquest and assimi-
lation which must end in anglicizing
every country that is not already
civilized, and in all probability will
make English the universal Ian
guage of the future.
For it takes no prophetic vision
to discern that the adoption of a
universal language will be one of
the forerunncrs of that federation
of nun into which all nations will
be ultimately merged.
Even now the need of such a
language is acutely felt, and has
given birth to such anomalies as
Volapuk and its limitations. But
VoIapuk can never supply the
need. A language cannot be de-
liberately invented; it must grow
and develop are part of the heritage
of a nation, strengthening with its
strength and embalming ali its
glories and traditions.
The universal language of the
future, therefore, will be either some
natural outgrowth from current
languages, formed through the pro-
cesses of corruption and phonetic
decay which are familiar to etymol-
ogists, or else some language al
ready in existen,e &c.
In a generation where the masses
are educated, where the majority
can read and write and whore there
is perpetual intercommunication, a
language loses it's Elasticity; it crys-
talizes into forms which are no
longer subject to corruption. The
dictionary, the locomotive and the
telegraph arc effectual barriers
against the disintegration as well
as the farther evolution of a Ian
guage.
The language of the future, there
fore, must be found in some tongue
already existing. Now, there are
two ways in which n language i'm
presses itself upon the outside
world-the red hand of conquest
and the intellectual ascendency of
the race that speaks it. 1t was in
both these ways that the Romans
made Latin enter as an important
factor into all the modern languages
of Europe and survive for ages as
the scholastic tongue of the de-
scendents of those barbarians whom
by arms or by intellect they had
conquered.
AS France was for years the
greatest of the nations of Continen-
tai Europe, the most polished, the
most civilized, the most advanced,
it's languages became the court Ian
guage of European nations and is
still understood by all educated men.
But the Anglo Saxon is now
dominating the world. He has
thrown a girdle around the earth,
and from the crlmpcd little island
in which its language took its birth
it has invaded the remotest corners
of the globe.
Gibraltar, Malta, the Isthmus of
Suez, Alden, Ccylon, Hindoostan,
Australia, New Zealand and the
West Indies form "a continuous belt
which connects the Anglo-Saxon of
the Old World with the Anglo-Sax-
on of the New. 1t is only ques-
ton of time before the continent of
Africa, whose most fourishing
States are as English in their Ian
guage and traditions as the CONT
nents of Australia and of North
America are to-day.
And as the United States is the
land of the future, the land of
promise for the older nations, the
meeting ground of all races wherein
they shall be fused into higher
and nobler civilization, it becomes
a vast centre for the diffusion and
the perpetuation of the language
which it speaks.