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THE Church of Scotland
has not had in our day a minister who could better be regarded as a type
of the highest rank of the Presbyterian divine and pastor, like those of
former days, than Dr. Robert Jamieson. A scholar, a theologian, an
author whose books command the attention of the learned, and
nevertheless are full of instruction and attraction for the ordinary
reader, a citizen always ready to maintain and promote the best
interests of the commonwealth, and throughout his long life a minister
who never flagged in doing the hard daily work of the Scottish
ministry—he was one of whom we were all proud. Many of our readers know
that, as he had been a founder and constant supporter of the Scottish
Christian Herald fifty years ago, he was one of the warmest friends of
this Magazine. A few notes of the chief incidents in his career will be
welcomed. He was born in Edinburgh, in 1802, of pious parents, by whom
he was taught the Scriptures from his earliest days. Educated at the
High School of his native city, at first—like his friend Dr. Thomas
M‘Crie the younger — destined for the Original Secession Church, he was
licensed as a preacher in the Church of Scotland in 1827. He was
ordained minister of Westruther in 1830; translated to Currie in 1837,
and to Glasgow in 1844. He was Moderator of the General Assembly in
1872, and he died October 26th, 1880. Many a time during his life he
showed the same unselfish spirit as when he left the scholarly leisure
of Currie for the harassing work of a city charge with a smaller income.
He went because he was persuaded that there was greater need of him in
Glasgow; and the only survivor of those who were his colleagues in those
days—Dr. Smith of Cathcart—has testified how his arrival encouraged and
strengthened the Presbytery, “sadly crippled” by the disasters of 1843.
His church offered him a sphere which was in many respects congenial.
Not only did he gather round him some of the best of the merchants of
Glasgow, but when the old College Chapel was closed and sittings were
taken for the professors and students in St. Paul’s, he had an academic
audience which was much to his liking. For a quarter of a century he
conducted a class of students every Sunday after the afternoon service,
reading the Greek Testament with them, and teaching them also Biblical
Antiquities and Christian Evidences. When the stately pile was reared on
Gilmore-hill, and the quaint quadrangles of the old College were
abandoned to the steam - engine and its myrmidons, a graceful compliment
was paid to him who had been so long the pastor of the College, by his
election to be Chancellor’s Assessor in the University Court. When Dr.
Jamieson, on the occasion of his Jubilee, was looking back over his
ministry, he stated that it was his Sunday school, conducted under his
own superintendence by enthusiastic young teachers, which drew “600 or
700 children, excavated from the wynds and hovels” of his parish, that
eventually filled his church with “a congregation that was eminently of
a family character, and largely contributed to the “reaction in favour
of the Church of Scotland, which began in the city a few years after
1843.” For he was not a mere scholar and divine, working in regions
remote from the stir and struggle of the life of men: his parish was
always the centre of all his thought and study. It was no little thing
for so truthful and modest a man to say, when he looked back on a
ministry of fifty years, “I have indeed written and published a good
deal more perhaps, in respect of quantity, than most of my
contemporaries, for I began in the second year of my ministry, and have
been more or less engaged with the press ever since; hut I wish
particularly to add that I have never written or published a single line
but in direct accordance with professional studies. However much I was
devoted to those Biblical inquiries, I never allowed them to encroach on
the functions of the ministry or on the duty I owed to the public and
charitable institutions of Glasgow.” Thus it was that in the hospitals
and charitable trusts of the great city he was an efficient director
during all the years of his ministry; and even in advanced years a
vigorous member of the school board; to the last he responded readily
and effectively when called to plead the cause of any enterprise of
charity; while from the time he published, at Westruther, his well-known
Eastern Manners and Customs, illustrative of Scripture, to the date of
his Baird Lectures on Inspiration, 1874, he was serving the Church
through the press as well as in the pulpit. His Critical Commentary on
the Old Testament, in which he was latterly associated with Mr. Fausset
and Dr. David Brown, and the Practical Commentary by him and the Rev. E.
H. Bickersteth, are standard works. The latter, when it was issued, had
a circulation of 70,000 copies monthly. Though he was naturally averse
from public discussion, he never shrank from it when he felt that he was
called, but he was so devoid of personal animosity as to carry with him
the respect of opponents as well as of friends. Thus it was that in the
memorable discussion on the Sabbath, originated by Dr. Norman Macleod in
1865, he was the leader of the Presbytery on the old lines of the
Scottish Church, and his speech was, like himself, learned, firm, and
courteous. A few years later, when Dr. Macleod was about to set out to
visit the mission stations in India, Dr. Jamieson, at Dr. Macleod’s
request, began the impressive services at the prayer-meeting in the
Barony Church. His last public work was again to lead his Presbytexy in
the discussion of “Scotch Sermons.” The effort was too much for him.
After the first day of the debate he was seised with what proved to be
his last illness; and though, with characteristic conscientiousness, he
wrote a speech as his “reply,” to close the debate, he was unable to
deliver it. It was read in his absence, and after a few days of
feebleness rather than of pain, he passed away from his labours to his
rest. His memory will long be cherished for his public services and the
attractive consistency of his tender-hearted, humble-minded, diligent
life. “He turned from evil, and did good; he sought peace, and pursued
it.”
A. H. Charteris. |
