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These Scotch-Irish were
uncommonly "set in their ways." This is often said to their discredit.
They are described as a bigoted, stubborn, pigheaded breed; as much given
to contentions and quarrels about trivialities; as extremely quick to take
offense, and very reluctant to be reconciled, and hence it is said, they
were a hard people to live with, and that there were among them many
life-long alienations and feuds arising out of matters utterly unimportant
and even contemptible. There is a color of truth in this. Their blood was
very red and their temper very hot, their heads were hard and their hands
heavy, but they were by no means a quarrelsome people. They were not of
kin to Paddy at the Donnybrook fair, strutting about with a chip on his
shoulder and provoking a fracas. They seldom invited trouble or picked a
quarrel, but once in, they could be depended upon to stay in to a finish.
They were bound to have room for themselves, and refused to be too much
crowded; hence they were sturdy fighters, and not likely to run away till
the trouble was over. This was their way when contending for their civil
and religious liberties in other lands; they showed the same trait in the
struggle for American Independence, and continued to show it in all
things. This mood, temper, or trait of the race was a very marked and
persistent one. No doubt there was in the typical Scotch-Irish a vein of
what may fairly be called asinine obstinacy. He sometimes thought he was
governed by principle and conscience when in fact it was only prejudice
and stubbornness. Consequently, many of the alienations in families,
neighborhoods and congregations were silly, contemptible and wicked. But
it was this very trait in its nobler manifestations, that gave them their
strength and heroism. The very men who were sometimes misled into making
battle where there was nothing worth while at stake were precisely the men
who were ready to stand, and who did stand unto death for the rights of
man and the truth of Christ. The noblest qualities are sometimes the most
easily perverted, and they are the very worst when so perverted. It was
the conscience and fiery zeal of Saul of Tarsus, perverted, that made him
the scourge and the terror of the early Church. An earnest and determined
man is always dangerous if he is misled. This is the snare of all able,
conscientious and resolute people. Every strong and overcoming man is "set
in his ways;" else he would not be strong and overcoming at all. Only the
weak and willowy give way when they are challenged. The important thing to
be seen to is, that the position taken is right, and that the matter at
issue is worth contending for. Herein was the weakness, and sometimes the
wickedness of my people. As a Scotch-Irishman by birth and breeding, in
blood and marrow, I call them mine, and claim the right to speak of them
freely. I have an honest pride in my race, but not in all their traits and
doings. They often made themselves small and contemptible before God and
all high-minded men, by their squabbles over things of no importance. Most
frequently these contentions were concerning matters of doctrine, or
worship, or church administration, for by far the most important interest
of life to these people was their religion. Just here is the explanation
of the manifold divisions of the common Presbyterians. All branches of
this common Presbyterianism hold substantially to the same doctrines and
policy, and yet they have been broken up into many divisions by
differences of opinion touching a more or less strict construction of some
points of doctrine, worship, or administration. This gave us two or three
kinds of Covenanters, of Seceders, and of those who called themselves
Regulars. These separated branches were not only alienated, but for most
of the time, actively belligerent. If the Presbyterian Jew did not openly
curse the Presbyterian Samaritan in his synagogue, he at least unsparingly
denounced him, and warned his flock against his perilous wiles and
pernicious delusions. This was in keeping with the temperament of the
people, and we cannot boast of it.
But many of these
lamentable alienations were found in families, and among neighbors and
fellow-church-members, and often over some paltry social matter, or
question of property. A dispute about a line fence between two farms, when
only a few inches in width of land were in question, would sometimes lead
to a bitter quarrel which would last for more than one generation. Two
neighbors of ours, people of the first respectability and piety, for two
or three generations could not agree on the precise location of the line
between their farms, and for many a day two fences were kept up, not three
feet apart, each claiming the little strip between. There was no open
outbreak, but a fixed difference of opinion which could not be composed.
The laying out of a new public road, or a small change in an old one,
sometimes resulted in a bitter and lasting feud. These were not merely
transient gusts of passion: they often degenerated into settled
alienations which passed down from sire to son. I have known a brother and
two sisters living near together, all members of the same church, all of
unquestioned character and strictly religious; often gathering at the same
communion table, and yet that brother never so much as spoke to either of
those sisters for more than forty years, and till his death. He would not
speak to his old mother while she lived, and would not attend her funeral
when she died.
