Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 8.djvu/35

 continued to act a decided part with the catholic clergy. "There have been, and are," says Wodrow, "some of God's children, and hidden ones, in Babylon, * * * * and no doubt Mr Winram was useful even in this period." May it not be asked, whether he did not, by a bad example, and a pertinacious adherence to a system which he knew to be erroneous, greatly more weaken the hands of his brethren, than he could possibly strengthen them by his private exertions?

Winram, as prior of Portmoak, attended the parliament of August, 1560, which ratified the protestant Confession of Faith. The first General Assembly held in December following, declared him fit for and apt to minister the word and sacraments; and on Sunday, April 13, 1561, he was elected superintendent of Fife, Fothrick, and Stratherne, "be the common consent of lordis, baronis, ministeris, elderis, of the saidis bowndis, and otheris common pepill," &c. The transactions in which he was engaged in this capacity present so little variety that we shall merely take a short general view of them.

One of Winram's earliest acts as superintendent was the reversal of a sentence of condemnation which had been passed on Sir John Borthwick, in 1540, for heresy. This gentleman had saved himself by flight, but appears to have returned to Scotland in or before 1560, for, at the first General Assembly, we find one of the members "presented by Sir John Borthwick to the kirks of Aberdour and Torrie." It is sufficiently singular that Winram was one of "those plain enemies to the truth" described in the reversal of the sentence, who had assisted at the trial and condemnation of the man whom he even then must have considered as a friend, although he had not the courage or the honesty to avow it. The notices of Winram in the records of the General Assembly consist, almost without exception, of complaints against him for negligence in visiting the district or diocese committed to his charge. This is a charge which was brought more or less frequently against all the superintendents: the people on the one hand seem to have been unreasonable in their expectations, and the government, beyond all question, gave the clergy but little encouragement by a liberal or even moderate provision for their wants. In Winram's case, however, the frequency of these complaints leaves on the mind a suspicion that he was to a considerable extent in fault, and, on one occasion at least, the complaint was accompanied with a charge of a covetous, worldly-minded disposition,—a charge which circumstances we shall mention in our general remarks on his character lead us to conclude were not unfounded. He was several times employed in reconciling party and private disputes. In 1571, he was ordered by the General Assembly to inhibit Mr John Douglas, who was appointed archbishop of St Andrews, to vote in parliament in name of the church. In January, 1572, he attended the convention at Leith, at which Tulchan bishops were authorized, and in the following month he was employed as superintendent of the bounds to inaugurate the archbishop of St Andrews. There are no subsequent notices of him of the slightest interest or importance. He died on the 18th or 28th of September, 1582, (the date seems uncertain,) leaving by his will James Winram and John Winram of Craigton, sons of Mr Robert Winram of Ratho his brother, his principal heirs.

The character of Winram is by no means free from suspicion. He was an early convert to the protestant doctrines, but he neither abandoned his situation nor emoluments in the catholic church; he did not, like almost all his brother superintendents, expose himself to danger or to suffering by a public