How many Irishmen are there who would purchase material prosperity at such a price? It is exactly such a question as this and the answer to it that shows the difference between the English and Irish race. Nine Englishmen out of ten would jump to make the exchange, and I firmly believe that nine Irishmen out of ten would indignantly refuse it.

Douglas Hyde

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Englishmen have very noble and excellent qualities which I should like to see imitated here, but I should not like to imitate them in everything. I like our own habits and character better, they are more consonant to my nature; I like our own turn of thought, our own characteristics, and above all I like our own language.

— Douglas Hyde

EnglishmenExcellentImitated

It is a most disgraceful shame the way in which Irishmen are brought up. They are ashamed of their language, institutions, and of everything Irish.

— Douglas Hyde

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I do not share the wish to see my language dead and decently buried.

— Douglas Hyde

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Every crag and gnarled tree and lonely valley has its own strange and graceful legend attached to it.

— Douglas Hyde

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As our language wanes and dies, the golden legends of the far-off centuries fade and pass away. No one sees their influence upon culture; no one sees their educational power.

— Douglas Hyde

LanguageLegends