Ce ee 
ages, would, in the eyes of foreigners, degrade our national 
underftanding, and fuggeft how flow our advances have been 
in letters and civility. 
ARE we then totally to reject Irith hiftory and Irifh antiqu- 
ties as undeferving notice or inveftigation? To this I anfwer 
with confidence, that fo far as the one is fupported by authentic 
records and the other by exifting monuments, they are as curious 
and interefting as thofe of any other country, not claflical, or 
the feat of a great empire. The formation of the Irifh alphabet ; 
the etymology and analogy of the language; the ftate of our 
literature from the fixth to the ninth century ; our round towers 
and ftone-roofed crypts; the origin and progrefs of Chriftia- 
nity in this ifle; our ancient laws and coins; our {kill in 
metallurgy, and the lapidary’s and goldfmith’s arts, with the 
remains of our primitive fuperftition, all foliciting our attention 
and illuftration by numberlefs monuments every where to be 
found, are topics that would abundantly exercife the ingenuity 
and erudition of the philologer, the grammarian, archite@t, theo- 
Jogian and antiquary.. 
