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Dwells there a shade on each
lofty brow?
Falls there a tear o’er the severing vow?
Each eye like a falcon’s is flashing bright,
Each brow is calm, and each step is light.
They have knelt at the Father’s triune throne,
And they know they are His, “they are not their own,’
And onward they go—though each hope hath fled,
From an earthly sceptre,—a crown-wreathed head!
They go, and the lip of the scorner may curl,
His sword may flash forth and his flag may unfurl,
But blessed, thrice blessed, their path shall be,
They have sprung from their fetters! Their Church is free!
The sixth meeting of the
British Association took place at Bristol, commencing on the 22d of August
1836. Sir David Brewster went south to attend this meeting, which was a very
interesting and successful one, under the presidency of the Marquis of
Lansdowne. The week previous he spent at Lacock Abbey, the residence of H.
Fox Talbot, Esq., the distinguished inventor of the Talbotype or Paper
Photography. Professor Whewell, Charles Babbage, Esq., Sir William Snow
Harris, Professor Wheatstone, Dr. Eoget, and other men of eminence, were
assembled in a memorable group, and they all went together to the meeting at
Bristol—my father visiting Mr. Daniell at Clifton. He wrote to his wife :—
“Lacock Abbey, Chippenham, Aug. 15, 1836.
“My dearest Juliet,—On my arrival here a few hours ago, I found a letter
from Lord Fitzroy Somerset, announcing Henry’s promotion, which I have sent
to him by this day’s post. . . . This place is a paradise—a fine old abbey,
with the square of cloisters entire, fitted up as a residence, and its walls
covered with ivy, and ornamented with the finest evergreens. All are Whigs,
and our only stranger to-day is Tom Moore, a most delightful person, full of
life, humour, and anecdote. He lives at a place called Sloperton Cottage,
about four miles from this, and I hope in a day or two to have the pleasure
of seeing him in his own house.
11 Aug. 17.—In consequence of taking a ride to Bo wood, the seat of the
Marquis of Lansdowne, with Mr. Fielding, I was unable to send this by
yesterday’s post. Bowood is the very perfection of art in
landscape-gardening, and is everywhere distinguished by the fine taste of
its owner. . . . Our party was increased last night by Dr. Roget, Mr.
Babbage, and Professor Wheatstone, so that we have all the elements of
spending an agreeable week here. Baron von Raumer is also to be at Mr.
Daniell’s, Clifton.”
The art of Paper Photography, although it had been experimented upon by Mr.
Fox Talbot since 1834, was not published to the world till January 1839. It
became a source of life-long interest to Sir David. Mr. Fox Talbot sent him
many of his earliest designs in photography—lace, leaves, printed pages, and
picturesque bits of the old cloisters, and, although much faded, these are
still carefully preserved as interesting to compare with the present degree
of perfection to which that wonderful invention has been brought. My
father’s connection with photography and photographers might well furnish a
chapter of his life in competent hands. A large correspondence was kept up
with Mr. Fox Talbot, M. Claudet, Mr. Buckle, Paul Pretsch, Messrs. Ross and
Thomson, and other eminent photographers. He made many experiments in the
art, though not able to give sufficient time to master its difficulties. His
son Henry, when at home on leave, practised it under his superintendence,
and it was one of his father’s means of relaxation from heavier work to take
positives from the negatives of his son and others. A new photograph was to
the last a joy to him, and he was peculiarly pleased with the receipt of a
medal from the Photographic Society of Paris in 1865. I extract the
following touching account of the termination of his correspondence with M.
Olaudet, the celebrated photographer in London, from the memoir of the
latter by his son: —
“Claudet’s scientific relations with Sir David Brewster had an affecting
conclusion. The two philosophers, for some months during last year (1867),
were concurrently engaged in investigating an interesting point in the
optics of photography. The correspondence was broken, never to be renewed,
by the death of one. The other, sixteen years the senior, undertook to write
a memoir of his friend. In a letter dated ‘Allerly, Melrose, January 1,
1868,’ addressed to Mr. Frederic Claudet, he says:—‘ ... I shall be glad to
do anything you desire that can do honour to his memory, and I will thank
you to send me the fullest information in your power respecting his early as
well as his later life and inventions.’ Six weeks later that ‘old man
eloquent’ passed away, and the full testimony he would have borne to the
scientific worth of Claudet—is not. The chief subject of the letters of
Brewster referred to, is the greater perfection of photoportraiture by means
of small lenses made of materials of different dispersive powers, with a
view to obtaining a depth of focus unattainable with glass lenses. These
letters are indeed surprising instances of vigour and freshness of intellect
in a man of eighty-six.”
