Guthrie, THOMAS, D.D.

Guthrie, THOMAS, D.D., an eminent pulpit and platform orator, philanthropist, and social reformer, was born July 12, 1803, at Brechin, Forfarshire, where his father was a merchant and banker. He studied eight years for the ministry at the university of Edinburgh, and devoted two additional winters to the study of chemistry, natural history, and anatomy. Meanwhile he was licensed as a preacher by the presbytery of Brechin in 1825. He subsequently spent six months in Paris, studying comparative anatomy, chemistry, and natural philosophy, and walking the hospitals there. Returning to Scotland, he for two years conducted, on behalf of his family, the affairs of a bank agency in Brechin. After waiting for five years for a presentation to a living, he had almost resolved to abandon the clerical profession when, in 1830, he received a presentation from the crown to Arbirlot, in his native county; and in 1837 was appointed one of the ministers of Old Greyfriars parish in Edinburgh. Here his eloquence, combined with devoted labours to reclaim the degraded population of one of the worst districts of the city, soon won for him a high place in public estimation. In 1840 he was chosen minister of St John's church; he declined calls to London and India. In 1843 Guthrie joined the Free Church, and for a long series of years continued to minister to Free St John's—a large and influential congregation in Edinburgh. In 1845-46 he performed a great service to the Free Church, in his advocacy throughout the country of its scheme for providing manses or residences for its ministers, and raised in less than twelve months £116,000 for this object. Guthrie's zeal, however, was not diverted into mere denominational or sectarian channels. He came forward in 1847 as the advocate of Ragged Schools (q.v.) by the publication of his first Plea for Ragged Schools. He was not, as sometimes stated, the founder of Ragged Schools, but rather the apostle of the movement. A Ragged School was founded on the Castle Hill, in 1887 removed to Liberton. He also earnestly exerted himself, in many ways, in opposition to intemperance and other prevailing vices, and in favour of national and compulsory education. He became a total abstainer in 1847 through a conversation with an Irish car-driver. Guthrie possessed great rhetorical talent; and his style was remarkable for the abundance and variety of the illustrations he used. Lord Cockburn attributed Guthrie's remarkable influence over his audience to the possession of 'passion and compassion.' Few public speakers have ever blended solemnity and deep pathos so intimately with the humorous, his tendency to which, although never in the pulpit, has more frequently than anything else been pointed out as his fault. Guthrie always displayed a generous sympathy with all that tends to progress or improvement of any kind. He was moderator of the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland in May 1862, and one of the vice-presidents of the Evangelical Alliance. He was presented with £5000 in 1865 as a token of public appreciation. He acted as editor of the Sunday Magazine from its establishment in 1864, in which year he retired from his regular ministrations. He died 24th February 1873. Guthrie's most important published works are The Gospel in Ezekiel (1855); The Way to Life (1862); A Plea for Drunkards and against Drunkenness (1850); A Plea for Ragged Schools, a pamphlet (1847), followed by a second and a third plea, the latter under the title of Seed-time and Harvest of Ragged Schools (1862); The City: its Sins and Sorrows (1857); Man and the Gospel (1865); Angels' Song (1865); Parables (1866); Studies of Character (1868); Sundays Abroad (1871). See his Autobiography and Memoir, edited by his sons (2 vols. 1874-75); and a small Life by O. Smeaton (1900).