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THE

FOR AUGUST, 1801.

MEMOIR OF THE REV. EBENEZER ERSKINE. THIS excellent man was the fon of the Rev. Henry

Erfkine, a younger child of Ralph Erfkine, Efq. of Shielfield, a refpectable family in Berwickshire, and defcended from the ancient houfe of MAR. Henry was born at Dryburgh, the family-feat, in 1624, and ordained, by the English Prefbyterians, to the paftoral office at Cornhil, in the county of Northumberland. But he had fcarcely refided three years in that place, when he was ejected from his charge by the Act of Uniformity, commonly called The Bartholomew Act, which required the Prefbyterian minifters to be ordained in the Epifcopal form, and to comply with the liturgy of the English church. Having fuffered a variety of hardfhips, during the reign of the royal brothers, he was, foon after the Revolution in 1688, called to be minifter at Chirnfide, near Berwick; where he died on the 10th of Auguft, 1696, in the 72d year of his age.

His fon Ebenezer, the fubject of this memoir, was born on the 22d of June, 1680. Having gone through a regular courfe of education at the univerfity of Edinburgh, he was, in 1703, ordained to the paftoral office at Portmoak, in the prefbytery of Kirkcaldy. Not long after which, he married Alifon Turpie, a young lady of amiable difpofition and diftinguifhed piety, by whom he had feveral children, who were all honourably fettled in life. Diligent, as he was, in compofing his fermons, and committing them to memory, yet, fuch was his modefty and diffidence, that, for fome years, he had not courage to look round upon his audience; but delivered his difcourfes from the pulpit with his eyes fixed upon a great ftone in the wall of the church immediately oppofite to him. During the first period of his miniftry at Portmoak, his views of the truth were far from clear or correct; and his difcourfes, like those of many worthy men at that time, whofe hearts were better than their heads, contained a mixture of legal and evangelical doctrine. His amiable fpoufe was fignally inftrumental in producing an happy change in his views of divine truth, of which he afterwards made the * See the Continuation of Calamy's Life of Baxter, p. 678. VOL, IX.

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moft tender acknowledgments to his children and friends. Having been brought to the knowledge of "the truth as it is in Jefus," he was infpired with an holy zeal for the fpread of it among his people; and accordingly, in addition to the ufual paftoral duties of catechizing and vifitation of his flock from houfe to houfe, he fet up a weekly lecture on Thursday, which was well attended, not only by his own hearers, but by others from the neighbouring congregations. Being established in the knowledge and faith of the Gospel, he acquired great freedom and boldness in the publication of it; and his talents, as a public fpeaker, either in the pulpit or the ecclefiaftical courts, becom→ ing more and more confpicuous, he fhone with diftinguifhed luftre among his brethren in the miniftry. When the General Affembly of the Church of Scotland, by their act 1720, condemned, as erroneous, a book entitled, "The Marrow of Modern Divinity," he was one of the twelve minifters who gave in a reprefentation and petition to the affembly 1721, fetting forth, that many precious truths of Chrift were condemned by that act; and therefore craving the repeal of it. His brethren had fuch an esteem for his abilities, that when they had made the firft draft of their reprefentation and petition, they employed him to put it into proper form, to be afterwards revifed by the brethren in that part of the country. It was then prefented to the affembly, who declined entering on the bufinefs, but referred it to their commiffion; and the commiffion, which met in November that fame year, put twelve queries to the petitioners, to be answered in writing against their next meeting in March following. The anfwers to the queries were begun by Mr. Erfkine; and being finifhed by the Rev. Mr. Willon, of Maxton, were prefented to the commiffion, with a proteftation prefixed to them. Thefe anfwers, which were afterwards printed, contain a masterly defence of many leading truths of the Gofpel, and richly deferve the ferious attention of students in theology and young minifters. They will alfo acquire clear and confiffent views of evangelical doctrine by a careful perufal of the Act of the Affociate Prefbytery anent the Doctrine of Grace."

Mr. Erfkine's reputation as a preacher had now rifen fo high, that when the Lord's fupper was difpenfed at Portmoak, great numbers of ferious and lively Chriftians from different parts of the country attended, and fome of them +. Ibid. p. 379.

