Parentage, Childhood, Youth, till His Father's Death
“A TRAP to catch a sunbeam,” — the playful title of a liction, strangely presents itself here as the fittest phrase to express the aim, sober, grave, and tender, of this real and recent history. Great and good lives, — lives that are at once manly and godly, where the affections that spring from the earth are imbued with the holiness that distils from heaven, — are like rays of sunlight which gladden the world while they shine, but leave it dark and chilly when they depart. 0 for an art in the moral sphere, equivalent to that of the photographer in the material, whereby we might seize, and fix, and perpetuate those rarer rays which stream through the mass of human history like veins of felspar in a quarry!
This Ls the specific task assigned to the biographer. Feeble and faint at best must be the image of a life transferred to a printed page, in comparison with that life itseK, a.s it was felt by friends while it lasted, and is remembered still; but, if the original were indeed a sunbeam sent from heaven to cheer a portion of this dull earth, a copy, to some extent true and suggestive, may be taken and kept. The negative which a biogi-aphy may fix for the use of posterity will fail indeed to reproduce the vital colours; but if it be at once fond and faithful it will secure a true outline, and help surviving friends to recall the vanished life.
The family from which James Hamilton sprang can be traced for several generations, some as proprietors and some as cultivators of the soil, in the middle ward of Lanarkshire. About the middle of the last century, John Hamilton, laird of Barnside and East Quarter, had reached an advanced age, and was unmarried. In these circumstances it was natural that James, the son of his deceased brother, should, in his youth, permit himself to be buoyed up with the hope of becoming in due time a country gentleman, and so being able to live on his rents without care or labour of his own. The marriage of the old gentleman, however, and the appearance of an heiress on the stage, effectually extinguished the young man’s fondly cherished hopes. But that which came in the form of a calamity turned out a blessing in disguise: it supplied the stimulus which was needed to mould and invigorate his character. The event that spoilt his prospect of an inheritance tore him away, before it was too late, from a career of idle sport, already begun, and projected his life upon a course of honourable industry. In 1761, at the age of twenty-three, he married Mary, daughter of Andrew Hamilton of Avondale, who had suffered much in person and property from incursions of the rebels in 1745. Thomas, their youngest son, originator and head of the eminent publishing house of Hamilton, Adams, and Co., London, still survives at a patriarchal age, in full possession of all his faculties, a pattern at once of the successful merchant, the accomplished gentleman, and the humble yet hopeful disciple of Christ.
William, an elder son, Dr. James Hamilton’s father, was horn on the 4th of February 1780, at Longridge in the parish of Stonehouse. The course of his early education is summed up in two short sentences of his autobiography, “The Bible was my class book. My mother was my tutor.” Somewhat imperfectly equipped, according to his own account, for want of a competent classical instructor within reach, he entered the University of Edinburgh in November 1796. Prosecuting each successive branch of his studies with extraordinary zeal, he completed with great credit his course of philosophy and theology, and was licensed as a probationer of the Scottish Church by the Presbytery of Hamilton in December 1804. After having served about three years as assistant successively in the parishes of Broughton and New Kilpatrick, he was ordained minister of St, Andrew’s Chapel, Dundee, in December 1807. There, with a wide sphere and abundant opportunities, he threw himself with his whole heart into the work of the ministry; but as the chapel was unendowed, and did not confer on its minister the privilege of a seat in any ecclesiastical court, he judged it his duty, within a period of two years, to accept a proffered presentation to the parish of Strathblane in the county of Stirling. In this place he continued serving God in the gospel with signal devotion and with much practical success till his death in 1835. As notices of his character and work from almost the beginning of his ministry in Strathblane will naturally emerge as we proceed, and entwine themselves round our own proper narrative, it is not necessary at this stage to prolong the sketch of his course. In the meantime, however, and by anticipation, it may be well to introduce the estimate of that gifted father, which was formed and expressed in mature life by his still more gifted son: —
“In that manse the animating presence was a ’ house-mother,’ who filled every corner with her kindly, cheerful influence; but somewhat awfully enshrined in his studious sanctuary, sate with brief interval his uncle,^ the Rev. William Hamilton, D.D. August in an altitude of six feet two, with raven locks brushed down on his high brow, with the darkest of eyes flashing terrible disdain on all shabbiness, as well as indignation at all sin, he was an object of uneasy respect to ‘moderate’ and temporizing CO -presbyters, and to some of the more jovial spirits amongst his own parishioners was so formidable, that rather than encounter him they would escape from his approach by a retreat more rapid than dignified. At the same time, his affections were so warm, his heart so tender, his standard of Christian attainment so lofty, his spirituality of mind was in such grand harmony with his intellectual majesty, his whole nature was so noble, that it was with an admiring, uplooking aff’ection that he was beloved by those who sufficiently knew him. His greatest failing
1 This sketch occurs in a memoir of his cousin, the Rev. James Hamilton, only son of the publislier, a most devoted and exemplary minister of the Church of England, Rector of Beddington, Surrey.
was a morbid sense of time’s precious n ess. Every moment was grudged which he did not give to his parish or his library. Even during the hasty repast his mind would be absorbed in the Magdeburg Centuriators or Owen on Perseverance; and what with forced journeys, and rising excessively early, and the absence of all recreation, he may be said to have shortened his days in redeeming the time. For, in regard to this as well as the other talent?, the maxim holds true — ‘There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth.’
“Although most generous in distributing his books, his money, and his influence, it must be confessed that his reluctance to part with a minute was miserly. Even the snatches surrendered to his family and friends were given with a grudge; and forgetful of the good which through his vast acquirements and conversational powers he could confer on others, it seemed never to strike him that in this form of beneficence he might after all be lending to the Lord, and fulfilling an important ministry.
“Still it was an impressive sight to witness that life so intense and devoted: the day begun with a long perusal of Kennicott’s Hebrew Bible, and the evening closing in with the contracted Greek of Eusebius, or the stately pages of Justin Martyr, under the brightest blaze of the argand lamp, and all the space between filled up with vigorous study and visits of mercy. Even now, and recalling it over an interval of thirty years, it is affecting to remember the work which that faithful pastor did for his little flock of a thousand people; the sermons which he prepared for a congregation of ploughmen and calicoprinters, as carefully as if they had been the most learned in the land; the classes, the libraries, the savings’ banks, which he established; the innumerable lectures on popular science with which he enlivened their winter evenings, and the good books with which he furnished their homes. And as his image arises again in that rustic pulpit, with its green baize drapery and the westering sun shining in through the plane-trees surrounding the little sanctuary, whilst with eyes suffused, and a countenance radiant with unutterable rapture, he expatiated on the love of God and the glories of the great redemption, we do not wonder that it was often felt to be heaven on earth; nor do we wonder that from the neighbouring city many came out into the wilderness to see.”
On the 19th of January 1813, soon after his settlement in Strathblane, William Hamilton married Jane, daughter of William King of Lonend, Paisley,^ a man who, combined in a high degree diligence in his secular business with fervency of spirit in the service of the Lord. He was a citizen of Paisley at a time when that place was remarkable for the observance of the Sabbath, and the almost universal practice of family prayer. Manufactures, in the earlier stage of their growth, did not demoralize and degrade the population, perhaps because then the increase of the inhabitants had not yet outgrown the means of general education and reKgious instruction.
I Dr. Kobert Bums, of Paisley, presided at the marriage ceremony, and survives in bodily health and mental vigour to this present day. (Such was the fact when this sheet was sent to the jirinter; but ere it returned the race of the venerable patriarch was run. He died at Toronto in August 1869. )
“Paisley,” Eowland Hill has said, “is the paradise of Scotland, for there Christians love one another.”
Ir, King was a cotton- spinner, and he must have been a man of enterprise, for his factory, according to the statistical account, “was the first that was erected in Scotland.” He seems moreover to have ruled his own house with as much exactitude and rigour as his mill. His daughter, Mrs. Hamilton, was wont to tell her children how two boys, her brothers, lost their caps, as boys are apt to do, in a gust of wind on Saturday night after all the shops were shut, and how on the Sabbath morning, which, however, fortunately turned out fine, they were led through the streets to church by their father, one firmly gi’asped in either hand, with bare heads, in spite of all their remonstrances. This God-fearing Scottish cotton- spinner did not see why an idle Sabbath should be spent at home because the boys were somewhat ashamed to march to the church bareheaded. This is the sort of stuff of which the men who made Paisley in those days were themselves made.
But this man, so resolute where duty was concerned, was tender and liberal when any case of need appeared. When his course was run, and they had carried his dust to the grave, a crowd of dependants and pensioners were admitted to the house, in order to receive some mark of kindness in memory of the dead. Among them one poor widow was observed with streaming eyes gazing on his portrait that hung on the wall. “That,” she said, “that is the very way he looked when he gave me the twentypound note to buy my laddie back frae the soldiers.”
This, to the bystanders, was the first intimation of the fact.
James Hamilton’s mother, from whom he learned so much, and whom he loved so well, was the daughter of this Scottish patriarch. On both sides he enjoyed the unspeakable privilege of being the seed of the righteous. He was born at Lonend, Paisley, on the 27 th November 1814. It was through the accident of his mother’s temporary residence in her father’s house that Paisley became his birthplace, and in March 1815, when little more than three months old, he was removed to Strathblane, which was to all practical intents the place of his nativity, and continued to be his home till the death of his father in 1835.
The other children of the family were —
William King, born 26tli April 1816, minister of the Free Church at Stoneliouse.
Elizabeth, born 24th May 1818; died 13th September 1831.
Mary, born 12th April 1820; died at Edinburgh 5th November 1838.
Jane, born 19th April 1822, married Mr. James Walker, minister of the Free Church, Carnwath, 1st January 1847; died 15th April 1849.
Andrew, born 14th December 1826; skilled in European languages and general literature; author of an interesting and valuable work on Denmark.^
The circumstances attending his birth fixed the attention of his parents with a peculiar intensity on their eldest child, and led them to dedicate him to God with singular urgency at the time, and with undeviating constancy after-
Sixteen Months in the Danish Isles. By Andrew Hamilton, Member of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of the North at Copenhagen. .2 vols. London: Richard Bentley. 1852.
wards. The record, written at the time and on the spot by his father, although it touches private suffering in plainer terms than we should have chosen to employ, seems a thing so sacred that we dare not mutilate it. Only “the day shall declare “how much the effectual fervent prayer of this righteous man availed to bring down upon the babe in all his subsequent life a double portion of the Spirit. If the agonizing cry of the trembling parent seem to draw aside the curtain, and admit a stranger further within the family precincts than a biography ordinarily ventures to do, let the reader tread softly the ground which sorrow makes sacred, and reverence the giief that brings the sufferer so near to God. “We transcribe from the journal of Dr. William Hamilton: —
“LoNEND, 2Uh November 1814. — This to me has been a day of darkness, perplexity, and distress. Early on Friday morning my dear wife was taken ill. Her labo-ir became severe on Friday afternoon at four. There has been no remission during all the evening, during all the night, and no appearance of abatement even this forenoon. Her spirits are sinking, her strength failing, and her cries pierce my heart and liaiTow up my soul. Lord, shall the children be brought to the birth, and shall there not be strength to bring forth? Shall the desire of mine eyes be taken away, when on the point of becoming a mother? Lord, what can be the meaning of this dark dispensation? If she be now removed, what end has been served by her union and mine? Oh send forth thy light and truth: lead her through the dark valley, and conduct her forth in safety and comfort. Here I give her and myself and
the infant up to Thee. Do with us what seemeth good in Thy sight. Only make us Thine own: Thine in time, and Thine through eternity; that if we be soon separated in this vale of tears, we may meet in the regions of bliss, and spend our eternity in Thy presence and in Thy praise.
