Arthur James Johnes

“ Those writers who have espoused, and those who have impugned, the conclusion that language is the natural fruit of the endowments which have been conferred on our species, have, for the most part, mutually assumed that conclusion to be irreconcilable with the common origin of the different nations and languages of the globe. ”

“ If the ancestors of the American Indians emigrated at a remote period from the opposite Asiatic Coasts, we have no right to anticipate in their dialects a complete conformity to any one language of the old world, but general and varying features of resemblance to several. The kindred dialects of the same Continent after the lapse of a considerable time do not exhibit any other kind of resemblance! Now this is the species of relation which the North American Indian dialects actually display when compared to the Languages of the Old World! ”

“ Scarcity became utter want, and want became famine! In the most gorgeous palaces of that gorgeous city, no less than in the humblest tenements of the poor, death was busy; not the momentary death of battle or massacre, nor the speedy death of pestilence, but the lingering and most miserable death of famine! Infants died before their parents' eyes, husbands and wives lay down to expire together! ”

“ Neither the extent nor the physical features of our Globe are such as imply that the spread of population over its surface must necessarily have been the work of many ages. To traverse the habitable earth from the Southern extremity of Africa to the North of Asia, and thence to the extreme Southern point of the American continent, is a task which would require only a small fraction of one man's life! ”

“ Lord Bacon's Principles Applicable To Inquiries Into The Origin And Changes Of Human Languages. The fanciful theories in which even some of the most distinguished writers have deemed themselves at liberty to indulge, when they have entered upon the field of Philological research, have naturally tended to create, among men of calm and dispassionate minds, a general distrust in the results of all inquiries into the origin and early history of human languages. ”

“ On the one hand it would be difficult to show that the rudest of the African tribes are in a more barbarous condition than the ancestors of some of the most civilized European nations once were! On the other hand, the proofs of a capacity for social improvement are as unequivocal in the former case as they are in the latter! Large and important nations, as for example the Mandingoes and the Iolofs, are found in the interior of Africa, professing the Mahomedan religion, and as far advanced in the virtues and refinements of civilization, as any other nations who are followers of the same creed. ”

“ The original identity of the Irish and Welsh Languages was established as far back as the commencement of the eighteenth century, by the investigations of the excellent Archæologist, Edward Lhuyd, who spent five years in travelling through the various Celtic regions, and whose comparison of the dialects of Wales, Cornwall, Armorica, the Highlands of Scotland, and the Isle of Man, is not inferior either in soundness of reasoning, or in patient, extensive, and honest research, to the best German works of the present day. ”

“ Recent Origin of the Human Race. The Hebrew and Sanscrit, as pointed out in the previous Sections, display certain features which cannot have long survived the infancy of language. The caprices of custom, the progress of the human mind, and the dictates of convenience, are calculated to efface these features within a limited period of time. Hence it follows, that the existence of language, and of the Species by which it is employed, could not have commenced at an era very remotely anterior to the date of the earliest specimens of these ancient Tongues ”

“ In the North of Africa the physiological difficulties which are encountered in the Middle and South do not exist to the same extent in any instance, and in most instances they can scarcely be said to exist at all. The Berbers—the original population of Morocco and the adjoining countries, the lineal descendants of the ancient Numidians—approach very closely to the Spanish population of the opposite coasts of the Mediterranean; and the Egyptians in the north-east of Africa are much more alike to the contiguous Asiatic nations than they are to the Negro Tribes. ”

“ The Changes which have occurred in the English, Scandinavian, and Celtic Languages, sufficient to account for the Differences among all Human Tongues. Causes which give rise to the Abandonment and specific Appropriation of Synonymes. Total Differences of Grammatical Forms no Proof of a fundamental Difference of Language. The Relation which the Languages of one Continent, viewed in the aggregate, bear to the individual Languages of such Continent, the same as that which the ancient Scandinavian bears to its derivative Dialects, &c. Incipient Changes in the Language of Australia. ”

“ Each ancient sept, they take for granted, must in that case be inferred to have had a distinct origin, and to have invented a distinct language for itself. But there is no necessary connexion between the premises and the conclusion. All nations may have emanated from one parent sept, and all languages may have sprung from one parent tongue, and yet the parent speech may, notwithstanding, have been the product of Man's own native energies in the earliest era of his existence! ”

“ Of the practical results of these changes in the moral sentiments of Society—of which Christianity, which teaches that all men are of one blood and of one family, has been the primary source—and of which the English nation—influenced by the example of a few men of extraordinary piety, wisdom, and humanity, to whom it gave birth in the last generation, have been the most conspicuous instruments—one example may be appropriately introduced in this place. ”

“ It is not intended to be suggested that the morality of the more virtuous and religious members of civilized communities is not superior to that of uncivilized races. But that such superiority can be claimed by the mass of the inhabitants of Europe is a proposition of which the evidence must be allowed to be doubtful as regards some—must be allowed, alas! to fail altogether as regards many—of those virtues of which our nature is capable! ”

