A Catechism on the first principles of Divine teaching both by nature and
revelation:—
Who are the two great teachers of mankind?—Nature and Revelation.
Who is the author of both?—The great God.
Is the teaching of both unerring or inspired?—Yes; because God is their
author.
Is the teaching of both in anything opposed the one to the other?—In
nothing, and cannot be so, because they have the same God as their author.
How ought the teaching of both to be received?—With an humble, teachable
disposition of mind.
Does God teach the animal species?—Yes; he teaches them by putting what
is called natural instincts in them.
Seeing that the human species have not only an animal body but also a
rational soul, how does God teach them?—He teaches them by nature and
revelation.
How does God teach them by nature? He teaches them by nature, by putting
natural instincts in them, though not to the same extent as in animals.
How does God teach them by revelation?—By putting spiritual instincts
in them. The unconverted have no spiritual instincts, are entirely
influenced by a depraved nature, under the power of sin and Satan. But
when God teaches them, he destroys the power of sin, puts spiritual
instincts in them; they get an unction from the Holy One. The spiritual
instincts of the converted differ as much from those of the unconverted
as the natural instincts of the sheep differ from those of the wolf.
The same God who by instinct taught the ewe and the moor-hen to love
their young and to care for them; the same God by instinct has taught
the mother to love her child and to care for it. And as the same God
by instinct has taught the former a language to express their kindness
which by instinct their young can comprehend; so in like manner he
has taught a language to mothers to express their kindness, which the
instinct and ultimately the reason of their offspring can comprehend.
The native languages of the Highlands and Lowlands are as much the
languages of nature, of what nature taught them, as the bleating of sheep
or the lowing of cattle. God has given the best languages to beasts and
birds that could be given to them. The Gaelic (and I say the same of
the broad Scotch) is the best that could be given to Highlanders in all
the relations of life, and for keeping them a united, a happy, and a
contented people. Yes, and the best medium for conveying the knowledge
of God our Saviour to their minds. This, then, is the language which a
gracious God in great kindness gave unto them.
But there is another great being—man—who frequently sets himself up in
opposition to the great God, as if he were wiser and disposed to be
kinder than what he is. He also must give a language of his own making,
which he has made up in a great measure from dead languages. He looks
upon his own language as greatly superior to theirs—more learned, more
refined, more respectable, and more genteel. Sets his extraordinary
machinery agoing, gets schools and schoolmasters established all over
the kingdom to teach, not one word of the languages which God taught the
people, but his own; gives prizes to his scholars, and rewards the best
of them by giving them honorary titles—Bachelor of Arts, and Master of
Arts, &c.—puffing them up to the very skies. Thus the artificial English
comes in direct opposition to the native languages of the country,
calling them vulgar. God their author might as well be called so.
It comes and ingratiates itself with the pride and the vanity of the
higher class of society. They were too high before, but it gives them
their heart’s desire, it exalts them to the very clouds. It comes, and
instead of bringing a blessing in its train, brings a curse; instead of
regenerating, actually degenerates society. It found people united—the
rich and the poor, the high and the low—in a society of brotherhood, knit
together by the same language. The Highlanders by their Gaelic and the
Lowlanders by their broad Scotch, living together in mutual friendship,
the one looking upon the other’s language as that which the God of nature
taught them. But the great man comes with his pure English and snaps the
link in the chain asunder that united the rich and the poor, the high
and the low together—puts a complete separation between them—removes the
former from the common brotherhood, and exalting them as high above their
heads as if they were a race of foreigners and not of the same species
at all. There is your handiwork, proud man, who would be as gods. Those
who have received the language you have prepared for them are exalted,
many of them, above common mortals, as if they were gods. Yet they shall
die like men. Both parties are injured, but especially the Englified,
the genteel, and the fashionable. They are puffed up with pride—filled
with a vain conceit of their own superiority—their feelings of affection
are dried up, being so far removed from the commonality as to have no
sympathy with them. The others are injured also, being disheartened and
discouraged from a conviction and a feeling of shame arising from it,
that they are despised and treated with disrespect. This was not the case
in former times. I knew proprietors in my younger days who not only spoke
the Gaelic, but spoke it even better than the common people, and who,
when they spoke English, spoke it in broad Scotch. At that time they were
the men of the people, standing on a common level with them as regarded
the language, and entered into their feelings. But how is the case now?
