MR. JAMES WODRow, the father of the Historian, was born at Eaglesham in the neighbourhood of Glasgow, on the 2d of January 1637. He passed through the regular course of study at the university of Glasgow, and took his degree of A. M. in 1659, with the high approbation of principal Gillespie, and the other members of the senatus. He forthwith entered on the study of divinity under professors Baillie and Young, and was soon distinguished by his high attainments in theological literature. Although ready for license in the course of a few years, his ideas of the sacred office were so solemn, and the difficulties attending its right discharge appeared to him so numerous and so great, especially in those days of persecution, that it required the earnest expostulations of some of the most eminent ministers of the day to induce him to become a candidate for the holy ministry. Among those who urged him to take license in the presbyterian church, then passing into the vale of tears, was the justly venerated Mr. Robert Blair, one of the ministers of St. Andrews, who after hearing one day from Mr. Wodrow the reason of that self-diffidence which kept him back from the public service of the church, thus addressed him in reply; "Be not discouraged: your timidity will gradually lessen, and although it should not entirely wear off, yet it will not marr you," adding in an easy facetious manner," I'se tell you for your encouragement, I have been now nearly forty years in the ministry, and the third bell scarce ever begins to toll when I am to preach, but my heart plays dunt, dunt, dunt." A solemnly affecting interview which he had with Mr. James Guthrie of Stirling, in the tolbooth of Edinburgh, on the night before his execution, appears to have had a very salutary effect op the mind of Mr. Wodrow; and although the persecuted state of the church, consequent on the restoration of the

Stuarts, opposed additional obstacles to his entrance on the public ministry, he was most usefully employed in the prosecution of his private studies, while residing for some considerable time at Car-donald near Paisley, as tutor to the young lord Blantyre. It was not till the 29th February, 1673, that he received license from a class of persecuted presbyterian ministers in the west of Scotland; whose high testimony to his eminent attainments and character is recorded in the memoirs of his life, and stands as a very interesting memorial of the good men of those troublous times. He preached with great acceptance and usefulness among the persecuted presbyterians of the west; associated freely with ministers of both the well known classes of indulged and not indulged; and met with much opposition from the common enemy, making many very narrow escapes from his iron grasp. In 1687, he settled in Glasgow, at the request of the "ynod of the bounds, and took charge of a small class of students in divinity who were preparing for the ministry among the presbyterians of Scotland. In May 1688, he was called to be one of the ministers of the city, and this office he held with distinguished reputation for four years. In 1692, he was elected to be professor of divinity in the college; and in consequence of this, resigned his pastoral charge. The same diligence and pious zeal which distinguished his ministrations, continued to characterize him as a theological professor. In the various departments of public lecturing examination of students, hearing and criticising discourses, discussing cases of casuistry, daily conference with students on the subject of personal religion, and correspondence with them when absent, on the progress of their studies;-he found enough, and more than enough, to engage all his powers and all his time. From 1692 to the

a

period of his death in 1707, nearly 700 students passed through his hands, exclusive of nearly 200 from England and Ireland. In order to lessen the burden of the laborious office of the professorship, the college were pleased to elect his son Alexander, a most promising young man, to be his colleague. While the process for his induction or installation was going on, death deprived the church of the services of one who promised to prove the worthy successor of an eminent father. The professor continued to discharge the duties of the chair with growing reputation, till the 25th September, 1707, when he died full of hope, and leaving a noble testimony to the faith which he adorned by his life, and whose principles he had so ably inculcated by his preaching and by his professional labours.*

ROBERT WODROW, the second son of the professor, was born at Glasgow in the year 1679. His mother's name was Margaret Hair, daughter of William Hair, proprietor of a small estate in the parish of Kilbarchan, who married a daughter of James Stewart, commonly called tutor of Blackhall. Mrs. Wodrow was a woman of considerable strength of mind, great discretion, and eminent piety. The year of Mr. Wodrow's birth is perhaps the most eventful in the annals of the history of the Covenanters, and the violence of persecution raged during this period with more than ordinary fierceness. At the time of the birth of her son, Mrs. W. was in the 51st year of her age; and her death, though it did not happen for several years after, was then fully expected. Her excellent husband, obnoxious to a tyrannical government, narrowly escaped imprisonment or something worse, in attempting to obtain a last interview with her. As he passed the town guard-house he was watched, and soon followed by the soldiers into his own house, and even into his wife's bedchamber where he was concealed. The officer on command checked this violence; sent the men out of the room, and left the house himself; placing

however sentinels both within and without till the critical event should be over. In half an hour after, Mr. Wodrow, at his wife's suggestion, assumed the bonnet and greatcoat of the servant of the physician then in attendance; and carrying the lantern before him, made an easy escape through the midst of the guard. They soon renewed their search with marks of irritation, thrusting their swords into the very bed where the lady lay; who pleasantly desired them to desist," for the bird," said she, "is now flown."

