Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 08.djvu/410

Candlish The family was connected with Ayrshire, and James Candlish, who was born in the same year with Robert Burns, was an intimate friend of the poet. Writing of him to Peter Hill, bookseller, Edinburgh, Burns called him 'Candlish, the earliest friend, except my only brother, whom I have on earth, and one of the worthiest fellows that ever any man called by the name of friend.' The wife of James Candlish was Jane Smith, one of the six belles of Mauchline celebrated in 1784 in one of Burns's earliest poems. Robert Candlish's father died when he was but five weeks old, and the care of the family was thrown on his mother, a woman of great excellence and force of character, who, though in the narrowest circumstances, contrived to give her two sons a university education, and have them trained, the elder for the medical profession and the younger for the ministry. James Candlish, the elder brother, a young man of the highest talent and character, died in 1829, just as he had been appointed to the chair of surgery in Anderson's College, Glasgow. Robert Candlish was never sent to school, receiving all his early instruction from his mother, sister, and brother. At the university of Glasgow he was a distinguished student, and among his intimate friends was known for his general scholarship, his subtlety in argument, and his generosity and straightforwardness of character, he was fond of open-air life, indulging in many rambles with his friends.

His first appointment, as tutor at Eton to Sir Hugh H. Campbell of Marchmont, was the result of an application to some of the professors for 'the most able young man they could recommend.' After nearly two years he returned to Glasgow, was licensed as a probationer, and served for about four or five years as assistant first in a Glasgow church, then in the beautiful parish of Bonhill, near Loch Lomond. About the end of 1833, his great gift as a preacher having become known to a select few, be was appointed assistant to the minister of St. George's, Edinburgh, the most influential congregation in that city. On the death of the former incumbent, within a very short time of his becoming assistant, he was appointed minister, his remarkable ability as a preacher being now most cordially recognised. For four or five years he confined himself to the work of his congregation and parish, with such occasional services as so distinguished a preacher was invited to give.

In 1839 he was led to throw himself into the momentous conflict with the civil courts which had sprung out of the passing of the Veto law by the general assembly in 1834, recognising a right on the part of the people to have an influential voice in the appointment of their ministers, which law of the church the civil courts declared to be ultra vires, Candlish was a member of the general assembly of 1839, and towards the close of a long discussion, when three motions were before the house, rose from an obscure place and delivered a speech of such eloquence placed him at once in the front rank of debaters. A few months later it fell to him, at the request of his friends, to propose a motion in the commission of assembly for suspending seven ministers of the presbytery of Strathbogie, who in the case of Marnoch had disregarded the injunction of the church and obeyed that of the civil courts. The occasion was one of supreme importance; it was throwing down the gauntlet to the court of session, and proclaiming a war in which one or other of the parties must be defeated. Even among those who were most opposed to the policy advocated by Candlish there was no difference of opinion as to the profound ability with which he supported his motion. The majority of the general assembly persistently adhered to the policy thus initiated in all the subsequent stages of the controversy. In 1843 that party, finding itself unable to longer maintain the position of an established church, withdrew from its connection with the state, and formed the Free church of Scotland.

The principles on which Candlish took his stand and which he sought to elucidate and maintain were two — the right of the people of Scotland, confirmed by ancient statutes, to an effective voice in the appointment of their ministers; and the independent jurisdiction of the church in matters spiritual — both of which principles, it was held, the civil courts had set aside. In regard to the latter, it has been pointed out by Sir Henry W. Moncreiff, in his sketch of his friend in 'Disruption Worthies,' that in reply to the common charge against the church that she claimed to be the sole judge of what was civil and what was spiritual, Candlish maintained, first, that whoever should make such a claim would trample under foot all liberties, civil and ecclesiastical; and establish an intolerable despotism; second, if such a claim should be made by a church, that church would necessarily be assuming an authority in all causes, civil and ecclesiastical; third, that the case was the same when the claim was made by the court of session: the claim would extinguish all liberty. The view of what should be done in cases of conflicting jurisdiction, enunciated by Candlish and maintained by his friends during the