ar as possible conform. How then do we define the nation
which is, if there is no special reason to the contrary, to fix the
limits of a government? Primarily, I say, as a rule,--but a rule
subject to exceptions,--as a _prima facie_ standard, subject to
special reasons to the contrary,--we define the nation by language. We
may at least apply the test negatively. It would be unsafe to rule
that all speakers of the same language must have a common nationality;
but we may safely say that where there is not community of language,
there is no common nationality in the highest sense. It is true that
without community of language there may be an artificial nationality,
a nationality which may be good for all political purposes, and which
may engender a common national feeling. Still, this is not quite the
same thing as that fuller national unity which is felt where there is
community of language.

In fact, mankind instinctively takes language as the badge of
nationality. We so far take it as the badge, that we instinctively
assume community of language as a nation as the rule, and we set down
anything that departs from that rule as an exception. The first idea
suggested by the word Frenchman, or German, or any other national
name, is that he is a man who speaks French or German as his mother
tongue. We take for granted, in the absence of anything to make us
think otherwise, that a Frenchman is a speaker of French and that a
speaker of French is a Frenchman. Where in any case it is otherwise,
we mark that case as an exception, and we ask the special cause.
Again, the rule is none the less the rule nor the exceptions the
exceptions, because the exceptions may easily outnumber the instances
which conform to the rule. The rule is still the rule, because we take
the instances which conform to it as a matter of course, while in
every case which does not conform to it we ask for the explanation.
All the larger countries of Europe provide us with exceptions; but we
treat them all as exceptions. We do not ask why a native of France
speaks French. But when a native of France speaks as his mother tongue
some other tongue than French, when French, or something which
popularly passes for French, is spoken as his mother tongue by some
one who is not a native of France, we at once ask the reason. And the
reason will be found in each case in some special historical cause,
which withdraws that case from the operation of the general law. A
ver