Bourke Ulick J. Aryan Origin of the Gaelic Race and Language
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100
MANUSCRIPTS.
and of
placing
it in
its
objective
fulness before the
eye.
The
fowl
in
the
fable
did
not
see
the
value of a
gem.
He
declared he
would
rather have
one
grain
of
barley
than
the most
precious
and
valuable of
gems.
Gems
to him
were
things
he
could not
eat.
He
had no
power
of head
to
soar
higher
than the
notion of
eating
and
drinking.
A
gem
to a
bird
was
certainly
useless. There are men
who
prefer
the
possession
of material
value,
which
contributes
to their
gross
animal
life,
to
all the
precious
paintings
ever
pencilled
in ancient or
modern
times
by
Grecian,
Dutch,
Italian,
or
Spanish
artists. A
man
who
values
money
and material
riches
for
what
they
bring
of
earthly
enjoyment,
of
civic
honor,
social
state,
or
sensual
living,
cannot
appreciate
the
possession
of
precious
pictures
as
creations of intellect and works of
genius.
Of course he
may
value them as he
values bank
notes
;
but
that
is
not
intellectual
appreciation.
Painting
as well
as
music,
does
not satiate
animal
cravings,
or
satisfy
mere
earthly
tastes.
Persons
of
mind,
of
thought,
of
intelligence,
alone can
understand those works of intellectual
creation.
And how
very highly they
are valued is
plain
from the
fact that
kings
and
emperors
and
governments,
in
modern
and ancient
times,
prefer
to
have them
to
the
possession
of
hundreds of thousands
of
pounds.
The
value
of
a
language,
too,
must not
be estimated
by
its
commercial
worth. Men of mind
and of
linguistic
knowledge
alone
are
capable
of
estimating
it
at its real
value.
3.
Every
one
knows
how
highly
rare
books
are
prized
by
the
learned.
Above
all the
manuscript
works
of renowned
writers,
such
as
the Bard
of
Stratford-upon-Avon,
whose
house,
even
as
a
natural
heirloom,
has
been
purchased
(in
1847)
by
the
British Government.
Thj
manuscript
by
Dante
of the
Divina
Co:nmcdia
would
PLATO. 101
be
purchased,
not
alone
by
the
Florentines,
but
by every
nation
in
Europe,
at a
great price.
The
manuscript
of
the
Canterbury
Tales would make a
fortune for their
pos-
sessor.
Every
people
of civilization
and
intelligence
throughout
the
world
appreciate,
in
the
highest
degreo,
the
creations
of
gifted
genius,
far
above all
the
material
splendour
of Eastern
monarchs.
It
is
in this
way,
too,
that
literary
men
value
a
language.
One cannot
argue
or reason with
persons
of
gross
views
regarding
a
subject
which is
intellectual,
which has
nothing
material
about it
the value of which
does
not
present
itself
to
the
view
under
the
appearance
of
bulk,
or
material
profit,
or
social
rank.
On
this
point
the words
of Professor
Blackie are
pertinent:
"People
whose low ambition does
not
soar
above
what is called
1
getting
on
in the
world,'
that
is to
say,
whose
whole
anxiety
is
expended
on
planting laboriously,
one above
another,
a
series
of
steps,
by
which
they may
mount
to
the
highest
possible platform
in the
merely
material
world,
without
the
slightest regard
to
moral or intellectual con-
siderations,
may
well
question
the
utility
of Gaelic
;
for
no
Gael,
I
imagine,
in
these latter
days,
ever
gained
a
penny by
any
remarkable
proficiency
in the
knowledge
of
his
mother
tongue
;
but
those
who
believe with
Plato
and
St.
Paul,
that
money
is
not
the one
thing
needful,
may
bo allowed
to think
otherwise."
If a
manuscript
of
some
great
writer of ihe
past
is
valued
exceedingly;
if
paintings
are
highly prized;
if
an
heirloom,
bequeathed
by
a
dear
friend,
is
carefully
pre-
served
why
not
the
language
of our
fathers
?
The
language
of the Irish
people
is
a
precious
heirloom
trans-
mitted to the
present
generation
of
Irishmen
through
a
period
of
over
two thousand
years.
