A Busy Life—Parish Gossip_Anecdotes—The Lame Minister—’
A bonnie wee bit of sky’ —The ‘Edinburgh’ Retreat — Pulpit Ministrations —
Louis Cauvin’s Device — Thomson on ‘Moderation ‘—Doctrine and Practice —
Portobello Church—Moderates and Evangelicals—Mrs. Thomson’s Music Lessons—
Stories of John Richardson the Beadle.
THE multifarious round of
occupations into which Thomson’s life was divided naturally enough created
among neighbours and parishioners some little speculation as to how he
managed to get through it all, and many were even uncharitable enough to
insinuate that it was only done at the expense of his ministerial duties.
All this painting, violin playing,
entertaining of company, sketching expeditions, etc., they said, could not
but interfere with these; and some ludicrous and even incredible stories
were current which may be taken for what they are worth. We repeat one or
two of them as specimens of the then current gossip of the district. As we
have already said, Mr. Thomson appears to have faithfully discharged his
duties as a parish minister both in visiting and preaching; and if the
latter function was sometimes delegated to probationers in his absence, he
was, upon the whole, wonderfully regular. Like other ministers he had his
holiday seasons, and these were always fully taken advantage of for
sketching tours.
A rather apocryphal story is told of
one of the probationers who occasionally took his place. He was a lame
man, or rather a man with a wooden leg, who resided in Edinburgh. On the
Sabbath morning referred to it was very stormy when he started from the
City, intending to walk to Duddingston through the King’s Park, past the
base of Samson’s Ribs, and over the ‘Windy Gowl.’ At that time there was
no smooth carriage-way as there is now, and the footpath was rough and
uncertain, meandering among the rocks and broken ground in a very
irregular manner. Being overtaken by the force of the gale, the poor man
stumbled and fell among the rocks in the ‘Windy Gowl,’ and was unfortunate
enough to break his leg—luckily only his wooden one—so as to be quite
unable to proceed further. The last bell had been rung, and there being no
appearance of the expected minister at the kirk, one or two of the elders
set out to meet him, when they discovered him scrambling among the rocks
with his broken stump. They at once carried him to the church and set him
in the pulpit in safety! Some may think that it would be well if ‘lame’
ministers could be as easily removed from the pulpit!
But it was not only hinted that the
minister absented himself for sketching expeditions, he also got the
credit of sometimes working at his easel on Sundays. On one occasion, as
the story goes, the first, the second, and the third bells had rung out.
Thomson was deeply engrossed in a captivating canvas, and the beadle, old
John Richardson, came to the door to remind him that the time was up, and
the congregation waiting. ‘Do ye no ken, sir, that the bells are dune
ringing, an’ the folk are a’ in the kirk ?’ said John; but so intent was
he realising an effect in the picture before him, he called out: ‘Oh,
John! just go and ring the bell for other five minutes till I get in this
bonnie wee bit of sky!’
Again, one day when in the middle of
his sermon a violent thunderstorm of extraordinary grandeur broke over the
church, Thomson, it is said, hurriedly brought the service to a close, ran
to his studio, and at once began to paint the effects as they flashed
before him—the rolling clouds, the vivid lightning, and the lurid light.
After the erection of the octagonal
tower at the Loch-side by the Duddingston Curling Club in 1825, which is
still standing, Mr. Thomson occasionally made the upper story of it his
studio, and a most suitable one it must have been, commanding, as it does,
a lovely prospect of hill and loch. Here he found a safe retreat when he
wished to be free from the bustle of the house or intrusive visitors. But
tittle-tattle had it that he was often to be found there when he was
supposed, or was represented to be, at Edinburgh; and so among some of the
villagers the curling-house came jocularly to be called ‘Edinburgh’!
These and other stories of a similar
kind were likely enough in the circumstances to be circulated, and even
find credence among a rural
population, some of them perhaps not over friendly to what they considered
the hobbies of their minister. A friend to whom they were narrated—the son
of one of Mr. Thomson’s elders—who, when he was a lad, was a good deal
about the manse in those days as a playmate of the minister’s sons,
informed us they were utterly untrue, and angrily asserted with some
emphasis that the person who made such cruel statements ought to be dipped
in the Loch!
