orn about the year 1583. He the only son of Mr. John
Dick or Dickson merchant in Glasgow, whose father was an old fenar and
possessor of some lands in the barony of Fintry, and parish of St.
Ninian's, called the kirk of the muir. His parents were religious, of a
considerable substance, and were many years married before they had Mr.
David, who was their only child; and as he was a Samuel asked of the
Lord, so he was early devoted to him and the ministry; yet afterwards
the vow was forgot, till providence by a rod, and sore sickness on their
son, brought their sins to remembrance, and then he was sent to resume
his studies at the university of Glasgow.

Soon after he had received the degree of master of arts, he was admitted
professor of philosophy in that college, where he was very useful in
training up the youth in solid learning; and with the learned principal
Boyd of Trochridge, the worthy Mr. Blair, and other pious members of
that society, his pains were singularly blessed in reviving decayed
serious piety among the youth, in that declining and corrupted time, a
little after the imposition of prelacy upon the church. Here by a
recommendation of the general assembly not long after our reformation
from popery, the regents were only to continue eight years in their
profession; after which, such as were found qualified were licensed, and
upon a call after trial were admitted to the holy ministry; by which
constitution the church came to be filled with ministers well seen in
all the branches of useful learning. Accordingly Mr. Dickson was in
1618, ordained minister to the town of Irvine, where he laboured for
about twenty-three years.

That same year the corrupt assembly at Perth agreed to the five articles
imposed upon the church by the king and the prelates. Mr. Dickson at
first had no great scruple against episcopacy, as he had not studied
those questions much, till the articles were imposed by this meeting,
and then he closely examined them; and the more he looked into them, the
more aversion he found to them; and when some time after, by a sore
sickness, he was brought within views of death and eternity, he gave
open testimony of the sinfulness of them.

But when this came to take air, Mr. James Law, arch-bishop of Glasgow,
summoned him to appear before the high-commission court Jan. 29, 1622.
Mr. Dickson, at his entrance to the ministry at Irvine, preached upon 2
Cor. v. 11. The first part, _knowing the terrors o