tact, it is time to remember the words of Archbishop Ussher. "It is known to the learned, that the name of Scoti in those elder times was common to the inhabitants of the greater and the lesser Scotland; I will not follow the example of those that have laboured to make dissension between the Mother and Daughter, but account them both as of the same people."

Individuals, therefore, to whom the Gaelic language is familiar, who are qualified in other respects, and in whose hearts it is to do somewhat for the advancement of the divine glory upon earth, would seem to be here specially addressed. You require no Native Irishman to appear in vision after what you have read. May you not assuredly gather that there is a call here to go and preach the Gospel? In one short month, or perhaps less, you would be perfectly intelligible in many districts. Your brethren too, the descendants of the Albanian Gaels, are there. You may have observed the period when a number of your countrymen left the Hebrides and Highlands for Ireland. How many I cannot ascertain, but they must be their grandchildren and great grandchildren who now live in Ireland. Is there to be no such thing as kindly going to see how they do, on the mountains of Donegal or the sea-coast of Antrim? As an encouragement to proceed farther, if you will, one of your own ministers was intelligible even far down in the south. You are aware who it is that hath said, "As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day." How worthy of the best and most powerful talents, and the warmest heart, would be such an employment! His special presence and aid would not be denied, who hath said so much, in such tender terms, about searching for souls when they are scattered abroad, and who, in his word, laments so deeply when no shepherd can be found conscientiously and carefully and wisely to do so.

SECTION X.

TO THE NATIVE IRISH,

More especially to such Individuals among them as are interested in the Progress of Literature, Education, and Oral Instruction.

WHILE it is desirable that your fellow-subjects should befriend you, and certainly incumbent on them so to do, the writer cannot conclude without returning to you yourselves, with a view to whose benefit every line has been written. He has not disguised, or rather he has been incapable of disguising, that he feels a peculiar interest in every thing relating to your present circumstances, and has only to lament its not having been in his power to discover it in some more substantial form; while at the same time he can never forget the warm and grateful language which has been so repeatedly conveyed to him in reference to a slight Memorial on your behalf, published about thirteen years ago.

On reading the preceding pages, he trusts that you have not found any one passage inconsistent with fairness or candour, or respect for your feelings as neighbours and fellow-countrymen ; and should there seem to be any thing bordering upon this, of which, however, he is unconscious, he has no doubt that you will give him credit on the whole for the kindness of his intentions. It is very possible that individuals among you may possess something valuable in Irish type, and that you may be acquainted with facts of which he is ignorant. Should it be

so, in a second edition of this volume they would certainly not be omitted. On the other hand, it is as probable that many among you may here find a variety of things, in regard to both your ancestors and your present state, of which you had but imperfect information, and which are not only interesting in themselves, but which seem, as with one voice, to assert, that the improvement of the mind and the progress of knowledge, are among the great ends of our existence.

You have read also how the Welsh have been acting for generations back by their language, and may inquire of them whether they have not gained by the attention which they have paid to it. I know it has been said, that "crowded numbers and great wealth together give prodigious advantages for educating, civilizing, and enlightening a people;" and you may be ready to add-the first we have, but not the second. But Wales in past ages was actually in as destitute a state as almost any part of Ireland is at this moment. It would be easy to describe this, and even substantiate the account so as to leave no doubt of the fact here stated. Various causes, it is granted, have contributed to a better day; so that Wales, though about five times as populous as our Highlands, is supposed to be four times as rich. But among these causes, I again refer you to the way in which they have been proceeding with their own vernacular tongue, and see whether this will not account for many of the advantages which they now enjoy.

