The Express.
London, England, 1847-06-03 00:00:00

theological triumphs, Chalmers entered the scientific
areas, and treading its plain's with majestic MAP. produced
his " Discourses on Astronomy." In the town of Glasgow,
as might have been expected, he carried all before him, and
the new church of St. John's was expressly built for his
accommodation; and alter labouring there for some years he
was appointed in 1824 to the Prefessonhip of Moral Philo-
sophy in the University of St. Andrew's. His arrival there
gave an impulse to that ancient seminary, which brought
back much of the glory of its former days ; but it was a
sphere too narrow for the genius of Chalmers, and
in 1828 he was removed to the chair of Theo-
logy in the University of Edinburgh, the highest
academical distinction which could be conferred.
Here, undisturbed by change, he prosecuted his labours for
some years; but that appointment, however dignified in
point of status, was but poorly endowed, and offered little
pecuniary advantage to a man having a family to provide
for, and who scattered his bounty with no stinted hand.
Accordingly, when the corresponding and richer chair in the
University of Glasgow became vacant, he offered himself as
a candidate, but the patronage was vested in the college,
Chalmers had become • non-intrusionist, and that was
enough. Constitutional principles had to be vindicated, and
Sir James Graham, who at the time held a university office,
went to Gleagow on peewee, and voted with the majority that
excluded Thomas Chalmers. Mere money for hoarding was no
vies of his, for he had previously refused the west church of
Greenock, the highest living in the church ; and against
pluralities he waged • long and deadly war. Next came the
disruption of the church of Scotland, when, as a matter of
course ,he resigned his chair, and was elected principal and
primaries professor of theology to the seceding body.
The enterprises of Chalmers' life were few, but they were
followed by mighty results, and were worked out with a
force and minuteness of agency which not only deserved,
but commanded, success. He came on the stage at a time
when the evangelical system was low in the church, and
ha rolled back the current of opinion so strongly as to
revolutionise and ultimately dismantle the national church.
Evangelism was his object ; his means were a new order of
pulpit ministration, • voluntary system of poor.laws,
Marta extension in the establihment, and out of it the
n=n of the free church. In preaching he succeeded
g a school of clergymen devoted to pastoral labour,
and eager in disseminating truth. In parochial economies
his views did not receive so much success; they were
opposed to the received canons of political economy, and, like
many other great men who mistake their forte, although he
perhaps prided himself more on his economic science than
any other acquirement, it is precisely the department of his
labours on which his contemporaries laid least stress,and in all
probability, posterity will confirmtheir award. In church ex-
tension he achieved wonders. Setting his shoulder to the
wheel, about two hundred churches sprung up in all parts
of Scotland as if by magic. And when by the breakieg up
of the church, much of this was lost, Chalmers, who
" gambled with difficulties," and who was now in his de-
clining years, set himself to the uprearing of the new sect,
with all the strength of a middle-age giant. His mind
caught at the idea of • central fund for the support of the
clergy, and with what effect he worked it the sinewy lines,-
' manta of the free church amply testifiy. He died at his
post. He attended and mere his evidence before the com-
mittee on sites in London, and came down to prepare him-
self for the Assembly. On the day on which he died he was
to have spoken in that court, and bad his notes all prepared.
On Sunday night, we learn—from the Witneu, the organ
of the free church party—that Dr. Chalmers retired to rest at
an early hour, in perfect health. Next morning, Professor
Maedougal. who expected to have received a packet of
papers from the doctor, rent, at about 20 minutes before
eight, to inquire whether the papers had been left out. The
housekeeper knocked at the door of the doctor's bed-room,
but received no answer, and concluded that the doctor was
asleep. Half an hour later, another party called, when the
housekeeper knocked as before, but still received no answer,
and the domestics agreed to enter the chamber and ascertain
if all were well with their revered master. On enter-
ing, they were shocked to discover that the
doctor had fallen into the sleep of death. He,
it appeared, had been sitting erect when overtaken by
the stroke of death, and he still retained, in part, that
position. The head gently reclined on the pillow. The arms
were folded peacefully on the breast. There was • slight ap-
pearance of oppression and heaviness on the brew, but not a
wrinkle, not a trace of sorrow or pain, disturbed its smooth-
ness. The countenance wore an expression of deep repose.
Professor Macdougal, who had been sent for, grasped the
hand. It was cold as marble. Life had departed several
hours. " The air of majesty on the countenance," says the
IVitners, "greater than he had ever perceived on the living
face, seemed to say, ' I am gone up.' No conflict had
preceded: dissolution. As a proof of this, the bedclothes
were gathered about his person, and had plainly not been
disturbed by any struggle at the moment of departure." On
the forenoon of Monday, the Doctor was to give in the report
of the College Committee to the General Assembly of the
Free Church; and, in anticipation of that event, his papers
and writing materials lay beside him in bed, so arranged that
he might begin his work so soon as he should awake.
The rev. doctor has left behind him a widow to lament
his loam, and • family of, we believe, six daughters, two of
whom are married, the one to the Rev. Mr. /Menem, of
Rothe, the other to the Rev. Dr. Hans, of Skirling, editor
of the " North British Review' " and four unmarried.
Few *cholera had accumulated so many academic honours
ea Dr. Chalmers. He received the degree of LL.D. from
the University of Oxford, and was elected a corresponding
member of the Royal Institute of Preece ; honours never
before accorded to a Presbyterian divine, and seldom to a
Scotsman. In fine, while living, he received all the homage
and respect usually accorded to great men when dead, and
this mainly because, while living, he was a good man as well
as a great man.
Like all men of note who have attained any amount of
years, descent to the tomb was not necessary for the forma-
tion if a fair estimate of the character of Chalmers. His
attainments, both in theology and science, were more com-
prehensive than minute, and he owed his elevation less to
original grasp of thought than to an intensity of character
and compositeness of intellect, which invested everything
that came from him with a force and novelty, which, if not
strictly creative, was near akin to it. His simplicity of mind
was such that, personally, he could hardly be Raid to have
had an enemy—whilst his tastes and habits were so expan-
sive and cosmopolitan that of him it might literally have
been said, he "reckoned the world his home and the men
of all nations his brethren."
In the matter of composition, as well as in style of rea-
soning, he followed methods of his own. A few leading
thoughts made up the sum and substance of a speech or dis-
course, but these he amplified and subjected to such endless
variety of illustration, as not only to faminate and subdue,
but to convince and rouse I. action. It was this quality that
led the late Robert Hall to compare him first to a gold.
beater, and afterwards to a kaleidoscope.
Besides his intrinsic and scholarly attainments, Chalmers
possessed minor graces and acoemphahments which did their
part in helping to work out the great tasks he set himself.
His oratory was occasionally enriched with a broad but
never unrefined humour. In his platform addresses, he
sometimes amused his auditors even to tumultuous mirth.
In discerning talent ho was remarkably quick-sighted, and
never failed to lend a generous and helping hand to merit
wherever he found it. By accident he heard Edward Irving
preach in Edinburgh, and at once carried him off to Glasgow
as his assistant. To the last he kept up with the current
' movements of the day. Morrell's " History of Philosophy"
was laid hold of when it issued from the press, and before
others had read or heard of it, he was lecturing on it to his
students; and when etherization came into vogue, Chalmers
was found seated on the benches of the infirmary witnessing
capital operations performed under the influence of the new
sedative. The last church which he reared was acne the
scene of the Burke murders, and there he was busied from
day to day in arrangements for draining the vicinity, wash-
ing the school-boys' clothes, and otherwise carrying out the
unitary system of tho day.