Kirk in the Craigs X.
James Dodson
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CHAPTER X.
A LONG VACANCY.
NOTES ON THEOLOGICAL TRAINING.
For some time after Professor McMillan’s death, the congregation took no steps towards filling up the vacancy caused by the loss of him whom they lovingly call “their worthy and eminent pastor.” The reason for delay was an honourable one. From the long illness and extra expenditure incurred, there were some financial obligations which they set about clearing off before incurring any fresh outlay. The managers had many and anxious meetings about this matter, always under the presidency of Mr Peter Jeffrey—that worthy man from his Christian character and his liberality always standing high in the estimation of his brethren.
At length Mr George Robertson was sent on a long journey to Kelso, to a Presbytery meeting held on 16th and 17th December, 1823—a journey which cost the congregation £3—to present a petition for a moderation in a call. This was granted, and the Rev. Hugh Young of Laurieston moderated as requested on 14th January, 1824.
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Mr James Dick of Strabane, Ireland, was the unanimous choice of the people; but Mr Young objected strongly to his name being inserted, it not being known to the brethren that Mr Dick was a licentiate, or that, if he were, he had been regularly transferred to the Church in Scotland. There was stiff argument, and the congregation had decidedly the best of it, for they could allege two cases—those of Mr Bates at Kelso and Mr Anderson at Loanhead, who had been duly elected in precisely similar circumstances. Mr Young evidently wished the people to make choice of Mr Haliday, probationer, but his efforts were quite unavailing. The Craigs folks had their heart set on Mr Dick.
This call caused a good deal of travelling and of irritation. Messrs Jeffrey and Robertson tried to get it given effect to at Loanhead, but there was an appeal to the Synod against the judgment of the majority who were inclined to allow the call to go forward. Then the Synod took it up, and they disallowed the call on the ground specially that it would be an act of injustice to the students in Scotland, if students from Ireland with a shorter theological curriculum should be admitted on equal terms to the pulpits of the Church.
On his return from the Synod, Mr Jeffrey had the longest question put to him with which he had ever been confronted. He was called upon to state his opinion by the following excellent example of a leading question:—“Whether from the behaviour of the majority
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of the ministers in Synod assembled in their treatment of this congregation and Mr Dick, it appeared to him that their conduct resembled that of ministers who protest against and disclaim the corrupt practices of other churches who profess to follow and act upon the principles of the Reformed Church in her purest times, and who declare themselves to be at present in a state of persecution from the civil and ecclesiastical establishments of the country; and whether their conduct appeared to him to be dictated by a desire to promote true piety and the good of this congregation?” Mr Jeffrey’s reply was long, but the substance of it was that their conduct did not so appear to him. He also reported that the Synod had made a new law, declaring that the Licentiates from Ireland must come through the Synod in Scotland before they could be eligible for a Scottish call.
Mr Alexander Pearson was next sent to Airdrie to see if the Presbytery would agree to a transmission of Mr Dick to the roll of Scotch probationers. But the proposal, which was Mr Pearson’s own, found no favour. The petition was rejected because it did not come through the Session. Then the Session was called in, and again Messrs Pearson, Thomson, and Jeffrey were sent to the Synod at Glasgow in May, 1825, to present a petition with the same prayer as contained in that presented to the Presbytery.
The petition was rejected by a large majority of the Synod.
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There was much disappointment at this in the Craigs—a chagrin which finds ample, well-reasoned, and caustic expression in the congregational minute book. If managers’ books had been called for in those days by the Superior Courts, things would have been said about the sturdy independence of the managers of the congregation which would have given them more than local fame.
What, then, was all this stir about? It was an illustration, and a forcible one, of the steadfast principle of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in Scotland that a full and not a partial course of ministerial training was required before any one could be admitted to the ministry among them. In illustration, we may institute a comparison between an old example and a modern instance.
