English has the right of way. Its composite character makes it the language for every-day use. Thirty-five languages are spoken in this city, but the assimilative power of English absorbs them all. The Public School is the effective agent in the process. This is the melting pot for all diversities of speech. Children dislike to be looked upon as different from their companions, and so it rarely happens that the language of the parents is spoken by the second generation of immigrant families. Their elders, even when their "speech bewrayeth" them, make strenuous efforts to use the language of their neighbors. Seeing, then, that Anglicization is inevitable, why should we not cut the Gordian knot, and conduct our ministry wholly in the English language? This would greatly simplify our tasks, besides removing from us the stigma of foreignism. We are often advised to do so, especially by our monoglot brethren. There are those who go so far as to say that the use of any language other than the English impairs the Americanism of the user. Some of the languages at present used in our church services may be of negligible importance. The Slovak, Magyar and Finnish for example, as well as the Lettish, Esthonian and Lithuanian of the Baltic Provinces, will never have more than a restricted use in this city. The Scandinavians and those whose vernacular is the Low German easily substitute English for their mother tongue. Scandinavian is kindred to English, while Low German is the very group of which, philologically speaking, English is the most conspicuous member. Upon these tongues it will not be necessary to do summary execution. It is a different matter, however, when we come to High German, or, properly speaking, New High German, the language of German literature since the sixteenth century, of which Luther, through his version of the Bible, may be called the creator. He at least gave it universal currency. This is a language which we could not lose if we would, and would not if we could. Scholars are compelled to learn it because it is the indispensable medium for scientific and philosophical study. Formerly Latin was this medium, today it is German. Lovers of literature learn it because it is the language of Goethe and Schiller, the particular stars of a galaxy that for the modern world at least outshines the productions of the ancient classics. Lutherans enshrine it in their inmost souls because it is the receptacle of treasures of meditation and devotion with which their forms of worship have been enriched for four hundred years. To ignore Angelus Silesius, Paul Gerhardt, Albert Knapp, Philip Spitta and their glorious compeers, would be to silence a choir that sang the praises of the Lord "in notes almost divine."