In regard to Mr. Thomson’s
pulpit ministrations different views have been expressed. The Rev. Hew
Scott, author of the Fasti Ecciesice Scoticanae, describes him as
‘a sensible, rather than a
popular preacher.’ At a time when long sermons were more common than they
are now, the minister of Duddingston does not appear to have erred on this
score. With a shrewd suspicion of his people’s weakness for short ones, he
generally humoured them accordingly.
From the foresaid friend we learn
that he would send one of his boys to look out a sermon for him on the
Sabbath morning, when a fresh one had not been prepared; and the boys,
having a partiality for short discourses, carefully selected those having
this desirable qualification, a few of which came to be known as
favourites on that account!
One of Mr. Thomson’s elders was
Louis Cauvin, a celebrated French teacher in Edinburgh. He had retired
from active life to spend the evening of his days at Woodlands, near to
Duddingston Mill. Being a man of considerable culture, with a pretty
intimate knowledge of Paris as
it was before the great Revolution, he and the minister came to be on very
intimate terms, and enjoyed many a social hour together; the artistic
temperament of the one and the scholastic culture of the other forming
between them a common bond of friendship.
Cauvin did not like long
sermons, and when he thought the minister had gone beyond reasonable
bounds, he had no hesitation in giving him the hint. Cauvin’s seat was in
the front gallery of the church, facing the pulpit. He wore one of those
large, old-fashioned watches, with heavy chain and seals, commonly worn by
substantial elderly gentlemen in those days, and when the sermon as he
thought was getting a little ‘dreigh,’ he would lean himself forward on
the book-board, take out his watch, and, hanging it over the front of the
gallery, give it a gentle swing by the chain to attract
the preacher’s attention, as much as to
say, ‘You have been long enough, time‘s up.’ The artifice, we are told,
generally had the desired effect!
Of the character of Mr. Thomson’s
preaching we should be inclined to say it was more of the moral, moderate
type, than fervidly evangelical. Doctrine and precept formed a large part
of the preaching of his time, unaccompanied by any stirring appeal to
conscience and heart, and he appears to have been no exception to the
general rule. Unfortunately few of his written discourses have survived
the fate so largely attendant, we suspect, upon this class of literature;
but we have one specimen before us which, in its style no less than its
theme, may be taken as a fair example of both. It was evidently composed
in 1810, and from the various markings upon it had done duty repeatedly
down to 1828, and possibly even later. The text is taken from the Epistle
to the Philippians, iv. 5:
‘Let your moderation be known unto
all men.’ In a plain, sensible way, and without any attempt at dialectic
eloquence, the duty of exercising ‘that quiet and unassuming temper which
prompts to love, conciliation, and peace’ is strongly enjoined; the evils
to society and the danger to our own happiness which follow the pursuit of
an opposite course are clearly pointed out. ‘Stiffly to adhere to our own
fancies and humours, to refuse all compliance on the one hand, and all
forbearance on the other, seems,’ he says, ‘contrary to any real desire
for peace, and therefore must be contrary to Christian moderation.’ To
live peaceably with all men he conceives to be the chief end of Christian
effort, for ‘there will always be men in the world to foment the
differences in it . . . to
search out faults and disturb its quiet; these are the chief instruments
in embittering the happiness of social and domestic life; . . . while the
disgusting passions of hatred, malice,, pride, and arrogance are the great
obstacles to our becoming truly in love with the divine virtue of charity,
which covereth a multitude of faults. . . . By these, men are impelled not
only to refuse all measures of conciliation, but to delight in still
further incensing one another. In order to do justice to the claims of
others we must learn to place no more than a just value on our own. If our
breasts be filled with an overweening conceit of ourselves, of our own
abilities, and our own way; if we think it beneath our dignity to alter or
amend anything concerning ourselves—if we are ashamed to own a fault, even
after we are inwardly sensible of it, then indeed there is little chance
of our acting with uniform fairness and candour, and moderation. This
indeed we can scarcely hope to do till we have truly subjected all selfish
passions and learned to take a just view of our own private ends, and have
learned such a command over ourselves as that we can oblige these private
views at any time to yield to more weighty and generous considerations.
This is surely no romantic, no unattainable height of human virtue. Like
other virtues it has its various objects, and if there is any virtue which
ensures its own reward, even in this world, and which not only imparts a
delightful sense of inward approbation, but infallibly is attended with
the admiration of our fellow-creatures, it is the virtue of candour and
moderation.’
Modern divines would, we fear, look
askance at this way of representing gospel truth, and doubt its power to
mould the life of their hearers to its precepts.
