William Erskine

“ During the political troubles of 1848 Erskine held it a duty to remain at home in order to relieve the distress of his own neighbourhood. He found employment for a large number of those out of work, but he viewed with great misgiving the democratic tendencies of modern legislation. In later life Erskine was not seen much out of Scotland, his summers being spent at Linlathen, and his winters in Edinburgh. Erskine survived all his own people, his sister Christian dying in 1866, and his younger sister, David, the widow of Captain Paterson, in 1867. ”

“ The books which he edited and published in this country were chiefly works of Jonathan Edwards and other American divines.
Erskine was very heartily devoted to the doctrines and aims of the evangelical party in the church, of which his family connections, his stainless character, and his abilities as a preacher and a writer contributed to make him one of the leading champions. It was a testimony to the amiability of both that he and Principal Robertson, the leader of the ‘moderate’ party, should have been friendly colleagues in the same congregation for a quarter of a century. ”

“ A life of Lord Erskine was nearly arranged for the press at the time of his decease, and it is to be regretted that as yet his labours have not been given, imperfect as they are, to the world; no one could have had better opportunities or have been better calculated for the task ”

“ Erskine, on the contrary, cannot be discovered by any of his speeches, or writings, to have read much, and most probably had read very little. He was in no sense of the word learned. He has, indeed by acuteness of observation, p. 59vigour of combination, and the ready power of deduction that he possessed, been able to produce and leave behind him what will become the learning of others, but he was not learned himself. His qualities, from his earliest years were quickness and acuteness, unchecked and insatiable curiosity, retentive memory, and busy reflection; his mind was never still. ”

“ Andrews, whose strictures on the deistical work, ‘Christianity as Old as the Creation,’ were not deemed satisfactory by the church. Erskine adopted some of the views of Warburton in his ‘Divine Legation of Moses,’ which led to a friendship between the two divines, and to several letters on each side. In 1744 he was ordained minister of Kirkintilloch, near Glasgow, and he devoted himself with great earnestness and assiduity to the spiritual duties of his office. ”

“ The greatest curse which can be entailed upon mankind is a state of war. All the atrocious crimes committed in years of peace—all that is spent in peace by the secret corruptions, or by the thoughtless extravagance, of nations—are mere trifles compared with the gigantic evils which stalk over the world in a state of war. ”

“ Fisher concurred with Erskine and other likeminded ministers in their views both as to patronage and doctrine, and in opposition to the majority of the general assembly, by whom their representations were wholly disregarded. In 1732 Erskine preached a sermon at the opening of the synod of Perth, in which he boldly denounced the policy of the church as unfaithful to its Lord and Master. ”

“ All who were his contemporaries remember that dauntless courage, that heroic virtue, that stainless purity of thought and speech, before which all evil things seemed to shrink away abashed. We remember how the outward beauty of body seemed only the visible symbol of a goodness which dwelt within, and how moral and intellectual excellence grew up together, blending into a perfect whole. ”

“ At one turn of the road there is a recognizable odour of late-cut hay, and in the middle distance I distinctly perceive a turnip-field, out of which a covey of partridges might rise without surprising any one. We pull up and gaze around. Look where I will, I cannot see a house, nor even a cottage. ”

“ Erskine's friends were most desirous that he should be a lawyer, but his devout and earnest spirit inclined him to the ministry; and his sense of duty becoming very clear, he chose that profession, contrary to the wishes of his family. At the university of Edinburgh he became acquainted with many young men of great ability, and was a member of a club called the Hen Club, along with Principal Robertson, Mr. ”

“ I hate innovation, but I love improvement. I am an enemy to the corruption of Government, but I defend its influence. I dread reform, but I dread it only when it is intemperate. I consider the liberty of the press as the great Palladium of the Constitution ”

“ We are like men standing on a mountain when the mist rolls up from the valley. At first we all are very cheerful, and assure one another that it will pass away in half an hour, leaving our path quite clear. ”

“ The Sloth, in its wild state, spends its life in trees, and never leaves them but from force or accident. The eagle to the sky, the mole to the ground, the sloth to the tree; but what is most extraordinary, he lives not upon the branches, but under them. He moves suspended, rests suspended, sleeps suspended, and passes his life in suspense—like a young clergyman distantly related to a bishop. ”

“ I feel Holland is little changed from what he was as a schoolboy and an undergraduate—the same joyous spirit, unbroken good temper, quick perception and insight, warm sympathy, love of friends, kind interest in lives of all sorts, delight in young people—these never fail. He never seems to let the burden of life and the sadness of things depress his cheery, hopeful spirit. ”

“ Similarly, the human but unregenerate landowners of fashionable London say, as they survey their possessions, "This Square belongs to me," "That place in the shade is Mine," while the August sun beats down on the malodorous street, and tottering paupers peer wistfully at the benches under the plane trees, and street-boys flatten their noses against the iron railings and madly yearn for cricket-pitches so smooth and green. ”

“ We could tell of those who drank molten lead as cheerfully as we would the juice of the grape, and played with the red fire and the bickering flames as gaily as with golden curls." These were the people who by endurance made their souls their own; and, by carrying endurance even unto death, propagated the faith for which they gave their lives. ”

“ He who takes the office of a Judge as it now exists in this country, takes in his hands a splendid gem, good and glorious, perfect and pure. Shall he give it up mutilated, shall he mar it, shall he darken it, shall it emit no light, shall it be valued at no price, shall it excite no wonder? ”