After the meeting at Bristol, Brewster returned to Allerly. Again the cares
of pecuniary difficulties pressed heavily upon him. He knew that at any time
he was liable to utter ruin should he lose the Encyclopedia lawsuit, and
thus be exposed to heavy legal expenses and accumulated arrears ; this
period of anxiety caused an irritability of nerves and of temper, and a fear
of poverty, which never again quite forsook his finely-strung organisation.
In 1836 the grant of £200 a year, in addition to £100 which had been given
previously, was made by Government, and in 1838 the gift from the Crown of
the Principalship of the United College of St. Salvator and St. Leonard, in
the University of St. Andrews, finally relieved him from all these
embarrassments, which never occurred again to any serious degree, although
the old apprehensions were apt to return from any fresh pressure of
Encyclopedia claims, and from a certain want of proper proportion in the
expenditure of his income. His appointment took place in January; he moved
to St. Andrews in February, was inducted on the 6th of March, and on the.
6th of April took possession of the old house, which he had purchased,
called St. Leonards, which was to be his home of joy and sorrow, of many
changes and much ardent work, for twenty-three years. The old house had
formed part of the building of the ancient College of St. Leonard, and had
been the residence of George Buchanan, the old reformer and the stern tutor
of James vi. During the time of the Reformation, when any one was supposed
to be tainted by the new heresy, it was significantly hinted by his friends
that “ he had drunk of St. Leonard’s Well.” A pure reservoir so called is
still found near the College. It was a gloomy-looking residence at first,
with its arched gateway and its old chapel, containing several tombstones,
just in front of the entrance door, but it soon assumed a cheerful and
comfortable appearance, with its tiny lawn and garden, and its creepers of
ivy and jessamine, fuchsias and roses. In the chapel was interred a
predecessor in the principalship, the same John Rutherfurd who had received
his education at an early date in the Grammar School of Jedburgh, while the
grave of Samuel Rutherfurd, another Jedburgh worthy, is not far off in the
Cathedral cemetery. The other and the larger part of the old College of St.
Leonard was occupied by the late Sir Hugh Playfair, Provost of St. Andrews,
a man of great eccentricity, unbounded energy, and real talent. The close
neighbourhood and some similarity of temperament occasionally produced
clouds in the horizon, but there was mutual warm regard besides a degree of
scientific sympathy, especially in photography, leading to a constant
intercourse, which was on the whole a source of great interest to both. Sir
Hugh Playfair died in 1861.
Sir David threw himself into the St. Andrews work with his usual energy. The
Principal’s office had up to his time been virtually a sinecure, but he made
it a post of unsparing exertion and usefulness. As Principal, he delivered
in the College, winter after winter, a course of lectures which we are told
were "perfect models of clear, simple, felicitous exposition of the laws of
optics and mineralogy,”— while many were the abuses he rectified, especially
those connected with the conferring of medical degrees.
Among Sir David’s objects of interest at St. Andrews was the Literary and
Philosophical Society, of which he was the founder, and the University
Museum, in the formation of which he took an active part. Professor Swan, in
the obituary notice read before the Society, remarked as follows :—“The more
important physical researches which have conferred so just celebrity on Sir
David Brewster were naturally communicated to the Societies of London and
Edinburgh, and other of the greater scientific associations ; but from first
to last he read a large number of papers to the Literary and Philosophical
Society of St. Andrews. Indeed, he himself once told me that he valued
greatly this medium for the first announcement of his discoveries, in cases
where he had reason to believe that other workers were engaged in similar
researches, and when he feared being anticipated. . . . Even when Sir David
had no original communication to make, and this, at least in the earlier
years of the Society, seems to have been the exception rather than the rule,
he came to the meetings full of information regarding the latest scientific
intelligence, which, acquired through his unremittingly studious habits, it
was his regular practice and his delight to communicate. I have a most
pleasing recollection of these expositions, into which, despite the small
number of his hearers, Sir David threw all the force of his ardent
temperament.”
