en well
armed will certainly subdue one single man in his shirt....
Those who have used to cramp liberty have gone so far as to
resent even the liberty of complaining, although a man upon
the rack was never known to be refused the liberty of roaring
as loud as he thought fit."--JONATHAN SWIFT.

The loss of her language by Ireland was, politically, the worst calamity
which could have befallen her, for it lent colour to the otherwise
unsupported assertion that she was a mere geographical expression in no
way differing from the adjoining island. The manner in which the revival
of the Irish tongue has been taken up by the whole country with,
literally, the support of peasant and peer is one of the most remarkable
phenomena of modern Irish life. That it has any direct political
significance is untrue, for the aim of its pioneers in the Gaelic League
has been fulfilled, and it remains strictly non-sectarian and
non-political. From the purely utilitarian point of view, no doubt a
polytechnic could provide a dozen subjects in which a more profitable
return could be made for the money and time invested than does the study
of Gaelic, but book-keeping or shorthand would not have roused the
enthusiasm which this revival of a half dead language has evoked and
which is incidentally an educative movement in that the learning of a
new language is of a direct value as a mental training, while as a
social organisation it has done more in inculcating a public spirit and
a proper pride than could otherwise possibly have been achieved. The
revival of the Czech language when almost dead, at the beginning of the
nineteenth century, and the eminent success of bi-lingualism in
Flanders, are hopeful signs for the preservation of a National
characteristic, the disappearance of which would have been welcomed only
by those who hold that Ireland as a nationality has no existence apart
from Great Britain, and the preservation of which will produce the
mental alertness characteristic of a bi-lingual people.

The temperance work done by the Gaelic League in providing occupation of
a pleasant nature and social intercourse of a harmless kind is one of
its chief titles to distinction, for in this aspect it has encouraged
the preservation of Irish songs, music, dances, and games. One other
thing it, and it alone, can do. One-half of the emigrants from Ireland
go on tickets or money sent from friends in the United States, and in