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The Annals of the Parish-Part20_John Galt(1779-1839)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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better; but pride interposed, and caused them to think that any show

of affability from them would be construed by the democrats into a



terror of their power; while the democrats were no less to blame;

for hearing how their compeers were thriving in France, and



demolishing every obstacle to their ascendency, they were crouse and

really insolent, evidencing none of that temperance in prosperity



that proves the possessors worthy of their good fortune.

As for me, my duty in these circumstances was plain and simple. The



Christian religion was attempted to be brought into disrepute; the

rising generation were taught to gibe at its holiest ordinances; and



the kirk was more frequented as a place to while away the time on a

rainy Sunday, than for any insight of the admonitions and



revelations in the sacred book. Knowing this, I perceived that it

would be of no effect to handle much the mysteries of the faith; but



as there was at the time a bruit and a sound about universal

benevolence, philanthropy, utility, and all the other disguises with



which an infidel philosophy appropriated to itself the charity,

brotherly love, and welldoing inculcated by our holy religion, I set



myself to task upon these heads, and thought it no robbery to use a

little of the stratagem employed against Christ's kingdom, to



promote the interests thereof in the hearts and understandings of

those whose ears would have been sealed against me, had I attempted



to expound higher things. Accordingly, on one day it was my

practice to show what the nature of Christian charity was, comparing



it to the light and warmth of the sun, that shines impartially on

the just and the unjust--showing that man, without the sense of it



as a duty, was as the beasts that perish, and that every feeling of

his nature was intimatelyselfish, but then when actuated by this



divine impulse, he rose out of himself, and became as a god, zealous

to abate the sufferings of all things that live; and, on the next



day, I demonstrated that the new benevolence which had come so much

into vogue, was but another version of this Christian virtue. In



like manner, I dealt with brotherly love, bringing it home to the

business and bosoms of my hearers, that the Christianity of it was



neither enlarged nor bettered by being baptized with the Greek name

of philanthropy. With welldoing, however, I went more roundly to



work, I told my people that I thought they had more sense than to

secede from Christianity to become Utilitarians; for that it would



be a confession of ignorance of the faith they deserved, seeing that

it was the main duty inculcated by our religion to do all in morals



and manners to which the newfangled doctrine of utility pretended.

These discourses, which I continued for sometime, had no great



effect on the men; but being prepared in a familiar household

manner, they took the fancies of the young women, which was to me an



assurance that the seed I had planted would in time shoot forth; for

I reasoned with myself, that if the gudeman of the immediate



generation should continue free-thinkers, their wives will take care

that those of the next shall not lack that spunk of grace; so I was



cheered under that obscurity which fell upon Christianity at this

time, with a vista beyond, in which I saw, as it were, the children



unborn, walking on the bright green, and in the unclouded splendour

of the faith.



But what with the decay of trade, and the temptation of the king's

bounty, and, over all, the witlessness that was in the spirit of man



at this time, the number that enlisted in the course for the year

from the parish was prodigious. In one week no less than three



weavers and two cotton-spinners went over to Ayr, and took the

bounty of the Royal Artillery. But I could not help remarking to



myself, that the people were grown so used to changes and

extraordinary adventures, that the single enlistment of Thomas



Wilson, at the beginning of the American war, occasioned a far

greater grief and work among us, than all the swarms that went off



week after week in the months of November and December of this year.

CHAPTER XXXVI YEAR 1795



The present Ann. Dom. was ushered in with an event that I had never

dreaded to see in my day, in our once sober and religious country



parish. The number of lads that had gone over to Ayr to be soldiers

from among the spinners and weavers of Cayenneville had been so



great, that the government got note of it, and sent a recruiting

party to be quartered in the town; for the term clachan was



beginning by this time to wear out of fashion: indeed, the place

itself was outgrowing the fitness of that title. Never shall I



forget the dunt that the first tap of the drum gied to my heart, as




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