Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 1.djvu/330

 Boyd devoted more of his attention to the composition of Latin poetry, he might have excelled in that elegant accomplishment.

In the time of Wodrow, several MSS. still remained in the possession of the family of Troclmg, consisting of Sermons in English and French, his Philotheca, a kind of obituary, extracts from which have lately been printed in the second part of the Miscellany of the Bannatyne Club. His life has been written at great length by the venerable historian of the sufferings of the Scottish church, already frequently quoted. Those who wish to know more of this learned man, than the limits of our work will permit, are referred to the very interesting series of the Wodrow biographies in the library of the university of Glasgow—article Boyd.

, an eminent divine and religious writer of the seventeenth century, was born before the year 1590, and was descended from the family of the Boyds of Pinkell in Carrick (Ayrshire). He was cousin to Mr Andrew Boyd, bishop of Argyle, and Mr Robert Boyd of Trochrig, whose memoirs have already been embodied in this work. He received the rudiments of his education at the school of Kilmarnock, and passed through an academical course in the college of Glasgow. About the year 1607, he had finished his studies in his native country. He then went abroad, and studied at the college of Saumur in France, under his relation Robert Boyd. He was appointed a regent in this University, in 1611, and is said to have been offered the principalship, which he declined. According to his own statement, he spent sixteen years in France, during four of which he was a preacher of the gospel. In consequence of the persecution of the protestants, he was obliged, in 1621, to return to his native country. He relates, in one of his sermons, the folio wing anecdote of the voyage:—"In the time of the French persecution, I came by sea to Flanders, and as I was sailing from Flanders to Scotland, a fearfull tempest arose, which made our mariners reels to and fro, and stagger like drunken men. In the mean time, there was a Scots papist who lay near mee. While the ship gave a great shake, I observed the man, and after the Lord had sent a calme I said to him, 'Sir, now ye see the weaknesse of your religion; as long as yee are in prosperitie, yee cry to this sainct and that sainct: in our great danger, I heard yee cry often, Lord, Lord; but not a word yee spake of our Lady.' On his reaching Scotland, he further informs us that he "remained a space a private man at Edinburgh, with Doctor Sibbald, the glory and honour of all the physitians of our land." Afterwards, he lived successively under the protection of Sir William Scott of Elie, and of the Marquis of Hamilton and his lady at Kinneil; it being then the fashion for pious persons of quality in Scotland, to retain one clergyman at least, as a member of their household. In 1623, he was appointed minister of the large district in the suburbs of Glasgow, styled the Barony Parish, for which the crypts beneath the cathedral church then served as a place of worship; a scene well fitted by its sepulchral gloom, to add to the impressiveness of his Calvinistic eloquence. In this charge he continued all the remainder of his life. In the years 1634-35 and 45, he filled the office of Rector of the University of Glasgow; an office which appears from its constituency to have then been very honourable.

In 1629, Mr Zachary—to use the common mode of designating a clergyman in that age—published his principal prose work, "The Last Battell of the Soule in Death; whereby are shown the diverse skirmishes that are between the soule of man on his death-bed, and the enemies of our salvation, carefully digested for the comfort of the Sicke, by &c. Printed at Edinburgh for the heires of Andro Hart." This is one of the few pious works not of a controversial nature, produced by the Scottish church before a very recent period; arid it is by no means the meanest in the list It is of a dramatic, or at least a conversational form; and the dramatis personæ, such as, "Pastour, Sicke Man, Spirituall Friend,