Probably about this time, though I do not exactly remember the year, another
serious threatening of mischief to Brewster’s precious eyesight took place,
causing him much anxiety and distress. Weakened probably by the accident at
Allerly, his eyes were nevertheless more tried than those of ten ordinary
men, not only by constant reading and writing, but by gazing through
mysterious “bits of glass” at noonday, and by microscopic and other
experiments by gaslight. An acute and agonising pain suddenly darted into
his eyeballs, deluging them with water, and necessitating complete darkness
and quietness till the paroxysm had passed, which was sometimes not for two
or three days. This complaint recurred frequently, and yielded to no mode of
treatment, till at last he heard accidentally of a cure said to be
discovered by Sir Benjamin Brodie, which consisted in using three or four
times a day, in the ordinary way, common snuff mixed with powdered quinine
in equal proportions. This had a most rapid and wonderful effect, and he
never again appeared to have any weakness or suffering in his eyes, although
to the last he never spared them; in some of his optical writings, however,
he alludes to having had symptoms both of hemiopsy or half-vision, and also
of incipient cataract. Some years after, on mentioning the good he had
derived from this prescription to his friend Sir Benjamin Brodie, its
supposed originator, he found that the latter had never heard of it, and was
much surprised by the effects, although he admitted the possibility of the
cure, supposing the disease to be neuralgia.
In 1837 Brewster published a Treatise on Magnetism, originally written for
the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and in 1841 he found leisure to give to the
world one of his most popular works, The Martyrs of Science, being the
biographies of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler. The significance and
quaintness of the title excited much pleasantry, and a circumstance which
occurred in connection with it long formed a favourite element in the
pleasant household raillery which my father was so pre-eminently good-humoured
in sustaining and enjoying. To the author’s surprise and horror he found the
following item in a “Christmas Box” which was handed to him :—“For binding
four Martyrs, so many shillings!”
In the summer of 1842 Brewster took his wife to Leamington, to try the
advice of the great “magician of the Learn,” Dr. Jephson, for her long
failing health. That remarkable man and the Scotish philosopher were
mutually attracted, and they enjoyed frequent and genial intercourse.
Leaving the recruiting invalid under his kind care and that of other
friends, Sir Dayid took his daughter to the twelfth meeting of the British
Association, held at Manchester under the presidency of Lord Francis Egerton.
It was pleasant to see the honour and distinction which attended him. “There
he is— that’s Brewster!” were constantly recurring whispers, and it was a
well-filled hemisphere in which he moved as a star of the first magnitude.
One feature of the increasing success of the British Association has ever
been the numbers of men of science from other countries who have come
especially to attend these great gatherings. Upon this occasion there was a
pleasant mingling of all nations, and a few amongst the number were Herschel
and Bessel, the representatives of English and Prussian astronomy ; Sir
William Rowan Hamilton, Dr. Lloyd, and Professor Maccullagh (whom my father
termed “the three leaflets of the Irish shamrock ”); Professor Jacobi, and
M. Ehrenberg, his distinguished son-in-law; Whewell, Murchison, Fox Talbot,
Sedgwick, Scoresby, General Sabine, and Dr. Dalton, fondly called “the
father of science in Manchester.” This venerable man appeared bowed down by
age and infirmities, which prevented him from presiding at this meeting, and
it was his last appearance at a British Association, but wherever he was
seen he excited much interest. Brewster had an especial admiration for him,
and a few years after reviewed his memoirs and works, saying of him that
“among the great men who have illustrated the passing century, there is no
brighter name than that of John Dalton.” The peculiarity of vision which
characterised this venerable philosopher, of which little was known for a
long time, was called Daltonism before it received its unpronounceable name
of Chromatopseudopsis, or, as it is now simply called, Colour-blindness. Dr.
Dalton’s inability to distinguish red from other colours was supposed to be
the cause of his occasional choice of a costume unusual for any, especially
for one like himself, belonging to the sober-habited Society of Friends.
When he and Brewster, along with some other men of science, received the
honour of D.C.L., during the meeting of the British Association at Oxford in
1832, Dalton was the only one of the group who wore his scarlet robe all
through the week, and two years later he attracted general attention by
appearing in the same gay colouring at a Court levee. The subject of colour-blindness
was one of the many which Brewster took up with vivid interest. Although not
the first to bring it before the public, his notices of the subject in
Natural Magic and in his Treatise on Optics, drew more attention to it as an
interesting and important optical inquiry. Several of his friends besides
Dr. Dalton had this imperfection: his old professor, the eminent Dugald
Stewart, Mr. Troughton the astronomical instrument-maker, and others. He
examined many cases of colour-blindness, gathered fresh facts and anecdotes,
both by correspondence and conversation, and wrote an interesting article in
the North British on the works of his friends the late Dr. George Wilson and
Professor Wartmann of Geneva.
