"When we look at the table which is before us [showing the branches of the Indo- European language family], [ . . . ] it is but a concise statement of the astonishing truth, that we Europeans, together with the Persians and Hindoos, however wide may be the apparent and superficial differences between us, are, nevertheless, members of a close and common brotherhood in the great families of nations. First westward and northward, afterwards eastward and southward, the Aryans extended; they forgot the rock from whence they were hewn, and the hole of the pit whence they were digged: they became wholly ignorant of their mutual relationship; and when, in their various emigrations, they met each other – like the lion-whelps of a common lair – they met each other no longer as brothers but as foes: yet brothers they were; and now, at least, the science of language has restored to them the knowledge of this unsuspected truth."