They never had an open
quarrel, but he conceived that he had not received his full share of the
small estate left by his father, and so he simply cut his mother and
sisters, and all their married relations, dead, and so continued to the
end. I knew two brothers living on adjoining farms, who fell out about a
road running through their land, and in consequence neither ever spoke to
the other for many years, though both members of the same church. And
while they lived, no member of either family ever saluted a member of the
other. Two men in the neighborhood, both men of substance and position,
elders in adjoining congregations, both highly reputed for integrity and
piety, and closely connected by family ties, for many years never so much
as recognized each other, any more than if they had been Hebrew and
Philistine, until once meeting in the highway, they fell into talk, which
quickly grew hot, and resulted in a violent physical encounter, with
sundry chokings, and smitings, and wallowings on the ground. No one
witnessed it except the distressed wife of one of them, who also was
sister of the other, and so the affair was never exploited. It ought to be
said, however, to the praise of God's grace, and to the credit of
regenerated human nature, that before either of them died, grace got the
better of both. One of them coming to his deathbed, sent for the other,
who quickly responded, and there these old, proud and stubborn men
confessed their sins to God and to each other, and with prayers, and
tears, and affectionate embracings, were completely reconciled. Examples
of this trait were not at all uncommon among the people. Sometimes a
congregation was thrown into confusion and strife by some paltry cause
which would have made the whole contention comical if it had not been so
sad. Within my own memory the old church of my nativity and of my fathers
was brought into sore trouble by the question as to the kind of notes to
be used in a congregational singing-school. Such a school was kept up
through the winter, and it met once a week in the lecture room. An
old-fashioned singing master was employed to drill the people, and thus
encourage singing in public worship. A new music book had lately been
published in which was used the system of notation known as "patent
notes," or, as they were slightingly called, "buckwheat notes." It was
claimed that this system was much more easily mastered than the common
system. The question was whether this new book should be used in the
singing-school. At first, the discussion was fairly rational and
good-tempered, but not for long. Soon it waxed warm, quickly the fire was
kindled and flew from one to another, until the whole community was
aflame. For weeks it was the ail-but universal topic of conversation and
of controversy. If you saw a bunch of young people with their heads
together after sabbath-school, you knew what they were so earnestly
talking about. If you saw two men on horseback in the middle of the road
wildly gesticulating and loudly vociferating both at once, you were in no
doubt as to the subject of dispute. Neighbors had angry debates,
church-members fell out, and before long the people were arrayed in two
hostile and belligerent factions. It resulted in the cleavage of the
school into two rival and very unfriendly schools, and the war went on for
a year or two. The comical part of it was that probably a majority,
certainly very many, of the fiercest fighters could not for their lives
have told one note from another; yet they stood by their guns and fought
it out to a finish, as if some great principle of the kingdom of God had
been at stake. Political feeling ran very high and discussion was apt to
become very heated. These men were not office-seekers nor trading
politicians, but they were often very strong partisans, and, according to
their views, very patriotic. My family were whigs of the strongest kind,
and the papers we read, and the talk we heard were of such a nature that
it was ail-but impossible for me to understand how a democrat could be a
Christian, or even an honest man. One of the elders of our church was a
well-known democrat. I now know that he was one of the most exemplary and
pious men in the congregation, but then it was hard for me to believe that
he could be anything else than some sort of disguised scoundrel. If not,
how could he vote so infamous a ticket, and for such rascals as were on
it?
Certain political leaders
were, in the estimation of some, little else than idols, while to others
they were ail-but devils. Andrew Jackson and Henry Clay were such men.
When Jackson was victorious many went almost wild with joy; when Clay was
defeated, strong men clenched their fists and wept. Let me give an
illustration: My paternal grandfather and James Taggart were near
neighbors and close friends from boyhood to old age; they were elders in
the same church for a great many years; men of the highest character for
probity and piety. They were strongly attached to each other, and lived
all through their lives in deepest confidence. They could talk freely and
rationally on any subject but one, and that one subject was Andrew
Jackson. His name could hardly be mentioned between them without putting
their friendship in peril. Mr. Taggart deeply believed that Jackson was
one. of the greatest and purest public men that ever lived, while my
grandfather as deeply believed that that noted Scotch-Irishman was an
unmitigated rowdy, bully, and all-round scoundrel. Neither of them ever
introduced the name of Jackson in the company of the other, but it
sometimes happened that when neighbors were gathered together, some
mischievous fellow would interject the subject with some comment, his
purpose being simply to have some fun out of these venerable men. Jackson
had been dead for many years, but the introduction of his name was like
throwing a dynamite cartridge between these old friends. There was an
instant explosion. This usually gave much amusement to bystanders. |