From Manchester we went to Cambridge for another brilliant week, living in
the rooms of Professor Potter, which, being vacation time, he kindly vacated
for our use in Queen’s College, once an old Carthusian convent. It was the
occasion of the installation of the Duke of Northumberland as Chancellor of
the University, and to nearly all the celebrated names which had assembled
at Manchester, were added Lord Rosse, Monckton Milnes the poet (Lord
Houghton), Buckland, Sir Mark Brunei, Hallam the historian, the Duke of
Wellington, and many others ; the conferring of degrees by the new
Chancellor upon all the eminent men, who had not already received them, was
part of the interest of the occasion. Many memorable gatherings in Senate
Hall, Colleges and Gardens, took place, but best remembered of all is the
fine statue of Sir Isaac Newton, seen for the first time by moonlight, with
his biographer and loving disciple, amidst the solemn beauty of Trinity
College Chapel. From thence we went to the Deanery of Ely for some days, to
visit Dr. Peacock. Our travelling companions were Dr. Buckland, famous for
wit as well as geology, and Professor Maccullagh, one of the most brilliant
mathematicians of his day, and of a truly reverent and Christian mind,
although, like Buckland’s, not very long after that happy visit, it
completely gave way.
The spring of 1843 was too memorable a time for us in Scotland, and too
decidedly an era in my father’s life to be passed over in silence. Lay
patronage had always been considered a grievance by the evangelical section
of the Church of Scotland, and had, for nearly a century, been rigidly
administered by the Church Courts. It had already caused the secession of
the Burgher and Relief Churches, and was now presenting its worst aspect in
many parts of the country. Being supported by the legal courts, several
forced settlements of unwelcome and unfit pastors, especially those of
Marnoch and Auchterarder, hurried on a crisis which an evangelical majority
of the Church of Scotland had for some years been striving to avert. Their
efforts produced what has been called “the Ten Years’ Conflict,”—a conflict
terminated in 1843. On the 17th of November 1842 there was a solemn
Convocation held in Edinburgh, at which 465 ministers took their places. A
memorial was prepared and addressed to Government, in which it was calmly
and clearly stated that the inevitable consequence of a continued refusal of
relief must be a retirement from their position as connected with the
Establishment, rather than the continuance of an unseemly contest. On the
18th of May 1843, at noon, the Rev. Dr. Welsh, the Moderator of the
preceding Assembly, preached the sermon before the Queen’s Commissioner and
the public in the ancient church of St. Giles, which, as is the wont of the
Scotch Church, always precedes the meeting of the General Assembly, and
chose for his text these words, “Let every man be fully persuaded in his own
mind” (Rom. xiv. 5). At half-past two o’clock the Assembly met in St.
Andrew’s Church, which was crowded from floor to roof. After earnest prayer,
Dr. Welsh read a solemn protest of the Church of Scotland by her
commissioners, against the oppression of the civil power, which had been
signed the night before in St. Luke’s Church by 203 representative ministers
and elders, in which document the approaching event was styled “our enforced
separation from an Establishment, which we prized and loved, through
interference with conscience, the dishonour done to Christ’s crown, and the
rejection of His sole and supreme authority as King in His Church.” Dr.
Welsh then laid the protest on the table, bowed to the representative of
Majesty, and left the church, followed at the time by 203 ministers (a
number speedily increased to 474), and many elders, with their protesting
adherents who had gained admission into the building.
That upwards of 400 ministers should resign manses and stipends, or status
and prospects, at the mere call of conscience, was a thing so little in
accordance with the fashions of the nineteenth century, that the long and
solemn warnings of it were treated as fiction. It seemed as if the eyes of
statesmen, officials, and clerical advisers were holden, that they might not
see the inevitable truth. Irreverent jokes, bets, and satirical prophecies
were circulated through the country, and men had made up their minds that
they were not to be shamed by the sight of an old-world triumph of
principle. But when the words “They come! they come!” thrilled through the
hearts of the bystanders, announcing the solemn fact, and when, arm in arm,
the protesting men, with firm faces, but many with aching hearts, walked out
into the streets of their Scottish metropolis, then the prophets had honour
in their own country. The pulse of the nation was stirred. Mind triumphed
over matter, soul over flesh, conscience over mammon, and the gazing
thousands of the city were moved into tearful admiration. When the fact
reached the ears of Lord Jeffrey in his quiet study, in surprise and
incredulity he asked the universal question, “How many?” and when the answer
came, he burst into tears, exclaiming, “Thank God! in no other country could
such a deed be done.”
