Eoin MacNeill

Phases of Irish History Eoin MacNeill

Thank you for checking out this book by Theophania Publishing. We appreciate your business and look forward to serving you soon. We have thousands of titles available, and we invite you to search for us by name, contact us via our website, or download our most recent catalogues. Every people has two distinct lines of descent-by blood and by tradition. When we consider the physical descent of a people, we regard them purely as animals. As in any breed of animals, so in a people, the tokens of physical descent are mainly physical attributes-such as stature, complexion, the shape of the skull and members, the formation of the features. When we speak of a particular race of men, if we speak accurately, we mean a collection of people whose personal appearance and bodily characters, inherited from their ancestors and perhaps modified by climate and occupation, distinguish them notably from the rest of mankind. It is important for us to be quite clear in our minds about this meaning of Race, for the word Race is often used in a very loose and very misleading way in popular writings and discussions. Thus we hear and read of the Latin races, the Teutonic race, the Anglo-Saxon race, the Celtic race. If these phrases had any value in clear thinking, they would imply that in each instance it is possible to distinguish a section of mankind which, by its inherited physical characters, differs notably from the rest of mankind. Now in not one of the instances mentioned is any such distinction known to those who have made the races of man the subject of their special study. There is no existing Latin race, no Teutonic race, no Anglo-Saxon race, and no Celtic race. Each of the groups to whom these names are popularly applied is a mixture of various races which can be distinguished, and for the most part they are a mixture of the same races, though not in every case in the same proportions.