第46章 OSTIG IN SKY(11)

The principle upon which extemporary prayer was originally introduced,is no longer admitted.The Minister formerly,in the effusion of his prayer,expected immediate,and perhaps perceptible inspiration,and therefore thought it his duty not to think before what he should say.It is now universally confessed,that men pray as they speak on other occasions,according to the general measure of their abilities and attainments.Whatever each may think of a form prescribed by another,he cannot but believe that he can himself compose by study and meditation a better prayer than will rise in his mind at a sudden call;and if he has any hope of supernatural help,why may he not as well receive it when he writes as when he speaks?

In the variety of mental powers,some must perform extemporary prayer with much imperfection;and in the eagerness and rashness of contradictory opinions,if publick liturgy be left to the private judgment of every Minister,the congregation may often be offended or misled.

There is in Scotland,as among ourselves,a restless suspicion of popish machinations,and a clamour of numerous converts to the Romish religion.The report is,I believe,in both parts of the Island equally false.The Romish religion is professed only in Egg and Canna,two small islands,into which the Reformation never made its way.If any missionaries are busy in the Highlands,their zeal entitles them to respect,even from those who cannot think favourably of their doctrine.

The political tenets of the Islanders I was not curious to investigate,and they were not eager to obtrude.Their conversation is decent and inoffensive.They disdain to drink for their principles,and there is no disaffection at their tables.Inever heard a health offered by a Highlander that might not have circulated with propriety within the precincts of the King's palace.

Legal government has yet something of novelty to which they cannot perfectly conform.The ancient spirit,that appealed only to the sword,is yet among them.The tenant of Scalpa,an island belonging to Macdonald,took no care to bring his rent;when the landlord talked of exacting payment,he declared his resolution to keep his ground,and drive all intruders from the Island,and continued to feed his cattle as on his own land,till it became necessary for the Sheriff to dislodge him by violence.

The various kinds of superstition which prevailed here,as in all other regions of ignorance,are by the diligence of the Ministers almost extirpated.

Of Browny,mentioned by Martin,nothing has been heard for many years.Browny was a sturdy Fairy;who,if he was fed,and kindly treated,would,as they said,do a great deal of work.They now pay him no wages,and are content to labour for themselves.

In Troda,within these three-and-thirty years,milk was put every Saturday for Greogach,or 'the Old Man with the Long Beard.'

Whether Greogach was courted as kind,or dreaded as terrible,whether they meant,by giving him the milk,to obtain good,or avert evil,I was not informed.The Minister is now living by whom the practice was abolished.

They have still among them a great number of charms for the cure of different diseases;they are all invocations,perhaps transmitted to them from the times of popery,which increasing knowledge will bring into disuse.

They have opinions,which cannot be ranked with superstition,because they regard only natural effects.They expect better crops of grain,by sowing their seed in the moon's increase.The moon has great influence in vulgar philosophy.In my memory it was a precept annually given in one of the English Almanacks,'to kill hogs when the moon was increasing,and the bacon would prove the better in boiling.'

We should have had little claim to the praise of curiosity,if we had not endeavoured with particular attention to examine the question of the Second Sight.Of an opinion received for centuries by a whole nation,and supposed to be confirmed through its whole descent,by a series of successive facts,it is desirable that the truth should be established,or the fallacy detected.

The Second Sight is an impression made either by the mind upon the eye,or by the eye upon the mind,by which things distant or future are perceived,and seen as if they were present.A man on a journey far from home falls from his horse,another,who is perhaps at work about the house,sees him bleeding on the ground,commonly with a landscape of the place where the accident befalls him.

Another seer,driving home his cattle,or wandering in idleness,or musing in the sunshine,is suddenly surprised by the appearance of a bridal ceremony,or funeral procession,and counts the mourners or attendants,of whom,if he knows them,he relates the names,if he knows them not,he can describe the dresses.Things distant are seen at the instant when they happen.Of things future I know not that there is any rule for determining the time between the Sight and the event.

This receptive faculty,for power it cannot be called,is neither voluntary nor constant.The appearances have no dependence upon choice:they cannot be summoned,detained,or recalled.The impression is sudden,and the effect often painful.

By the term Second Sight,seems to be meant a mode of seeing,superadded to that which Nature generally bestows.In the Earse it is called Taisch;which signifies likewise a spectre,or a vision.

I know not,nor is it likely that the Highlanders ever examined,whether by Taisch,used for Second Sight,they mean the power of seeing,or the thing seen.