24th Nov.
'T'uare are many readers of the journals published in the Chinese Empire who are by no means attracted by the Chinese language. For such our observations in the present article will be of no interest, though: this, as we hasten. to point out, is no fault of ours. There are. many others to whom the raising of such an enquiry at all, is like asking whether the Dutch have really taken Holland. The theme is suggested by a paragraph in the Introduction to his huge Chinese Dictionary by Mr. Giles, who has a great deal to say that is of interest and who never speaks without having something to say. After alluding to the familiar fact that different Chinese themselves do not give the same explanations of some of the difficult phrases, sentences, etc, Mr. Giles remarks,' " This feature is, of course, not wanting la Western languages; yet it is partly in consequence of this that early explorers have jumped to the fatal and foolish conclusion that Chinese is an. ambiguous language—an error which unfortunately with the less wall informed lasts down to the present day.
To begin with there is an obvious confusion in terms; ambiguity is confounded with obscurity, which is, of course, quite another matter." He then points out that obscurity is a trait of other languages as well of the Chinese.
The distinction' thus drawn between ambiguity and obscurity has a look of discrimination, but we are unable to see any justification for it. Here are three specimen definitions from the first dictionaries that happen to be at hand, Worcester, Webster, and the Standard, which is superior to either. The first defines Ambiguous, as "Qccasioning uncertainty by double signification; having two meanings equivocal; uncertain." The second authority says, "Doubtful or uncertain, particularly in regard to signification equivocal." The Standard is fuller: "Capable of being understood in more senses than one; obscure in meaning through indefiniteness of expression." Obscurity is the wider term, ambiguity the narrower. It is impossible to be ambiguous without at the same time being obscure, although there are many other sources of obscurity than the possibility of a double meaning. We may illustrate the distinction by a citation from the preface to} his translation of Chuang Tze, by! Mr. Giles himself. He tells us that! there is a passage in that profound author, the rendering of which Mr.! Giles gives thus: "A one-legged man discards ornament, his exterior not being open to commendation." But) this passage appears in Mr. Balfour's version thus: "Servants will tear up a portrait, not liking to be confronted with its beauties and its defects." As a general rule we never read Chuang Ize, but we should really like to see the original of this distinctly ambiguous paragraph.
The causes of obscurity in Chinese are the same as in any language, with 'a great many others largely indigenous such a tongue as the Chinese use. The word Homophony has a rather pleasant sound, but the poison of asps is under its lips. As no Chinese has any idea what it would be to speak other than in an homophonous speech, and as Westerners have no idea what it must be to be pent up within homophonous walls, we are not likely to know very soon how much of Chinese ambiguity is certainly due to the fact: that when one hears a sound it is often impossible to know with certainty what is meant. It is idle to say that che: Chinese know this by nature, and without effort. A careful attention to their intellectual processes shows that this! is not the case, They are obliged, however, unconsciously, to go through an analysis of the possibilities of meaning, whenever there is uncertainty, not unlike that of one to whom the Chinese is not a native idiom. That they often err in doing this we constantly perceive, though they are, no doubt, far less liable to go wrong than a foreigner. Probably all the languages in Europe combined afford less facilities for punning than the Chinese colloquial, and every pun is ex officio a case of ambiguity. Then the total lack of those inflections which we think it necessary for "civilised" languages to be provided with, the possibility of speaking indefinitely without any specified subject, and of thus making a pagoda of predicates built literally upon nothing; the frequency of recondite allusions which may be this or that or the other, according as they ara taken, and the absence or suppression of words which show relations, time-particles, prepositions, etc., these and other eccentricities produce a language which, if not ambiguous, might as well be so. The gist of the matter is that the Chinese speak an ambiguous language, because a Chinese is essentially an ambiguous man,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.