UN TEXTO NO SIEMPRE RECORDADO

She Ohurch of Scotland in thq..f.irst

half of the Kiacteenth Centura.

I.

! J *

Scottish .Tijfft and

'^hoUEht.

Although this Scottish High Church group lived and

worked in the second heli of the nineteenth century,

their contribution to the revival of Churchmanship within

Presbyterianism cannot be properly assessed without a

backward glance at the previous half-century. During this period momentous changes took place in almost every departmexit of Scottish life, not least within the Ohurch. Eighteenth-century Ohurch life in Scotland had been

dominated by the Moderate party. But when the new century dawned Evangelicalism had usurped the power and prestige of the Moderates, and although a party calling themselves by the old name still survived, Koderatlsm could no longer claim undisputed leadership. In the new century all the most influential Church leaders were Evangelicals. The Evangelical ethos. with its rigorous doctrinal orthodoxy,

firmly based on the Westminster Confession and the teaching

of Calvin, produced among the stricter Evangelicals,

both clerical and lay, an austerity of belief and strict­ ness of life which not infrequently degenerated into

religious intolerance end Pharisaism. This is •

particularly evident in the attitude of many of them to

secular literature, to the works, for example, of Sir

Walter Scott, "With the stricter sections of the Church, now in the ascendant, and already beginning to hark back to the severities of Puritanism, Scott fell under the

suspicion with which such minds always regard the artist. They were inclined to regard the writing and reading of works of fiction as sinful, and though many of the

Evangelicals read the Waverley Hovels with delight, they did so with a certain secrecy, as if books of that sort ought not to be found in godly homes"3 With its sharp distinction between secular and sacred Evangelicalism,

tended to narrow the outlook and interests of Ghurch people But despite Evangelical religious seal, powerful

factors were at work whto h greatly disturbed the faith of many of the orthodox. Notable among those new influences was the spectacular expansion of scientific research and

invention. "We seem", said a Moderator of the Free Church in 1900 in a review of this period, "to be listening to a 1. A.J.Campbells Two Centuries of the Church of Scotland

41

fairy-tale as we read of the extent to which nature has yielded up her secrets to patient investigators , and of the success with which inventive genius has bro.ught the mightiest and most subtle of hature’s forces under

control* Xn these respects, the century is without parallel in history. In every department of knowledge there is the throb of eager enquirys and ever and again the spirit of expectancy is gratified by hearing of fresh

I

scientific triumphs0/ To many the proud progress of science had °cx*eated a widespread uncertainty with

2

reference to beliefs formerly unquestioned’** When, for example, three celebrated Scottish geologists, Sir Robert Murchison, Sir Charles Byell and Hugh filler, propounded

their theory of the age of the earth from their observation of rock strata and fossil remains, it was widely believed that their conclusions discredited not only Archbishop Usher1 a long-accepted date of the world’s creation (4,004

but even cast doubt on the reliability of Holy Scripture and, in particular, the Creation narrative in the Book of Genesis.

The new science of Biblical Criticism likewise

appeared to many to be a highly destimctive force, With its microscopic scrutiny of every word and sentence of 1. WJLTaylors Religious. Thought, and Scottish ,ghuy ch ...hi^e

...' 2, W,.K,Taylors op,cit,, p.Xl,

Holy Scripture, its thorough investigation of Biblical

manuscripts, this method of Bible study seemed to dethrone the popular conception of the inerrancy and infallibility

of the Holy Book as a record of the history of mankind and of the Divine relationship with the world and the human race.

