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Thomas Guthrie, the subject of the following
brief Memoir, was born in the town of Brechin, Forfarshire, on the 12th day
of July, 1803. At one time, Brechin was the site of an Episcopal see, and
the county town of Forfar. It seems, however, to have made comparatively
little progress during the first years of the present century, as the
population, which was 5166 in 1801, had only increased to 6508 in 1831. and
to 7933 at the last census. Brechin is beautifully situated on the left bank
of the Esk, at a distance of eight miles from the point where that river
joins the sea at Montrose. In the Esk there is abundance of fine trout, the
existence and accessibility of which doubtless kindled and stimulated young
Guthrie's love of piscatorial pursuits, a love which did not desert him in
his maturer years. At one time Brechin was completely walled round; and
until very recently some relics of the gates were still to be seen. Perhaps
the most noteworthy ancient edifice- in the town is the Cathedral Church of
St Ninian's, supposed to have been founded by I>avid I., and a portion of
which forms the parish church where the Guthrie family usually worshipped.
It is a stately Gothic fabric, 166 feet long, and 61 broad, the roof being
supported by two rows of pillars and arches. The eastern end was sadly
devastated at the Reformation, but the building, in fact, appears never to
have been completed. "The present parish church occupies the west end of the
Cathedral. At the north-west corner is a square tower, with a handsome spire
128 feet high. At the south-west corner is one of those round towers,
probably of Pictish origin, of which this and another at Abernethy are all
the specimens that remain in Scotland. The tower of Brechin is a circular
column of great beauty and elegance, 80 feet high, with a kind of spire or
roof rising 23 feet more, making the whole height 103 feet, while the
diameter over the wall at the base is only 16 feet." The entrance to this
tower is about feet from, the ground, and on the stones forming it are
rudely carved several grim figures well fitted to excite the imagination of
youth and the interest of the antiquary. The tower itself seems to have
suffered little injury from the lapse of years, but it is off the
plumb-line, and vibrates in a high wind. In the immediate locality of
Brechin there are many places of interest, not the least important being
Brechin Castle, the seat of Lord Panmure, which is built on a perpendicular
rock, overhanging the south Esk, half a mile south of tho town. To this
noble edifice and its grounds young Guthrie had easy access, owing to the
intimacy existing between his family and Lord Panmure.
It is worthy of note that Maitland, author of
the Histories of Loudon and Edinburgh; Dr Gillies, the historian of Greece;
Dr Tytler, the translator of Callimachus; and his brother James Tytler, who
had so large a share in compiling the "Encyclopaedia Britanica." and other
standard works, were all natives of the parish of Brechin. But there are
others, hearing the name of the subject of our Memoir, who have shed upon
the old burgh the lustre of their varied achievements. There was William
Guthrie, a political, historical, and miscellaneous writer, who was born in
Brechin, where his father was Episcopal minister in 1708. More, than a
century previous we find mention of another William Guthrie, born near
Brechin in 1620. This was the author of the "Christian's Great Interest." He
appears from "The Scots Worthies," where he has not unworthily found a
place, to have been distinguished for his sincere piety and his consistent
adherence to nonconforming principles. Ami now we come to James Guthrie,
"the noblest Roman of them all.'' He was the son of the Laird of Guthrie,
and commenced his ministerial career in Lauder, from which place he was
translated to Stirling in 1619. It is related of this fearless, consistent,
and truly godly man, that when he cam3 to Edinburgh to sign the " Solemn
League and Covenant," the. first person he met on entering the West Bow was
the public executioner. This singular circumstance he could not help
regarding as a premonition that he would one day suffer by the hands of this
functionary, on account of the document he had that day come to subscribe.
His foreboding was realised, and none of the Covenanters met death with more
firmness, or with greater serenity of mind. With each and all of these
distinguished men, Thomas Guthrie claimed a relationship more or less
remote. They were all cadets of the Guthries of Guthrie, one of the oldest
families in Forfarshire. He was early acquainted with the story of their
lives, and especially with that of James Guthrie, the covenanting hero, who
had "resisted unto blood, striving against sin." Thus Brechin and its
immediate neighbourhood, with its Pictish tower and curious sculptures, its
ancient battlefields and Danish camp, its flowing stream and wooded heights,
and its illustrious roll of men renowned in literary and ecclesiastical
story, furnished much well fitted to excite intellectual activity, feed the
youthful imagination, develop the latent love of natural beauty, fill the
soul with noble resolve for highest service in the cause of humanity and
God, and so be the becoming birthplace of Thomas Guthrie.
