WODROW, Robert, a well-known ecclesiastical historian, was born at Glasgow in the year 1679. His father, James Wodrow, a man of piety and learning, had been licensed to preach in 1673; but during the times of persecution he obtained no settled charge, and was obliged to live a considerable time under concealment, occasionally preaching to the proscribed presbyterians in the west of Scotland. After the Revolution, he became one of the ministers of Glasgow; but resigned his pastoral charge in 1692, on being elected professor of divinity in that university. Robert, his second son, entered the university in 1691; and after passing through the usual academical course, with the view of qualifying himself for the sacred ministry, he became a student of divinity under his father. About the same time (in 1698) he was chosen librarian to the university; an office which he held for four years, availing himself of the opportunities it afforded for carrying on his literary and antiquarian pursuits, and also for becoming acquainted with many persons of eminence, with whom, in after life, he maintained a regular correspondence. On leaving the university, he resided for a short time in the family of Sir John Maxwell of Nether Pollock, one of the senators of the College of Justice; and having offered himself as a probationer to the presbytery of Paisley, he was licensed to preach the gospel in March 1703. In the summer following, the parish of Eastwood, where Sir John Maxwell resided, became vacant by the death of the Rev. Matthew Crawford, the author of a history of the Church of Scotland (a work of some value, which still remains unpublished); and Wodrow having received an unanimous call from the heritors, elders, and congregation, to supply the charge, he was ordained minister of that parish on the 28th of October 1703. As Eastwood was at the time one of the smallest parishes in the west of Scotland, he was the better enabled to devote his leisure hours to the prosecution of his favourite pursuits, which then included natural history as well as antiquities. To Edward Lhuyd, the learned keeper of the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, he writes in August 1790, “My lott is by providence cast in the parish of Eastwood, and my house within a quarter of a mile from the Aldhous-bourn, where you and I were a-lithoscoping. My pastorall charge does not allow me that time I once had to follow out these subterranean studyes, but my inclination is just the same as when I saw you, or rather greater; and I take it to be one of the best of diversions from more serious work, and in itself a great duty, to view and admire my Maker in his works as weel as his word. I have gott together some store of our fossiles hereabout from our marle, our limestone, &c., and heartily wish I had the knowing Mr Lhuyd here to pick out what he wants, and to help me to classe a great many species I know not what to make of.”

Throughout the whole of his extensive correspondence, Wodrow evinces his inquisitive turn of mind, thirsting to acquire information on all subjects, whether as regarded science, literature, or the state of religion; and he often apologizes for his “Athenian disposition,” or, as in one place he more quaintly terms it, “his Athenian or queristicall temper.” Thus, soon after his settlement at Eastwood, we find him availing himself of his acquaintance with the Rev. Patrick Simpson of Renfrew, and other aged ministers, who had been ordained before the Restoration, to glean their recollections of the more eminent presbyterians who flourished during the period usually called the Second Reformation; and many of their memorials are treasured up in his MS. volumes of Analecta. These pursuits, however, never interfered with his parochial duties, and his success and faithfulness as a Christian minister endeared him to his own people, while his reputation as a preacher was considerable; yet, not being given to change, he resisted all attempts made to translate him to some more important field of labour in the church, to Glasgow in 1712, to Stirling in 1717, to the same place in 1726, and finally to Renfrew in 1729. He was regular in his attendance on the several ecclesiastical courts, and he availed himself of his periodical visits to Edinburgh during the meetings of the General Assembly to prosecute his historical researches. As might have been expected from a person of his habits, pursuits, and education, he took a lively interest in all ecclesiastical proceedings; and in questions involving matters either of sound doctrine, or of discipline and church government, he was invariably found on the popular side. Thus we find him a steady opponent to the imposition of the abjuration oath, hostile to the restoration of lay-patronage, and taking a decided though [7:21:911]reluctant part in the well-known case of his father’s successor, Professor Simson of Glasgow, who was finally deposed from his office for teaching erroneous doctrines. However much he might lament the exercise of the powers conferred by the obnoxious act alluded to, which was passed by the Jacobite party for the evident purpose of subverting the church as an establishment, he uniformly inculcated submission to the civil power in such matters, and used his best endeavours to promote peace and harmony in cases of disputed settlements. It might not indeed be possible to overestimate the amount of injury done to the interests of religion, and of the country at large, by this act of Queen Anne, restoring to lay-patrons the exercise of a civil right, in regard to the presentation of ministers to vacant parishes, without some efficient check on its due exercise. In his MS. correspondence we find Wodrow often expressing his deep-felt regrets at the evil effects it was then beginning to produce. “If the Lord open not a door of relief (so he writes in 1717), we are in the utmost hazard of a corrupt ministry.” And the reiterated expression of his fears of “a corrupt ministry,” and his remarks on “the servile crouching (of the probationer) to every thing his patron happens to be for,” were but too fully justified by the declining state of the church during the last century. Looking at its effects during Wodrow’s own time, it was the primary cause of ejecting from the bosom of the church some of her most faithful ministers, of alienating the affections of the humbler classes of the people, who retained a longing after the fruits of gospel ministrations, and of fostering in those who continued within its pale a growing laxity of principle, however outwardly its standards were professed; and thus, while no adequate means were provided for the spiritual wants of an increasing population, and no attempts made to win back to their fold the people who had left it in search of more faithful and devoted pastors, the church as an establishment seemed fast verging into a state of languor and spiritual death. But it would be out of place to enlarge on such a topic, even if Wodrow had filled a more conspicuous situation in the church. His reputation is founded on his literary labours as a diligent and successful investigator of the history of the church prior to his own times.

