The matter is very delicate and can hardly be managed by legislation, as
it was on the point of our pen to suggest it should be. The first French
Republic, one and indivisible, decreed a really charming form of
address, which could be used without offence to the self-love or the
self-respect of any one. Citoyen for all men and Citoyenne for all women
was absolutely tasteful, modest, and dignified; but some things, though
they are such kindred things, cannot be done as well as others. The same
imaginative commonwealth invented a decimal chronology, and a new era,
very handy and very clear; but the old week of seven days came back and
replaced the week of ten days, and the Year of our Lord resumed the
place of the Year of the Republic, as Monsieur and Madame returned
victorious over Citoyen and Citoyenne. Yet the reform of weights and
measures, when once established, continued, and spread from France to
most other countries--to nearly all, indeed, less stupid than Great
Britain and the United States--so that the whole civilized world now
counts in grammes and metres. What can be the fine difference? Here is a
pretty inquiry for the psychologist, who has an opportunity to prove
himself practically useful. Is it that grammes and metres are less
personal than week-days and addresses? That can hardly be, or else the
Society of Friends could not have so absolutely substituted First Day
and Second Day, etc., for the old heathen names of our week-days, and
could not have successfully refused all name-honor whatsoever in
addressing their fellow-mortals.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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