SPEAKING WITH TONGUES.
fTo THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.] SIR. –In a notice of a work on The Life and Letters of St. Paul, by Professor David Smith, you say :-
" In connexion with the Corinthian Glossolalia, we find an interesting account of the Speaking with Tongues at the Gareloch in 1830. These phenomena were associated with the Irvingite movement; and were taken seriously, though not uncritically, by so wise a man as Thomas Erskine of Linlathen."
This statement is somewhat misleading, so far as Thomas Erskine is concerned. At first, like many other people, he believed in the supernatural character of the phenomena in question, but subsequently saw reason to change his mind on the subject. and had the candour to acknowledge that he hag been mistaken. In a book published in 1837 he wrote :- "In two former publications of mine . . . I have expressei my conviction that the remarkable manifestations which I witnessed in certain individuals in the West of Scotland abole eight years ago were the miraculous gifts of the Spirit, of the same character as those of which we read in the New Testa- ment. Since then, however, I have come to think differently, and I do not now believe that they were so. . . . To some it may appear as if I were assuming an importance to myself, by publishing my change of opinion; but I am in truth only clearing my conscience, which requires me thus publicly to withdraw a testimony which I had publicly given, when I rc longer believe it myself."—(Letters of Thomas Erskine of Linlathen, edited by William Hanna, Edinburgh, 1877, pp. 184 and 408-9.)
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