“27 tJi N’ovemher. Lords daij. — ‘Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.’ This morning, at three minutes before four, my wife was safely delivered of a son. 0 my soul, never forget all the fear and pain which thou hast felt on her account; and all the vows and resolutions which thou hast made before the Lord to devote the remainder of my life to His service and glory; to promote the temporal comfort and spiritual improvement of my wife; to guard against levity and folly; to suppress peevishness and irritability; to cultivate a meek and quiet spirit. 0 Lord, I am Thine; Thy vows are upon me. Seal my soul till the day of complete redemption.”
While in substance this monologue is sublime, it becomes in form dramatic. What a burst of joy flows forth when the light breaks at length! Nor was this goodness like the morning cloud. These vows were paid. This suppliant cleaved as close to God his Saviour in subsequent prosperity, as in that day of darkness.
In an enumeration of signal providences in his behalf, at various periods of his life, Dr. Hamilton, the father, has given an accoimt of a dangerous illness through which his eldest child passed in infancy: —
“On the Lord’s day, August 6, 1815, my eldest child, who “was little more than eight months, and who had been seriously ill for many days, seemed in the morning to be growing worse. As the case was not desperate, I went to the church, and went through the forenoon service, in the hope that his complaint would take a favourable turn by the time that it was over. On my return I found him worse. I had left the people in the expectation of sermon in the afternoon, and therefore was again obliged, though with a painful heart, to ascend the pulpit. On the close of the last service he appeared to be rapidly sinking; and on asking the surgeon his opinion of the case, he declared that the child could not long survive snnset. This confirmed all my fears; but since my dear child’s decease was so near, I rejoiced that I had received warning of its approach; requested the surgeon to withdraw, and fell on my knees, with my wife by my side, by the bed of our infant. I cried to God that we would not contend with Him — that our child and ourselves were wholly His — that we gave our infant as a free-will offering — that we were thankful that He had given us warning of His pleasure, and were glad, since such was His holy will, to have the privilege of surrendering voluntarily such a child into His hands. Again and again I cried, ‘Father, glorify Thy name.’ My ambition was that His name should be glorified. And, like a God of infinite grace, he speedily glorified His blessed name far beyond all that we could expect. He guided the skill of the surgeon in another way by bleeding, to preserve our infant; and within forty-five minutes after He had enabled my wife and myself to surrender our infant into His hands, we saw decided symptoms of the alDatement of inflammatory attack. Oh, who is a God like unto our God! and what must eternity be like in the presence of Him who spared not His own Son, hut delivered him up for us all; and on earth hears our prayers, and treats us with such ineffable gentleness and tenderness! During the season of agitating suspense, I enjoyed uncommonly elevated views of the majesty, love, and all- sufficiency of the Lord; and saw most powerfully that though my child were removed, His power, and grace, and glory would remain unchanged, and that in the riches of His grace, and all-sufficiency of His nature, there was still an infinite fulness from which to supply all my need, and replenish and delight my soul with every consolation and joy.”
From the time of Moses downwards, it has been observed that, as a general rule, those who are destined to be leaders of Israel in their maturity have been in their childhood drawn out of the water. The hearer of prayer knows that it is “out of the depths” that the most urgent cries ascend to the throne; and he seems, in paternal wisdom and love, to permit the danger to become imminent in order to increase the fervency of the prayer. In whatever way the fact may be explained, the fact itself cannot be disputed, that, for the most part, those who have occupied a high place, and accomplished a great work in the Church, have been brougl.t to the “large place” of their mature activity “through fire and water” in some form during the earlier period of their lives.
Among Dr. Hamilton’s miscellaneous papers, I have
1 Memoir of Dr. William Hamilton, p. 98.
found a characteristic sketch of Strathblane, the home of his childhood, which, though without date and unfinished, I insert here as the shortest and best method of conveying to the reader some conception of the place and its people: —
“Sheltered from the north by an outlier of the Ochils, and shut in at either end by its own Dunglass and Dungoiach, with the perpetual Sabbath of the hills smiling down on its industrious valley, and with its bright little river trotting cheerily on towards Loch Lomond, few parishes in Scotland could be more secluded or lovely than Strathblane. With its southern aspect, it made the most of the sunshine, and, if we could trust our childish recollections, we should say that nowhere else within these seas were the breezes so soft; that nowhere else did summer linger so long. But the memory of childhood is eclectic, and we begin life as we end it, wearing spectacles, of topaz, or some substance akin to the transparent gold of St. John. Mine were amber- coloured. In the dim winter days I used to look with envy at certain spots far up the mountain, for I fancied that they were suffused with constant sunshine. It was a great mortification to find at last that they were only patches of withered grass; and, for fear that in like manner the glory should go off, there are other early illusions which I have refrained from inspecting too closely. Forty years ago, Strathblane still retained some traces of primitive simplicity. The name of Eob Roy filled a larger place in the imaginations of the people than the Duke of Wellington; and all who had reached fourscore could recall the times of the Pretender.
Mrs. Provan had been eight years old when a detachment of the rebel army passed through the Muir of Fintry, and as she was the only one left at home the Highlanders coaxed and threatened her by turns to reveal the hiding place of the meal and cheeses; but although she had seen them buried in the moss, the little maid was firm, and neither swords nor “sweeties” could extort her secret. Some of the old men still wore the broad blue bonnet, and a larger proportion of the old women in showery weather drew the hood of their scarlet mantles over their snowy mutches. The arrival of the first umbrella was a comparatively recent and well-remembered era. The fortunate possessor was a Miss Eobertson of Leddrigreen, and the first day of its public exhibition was a rainy Sabbath. Being apprised of its presence in church, all the youngsters turned out to view the phenomenon, and as the old lady advanced through the descending flood under covert of her moving tent, they eyed her with such admiration as some of us have felt the first time we saw a man go down in a diving-beli
“As in all primitive places, the people were by no means locomotive. Margaret Freeland, for upwards of eighty years, never slept under any roof but her own. Once vshe was overtaken in Glasgow by a terrible storm, and her hostess would not let her return that evening; but as, owing to the strangeness of her situation, she lay awake all night, she still could boast that she had never slept out of her own bed. One man had visited the great metropolis. This venturous spirit was John Livingston, a tailor, and to distinguish him from John Livingston the precentor (alias ‘singing Johnnie’), he went by the name of ‘London John.’ We had for a long time no foreigners; the only exception being a cobbler, an old soldier from England. William Orme and the villagers of Edinkiln did not amalgamate. To him they appeared coarse and slatternly; and, with tea and fried bacon to his breakfast, but with seldom a decent Sunday suit, he appeared to them little better than a glutton and a self- coddling sensualist. I suspect, however, that his Doric neighbours might have taken, with advantage, a leaf from the soft spoken stranger’s book of etiquette.”
Like many boys, who have ultimately become preachers, and some who have not, he was much addicted to preaching at a very tender age. In one important respect, however, his juvenile efforts in this direction were peculiar; his were not extemporaneous harangues, but regular written sermons, not spoken, but read in select circles of his companions. These discourses, when he was between nine and ten years of age, were pronounced by one of his cousins, some years his senior, to be better than those of a certain noted parish minister in Lanarkshire. Whether the youthful critic was too partial to his friend, or whether the dignified clergyman with whom he was compared was not a formidable rival, does not appear. One feature of this picture is interesting to us, — the mimic sermons were written and read. The literary instinct already appears in germ; the small seed is invested with a species of sublimity, when we think of the tree that may spring from it.
The education of the family at this time was conducted
at home by a resident tutor; and his brother, who was his fellow-student, bears witness that, though exceedingly fond of play, James would on no account consent to abridge the hours set apart for study. He was not a book- worm from inability or disinclination for sport. His mind, even from childhood, was singularly well balanced. Judgment took command from the first, and mere inclination was resolutely kept in subordination.
Under a general law of the manse, the boys were permitted to spend an hour or two of the evening in the library, even while their father was at work there, but one stern condition was attached to the privilege — absolute silence. “You may come and read as long as you please, and when you are wearied you may retire, but you may not open your lips while here.” William, the younger brother, seems, for the most part, to have considered the privilege dear at the price; but although he was sparing in the use of it himself, he bears witness that “James enjoyed it mightily for many years.”
A reminiscence of this fascination of his childhood occurs appropriately in the introduction to a work of his ripest years. Our Christian Classics. “In the following pages the compiler must plead guilty to a certain amount of self-indulgence. It was his lot to be born in the midst of old books. Before he could read them they had become a kind of companions, and, in their coats of brown calf and white vellum, great was his admiration for tomes as tall as himself. By and by, when he was allowed to open the leather portals, and look in. on the solemn authors in peaked beards and wooden ruffs, his reverence deepened for the mighty days of the great departed; and with some vague prepossession, his first use of the art of reading was to mimic an older example, and sit poring for hours over Manton and Hopkins, Eeynolds and Horton. Indeed, so intense did this old-fashioned affection grow, that he can well remember, when compelled to shut the volume and retire to rest, how, night after night, he carried to his cot some bulky folio, and only fell asleep to dream of a paradise where there was no end of books, and nothing to interrupt the reader. And although it is impossible to recall, without a smile, such precocious pedantry, the writer is grateful for tastes then formed and for impressions then acquired. Busier years have made those early haunts forbidden, but not altogether forgotten ground.”
Besides sitting for hours in the library reading sombre folios, the boy took great delight in listening to the conversation of those grave and learned men who frequented the manse as the friends an<l fellow- workers of his father. Chief of these conversational attractions was a certain Mr, Bell, who resided in the neighbouring parish of Campsie, author of a geography which bears his name, and annotator of Rollin’s Ancient History. He is described as having been bodily a short, thickset man, with coarse features, two or three huge warts on his face, and one eye nearly closed; mentally a walking encyclopaedia, from which a stream of knowledge flowed like oil from a barrel when the bung comes out. The chief difficulty that occurred in this literary intercourse was to get Mr. Bell stopped after he had begun to low. These were precious opportunities for our student.
Silent at his father’s knee he sat, while the rest of the children were at play, drinking in knowledge as thirstylips drink water from the cooling stream. As the redoubtable geographer warmed with his theme the eye that was at liberty to move glanced grandly in unison with the versatile evolutions of its owner. ‘Nov was this man a dictionary merely; although his mind was stored with the knowledge of the world, his treasure lay in heaven, and thitherward his heart tended, like the needle trembling towards its pole. The time at length came when the rural philosopher must die. His friend, the minister of Strathblane, hastened to his bed-side as soon as he heard of his illness. On his return his family observed him deeply affected. Mr. Bell, he informed them, was dying; but such a deathbed! It seemed not a dying, but a translation. This man of learning was leaning like a child on the Saviour’s breast. He was saying and singing, as he walked down the sides of the dark valley, “I will not fear, for thou art with me,”
By the conversation of such men, and the example of his father, besides the books which he read, the mind of the scholar was stirred, informed, and moulded. Although I have not found any record that assigns the time and manner of a decisive heart change, the spiritual life at this period seems to have developed itself concurreotly with the intellectual. By its fruits in those early days we know the existence and strength of his faith, rather than from any articulate testimony. Every Saturday night some God-fearing men, chiefly from the neighbouring bleachfields and print-works, convened in the manse for the purpose of reading the Scriptures together, and offering in unison specific prayer for the minister and his ministry on the following Sabbath. The minister’s eldest son was a constituent member of the meeting; the fragile scholar boy and the brawny labouring men, with one heart, but differing voices, offered alternately the united supplications of the company for the descent of the Spirit to make the word of the Kingdom powerful in the assembled congregation on the Lord’s day.
