ccurate, but may yet be quite near
enough to the truth for the purposes of the matter in hand. It may,
for some practical or even historical purpose, be really more true than
the statement which is scientifically more exact. Language is no
certain test of race; but if a man, struck by this wholesome warning,
should run off into the belief that language and race have absolutely
nothing to do with one another, he had better have gone without the
warning. For in such a case the last error would be worse than the
first. The natural instinct of mankind connects race and language. It
does not assume that language is an infallible test of race; but it
does assume that language and race have something to do with one
another. It assumes, that though language is not an accurately
scientific test of race, yet it is a rough and ready test which does
for many practical purposes. To make something more of an exact
definition, one might say, that though language is not a test of race,
it is, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, a presumption of
race; that though it is not a test of race, yet it is a test of
something which, for many practical purposes, is the same as race.
Professor Max Mueller warned us long ago that we must not speak of a
Celtic skull. Mr. Sayce has more lately warned us that we must not
infer from community of Aryan speech that there is any kindred in blood
between this or that Englishman and this or that Hindoo. And both
warnings are scientifically true. Yet anyone who begins his studies on
these matters with Professor Mueller's famous Oxford Essay will
practically come to another way of looking at things. He will fill his
mind with a vivid picture of the great Aryan family, as yet one,
dwelling in one place, speaking one tongue, having already taken the
first steps towards settled society, recognizing the domestic
relations, possessing the first rudiments of government and religion,
and calling all these first elements of culture by names of which
traces still abide here and there among the many nations of the common
stock. He will go on to draw pictures equally vivid of the several
branches of the family parting off from the primeval home. One great
branch he will see going to the southeast, to become the forefathers of
the vast, yet isolated colony in the Asiatic lands of Persia and India.
He watches the remaining mass sending off wave after wave, to become
the forefathers of the nations of h