Page:The Chinese language and how to learn it.djvu/34

 16 THE CHINESE LANGUAGE n. THE SPOKEN LANGUAGE DURING its progress through a long series of ages the Chinese spoken language, it may readily be supposed, underwent many changes. To refer to one proof alone, the specimens of ancient poetry still in existence establish this fact by the rhyming of words which have now, in many instances, no uniformity of sound. Its origin is, and must remain, a mystery in spite of the array of opinions and judgments concerning it, and as none of them can possibly be conclusive, or indeed more than purely speculative, it seems advisable to leave theory alone, and to pass on at once to modern fact. Those who are interested in the attempts to trace the origin of the language to its source, and to establish its family relationship with the great clan of human tongues, are referred once more to Mr. Watters' Essay on the Chinese Language, and particularly to the chapter entitled " Some Western Opinions." They will there find that it has been regarded by some as a special creation, by others as the language spoken by Noah, and Shem, the son of Noah, who moved into China in time to escape the confusion of tongues ; that others, again, discover a relationship between the language of China and that of ancient Egypt, while some inves- tigators try to prove that there is a connection between Chinese and the Hebrew tongue. Wherever it sprang from originally, we know that the pronuncia- tion of the language in the days of Confucius and that of the present day is so dissimilar as to make it a matter of certainty that Confucius would understand nothing of the speech that now prevails at his native place in the province of Shantung. He might, probably, according to Mr. E. H. Parker,* an eminent authority, be more at home in Korea, or Annam, or, possibly, Canton, but he certainly would be unable to understand his own remarks as recited by the modern school-boy in any part of the Empire. And it may
 * Pioft ssor of Chinese at Owen's College, Manchester.