The father of Thomas Guthrie was a banker, and
one of the leading merchants in Brechin. For a number of years he occupied
the prominent position of chief magistrate, and in that capacity acquired on
amount of respect and popularity that stood his family in good stead. But in
a town containing little more than 5000 inhabitants there was not much scope
for mercantile enterprise, nor much hope of amassing wealth. To maintain
appearances, and provide for the requirements of his numerous family, the
elder Guthrie, like many others in rural districts, added to the other
ramifications of his business that of a grocer. Probably at one period of
his career Thomas was twitted about this fact. At all events, it was a
circumstance to which lie not unfrequently referred, and always, be it said,
with manly and proper feeling. Speaking at an early closing meeting in
Edinburgh, he said : "Shopkeepers are one of the most important classes of
the community. With few exceptions, the houses in Edinburgh stand upon
shops; and if the foundation go to pieces, where will the superstructure be?
Did not Napoleon Bonaparte call us a nation of shopkeepers, and did not this
nation of shopkeepers lick Napoleon Bonaparte and all Europe to boot! I say;
then, up with the shopkeepers! Close your shops in good time, and let us
have a right race of shopkeepers, morally, physically, intellectually, and
religiously. Although the brains birth, birthplace, and parentage of our
shopkeepers are not yet what they should be, and what they will be, I will
say for them that they make the best, very best, the most virtuous, honest,
and religious part of the community. They are not what you may call a
learned people, but they are very clever, very sharp; and 1 will say for
Edinburgh, that one or two of our most sagacious men are shopkeepers, whose
intelligence I'll stake any day you like against 'tho tottle of the whole'
of the advocates and all other men in the city. I say, let no man despise
shopkeepers. They are the backbone of our country, and if the backbone is
not right, depend upon it, the whole body is wrong. With regard to the
grocers, I have a special interest in them. My father was a grocer, a
merchant engaged in various branches of business. He had a shop all his
days; and do you think I am ashamed of that? I think God I had such a
father, a man who maintained a high character in the community, and, I
repeat, God forbid that I should be ashamed of such a man! More than that, I
have two sons in the trade— I might have sent these sons to India, or used
any influence I had to get them into Government offices. Some of my genteel
friends held up their hands in astonishment that I should have made my sons
grocers. But I'll tell you why I made them grocers, and did not send them to
India. I wanted my sons to stand upon their own feet independently of any
man's patronage ; and if any man wants a good advice from me as to how he
would dispose of his sons, I recommend him to do the same. I felt that if I
asked favours for my own family, I should soon be required to ask favours
for other people; and if I once began, I saw I would soon become a perfect
Solicitor-General. 1 felt that by doing so I would soon lose any influence I
possessed with great men, whose acquaintance I never sought, though they
sought mine and that, in so far as I could make, a good use of that
influence! I was bound to use it for the religious, educational, and
benevolent interests of the people. I have reserved my influence for those;
and so far as asking favours for myself or others of my family, these hands
are, clean."
Thomas Guthrie's mother was in all respects a
most superior woman. Both by natural endowments and by education, she was
far a-head of the average lady of her time. She was a "managing" woman, and
inculcated economy; she was a prudent woman, and kept her own counsel; and,
above all, she was a good Christian and an inflexible Seceder. Her influence
with her family accompanied and flowed from this one fact more than any
other. Iler strong love for Secession was the result of still stronger
religious convictions. She was no stern bigot either; but practised and
enforced toleration where it was not incompatible with orthodoxy and
religious freedom. At that time of day the Seceders were a comparatively
humble and obscure body. The Church of Scotland was dominant anil all
powerful. But the acorn planted by the Erskines was slowly yet surely
assuming the proportions of the deep-rooted and wide-spreading oak. Mrs
Guthrie was a woman who thought for herself, and taught her family to do
likewise. She was a staunch and unflinching friend of nonintrusion and
anti-patronage. She held strong views as to the necessity of reforming the
Established Church, which she regarded as an Augean stable requiring the
services of some ecclesiastical Hercules. The example of a strong-minded
mother is all potent in a family, especially when that sometimes equivocal
attribute is accompanied, as it was in this case, with perfect Christian
consistency. Guthrie was early taught to cherish a warm feeling towards the.
Seceders, and this continued to be a distinguishing trait of his character
all through life. Speaking on behalf of the proposed union of the churches,
he says:—
"My regard for the Seceders, if I may be allowed
to allude to personal matters, is not a causeless prejudice. It is founded
on a better knowledge of the Seceders than perhaps many in this house have.
One of my parents—a sainted mother, and how she would have rejoiced to see
this day! — was a Seceder, and other two members of my family felt
themselves constrained, by the thrusting in of an unpopular minister into
the collegiate charge of Brechin, to leave the parish church; and in
consequence of the accommodation in the parish church being deficient when
we were young, we were all Seceders. We were sent to the Secession Church.
