The subject of the ancient hymns and religious poetry of the ancient Gaels was discussed in earlier chapters, as also the religious compositions of mediæval times. After the stormy era of the Reformation and the Jacobite period, the sacred muse of the Highlands began to make her voice heard once more. The sacred bards of the Early and Mediæval times have thus received attention; it now remains to treat of those of Modern days. The light of the Reformation movement failed for some generations to reach the masses of the people in many districts of the Highlands. The hindrances were many: the want of suitable earnest pastors, and the large extent of the districts assigned to each. It ought also to be remembered that the complete translation of the Bible into Gaelic is not yet a century old; and even although there had been a translation earlier there were not many who were able to read it. The Highlanders then were also in the first stages of a transition state. They felt the system of clanship crumbling under their feet. Quarrels were easily fomented. The strong and sagacious took advantage of the times, and took care to adjust themselves to the developing circumstances of the future. Jacobitism found a strong-hold in the Highlands, not because the people were Papists or religiously indifferent or fervent lovers of the Stuarts, but because they had a strong sense of justice and loyalty, sore as they had frequently suffered for their fidelity. Jacobite adventurers regarded the Highlands and Islands as a suitable field for their treasonable operations—isolated from the mighty stirring current of the kindling spirit of the times—a spirit that began to question the right divine of kings to govern wrong. The conflict between the enlightened Protestant mind and the enslaving spirit of Jacobitism came to an end on Culloden Moor. Many of the Highlanders forsook the Stuart cause earlier. Argyllshire in the west, and almost whole counties in the north and north-east, did not either stir for Prince Charles or espoused the opposite side. Evangelical religion had turned the current of the people’s thoughts in those districts. Especially was this the case in the north, where able and godly ministers—some of them Lowland ministers, who found asylum there from persecution—brought back the clans to the knowledge of the true religion. Yet even in the north there were many inaccessible glens and corners where many—often desperate men—made for themselves a home, and where they lived in a state of heathenism. And in this state they continued almost down to our own time. Uncomplimentary as they were in many respects to the religious character of his countrymen, there is no doubt the following lines were very applicable last century. The author—Dr Macgregor, the Gaelic apostle of Nova Scotia—laments that the Highlanders were ignorant and blind, and that learning was rare among them:—