"
Whose
youthhood
saw the
Tyrian
on
our
Irish coast
a
guest,
102
A
PRECIOUS HEIRLOOM.
Ere
the
Saxon
or
the
Roman,
ere
the
Norman
or the
Dane
Had
first set
foot on
Britain,
or the
Yisigoth
in
Spain
;
Whose
manhood saw the
Druid
rite at
forest,
tree,
and
rock^
The
savage
tribes of Britain round
the shrines
of
Zernebock
;
And
for
generations
witnessed
all
the
glories
of the
Gael,
Since
our Keltic sires
sung
war-songs
round the
warrior
fires
of
Baal !
The
tongues
that saw its
infancy
are ranked
among
the
dead
;
And
from their
graves
have
risen.
those
now
spoken
in
their
stead.
All
the
glories
of old
Erin,
with
her
liberty,
hdve
gone,
Yet,
their
halo
lingered
round her
while
her
olden
Tongue
lived
on
;
For,
'mid
the
desert
of her
woe,
a
monument
more vast
Than all
her
pillar-towers,
it stood
that
old
Tongue
of the
past."
Is
not
an heirloom
so
precious
worth
preserving
?
Surely
yes.
Any
Irishman
who
says
that
his
nation's
language
one
of
such
antiquity,
so rich and
valuable in
the
eyes
of
scholars
is
not
worth
retrieving,
is
sordid,
selfish,
and
at heart
he is
not
divested
of
those
traits of
character
which
belong
to the
uncivilized and the
barbarian a
lack
of
that
faculty
which
appreciates
learning,
knowledge,
intelligence.
The writer has
heard
several Irishmen
educated
men
repeat
that the
Irish
language
is not
worth
preserving.
These
men
regarded
the
language
from
a
material
point
of
view,
from
its
productive
value
in
the
money
market,
or
in
society
. He
could
understand
how
one
could
be so
blinded
by
the
love of
England
that
he
would,
following
the
fashion of
people
in
position,
see
nothing good
in the Nazareth
of
mother-land
;
bat for
an
Irishman
and
a
Catholic
priest
to
say
that
the
national
heirloom,
bequeathed
him
by
his
Irish
Catholic
forefathers
not
worth
keeping,
is
expressing
a
proposition
which
is
simply
revolting
to
every
sense
of
our
intelligent
nature,
AN
AMERICAN BISHOP.
103
as
a civilized
and
enlightened people,
which
is
subversive
of the
national
character of
the Keltic
race,
that for
thousands
of
years
have
been,
with a
force
strong
and
enduring
as if
it
sprung
from
nature,
devoted to
the
tra-
ditions
and the historic
glories
of
the
past.
4.
In
the
opinion
of men of
thought,
the
acquisition
of
knowledge
is
better
than the
possession
of
money, parti-
cularly
the
knowledge
of a
language,
ignorance
of
which
is
deemed
a
shame
ignorance
of
one's
mother
tongue.
The writer
has before
him a
letter
received
while this
page
is
passing
through press,
from an
Irish
gentleman
at
present dwelling
in
Sumter,
South
Carolina
a
Mr.
Barrett.
He
states
that
the
Most Rev.
Bishop Lynch
declare!
to
him
:
"
I
would
give
a thousand
dollars
to
be
able
to hear
confessions
in
the
language
of
my
fathers."
A similar statement
has been sent
by
the Rev. John
MacNulty,
Pastor,
Caledonia,
Dominion
of
Canada,
that
the
Bishop
of the
diocese declared
he
would
rather
than
the
possession
of
thousands
of
pounds,
have
a
knowledge
of even a
little
of the
speech
of the
sages
and saints
of
his
own mother
Eire."
The
writer has met
over
a
score
of
Irishmen who
have,
since
they
emigrated
to
America,
learned to
speak,
in
a
foreign
land,
the
language
which
it
was their misfortune
not to
have
learned at
home.
This fact
shows with
what
ardour
Irish
-Americans love
the
language
of their
fore-
fathers.
