But though mention is made of that name even after
this aera, yet upon examining impartially what is given us for that
language in this period, it will be found so different from the Romance
of the ninth century, that to trace it any further would be both a vain
and an extravagant pursuit.
Admitting, however, the universal use of the Romance all over France
down to the twelfth century, which no French author has yet doubted or
denied; and allowing that what the writers of those times say of the
Gallic is to be understood of the Romance, as appears from chronological
proofs, and the expressions of several authors prior to the fifth
century;[AS] who, by distinguishing the _Gallic_ both from the _Latin_
and the _Celtic_, plainly indicate that they thereby mean the Romance,
those being the only three languages which, before the invasion of the
Franks, could possibly have been spoken, or even understood in Gaul:
admitting these premises, I say, it necessarily follows, that the
language introduced into England under Alfred, and afterwards more
universally established by Edward the Confessor, and William the
Conqueror, must have been an emanation of the Romance, very near akin to
that of the abovementioned oath, and consequently to that which is now
spoken in the Alps.
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