The earliest journal that has come into my possession is dated 31st December 1827, and bears as title on the blank leaf — “Journal of the literary occupations of James Hamilton.” I look with deep interest on the faded paper and boyish handwriting of this humble and now venerable book. Here a life in earnest begins. The spring that bursts from the ground here, we now know, became a great river ere it reached the sea. The student was at this time only thirteen years of age; but he bears himself most manfully even at the outset. As a student, from the very first, he is a workman who “needeth not to be ashamed.” The first lines breathe the air of a healthy, hearty earnestness. He has girt up his loins for a life-long journey. He will not look behind him. Here is a student who thoroughly loves his work, and walks into it with a will.
The first ten months of 1828 seem to have been spent at home, partly in miscellaneous reading, and partly in specific preparation for entering the Greek and Latin classes in the University of Glasgow. The records of the successive months contain little more than a list of the )ooks that he has read. His appetite was from the first voracious. Indeed any judicious and experienced adviser, on glancing over these records at the time, would certainly have recommended a very great reduction in the quantity of the boy’s reading. But the event justified the practice which at the time was dictated only by the mental appetite of the youthful scholar. At the moment any observer might have seen that he read much; but in due time it became evident that he also read well. The mass of miscellaneous information which he drank in during those early years was by some peculiar instinctive process stowed all safely away, not in a promiscuous heap, but in regularly arranged and labelled compartments, ready to come forth at call, as they might successively be needed in the various exigencies of his subsequent life.
The variety is as noticeable as the vigour of his reading.” Read Bonar on genuine religion, and the articles Opheology. Spectre, Mle, Nileometer, and the life of William Cowper in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
“Wrote an essay on population. 30^A Scpteniber. — Slept in the new manse for the first time.” Such is a specimen of the entries in this juvenile day-book.
It is not our business here to discuss the propriety of the custom, prevalent in Scotland, of sending boys to college at a very tender age. It is enough for us to record the fact that James Hamilton entered the University of Glasgow on the 3d of November 1828, before he had completed his fourteenth year. His two classes for the first session were the Latin and the Greek. Mr. Walker, who presided over the Latin class, was an accomplished man, and a competent scholar, but by that time enfeebled tlirougli advanced age. The Professor of Greek was the late Sir Daniel Sandford, justly designated by his eminent pupil, James Halley, “the light of Glasgow College.” I have never known any teacher equal to Professor Sandford in the art of exciting the enthusiasm of his pupils for himself and his theme. By his tenure of the chair, alas! comparatively short, a great impulse was given to the study of Greek in the wet of Scotland.
On the 7th of November, four days after his entrance, the student’s first letter home was written. As it is the earliest example that has come into our hands, we submit this primary epistle to the reader entire: —
“Glasgow, November 7th, 1828.
“My dear Father, — I paid my subscription, or rather your subscription, to the library yesterday, and one pound of deposit; so you may have any book you wish, by sending me word, provided it be not a novel, and have no valuable engravings in it.
“On Wednesday afternoon I felt very sorry at your going away. But after a little conversation with the Miss Marshalls, and reading a piece of Horace, my spirits recovered. I hope you and my dear mother (for so I must begin to call mamma now) got home in perfect safety, and found all at the manse quite well.
“Yesterday I was called on for the first time to read Sallust, and received a great many compliments from Professor Walker.
“I do not know who is likely to be Lord Rector this year. I understand that Lord John Campbell is to be a candidate. But as there is no student to whom I choose to speak, with the exception of Mr. Archibald M’Intyre, I cannot say anything about the matter. And, indeed, if you take no more interest in the matter than I do, it would be preposterous in me to trouble you with any conjecture about it.
“I am as comfortable here as I think it possible I could be. Enjoying, as I do, perfect health, and having every comfort that I could desire, I have much cause of gratitude to God.
“Miss Betsey Marshall is in much the same way as when you were here. The ladies here desire to be kindly remembered to you all. And now, my dear father, farewell. Write soon. Give my kindest love to my mother, aunt, William, and all my sisters, Mr. M’Intyre, and Andrew, if he chooses to take it; and believe me, your ever affectionate James.”
Brave boy! Not yet fourteen: mother and manse for the first time clean out of sight: plunged into the heart of a great city; pushing his way along crowded streets, where every face is strange. There is a fit of home-sickness; he does not deny the fact; but neither does he whimper over it. A talk with his landlady and “a piece of Horace” put the disease to flight, and we hear of it no more.
A journal, written during the summer of 1831, assuming rather than asserting the commencement of his spiritual life, is mainly occupied with circumstances that helped or hindered its development and progress. Considering his training and his mental constitution, and the method of Providence ordinarily followed in similar cases, I think it is altogether probable that the new life began at an age so early that it could not be definitely marked either by himself or others; and that, through the blessing of God on a pious nurture and holy example, it grew with his growth. At the same time it is evident that in his case, as well as in the experience of almost all other Christians, there were periods of sudden and great advancement in the divine life. An illness under which he laboured, and which he believed to be unto death, though certainly not the occasion of his first dedication to Christ, seems to have been the immediate means of much growth in grace. I look with peculiar interest on the notes which he has left of his experience during that sickness. They reveal to me some things which I could not otherwise have understood so well in his maturer life. There was such a strength and steadiness, such a depth and permanence in his personal religion, when called to mingle for many years with the miscellaneous society of London, that, even in absence of information, would have led one to suppose that his faith at an earlier date must have been, through some special divine dealing, very deeply and widely rooted. The sight of his private day-book, written at Strathblane during the summer of 1831, removes the veil, and explains some things that otherwise would have been to some extent inexplicable. The Lord doeth all things well, and makes all things work together for good to His own. The Lord sees the end from the beginning, and prepares His own instruments in time for the work which he foresees to be necessary. It is not while the sun is shining that the roots of a plant are refreshed and invigorated for resisting a subsequent drought, and perfecting its fruit in harvest. It is under the dark cloud that the process of strengthening the foundation goes on. God’s husbandry in the spiritual sphere follows the analogy of that in the natural. It is in the dark and cloudy day, ordinarily, that the new creature, also the planting of the Lord, makes most progress in getting itself “rooted and grounded” in the hidden depths of redeeming love. By the wise and kind providence of God this youth, while not yet seventeen years of age, was brought and kept for a while in his own consciousness close to the edcje of life and near the entrance of eternity. There he acquainted himself with God; there he became strong in the faith for future work. There the vessel, previously chosen, was purified, enlarged, strengthened for receiving in greater measure the name of Christ, and pouring out that name as precious ointment to the end of his life, and wheresoever his lot might be cast.
“Sabbath, May 29th, 1831. — The kind providence of God has hitherto upheld me in the enjoyment of much health and comfort; but now I seem to feel that my connexion with all that is seen and temporal is near a close. A pain which I have felt at intervals in my side for some time past reminds me that I am not to live always, and probably not long. It is a solemn thing to die. The dearest of God’s saints have shrunk at the prospect of crossing the dark waters, and unless they had had the arm of Immanuel to lean upon, the floods would have overwhelmed their souls. 0 for an interest in the Redeemer’s righteousness! Could I assure myself of possessing that, death would be welcome. 0 Lord, say unto me that I am thine, and I am prepared for what Thou wilt, and what time Thou wilt.”
“Saturdai/,June lUh,l 831. — To-morrow the Sacrament of the Supper is to be dispensed here. 0 for the wedding garment! This may be the last opportunity that I will have of commemorating the death of the Redeemer. 0 that my desires were more strongly drawn out after him! He is the chiefest among ten thousand, and altogether lovely. 0 that I could see more of his beauty and comeliness! Lord, grant that in encompassing Thy table my faith may be strong, my love to Thee ardent, my sorrow and humiliation for sin greater than they have ever been heretofore. Open the windows of heaven, and pour out a blessing till there be not room enough to receive. I have renewed my covenant with Thee. Enable me to remember and keep it. May it be an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure, and never to be forgotten.
“I should like to do something for the cause of God before I go hence, and be no more. For some time I have spent a few hours occasionally in writing a life of the eminent Mr. Baxter. It is nearly finished. This week I commenced writing a small collection of hymns for the Lord’s Supper. Some of them were so pleasant to myself that I thought it possible that, were a number of them collected and printed, they might be the means of cheering some of Zion’s pilgrims on their heavenward journey. I have also contemplated a translation of Arrowsmith’s Tactica Sacra. To the execution of these undertakings I would devote what time can be properly spared from my other studies.”
“Sahhath, June 2th, 1831. — This day sat down at the table of the Lord. My own impression is that I shall not hereafter taste of the fruit of the vine till that day that I shall drink it new in my heavenly Father’s kingdom. Had some enjoyment in the ordinance, but too little spirituality for a dying creature. I have this day solemnly and publicly said that whatever others do, I shall serve the Lord. Help me, Lord, to keep this resolution, and may the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil, not allure me from Thy ways. Guide me by Thy kind counsel through life, and after death receive me to Thy glory. Amen.”
In the earlier portion of the summer recess, on the occasion of the dispensation of the Lord’s Supper at Strathblane, he devoted an entire week to religious reading, meditation, self-examination, and prayer. By these exercises his sense of sin was greatly increased, as his tender and full confessions show; but though he increased in the knowledge of his own unworthiness, his hope and happiness did not fade, for the more he discovered of his own need the more he saw of the Redeemer’s fulness. On the whole, while his religious exercises at this time certainly ran mainly in the direction of a keen self-dissection and stern self-condemnation, the tone of his mind remained thoroughly healthful. His faith throughout remained firm and his hope bright. Severe and protracted introspection did not in his case generate in any degree a morbid moroseness. It made his piety stronger without diminishing its elasticity and cheerfulness.
Considering the form which his religious activity at this time assumed, and the views of those authors with whose works he was most familiar, we need not be surprised to learn that he wrote and signed a formal personal covenant, dedicating himself to God in the gospel of his Son. In order that those who knew him in later years, and admired the buoyant, hopeful, winsome type of Christianity which he exhibited in the various circles of London society, may know something of the roots which bore so many sparkling clusters, I think it my duty to give this document in full. It is written out at the end of the book, and under the corresponding date in the journal occurs a notice of the circumstances connected with it: — “... Endeavoured to humble myself before the Lord because of these sins, and plead the righteousness of Jesus as my only ground of acceptance. I wrote down the form of a personal covenant, finding that that which I made this time two years wanted some things which I now wished to be in it. But the church and the Sabbath-school and the prayer-meeting prevented me from proceeding any further that day; so I this evening did on my bended knees, in the presence of the God of heaven and earth, set my worthless name to the covenant, and vouch him to be my God and Father, the Lord Jesus to be my only Saviour and Intercessor, and the Holy Spirit to be my sanctifier and guide. This done, I besought a special blessing on the approaching communion for myself and fellow-worshippers.
“THE COVENANT.