The work by which Mr Wodrow is best known, is “The History of the Sufferings of the Church of Scotland from the Restoration to the Revolution.” Edinb. 1721-2, 2 vols. fol. It was the labour of many years. In 1717, having prepared the first portion of it, the manuscript was submitted to George Ridpath and other literary friends, and he profited by their suggestions. Two years later, the plan was laid before the General Assembly, when it was cordially approved of, and an act was passed recommending the members of assembly and the several ministers of the church to subscribe for copies, and “to deal” with such in their bounds as were well disposed to encourage the work, “now ready for the press.” He obtained by those means a most respectable list of subscribers; and on its publication, the work being dedicated to George the First, copies of it were presented, through Dr Fraser, to the king, the queen, the prince and princess of Wales, by all of whom it was most graciously received. In fact, the reception of the work by the public must have been gratifying to the author; and he appears from his correspondence to have received with comparative indifference some scurrilous attempts to depreciate his labours by the nonjuring episcopalians, or rather by one of their adherents, Alexander Bruce, advocate, first in an anonymous tract, “The Scottish Behemoth dissected, in a Letter to Mr Robert Wodrow, &c;” Edin. 1722, folio; and then in the preface to a Life of Archbishop Sharpe, 1723, 8vo. Mr Bruce next announced, in 1724, a great work, an “Impartial History of the Affairs in Church and State in Scotland from the Reformation to the Revolution,” in two volumes folio. He did not survive long enough to make much progress in this work, which was taken up by Bishop Keith, who published only the first volume in 1734, bringing the history down to the year 1568. Keith’s history is only important as a collection of materials, for the author was equally destitute of acuteness and liberality. To what extent he may have profited by Bruce’s labours, is nowhere stated.

It does not appear in what manner Wodrow’s History was again brought under the notice of George the First; but his majesty, “to certify our esteem of the said author and his works, by bestowing on him some mark of our bounty,” ordered the sum of one hundred guineas to be paid to the Rev. Robert Wodrow by the Treasury. This grant is dated the 26th of April 1725; and such a mark of royal favour, wholly unexpected on Wodrow’s part, was well bestowed on one whose labours served by contrast to exhibit in lively colours the advantages which were secured to Great Britain by the Hanoverian succession. In more recent times public attention was directed to the work by the high eulogium of Mr Fox on its fidelity and impartiality; and the demand having increased its price beyond the means of ordinary purchasers, a new edition in a more commodious form was published at Glasgow in 1830, 4 vols. 8vo, with a memoir of the author prefixed, by Robert Burns, D. D., one of the ministers of Paisley. The work itself was seasonably undertaken, the materials were ample, and in general not difficult of access; the events were still recent, and many of those who had experienced the hardships and sufferings of the times were either still alive or had been personal friends of the author; and he brought to the task a singular degree of industry, and a fidelity and impartiality which compensated for his want of literary skill and elegance of composition; and by incorporating such a mass of original and authentic documents, he has rendered his work interesting by the copiousness and minuteness of its details, no less than by exhibiting an appalling picture of the times.

