D. P Moran's argument mirrors the contributionist views espoused by Matthew Arnold and William Dean Howells. While Arnold argued for the amalgamation of the Celtic peoples into a dominant English nation, and William Dean Howells desired the fusion of his nation's ethnic and linguistic differences into a common American identity, Moran conceives of an Ireland in which the nation's racial and cultural diversity is absorbed into a dominant Gaelic culture. R. F. Foster considers Moran's statement that ‘the Gael must be the element that absorbs’ a ‘chilling dictum’. When one considers, however, that this passage was written at a time when such views of ethnic contributionism were widely entertained, a time when the Gael was generally feared and ridiculed in the British press, and when Irish speakers had no access to education in their own language, Moran's dictum may be less chilling than first impressions might suggest.