“0 Lord, I have sinned in Adam, and at my coming into the world I was covered with guilt-pollution. In the first actings of my infant years I manifested the strength of that depravity within which made me prone to every evil and backward to all good. The whole tenor of my life has been a building of actual guilt upon the foundation of original corruption. I am a dying as well as an immortal creature, and if I die in my sins I must perish everlastingly. But no efforts of my own can save me from my sins, for the longer I live I sink the deeper in the mire; nor do my efforts to extricate myself avail. Unless a stronger arm come to my deliverance I must perish; but such a deliverance is to be had in the Lord Jesus, Upon the sure testimony of Thy own Word I believe that a gracious covenant was from all eternity entered into by Jehovah, the first person in the blessed Trinity, upon the part of heaveil, and by Jehovah, the second person in the Godhead, even Immanuel, the second Adam, on the part of lost sinners, whereby, on condition of His fulfilling all righteousness, the elect should be saved. And I believe that the terms of the covenant have been fulfilled by his meritorious life and death, and that now the way of salvation is opened up, and that he who believeth on Jesus shall not perish, but have everlasting life, and that henceforth there is no condemnation to them who are in Him.
“0 Lord, I would ascribe everlasting praise unto Thy name for this well-ordered covenant, and would now take hold of it for my soul’s eternal salvation, through faith in Christ. I acquiesce in, love, and admire, the covenant, as all my salvation and all my desire. I embrace Jesus
Christ as he is ofifered to my acceptance in the Gospel, in all His offices of Prophet, Priest, and King, — as my Surety, Intercessor, and Redeemer; and in him God, as my God and Father, and the Holy Spirit as my Sanctifier, Comforter, and Guide.
“Every sin that has had dominion over me I renounce, grieving that so many idols have had dominion over me, and praying that grace from on high may be given me to carry on, in the strength of my mighty Redeemer, an unremitting and successful war against all my spiritual enemies.
“To Thee and to Thy service I surrender all the faculties Thou hast bestowed upon me, and pray that Thou wouldest honour me to be successful in Thy service. Grant unto me more and more to know Thee. Strengthen in me that which is good, and root out that which is evil. Make Thy grace sufficient for my need, and perfect Thy strength in my weakness. Support me in the time of trial and temptation, and stand by me in the hour of death. Do Thou then lift upon me the light of Thy reconciled countenance, and make me to behold it. And may all near and dear unto me possess an interest in the blessings of salvation.
“0 Lord, behold me, I am thy servant; and in token that I am thine I do hereto subscribe my unworthy name, James Hamilton.
“June Sth, 1832.
“To Father, Son, and Spirit, one God, be glory for ever. Amen.”
At this period, plans for the arrangement of his studies frequently occur in his journal. Although he never practically attained his own ideal, it is evident that he derived very great benefit from the habit of mapping out beforehand the work which he desired to overtake, and noting afterwards the measure of his success or failure. Both in the ordinary studies of his course at college, and in reading for his own spiritual profit, his life was a constant and eager effort to forget the things that were behind, and to reach forward to the mark of a higher attainment which he had set up on the horizon of the future.
“Saturday, June 25th. — Impressed with the importance of observing methods (which I am sensible that I have hitherto too much neglected), I purpose to form, and, if health be granted to me, to follow out a course of theological reading. For some time I have been in the habit of reading a portion of Henry’s Commentary every day. This I intend to continue. I ought to read some system of Divinity, — either Doolittle, Dwight, Hill, or Boston. Read also the following.” Then follows a list of 87 works, 17 of which are biographical.
“Wednesday, June 29th. — Rose to-day at four o’clock, and finished Baxter’s Life. I laid it before the Lord, and implored his blessing on it. I intend to devote next Saturday to the correcting of it, previous to sending it up to the London Tract Society, in whose series of Christian biography I wish it to be inserted. If well, I may perhaps write a similar account of Boston, Halyburton, or some of the eminently pious ministers of the Kirk of Scotland. The pleasure and benefit resulting from the exercise are ample recompense for the trouble.”
“Friday, July 8th, 1831. — Sent off Baxter to-day, with the following letter: —
“‘SiE, — I take the liberty of addressing to you a life of Baxter, written with a view to insertion in the series of Christian Biography published by the London Tract Society. In writing it, I consulted all the authorities which I could meet with (Mr. Orme’s Memoir excepted), but have used the words of Baxter himself, as contained in his Narrative of his Life and Times, when this could be done with propriety. I lay claim to no merit, except that of a strict adherence to the truth, and a studious wish to admit no expression which might give offence to any individual who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity and truth. Whether or not I have succeeded belongs to you to judge.
“‘Should I be so happy as to have this Life accepted, I would have no objections to write a similar account of Boston, Doolittle, Halyburton, or some other eminent divine, in the course of a few months.
“‘If the MSS. be not wanted, have the goodness to return them. — I am. Sir, with much esteem and respect, your mo. obedt. sert,
* ‘James Hamilton*
“‘JuneZQ, 183L “‘To the Secretary of the London Tract Society.’”
Many readers who have been delighted and instructed by the products of his matured mind will be interested to observe how early and how eagerly his instincts led him mto authorship. His Memoir of Baxter was politely declined by the Secretary of the London Tract Society.
Nothing daunted, the youthful biographer obtained an introduction to the conductor of a similar society on a smaller scale in Glasgow, who thankfully received from him and published the Life of Baxter in an abridged form. In subsequent issues, they sent out notices of the lives of Jonathan Edwards and Boston from the same juvenile, but already prolific pen. Not having access to these tracts, I cannot judge whether the author’s lack of patronage, or the substantial defects of his earliest efforts, may have been the cause of his want of success with the great Metropolitan Society. Certain it is that at a later day biographical tracts by James Hamilton would not have gone a-begging from their door. At a later date, they discovered and acknowledged his worth in the department of Christian Literature for the People. Twenty years afterwards, they solicited his help. It is interesting to mark the contrast; and, accordingly, we place on record here the principal parts of the letter addressed by the Secretary of the London Tract Society to Mr. Hamilton.
“I beg leave to enclose a communication respecting a new journal for the masses, which this Society contemplates establishing. I most respectfully, yet most earnestly, solicit the favour of at least an occasional contribution to the pages of this magazine. The press groans with the weekly issue of periodicals steeped in sensuality, imbued with a secular spirit, if not tinged with infidelity. It is surely time that an effort should be made to rescue this department of literature from the hands in which it has hitherto been too much left, and so consecrating it to the Redeemer’s service. To do this effectually we must have not only sound piety, but consecrated talent of the highest order that can be procured.
“From the moment the Journal was projected my thoughts have turned to you, as the writer capable of gaining the ear of the masses, and winning the way to their hearts,
“My connexion with this Society is of a comparatively recent character, and I learn with regret that from some cause imperfectly understood, you have not hitherto written anything for us. I trust, however, that this difficulty is not an insuperable one. The cause of the working man I must leave to plead with you. You would have, I hope, if our arrangements are successful, writers of eminence as your coadjutors,
“You will pardon me if I am reluctant to contemplate a total refusal of my request. For years I have been a profited reader of your writings. To Life in Earnest, perused and reperused, I personally owe deep obligation, and to recommend it to others I have always felt a great privilege.”
Let it be fairly acknowledged, however, that twenty years elapsed between the time when James Hamilton solicited the Society for employment, and the time when the Society solicited him for aid. It may be freely conceded that the biographer of Baxter had grown in power during the interval, and yet it is possible that if the earlier representatives of the institution had been more attentive and more acute, they might have seen in the volunteered contribution from Strathblane something worthy of their notice, both on account of what it achieved and what its achievement by a youth promised for the future.
As the season advanced, the impression that his time would be short gained ground. At this period he seems to have thought that secular studies were labour lost, inasmuch as he did not expect to live long enough to turn them to any account.” What time I can command I mean now to devote to the perusal of such books as are best fitted to prepare me for crossing the dark waters.
“Tuesday, July 2Qth. — Last Saturday I was called to attend the funeral of my cousin, Jeanie Adam, at Paisley. Three months have not elapsed since in the same churchyard I saw the remains of my aunt committed to the gxave. Of her happiness I dare not entertain a doubt, for I never saw, and never again may see, one whose affections were more completely raised above all that is seen and temporal, and whose conversation was more in heaven. Jane Adam also died declaring her hopes of acceptance with God, rested on the finished work of Christ alone; and who that ever put their trust in Him were ever put to shame? Many of my relatives are now in glory, and my heart’s desire and prayer for those who yet remain are that they may be saved. May we be followers of them who through faith and patience are now inheriting the promises.
“Sahhaih morning, July Zlst. — A new ailment has been sent to bid me prepare to meet the Lord. But blessed be His name, I think I can say, * I know in whom I have believed.’ Lord Jesus, into Thy hands I commit myself; and while heart and flesh do faint and fail, be Thou the strength of my heart and my portion for ever. The filthy rags of my own righteousness I entirely renounce, and desire to be clothed upon with Thy perfect and all-sufiicient righteousness. Into Thy hands I commit my spirit. Heaven is too holy a place for one so vile, but oh, shut me not out of Thy presence, where alone there is fulness of joy!
““When I am taken away from them, 0 Lord; comfort my dear parents. May they not sorrow as those who have no hope. Enrich them with Thy best blessing. Be the God and Father of all near and dear unto me. Bless my brothers and sisters. May they have a loving spirit towards each other, and may they be all united to Thyself. Prepare them for Thy heavenly kingdom, and may the soul of none of them be lost, but may we spend a happy eternity together, for Thy own Son’s sake. Amen.
“Many are the precious opportunities I have neglected and allowed to pass unimproved. My life has been unprofitable, 0 may my death be more blessed than my life! May it be the means of leading some who have hitherto been careless and unconcerned, to consideration and serious concern for the salvation of their precious souls; then shall I not have lived in vain.
To Jesus, the ground of my hope,
My soul is in haste to be gone j
Oh bear me, ye cherubims, up,
And waft me away to his throne.’
“Saturday, August 6th. — I have had some thoughts of writing a series of lives of the principal theological authors of the Scottish nation, to be sent to the Christian Instructor. In it I would propose to insert memoirs of Boston, Binning, Ilutherford, W. Guthrie, Durham, Craighead, INIuir of Paisley, Wishart, “Webster (James), etc. In doing so, I would acquire a knowledge of our ecclesiastical history which I might not otherwise attain, and might possibly have some little effect in drawing attention to their writings, which might be followed with most beneficial results.
‘’Saturday, August 21th. — To-day was reading the account in Gillies of the awakening at the Kirk of Shotts. How stately were God’s goings in his sanctuary that day! Awake, 0 arm of the Lord, as in the days of old! O blessed Spirit! breathe on these dry bones with which the valley of the visible Church has so long been filled, and they shall live. The fathers, where are they, and the prophets, do they live for ever? “Where now are the men who would renew the scenes of Cambuslang and the Kirk of Shotts? Surely there are not a few to be found who would rejoice to see these days of the Son of Man renewed. “When will that communion solemnity arrive at Strathblane, when there shall be a general weeping and mourning for sin, and men crying out, ‘0 that I knew where I might find him! ‘Such glorious seasons. are coming. Ere long the wilderness and solitary place shall become a fruitful field, and the fruitful field shall be counted for a forest. When I use these words they remind me of Mr. M’Donald of Urquhart, whom I heard preach from them on the evening of the Glasgow Fast, last April. I shall ever remember that holy man’s sermon. Surely he preached with the Spirit, and no other preaching can do good, I do not know whether to set him or Mr. Sherrif or my father highest of the preachers I have heard. Surely they are all precious in the sight of God, whose approbation and blessing if they gain, what more need they mind?”
Towards the autumn, without any express notice of the fact, it appears from the tone of his journal that the expectation of an early removal gradually wore away. Relieved from the restraint under which he had placed himself, he launches forth again with vigour into all the departments of useful knowledge that lay within his reach. At this time he had not completed his seventeenth year.