But if Thomson’s power as a preacher
was not of the first order, be had at all events the happy reputation of
exercising that charity which covereth a multitude of sins. ‘Good words,’
it is said, ‘are worth much,’ but good deeds are a splendid supplement. He
is a better preacher who can follow up the sermon by skilful toil for the
glory of God and the good of his people. In this respect Thomson’s
practice outran his profession. Profoundly impressed with the importance
of religion, he was tolerant of dogmas. His advice—and it was uniformly
sound and judicious—was ever at the service of his parishioners, while his
sympathy flowed out in more substantial aid when that was required. The
price of many a picture found its way in the shape of bottles of wine and
other comforts into the cottages of the sick and infirm, while seldom or
never was a case of real distress turned from his door unaided.
In this connection we have a
characteristic illustration in the case of the old woman—Betty Steele, a
poor old body in the village—who came to the manse one day in sore
distress over some grievous loss that had befallen her. After pouring out
the torrent of her trouble into the patient ears of her minister, she
wound up with the pious request, ‘Eh, Mr. Thamson, would ye no pit up a
bit prayer for me?’ The minister, who evidently diagnosed the case as
calling for more practical assistance than ‘a bit prayer,’ dived into the
recesses of his breeches pocket for any stray coins that might happen to
be there; and slipping five shillings into the old woman’s hand, he
whispered into her ear, ‘Tak’ that, Betty, my good woman; it ‘s likely to
do you more good than any prayers I ‘m able to make!
Of the minister and the manse,
indeed, the words of Goldsmith present us with a not inapt picture of the
open-handed liberality which did not look too closely into every
applicant’s worthiness:
‘His house was known to all
the vagrant train,
He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain;
Careless their merits, or
their faults to scan,
His pity gave, ere charity began.’
Not often do we find Mr. Thomson’s
name identified either in Presbytery or General Assembly with
ecclesiastical matters. Polemical discussion had for him no attractions.
Even the agitation on the question of non-intrusion, important as it was,
which during the last ten years of his life stirred the whole country, did
not much affect him. He attended to his pastoral duties, preached the
gospel to his people, and visited the sick and dying, filling up what
spare time he had with his brush, but keeping himself clear as far as he
could of church courts and public agitation.
When duty called, however, he did
not shrink from taking his fair share of ecclesiastical business and
responsibility. We find, for instance, that in February 1818 he took a
very active and prominent part in assisting the inhabitants of Portobello
in getting the sanction of the Edinburgh Presbytery to the erection of
their chapel—built ten years previous—into a ‘Chapel of Ease,’ with an
ordained minister. Hitherto it was only a chapel with a ‘preacher,’ under
the authority of the Kirk Session of Duddingston. But the people of
Portobello now desired to have a fully ordained pastor with a Kirk Session
of their own, and petitioned the General Assembly accordingly. The matter
had been up before the superior court of the Church in 1817, by whom it
was referred to the local Presbytery. Mr. Thomson entered very heartily
into the movement, though its object was to cut off a large portion of his
parish from his supervision and control. He not only presented the
petition of the people of Portobello, but gave his most hearty consent and
support to the movement. It was granted, and shortly afterwards the
‘preacher,’ Mr. John Glen, was formally set apart by the Presbytery as the
first fully ordained minister of the town.
For a considerable time parochial
affairs were managed for the two congregations by the Kirk Session of
Duddingston, to which the Portobello congregation sent three
representatives; but in 1834, by the passing of the Chapels of Ease Act by
the General Assembly, the Portobello chapel was raised to the
ecclesiastical status of a parish church, quoa4 sacra. By this
arrangement Mr. Thomson and his Session were relieved of a considerable
amount of supervision in regard to discipline, management of churchyard,
and providing for the poor, which did not strictly pertain to Duddingston
congregation. The Church of Scotland in the first part of the century was
divided into two distinct and sharply defined sections. Holding
practically the same doctrines so far as outward profession was concerned,
and submitting to the same form of Church government, the Moderates and
the Evangelicals were yet diametrically opposed in their methods and aims.
