14 Miles Walker, The History of English Spelling 



just as we continue to oppose the metric system and a 

 decimal coinage, on account of our inertia and for no logical 

 reason. Now that Japan is adopting the metric system and 

 the Chinese are going in for a phonetic spelling, we are indeed 

 being left behind. 



(2) Another argument is, that children who grow up in 

 the new system will be unable to read the present books. 

 This is not true, because it has been found that children 

 who learn the reformed spelling first can learn the old 

 spelling as well, and the total time taken is less than that used 

 in learning the old spelling in the first place. The reason is, 

 that they learn all the phonetically-spelt words in English 

 (which constitute more than one-half the language) on a 

 rational system, and learn the unphonetic words by contrast, 

 the contrasts in some cases being so striking that they are 

 impressed upon the memory. Thus without any more effort 

 than is at present devoted to spelling, children would be able 

 to read in both spellings. But the necessity for doing so 

 would very soon disappear, because the books that are best 

 worth reading would soon be reprinted in the new spelling. 

 What a splendid thing it would be to occupy the publishers 

 for some years to come in reprinting in rational spelling some 

 of the old books that are really worth reading ! The republi- 

 cation would act as a kind of sieve, through which good books 

 would pass, worthless books being left behind. We should 

 thus have an automatic purification of our bookshelves. It 

 might be a very good thing for literature as a whole that the 

 majority of the writings of the past should fail to go through 

 the sieve. It would, however, still be possible for students of 

 literature, by the expenditure of a little time and energy, to 

 learn the old spelling sufficiently well to read whatever they 

 may choose. 



(3) It has also been argued that confusion would arise 

 between words that are at present spelt differently but pro- 

 nounced alike (such as rite, right, write). In the first place, 

 it should be pointed out that there are many words spelt alike 

 and sounded differently (such as bow and bow) ; so that in 

 any case where we lose in one respect we gain in another. 

 But the argument has really very little weight, because we do 

 not find that serious confusion arises in conversation from 

 words that have the same sound but different meanings. The 

 context tells us which meaning is intended, and the same 

 would hold with the new spelling. In any case, if these pious 

 people are so anxious that there should be no possible mistake 

 about the meaning of the written word, why do they not take 