“Fridaij, September 2d. — For two days have been engaged without ceasing in reading Sir H. Davy’s Life, a book which, when I once begin, I do not know when or how to leave off. What an astonishing man he was! One would think that nothing in the world escaped his notice but the God who made it. He appears to have gained everything but the thing he most desired, and that was happiness. For as far as I may judge from his Memoirs, he had none of that to spare; and the reason is plain, because he sought it in meat and drink, in the theatre, the ball-room, and the billiard-table, in his medals, and his laboratory, instead of seeking it where alone it has ever yet been found — in God. My prayer to God would be, Lord, make me a Christian philosopher, or none at all. Withhold this world’s learning from me if the price of it is to be my interest in the Saviour.
“Get and read Dr. Erskine’s Letters, and Meditations of
Hall of Bunglass, immediately, also Middleton’s Biographia Evangelica.”
His sister Elizabeth, beautiful and wiusome in person, of precocious intellect, and early developed spiritual life, was removed this season, at the age of thirteen years and five months. This was the first breach in the circle of the family; and touching proofs appear from time to time through all their subsequent history that the treasure taken away was counted very precious, and that the blank stood long open refusing to be filled up. Her illness was protracted, and both its character and its duration tended at once to develop more fully the loveliness of the patient, and to make all the house cling more fondly to the spirit that was passing away. The case occurs so frequently that experienced observers have been inclined to set it down as a general law that consumption seems to single out as its victims the finest specimens of our kind. Whether it selects the refined, or refines after selecting them, it is certain that we have seen many very lovely sun-settings through that dark cloud which hangs so heavy and so constant on the horizon of humanity in our northern clime.
Indications from all quarters show that in those years Elizabeth was the centre of attraction for the whole family, and in some measure also for a wider circle. She read French, and had made some progress in Greek. Her disposition was both sweet and sprightly. The sick-room became the favourite place of resort. In this case too the insidious malady exerted its proverbial power of deception. Expectations of her recovery were entertained till near the close; acd, strange to say, it was the brightness of her eye that quenched these hopes at last. An eminent physician called for consultation said on’ retiring, in reply to her mother’s anxious inquiries, “I don’t like that bright eye,” Alas! this was the symptom which had hitherto sustained the hope of the fond but unskilled mother. Such a radiance she thought betokens a longer life on earth; it rather betokened an early removal to heaven. The parents, warned by the physician’s gentle but faithful hint, prepared themselves to resign the gift into the Giver’s hand. The desire of their eyes was removed with a stroke, but the faith of their hearts remained firm, and they cherished the memory of Elizabeth as still a member of the family, though taken home before the rest,
‘’Saturday, Sepiemher 10th. — After an illness of more than a year and a half’s duration, my dear sister seems now to be drawing near the end of all things earthly. It is cause of gratitude to the Father of mercies that she shows satisfactory evidence of a state of reconciliation to God, which at this moment affords me far greater comfort than her living to the utmost term of human existence destitute of the grace of God could have done.
“Ttiesday, September 3th. — Dear Elizabeth has been now for some hours in the enjoyment of immortality. She joined the general assembly and church of the first-born at a quarter before twelve this forenoon,
“My prayers for her are now ended, and I would now thank the Lord for the kindness of His ways of dealing with her — for her easy dismission from the body — above all, for the work of grace which He hath carried on in her heart.
“For myself and my surviving relations, my prayer is that the Lord would be pleased to make us possessors of the faith and patience of those who now inherit the promises, and then we shall also be made partakers of their
joy.”
“Sabbath, October 2d — Was chiefly occupied in reading The Pilgrim’s Progress, with Scott’s notes. Many have considered this book next in value to the Bible, and of any books I have yet read it is certainly the chief. The cause of its being so good is that it has so much of the Bible in it. Keading it with self-application, I thought that I had a good hope through grace that I was travelling the pilgrim’s road to the celestial city; but my conscience bears me witness that in nothing do I equal Christian save in his deviations from the strait and narrow way; and in these I am more than his equaL If the Lord would only bring me back to himself as often as I wander from his good ways, let Him do what seemeth Him good with me as far as other things are concerned.”
The entries in the journal during this season are frequent and full. They are all occupied with spiritual reflections, strangely mature considering the age of the writer, and interspersed with plans and resolutions for prosecuting his work. In order to economize space it is necessary to make selections from papers that are all of a similar character. It was a season of great intellectual activity and of rapid spiritual progress.
“Glasgow, 5 th November 1831. — This morning I left my father’s house in order to attend the session of college. In my present circumstances there is much which calls for ray most lively gratitude. I have a house to myself, which is rendered somewhat like home by having my sister and the furniture to which I was used there. I hope to derive much pleasure from attending upon the Greek, and especially the logic class. Above all, I have the means of grace — good ministers, good books, and the Bible. With the health I enjoy, and by the blessing of the Lord, this may be a profitable winter both for my intellectual and spiritual improvement. Lord, I thank Thee for Thy goodness.”
“Sabbath, Noverriber 6th. — Renewed my solemn engagements to be the Lord’s — to fight against sin, the world, the flesh, and the devil — to be for the Lord, and for Him alone. May He grant that in all circumstances wherein I may be placed His glory may be the object of all my exertions, and His word and will the rule of all my actions.
“Monday, Novemher 7th. — I am to attend the Greek and logic classes this winter. Though I cannot be certain that it Will be at all times expedient or even practicable to follow them out, I make the following suggestions for the employment of my time till the Christmas recess: —
“Rise at a quarter to 7. Read Henry’s Commentary. Attend Greek and logic classes from half-past 7 to half-past 9. Breakfast. 1 0 to 11 write logic lectures. 11 to 1 2 attend the logic class. 1 2 to 2 write letters; prepare for Greek; write notes of the logic lectures; get books from the library, etc. 2 to 3 Greek class. 3 to 4 walk, dine. 4 to 6 Greek. 6 to 7 logic. 7 tea. Half-past 7 to 9 logic. 9 worship. Half-past 9 to half-past 12 read two chapters of Greek Testament, and go to bed.
“Mem. — Read Potter’s Antiquities. Theatre of Greeks, Eollin’s History.
“Sabbath, November 27 ih. — A pain at one time in my breast and at another time in my side, made me apprehend that earth and the things of earth were to me near a close. These apprehensions the Lord has disappointed, and the day of my visitation is still lengthened out. 0 may I improve it for the gracious end for which it has been given!
“I would wish to improve time better. For this purpose I would avoid all unnecessary or useless visiting, never go out to any party more than once in the week, and seldomer if I can. Never be more than seven hours at a time in bed during the winter, except when unwell, or deprived of my usual rest. Spend as short time as possible on my meals when by myself. Always carry about some book for occupying odd minutes. Attend to my most necessary studies first. Do things methodically.
“There are a few things which I would like to do before my next birthday, viz,: — Finish my lives of Christian authors for the Tract Society. Write some life for the London Tract Society’s series. Form a society for religious purposes among the sons of clergymen attending the College. Write a collection of hymns for young men.
“Tuesday, December 6th. — For some days past have been very busy preparing for the Greek Prize Profession, and, if well, must be equally busy for two weeks longer. It is hard work. Two months of it would make me unfit for any exertion. And this is all for a single prize, which I am far from being sure of gaining, and which, though gained, can do me little good. How different from that prize wliicli is held out to the acceptance of all, and which will impart joy unmingled, honour unfading, and happiness eternal, on its possessor! For this prize may I be continually straining every nerve, and in due time, by grace from on high keeping me from fainting, I shall reap.
“Thursday, Dec. 2 2d — This was the day of the Greek Prize Profession. The competitors were, Georgius Forsythe, Jacobus Connal and Hamilton, Joannes Wardlaw, Jos, Crompton, and Ramsay Campbell I professed the Odyssey and Iliad, 2 books of Herodotus, 5 of Xenophon, 3 Tragedies of Sophocles, and 8 of Euripides.”
At the close of the session he obtained the first prize in this examination, besides the first in logic and the fifth in Greek,
This is a very formidable ordeal through which all regulq,r students of arts in the University are obliged to pass. Each student takes his seat successively, and alone, on an old arm-chair, which has for its bottom a smooth black stone of unknown antiquity and virtue. In the case of those who are satisfied with the minimum, an officer with a mace and a sand-glass standing by, calls out “ad alium, Domine” when the subject has been five minutes under the operation, and he is accordingly set at liberty, like a sheep from the washing, to make way for the next. But when the “mighties” contend for the mastery, a whole day is set apart for the conflict, and the arena is crowded by anxious and interested spectators.
The scene, as it occurred on a preceding year, has been photographed by Hamilton’s pen in his usual style. In reviewing the memoir of James Halley (3d Edition, 1850), he introduced the following description: —
“When we arrived at Glasgow College, more than twenty years ago, the nom de guerre which we heard in its busy class-rooms most frequent and most formidable was Jacobus Halley. We soon acquainted ourselves with the personal appearance of this literary Goliath. He was a tall youth, with large bones, and a light springy step. He had a high and cylindrical head, something like what we suppose Sir Walter Scott’s must have been. His hair was light, inclining to red. He had evidently lost the sight of one eye, and often applied his forefinger to the lid, as if it were still in pain; but through the survivor there streamed an animation sufficient for many ordinary eyes; and through every pore of his pale and etiolated countenance there radiated a penetration and alertness which made him look as if he were seeing with all his face. When some hard question in prosody was performing the circuit of the silent benches, the concentration on that corner of the class-room showed that the hopes of the Grccci rested with this fair-haired Porson; and when he rose to read Homer or Aristophanes, the long paragraph which Sir Daniel allowed him to appropriate, and the loud applause which greeted the brilliant translation, announced a favourite of the Professor, and a champion of the students. We still remember his Blackstone examination. It was a day in the dingy Glasgow December, and the great hall of the library, with its solemn folios, was made cheerful by a splendid fire; and round the awful chair, with its sand-glass suspended in laurel, was congregated a huge ring of red-robed spectators, whom the heavy swing of the great college bell was constantly augmenting. Depositing their arms — vast piles of Greek books — the challengers took their places. We only recollect those who, in Hebrew phrase, would be called the * three mighties.’ And when, preceded by the macer, and followed by his learned colleagues, in his shining boots and rustling gown of Oxford silk, Professor Sandford took his place, it might be seen in the sparkle of his eye, and the proud elasticity of his graceful movements, that a great contest was coming off. They were the happy days before he tried to be a statesman, and when his favoured class enjoyed the full treasures of his accomplished mind, and the fresh outpourings of his enthusiastic eloquence. The tournay commenced with one whose terse renderings, and clear categoric answers, bewrayed the mathematical precision which was soon to win the senior wranglership at Cambridge.^ Then followed a scholar less dry, but equally concinnate, whose manly intellect and elegant erudition were destined to succeed Arnold at Eugby, and impart new dignity to the Deanery which Milner once filled at Carlisle.^ And so fine and unfaltering was the demonstration made by each, that in common years either must have won the prize. But, ‘ad alium, Domine’ it still was Halley’s turn. Tripping nimbly forward, and depositing on the table the learned heap with whose contents his cool assured look bespoke a confident acquaintance; first prose, then poetry, he turned
1 Archibald Smith, Esq. of Jordan Hill.
‘Now Archbishop of Canterbury.
it all into English, so fluent and so happy; and all hard questions of syntax and archjeology he answered with such an easy completeness that examiners and onlookers alike felt it the ne plus ultra of scholarship, and the rapture with which it was received left no doubt regarding the result.
