so again during the years to come I shall find little leisure for these researches. I have just finished a new edition of the text of the Rig-veda, and I now feel bound to print the last volume of my large edition of the Rig-veda with the commentary of Sâyana. When that is done, the translation of the hymns of the Rig-veda, of which the first volume was published in 1869, will have to be continued, and I see but little chance that, with these tasks before me, I shall be able to devote much time to my favourite study of ancient language, mythology, and religion. I should gladly have left these Lectures to their ephemeral fate; but as they have been republished in America, and translated in France and Italy, they have become the subject of friendly and unfriendly remarks in several works on Comparative Theology. A German translation also being on the eve of publication, I at last determined to publish them in their original form, and to render them at least as perfect as I could at the present moment. The Lectures, as now printed, contain considerable portions which were written in 1870, but had to be left out in the course of delivery, and therefore also in Fraser's Magazine. I have inserted such corrections and supplementary notes as I had made from time to time in the course of my reading, and a few remarks were added at the last moment, whilst seeing these sheets` through the Press. For more complete information on many points touched upon in these Lectures, I must refer my readers to my Essays on the Science of Religion, and the Essays on Mythology, Traditions and Customs, published in 1867 under the title of 'Chips from a German Workshop1. The literature of Comparative Theology is growing rapidly, particularly in America. The works of James F. Clarke, Samuel Johnson, O. B. Frothingham, the lectures of T. W. Higginson, W. C. Gannett, and J. W. Chadwick, the philosophical papers by F. E. Abbot, all show that the New World, in spite of all its preoccupations, has not ceased to feel at one with the Old World; all bear witness to a deep conviction that the study of the ancient religions of mankind will not remain without momentous practical results. That study, I feel convinced, if carried on in a bold, but scholar-like, careful, and reverent spirit, will remove many doubts and difficulties which are due entirely to the narrowness of our religious horizon; it will enlarge our sympathies, it will raise our thoughts above the small controversies of the day, and at no distant future evoke in the very heart of Christianity a fresh spirit, and a new life. F. M. M. OXFORD, May 12, 1873. 1 Since republished with additions in 'Selected Essays,' 2 vols. Longmans, 1881. W FIRST LECTURE. DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION, HEN I undertook for the first time to deliver a course of lectures in this Institution, I chose for my subject the Science of Language. What I then had at heart was to show to you, and to the world at large, that the comparative study of the principal languages of mankind was based on sound and truly scientific principles, and that it had brought to light results which deserved a larger share of public interest than they had as yet received. I tried to convince not only scholars by profession, but historians, theologians, and philosophers, nay everybody who had once felt the charm of gazing inwardly upon the secret workings of his own mind, veiled and revealed as they are in the flowing folds of language, that the discoveries made by comparative philologists could no longer be ignored with impunity; and I submitted that after the progress achieved in a scientific study of the principal branches of the vast realm of human speech, our new science, the Science of Language, might claim by right its seat at the Round-table of the intellectual chivalry of our age. Such was the goodness of the cause I had then to defend that, however imperfect my own pleading, the verdict of the public has been immediate and almost unanimous. During the years that have elapsed since B the delivery of my first course of lectures, the Science of Language has had its full share of public recognition. Whether we look at the number of books that have been published for the advancement and elucidation of our science, or at the excellent articles in the daily, weekly, fortnightly, monthly, and quarterly reviews, or at the frequent notices of its results scattered about in works on philosophy, theology, and ancient history, we may well rest satisfied. The example set by France and Germany in founding chairs of Sanskrit and Comparative Philology, has been followed of late in nearly all the universities of England, Ireland, and Scotland. We need not fear for the future of the Science of Language. A career so auspiciously begun, in spite of strong prejudices that had to be encountered, will lead on from year to year to greater triumphs. Our best public schools, if they have not done so already, will soon have to follow the example set by the universities. It is but fair that schoolboys who are made to devote so many hours every day to the laborious acquisition of languages, should now and then be taken by a safe guide to enjoy from a higher point of view that living panorama of human speech which has been surveyed and carefully mapped out by patient explorers and bold discoverers: nor is there any longer an excuse why, even in the most elementary lessons, nay I should say, why more particularly in these elementary lessons, the dark and dreary passages of Greek and Latin, of French and German grammar, should not be brightened by the electric light of Comparative Philology. When last year I travelled in Germany I found |