64 INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE AND SCIENCE 



artificial auxiliary languages, such as Volapiik, Esperanto, 

 Neutral Idiom, Novilatin, Universal, etc., science has not 

 long ago adopted and introduced one of them. Quite apart 

 from the actual circumstances which have prevented this, a 

 perfectly precise answer may he given to the ahove question. 

 There have not heen wanting experiments in this direction. 

 Already in the Volapiik period endeavours were made to 

 translate scientific works into Volapiik in order to prove 

 that this language could also be of service to science. In 

 particular the translations of Dr. Miess's Craniology, Dr. 

 Winkler's Petrification of Fishes, and the Eastern Travels 

 of the Crown Prince Rudolph were boasted of by the 

 Volapiikists. Esperanto has gone further, and is, as a 

 matter of fact, more capable of development in this direc- 

 tion. There appears a periodical, Scienca Revuo, which in 

 popular form conveys the most important results of different 

 sciences to Esperanto readers. Fechner's little book on life 

 after death and some others have also been translated. All 

 these attempts possess an extraordinary interest for the 

 great experiment in language on which mankind has been 

 engaged during the last twenty years, and the greatest 

 thanks are due to their authors. It is only, indeed, after 

 many attempts that an experiment can be successfully 

 carried through. But, without wishing to deny that very 

 remarkable things have been accomplished, all these experi- 

 ments prove one fact beyond question, namely, that the 

 languages mentioned do not even approximately, and cannot 

 indeed possibly, satisfy the requirements which science must 

 demand of the artificial auxiliary language. Science could 

 not, therefore, have chosen any of these languages as the 

 artificial auxiliary language even had she wished, nor could 

 she do so in the future without experiencing failure. An 

 examination of the reasons for this state of affairs will enable 

 us to arrive at the relation between science and the inter- 

 national auxiliary language. It can be shown what the 



