The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1910-04-02
The Philosophic ceIt.

To the tendency of the literary Celt
to localize the creations of his imag-
ination corresponds an important trait
in the philosophic Celt, his disputa-
tiousnesS, or to use a current idiom,
his love of argyfying." 1t is often
said that the Scotchman would rather
argue about metaphysics than eat. And
from the days Of Charlemagne down to
the present time the Irishman at the
Continental schools was famous for his
elaborate argumentationS. Benedict of
Aniane, in the ninth century, talks of
the "syllogism of delusion." at which
the Irish were experts. Montesquieu,
in his Lettres Persanes, talks about the
Irishmen who crossed over to France
to be educated, and adds that they
brought with them, as their only
means of obtaining livelihood, "a for
midable talent for disputation.'
And in our own day a distinguished
teacher at the Gregorian university in
Rome, where the test of proficiency is
ability to conduct a theological debate,
bears witness to the fact that the Irish
students in Rome at the present time
are keeping up to the tradition Car
dinol Franzelin is reported to have said
to Archbishop Croke: "As a professor
of theology at Rome for many years
ing the character and mental equip
ment of various nations, and though
in favor of the Germans, I give it as
my opinion that the Irish, as a race,
have the most theological minds of any
people" The typical Scotch mind is
also theological. And for the same rea-
SON,
Because the Celt is so closely in
touch with the world of spiritual
things, he is under the necessity of
clearing up all his ideas of the spirit
ual, the immaterial. and the abstract.
AS soon as man begins to believe in
anything he must try to have a clear
idea Of it. If, then, the innaginatton
or the Celt is directed towards the
other world, If the other world-and by
this 1 mean not merely heaven, the life
to come, but the whole world of our
ideals and spiritual ideas-is more real
to him than this material world. he
takes very naturally to the task of
trying by augmentation to make his
ideas about it exact. And here is the
root of that talent for scientific inyes-
tigation which, outside the domain of
philosophy proper, has distinguished
such men as Tyndal, Kelvin, Pasteur
and Ramsay. These are only a few of
the Celts who, in our own day, have
attained high rank as scientists 1t is
mistake to think that the ideal sci
entific temperament includes merely
the talent for painstaking inyestiga-
tion of facts. That is necessary. But
more necessary still is the talent for
scientific generalization and the formu-
lation OF laws and hypotheses. And
this IS a talent that belongs to the i'm
ag1nation. An imagination that COM
bines with extraordinary fertility and
resourcefulness a demand for exactness
and localiZation is quality which
must be present in scientist, if he is
to accomplish the best work.
As to philosophic thought. what
have been the services of the CeIt in
this department of human endeavor?
How has the Celtic factor influenced
the history of philosophy? The Celts
have leavened the mass of human
speculation with love of ideaIism. of
spiritual values, of the entities and
realities which transcend the limits of
matter. Their influence has been for
good. To the literature of the world.
and to life, of which literature is but
picture, the Celt has contributed
much that the world cannot well dis
pense with He has pleased us by the
genial play of his fancy anS amused
us by the brilliant flashes of his wit:
ne has stirred us by his eloquence and
played on all our emotions by the
sweet, tunefulness of his song. In phil
osophy he has lifted us up by his en-
phatlc assertion of the reality of the
spiritual world, he has enlivened us bN
the vivacity and subtlety of his argu-
mentatfve powers, and he has saved us
from the prosaic literalness of the ma
terialist and empiricist who would have
US believe only that which we see. and
would deny us the right to use the
eye OF the soul as well as that of the
body. The Celt stands for lofty specu-
lation; the matter-of-fact materiaIist
stands for minute determination. The
Celt stands for the morality of ideals,
the empiricist stands for the restric-
tive force of law. and grounds all NOR
al principle on ultimate expediency.
The Celt is an optimist.- William TJr-
ner, in the Catholic World.