i 7 o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ing one of their many examples of Welch characteristics — describ- 

 ing the emotional tumult of a marriage celebration by declaring 

 that he " had never see sic a wedding before, it was just like a 

 vuneral " ! 



The Welsh disposition or temperament is less familiar to us in 

 America than the Irish; it is the exact counterpart of it. The key- 

 note of this disposition lies in emotion. As vehement in speech as 

 the Alpine Celt in Switzerland, France, or Germany is taciturn; as 

 buoyant and lively in spirits as the Teutonic Englishman is reserved; 

 the feelings rise quickly to expression, giving the power of eloquence 

 or its degenerate prototype loquacity. This mental type is keen in 

 perception, not eminent for reasoning qualities; " a quick genius," as 

 Matthew Arnold puts it, " checkmated for want of strenuousness 

 or else patience." As easily depressed as elated, this temperament 

 often leads, as Barnard Davis says, to " a tumult followed by a state 

 of collapse." Apt to fall into difficulty by reason of impetuousness, 

 it is readily extricated through quick resourcefulness. In decision, 

 leaning to the side of sentiment rather than reason, " always ready," 

 in the words of Henri Martin, " to react against the despotism of 

 fact." Compare such an emotional constitution with the heavy- 

 minded, lumbering but substantial English type, and one realizes 

 the possible " clashing of a quick perception with a Germanic in- 

 stinct for going steadily along close to the ground." Ascribe it all 

 to a difference of diet, if you please, as the late Mr. Buckle might 

 have done; derive the emotional temperament from potatoes, and 

 the stolid one from beef; or invent any other excuse you please, the 

 contrast is a real one. It points vaguely in the direction of a Medi- 

 terranean blend in the Welsh and Irish, even to a lesser degree in 

 the Highland Scotch. More we dare not affirm. 



The moderator of the recent General Assembly of the Free Church of 

 Scotland, Dr. Hugh MacMillan,an eminent divine of undoubted orthodoxy, 

 in his inaugural address before the assembly, said, alluding to scientific 

 discoveries, that the scientific method had created a greater regard for 

 truth than ever before existed in the world. The extraordinary exactness 

 of the scientific method in the physical world has reacted beneficially upon 

 the moral world, and has led to an intolerance of every form of falsehood. 

 The scientific method is carried into theological studies, and men under its 

 influence refuse to accept conventional or traditional evidence, and insist 

 upon subjecting even the most sacred things to the most rigid investiga- 

 tion. Veracity is the passion of their life. In this way the influence of 

 recent science in some directions and to some extent has been unsettling, 

 but upon the whole it has been a great and permanent advantage. True 

 l'eligion can not possibly suffer from the tests and methods of science prop- 

 erly conducted. 



