Knowledge of English
OUTLINES
- Knowledge of English gives access.
(a) To a noble literature.
(b) To the latest discoveries of science.
- English being spoken all over the world is most useful to travellers.
- The native of India derives special advantages from the knowledge of English, because
(a) English is the official language of India.
(b) Most of the foreign trade of India is with England.
(c) English is becoming the common language of all educated natives of India.
The Indian student is likely to derive more advantage from the knowledge of English than from the knowledge of any other language. In the first place, he thereby gains access to the varied stores of a noble literature. The advantage of being able to read in original the poetry of Milton and Shakespeare, the histories of Gibbon and Macaulay, the novels of Scott, Thackeray and Dickens, and the philosophy of Mill, Darwin and Herbert Spencer, is incalculable.
This language also gives the key to the latest scientific discoveries of the two most advanced nations of the modern world. Every newly-found marvel of science, even if originally discovered on the European continent, is sure to be published with little delay in the pages of English and American works.
For the traveller and the man of business, no language is more useful than English, which is the mother-tongue of about a hundred million people, and is acquired for commercial and literary purposes by an immense number of foreigners. Indeed, the English language is known so widely over the surface of the globe, and is spreading so rapidly year by year, that it bids fair to become in the course of time a kind of universal language known and spoken all over the world.
Such are among the general advantages derived from the knowledge of English. But there are, of course, special reasons why Indians should master the language. As India is a part of the British Commonwealth of Nations, English is of unique importance in the country, and only the very lowest posts in the service of Government are open to those who are ignorant of it. English being the language of the law courts, generally Indian barristers and solicitors are somewhat handicapped in the legal profession, unless they are able to speak it fluently. The great bulk of the foreign trade of India being with Europe and the United States of America, knowledge of English is essential for one and all in commercial offices and for those who engage in trade on their own account.
