Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 8.djvu/71

Rh published on the following year, a "Memorial in behalf of the native Irish." The effect of this work was startling: such was the amount of new information which he produced on the subject, the force and truthfulness with which he detailed it, and the cogency of his reasoning and appeals in behalf of unhappy benighted Ireland, that several benevolent societies in behalf of its people owed their origin to this production, while other similar societies, already in existence, were taught from it to alter and improve their rules according to the real state of circumstances. As this work was solely in reference to the education of the Gaelic speaking Irish, he found it necessary to write a second upon the subject of preaching, and this he did in 1819, by his "Diffusion of the Scriptures in the Celtic or Iberian Dialects," afterwards enlarged by many additions into a volume, entitled "The Native Irish and their Descendants." Until these works were published, the British public was not generally aware that of the 196 islands composing part of Ireland, 140 of these, inhabited by 43,000 souls, were in a miserable etate of spiritual destitution and wretchedness. The length of interval that occurred between these publications was too mournfully filled up, as the following extract from one of his letters to his talented and distinguished correspondent, Charlotte Elizabeth, will sufficiently explain: "But why, you will say, were the Sketches of 1828 so long delayed? Ah! that is a tender question; but since you also have been in affliction, and apparently much of it, I feel the less reserve, and can therefore go on. Did you observe a book advertised at the end of the Sketches? If you have ever chanced to see it, the dedication will explain more than I can now repeat, and yet it does not explain the whole. A beloved wife and three much-loved daughters are there mentioned; but ah! my friend, this was not the end. Two sons survived—but they also are gone, and the father to whom they were so much attached was left to plough the deep alone. But no, I am not alone, for the Father is with me, and I am often, often, a wonder to myself. The truth is, these two volumes, particularly the first, were composed amidst many tears—often fled to in order to keep the mind from falling to staves, and the Lord Jesus himself alone hath sustained me. The first volume was never read by the parties to whom it is dedicated; and as for the second, I often yet see my last, my beloved sole survivor, only four and a-half years of age, running into the room, and saying: 'And are you writing to the poor Irish yet, papa?' 'Yes, love, I am writing for them.' 'Oh, you are writing for them!

The pressure of these numerous and heavy domestic bereavements, which his sensitive heart felt so keenly, that at their height they had suddenly whitened his hair and furrowed his brow with the premature tokens of old age, compelled him gradually to withdraw from the toil of public business, and betake himself more closely to the retirement of his study. It was not, however, for the sake of indulging in melancholy, or even in literary indolence, for his work, entitled "The Domestic Constitution," was written during his attendance on the sick-chamber, and finished after his third visit to the family grave. Of this volume a new edition was subsequently prepared, with the following enlarged title, by which its bearing is better understood: "The Domestic Constitution; or, The Family Circle the Source and Test of National Stability." But the chief subjects of his study and research during the remaining period of his life, were the materials for his principal production, "The Annals of the English Bible." This voluminous work, like many in similar cases, originated in a single and temporary effort. The third centenary of Coverdale's translation of the Bible