See Pofton's Memoirs, p. 379,

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from places fixty or feventy miles diftant; and fo great was the concourfe of people on thofe occafions, that they had frequently two places for public worship, befides the parith-church. So remarkably did the Lord Jefus give tef timony to the word of his grace, that not a few of those people, on their death-beds, fpoke of the braes (rifing grounds) of Portmoak as fo many Bethels, where God Almighty met with them, and bleffed them.-Mr. Erskine fuffered an almoft irreparable lots in the death of his beloved wife, Alifon Turpie, who flept in Jefus, after having born him ten children. Some time after her death, his brother Ralph, who was minifter at Dunfermline, having come to fee him, wrote the following verses, in commemoration of her death:

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The law brought forth her precepts ten,
And then diffolv'd in grace;
This vine as many boughs, and then
In glory took her place.

Her dying breath triumphantly
Did that fweet anthem fing,
"Thanks be to God for victory!

"O death, where is thy fting?"

In the large edition of Mr. Ralph Erfkine's works, publifhed at Glasgow, these lines are faid to have been written on the death of his own fpoule, Margaret Dewar; but the writer of this had the following account of them from Mr. Ebenezer's eldest daughter, Mrs. Fisher, of Glasgow. My uncle, Ralph," faid fhe, "being on a vifit at our houfe, was walking through the parlour while the fervant was bringing out his horfe from the ftable; and obferving my mother's Bible lying on a table near the window, he took out his pen and ink, and, fetting his foot upon a chair, with the Bible on his knee, immediately wrote these lines on the blank leaf fronting the title-page."

Having been left a widower with a young family, the oldeft of whom was not above thirteen years of age, Mr. Erfkine afterwards married a daughter of the Rev. James Webster, of Edinburgh, who bore him feveral children; none of whom are now alive. His character and talents as a minifter were fo extenfively known, that he was called to exercife his gifts in many places at a confiderable dif tance from his own parish; and the town of Stirling, finding it neceffary to have another minifter in addition to the Rev. Meffrs. Hamilton and Muir, gave him an unanimous call; upon which he was tranflated to Stirling in 1731,

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after he had been twenty-eight years minifter at Portmoak. Having been elected Moderator of the Synod of Perth and Stirling in April 1732, he opened the next meeting at Perth with a fermon from Pfal. cxviii. 22. "The ftone which the builders refufed, is become the head ftone of the corner.' The General Affembly of the Church, which met in the month of May preceding, having paffed an act, investing the decifive power of electing and calling minifters (where an accepted prefentation did not take place) in the majority of a conjunct meeting of heritors and elders being Proteftants, Mr. Erfkine confidered this act as a manifeft encroachment on the divine prerogative of the Lord Jefus Chrift, who is the fole King and head of his church, as well as a violation of the natural rights of Chriftian people; and therefore, with a becoming freedom, and a boldnefs peculiar to himself, teftified against it, as contrary to the word of God and the fundamental principles of the conftitution. This public teftimony, in which he was joined by the Rev. Meffrs. Wilfon, of Perth; Moncrief, of Abernethy; and Fisher, (then) of Kinclaven, brought these four brethren, by a procefs, before the General Affembly; which terminated in their ejection from the established church. The feceffion was now formally ftated. Mr. Erfkine, poffeffing the affections of his people, who were well fatisfied with regard to the rectitude of his conduct, the great body of the congregation ftedfaftly adhering to his miniftry, joined with him in the feceffion, and built for him one of the largeft meeting-houses in Scotland, capable of containing between three and four thoufand people, numbers of whom came from different parts of the adjacent country, and placed themselves under his miniftry. There are, at prefent, fix different congregations with fettled ministers, formed from that of Stirling, which is ftill fo numerous, that it is a collegiate charge. Mr. Erskine coming into the decline of life, his congregation frankly agreed to give him an affiftant in the miniftry; and, accordingly, his nephew, Mr. James Erfkine, being regularly called, was ordained colleague and fucceffor to his uncle, who preached the ordination-fermon from 2 Cor. iv. 7. "But we have this treasure in earthen veffels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us." But being unable, on account of bodily weaknefs, to go through the whole of the folemn fervice, his fon-in-law, the Rev.

Mr.

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