There
are,
thank
God,
at
home in
Ireland
and
abroad
in
America
and
Australia,
many
men of
mind
and
of
scholarly
attainments, who,
like those most rev.
digni-
taries,
prefer
the
acquisition
of
knowledge
to the
posses-
sion
of the
mighty
dollar. Men of
this class will
ever
value
learning
and
scholarship
above
silver
and
gold.
*
"
Morum
priscovum
semper
tenacissimi
fuerunt
Celtic
populi."
Zeuss
Gram.
Celt-ca,
p.
916.
104 OUT BEGONE !
5. It
is not
by
bread
alone
that
man doth
live. And men
of
intelligence
in
every
clime
will
always appreciate
that
which is
stamped
with
the
image
of
genius,
nobility,
and
historic worth.
If
those Irish
gentlemen
and
ladies, too,
who do not
hold
in
esteem the
language
of their
fathers,
care not for
its
preservation,
the
fault
cannot at
present
be
helped.
Let the
language
fade
away
and
die
in
peace,
but
do not
scoff at
it,
scorn
it,
treat it as even its worst
persecutors
in
days
past,
did not
treat
it
with
contumely
and dis-
dain. It
is
not a
sign
of filial
devotedness to
beat
one's
grandmother,
and to turn her
out
of the
house before
the
term
which
nature has fixed for
the
close of her
life
has
arrived. Our mother
tongue
is
still alive. It
has
a
resi-
dence
in
Connacht.
It
is
fading
;
to
be
plain,
it
is
dying.
Is it
a
sign
of
filial
devotion
to
say,
"
Out
begone
!" A
sad
retribution is
threatened
against
children that
act
undutifully
towards
parents.
Let
us
take care
that
no
social retribution
is in store
for
un-Irish
Irishmen
who
despise
and hunt to
death their mother
tongue.
In an
appeal,
addressed
by
Professor
Blackie,
on
the
12th
September,
1874,
to the
members
of
the
Argyle-
shire
gathering,
requesting
Highlanders
to
contribute
the
sum
of ten
thousand
pounds
to
enable him to
estab-
lish
in
the
University
of
Edinburgh
a Keltic
chair,
he
writes :
"
Yet,
somehow
or
other,
by
sad
neglect
and
a con-
currence
of
untoward
circumstances,
the venerable
lan-
guage
of
the
Gael,
in whose
picturesque
phrase
the
sub-
lime
scenery
of our
country
has been so
admirably
photographed,
is
systematically
neglected by
those who
should
naturally
cherish
it.
This most
unreasonable
and
unnatural
neglect
is the cause
of
the sad blank
in
the
department
of
the
Keltic
language
and literature.
There
A KIND WORD.
105
are Professors
eminent for
their
knowledge
of
Keltic
philology
in
German
Universities,
but none
in
Scotland.
The
existence
of this blank
is a blot on
the fair
scutcheon
of
our
national
intelligence,
which
ought
to be
removed
;
and I
appeal
to
you,
as
intelligent
Keltic
gentlemen,
to
give
me a
helping
hand in
its
immediate
removal.
If
you
do
so,
you
will at
very
little
expense
achieve
a
five-
fold
good
you
will
(1)
co-operate
with
the
founder of
the
Sanscrit
Chair,
Edinburgh,
in the
creation of a
great
school
of
comparative
philology
in
the
metropolis
of
Scotland
;
you
will
(2)
elevate the tone of
the
Highland
pulpit,
by giving
to
the native
preachers
a
more
mascu-
line
hold of the venerable
language
which
they
wield
;
you
will
(3)
advance
the
teaching
of
English
in
the
schools
of Scotland
by
that
aid
which
every practical
teacher
knows can
be
given
only
by
the
apt
comparison
of
the mother
tongue
;
(4) you
will
enrich the
intellect
and warm
the
fancy
of the
people
in
the
North
by
cher-
ishing
those
gallant
memories,
and
fanning
those
gene-
rous
sentiments
which
it
is
the
mistaken
policy
of
some
to obliterate
and to
extinguish
;
and
finally
you
will
(5)
gain
for
yourselves
by
one
stroke
the
love
of
the
High-
land
people,
and
the
respect
of
all
the
great
scholars
and
the
large
thinkers of
Europe."
(106)
CHAPTER VI.
