The Scottish Philosophy [123]
owing to its sectarian character -- received from Glasgow, if not a refined, a very useful education, which enabled them, as ministers, doctors, and teachers, to raise their province above the other districts of Ireland in industry and intelligence.
As it is interesting to notice the Aberdeen philosopher's view of the frolicsome Irish youth, so it is instructive to observe the estimate by the Aberdeen moderate of the Calvinistic religion of the land of the covenant. Writing to Aberdeen, July 13, 1765: ,I think the common people here and in the neighborhood, greatly inferior to the common people with you. They are Boeotian in their understandings, fanatic in their religion, and clownish in their dress and manners. The clergy encourage this fanaticism too much, and find it the only way to popularity. I often hear a gospel here which you know nothing about; for you neither hear it from the pulpit nor will you find it in the Bible." Possibly this gospel was the very gospel of grace so valued by the people of the west of Scotland. It is possible, too, that at this time, when the contest between the refined moral system and the evangelical system was the closest and keenest, Dr. Reid may have been kept at a distance from the latter. In another letter he sees some of the more favorable features of the western character. " The common people have a gloom in their countenance which I am at a loss whether to ascribe to their religion or to the air and climate. There is certainly more of religion among the common people in this town than in Aberdeen, and although it has a gloomy enthusiastic cast, yet I think it makes them tame and sober. I have not heard either of a house or head broke, of a pocket pict [picked], or of any flagrant crime, since I came here. I have not heard any swearing in the streets, nor seen a man drunk (excepting,, one prof -- r), since I came here." The Aberdeen moderate is not prepossessed in favor of the west-country religion, but testifies in behalf of the west-country morality. He has an idea that the morality may somehow be connected with the religion; and possibly he might have seen more amiability and cheerfulness in the piety of the common people had he come in closer contact with it. It is significant that the drunk man is to be found in the class which had risen above the national faith. We shall have to look at a very {206} different picture half a century later, when Chalmers begins his moderate labors in Glasgow. By that time, under the regime, both morality and religion have disappeared from the region (Drygate) in which Reid lived. The Glasgow professors may not have been directly responsible for the growing wickedness; but there was nothing in their teaching, moral or theological, adequate to the task of purifying the pollution coagulating all around them.
There are indications in these letters of the interest taken by Reid in every sort of scientific pursuit. He confidentially reports to Dr. David Skene Dr. Black's theory of heat before it was made known to the world. He is aiding a Turin professor of medicine who comes to Glasgow in his inquiries about the petrifaction of stones. He sends philosophical instruments to his friends in Aberdeen (Feb. 25, 1767). " For my part, if I could find a machine as proper for analyzing ideas, moral sentiments, and other materials belonging to the Fourth Kingdom, I believe I should find in my heart to bestow the money for it. I have the more use for a machine of this kind, because my alembic for performing these operations -- I mean my cranium-has been a little out of order this winter by vertigo, which has made my studies go on heavily, though it has not hitherto interrupted my teaching."
Thus flowed along, quietly and honorably, the remaining days of Dr. Reid. He corresponded with Lord Kames and Dr. James Gregory on such subjects as liberty, cause, motives, and volition. The letters have been published. Many of them are controversial, but they are conducted in an admirable spirit. He wrote a number of papers of
As it is interesting to notice the Aberdeen philosopher's view of the frolicsome Irish youth, so it is instructive to observe the estimate by the Aberdeen moderate of the Calvinistic religion of the land of the covenant. Writing to Aberdeen, July 13, 1765: ,I think the common people here and in the neighborhood, greatly inferior to the common people with you. They are Boeotian in their understandings, fanatic in their religion, and clownish in their dress and manners. The clergy encourage this fanaticism too much, and find it the only way to popularity. I often hear a gospel here which you know nothing about; for you neither hear it from the pulpit nor will you find it in the Bible." Possibly this gospel was the very gospel of grace so valued by the people of the west of Scotland. It is possible, too, that at this time, when the contest between the refined moral system and the evangelical system was the closest and keenest, Dr. Reid may have been kept at a distance from the latter. In another letter he sees some of the more favorable features of the western character. " The common people have a gloom in their countenance which I am at a loss whether to ascribe to their religion or to the air and climate. There is certainly more of religion among the common people in this town than in Aberdeen, and although it has a gloomy enthusiastic cast, yet I think it makes them tame and sober. I have not heard either of a house or head broke, of a pocket pict [picked], or of any flagrant crime, since I came here. I have not heard any swearing in the streets, nor seen a man drunk (excepting,
There are indications in these letters of the interest taken by Reid in every sort of scientific pursuit. He confidentially reports to Dr. David Skene Dr. Black's theory of heat before it was made known to the world. He is aiding a Turin professor of medicine who comes to Glasgow in his inquiries about the petrifaction of stones. He sends philosophical instruments to his friends in Aberdeen (Feb. 25, 1767). " For my part, if I could find a machine as proper for analyzing ideas, moral sentiments, and other materials belonging to the Fourth Kingdom, I believe I should find in my heart to bestow the money for it. I have the more use for a machine of this kind, because my alembic for performing these operations -- I mean my cranium-has been a little out of order this winter by vertigo, which has made my studies go on heavily, though it has not hitherto interrupted my teaching."
Thus flowed along, quietly and honorably, the remaining days of Dr. Reid. He corresponded with Lord Kames and Dr. James Gregory on such subjects as liberty, cause, motives, and volition. The letters have been published. Many of them are controversial, but they are conducted in an admirable spirit. He wrote a number of papers of