nationalities and languages, and these seemingly so distinct that
each often asserted that the other spoke a barbarous tongue. But, for
all that, each of those tongues bears about with it still, and in
earlier times no doubt bore still more plainly about with it,
infallible evidence of common origin, so that each dialect can be
traced up to that primaeval form of speech still in the main
preserved in the Sanscrit by the Southern Aryan branch, who, careless
of practical life, and immersed in speculation, have clung to their
ancient traditions and tongue with wonderful tenacity. It is this
which has given such value to Sanscrit, a tongue of which it may be
said, that if it had perished the sun would never have risen on the
science of comparative philology. Before the discoveries in Sanscrit
of Sir William Jones, Wilkins, Wilson, and others, the world had
striven to find the common ancestor of European languages, sometimes
in the classical, and sometimes in the Semitic tongues. In the one
case the result was a tyranny of Greek and Latin over the non-
classical tongues, and in the other the most uncritical and
unphilosophical waste of learning. No doubt some striking analogies
exist between the Indo-European family and the Semitic stock, just as
there are remarkable analogies between the Mongolian and Indo-
European families; but the ravings of Vallancy, in his effort to
connect the Erse with Phoenician, are an awful warning of what
unscientific inquiry, based upon casual analogy, may bring itself to
believe, and even to fancy it has proved.

These general observations, then, and this rapid bird's eye view, may
suffice to show the common affinity which exists between the Eastern
and Western Aryans; between the Hindoo on the one hand, and the
nations of Western Europe on the other. That is the fact to keep
steadily before our eyes. We all came, Greek, Latin, Celt, Teuton,