The name of Mr. Chalmers was pretty well known over the south of Scotland as that of a man of powerful mind and extraordinary eloquence when, in 1815, or in the thirty-sixth year of Ilia age, ho was called from his quiet country parish to assume the pastoral care of Tron parish in the city of Glasgow. lie remained in Glasgow in all eight years. In 1816 the degree of D.D. was conferred on him by the University of Glasgow. From 1815 to 1819 he was minister of Trots pariah. From 1819 to 1823 he was minister of the newly-, constituted parish of St. John's. These eight years were the period of his highest celebrity as a pulpit-orator. In this capacity, all Glasgow, and soon all Scotland rang with his fame. One of the most enthusiastic descriptions in Mr Lockhert's account of Scottish celebrities at that time, published under the title of ' Peter's Letters to his Kinsfolk,' is that given of Chalmers in his Glasgow pulpit. A picture so elaborate and glowing from such a pen of a man whose professed position was simply that of a Preebyteriau clergyman of is Glasgow pariah, proves that already he was no longer thought of only in that capacity, but MI a man of truly great genius. "I know nut what it la,' said Jeffrey, in 1816, "but there is something altogether remarkable about that mats It reminds mo more of what one reads of as the effect of the eloquence of Demosthenes than anything I ever heard." The same impression was afterwards produced on men of all kinds in England, as well as in Scotland—ou Hazlitt, Canning, Wilber force, Hall, and Foster. Part of the secret was that Chalmers was not one of those orator, whose power evanesces in the moment of their actual utterance, but a man of massive, large, and substantial thought, whose every speech was the enunciation and illustration of some principle or generalisation, and whose language was full of extraordinary felicities, memorable turus of phrase, and gleam., of poetic conception. Perhaps the first exhibition of his oratory in which this union in him of high intellectual attainments and general literary genius with the specific qualities of the orator, was con spicuously brought out, was on the occasion of the delivery, in 1816, of a eerier of week-day lectures ou Astronomy iu its connection with Religion. The excitement caused by these Astronomical Dis courses' was unprecedented; and their popularity, when published in the name year, rivalled that of the contemporary Waverley Novels.' But his regular pulpit sermons were no less extraordinary as displays of mental and oratorical power; and on his occasional visite to Edin burgh, London, and other places, hie (area as an orator preceded hint, and drew crowds to hear him. At Edinburgh his oratory was exhibited not only in the pulpit, but also in debate in the general assembly, or annual ecclesiastical parliament of Scotland. Hero as leader of the "Evangelical" party, then gradually attaining number, and influence, he took a polemical part in some of the Scotch cede eiastical questions of the time, and always with the effect of a man at once great in wisdom and resistless in speech. His speeches, like his sermons, were generally read ; and very rarely indeed did he speak (3:V:impure. With all his extraordinary popularity as an orator, how ever, no man better appreciated than be did the exact value of such popularity—"a popularity," which, in his own characteristic language, "rifles homo of its sweets, and by elevating a man above his fellows, places him in a region of desolation, whore he stands a conspicuous mark for tho shafts of malice, envy, and detraction ; a popularity which, with its head among storms, and its feet on the treacherous quicksands, has nothing to lull the agonies of its tottering existence but the hosanualis of a drivelling generation." Far more important in his owu eyes than these pulpit services which brought him such hosannalis, were his practical schemes for ahowiug the social efficacy of Christianity. It was Dr. Chalmers's fixed and lifelong belief that in religiou alone was there a full remedy for the evils of society, and that all schemes of social amelioration would bo futile which did not aim at working Christianity through the hearts of the people down iuto their habits and households. Subordinate to this belief was Lie attachment to the parochial system of social organisation—that system which divides a community into small manageable masses, marked out by local boundaries, and each having a euffioient occleeiaetical and educational apparatus within itself. Disliking with his whole heart the English Poor-Law system, he was of opinion that, if the parochial oysters) were properly worked, pauperism could be provided for without a poor-law at all, by the judicious direction, under clerical cud lay superintendence, of private benevolence. In order practically to illus trate these views, ho undertook a vast experiment, first with Troll pariah, and then with that of St. John's. The population of this latter pariah (in which Edward Irving was for some time Dr. Chalmers'e assistant) was upwards of 10,000, including perhaps the poorest part of the operative population In Glasgow; but such was his zeal, such his practical sagacity, and such his power of influencing persona fit to be his agents, that in a abort time the pariah was organised both for economical and educational purposes in a manner uuknowu before, school. being set up in every part of it, and the poorest lanes visited periodically eaoh by its own special teacher and inspector. The results of his experiment, with his speculation. in connection with it, were published by him (1819.1823) in a series of quarterly tracts, on the ' Christian and Civic Economy of Large Towns;' which, with two volumes of 'Sermons,' published respectively in 1818 and 1820, two articles un 'Pauperism' contributed to tho 'Edinburgh Review' iu 1817, and a sermon in the same year on the Death of the Princess Charlotte, termed, along with the 'Astronomical Discourses' already mentioned, hie chief literary exertions during his residence iu Glasgow.
