s enforced seclusion
from outward ministerial activity only set him the more free to that
inward activity which has been such a blessing to so many, and to so many
ministers especially. And as to this of every minister being well read,
that master in Israel says: 'Above all, let me tell you that the book of
books to you is your own heart, in which are written and engraven the
deepest lessons of divine instruction. Learn, therefore, to be deeply
attentive to the presence of God in your own hearts, who is always
speaking, always instructing, always illuminating the heart that is
attentive to Him.' Jonathan Edwards called the poor parish minister of
Ettrick 'a truly great divine.' But Law goes on to say, 'A great divine
is but a cant expression unless it signifies a man greatly advanced in
the divine life. A great divine is one whose own experience and example
are a demonstration of the reality of all the graces and virtues of the
gospel. No divine has any more of the gospel in him than that which
proves itself by the spirit, the actions, and the form of his life: the
rest is but hypocrisy, not divinity.' Let all our parish ministers,
then, give themselves to this kind of reading. Let them all aim at a
doctor's degree in the divinity of their own hearts.

3. We are done at last, and we are done for ever, in Scotland, with
patrons and with presenters; but I daresay our most Free Church people
would be quite willing to surrender their dear-bought franchise if the
old plan could even yet be made to work in all their parishes as it
worked in Mansoul. For not only was the presented minister in this case
a well-read man; he was also, what the best of the Scottish people have
always loved and honoured, a man, as this history testifies, with a
tongue as bravely hung as he had a head filled with judgment. In
Scotland we like our minister to have a tongue bravely hung, even when
that is proved to our own despite. When any minister, parish minister or
other, is seen to tune his pulpit, our respect for him is gone. The
Presbyterian pulpit has been proverbially hard to tune, and it will be an
ill day when it becomes easy. 'Here lies a man who had a brow for every
good cause.' So it was engraven over one of Boston's elders. And so is
it always: like priest, like people in the matter of the hang of the
minister's tongue and in the boldness of the elder's brow.

'Bravely hung' is an ancient and excellent expression which h