Page:Life of William Blake 2, Gilchrist.djvu/466

 362 inspired, for wisdom was its greatest influence. I have always thought of the little mean-looking old man as standing high in the rank of being, and have felt persuaded that it would be impossible for external circumstances to prevent me from rising, if I chose, to true intellectual and moral dignity.' After completing his course at Edinburgh, James entered the ministry as a member of the sect of General Baptists, an offshoot of the Presbyterian Church; was sent out on a mission to preach in England, travelling through Cumberland, Westmorland, Lancashire, Shropshire, and Staffordshire; preached a while in Birmingham, then for three years in the beautiful little village of Melbourn in Derbyshire: made a happy marriage and finally settled down at Newington Green. During these various ministrations his mind had travelled no less restlessly than his body, questioning, doubting; now tending to Unitarianism, now drawing back from it; now busy with the 'fathomless speculations of theological metaphysics,' now taking refuge from these in a philosophical examination of language, which resulted in an attempt to found a system of rational philology. Although his labours in this direction—undertaken as they were before the study of Sanskrit had revolutionised the methods and results of philological research in England (though not before German scholars had already seized the clue)—have no permanent value, they display much philosophical acumen, a vigorous grasp of the problems in question, and a trenchant way of demolishing some of the ingenious errors then flourishing as newly discovered truth;—such as the northern origin of language as set forth by Home Tooke; of whom, however, he was, in the main, a warm admirer. It was, in truth, the desire to 'dig deep into the reasons and qualities of things' that set James Gilchrist upon the preliminary task of scrutinising his tools, convinced 'that the alchemy of a fancifully uncertain etymology' such as then prevailed 'might be transmuted into the chemistry of a rational philology. ., which would not only facilitate the acquirement of