Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 3.djvu/199

Rh manded deep and reverential attention. At the same time that Mr Erskine was thus attentive to his public appearances, he was equally so to those duties of a more private kind, which are no less important for promoting the growth of piety and genuine holiness among a people, but which, having less of the pomp of external circumstance to recommend their exercise, are more apt to be sometimes overlooked. In the duties of public catechising and exhorting from house to house, as well as in visiting the sick, he was most indefatigable. In catechising he generally brought forward the subject of his discourses, that by the repetition of them he might make the more Lasting impression on the manners and hearts of his people. For the purposes of necessary recreation he was accustomed to perambulate the whole bounds of his parish, making frequent calls at the houses of his parishioners, partaking of their humble meals, and talking over their every day affairs, without any thing like ceremony. By this means he became intimately acquainted with the tempers and the characters of all his hearers, and was able most effectively to administer the word of instruction, correction, encouragement, or reproof, as the circumstances of the case might require. Though Mr Erskine was thus free and familiar with his people on ordinary and every day occasions, he was perfectly aware of the necessity of maintaining true ministerial dignity and deportment ; and when he appeared among them in the way of performing official duty, was careful to preserve that serious and commanding demeanour which a situation so important, and services so solemn, naturally tend to inspire. When visiting ministerially, it was his custom to enter every habitation with the same gravity with which he entered the pulpit, pronouncing the salutation, "Peace be to this house;" after which he examined all the members of the family, tendered to each such exhortations as their circumstances seemed to require, concluded with prayer, fervent, particular, and affectionate. In visiting the sick, he studied the same serious solemnity, and few had the gift of more effectually speaking to the comfort of the dejected Christian, or of pointing out the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world, to the sinner alarmed with a sense of guilt and the view of the approaching judgment

We cannot forbear mentioning another part of his ministerial conduct, in which it were to be wished that he were more imitated. Not satisfied with addressing to the children of his charge frequent admonitions from the pulpit, and conversing with them in their fathers' houses, he regularly superintended their instruction in the parish school, where it was his practice to visit every Saturday to hear them repeat the catechism, to tender them suitable advice, and affectionately to pray with them. When such was his care of the children, the reader will scarcely need to be told that he was watchful over the conduct of their teachers; and for the preservation of order and good government in his parish, he took care to have in every corner of it a sufficient number of active and intelligent ruling elders, an order of men of divine appointment, and fitted for preserving and promoting the public morals beyond any other that have yet been thought upon, but in subsequent times, especially in the established church, till of late years, greatly neglected. The effect of all this diligence in the discharge of his pastoral duties, was a general attention to the interests of religion among his people, all of whom seemed to regard their pastor with the strongest degree of respect and confidence. Not only was the church crowded on Sabbaths, but even on the Thursdays, and his diets of examination drew together large audiences. Prayer meetings were also established in every part of his parish, for the management of which, he drew up a set of rules, and he encouraged them by his presence, visiting them in rotation as often as his other avocations would admit. Nor was it this external regard to the practice of piety alone that dis-