OF THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATION. 97 



from their peaceful home ; — the order in which they wandered forth 

 to win new thoughts and conquer fresh countries ; — what drew the 

 Norwegian and the Icelander ever farther and farther towards the 

 inclement and pine-clad north ; — why the Celt first ensconced him- 

 self behind (he storm swept cliffs of Britain ; — what happy destiny 

 guided one great family to the plains of Persia and Hindostan, and 

 another to the shores of the blue Mediterranean and the poetic hills 

 of Italy and Greece, — we cannot tell. Whether it was the result of 

 religious divisions, or physical convulsions, or civil feuds ; — whether 

 it was caused by the natural growth of population, or by the irresist- 

 ible spirit of enterprise ;— whether the tribes marched forth under 

 different leaders in a succession of waves, each one driving its prede. 

 cessor farther and farther from the original home, — all this is wrapt 

 in oblivoin ; — but the main fact is certain, that the parents of the 

 Hindoos, and of the natives of modern Europe, did at an early date 

 wander away from this common home." 



In the light of the science of philology, we can learn something 

 definite as to the kind of life our early Aryan ancestors led some three 

 or four thousand years ago in their happy home in the highlands of 

 Asia. And first their very name tells us a part of the story of their life. 

 They were Aryans, — a name derived from the Sanskrit root Ar, to 

 open the soil, — to plough. We have this same old word in our own 

 Bible. In Deut., 21:4, we read of a valley that is neither eared 

 nor sown,— meaning neither ploughed nor sown. In Gen., 45 : 6, 

 and Ex., 34 : 21, we read of earing and harvest, — meaning the time 

 of tilling and of harvesting. Shakespeare makes the same use of the 

 word when he says : " To ear the land that has some hope to grow,'' 

 (Rich. II, III, 2.), and again : "Make the sea serve them, which 

 they ear and wound with keels." We have the same word in the 

 Latin arare, to plough, and in our word arable. All are derived 

 from the original Sanskrit root ar, — to plough. The Aryans then 

 were the ploughmen, and because ploughmen 4000 years ago, as now 

 were a goodly race, the word came to mean noble. We have a 

 trace of the old Sanskrit name, Aryan, in the name Armenia, and 

 what is more remarkable, in the names Erin and Ireland, the name 

 of the most westerly point in Europe, to which those Asiatic plough- 

 men made their way. 