Until I came to the college, I was in the regular habit of sitting in the
Burgher Church; and, until I became a preacher, I generally worshipped, on
the Sabbath evening, in the Burgher Church of Brechin. I do not think I lost
anything by that. With my mother's milk 1 drank in an abhorrence of
patronage; and it was at her knees, sir, that I first learned to pray, that
I 1 earned to form a reverence for the Bible as the inspired word of God,
that I learned to hold the sanctity of the Sabbath, that I learned the
peculiarities of the Scottish religion, that I learned my regard for the
principles of civil and religious liberty which have made me hate
oppression, and, whether it be a pope, or a prelate, or a patron, or an
ecclesiastical demagogue, resist the oppressor. I have seen them outside in,
and inside out; know more of that body than a very large number of those
here, and the sound of Seceder, sir, sounds like music in my ear, and is
dear to my heart. I did not say they were perfect. I do not know anybody
perfect except our friend, indicating Dr Gibson, who has to confess nothing
at all. With their anti-Burghers and Burghers distinction, their Lifters
arid anti-Lifters, and with their aversion in the olden time - though they
have changed wonderfully of late, and let no man ever say that he will not
change—with their aversion to paraphrases and hymns, to gowns and bands, to
crosses on the outside of the church, or any ornament whatever within, there
is no denying it, my friends were a little narrow. There are worse things,
however, in the world than being narrow. The way of life is narrow. It is
said that my friends, the Seceders, were narrow minded and gnarled. They
were gnarled. They were a gnarled oak, sound to the core, solid in the
grain, and the very timber, before all others, out of which men like to
build ships in which to fight battles, or ride out the storm.
"I knew the old Seceders well. Perhaps we may
find that there is not so much difference between them and us as there used
to ba. This may be, not because the old Seceders have come down to us, but
because we have risen up to them. They have now no exclusive right to the
honour of having their n3,me made a reproach because of their piety. I
remember the day when it was so—the time when the man who would not sware or
debauch himself, who maintained family worship, would talk to another about
his soul, and rebuke his fault, was sneered at as a Seceder. Dr Burns of
Kilsyth used to tell how, when travelling in a stage coach north of
Aberdeen, he encountered a farmer, who, it turned out, was on the way to see
his minister about baptism. Dr Burns seized the opportunity of putting a
good word into the man's ear; speaking to him about the importance of the
ordinance. Whereupon the other looked at him astonished, and said, 'Ye'll be
a Sinceder man?' and when Dr Burns repudiated the connexion, telling him
that he was mistaken, and that so far from being a Seoader, he was a
minister of the Established Church, the man, more astonished still,
exclaimed, 'If ye'r no a Seceder, then ye'll be frae the south,' adding, 'We
dinna trouble oursels much about these things here; the fact is, if the
lairds are guid to us, and dinna fash oursels about the ministers.' I will
give an example from my own experience. I was returning from the General
Assembly to my own parish of Arbirlot, when, between Dundee and that place,
a man mounted the coach who was pretty drunk lie had no sooner seated
himself than he began swearing at a shocking rate; and while 1 was thinking
how I could close the blasphemer's mouth, and whether such an attempt might
not be like casting pearls before swine, his neighbour on the other side
turned round, and solemnly and affectionately rebuked him; whereupon, with
eyes rolling in his head, and speech thick in his mouth, and a fiendish
sneer linking in his cheeks, he looked round, and said, 'Ye'll doubtless be
a Seceder.' In this case the drunken man uttered a truth—the gentleman was a
Secession minister. I tell you, my friends, who are sitting with us in this
house, that the day has gone by for such remarks, and that Seceders, as I am
happy to think, have no longer the exclusive right to be reproached for
godliness. This should make a union all the more hearty and practicable. The
Seceders have not sunk, but we have risen. The descendants of those good old
Seceders, so far as I know, have not forfeited their title to be considered
worthy of their ancestry."
But there were other directions in which the
superior mind and intelligence of Mrs Guthrie made themselves manifest. She
was an ardent politician. At the time of which we write, Brechin joined with
Aberdeen, Arbroath, Montrose, and Bervie, in sending a member to Parliament,
and we have heard from one who knows the circumstances well, that Mrs
Guthrie's influence had a great deal to do in controlling the election. Mr
Joseph Hume was her favourite candidate; she approved and admired his
economics; she sounded his praises far and wide, and at the election, which
was marked by an unprecedented excitement, she fought his battle so well,
that, as far as Brechin was concerned, his opponent (a Mr Mitchell) was
nowhere. The mutual sympathies of Lord Panmure and Mrs Guthrie in favour of
the great political economist led to a somewhat close intimacy between the
two families, and this friendship was helpful in various ways to the subject
of our Memoir.
We have given those extracts and dwelt thus long
and minutely upon the religious tendencies and political sympathies of Mrs
Guthrie, because it was doubtless largely due to her teaching and example
that Dr Guthrie exhibited in after life, as the most distinguishing feature
of his character, a "charity as boundless as the sea," and a love for
humanity as deep. |