In the midst of the bustle and fatigue of his life in Glasgow, increased ten-fold by the hospitality which his celebrity obliged him to exercise, Dr. Chalmers bad never ceased to sigh for the academic quiet of a professor's chair in one of the Scottish universities ; and in January 1823, much to the suprise of the public, he resigned his charge, and accepted the chair of Moral Philosophy then vacant in his native University of St. Andrews. The new post was one of much less emolument, and of far leas publicity than that which he bad resigned ; but even had his tastes not disposed him to accept it, he had paramount reasons in the state of his health, which was giving way under the wear and excitement of city-life. Forty-three years old when he accepted the chair, ho retained it till his forty-ninth year, or from 1823 to 1823. The winters of these five years were spent by him in the preparation and delivery of his class-lectures, and in the genial society of many of his old friends ; but be carried with him to St. Andrews those notions and schemes of Christian philanthropy which he bad matured in Glasgow, and the little Fife shire town felt during these five years the vivifying influence of his spirit and enthusiasm. Occasionally he preached in St. Andrews and in the neighbourhood round; annually in Maybe visited Edinburgh to take part in the business of the General Assembly, where his eloquence as before was felt as a conquering force on the "Evangelical" side in all the great ecclesiastical controversies of the time ; and excursions in Scotland and Ireland, and journeys as far as London, varied his summer. It was proposed at one time to elect him to the Moral Philosophy chair in the newly-established University of London ; but this pro posal, which might have altered the whole tenor of his future career, was not carried out. The literary results of his five years' sojourn at St. Andrews were courses of Lectures ou Moral Philosophy,' and on Political Economy,' prepared for his class and reserved for publica tion ; a third volume of his Christian and Civic Economy of Large Towns,' published in 1826 ; and a treatise on ' Ecclesiastical and Literary Endowments,' published in 1827.
Dr. Chalmers'. next appointment was to the chair of Divinity in the University of Edinburgh. The duties of this office he assumed in 1323, and he discharged them during fifteen years—i. e. from 1823 to 1343, or from his forty-ninth to his sixty-third year. His activity during these fifteen extraordinary years of his life (not taking account of his occasional sermons) was made up of three distinct kinds of work —his duties as theological professor; his continued exercises in litera ture, speculation, and schemes of Christian philanthropy ; sod his controversial energy in connection with the serious ecclesiastical struggle which during that time convulsed Scotland. 1. ills Labours as 7'heological Professor.—In this important capacity, which involved the theological instruction and training of between one and two hundred young men annually for the Scottish Church, Dr. Chalmers exerted a vast influence, less as a man learned in theological lore, than as a man of noble purpose and burning enthusiasm with whom no young man could come in contact without love and veneration, and who was in the habit not only of communicating massive thoughts of his own on almost all subjects, but also of stirring up thought in others. His class-room was truly a centre of life and intellectual influence ; and those who went forth from it carried with them perforce much of his spirit and many of his views. 2. Ilia independent tabours in literature, speculation, and Christian philanthropy.—Of these it is impossible to take full account; suffice it to say that in 1831 he published his treatise on `Political Economy,' and in 1833 his Bridgewater treatise ' On the Adaptation of External Nature to the Moral and Intellectual Constitution of Mau ; ' that in 1833 be delivered in London, and afterwards published, a aeries of Lectures in Defence of Church Establishments;' that in the following year he made a tour through Scotland to advocate the cause of church extension ; that in 1841 ha published a volume on ' The sufficiency of the Parochial System without a poor-rate for the right management of the Poor ;' that during the same period he delivered, during the summer vacations various lectures to popular audiences on topics of natural science ; and that he gave much of his time to the superintending of an attempt to carry out his notions of proper parochial management in one of the poorest districts of Edinburgh. Some of the labours here mentioned received public recognition, in the form of honours conferred upon him. Thus in 1830, he was appointed one of the king's chaplains for Scotland ; in 1S34 be was elected a Fellow of the .Royal Society of Edinburgh, and a corresponding member of the French Institute; and in 1835 he received the distinction of Doctor of Laws from the University of Oxford. 3. //is connection with the Scotch Church Contra rersy.—The " Evangelical " party with which, since 1810, Dr. Chalmers had been so permanently connected, had gradually increased in the church, so as at last to attain the majority ; and in 1832, Dr. Chalmers was elected to the moderatorship, or presidency, of the General Assembly of that year. In 1834 the Assembly, under the auspices of the ruliog party, and with his advice and sanction, passed the famous " Veto Act," the design of which was to modify the action of the system of patronage of livings in the Church of Scotland, by enabling the Church Courts to reject any nominee of a patron on the ground of his being displeasing to the majority of the congregation or parishioner, over whom he was appointed. • Several nominees having in immediately subsequent years been rejected in accordance with this act, appeals were made to tho Civil Courts of Scotland and to .„..