Mr John McMillan, student of Theology, had to attend a Presbytery meeting at Quarrelwood near Dumfries, on June 11th, 1773. Having submitted himself to the Court as a candidate for license, he was appointed a trial discourse on Galatians ii. 21, which was heard at Pentland on 31st November. He was then appointed an exercise and additions on John i. 47-9, which he delivered in the Meeting-house at Sandhills, on 2nd March, 1774, when a Latin discourse, De predestinatione, and a history of the Church, from 1530-1565, were given him. The former of these new trials was heard at Pentland on 13th June, the latter at Ponfeigh on 8th August. Mr McMillan’s popular lecture and sermon—the
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one on Hebrews iii. 5-10, the other on Matthew xxiii. 37-39—were delivered at Sandhills on 16th September, 1774. At the same meeting, he had to read the 19th Psalm in Hebrew, and the Greek Testament ad aperturam libri [at the opening of the book]. Finally at Pentland he got licence, after answering satisfactorily “extemporary questions proposed by ye Modr. and other members,” on 3rd November, 1774.
A student appeared before the Free Presbytery of Stirling on 3rd November, 1874, who delivered an exegesis in Latin—An sint miracula novi Testamenti credibilia? [Whether the miracles of the New Testament are credible?] an exercise and additions on 1st Thessalonians ii. 1-8; a homily on Pantheism; a lecture on Matthew xiii. 24-30 and 36-43; and on Romans vi. 23, a popular sermon—all which were sustained with approbation. He was then examined on Divinity, Chronology and Church History, also on the Hebrew and Greek languages, and acquitted himself to the great satisfaction of the Presbytery.
John Watson, M.A. (Ian Maclaren), was then licensed in name of the Presbytery, by Rev. Charles Wedderburn of Stirling, the Moderator. It is a long cry between 1774 and 1874. Circumstances had much altered, and education had made long strides in the interval of a century. It is not without interest to know authentically that the tests were as severe then as now—only in modern times the prominent littérateur was saved the “exercise and addition” of travelling.
As the trials for license show, even from the earliest times, there was great strictness in dealing with students. Perhaps there is a lesson
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to all presbyterial conveners of students’ committees at the present time. Such care, judiciously exercised, might lead to fewer cases of ministerial inefficiency.
On one occasion, a student was told that his discourse was unsatisfactory, and got another text from which he was instructed to make a better “specimen of lecturing.” In 1783 the Presbytery state regarding a student that he showed “a great want of natural and Christian prudence, together with some things opposite to this, such as an assuming boldness, arrogance, pride, self-conceitedness, and an affectation of singularity.” The gentleman so spoken to said he was grieved but not discouraged. He had expressed at the former meeting of Presbytery—“without being asked”—his abhorrence of the relief scheme. He joined the Relief Church. In 1803, a young brother delivered a trial discourse. The Court say they are of opinion that he had not the abilities necessary for the edification of the Church. They agreed to advise him to give up thoughts of employing himself in preaching the Gospel, “and content himself with the situation Providence had carved out for him.” The student agreed to this.
Professor McMillan had made little of him in the Craigs as a scholar. But he had taught him this lesson—more difficult to learn than heads of theology—how to meet the suggestion of faithfulness with the attitude of humility.
The Synod were sometimes as clear and plain in the expression of their opinions anent the
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fitness of students as the Presbytery. In one case, they recommend the candidate “to drop the view of going forward to the ministry.” The view is dropped accordingly. It was honourable in a high degree to a small church—often short-handed through lack of candidates and resources—that the ministers sought to keep up a high standard of theological learning.
Mr James Dick of Strabane could have done all the exercises required of him and done them well, for he was a distinguished student. He returned to Ireland, and ultimately became Professor Dick of Belfast. His son—formerly minister at Wishaw—is now Professor James Dick, his father’s worthy successor, in the capital of Ulster.
Deeply disappointed as the Craigs folks were at the loss of the future Professor, and still smarting under a sense of what they considered their grievance, they made another attempt to get a minister in 1826. In April of that year Mr Pearson is again on his travels. This time he goes to Airdrie to a Presbytery meeting to request a moderation. He promises £80 of stipend, and £5 at the dispensation of the Lord’s Supper. His request was granted, and on 3rd May, 1826, the congregation made choice of Mr Gavin Rowatt.
There was again disappointment in store for the congregation, for Mr Rowatt was called to Strathmiglo and Whithorn, as well as to Stirling. He went to Whithorn, and ministered there from 1826 to 1832, when he died.