Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 16.djvu/381

 and continues to be done still, for the circulation of religious literature, especially in rural districts. 3. Finding that intemperance bred prostitution, he turned his attention very earnestly to the case of fallen women, and procured the erection of a house in Brunswick Street for the reception of those who desired to return to an honest life. This institution proved most useful, and its administration commended itself much to visitors, among the most cordial of whom were Mr. and Mrs. S. C. Hall. 4. When the famine prevailed he was indefatigable in visiting the stricken districts, and used his utmost energies, and with great effect, both at home and in America, to obtain help for the sufferers. 5. He worked very hard too to establish industrial schools in the famine districts, at which girls were taught Irish embroidery, and by which a valuable department of female industry was added to the scanty resources of Irish labour. In other ways he exerted himself for the sufferers, especially by promoting schools in which bible instruction was given to the children of the peasantry, many of whom showed a most eager desire to obtain it. In his zeal for his countrymen, and in order to increase the means of relief, he visited America in 1859, and went from place to place telling of the ravages the famine had caused, and the thirst for scriptural instruction that had arisen in many of the people. He and his coadjutors raised a sum of upwards of 6,000l.

Edgar was an active leader in the presbyterian church. When a union was proposed between the synod of Ulster and the secession synod to which he belonged, he cordially approved of the proposal and zealously promoted it. It was completed in 1840.

At the third meeting of the general assembly of the united church (in 1842) he was elected moderator. During his term of office several important events happened: the bicentenary of the foundation of presbytery in Ireland, the bicentenary of the Westminster Assembly, and the last stage of struggle in the church of Scotland, which ended in the disruption of 1843. In all these he took a lively interest. All the undertakings and operations of the presbyterian church in Ireland interested him greatly, and in particular its home and foreign missions and its church and manse scheme. After being released from the pastoral charge of his congregation he often preached to his people as a labour of love; and latterly, having obtained an old chapel in Academy Street, he conducted a mission service in it for the very poorest of the people.

His philanthropic services were thoroughly appreciated by his townsmen and countrymen generally. In 1848 he was presented with a testimonial, consisting of a polyglot bible and a sum of 800l., in recognition of his unwearied labours. The general assembly of 1844 having decided in favour of having a college of its own, Edgar took an important and successful part in collecting funds for this institution.

As a professor he was not remarkable for learning, nor for the faculties that are adapted to minute theological discussion. He was better fitted to give his students an enthusiasm for the work of the church and to guide them as to methods of doing it. In this respect his work was much appreciated. He wrote no book of any magnitude, but the most important of his pamphlets and addresses were collected in a volume and published under the title ‘Select Works of John Edgar, D.D., LL.D.’ This volume embraces twenty-five pamphlets on temperance, and seventeen on the other philanthropic schemes that engaged his attention. His ‘Cry from Connaught’ was the most pathetic piece he ever wrote, and inaugurated his Connaught mission. He died in 1866, in his sixty-eighth year.

[Killen's Memoir of John Edgar, D.D., LL.D., 1867; private information.] 

EDGAR, JOHN GEORGE (1834–1864), miscellaneous writer, fourth son of the Rev. John Edgar of Hutton, Berwickshire, was born in 1834. He entered a house of business at Liverpool and visited the West Indies on mercantile affairs, but soon deserted commerce and devoted himself to literature. His earliest publication was the ‘Boyhood of Great Men’ in 1853, which he followed up in the same year with a companion volume entitled ‘Footprints of Famous Men.’ In the course of the next ten years he wrote as many as fifteen other volumes intended for the reading of boys. Some of these were biographical, and the remainder took the form of narrative fiction based on historical facts illustrative of different periods of English history. Edgar was especially familiar with early English and Scottish history, and possessed a wide knowledge of border tradition. He was the first editor of ‘Every Boy's Magazine.’ In the intervals of his other work Edgar found time to contribute political articles, written from a strongly conservative point of view, to the London press. Under his close and continuous application to work his health broke down, and he died of congestion of the brain after a short illness on 22 April 1864.

[Gent. Mag. 3rd ser. 1864, xvi. 808; Cooper's Biog. Dict.; Brit. Mus. Cat.] 