Germany is the land of exegesis, England is
the land of Puritanism. The religion of Wales is more emotional and
sentimental than English Puritanism; Romanism has indeed given way to
Calvinism among the Welsh,--the one superstition has supplanted the
other,--but the Celtic sentiment which made the Welsh such devout
Catholics, remains, and gives unction to their Methodism; theirs is
not the controversial, rationalistic, intellectual side of
Protestantism, but the devout, emotional, religious side. Among the
Germans, Protestantism has been carried on into rationalism and
science. The English hold a middle place between the Germans and the
Welsh; their religion has the exterior forms and apparatus of a
rationalism, so far their Germanic nature carries them; but long
before they get to science, their feeling, their Celtic element
catches them, and turns their religion all towards piety and unction.
So English Protestantism has the outside appearance of an
intellectual system, and the inside reality of an emotional system:
this gives it its tenacity and force, for what is held with the
ardent attachment of feeling is believed to have at the same time the
scientific proof of reason. The English Puritan, therefore (and
Puritanism is the characteristic form of English Protestantism),
stands between the German Protestant and the Celtic Methodist; his
real affinity indeed, at present, being rather with his Welsh
kinsman, if kinsman he may be called, than with his German.
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