The publication of this great work had no effect in relaxing Wodrow’s literary ardour. It had always been with him a cherished plan to form a series of biographical memoirs of the more eminent ministers in the church of Scotland; and he took every opportunity of collecting materials for that design. Before proceeding with this task, he wrote a memoir of his father, Professor Wodrow, who was well entitled by his learning and usefulness to such a mark of filial affection and regard. He commences this memoir with the following remark: “When I have a design of making all the collections I can now recover, concerning the lives of persons in this church and nation, remarkable for piety and usefulness, the apostolical rule of shewing first piety at home, and requiting parents, seems to lead me to begin with my worthy and excellent father.” It is dated February 5th, 1724, and the MS. remained in the possession of the family for more than a century. This “Life of James Wodrow, A. M., Professor of Divinity in the University of Glasgow,” was published at Edinburgh in 1828, under the direction of the late Dr John Campbell, one of the ministers of that city. The series of lives, chiefly compiled between 1726 and 1733, forms ten volumes in folio, with four quarto volumes of appendix. These volumes are preserved in the library of the University of Glasgow; and a selection was commenced in 1834 for the members of the Maitland Club, under the title of “Collections upon the Lives of the Reformers and most eminent Ministers of the Church of Scotland.” This work is certainly not the most important of Wodrow’s labours. The lives are compiled and filled with extracts from works now much better known and more accessible than in his days, and being in most instances only first draughts hastily put together, the style is remarkably careless and slovenly. The lives already printed, however, are rendered of much greater value by the copious illustrations of the editor, Mr [7:21:912]W. J. Duncan, whose researches have been most assiduous and successful.

Wodrow’s studious habits appear to have injured his health; and during the latter years of his life his usual pursuits were often interrupted by sickness, and he at length sunk under a gradual decline on the 21 st of March 1734, in the 55th year of his age. In the year 1708 he was married to Margaret, daughter of Patrick Warner, minister of Irvine, and grand-daughter of William Guthrie, minister of Fenwick, author of a well-known practical treatise, “The Trial of a saving Interest in Christ.” Of a family of sixteen children, nine, with their mother, survived him. His last illness he bore with much Christian fortitude and faith in the gospel, thus giving “a testimony in his practical experience to the efficacy of those holy truths which he preached so faithfully, and vindicated so nobly by his writings.”

In the course of his researches Mr Wodrow had industriously formed an extensive and important collection of manuscripts, chiefly relating to ecclesiastical affairs in Scotland. Some years after his death, the collection was offered for sale by his family. In May 1742, a portion of the MSS. was purchased by direction of the General Assembly, and this portion now remains the property of the Church. Fifty years later (in 1792) the great mass of his other MSS. and printed tracts was sold to the Faculty of Advocates, with the exception of his Biographical Collections (already mentioned), which were obtained about the same time by the University of Glasgow. In June 1828, the Faculty of Advocates likewise secured, what cannot fail to be esteemed an important accession to the Wodrow Manuscripts, 1st, his “Analecta,” in six volumes, closely written, being a kind of note-book or diary, in which he has preserved a valuable and amusing record of literary intelligence, as well as remarkable occurrences, and the news of the day; 2d, a collection of his own letters, in three volumes, closely written (the first volume not being discovered), from March 1709 to December 1731, comprising copies of nearly 600 letters, which are well worthy of publication; and, 3d, the regular series of Letters addressed to him by literary persons, or by friends and relations, arranged by himself in chronological order, in twenty-two volumes 4to, and containing upwards of 3880 letters, between the years 1694 and 1733. In mentioning these collections, it may be proper to add, that, for illustrating the literary and ecclesiastical history of the period which they embrace, the publication of no similar works would be of greater importance than that of Wodrow’s Analecta, with an extensive but judicious selection from his Correspondence. (c, c. c.)