ESSAY I. REMARKS UPON THE SYMBOLS OF THEREPRODUCTIVE POWERS. ROM the investigations and researches of the learned, there appears to be no doubt but that the most ancient of all superstitions was that in which Nature was contemplated chiefly under the attribute or property of fecundity; the symbols of the reproductive power being those under which its prolific potencies were exhibited. It is not because modern fastidiousness affects to consider... more...

PREFACE In introducing the student to the history of the development of European culture, the problem of proportion has seemed to me, throughout, the fundamental one. Consequently I have endeavored not only to state matters truly and clearly but also to bring the narrative into harmony with the most recent conceptions of the relative importance of past events and institutions. It has seemed best, in an elementary treatise upon so vast a theme,... more...

CLONARD is situate about Twenty five miles from Dublin on the Western road leading to Mullingar. Tho' constituted a post town, it is a very small village, consisting of an Inn and a few thatched houses; but from its situation being on the confines of two counties, Kildare and Meath, and having a bridge across the river Boyne, which opens a communication from Dublin to Westmeath, and from thence to Athlone and the Province of Connaught, it must be... more...

CHAPTER I Celtic Literature—Antiquity of our Annals—Moore—How we should estimate Tradition—The Materials for Irish History—List of the Lost Books—The Cuilmenn—The Saltair of Tara, &c.—The Saltair of Cashel—Important MSS. preserved in Trinity College—By the Royal Irish Academy—In Belgium.   he study of Celtic literature, which is daily becoming of increased importance to... more...

ROAD FROM CALAIS. UNNECESSARY PASSPORTS. CHANTILLY. THE following excursion was undertaken for several reasons: the first of which was, that though I had been many times in Paris before, yet I had not once been there since the Revolution, and I was desirous of seeing how far a residence of a few years in France might be practicable and agreeable; secondly, a Counter-Revolution, or, at least, some violent measures were expected, and I was willing... more...

The present work is intended for such students as have already an elementary knowledge of the main facts of English history, and aims at meeting their needs by the use of plain language on the one hand, and by the avoidance, on the other hand, of that multiplicity of details which is apt to overburden the memory. At the close of the book I have treated the last eleven years, 1874 to 1885, in a manner which precludes all expression of my own... more...

CHAPTER I.  SCOTLAND AND THE ROMANS. If we could see in a magic mirror the country now called Scotland as it was when the Romans under Agricola (81 A.D.) crossed the Border, we should recognise little but the familiar hills and mountains.  The rivers, in the plains, overflowed their present banks; dense forests of oak and pine, haunted by great red deer, elks, and boars, covered land that has long been arable.  There were lakes... more...

CHAPTER I PRIMITIVE CONDITIONS AND RACES The topography of a country is to some extent a prophecy of its future. Had there been no Mississippi coursing for three thousand miles through the North American Continent, no Ohio and Missouri bisecting it from east to west, no great inland seas indenting and watering it, no fertile prairies stretching across its vast areas, how different would have been the history of our own land. Russia is the... more...

CHAPTER I. One of the greatest achievements of modern research is the discovery of a key by which we may determine the kinship of nations. What we used to conjecture, we now know. An identity in the structural form of language establishes with scientific certitude that however diverse their character and civilizations, Russian, German, Englishman, Frenchman, Spaniard, are all but branches from the same parent stem, are all alike children of the... more...

CHAPTER I COMMUNISTIC FARMING.—GROWTH OF THE MANOR.—EARLY PRICES.—THE ORGANIZATION AND AGRICULTURE OF THE MANOR When the early bands of English invaders came over to take Britain from its Celtic owners, it is almost certain that the soil was held by groups and not by individuals, and as this was the practice of the conquerors also they readily fell in with the system they found. These English, unlike their descendants of to... more...