On Tuesday the 23d, in Tanfield Hall, Canonmills, the protesting ministers
signed the Deed of Demission. It was a noble sight—one of the solemn joys,
of a lifetime to witness,—as, the excitement over, each brave man took his
pen and irrevocably signed away home and. income. There were additional
signatures also, which were peculiarly noticeable and valuable, for they
were those of men who had wavered on the day of Disruption, perhaps because
of the tears of their wives and the wails of their children. Yet conscience,
enlightened by the Word of God, had done its sure work, and with judgment
cool and collected, they came forth to the place of signature with their
feet planted on the promise, “The Lord will provide.” And He did provide.
David Brewster had taken part in every step of the long conflict. He signed
the Act of Protest, where his well-known writing is still shown; with his
elder brother James he walked in the solemn procession, and he attended
every sitting of that first Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland, the
opening psalm of which was emblematic of her future, for as the words “O
send thy light forth and thy truth,” —led by the magnificent voice of Mr.
Hately, and then taken up by 4000 singers,—echoed through the pointed roofs
of the spacious Hall of Canonmills, a bright beam of heaven’s light shone
out and dispelled the thick darkness of a previous thunderstorm. It was not
excitement, but earnest conviction, that caused his secession from the
Church of his fathers, and of his own deeply-rooted attachment., Excitement,
political partisanship, and some of the “madness”, which “oppression”
causeth even to “wise men,” there was much of, however, in the mind of the
day, fostered by the brilliantly witty and vehement articles of the Witness,
the principal organ of the Free Church, edited by Hugh Miller, the eminent
geologist, and the Fife Sentinel, a less known but equally vehement paper,
edited by David Maitland Makgill Crichton of Bankeillour Makgill, in both of
which publications Brewster took part, sending notes and hints for articles
when not able to write himself, taken from the books he read, or the
conversations he shared. His friendship with these two gentlemen, indeed,
probably kept up much of his church feeling, and every Christmas regularly
for many years he and Mr. Miller spent some days together at Bankeillour,
where geology and ecclesiastical topics reigned supreme. But the progress of
events would alone have prevented the decay of party feeling. The Free
Church was not without her martyrs ; sites refused for churches and manses
in which men might worship and dwell with a free conscience, did something
of the work of sterner instruments in days of old. Some of the Disruption
ministers were infirm, others aged, many peculiarly liable to the various
ills to which flesh is heir, and for such, preaching in gravel-pits—in
ships—on the highways—on the shore below high-water mark—travelling many a
Highland mile in storm and tempest, or sleeping in attics under the drip of
the rain, could not be conducive to health, strength, or life. Many
contracted disease, and some lay down and died. It was, however, the
ministers, their wives, and their children, who suffered in this fashion.
The elders of the Free Church, though undergoing much social inconvenience,
were, as a body, free from loss or suffering. One man was, however, called
at the period, par excellence, “the suffering elder of the Free Church.”
That man was David Brewster. It appeared that he was the only official in a
similar position who had “ come out,” though others were supposed to have
had equal desire though not equal courage. In 1844, therefore, proceedings
were commenced against Sir David by the Established Presbytery of St.
Andrews, aided by the University, to eject him from his chair as Principal,
because of his adherence to the Free Church. The Test Act was made much
of—an Act instituted originally to keep out Episcopalians, several of whom
were calmly occupying, at the very time, Scottish Professorial chairs
without remark or question. Amongst these reverend and academic gentlemen,
only one was found bold enough to take the part of the heretical Principal,
the late Eev. Professor Ferrie. Public opinion, however, was the best
defence in such a case, and after months of small attacks and annoyances,
and irritating summonses, which it must be confessed were not borne with
equanimity, and which much deepened party prejudice in my father’s mind, the
proceedings were at last dropped, technically, I believe, because he had not
signed the formal Deed of Demission, which no elder had done. The following
short account he wrote to his wife ;—
“May 31st, 1845.
“My case was quashed in the Residuary Assembly. They durst not look it in
the face, and therefore gave the decision the appearance of having been only
delayed. Dr. Ferrie objected to the word 1 meanwhile’ which indicated that
it was not at an end, but Dr. Mearns, the Moderate leader, begged of him to
say nothing about that, as this was ‘ their way5 of getting rid of it
altogether!”
