J. Stephen Jeans

“ Those who believe in the transmission of hereditary qualities and predilections from generation to generation will find a rare practical illustration of their theory in the Rev. Norman Macleod, who is known and recognised as par excellence Her Majesty's Chaplain for Scotland. With as unfailing certainty as if they had been regulated by the laws of primogeniture and entail, this estimable clergyman has inherited the gifts and graces of his esteemed father. Nay more, he has even fallen heir to whatever honours and emoluments of value accrued to the latter during his long and useful career. ”

“ The full deep voice, so beautifully expressive, already taxed to its utmost extent, breaks into something which is almost a shriek; the gesticulation becomes wild; the preacher, who has hitherto held himself to some degree in check, seems to abandon himself to the full tide of his emotion; you feel that not even his eloquent lips can do justice to the rush of thought and feeling within. Two or three minutes in this impassioned strain and the sermon is done." [Pg 120]
In 1862, Dr. Caird was appointed Professor of Divinity in the University of Glasgow. ”

“ SIR JAMES CAMPBELL.
Glasgow cannot lay claim to a hereditary aristocracy. She has, however, what is infinitely better for the purposes of commercial, political, and social progress—an aristocracy of energy, talent, and moral worth. There are very few of her merchants and manufacturers who have not been the architects of their own fortune. The pioneers of her industrial prosperity do not build their aspirations and hopes upon a few broad acres, or a pedigree stretching backwards to the time of William the Conqueror. ”

“ Certainly, the decadence of the one has not followed the development of the other. Learning and commerce flourish hand in hand, without the slightest trace of incompatibility. No less an authority than Sir Robert Peel declared, on the occasion of his installation as Lord Rector of the University in 1837, "I do not consider it an exaggerated compliment when I say that I doubt whether, of all cities existing on the face of the earth, there be any one so remarkable for the combination of commercial and active industry, with services rendered to science and literature, as Glasgow." ”

“ Our merchant princes, too, subscribe most liberally to every movement projected for the amelioration of the moral, social, or religious condition of the lapsed masses. The story of our lives from year to year is one that contains many bright spots in which the recording angel must take pleasure, although it is also darkened by not a few stains so black, foul, and ghastly, that we are led to despair of ever attaining the ends for which the Church and the State are existent—for which laws and religion are inculcated and enforced. ”

“ James Baird of Cambusdoon, who, along with his brothers who have predeceased him, has set a noble example in regard to both the acquisition and the distribution of wealth. Few men have been so fortunate in laying up treasure on earth; few have been so zealous of those good works which realise treasure on the other side of Time. For nearly half a century the name of Baird has been a household word in the West of Scotland. Ranking as they have done for many years as the largest employers of labour in Scotland, they must ever continue to occupy a foremost place in our commercial annals. ”

“ They are not polluted with the vapours that are evolved from industrial life. No sounds of the ponderous hammer, or screeching "buzzer," are to be heard within the range of their pellucid course. They are consecrated to more lofty, if not to more useful purposes. But with the Clyde the case is different. It is almost a puzzle to say whether Glasgow excels more as the seat of a famous University or as the centre of a hundred busy, important, and prosperous industries. ”

“ One who had taught himself to write by copyright the letters of a printed book as he lay watching his flock on the hill side, and whose vivacious imagination, as his own brother informs us, disqualified him from study or research, was not likely while alive to make many close friends in the exclusive and polished circles which formed the élite of Edinburgh. But by Bell and a few others, who saw the diamond glittering in the rough casket, Hogg was duly appreciated. To the Literary Journal he was a constant contributor both of prose and verse, and he took a warm interest in its success. ”

“ Nor can we forget that the sad event which made way for the return of a stranger was the sudden death of Captain Spiers of Elderslie—one who was just beginning to be appreciated by the general public, as they saw the gradual development of qualities which were solid rather than brilliant, and in whom were united manliness and modesty in a degree which is rarely to be seen, and which now gives more than a touch of pathos to his memory. ”

“ Never having been directly engaged in commercial pursuits, Professor Rankine could not earn the credit of building those leviathans that have directly contributed to our commercial prosperity; but in another, and not less essential way, he has assisted to build up and consolidate our industrial supremacy, and his numerous writings and discoveries in the science of mechanics will ever cause him to be regarded as a pioneer, not less than Henry Bell or Robert Napier, of a trade that has proved a source of untold wealth to the West of Scotland. ”

“ The commercial annals of the West of Scotland are full of interest. They illustrate a prosperity that is almost without parallel. Macaulay's New Zealander is not likely to plant his foot on Glasgow Bridge for many generations to come, or if he does he will witness a scene totally unlike that for which the historian had prepared him. In all our staple industries we are advancing with gigantic strides. Shipping and shipbuilding are especially conspicuous for their steady and rapid development. As a shipping port Glasgow stands second to none in the United Kingdom, Liverpool alone excepted. ”

“ I have much respect for the voluntary system of education, but I feel that it does not reach all the children of a large city such as Glasgow, and that therefore a national system of education is required. I would also support the establishment of schools for the teaching of children, because I believe that he who teaches should first be taught himself. ”

“ A man of rare gifts, and one of whose happiest literary productions it may safely be predicated that they will live in the literature of his country, he has now for upwards of thirty years relinquished the pursuit of belles lettres, thereby sacrificing the world-wide fame as an author to which, in the early part of his career, he seemed likely to attain. But if he has failed to achieve a niche in the Temple of Fame, he has at least secured a permanent place in the respect of the legal profession, and in the esteem of his fellow-citizens. ”

