Many who realized these difficulties put forward French as the auxiliary international language. It is quite true that the power behind French is now relatively less than it was two centuries ago.
6 At that time France
by its relatively large population, the tradition of its military greatness, and its influential political position, was able to exert an immense influence; French was the language of intellect and society in Germany, in England, in Russia, everywhere in fact. During the eighteenth century internal maladministration, the cataclysm of the Revolution, and finally the fatal influence of Napoleon alienated foreign sympathy, and France lost her commanding position. Yet it was reasonably felt that, if a natural language is to be used for international purposes, after English there is no practicable alternative to French.
French is the language not indeed in any special sense of science or of commerce, but of the finest human culture. It is a well-organized tongue, capable of the finest shades of expression, and it is the key to a great literature. In most respects it is the best favoured child of Latin; it commends itself to all who speak Romance languages, and, as Alphonse de Candolle has remarked, a Spaniard and an Italian know three-quarters of French beforehand, and every one who has learnt Latin knows
half of French already. It is more admirably adapted for speaking purposes than perhaps any other language which has any claim to be used for international purposes, as we should expect of the tongue spoken by a people who have excelled in oratory, who possess such widely diffused dramatic ability, and who have carried the arts of social intercourse to the highest point.