JTo
those
not of
Irish
origin
of what
use
is a
knowledge
of
Irish
?
Much in
every
way.
The
primaeval
Aryan
race.
How the
science
of
philology points
them
out,
and shows
where
they
dwelt.
Emigration
westward :
Greek,
Latin,
Keltic.
The
Gaelic
family
of
the
Aryan
race
the earliest
in
their
migration
to
the
west of
Eu-
rope
;
to
Iberia
;
some
to
Northern
Italy,
Helvetia,
Gaul, Britain,
and lerncj or
Eire.
Authorities for
these
statements
Newman,
Pictet,
Sullivan,
Geddes,
Pritchard,
Bopp,
Blackie,
Schleicher.
Keltic
installed
in the
hierarcy
of the
Aryan
tongues.
Though
the
last
installed,
the Irish
Gaelic branch
is the
purest,
the
fullest,
the best
preserved,
the least
affected
by
change
of
all
on account of
the
insular situation
of the Irish
Keltic race.
(1)
Therefore,
for
all lovers of
philolo-
gical
research a
knowledge
of Irish
is as
necessary
as
a
knowledge
of
Sanskrit
;
nay,
more so.
(2)
It
is
at
the door for
European
scholars,
an
El-Dorado
which
they
neglect,
while
they
weary
themselves
by
needless
journeying
to the
East.
(3)
The
lips
of a
living
Gaelic
speaker
a
nobler and a surer
source
of
philolo-
gical
science than the
graves
of dead
Rabbis
and
mummied
Bramins.
(4)
Philology
a
sister
science
to
Ethnology
:
both are
in accord
with the
inspired
writ-
ings
of
the
author of
the
Pentateuch.
(5)
Irish Gaelic
being
free
from
phonetic
decay
in the
past,
and affected
least of all
by foreign
influence,
is of
great
use
in
set-
ling
the vexed
question
of
classic
pronunciation
re-
garding
the natural
sounds
of
the
consonants
g,
c
}
and
the
vowels
a, e, i,
u.
The reader now
sees
the
value
and
interest which natives
of
Ireland
should attach
to
the
vernacular
speech
of
their
country.
A PRIMAEVAL TONGUE.
107
Regarding
tliose, however,
who
are
not
of
Irish
origin,
it
will be
asked,
"
Of
what
use is
a
knowledge
of
the
Irish
tongue
to
them,
for
they
are not natives of
Ireland.
Why,
then,
should
they
be
expected
to
unite
in
preserv-
ing
all
that remains
of Ireland's
language
?
To
answer
this
question
fully
one must ascend
the
heights
of
the
history
of human
speech.
The
primaeval
language
of
man,
called
amongst
the
learned
of the
present
day
-the
Aryan,
of
which
Keltic
is
a
dialect,
brings
us back to the
period
before
the human
family
had
emigrated
from the first
home wherein
they
had
settled.
For the
sake
of
those who
are not
acquainted
with the
science
of
comparative
philology, by
the aid of which
scholars can
point
out
clearly
and
distinctly
the
connexion
as well as the
difference between
living languages,
and,
at
the same
time,
trace
all
to
one common
origin,
it
is
ne-
cessary
to
state,
that
by
aid of this
science and
by
kindred
aids,
without
direct reference
to
revelation,
men of lite-
rary
research
have
found
proofs
the
most
convincing,
to
shew
that before
the
dispersion
of the human
family,
there existed
a
common
language,
"
admirable
in
its
raciness,
in
its
vigour,
its
harmony,
and
the
perfection
of
its
forms."
The sciences
in
connexion with
languages
are,
in
this
respect,
quite
in
accord
with the
tradition
of
every
nation
on the
globe,
and
with
the
teaching
of
history
and the
inspired writings
of Moses and the
Prophets.
These
linguistic
sciences
do
not
deal
with
any parti-
cular
language
;
they
take in all
modern
radical
tongues,
and
like
those
who sail
up
separate
small
rivers,
till
they
reach
a
common
source,
they
trace the
different
streams
of
language up
to
a
primaeval
fountain-head,
from
which
all
the
European
dialects
have
taken their rise.
108
ARYAN.
