The Irish standard., 1897-05-08
Fine Speech by Mr.. Joseph Smith
in the City of Boston.
The. FRESHMAN PORTRAYED
A Lecture to the American-lriSh
Historical Society
WHICH is WORTH READING.
The Peculiar Characteristics of
the Irish Celt.

the Irish Celt.
It is almost as hopeless a task to lie.
fine an Irishman as it is to give tht
dimensions of a perfume; foc the Irish.
man Is as evasive and del,tsive, as per.
vasive and variable in type and charac.
ter as the sweetness rising from the
glowing bed of flowers.
II this society is to have logical and
reasonable plea for existence, if it's title
OF American-Irish is to mean anything
we must reach some solid basis upon
which to build our fabric; we must
agree upon an acceptable definition of
what is an Irishman.
This is what 1 shall try to do rather
than attempt to show the clinical COM
ponents that enter into an Irisbman
have gone past the point in my specu.
latfons and theories on TIE Irishmau
where l place much stress upon the
racial elements that go to make the
Irish nation. We must start with these
facts-the race and the nation are two
distinctly different things; the terms
Celtic and Irish are not synonymous.
l Will state so as to avoid the poiemics
OF ethnology, just few facts upon
which all people are agreed, to explain
why l attach so little Importance to the
merely racial elements that go to make
up nation. The islands of Ireland
and Great Britain were at one time
peoplcd by the one race which was
known variously as the Celtic, Cymric
and Gaelic. BY emigration, conquest,
settlement, slavery and interma,riage.
and all those causes which mix races.
Dane, Morse, German, Norman-French,
Dutch, French, Walloon and Flemish
were mingled and intermingled with the
original race, the constituent elements
varying with time, place and circum-
stances. So we have today in ireland.
Scotland, Wales and England four dis
tinct peoples different in characteristics.
temperaments, thought and methods.
peoples made up practically from the
! very same elements. AS the different
sections of Great Britain are separated
by purely artificial frontiers they do not
diner as profoundly as do the people of
ireland from those of the neighborine
Island. We observe in this republic
people who claim a direct descent from
English and other stocks producing a
people as widely separated in thought.
ideals and physical appearance and 9TH
or distinctive features from the stock
OF the old countries as the Russian ia
from the Spaniard.
1t Is clear to me that there are other
and more potent elements that make
and differentiate peoples than mere rae.
ial admixtures.
The Irish, though speaking the Eng.
lish tongue and living under laws for
eign to the instincts of the people. are q
nation apart from the English, hating
intensely the tie that binds them, out of
sympathy with English ideas, ambi-
tions, religions and methods, and vet
they are both the product of the same
racial elements, the alleged preponder-
ance of the Celt in the Irish being
largely matter of doubt and specrla-
tion.
What is 1t, then, that makes this tre-
mendous difference in the two nations? :?
What were the forces that were at work
10 produce from the same ingredients
such profoundly different results? That
Is the question we must answer; and In
answering it we will reason the basic
idea Of this society. Let me try and
answer it in my way, and endeavor to
show as simply as possible what an
I lrishman is.
There is in England as we'll as in
America among the class that for lack
OF better term we must call Celto-
{ phobes, those who have an original If
unsatisfactory and unscientiic way of
answering this question which adds to
the accumulation of their stolen laurels
and seems to afford them much satis-
ssessSSA0As IL ek4A x446uu6A OCS6kS CO0 rec.
ord in science, art, literature or any
{ department of human activity, he is at
once classed as an Englishman in Eng
land, an American in America; If, how
] ever. he merely breaks the decaloxue.
the law, a bank, or his mothers heart,
ne must, perforce, be an Irishman. This
4 atherentiation will not do for us, how
ever.
There are some things We must re-
I. member, for our work has to bear the
closest scrutiny and the most searching
!: criticism,
The characteristics which we deem
essentially Irish are not distinctly Irish:
they arc merely more widely distributed
|zlone tho bunor. poesy,