E’rom such sources there arose, as the nineteenth century advanced, a growing attitude of religious

uncertainty which, in'xaany instances, led to scepticism and agnosticism. "Whe nineteenth century”, says Campbell, "was the age of science. In one direction science

produced a hard, utilitarian type of mind, which paid heed only to immediate practical results; and this wind denied

l»A

the worth of anything spix’ihuel* *fhe Ohurch had hitherto operated in a society which, on the whole,.accepted the Christian faith and ethic* Xt had. now to turn its

attention to a widely diffused temper which bluntly

declared that neither Christianity nor any other religion possessed any value”** ”$he ferment of the nineteenth century”, he continues, ”prpduoed a new religious

phenomenon - the type ;bf thought which was generally, if vaguely, described as Doubt♦ Its most prominent expresslc was Agnosticism, the temper which did not deny the existenc

of God, but declared that the human mind had no knowledge

4*5 •

of film and that no knowledge of Him was possible”

Within the Ohuroh, too, there was evident, amongst

friends and critics alike, an increasing dissatisfaction with the state of religion in the land, and a growing realisation that, in order to meet the challenge of the times, the Ohuroh must bestir herself to discord outworn attitudes of thought and method, and adopt new ways of winning the allegiance of her people♦ This impatience with the contemporary Church was a feature of the best of

the Evangelicals, and is conspicuously seen in three of the most notable Churchmen of the day who, each,in -widely different ways, sought to revitalise the Church of which

they were ordained ministers *• Thomas Chalmers, Edwax’d.

Irving, and John McLeod Campbell.

11.

Thomas Oto Imere. (1780-1647) *

In the life and work of Thomas Chalmers is seen, more clearly perhaps than in any other ecclesiastical figure of the time, the upsurge of renewed vitality and evangelical enthusiasm which animated the minds of the more eager ministers of the pre-Disruption Church in Scotland. Chalmers claimed to be a Moderate during his

early ministry in the Fifeshire parish of Kilmany, and confessed that he was more concerned with his lectureship in mathematics at Bt. Andrews University than with his ministerial duties, One weekday was given over to his

clerical work in the parish? the rest of the week was spent in the prosecution of his studies in political ecoxxomy *

When he passed over to the Wang© Ileal side of the Church a new »eal for th© duties of the ministry took hold of him, In particular, his preaching was infused with such vigour and fervour as to delight and surprise not only his parishioners, but the crowds from neighbouring towns who were attracted to his little church, 'fee© that time onwards, Chalmers was recognised ®s Bootland’s fore­ most preacher* In 1814 he was elected by the Town Council

of Glasgow to be minister of the 'Iron Church, and there, as in the parish of St, John’s to which he was shortly trans­ lated, his ministry was marked by a popularity unequalled in his day. Both parishes contained populations whose poverty and squalor of environment appalled the young minister and awoke in him an acute consciousness of the Church’s failure to reach the inhabitants of the crowded tenements around his church, the ©adox'ity of whom were completely alienated from the Christian religion,- He noted with special concern that although in the previous

thirty years the population of Glasgow had almost

trebled, yet no new pariah churches had been erected to

meet the needs of the newcomers, and that the existing

churches were mainly occupied by the prosperous commercial and professional classes.

Hence there arose in Chalmers’ mind a realisation of th© clamant need for Church Extension, a work to which he gave the first impetus and which he urged on for many year's, until in 1854 he wee appointed Convener of the General Assembly Committee on Church Extension. During the seven years of his convenerahip more than two hundred •places of worship were erected throughout Scotland (eighty

having previously been built). These new churches could

claim no architectux'al merit or beauty. ”In a land full of ugly churches the Chalmers Extension churches sro on the whole th® ugliest --- uncouth edifices of the

cheapest material and the roughest workmanship, crammed I

with deal pews”.'

To Thomas Chalmers must be given the credit of bestirring the pre-Disrnption Church to a new zeal, particularly in the task of evangelising the masses of

population outwith her care. Xn his concern for the

"home-heathen” and the lapsed, his ideal of a National

Church caring for every parson in the land, his vision of

45.

a school associated, with each church,, especially la the poorer districts where children often haft no opportunity of school attendance, his system of poor relief in each parish, Chalmers "determined the form and method of the

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