“This is the student whose fame still lingers within the halls of his Alma Mater, and of whom a loving friend has compiled the faithful memoir which suggested this notice.”
About the New Year, the earnest student was drawn unwittingly into a scene of dissipation, which he neither enjoyed nor approved. It may not be amiss to submit here the letter to his sister, in which he describes his misfortune, to show that in the aristocratic circles of Glasgow at that time hospitality was sometimes more profuse than refined. The tendency in a wealthy commercial community is to exhibit in their entertainments a sublime indifference to pecuniary cost; and those among them who have adopted a different standard of measurement find it difficult to stem the tide: —
“January 1832.
“My dear Maky, — On Friday Jane and I went to Mr. ’s in the expectation of getting tea, as had been
promised, but were a good deal surprised to find instead a ball! I, who could not dance, was glad to be kept in
countenance by so grave men as the Messrs. P and
D. S. There were at least forty young people.
They got two urns filled with negus set in the lobby, and
1 English Presbyterian Messenger, Feb. 1851.
all were allowed to take as much as they chose; one little girl took seven glasses, and was so ill that she had to go to bed. It was near twelve before we got home. Though
the room was very hot we got no cold. I saw Mr. P
next day, and he said it was after one before all was over.”
He expresses no opinion on the character of the entertainment. His only interest in the matter concerned the loss of an evening. Time was his treasure, and he mounted guard upon it with a miser’s jealousy.
The summer vacation of 1832 was spent at home in constant activity. His efforts seem to have been equally divided between the prosecution of his intellectual studies and the cultivation of his own spiritual life. The journals exhibit as usual an alternation of hard head-work and tender spiritual aspirations. The dispensation of the Lord’s Supper in his father’s congregation is “a well in the desert.” The perusal of Baxter’s writings makes him ashamed of his backwardness in the divine life: the Sabbath-school opens up to him an unlimited sphere of activity and enjoyment.
“Sabbath, July 29th. — This day fortnight I was at Kippen Sacrament, and I bless the Lord for having brought me there, for surely His banner over me then was love. While seated at His table my heart was drawn out after Jesus, and melted at the contemplation of His sufferings. I felt an inexpressible delight in again surrendering myself to Him and His service, and was willing to do or be anything for His sake. I felt willing to be with Him even then — absent from the body, present with the Lord. To be in such a frame always — how happy! But this treacherous heart will not be long one way, especially in the right way; and without a constant administration of grace from on high, it is awful to think to what depths of wickedness it will descend.
“I have much happiness in teaching the Sabbath -school. This would be greatly increased, no doubt, could I satisfy myself that a work of grace was really going on in the souls of any of the children. But the beginnings of gTace are often imperceptible to outward observation.”
Towards the close of this year we find him again in Glasgow, attending the University for the third session. The following letter is addressed to his youngest sister, then a very little child: —
“November 1832.
“My dear Jane, — I send you this letter because it will contain nothing but what is level to your capacity, and which, at the same time, will be interesting to you, namely, the assurance that I am quite well, and am your most affectionate brother, James Hamilton.
“P.S. — There have been sad riots in Paisley yesterday. I have seen no accounts, but have heard plenty. They were attacking the doctors, and breaking their windows. No life was lost. Paisley will never be my birthplace after this, unless it mend its ways, J. H.”
This was the season of the first outbreak of cholera in this country, and the riots to which he refers were certain ebullitions, partial and temporary, of the poor people, when a wild suspicion for the moment took possession of them that the doctors designedly propagated the disease.
“Saturdai/, November 10th. — This has been a week of constant occupation, whether to the purpose is a different consideration. If I live to the winter’s close, I expect to have many weeks of unremitting toil. Thus it is that men labour for the meat which perisheth, and thus I laboui” for knowledge which I may speedily forget, or which, if remembered, I may never have opportunities of turning to account. But how few thus labour for the bread of life — how few spend their days and nights in seeking to know God and Jesus whom He hath sent, and whom to know is everlasting life!
“Much study is a weariness to the bodily frame, and its exhausting influences soon tell upon the mind. How cruel to themselves are those men of literature and science who make a working day of the Sabbath! — who bitterly complain of the hardships of the way in which they travel, but refuse to avail themselves of the rest and refreshment the Sabbath periodically brings round — who are conscious that they are pilgrims in a desert, but refuse to turn aside to that oasis which meets them at the close of every six days’ journey.”
TO HIS SISTER.
“December 5th, 1832. “Dr. “Wardlaw was to have delivered a grand sermon against Establishments on Sabbath night, but studied so hard during the week that on Sabbath neither he nor the sermon was. forthcoming. Just like some acquaintances of mine last winter (I do not include myself in the number), who used to sit up so late preparing for the Greek
D class, that they slept so long in the morning that the Greek class had to do without them.
“Dr. Thomson’s geographical ladies are on the increase.
J. H.”
The brief postscript refers to a praiseworthy effort made by the late Dr. James Thomson, Professor of Mathematics in Glasgow, and father of Sir William Thomson, who now occupies and honours the Chair of Natural Philosophy in the same University, to extend the benefits of a higher education to the citizens generally, and especially to the female sex. He was the first of our academic men in Scotland, as far as we know, who made the attempt; and it is only now that both in Ediaburgh and Glasgow his idea has begun to be carried out in a systematic manner, and on a larger scale.
The allusion in the body of the letter, though playfuUy expressed, as spoken to a child, points to what was at that period a great and keen ecclesiastical controversy in Scotland. At that early period the question which has risen to the surface of practical politics in our own day, whether there should be an Endowed and Established Church, was debated with much earnestness and not a little acrimony. The champions on both sides were led at times to take up extreme positions; and these excesses have impeded somewhat the progress of that review which the great problem is undergoing now; but in the main that old battle did much to prepare the way for a better era, which seems now to be dawning on the nation. In the allusion to the indisposition which prevented Dr. Wardlaw from delivering his promised lecture on behalf of a Voluntary
Church, our student betrays somewhat of the class prejudice with which, at that period, the zealous members of the Establishment were tinged. In his circumstances he could not but adopt the views of those by whom he was immediately surrounded, especially as his father and the godly circle of his associates were all attached to the Established Church, However, notwithstanding the partial alienation which this controversy produced, young Hamilton cherished even then a very high respect for Dr. Wardlaw, and lived, as these pages in the proper place will prove, to pronounce the Church’s common eulogy over his grave.
We resume the journal
“Saturday, December Mh, 1832. — Since Thursday last week I have every evening had some engagement or other — to a lecture, to a meeting, to dinner, etc, each occupying, I should say, more than two hours at an average, and, with one day’s exception, I am similarly engaged for all next week. Now, all this appears to me quite wrong. I am here at great expense to my father, for the avowed purpose of prosecuting my studies at College, and adding to my previous information. And for this purpose all the time I have is short enough, after making deductions for those necessary interruptions occasioned by calls from friends, letter- writing, and a hundred other things. Now, if I choose to accept of every invitation, and at the same time am desirous to obtain a respectable standing in my classes, I must redeem the time thus squandered from what quarter I can get it — that is to say, from sleep; in other words, from health, for a proper measure of sleep is as essential to health as time is to study. I am therefore determined to take effectual measures for diminishing these encroachments on my leisure, should I be spared till after the approaching holidays. Once going out, whether to breakfast, tea, or dinner, is sufficient for one week. Since Monday ten full hours have been spent in College-meetings, visits, etc. Of these at least eight may be spared in all time coming.
“Time is a talent, and, with all the rest, must be accounted for. If called on to account for the way in which each moment of my time has been employed to a fellow-mortal, how silly and contemptible would the reckoning appear! What, then, must the ordinary employment of them appear when viewed in the light of eternity?”
“January 2, 1833. — During the past year I have read thirty-nine duodecimos, eighteen octavos, and one quarto — in all fifty-eight volumes. I also wrote an abridgment of Boston on Fasting, a translation of Tlieophrastus, an essay on the Rhetoric of Aristotle, another on the Kule of Faith, etc.”
A little later, 8th January, he writes to his father: — “This is the best time of the College — this and the next two months, — when we have a good steady supply of work, but not too much, and few interruptions.” This short sentence, we think, exhibits the leau-iddal of a student’s spirit. Here is a strong and healthful appetite. The “supply” he desires and rejoices in is “a supply of work.” He is supremely happy in the prospect; for, on the one hand, as the interruptions will be few, the quantity of work will be sufficiently large; and, on the other hand, prudential considerations, springing from experience regarding his health, are satisfied by the reflection that there will not be too much.
The summer vacation of 1833 was spent at home in the usual way. Few memorials of that season remain, except the inevitable and formidable lists of books read, and hours daily occupied, with here and there a hearty plunge either into himself or into some injudicious visitor for the loss of half a day. Neither from letters nor journals can any continuous narrative be constructed: but as you follow the track of the student you meet evidences on every side of the same constant and zealous labour. Both his instincts and his adopted principles pressed him continually forward. Idleness and procrastination were alien alike to his constitution and his convictions. His mind was a bow always bent; to be unstrung was to be unhappy. The current of his life was always flowing, never stagnant, never even slow.
Here and there, as in the next extract, we obtain glimpses of a conflict which Paul waged long ago between two natures, a worse and a better, an old and a new, in his own breast. In this matter, however, the only safe and healthy state is a state of active warfare, for victory will not be complete until the pilgrimage is done.
“Thursday, June 6th, 1833. — On looking back I see a great many things to cause self-abasement. In everything I come short, but there are some particular deficiencies with which I feel myself especially chargeable. One of them is a want of candour, often attributing to the worst of two motives particular actions of certain individuals.
This is a very odious and sinful spirit, and I humbly pray that I may he delivered from it in time to come. Nearly allied to this is a censorious disposition, commenting on the faults of others, and in frequently noticing the failings even of the excellent of the earth. I waste much invaluable time; the consequence of which is that I do not make that progress in learning that I ought, do little good, and leave to the last things of high importance. By frequently lying so long in bed in the morning I leave myself little time for reading the Bible, and am hurried in devotion. Often listless and unengaged in family and public worship. I have again and again found myself more willing to pass by a wrong thing in another, as if I had not observed it, than incur the bad opinion or ill-will of man by standing up for the honour of God — as if the good opinion of man were better than the favour of God.
0 Lord, lay not these sins to my charge. Against these
1 would especially watch and strive in the time to come, by the aid of Divine grace.”
“Sabbath, August 11, 1833. — In reading Henry Martyn’s Memoirs, the sacrifices he made that he might do good to souls could not fail to press upon me a painful and troubling sense of the little good that I have done, and the little labour which I have undergone in the cause of God. Oh for that spirit by which he was actuated, or rather, that that mind which was in Christ may be also in me! Then will I overcome this fear of man, which has hitherto proved to me such a snare, and kept me silent and inactive when I should have been zealous for the Lord of Hosts. Then will no sacrifice — nothing in the way of performance so difficult, or of endurance so painful — cause me for a moment to hesitate when the salvation of souls is at stake. I have this day been thinking that I may find it my duty to go and preach the gospel to the heathen. Before I can do so — and if I see a call of God to do so, I trust I shall — what self-denial will be needful! What a missionary I would make at present — with a mind so filled with schemes about academic distinction, so vain and earthly in all its tendencies, so apt to be dismayed by every discouraging circumstance!”
In the beginning of November, braced up in health as well as fm*nished in mind, the student betook himself once more to his philosophical studies in Glasgow.
