pose
The Lesson of the Hour.

THE SCIENTIFIC UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE: ITS CHARACTER AND RELATION TO OTHER
LANGUAGES.

_ARTICLE ONE._

THE ORIGIN OF SPEECH.

The CONTINENTAL for May contained an article, written by Stephen Pearl
Andrews, entitled: A UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE: ITS POSSIBILITY, SCIENTIFIC
NECESSITY, AND APPROPRIATE CHARACTERISTICS. Although then treated
hypothetically, or as something not impossible of achievement _in the
future_, a Language constructed upon the method therein briefly and
generally explained, is, in fact, substantially completed at the present
time. It is one of the developments of a new and vast scientific
discovery--comprising the Fundamental Principles of all Thought and
Being, and the Law of Analogy--on which Mr. Andrews has bestowed the
name of UNIVERSOLOGY. The public announcement of this discovery,
together with a general statement of its character, has been recently
made in the columns of a leading literary paper--_The Home Journal._

Although the principle involved in the Language discussed in the article
referred to is wholly different from that upon which all former attempts
at the construction of a common method of lingual communication have
been based; and although such merely mechanical _inventions_ were
therein distinguished from a Language _discovered as existing in the
nature of things_; several criticisms, emanating from high literary
quarters, indicate that there is still much misunderstanding as to the
real nature of a Universal Language framed upon the principles of
Analogy between Sense and Sound. This misunderstanding seems most
prevalent in respect to the two points relating directly to the
practical utility of such a Lingual Organ. It is assumed that a Language
so constituted must be wholly different in its material and structure
from any now existing, and that the latter would have to be abandoned as
soon as the former was adopted. It is supposed, therefore, that in
order to introduce the SCIENTIFIC UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE, the people must be
induced to learn something entirely new, and to forsake for it their old
and cherished Mother-tongues. The accomplishment of such an undertaking
is naturally regarded as highly improbable, if not impossible.

It is also supposed that every word of the Language is to be determined
in accordance with exact scientific formulas;--a process which, if
employed, would, as is conceived, give a stiff, inflexible, monotonous,
and cr