The latter represented the zeal, the life, the aggressive spirit of
religion, in seeking to send the gospel to the poor at home, as well as to
the heathen abroad. The former were supposed to be indifferent as to
these, if not practically hostile; looking upon foreign missions as
‘romantic and visionary,’ and ‘highly dangerous to society.’ Culture and
the practice of letters they considered of more importance; and among the
Moderate clergy of that period there were many notable men, distinguished
for their culture, and as leaders in philosophy and science. Nor did their
conservatism in regard to ecclesiastical matters prevent many of that
party being thoroughly liberal in regard to political matters. It was a
class, however, which was rapidly decreasing in numbers and influence, and
of John Thomson it has been said, ‘he was the last of that class of Scotch
clergymen to which Robertson and Playfair belonged—Liberals in secular and
Moderates in ecclesiastical politics.’ He was to Art what they in the
church were to literature and science: the ripe scholar, the poetical
artist, the man of the world, and yet the clergyman too. Few men of his
time enjoyed a larger share of the society and friendship of men of
kindred genius; and whether they were Whigs or Tories, Moderates or
Evangelicals, all were alike recognised by him as friends and brethren.
Nor must the influence of Mrs.
Thomson in this connection be overlooked. As a minister’s wife she
excelled. We have seen how keenly she interested herself in the
cultivation of the service of praise; and as the result of her exertions,
few parish churches could boast of this part of the service being so well
conducted as Duddingston in the first part of the century. But in other
respects she was equally helpful, visiting the sick, relieving distress,
and interesting herself and the people in Christian work. Among the young
she was a special favourite; every Sabbath morning at 8.30 she had a
Sabbath-school in the manse, which was well attended by the children of
the village. Who can sufficiently estimate the value of such work? ‘Next
to the work of the Christian ministry,’ it has well been said, ‘comes the
work done by ministers’ wives.’ We would even go a step further, and say
that the peace and prosperity of a congregation depend at least as much
upon the mistress of the manse as on its minister.
The duties of that important office,
the parish beadle, were in Thomson’s day performed, no doubt with the
utmost satisfaction to himself, by an old man named John Richardson. John,
like many of his class, was a character in his way, not without an element
of humour in his composition. His duties as ‘minister’s man’ brought him
almost daily about the manse, where he was treated as a privileged friend
rather than as a servant. He had quite a literary taste, and often when he
had a little spare time, or as a reward for any extra exertion, his master
would send him for perusal his copy of Shakespeare, an author of whom he
was fond to enthusiasm. The circumstance passed with him into a proverb,
so that on the occurrence of any piece of good fortune, or faring somewhat
better than usual in the kitchen, he would say, with a smack of
satisfaction in his voice, ‘Ay, ay! it ‘s no’ every day we get Shakespeare
to read!’
In the way of criticism John could
be unconsciously true, if somewhat severe, even when most desirous to be
complimentary. On one occasion Mr. Thomson had to be from home on the
Sabbath day, and had engaged a young country minister to occupy the pulpit
in his absence, of whose capabilities as a preacher he was not very
confident. On his return he interrogated John as to how the young divine
had got on. ‘Deed, sir,’ said the beadle, ‘just middlin’; it was guid
coorse country wark, but there‘s naebody jumbles the judgment and confuses
the sense sae wee! as yersel.’
His attachment to the minister and
his family was unbounded, and the boys especially were a great source of
solicitude to the worthy man. He was quite a favourite with them, and many
sly pranks were played off upon him. When Edward and Henry (Thomson’s two
youngest sons) left home to go abroad, the old man formulated in his
family devotions a special prayer on their behalf that ‘the Lord would
watch over Master Edward and Master Henry when they were on the stormy
deep, and bring them in safety to their destined haven’; but, once
introduced into his prayers, it seemed difficult to give up his special
petition, and he repeated it so often that it became stereotyped; and so,
long after the lads had safely arrived in Australia, honest John still
went on praying that Edward and Henry might be brought in safety to their
destined haven!
He was very fond of a dram, and was
a frequent and generally a welcome guest at one or other of the several
public-houses which were then in Duddingston, where his manse gossip
suffered nothing in the telling. His being so much in the pulpit had no
doubt something to do with his frequent use—not always reverently, it is
to be feared—of Scripture phrases, which he would apply in rather a
comical style. One day he was busy putting up a new ‘stob,’ or post, for a
gate. The minister happened to come along, and seeing him at work said,
‘Well, John, you ‘re putting in a new stob, are ye? Will that one last
long this time?’ ‘Ay will ‘t, there‘s nae fear o’ this yin,’ said John,
‘it'll last till the judgment day in the
afternoon!’ |