THE CONFLICT OF LANGUAGES
things inconceivable of any other existing nation. I may be the slave of perspective effects, but when I turn my mind from the pettifogging muddle of the English House of Commons, for example, that magnified vestry that is so proud of itself as a club—when I turn from that to this race of brave and smiling people, abruptly destiny begins drawing with a bolder hand. Suppose the Japanese were to make up their minds to accelerate whatever process of synthesis were possible in China! Suppose after all I am not the victim of atmospheric refraction, and they are, indeed, as gallant and bold and intelligent as my baseless conception of them would have them be! They would almost certainly find co-operative elements among the educated Chinese. . . . But this is no doubt the lesser probability. In front and rear of China the English language stands. It has the start of all other languages—the mechanical advantage—the position. If only we, who think and write and translate and print and put it forth, could make it worth the world's having!
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