Lay hold then of the medium of the Irish tongue in the same spirit-act by it in the same manner, and be not discouraged. The noblest use certainly, though not the only use to which your Irish types can ever be applied, is that of conveying to your countrymen the volume of Revelation entire; and the noblest use to which your ancient and expressive language can ever be applied as spoken, is when it is employed in uttering the words of Him who gave us this soul. As men of other tongues and former days have proved, your countrymen will then find, that "all the words of his mouth are in righteousness-that there is nothing froward or perverse in them—that they are all plain to him that understandeth, and right to them that find knowledge ;" and that, let the pressure or peculiarity of a man's earthly state be what it may, there is nothing which can prevent him from borrowing comfort from this fountain of life and wisdom.

Besides, the days are at last come, we trust, when you will find many a kind and intelligent friend cordially willing to help you on your way, whether it regards the printing or possession of books, or the benefits of education. But whether this be the case or not, after all that such can do, these are but subsidiary things-these are but means to an end; and to yourselves as men I now rather turn,-and to you yourselves, ultimately at least, I look for a better day.

In most parts of Scotland we have, and have long enjoyed, benefits such as these. Books and schools we have in abundance; but it by no means follows as a necessary consequence in these parts, though Christianity be professed, that the people are in possession of her purifying faith-her animating prospects-or that love which is the balm of the soul, and the last end of God in all that he bestows. No; come over to Scotland, where in most parts, on an average, you may find one in eight who can read, which is about the highest in the world; yet in many a district you will see, that, without the living voice-without the language of the heart addressed to the conscience-all around is cold, and withering into the grave. No; there is One above who hath not revoked his own commission-" Go into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature."-" Go, teach all nations ;" and, without obedience to these words, no country can enjoy substantial gladness, nor any land yield that return of gratitude and praise for which he created it; and so it must be with the country in which you dwell: but this commission once obeyed, the solitary place itself will be glad, the moral desert will rejoice and blossom as the rose.

With most of the discouragements which you might immediately bring forward the writer is not unacquainted; but then it is not wise to look upon a country, and think only of what it ought to be, or might have been, by this time. No; it is the part of wisdom to take it up just as it is; and, upon calm reflection, discouraging in many respects though the prospect be, there is no situation into which a people can be plunged, in which there may not be descried some circumstances favourable to the design of enlightening the mind and saving it from ultimate ruin; and who can tell but that in your present situation there may be found some things favourable, and which almost seem to say, that the Messiah himself is on his

way to bless you? At all events, let us rather search for encouragements, however small, or of whatever kind.

After all that can be said of the worst parts of Ireland, we cannot say that they are over-run with pernicious and debasing publications in the Irish language, as some other parts of the kingdom have been with such things in English. Now, this is a circumstance favourable to every measure here recommended.

Even with regard to poverty let us look into this, since it cannot be removed but by degrees. Nay, let us look into it before it be removed, and see whether in the meanwhile any good can be done to the people. In his own estimation, the rich man's wealth is his strong city, and in many instances the destruction of the poor is their poverty. Thus, many who are poor seem to imagine that their mere poverty excuses them from almost all obligation. But if riches profit not in the day of wrath, neither will poverty; yet even in the state of poverty, as such, there may be some encouragements for us to hope for a better day. From the rest of the community, it is true, the people seem almost as if they had been cut off; and so the state has been described by the French word-degagé, disengaged. But though poverty in many respects may detach that part of a community from the rest, still when religious truth is considered, thus disengaged they are often nearest of all others to free inquiry. The senses of seeing and hearing are the same with those of their superiors, and their faculties of observing and reflecting often less sophisticated.

Some men, and benevolent men too, talk as if all the evils that afflict a community were summed up in one word—ignorance, and they see no ground on which to fix the anchor of their hope, save an increase of knowledge; but this is, at the best, but a very superficial view of human nature at large, or of any one community upon earth. The cause of confusion or discord, misery and distress, has its root in the dispositions. of the heart; and although knowledge unquestionably produces both peace and power, no radical cure can be effected till the dispositions are changed. For example, "What is the source of contentions in common life? Observe the discords in neighbourhoods and families, which, notwithstanding all the restraints of relationship, interest, honour, law, and reason, are a fire that never ceases to burn, and which, were they no