Our author went through the usual course of academical education at Glasgow, having entered the university in 1691; and studied the languages and different branches of philosophy, according to the method then generally adopted in the colleges of Scotland. One master or regent was in the habit of carrying his pupils through the whole of the university curriculum; a custom long ago changed for the more rational and useful plan of assigning to each professor his own appropriate field. In this way, each science obtains its own suitable kind and measure of talent and learning; while the student in the course of his studies enjoys the benefit of profiting by the diversified labours of different minds. Condensation of energies on the part of the teacher, thus secures, or may be reasonably expected to secure, a higher measure of literary qualification; while the pupils may be expected to profit by the concentration of talent thus wisely diversified.

While a student of theology under his father, Mr. Wodrow was chosen librarian to the college, an office which he held for four years. He had very soon displayed a peculiar talent for historical and bibliographical inquiry; and this recommended him as a person admirably qualified for the situation. He accepted of it not from considerations connected with its pecuniary emoluments, then exceedingly slender; but because it gave him a favourable opportunity of access to books and other facilities for his favourite studies. It was immediately on his nomination to this office, he entered with ardour on those researches which in the course of

his life he prosecuted to such an extent,

divided among his friends, or found their way into the cabinets of private collectors or of public institutions.

The study of natural history, then scarcely known in Scotland, seems to have attracted him with no ordinary interest; and before he had arrived at the years of majority, he had opened a correspondence with a number of celebrated men in this and the kindred departments. Among his correspondents we find the names of bishop Nicolson, the distinguished author of the "Historical Libraries;" Mr. Edward Lhuyd, keeper of the Ashmolean closet at Oxford; Sir Robert Sibbald, so well known as a naturalist and antiquarian of the first order; lord Pitmedan; Messrs. James Sutherland, professor of Botany at Edinburgh; Lauchlan Campbell minister of Campbeltown, and many others. With these gentlemen he was in habits of intimacy, and they exchanged with cach other their curiosities in natural history and geology. In a letter to Mr. Lhuyd, dated August 1709, Mr. Wodrow tells him that his manse was but at a little distance from a place where they had been lithoscoping together during a visit of Mr. Lhuyd to Scotland. "My parochial charge" he continues" does not allow me the same time I had then for those subterranean studies, but my inclination is equally strong, perhaps stronger. I take it to be one of the best diversions from serious study, and in itself a great duty to admire my Maker's works. I have gotten some fossils here from our marle, limestone, &c. and heartily wish I had the knowing Mr. Lhuyd here to pick out what he wants, and help me to class a great many species which I know not what to make of." He informs him in the end of the letter, that he had 5 or 600 species of one thing or another relative to natural history. His collections were at his death

The physical and historical pursuits of Mr. W. were all subordinate to his great business, the study of theology and the practical application of its principles in the discharge of the duties of the pastoral office. To these he showed an early and a decided

his talents, and all his varied pursuits, to the glory of God and the good of his church. From a pretty extensive examination of his | correspondence, it appears that his pursuits in natural science engaged his leisure hours, only during the earlier part of his life, and that after he had framed the design of writing the history of the church of Scotland, every thing seems to have been relinquished for the sake of an undivided attention to that great subject.

Mr. Wodrow when he left the library of Glasgow, and on finishing his theological career, resided for some time in the house of a distant relation of the family, Sir John Maxwell, of Nether Pollock, then one of the senators of the college of justice, a man of great vigour of mind, and exalted piety. While resident in his house, he offered himself for trials to the presbytery of Paisley, and was by them licensed to preach the gospel in March 1703. In the summer following, the parish of Eastwood, where lord Pollock lived, became vacant by the death of Mr. Matthew Crawfurd, the pious and laborious author of a history of the church of Scotland, yet in MS. Mr. Wodrow was elected by the heritors and elders, with consent of the congregation, to supply the charge; and he was ordained minister of that parish on the 28th October, 1703. While he did not feel himself called on to relinquish his favourite studies in history, and antiquities, he nevertheless devoted the strength of his mind, and of his time, to the more immediate duties of the pastoral office. The parish of Eastwood was at that time one of the smallest in the west of Scotland; and it was, on this account more agreeable to Mr. Wodrow, inasmuch as it afforded him more time to prosecute his favourite studies, in perfect consistency with a due regard to his