ivine in their origin. Every heroic
deed is an act of the spirit, and every perception of beauty is vision
with the divine eye, and not with the mortal sense. The spirit was
subtly intermingled with the shining of old romance, and it is no mere
phantasy which shows Ireland at its dawn in a misty light thronged with
divine figures, and beneath and nearer to us demi-gods and heroes
fading into recognizable men. The bards took cognizance only of the
most notable personalities who preceded them, and of these only the acts
which had a symbolic or spiritual significance; and these grew thrice
refined as generations of poets in enraptured musings along by the
mountains or in the woods brooded upon their heritage of story, until,
as it passed from age to age, the accumulated beauty grew greater than
the beauty of the hour. The dream began to enter into the children of
our race, and turn their thoughts from earth to that world in which it
had its inception.

It was a common belief among the ancient peoples that each had a
national genius or deity who presided over them, in whose all-embracing
mind they were contained, and who was the shepherd of their destinies.
We can conceive of the national spirit in Ireland as first manifesting
itself through individual heroes or kings, and as the history of famous
warriors laid hold of the people, extending its influence until it
created therein the germs of a kindred nature.

An aristocracy of lordly and chivalrous heroes is bound in time to
create a great democracy by the reflection of their character in the
mass, and the idea of the divine right of kings is succeeded by the idea
of the divine right of the people. If this sequence cannot be traced
in any one respect with historical regularity, it is because of the
complexity of national life, its varied needs, the vicissitudes of
history, and its infinite changes of sentiment. But the threads are all
taken up in the end; and ideals which were forgotten and absent from the
voices of men will be found, when recurred to, to have grown to a rarer
and more spiritual beauty in their quiet abode in the heart. The seeds
which were sown at the beginning of a race bear their flowers and fruits
towards its close, and already antique names begin to stir us again with
their power, and the antique ideals to reincarnate in us and renew their
dominion over us.

They may not be recognized at first as a re-emergence of ancient moods.
The democratic econ