GRACE.

Feilding Star, Volume XVII, Issue 147, 20 December 1895, Page 2

GRACE.

TO THE EMTOB. Sik,— l do not know whether it is wise ' to notice our Celtic inquirer who takes refuge under the norn de flume oi " Better Wozd," uiasmuch as it ie deer that he is hot asking for information but is a caviller, if not deserving a harsher name. If Scott in hie celebrated poem of tbe ' ' Lady of Uie Lake," wben describing the interview between' James - FitzJames and Roderick Dhu, expressed tbe f eelings of the dwellers of the moan* 4 tains, the absence of the term " grace 4 ' " in the Celtic language is easily, accounted for. Wild, fierce, and revengeful; seems to have been the race characteristic of. , the Celt at that period, mixed.;however, with some chivalrous feeling jrad some, regard for the rights^ of hospitality. Mountain Arabs they were, tbebf|);taas against every man's hand. --Andlsir, if the knowledge and practice "cjf , grace were then unknown and, tfaercdTore^ un- • expressed, with the baser passion of revenge they were not altogether* on-, acquainted. Since that, however/ the Gospel has been preached among^them «^ and has been savingly accepted by many, perhaps by more in proportion to their numbers than any other people, and nowhere have the blessings of grace , been more fully exemplified than in turning the rude revengeful mountaineer into a loyal and God-fearing subject. Our graceless Celt who makes this enquiry has, unfortunately, not kept pace withy the majority of bus countrymen, a-nd is clearly a fossil of that remote age^when revenge was a>duty and grace unknown* For further information on tbis subject., I would refer him to the writings of bis illustrious countrymen— Rutherford, tlie Bonars, McCheyne, Cbalmersetc., — men who were recipients and jtroclaimers of that grace which " Better Word," pro* f esses to hold in such disdain.. I am, etc., J. B. Boots.