Tims,
it
has been discovered
that
there
had
been,
ante-
rior
to
the
dispersion,
one common
primaeval speech.
Learned
men
in
England,
France, Switzerland,
Ger-
many,
have,
by
their
labors,
within the
past
half
century,
contributed
to
this
important
result.
It
is
the same class
of
scholars
in
Germany
and
Swit-
zerland,
and
not
Irishmen,
who have shewn
that
Irish
Gaelic
is,
in
origin,
one with
Sanscrit, Greek,
and
Latin
;
and that
it is
amongst
the oldest
branches of
the one
primaeval Aryan tongue.
First
The Irish
speech
is, therefore,
for
all
lovers of
languages,
and
for all who
wish
to
become,
like German
scholars,
acquainted
with the first
tongue spoken by
the
human
family,
equal
in
value
to
Sanscrit, Latin,
and
Greek.
This
is not
merely
the
opinion
of the writer
it
is
held
by
Professor
Blackie of
Edinburgh,
by
Monsieur Pictet
of
Geneva,
by
Bopp,
by
Geddes,
Professor of Greek in
the
University
of Aberdeen. Geddes
says
(Lecture
the
Philologic
uses
of
the Keltic
tongue published
by
A
Browne
&
Co., Aberdeen,
1872)
:
"
A
great
field of
in-
vestigation,
as
yet
comparatively
unexplored,
lies before
you
in
your (the
Gaels
of the
Highlands)
own
tongue
it
is
an El-Dorado for the
winning."
Second
Schleicher,
a
German
scholar,
shows
in
his
compendium
of
comparative
grammar,
the
position
which
Irish
holds
as
a
language
in
the wide field of
Aryan speech.
ARYAN.
(1.
Alt
Indisch
or
Sanscrit.
Eastern.
{
2. Baktrisch
or
Zend.
^T
(3. Griechisch.
Classic.
|
4 Italisch
or
Latin.
5. Irisch
or
Gaelic.
6.
Bulgarisch.
7.
Litauisch or Lithuanian.
8.
Gothisch.
THE GARDEN
OF
EDEX.
.
109
According
to this
distinguished linguistic
scientist^
a
foreigner
to Ireland
in all
save
her ancient
language,
Irish holds
on the
tree o
early
human
speech
a
position
next after
the
eastern
and classic
off-shoots of
the
great
Aryan
tongue.
Fuller
investigation
shows
that
Irish,
with its
16 or
17
primitive
letters,
had
aa earlier
start
westward
than either
Greek
or Latin from
the
Aryan
region
namely,
that
high
table
land
around Mount
Ararat,
whence
the four
rivers
the
Euphrates,
and
the
Tigris,
the Araxas and the
Oxus,
flowing
out from
the
Garden
of
Eden,
took
their
rise. Professor
Geddes
does
not fail
to
observe,
viewing
the
linguistic
tree framed
and
developed by
German
hands,
that Schleicher makes
?
immediately
after
the
sep
iration of Sanscrit or
Zend from
the common
stem,
the
Keltic
keep
company
with
the
Greek
and Latin in
what he calls a common
Greco-Italo-
Keltic
branch,
and that
there remained the
Italo-Keltic
which shot fur
more to
the
west,
after the Greek
had
sprouted
forth to the
south,
and had attained
develop-
ment. It
there
found,
as
history
testifies,
a
congenial
clime
for
further
growth
in
the
mountains and
valleys
of
Thes-
saly,
and
stretching
more
southward still in the
Pelopon-
nessus and
in the isles of
Greece,
and,
above
all,
in
Ionia,
where
it
blossomed
and
ripened
into
the
highest
and
the
most
matured
perfection.
Under
the
stylus
of
tha
father
of Grecian
poetry,
it had
been
m
ide the
medium
of
the
undying
Epics,
that
tell of
the direful
wrath of
Achilles
with
the destruction of
Troy,
and the
wanderings
of
Ithaca's
king.
In
following
the
line
of march
of
thosa
amongst
the
very
early emigrants
to
Europe
from the
table land
in
which the
primitive Aryan speech
had
once
been
spoken,
the writer has
necessarily accompanied
on
their
way
that
colony
which,
at a
subsequent
period,
was
known as Hel-