“ He does not draw the multitude about him. He is no Boanerges of the Temple; but he is a giant as regards a firm grasp of doctrinal truth. He never evolves new shapes or fantastic theories, "won from the vague and formless infinite;" but he "proves all things," and "holds fast that which is good." If he is not an essentially popular preacher—and this is a merit which even his most partial admirers would scarcely venture to claim for him—he is edifying and didactic, and few ministers are better qualified to build up and consolidate a church. ”

“ Napier, prior to his complete retirement into private life, had no time to devote to municipal or imperial politics. He was, however, even while most engrossed with his own affairs, an indefatigable promoter and supporter of all movements tending to the well-being of the city. In the local institutions of engineers and shipbuilders he has always taken a peculiar interest, and his sympathy and co-operation were never invoked for a deserving object in vain. ”

“ When we remember that Sir John was no less able as a teacher than as an author, and that his knowledge of engineering was not bounded by mere theory alone, we get a clue to the eminently practical turn of mind which characterised his illustrious pupil. ”

“ Truly, those who have had the management of this gigantic business are entitled to be regarded as the pioneers of a high standard of progress, the highest standard, indeed, that has yet been attained, or is possible of attainment, in the direction of one of the greatest ends of civilisation—that of making the navigation of the ocean compatible with perfect safety to human life. ”

“ Dalglish is about the ordinary height. He has a genial and pleasant countenance, to which a long white beard imparts somewhat of a patriarchal aspect; and the merry twinkle of his keen, bright eye affords a capital index to his real character. His whole demeanour is that of a man in whom confidence may be reposed without fear of rebuff, and no man in the House could be more readily accessible to his constituents. Mr. Dalglish is considered to have as good a technical knowledge of the House of Commons' business as any private member in it. ”

“ A well-known author has said that "whatever withdraws us from the power of the Senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominant over the present, advances us in the dignity of human beings." So must the quondam editor of the Literary Journal think when he recalls the reminiscences of those bygone days—days that were spent in edifying and agreeable association with men and women whose names are inscribed on the roll of Scotland's illustrious sons and daughters. ”

“ Possessing the power that belongs to wealth, they have not been unmindful of its accompanying responsibilities and duties. In the promotion of education, in the support of Church and missionary objects, in aiding the amelioration of their less fortunate fellow-creatures, and in the dispensation of that charity which covers a multitude of sins they have made their vast wealth subordinate to the service of their day and generation—the humble but yet potent means to the most beneficent ends. ”

“ These are the words of one who has evidently "read, marked, learned, and inwardly digested" the whole subject of education, and is prepared, at whatever sacrifice or cost, to stand up for a system of instruction that shall embrace preparation not only for the duties and exigencies of this life but also for that which is to come. ”

“ Born in humble circumstances, he "burst his birth's invidious bar," and elevated himself to the proud position of the first magistrate of that city "whose merchants are princes and whose traffickers are the honourable of the earth." During his three years tenure of the civic chair, Mr. Robert Dalglish, sen., approved himself a very useful and excellent citizen, and his attention to municipal affairs was most unremitting and diligent, while at the same time he was laying the foundations of that splendid business to which his son, the subject of the present sketch, ultimately succeeded. ”

“ In a sermon which he preached before the Senate, at the opening of the new University Chapel, on the 8th of January last, he set himself to show that the mere holding of the Catholic faith, in the sense and form of the creed, cannot be the essence of religion—first, because the great mass of mankind are incapable of doing justice to the definitions and evidences of the creeds; yet need religion, and are, in point of fact, pious in spite of their want of theological accomplishments ”

“ The Hamiltons, the brothers Burns, Jeffrey, Millar, Thomson, M'Kenzie, Lawrie, M'Grigor, Graham, Hunter, and Pagan were men all who would have shone with a bright lustre in any sphere, and when we instance Harry Rainy, Andrew Buchanan, and Allen Thomson as a few who are still with us, we say enough to show that the mantles of those that have passed the fatal bourne have fallen on no unworthy successors. ”

“ The most abstruse and knotty points he makes so obvious and clear that his hearers are inclined to wonder why they did not think of them in that light before—giving to themselves, or to the merits of the question in hand, a credit that is only due to the preacher whose discernment has removed the lions of doubt and difficulty from the path of the reader or hearer. As a litterateur his taste is highly cultivated, and his discriminating judgment enables him to compose sermons the diction of which is as beautiful as the argument is sound. ”

“ But the magnates of Glasgow have a juster and more legitimate cause for pride; their ambition is of a less ornamental, but far more useful kind. The Youngs, the Napiers, the Elders, the Campbells, and the Bairds are, after all, your true and permanent nobility. All that is not the direct result of merit and industry can only induce vanity and vexation of spirit. ”

“ And the eminence of not a few men was so great as to leave a long way behind others who, like Sheriff Bell, would now be considered above the average in their profession. The young advocate of 1872 has not to encounter such intellectual giants as Patrick Robertson, Jeffrey, Cockburn, Rutherford, M'Neil, Moncrieff, Hope, and other contemporaries of Bell, who shed the lustre of their genius upon the law of Scotland, and secured for the Court of Session a reputation higher, perhaps, than even Westminster Hall has ever been able to attain. ”

“ The adventitious circumstances of his birth placed him in a position only a few removes from Royalty itself, but not content with mere physical greatness, and realising that "the mind's the standard of the man," he has applied himself diligently to the acquisition of wisdom, until both in the domain of politics and in the still more cosmopolitan sphere of belles lettres he has, perhaps, made himself more conspicuous by his sheer native worth than any other member of the aristocracy of Scotland. ”

“ Your works on Civil Engineering, Machinery, and Millwork, &c., each exhibit the powerful intellect that is invariably found in all your productions, and that place them on an eminence peculiarly your own. All your books possess a value which we, who are practical men engaged in performing many of the varied works which fall to engineers, feel to be of the very highest importance. ”