Hew Morrison Collection > Gaidheal > 1 Leabh 2 Air

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT.
AUGUST, 1872.
THE AFFINITY OP GAELIC TO LATIN
AND GREEK."-
The Highlanders have been very frequently
describedas unreasoningly reasonable in their
opinions of things ; — that is when you find
them in the right, the correctness of their
position depends, not on the result of dis-
cursive thought, so much as on some acci-
dental impulse. This, though their cooler
advisers do not altogether intend to mean it,
is very much akin to being intuitively in the
right, to gaining by a surt of intellectual
naturalness ends which the creeping but ad-
mittedly progressive intellect of the German
reaches by a toilsome effort of reason. De-
spite the sneering element accompanying it
as well as the sparingness with which the
possibility of any good coming out of Nazar-
eth is plainly acknowledged, we willingly
and thankfully accept the compliment, and
endeavour to show thereby in one word (our
space is small) one quality at least of no
contemptible species, admitted by the Ger-
man himself to be preeminently character-
istic of the Celtic mind. It is fairly admis.
sible that the haste in which the large majo-
rity of mankind live, move, and have their
being prevents them from ascertaining
scientifically the truth or hollowness of
many important opinions which they must
receive or reject in their actings of every-day
life. Take for instance the question of re-
ligion. Man in his first awakenings to his
position as such finds this an immensely
powerful element in the world, vitally affect
ing its health and destiny, — an element
with which in his human capacity as well
as in his relations to social life he is com-
pelled seriously to deal. He is a hard
working man of the world; and should he
be possessed, which not many are, of the
*The Philologic Uses of the Celtic Tongue
— An Auilre.NS (lelivere.i by W. D. Geudes, M.A.,
Professor of Greek, Univeisity of Aberdeen. To
the Univeritv Celtic Dehating Society. Abtr-
<leen: A. & K. Milne. 1872.
necessary will and ability to weigh and ex-
amine the arguments for and against certain
religious opinions or propositions, his busy
life will preclude him from attempting it to
any considerable extent. So he must adopt
agreatd alat second-hand; acquiescing in,
and receiving intuitively as true, the results
arrived at by a Calvin, a Butler, a Mansel,
a Mill, or a Mac Cosh, and even Revelation
itself.
Fortunate it is for the great mass of human-
ity that this power of intuition is anunfaihng
feature of the human mind, or many would
be left destitute of having anything to
nourish in their bosoms except the dreary
shade of sceptical thought, or the vacantness
of an untramed mind. It is this intuitive
capacity of rejecting or accepting what is
false or true in the world of opinion that
many of his unfriendly critics ascribe to the
Celt. And really most practical, bard-
working people will be disposed to acknow-
ledge that it is a noble, needful, and a most
divine element in the human mind; and
that the Celt has only some reason to feel
supremely satisfied that, in a higher degree
than others, he is in possession of an intellec-
tual quality which enables him, while hurri-
edly marching in the dust and roar of the field
of life's battle, to adopt as correct, without any
long process of speculation, doctrinal results
and propositions presented to him. This
line of remark leads us into the reason why
Germany is so characteristically rational
and infidel; in the case of many of her
intellectual great men the cold dreariness of
discursive speculation has well-nigh absorb-
ed the warmth and divine glow of the
original intuitions of the mind.
These digressive remarks are made on
account of the frequency with which the
Celt is complimented for his incapacity of
submission either to logic, facts, or reason.
The sneer owes its existence, not to the
Celt being actually unreasonable. — it is
admitted that he is reasonable, — but to the
manner in which he arrives at reason. But