All the answer that I will give to the question is, “God be merceful to
my countrymen when foreigners are their proprietors!” Who has produced
the melancholy change? Has it been brought about by God’s teaching,
either by nature or revelation? Not at all; it is the doing of vain man,
by introducing his artificial language. Is it not possible for men to
receive all the benefits from the English which it is calculated to give
without renouncing their own language and choosing it as the language of
society.
Nature’s teaching and man’s teaching come contrary, the one to the
other, in another respect. Nature teaches a beautiful variety, but
the master of arts a dull uniformity. I have already referred to the
beautiful varieties of the Gaelic, as spoken in the different parts of
the Highlands. There is also the same variety in the different counties
where the broad Scotch is spoken; but the master of arts comes with his
artificial English, and with its rolling waves disfigures and spoils the
whole, and leaves nothing but his own dull uniformity on their ruins. I
believe that the time has come when God, as the great author of nature,
and consequently as the author of the native languages of Scotland, shall
say to the proud waves of man’s language, “Hitherto shalt thou come and
no farther,” and “Here shall thy proud waves be stayed.” May all hearty
Highlanders and all hearty Scotchmen say, “Amen, God grant it.” The great
man does not duly set himself against the great God by going to the
languages of nature and bringing a language out of them, which he sets up
in opposition to the native languages as better and more genteel, but he
must set himself up in opposition to Him likewise, as if he were wiser
than he, by going to the other fountain of God’s teaching, Revelation,
and bringing a creed and confession out of it, to be set up as the best
and the most fashionable, and brands as a heretic every man who would
differ from him. What do all the denominations of Christians attempt but
to bring a creed and a confession out of Revelation as a bond of union
and uniformity. But nature teaches a very different lesson. It teaches
union and not uniformity, but union and variety. It teaches it in the
human countenance, the human race, in trees and plants, four-footed clean
animals, clean birds; in the Gaelic, broad Scotch, and, I am sure, in
the French. Revelation teaches the same—a Trinity in unity. The bond
of union amongst Highlanders is their Gaelic, and still there is no
uniformity, but a beautiful variety. The bond of union amongst Christians
is their Christianity. Christianity cannot exist without Christians.
Christian union cannot exist amongst men without Christianity, and a
real unity cannot exist amongst Christians without a glorious variety.
This lesson nature teaches with perfect inspiration. Let Christians then
treat Christianity as Highlanders treat the Gaelic. Let them follow their
own views of it conscientiously and allow others to do the same, without
attempting to set up their views as a confession of faith to others. Let
the people of God then separate themselves from the unconverted world,
and let this principle of nature’s Divine teaching be admitted by them,
namely, unity and a glorious variety—unity as it regards the great
essentials of Christianity, and variety as it regards the non-essentials.
In that way, and in that way alone, shall they be properly united; in
that way alone shall they enjoy one another, and, instead of living in
the cold, narrow cell of sectarian selfishness, they will live in the
expansive, the benign, the benevolent region of a glorious variety, and
their minor differences, instead of detracting from, will actually add to
the pleasure, the harmony, and the happiness of the whole.
There is a text which I would give to all the ministers in Scotland
as the subject of their discourse on the first Sabbath of January,
1869—“Doth not nature itself teach you.”—_1 Cor._ xi., 14.
I am convinced that the teaching of nature has not been attended to as
it ought. A person properly influenced by it, and humbly receiving its
teaching, is conscious that he is under the guidance of a safe teacher.
I will give one instance of nature’s teaching. I have two grandchildren
in my house, a boy and a girl, about four years of age, who are very fond
of their grandpapa, so fond that they wish to be oftener with him than
he considers desirable. Should he only request them to go out in the
usual way, they only laugh at him. If he rises to put them out, they run
under the table like kittens. When he is on the one side they are on the
other, where his hand cannot reach them. He then has to take the strap
and threaten them severely and, even when putting them out with that
severity, they put their backs to the door to prevent him from shutting
it, and sometimes weep bitterly, which is very painful to his feelings.
Nature, however, has taught him a different lesson: to speak kindly to
them in a low tone of voice, and instantly they go out quite happy, and
even saying, “Put the snib on the door, grandpapa.”