In the fourth and last year of their undergraduate course, students at the University of Glasgow attend what is called the Natural Philosophy class. Like most of the other classes, it meets twice a day; the first hour is occupied with prelections by the Professor, and the second with a public examination of the students on subjects which have been previously explained. It is a course of applied mathematics, ranging over mechanics, optics, electricity, and other departments of physics. The class was at that time competently conducted by the late Mr. Meikleham. The examinations were oral and public; each student answered in presence of all his peers. This system, combined with the practice of awarding prizes at the close of the session by the majority of votes, proved, under a competent master, eminently successful. It produced in the pupils a healthful, well-sustained enthusiasm.
As the students entered the class with various measures of mathematical acquirements, the Professor at the commencement of the session gauged the capacity of each, and ever afterwards took care to accommodate the depth of his question to the depth of the scholar’s attainments. Some were permitted, when their turn came round, to answer respectably a simple interrogatory regarding the more obvious physical laws, while another was permitted to perform a solo with chalk on a blackboard among the intricacies of algebraic formularies. On these occasions, human nature, instead of being dammed up, was permitted freely to flow, and the stream did yeoman service in driving round the educational machinery. When the Professor had chosen his man, and the chosen man, justifying his teacher’s confidence, had tunnelled through his mountain, and emerged, chalk in hand and blush on countenance, on the other side, then the old man’s eye glistened in liquid delight, and his formal “Silence, gentlemen,” was manifestly not meant to check, far less to extinguish, the rapturous applause with which the roof was by this time ringing. In such scenes, and by such methods, a generous rivalry was stimulated, and ordinarily those men who strove hardest for the mastery in the class were sworn friends ever after on the wide stage of the world.
A surviving fellow- student delights to tell how the Professor on one occasion called up Hamilton to demonstrate the proposition from Newton’s Princvpia, Book i. sect. 3, that “if a body revolve in an ellipse, the force tending to the focus of the ellipse varies inversely as the square of the distance,” and how he performed his task in such a manner as to fill the face of the venerable but ruddy philosopher with beaming delight, and draw forth from the youthful audience a louder and more articulate satisfaction. Nor is the narrator an incompetent judge of prowess in these recondite matters. He is Dr. John Cunningham, a man of prodigious mathematical faculties and attainments, a Christian of the same primitive and unadorned type with the late Michael Faraday, and, like him, uniting the most retiring and modest simplicity of character with the highest scientific acquisitions. This man, now venerable in years and aspect, has devoted his life as a missionary to the Jews in London. A philosopher who might have coped with any of his contemporaries in plying the calculus which extorts from Nature her secrets, treads the dark narrow lanes, and climbs the dark narrow stairs, of the metropolis, seeking the lost sheep of the house of Israel. There he labours, sowing good seed on beaten way-sides, contented to follow his Master’s footsteps where he is not ‘* seen of men.”^ John Cunningham cherished a fond friendship for his fellow-student while he lived, and survives to lament his comparatively early removal.
There is not much of permanent interest in the letters and journals of this session. A few brief extracts are subjoined.
1 Some years since I had occasion to meet a Wesleyan missionary from the Fiji Islands, on leave of absence in England for the benefit of his health, and was much interested in learning that he was the brother of Mr. Adams the astronomer, who, simultaneously with Levemer, but independently, discovered the planet Neptune. How diverse on the surface, and yet how closely connected in the deep, were the positions and occupations of the two brothers! One, in the central home of British science, measuring out the heavens, and determining where an unseen planet must be rolling; the other on a small speck of earth standing out from the surface of the southern ocean, labouring to win some degraded savages to Christ. Sublime occupations both! Par iu)biU fratrvM I” December 13<A, 1833.
“My deae Maey, — I am glad that the book of travels gives satisfaction. By reading such books, taking care to follow the route of the traveller on a map, you may soon come to have a good knowledge of the geography of different countries, along with a great deal of information besides which it is desirable to possess. It is no waste of time to read good voyages and travels, the lives of great men, and works of history. I think now that if I could manage it I would read a multitude of such books, and regret having read so few when I had better opportunities. This winter I do not expect to have one, hour for such purposes, nor can I well anticipate the time when I shall have sufficient leisure to acquire much of what I am horrified at the idea of wanting — general knowledge. I therefore consider myself entitled to prescribe to you what I have myself failed in, in the same way that a condemned criminal may exhort others to take warning from his fate.”
“Sabbath, March 9, 1834. — I went to hear Dr. Cooke of Belfast with my dear friend Hanna this evening. He goes home to-morrow. The Lord watch between him and me when we are parted from one another! 1 felt that I have been much the better for his conversation during the short intervals that we have been together during these few days. He has the right views of what a minister should do and be. Would that there were many such!”
The friendship thus begun continued unbroken to the last, and Dr. Hanna survives to mourn with us the absence of a precious member from the ever lessening circle of kindred spirits that gravitated towards each other by the force of common aspirations in those early days.
“16th April 1834.
“My deae Fathek, — Friday is a holiday, but I must stay in town, comforting myself with the prospect that a fortnight will bring me home for altogether. I have got an addition to my library — a very beautiful copy of Magee on the Atonement. It is a present from the students, and from the inscription having something about ’ zeal for the best interests of the University,’ I suppose it is given for the same reason for which Dr. Fleming and others would say it should have been withheld. My conscience does not reproach me for the manner in which I have exercised my rights as a member of Glasgow University. If political principles be hereditary, I apprehend mine ought to be comprehended in this — 1. What is right is the true expediency; 2. The real rights and interests of the many should be preferred to the alleged interests of the few. Whether this be Whiggism, or whatever it be, I am not conscious of having done anything contrary to it in these matters. And though I was always aware, and am now more than ever, that this was not the way to secure the favour of Professors, I have the satisfaction of knowing that there is more honesty, kind-heartedness, and talent among the twenty-four names attached to this present than are to be found in the majority of the faculty.”
The preceding letter alludes to the lively contest between the Liberal and Conservative parties, which terminated in the election of the late Lord Cockburn, one of the judges of the Court of Session, as Lord Rector of the
College. It is quite refreshing to hear the clear, frank confession of a Liberal faith in the sphere of temporal politics, from the lips of this grave and studious youth. Nor is it merely an adherence to a party through hereditary prejudice. It is manifestly a matter of the judgment, and based upon what he considered the right and the true. So effectively had Hamilton led the Liberal phalanx in that campaign that the victors resolved to express and record their satisfaction by a united and formal presentation. The inscription, with its list of appended names, is subjoined. The principles that were then dwelling in the breasts of generous youths have since that time told effectively in various places and in various spheres.
There is scarcely any species of certificate on which we should be inclined to set a higher value than the spontaneous and enthusiastic acclaim of his feUow-students.
“College of Glasgow, 1834.” Presented by ’ the Cockbum Committee ’ to Mr. James Hamilton, the son of a most learned, upright, and pious father, in testimony of their high sense of his distinguished talents, profound erudition, indefatigable industry, stern integrity, and honest independent zeal for the beat interests of the University.
Robert Walter Stewart, M.A- William Park, M.A.
John Craufurd, Med. Thomas Dymock, M.A.
Alexander P. Stewart, do. Thomas Thomson, Arts.
James Davidson, Arts. David Stewart, Arts.
Colin Campbell, Jim. Joseph Compton, Arts.
William H. Graham, Arts. George B. Moncrieff, do.
David Thomson, do. William J. Uawin, B.A.
W. Urquhart, do. John M. Douglas, Arts.
a W. Nesbitt, Med. Alexander P. Forbes, Arts.
Adam Roxburgh, Theol. Michael Connal, do.
John S. Wardlaw. George R. Kenedy, Theol.
James Halley, A.B. Alexander Gardiner, A.M.”
Conflicts on various subjects between the students and the Professors were of frequent occurrence in those days, and constituted interesting episodes in the otherwise dull routine of College life. They have long passed away, and it is not necessary to revive them. Suffice it to remark, generally, that liberal ideas on many subjects were invading the monkish cloisters, and ordinarily the students caught the spirit of the age somewhat earlier than their seniors. Hence some smart skirmishes between the more advanced and more liberal-minded students on the one hand, and the dignified Conservative heads of the Senatus on the other — not on points of theology or philosophy, but on certain practical matters of administration. In short, some wavelets from the great storm that raged outside between those who demanded reform and those who resisted it, had leapt over the dark battlements of the ancient University, and raised an unwonted commotion in, its hitherto still, if not stagnant, waters.
On one occasion about this period the collision between the progress of Liberal ideas among the students, and the Conservative tendencies of the Senatus, went so far as to threaten danger to the discipline of the University. The students plied the Senatus with “memorials,” and the Senatus launched forth “minutes” against the students, until the duel assumed ominous proportions. Threats of expulsion were introduced, not very skiKully, into the minutes. These were repaid with interest by memorials, drawn up in a phraseology of conventional respectfulness which was not meant to conceal.
as one of the remonstrants characterized it, “an under-current of contempt.”
The commonplace observation, it may be franldy confessed, was true of those wars, — there were faults on both sides. The students were too bold and self-confident, but the Professors lacked the wisdom and generosity that would have directed, instead of merely repressing, the impetuosity of youth.
Another summer vacation passes without change of methods, and it may therefore be left without a record. Next session he entered the classes of theology. He does not signalize this stage of his progress by any permanent notice in either letters or journals. The obvious reason of this reticence is, that the choice of his profession had been decidedly made long before. He did not need to consider, at the close of his undergraduate course, what direction should be given to his studies in the next stage of his progress. The choice of his sphere and work was made at a very tender age, and it was made with a complete intelligence. I have never known any one more constantly and thoroughly dedicated to the Lord’s service, like Samuel, from his birth, in his childhood, and in his mature age. The vows of his father, uttered before his birth, were fondly accepted by himself as soon as his understanding opened. His father’s judgment became his own; and at no subsequent period did he ever manifest any tendency either to reverse the decision he had formed, or to regret the step he had taken. His heart was all in it, and always in it.
If, a few years after this date, and immediately before he was called to the ministry, he experienced some desires to devote himself to botany, and relative literature, there was still no dubiety as to the aim of his life. With his tastes and acquirements in natural science on the one side, and his physical constitution, feeble in those organs on which a preacher must mainly rely, on the other, it is not wonderful that he should have entertained the question as to the position in which his talents might be best laid out in the service of God; but whatever amount of debate was admitted at any time, it was a debate as to means, and not as to end. He was bought with a price, and he was bent on glorifying the Lord that bought him. The only inquiry he made at any stage was. How and where may the talents intrusted to me be most profitably expended in my Master’s cause?
In some of the theological classes of the University at that time a beneficial influence was exerted upon the students, but in others, if the young men did not educate themselves, they fared the worse. In some cases patronage had filled a chair in accordance with some obscure private connexions, in flagrant defiance alike of the public opinion and the public good. A person endued with a perennial childishness, not very many degrees above absolute imbecility, might, if he gained the patron’s favour, be placed in a chair in which he should doze and vegetate for half a century, to the unspeakable injury of two generations. In those days there was neither security for a right appointment at first, nor provision for retirement when age and infirmity had done their work. The aged incumbent must live, although the students should be left to take care of themselves. But in Providence compensations come up in a wonderful manner, when and where they are most wanted. The particular form in which these preserving and healing powers of nature appeared in the College of Glasgow when James Hamilton studied theology there, was a liberal, earnest, patriotic spirit, diffused in large measure among the students. If they shivered sometimes when condemned to sit out their hour on the benches of the class-room, they kept themselves warm by combining together both for mental discipline and spiritual health. To the theological societies and the missionary meetings of those days the memory of many men now scattered over the world in the service of the gospel still fondly reverts, as to springs of water in a dry place. By means of earnest and able teachers in departments where such held office, or in spite of a teaching that was cold or incompetent where that obstacle unfortunately stood in the way, many of the students that passed through the Hall in line with Hamilton, have, through God’s good hand upon them, reached and held important positions in the Christian Church.
