Download or read book A Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen, Vol. 4 of 4 written by Robert Chambers and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2018-01-06 with total page 540 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from A Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen, Vol. 4 of 4: With a Supplemental Volume, Continuing the Biographies to the Present Time During the earlier period of their residence at St Andrews, Andrew Melville and his nephew had many difficulties to encounter. The former principal and professors annoyed their successors by pursuit of the compts of the college. The regents of St Leonards, enraged that the philosophy of their almost deified Aristotle should be impugned, raised a commotion; and, to quote the appro priste allusion of James Melville, cried out with one voice, Great is Diana of the Ephesians. The provcst and baillies, with the prior and his gentlemen pen sioners, were suspected of corrupt proceedings, especially in the provision of a minister for the town, and the opposition and exposures of Andrew Melville thus raised Up for him and his fellow labourers another host of enemies. These were all open and avowed Opponents, but they had one to deal with, who, as yet wearing the mask of friendship, as secretly plotting their own and the church's ruin, - this person was archbishop Adamson. Add to all this, that im mediately after their settlement at St Andrews, the carelessness of one of the students had nearly been the cause of setting the establishment on fire, and we shall be abundantly persuaded that it required no small energy of mind, such as Andrew Melville indeed possessed, not only to bear Up in such a situation, but successively to bathe all the Opposition that was offered to him. But amidst many discouragements which the more sensitive mind of James Melville must have keenly felt, he had also many cheering employments. He was engaged in duties which we have seen had been, from an early period, the objects of his greatest desire, -he was the teacher of some promising young men, who afterwards became shining lights in the church, and he had the grati fication of being requested to occupy the pulpit on many occasions, when there was no minister in the town, or, when the archbishop happened to be absent. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.