But when the excitement and persecution was all over and gone— when again,
as in the old days, he had warm friends among Established Church ministers,
and occasionally worshipped within her pale,—when he had seen the worst and
the best of Free Church government, he still held that though not perfect,
it was the purest and nearest the Scriptural Church, and maintained, with
the calmest, strongest judgment, the principles of the Protesting Church of
Scotland, i.e. the spiritual independence of her Courts, and the right of
her people to choose their pastors. Wherever he went he fought her battles ;
and when in England, amazed and half amused by the profound ignorance
existing on the subject, even amongst thinking minds, he was accustomed to
recommend a book which he thought gave the most clear and incontrovertible
statement of the truth. It was entitled The
Scottish Church Question written by the Rev. Adolphus Sydow, chaplain to the
King of Prussia, who came over to Scotland, studied both sides of the
question, and published his impartial opinion. It was a grief to my father
that only one of his immediate family belonged to the same communion as
himself; and of one near connection, whom he highly valued, he said, twenty
years after the Disruption, “ It can only be because he has not studied the
subject; he must read Sydow.”2 For many years his silver head was seen
regularly at every meeting of the Free Church Assembly, and his
correspondence shows that he left his science and his writing to make the
most careful arrangements for supplying pulpits and getting candidates to be
heard, attending also punctually Commission and committee meetings, of which
the following undated letter gives an idea:—
“As Tuesday is a very busy day in the affairs of the Free Church, I have
resolved to go to Edinburgh to-morrow in the train which arrives there at
3.40. There is a meeting of the Education Committee at ten; a conference
with the United Presbyterian Committee at twelve ; another meeting of the
General Education Committee, at 38 York Place, at one o’clock; a meeting of
the College Committee at three, in the New College, George Street; and a
meeting of Lady Effingham’s Bequest Committee at seven o’clock in the
evening. Of all these committees I am a member, and the subjects are of such
importance that I feel it a duty to be present.”
One kindred subject, although out of date, maybe mentioned here. Like the
large majority of the Free Church, my father was no Voluntary. They did not
leave the State till the State left them, and it was with extreme reluctance
that they quitted an Established Church. But the tie once broken, in the
case of many it was so thoroughly severed that they began to see the
blessings of a Church which did not “walk abroad in silver slippers,”
according to the saying of the old divine, and their desires for union have
not therefore gone so much in the direction of mending the tie broken by the
Disruption, as of uniting with the large body of Presbyterians whose rules
and worship are precisely the same as the Free Church, except that the
Voluntaryism of the one was voluntary, while the Voluntaryism of the Free
Church was at the first compelled. This view my father
1 The following translation of part of the Preface to the German edition of
Mr. Sydow’s work has been sent to me:—“When I returned to London from
Edinburgh, in the June of the previous year, in order to proceed directly
homewards, I was introduced to His Royal Highness Prince Albert. He declared
to me that he heartily desired to obtain the opinion of an unprejudiced man
on the Scotch Church question, and especially that of a German theologian;
and inasmuch as I possessed a more exact knowledge of the matter, and had
been personally on the field of the events, I was qualified thereby to
express my opinions as desired. In consequence of the interview with which
His Royal Highness honoured me, I received the commission to prepare a
comprehensive statement of my opinions. The high confidence with which I was
intrusted—the fresh impression made on my mind by the inspiriting events
from which I had just returned—the joy which I felt at defending a cause, to
which I held, and still bold, as not more just than important, and in which
so many, noble men and dear friends of mine, had been involved on both
sides—have throughout determined the forms and contents of my undertaking.”
My father’s early friendship with Dr. Chalmers, of whom it was said at this
time, “Where Thomas Chalmers is, there is the Church of Scotland,” was not,
as may be believed, hindered, but rather furthered, by these events. Much
correspondence took place between them upon Church affairs, and while there
was yet neither Free church nor pastor at St. Andrews, Dr. Chalmers became a
guest at St. Leonard’s College, and preached in the open air to 4000 people
in the green amphitheatre between the sea with its far-stretching rocks, and
the monument to the martyrs who suffered by fire at St. Andrews, which was
then in the process of being erected. A grand scene, and a noble sermon on
“Fury is not in me.” When Chalmers left St. Leonard’s, it seemed to those
who had had the privilege of receiving him as if it had been an angel’s
visit, so profound was the impression made by his childlike humility,
gentleness, and wisdom of speech. |
