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this language, or at least several million people, we will do the same.
I have always been interested in the question of a universal language, but as I did not feel myself better qualified for the work than the authors of so many other fruitless attempts, I did not risk running into print, and merely occupied myself with imaginary schemes and a minute study of the problem. At length, however, some happy ideas, the fruits of my reflections, incited me to further work, and induced me to essay the systematic conquest of the many obstacles which beset the path of the inventor of a new rational universal language. As it appears to me that I have almost succeeded in my undertaking, I am now venturing to lay before a critical public the results of my long and assiduous labours.
The principal difficulties to be overcome were:—
(1). To render the study of the language so easy as to make its acquisition mere play to the learner.
(2). To enable the learner to make direct use of his knowledge with persons of any nationality, whether the language be universally accepted or not; in other words, the language is to be directly a means of international communication.
(3). To find some means of overcoming the natural indifference of mankind, and disposing them, in the quickest manner possible, and en masse, to learn and use the proposed language as a living one, and not only in last extremities, and with the key at hand.
Amongst the numberless projects submitted at various times to the public, often under the high-sounding but unaccountable name of "universal languages," no one has solved at once more than one of the above-mentioned problems, and even that but partially.
Before proceeding to enlighten the reader as to the
