"This prophecy of the unity of the [human] race [in "A man's a man for a' that"] is founded on the thoroughly Scottish sentiment, fostered by Scottish history from the days of Wallace till our own times, of the value of man as man, of the dignity of labour, whether physical or mental or moral, as compared with the tinsel shows of privileged indolence. The scorn for the empty "birkie ca'd a lord," and for the king-made dignities unbacked by merit, have persistently remained as Scottish qualities all down the ages, and they are becoming the qualities of men wherever thought has filtered down to the humbler classes, wherever the peasant has learned to venerate himself as man."