“ The evidence of language will be found sufficient to show not merely the common origin of the Welsh and Irish, but also to fix a much more recent date for their separation than that which has been assigned by Lhuyd. It will thence appear that the Irish are descendants of Colonists of the Welsh or British race, not of a distinct Celtic sept, and that the commencement of the separate existence of the Irish nation must be referred to a comparatively recent date, propositions of much interest, of which the proofs about to be advanced will probably be deemed to be at once clear and simple. ”

“ Pronouns enter very largely into the composition of languages, not merely in a separate form, but also as the source from which the most striking peculiarities of other parts of grammar have been derived. It has been shown by Dr. Prichard that the various inflections which distinguish the different persons of the Verb in the Latin and Sanscrit, and other highly-complicated languages of the same class, are identical with pronouns.
In the works of Horne Tooke and others it has been abundantly shown that Pronouns are merely Nouns, viz. Names of the Human Species, “Man, Woman,” &c. ”

“ The Hebrew, and some other ancient Oriental tongues, are distinguished by the frequent occurrence of harsh aspirates and gutturals, and of vehement and discordant tones, which, in many instances, are utterly incapable of representation by means of any sounds in use among the nations of modern Europe. Now if language had an imitative origin, and if these ancient Oriental tongues can be viewed as specimens of language near its source, and the European tongues as specimens more altered by time, these features of contrast will be satisfactorily explained. ”

“ From these and similar facts it must be inferred—not only that the existing varieties of Human Physiology form no objection to the opinion that the different populations of the Globe are descended from one stock—the same facts lead also to the conclusion, that—with relation to the earliest eras in the History of our species—Physiological peculiarities must be entirely rejected as evidence, either of a specific connexion or of a specific difference between individual races of men, a principle admitting of many highly interesting applications, of which an example will now be offered. ”

“ There are certain languages of which the original unity can be proved, either by the extrinsic evidence of history, or by the gradual approximation they display as we ascend from modern to earlier epochs, and compare modern with ancient specimens. We can show, by means of the like evidence, the progressive changes they have undergone, and the nature of the existing differences which have been the result of those changes. ”

“ Being a small tribe, and unable to contend on the wide prairies with the Sioux and other roaming tribes, who are ten times more numerous, they have very judiciously located themselves in a permanent village, which is strongly fortified, and ensures their preservation. By this means they have advanced further in the arts of manufacture, and have supplied their lodges more abundantly with the comforts and even luxuries of life than any Indian nation I know of. ”

“ I do not doubt that the present French names are, in many instances, much more faithful transcripts of the original Celtic appellations than those which occur in the Roman Maps are. Thus, for example, Bonomia, a name conferred by the Romans upon Boulogne, and of which the origin has perplexed Antiquarics, may easily be explained as a Roman abbreviation of the word Boulogne itself, of which the Celtic meaning will be shown hereafter to be appropriate and unequivocal. ”

“ I have unavoidably formed warm and enduring attachments to some of these men, which I do not wish to forget, who have brought me near to their hearts, and in our final separation have embraced me in their arms, and commended me and my affairs to the keeping of the Great Spirit. ”

“ On the other hand, the natural progress of language will account also for the opposite qualities displayed by the dialects of modern Europe. As Society advanced, the severe features that belonged to Language at its first commencement must have gradually softened down. Words originally intelligible only as imitations of the qualities of objects, or by reason of the signs with which they were accompanied, must have gradually acquired conventional meanings, calculated to render the use of signs and of rough and painful articulations unnecessary. ”

“ Neither the Irish nor the Welsh, nor a combination of all the Celtic dialects, will be found to afford a complete solution of the Topographical nomenclature of the ancient Celtic regions of Europe. Names undoubtedly occur in these countries which have been preserved in none of the Celtic tongues, names which I shall indisputably show to be positive transcripts, in many instances, of appropriate terms occurring in the Hebrew and other languages, with which, in other parts of this work, the original Celtic dialects will be proved to have been originally identical. ”

“ Prichard to identify the Egyptian with the Asiatic languages, has arisen from the predominant error of Philological writers,—viz. the expectation of finding in every respect a close and peculiar affinity between the languages of nations, who, though contiguous, must in all probability have been separated in the earliest ages of the world. Hence the unsuccessful issue of those researches of which the object has been to show that the Egyptian is a dialect of the Hebrew. ”

“ To adopt the expression of Schlegel, (See Schlegel's Translation of Dr. Prichard's Work on Eg. Mythol.,) the physiognomy of the ancient Egyptians is that of a “very noble race” of men. But it differs very widely from the characteristics of the European nations; in the dignified features of the men, and also in the lineaments of female beauty, the approach to the Negro Physiognomy is often very conspicuous!
I may instance the countenance of the Sphynx as affording a specimen of the species of approximation to the Negro Physiognomy which is observable in ancient Egyptian remains! ”

“ As has been previously stated, the Gothic Class of languages are naturally divisible into two great subordinate branches: the Teutonic or German, including the dialects of Germany, the Low Countries, and of Great Britain—and the Scandinavian, including those of the two Scandinavian Peninsulas and Iceland. These two great Divisions of the Languages of the Gothic race are radically the same, but they are supposed to display certain specific differences by which they are distinguished from each other. ”