good part thereof.----And
sitting all down on the ground in a good summer night, about
sun-setting; when, he having rehearsed the sermon, they thought it a
wonderful great one, because of his good delivery, and their amazing
love to him: After which they arose, and set forward.

All allow that Mr. Guthrie was a man of strong natural parts
(notwithstanding his being a hard student at first); his voice was,
among the best sort, loud, and yet managed with a charming cadence and
elevation; his oratory was singular, and by it he was wholly master of
the passions of his hearers. He was an eminent chirurgion at the
jointing of a broken soul, and at the stating of a doubtful conscience;
so that afflicted persons in spirit came far and near, and received much
satisfaction and comfort by him. Those who were very rude, when he came
first to the parish, at his departure were very sorrowful, and, at the
curate's intimation of the bishop's commission, would have made
resistance, if he would have permitted them, not fearing the hazards or
hardships they might have endured on that account afterwards.

Besides his valuable treatise already mentioned, there are also a few
very faithful sermons, bearing his name, said to be preached at Fenwick
from Matth. xiv. 44, &c. Hos. xiii. 9, &c. But because they are
somewhat rude in expression, differing from the stile of his treatise,
some have thought them spurious, or, at least, not as they were at first
delivered by him. And as for that treatise on ruling elders, which is
now affixed to the last edition of his treatise (called his works), it
was wrote by his cousin, Mr. James Guthrie of Stirling. There are also
some other discourses of his yet in manuscript, out of which I had the
occasion to transcribe seventeen sermons published in the year 1779.
There are yet a great variety of sermons and notes of sermons bearing
his name yet in manuscript, some of which seems to be wrote with his own
hand.

_The Life of Mr. ROBERT BLAIR._

Mr. Blair was born at Irvine _anno_ 1593. His father was John Blair of
Windyedge, a younger brother of the ancient and honourable family of
Blair of that ilk; his mother was Beatrix Muir of the ancient family of
Rewallan. His father died when he was young, leaving his mother with six
children (of whom Robert was the youngest). She continued near fifty
years a widow, and lived till she was an hundred years old.

Mr. Robert entered into the college of Glasgow