“ In a London home there is nothing to fascinate the eye. The contemplation of the mews and the chimney-pots through the back windows of the nursery will not elevate even the most impressible child. There is no mystery, no dreamland, no Enchanted Palace, no Bluebeard's Chamber, in a stucco mansion built by Cubitt or a palace of terracotta on the Cadogan estate. There can be no traditions of the past, no inspiring memories of virtuous ancestry, in a house which your father bought five years ago and of which the previous owners are not known to you even by name. ”

“ It is like opening the window daily, and looking out and letting in the air and the sunlight into an otherwise stuffy little room; and if I cannot read some poetry in the day I feel more uncomfortable than I can tell you. ”

“ All sorts of discordant voices reach me through the layers of cloud. Some cry, "Our one hope for national religion is to rivet tighter than ever the chains which bind the Church to the chariot-wheels of the State." ”

“ The look of favour—the voice of power, no more;—the deserted palace—the wretched monarch on his funeral bier—the mourners ready—the dismal march of death prepared. Who are we, and what are we? and for what has God made us? and why are we doomed to thus frail and unquiet existence? Who does not feel all this? in whose heart does it not provoke appeal to, and dependence on, God? before whose eyes does it not bring the folly and the nothingness of all things human? ”

“ Thou shalt not kill—Thou shalt not steal—Thou shalt not bear false witness:—by how many fables, by how much poetry, by how many beautiful aids of imagination, may not the fine morality of the Sacred Scriptures be engraven on the minds of the young? ”

“ One emerged (like Herbert Gladstone) from the obscurity of College rooms or from the undistinguished herd of London ball-goers, or from the stables and stubbles of a country home, and became, all in a moment, a Personage. For the first time in one's life one found that people—grown-up, sensible, vote-possessing people—wished to know one's opinions, and gave heed to one's words. For the first time, one had "Colours" of one's own, as if one were a Regiment or a University; for the first time one beheld one's portrait, flattering though perhaps mud-bespattered, on every wall. ”

“ Gladstone, who thought modern luxury rather disgusting, used to complain that nowadays life in a country house meant three dinners a day, and if you reckoned sandwiches and poached eggs at five o'clock tea, nearly four. Indeed, the only difference that I can perceive between a modern luncheon and a modern dinner is that at the former meal you don't have soup or a printed menu. ”

“ Whenever he touches a historical or literary theme his whole being seems to undergo a transformation. The real nature flashes out through his twinkling eyes. While he muses the fire burns, and, like the Psalmist, he speaks with his tongue. Dates and details, facts and traditions, cantos and poetry, reams of prose, English and Latin and Greek and French, come tumbling out in headlong but not disorderly array. ”

“ If ye would that men should love you, love ye also them, not with gentleness of face alone, or the shallow mockery of smiles, but in singleness of heart, in forbearance, judging mercifully, entering into the mind of thy brother, to spare him pain, to prevent his wrath, to be unto him an eternal fountain of peace. These are the fruits of the Spirit, and this the soul that emanates from our sacred religion. ”

“ And what is the cure for this great evil to which your profession exposes you? The cure is, to keep a sacred place in your heart, where Almighty God is enshrined, and where nothing human can enter; to say to the world, 'Thus far shalt thou go, and no further'; to remember you are a lawyer, without forgetting you are a Christian; to wish for no more wealth than ought to be possessed by an inheritor of the Kingdom of Heaven; to covet no more honour than is suitable to a child of God ”

“ Lord Salisbury goes so little into general society that his qualities as a talker are not familiarly known. He is painfully shy, and at a club or in a large party undergoes the torments of the lost. Yet no one can listen, even casually, to his conversation without appreciating the fine manner, full both of dignity and of courtesy; the utter freedom from pomposity, formality, and self-assertion, and the agreeable dash of genuine cynicism, which modifies, though it does not mask, the flavour of his fun. ”

“ It was eloquence particularly well calculated to sway a popular assembly which yet had none of the characteristics of a mob. A sonorous voice; a figure and bearing which, though stiff and ungainly, were singularly dignified; an inexhaustible copiousness of grandiloquent phrase; a peculiar vein of sarcasm which froze like ice and cut like steel—these were some of the characteristics of the oratory which from 1782 to 1806 at once awed and fascinated the House of Commons.
"I never want a word, but Mr. Pitt always has at command the right word." ”

“ If I am afraid of voting against this bill, because a mob may gather about the House of Lords—because stones may be flung at my head—because my house may be attacked by a mob, I am a poltroon, and unfit to meddle with public affairs. But I may rationally be afraid of producing great public agitation; I may be honourably afraid of flinging people into secret clubs and conspiracies—I may be wisely afraid of making the aristocracy hateful to the great body of the people. ”

“ The smoking-room of the House of Commons is his shrine, and there, poised in an American rocking-chair and delicately toying with a cigarette, he unlocks the varied treasures of his well-stored memory, and throws over the changing scenes of life the mild light of his genial philosophy. It is a chequered experience that has made him what he is. He has known men and cities; has probed in turn the mysteries of the caucus, the green-room, and the Stock Exchange; has been a diplomatist, a financier, a journalist, and a politician. ”

“ Never was a brighter intellect or a more gallant heart housed in a more fragile form. His figure, features, bearing, and accent were the very type of refinement; and as the spare figure, so short yet so full of dignity, marked out by the decanal dress and the red ribbon of the Order of the Bath, threaded its way through the crowded saloons of London society, one felt that the Church, as a civilizing institution, could not be more appropriately represented. ”

“ Man is imprisoned here only for a season, to take a better or a worse hereafter, as he deserves it. This old truth is the fountain of all goodness, and justice, and kindness among men: may we all feel it intimately, obey it perpetually, and profit by it eternally! ”