of Ireland; and that a great part of the Greek, which is not Latin, is also derived from the Gaelic language, and that a very considerable portion of both these languages, where they agree in sound and sense, is obviously deducible from the same source, we draw thence two conclusions: 1st, That the Gaelic language is so far the common parent of both; 2dly, That the Greek language brought into Italy by Grecian colonies, renewed, in its altered and more cultivated state, its acquaintance with its parent languages, the Pelasgic and Gaelic, as yet spoken in a more uncultivated state by the inhabitants of Italy. We propose to submit, with all due deference to the learned, some remarks and observations, which we think entitle the Gaelic language to claim in some measure to be the parent stock of both the Greek and Latin languages. We propose also to offer some remarks to show, that the Gael of Scotland and Ireland are genuine descendants of the great Gaelic nation, whose language was Gaelic, and has been preserved in greatest purity by the descendants of the ancient inhabitants of Scotland and Ireland, who, if our deduction be well founded, are the progeny of the same race of people who first inhabited Greece and Italy, and who, immixed chiefly with the Pelasgians, became in after times, under the names of Greeks and Romans, so illustrious for their improvements in philosophy, arts and sciences, and for their conquests over many nations. The science of cultivation of language is an object worthy the attention of a refined people. The study of language has occupied minds the most remarkable for ingenuity and acuteness. Such study is curious and amusing. Is it not, in a philosophical sense, instructive too, when it carries with it that spirit of research, which, in primitive roots and their combinations, serves to throw light upon the original situation of man in his earliest state of existence, to investigate the history of ideas, and to develop the operations of the human mind in the formation of the art by which ideas are communicated? . In disquisitions of an etymological nature, much caution is to be observed. Fanciful imaginations have often run into such deviations from the natural combinations of the component parts of speech, as have given frequent occasion to throw into ridicule a science, in a just view not contemptible, whose object is to ascertain the formation of the words of a language, and deduce them from their radical primitives. "The world is a great wilderness, wherein "mankind have wandered and jostled one ano"ther about from the creation; and it would be "difficult to point out the country which is at "this day in the hands of its first inhabitants; no original stock is perhaps any where to be "traced."* In this view of things, the Greeks * SULLIVAN's Letters. and Romans could not boast of being possessed of an original language. A claim to such originality can be truly maintained only by an unmixed people. Such, we will venture to affirm, are to be found at this day in the Highlands of Scotland. * Some learned men have entertained the opinion, that the Greek, the Roman, and the Celtic languages, had one common origin. If this opinion be well founded, whatever alterations they may have undergone in the course of ages, by the multiplication of ideas, and consequently of words, or by revolutions incident to communities and states, they were at some remote period kindred languages. It still remains an undetermined question, which of these languages has best preserved the unadulterated parent stock. It is admitted that the Latin is in a great measure a dialect of the Greek language, and it cannot be maintained that the Grecian philologists have been, with all the ingenuity they have displayed in their etymological analysis of words, successful in establishing their true derivation to flow from primitives constituting the elementary basis of that illustrious language; but it is a proposition which is admitted by all those who are in a moderate degree critically versed in the Gaelic language, that every word in that language is either a simple primitive, a compound, or a deri *PEZRON. LHUID. vation from well known primitives in the same language. In fact, the Greek language is a copious, elegant, and polished composition of various ancient languages. It still, however, retains a pregnant proof of its descent from that common origin, of which the language called by the above mentioned learned authors Celtic, but by us Gaelic, still remains the living offspring. The Greek language, it is certain, never penetrated into the country of the Gael of Scotland. The Romans visited it as enemies, who separated themselves and their conquered provinces from it and its inhabitants, by walls defended by Roman arms. The Saxons, Angles, and Normans, were ever held as enemies, with whom the Gael held no intercourse which could affect their language; and the Danes or Norwegians, although they made conquests of several of the Scottish islands, and retained them in subjection for a considerable time, yet they never penetrated into the interior of the country in any other shape than as enemies, with arms in their hands; and as such they met with successful opposition and a total expulsion, without their being able at any period to make permanent settlements. That the Picts were of Scythian race, or emigrants from the northern continent of Europe, we hesitate not to affirm to be a false conjecture, which we will have occasion to consider in another place. 圈 ORIGINAL CONDITION OF MAN. HOWEVER humiliating it may appear to those who entertain high notions of the physical and moral nature of the human species, the testimonies of ancient and modern authors concur in establishing this proposition, That mankind, in the primitive ages of their existence, followed a mode of life similar to the gregarious animals of the brute creation. Yet, more cruel than these, human beings, to gratify their vengeance or their sensual appetites, have been found devouring their own species, with as little feeling of compunction, remorse, or revolt of mind, as they fed on the flesh of those other animals which still prove savoury to the taste of the polished and refined part of mankind. The philosophic curiosity, or commercial views of modern times, have established beyond controversy the existence of cannibals or man-eaters. Modern voyagers of the highest credit, teach us to respect relations of ancient authors,* who were long held in derision, as handing down traits of human manners which could obtain the credit of historical facts only in those days of ignorance * Vide GOGUET, and the Authors quoted, vol. i. Introduction. |