His younger brother having this year entered the University, he writes to his sister: —
“Nov. 5th, 1834.
“My dear Mary, — ... William is enjoying the Latin very much, — as much as I enjoy the chemistry.... Dr. M’Turk gave his first lecture yesterday, and, like my neighbours, I had pen and ink ready for taking notes, but as nothing notable occurred most of us saved our paper, but I did not see anybody sleeping. Dr. M’Gill’s lectures make amends, and if his future lectures be equal to the two which I have heard, I shall never bear to hear any one speak disparagingly of them. William Burns, of Kilsyth, is in the Hall with me, so are a good many of last year’s acquaintances, some strangers too.”
The allusion to William Burns, singled out from all the rest, and named as his class-fellow, in the light of subsequent events seems almost prophetic. It is altogether prophetic in the best sense; for that deep congruity of spirit which drew these two together in their youth, continued in force, and in due time knit them into a pair, one at home and another abroad, in the mission work. United thus by one spirit in early life, in their death, as we shall find in the course of our narrative, they were not divided.
“Glasgow, Nov. 28, 1834.
“My DEA.R Jane, — Yesterday, you know, was my birthday, and I lay awake a long while, scarcely believing that I could be twenty years of age. And I have just been thinking that in these twenty years more time has been wasted than Milton took to compose Paradise Lost, or Newton to write the Principia. If you be a good arithmetician, you may perhaps get on to learn mathematics, and then you will be able, like Mrs. Somerville, to understand the Principia, which is more perhaps than other three ladies in England do....
“Edward Irving has been in town for more than a month, meeting with a few people in the Lyceum Rooms every Sabbath. I believe he performs very little of the service
E himself, merely addressing the congregation in a few words before the close. His health is bad. It is supposed that his lungs are diseased. Three Sabbaths ago I met him riding in the High Street, being the first time that I have seen him since he used to play with me in the old manse of Strathblane. He has seen changes since that time, and has made the sad descent from the highest popularity to the deepest obscurity.”
A casual meeting for a moment between Edward Irving and James Hamilton, as two atoms meet in the air, then pass, and never meet again! History will connect both with the National Scotch Church in Loudon. How like, and yet how diverse! In the one, piety, genius, power, all wrecked by a wayward spirit, and an enthusiasm which mightily impelled, without a sober judgment to direct; in the other, piety, genius, and a Christ-like meekness, which did more execution upon the enemies of God and man than any giant-champion who might make the battle-ground shake beneath his feet. When the engine slips off the rails, the skilfulness of its structure and the force of its fire avail it nothing.
As a student, James Hamilton was as blithe and discursive as a butterfly, but as busy and successful as a bee. His learning was spread wide, but it was not therefore spread thin. While he was engaged in the professional study of theology, he contrived to carry on always some under-plot without marring his main pursuit. Of his subsidiary studies, botany, natural history, and chemistry were the chief Botany was a life-long recreation, but in this year, and during the currency of his theological course, he made an earnest and not unsuccessful inroad on the domain of chemistry. A class-room, in the form and of the dimensions of a small theatre, had been built beyond the walls of the College, to accommodate the nimibers who flocked to the study of chemistry under the late eminent Professor Dr. Thomas Thomson. I remember well a pilgrimage made by a few students from the Divinity Hall at the close of the session to the chemistry class-room, where our sectional pride was abundantly gratified by hearing Hamilton called to receive the first prize in a class of several hundreds engaged professionally in the study of medicine. In great glee we marched along College Street to see Hamilton “beat the medicals.”
It is right, and may be useful to mention here, that while he was indebted for success in these sciences to his own intellectual aptitude and his persevering zeal, he was indebted, under Providence, for the opportunity to a moderate patrimony, which relieved him wholly from the necessity of working for his bread. “While Hamilton was thus enabled to enrich his mind, and lay in precious stores for future use, James Halley, and other companions and contemporaries less gifted, were obliged to toil four or five hours every day gi-inding juniors, in order to procure the means of attending the University themselves. Very little provision was made in those days for assisting students who might have shown themselves worthy of being assisted. For the most part the bursaries that existed were at the disposal of patrons who admitted no influence except that of private partialities. Better days have come for Scottish students. A great number of bursaries have been instituted since that date, almost all open to public competition. Of late years not a few princely gifts have been bestowed or bequeathed by patriotic private citizens, for the purpose of encouraging learning in connexion with the Scotch Universities. Although few and feeble in comparison with the rich foundations of Oxford .and Cambridge, some endowed scholarships are now in full operation, especially in Edinburgh, which enable young men of intellect and energy to prosecute their studies somewhat beyond the period of the ordinary curriculum, without the necessity of toiling all the time for daily bread.
This session was suddenly and prematurely closed on the 16th of April, by the heaviest stroke that had ever fallen on his head — the death of his father. On the 5th, eleven days before his decease, he preached a public sermon in St. David’s Church, Glasgow. It so happened that on that occasion I saw and heard the minister of Strathblane for the first and last time. I remember well both his figure and fervent manner as he preached. He gave me the impression of the Baptist preparing the way of the Lord, with none of the Baptist’s sternness. I stood in awe before him, but it was the awe inspired by the tenderness of a messenger who besought us to be reconciled to God. From want of vigour in the chest, his voice was not well under control, — indeed the power of his preaching owed little to the instrument by which the message wasi articulated. It was not the measured cadence of a cultivated orator that carried you away, it was the holy elevated earnestness of the man that made a listener’s heart burn within him, in spite of defective vocal modulations.
James spent some hours with his father that evening in Glasgow, in animated conversation on the themes which parent and child relished in common — the things that concerned the kingdom of Christ, and next morning saw him off by the stage to Strathblane. It was the last meeting of these two, who had been very lovely in their lives. He preached in his own church on the following Sabbath, was taken ill on Monday, and, after a very short illness, gently passed away.
The great bereavement was simply and briefly announced in a letter to his uncle, the publisher in London, the iirst of a long series affectionately written by the nephew, and affectionately preserved by the uncle, which will afford us important aid at every stage of our narrative, even to its close.
“Strathblane, April 11th, 1835.” My dear Uncle, — On Monday my dear father complained that he felt unwell, and at tea-time was seized with a shivering fit, and persuaded to go to bed. It, seemed at first to be merely a cold, and no danger was at all apprehended, — so much so that I was not sent for from town; but he had a worse night on Wednesday, and yesterday morning my mother sent to town for Dr. Rainy. About mid-day yesterday it was evident that his strength was giving way, and when Dr. Rainy arrived at ten in the evening, he found him so low that he had no hope of his recovery. His throat, which had been much inflamed, had now become greatly suppurated. He only lingered till midnight, and then his prepared spirit winged its flight to that heaven which had so long been its home. Oh, my dear imcle, you know how unsearchable are His ways, and this is one of them. Mamma was dreadfully agitated last night, but is more composed to-day. It was only this morning, when Dr. Rainy returned to town, that I heard that my father was so ill, and that he was gone. I am not able to give more particulars at present, but his mind was happy, happy,
“Pray for us, and God bless you, my dear uncle. — Your afiectionate nephew, James Hamilton.”
It will be convenient to introduce here an extract on the same subject from his journal, although it is dated at Easterhouse in the beginning of the following year: —
“What have I been called to see and feel since I made my last entry in this journal! Since then I have experienced at least one dangerous illness, have lost a father such as few had to lose, and I, and those who are dearest to me, have gone from a home which we loved, and where we almost dreamed that we were to abide for ever, to sojourn in what we may truly call a stranger-land. Last winter was almost entirely given up to the acquisition of human knowledge, and the pursuits of literary distinction. There was every appearance that my wishes would be gratified. On Thursday, the 1 6th of April, having just completed an essay which I expected would gain a prize, and as the day was one of the most beautiful days that ever lighted up the spring, I wandered four or five miles up the Clyde in search of plants. Little did I imagine, as I looked forward to my return home, which another fortnight would bring about, and laid schemes of employment and recreation for the summer, and thought of the possible gratification which might be occasioned to those I most fondly loved by a successful termination of the winter’s toils, — little did I imagine that at that very hour the hand of death was on the object of my warmest affections, and that next day I should be called to a desolate home, to fin/l my mother broken-hearted, my brothers and sisters a’ZL sick of an alarming malady, and my father’s lifeless rem Ains. In a few days I myself was taken ill with sore tAroat also; and as if to pour contempt on all my pride, when the 1st of May arrived, my medal and my prize- books came in the evening, and found me in bed, scarcely begun to recover. After such an admonition I would be more brutish than any man if I did not regard this world’s honours and pleasures as vanity. The warning, I kust, has not been altogether in vain. I now feel alarmed when mere secular studies are beginning to occupy the place which God claims for Himself. 0 that He were more constantly and indisputably supreme in my affections! Till His throne be established here, if He ha purposes of mercy towards me. He will visit my backshdings, and when His mercies fail to accomplish it, make Himself remembered by ’ terrible things in righteousness.’ Lord, help me to live above the world. Keep me from ever being so engrossed by its cares as to forget the one thing needful.
“Here we have commenced, about two months ago, a Sabbath-schooL I do not yet feel the same interest in these children as I did in those I left at Strathblane, but 1 must remember that all souls are equally precious. I often wonder how I am so lethargic and lifeless amongst the scholars, when I always feel as if my time were short, and that I am soon to give in my account. I am not what I would like to be. I would like to make more exertions to promote the comfort and happiness of my beloved mother, whose heart is oppressed with a load of sorrow accessible only to the hand of the Great Physician, and to advance the spiritual improvement of the rest of the family. I would like to be more lively in prayer, more humble, less fretful, less vain-glorious. I would like to live nearer to God, and possess an assurance of my own acceptance. I would like to read the Bible more as the Word of the living God!’,
“JuneSOth, 1835.
“My dear Uncle, — When I look at the date of your last letter, I fear you may begin to feel uneasy at my long silence. The truth is, when I was purposing to write to you a fortnight ago, I was attacked by one of the most obstinate colds I ever recollect to have had, which has confined me to bed for nearly all that time, and which still renders writing a formidable employment. I am sorry that I am not yet able to give favourable accounts of mamma’s health. For nearly a month she has not been out of bed, and so far from being better, I think she has for the last two days been weaker than ever. This long protracted debility is a cause of much anxiety to us all.
The summer is hastening away without having produced any of those beneficial effects which we thought it only required time to accomplish. And in a month or two we must leave Strathblane, which I do not see how she can stand in her present infirm state.”
When a minister in the country is called away by death, some peculiar features adhere to the bereavement. It is not only that the modest income ceases immediately, but the house, the birthplace and home of the children, must be abandoned at once. The first morning that they awake fatherless, they awake as strangers on the only spot they have ever known as their own. The widow, while her wounds are yet green, must remove with all her family, to seek elsewhere a place of abode. In this case the suffering was much mitigated by the possession of a little property, which, carefully husbanded, satisfied the simple wants of mother and children, and sufficed to carry forward the education of all three sons.
Suddenly at this crisis our youthful student was thrown to the front, and obliged to cope directly with the various troubles of life — as the support of his widowed mother and the guide of his younger brothers and sisters. Loyally he accepted the task, lovingly and courageously he discharged it. Now appeared the value of the training he had received from his father, and the grace he had gotten from God.