Rev. George Douglas, LL.D.
 Rev.
George Douglas (1825-1924) was a Scottish-born Methodist leader in
Canada.
Dr. Douglas's career furnishes a notable example of the
extent to which genuine manliness and force of character, aided
by a strong and earnest purpose in life, can triumph over
depressing and adverse circumstances. He began his ministerial
life with few advantages derived from education, and with none
whatever derived from social standing.
Since reaching manhood he has been subjected to the serious drawbacks
inseparable from various depressing ailments and an uncertain state of
bodily health. His great powers have developed themselves in spite of
hindrances to which a feebler will and a smaller measure of genius would
undoubtedly have succumbed. Undeterred by the various obstacles which
from time to time have arisen in his path, he has long since achieved a
position as a pulpit orator unsurpassed—perhaps unrivalled—in this
country.
His reputation is not confined to Canada, or to the religious Body
wherewith he is more immediately connected. The lecture-halls of New
England have echoed to the deep tones of his powerful voice, and his
reputation for eloquence stands as high in Boston as in Montreal, where
the greater part of his ministerial career has been spent. That he has
been able to accomplish so much—handicapped, as he has been, by a late
start in life, and by subsequent ill-health—affords strong proof that,
under more favourable circumstances, his fame would have been
world-wide. His services to the Methodist Church, and to the cause of
Christianity generally, have been very great, and the future historian
of Canadian Methodism must assign to him a place in the front rank among
the pulpit orators of his time.
As is sufficiently indicated by
his name, he is of Scottish origin. He was born on the 14th of October,
1825, at Ashkirk, a beautiful little village in one of the most
picturesque parts of Roxburghshire, about seven miles from Abbotsford,
and in the very centre of the district consecrated by the genius of Sir
Walter Scott, the Ettrick Shepherd, and John Leyden. "Doubtless," says a
writer in the Methodist Magazine, "his young soul was often stirred by
the heroic traditions of Flodden Field and of Dunbar, which were both
near by, and by the ballads of Chevy Chase and of the border wars." His
parents were strict Presbyterians, and of course reared their family in
the Presbyterian doctrines. How extensive the family was, we have no
present means of ascertaining. There were at all events three sons, of
whom the subject of this sketch was the youngest.
The family emigrated from Scotland to Canada in 1832, when George was
a child of seven years old, and settled in the city of Montreal. The
parents were in humble circumstances, and the children seem from the
first to have recognized the fact that it would be necessary for them to
make their own way in life. Their educational advantages, as has
been intimated, were not great. George attended for a short time at a
private school at Laprairie, kept by the Rev. Mr. Black, a Presbyterian
minister; but he does not appear to have acquired much there beyond an
elementary knowledge of the three R's. Upon leaving this school he was
for a short time employed as an assistant in a Montreal book store,
after which he was apprenticed to the trade of a blacksmith. He learned
his trade, and entered into partnership, while still in his teens, with
his eldest brother, James, who was a carpenter and builder. Meanwhile he
had become an insatiable reader, and devoured with eagerness whatever
books came in his way. His faculties would seem to have developed
somewhat late, but before he had reached manhood his friends and
acquaintances began to recognize the fact that he was endowed with
unusual powers of mind. Upon any subject which specially attracted his
attention he was wont to express himself with an eloquence and a wealth
of illustration such as is not often heard from a youth imperfectly
educated, and who has not enjoyed the advantage of association with
cultured minds. Erelong he made up his mind to study medicine, and
matriculated in one of the medical schools of Montreal.
Soon after this time, and while his medical studies were still in
progress, a crisis took place in his mental history. He began to attend
the Methodist Church, and was awakened by the preaching of the late Rev.
William Squire, who was then a power in the local Methodist pulpit.
Having experienced the mental phenomena incident to "conversion," he
joined the Methodist Church, and soon afterwards began to take a
conspicuous part as a "class leader," under the direction of the Rev.
John Mattheson.
It is said that he was singularly diffident about his own capacity
for speaking before an audience. In a very short time, however, his
thoughts found forcible expression, and it was observed that his
addresses produced a marked effect upon those who listened to them. In
process of time he became a local preacher; emulating, in this respect,
the example of his elder brother John, who had also undergone spiritual
experiences, and who subsequently became a zealous and effective
minister of the Methodist Church. George's sermons were from the very
first marked by a high degree of spiritual fervour. "It was evident,"
says the writer already quoted from, "that God had called this young man
to the office of the Christian ministry as his life-work, and he was not
disobedient to the Divine call." In 1848, being then in his twenty-third
year, he was received as a probationer for the ministry.
In 1849, having been recommended by the Lower Canada District to
attend the Wesleyan Theological Institute at Richmond, in England, he
crossed the Atlantic for that purpose, but had scarcely reached his
destination ere he was appointed to missionary work in the Bahamas
District of the West India Mission. He was specially ordained at St.
John's Square, London, in the spring of 1850, by the Rev. Thomas
Jackson, Dr. Alder, and others, and sent to the Bermuda Islands. After
about eighteen months' residence there his health failed, and he began
to suffer from a distressing affection of the nerves, engendered by the
peculiarities of the climate, and augmented, doubtless, by his ceaseless
mental toil. He was accordingly compelled to return to Montreal, and has
ever since resided in Canada, where his reputation has steadily grown
with his increasing years.
Of his ministerial life, twenty years have been spent in
Montreal—eleven in pastoral work, seven as head of the Wesleyan
Theological College, and two without a charge, on account of ill-health.
His other fields of toil have been Kingston, Toronto, and Hamilton, in
each of which he laboured with great effect for three years. Ever since
devoting [Pg 96]himself to the ministry he has been an indefatigable
student, and has aided his great natural powers of mind by a wide and
various course of reading. He is especially learned in Metaphysics, and
notwithstanding his multifarious duties and frequent bodily infirmities,
he has kept himself fully abreast of the times in literature,
philosophy, and natural science. In 1869, in recognition of his
distinguished abilities, the University of McGill College conferred upon
him the degree of LL.D.
To say that Dr. Douglas is highly esteemed by his brother ministers
and Professors, and by Canadian Methodists generally, would be to give
very faint expression to the prevailing sentiment. He is endowed with a
magnetic force of character which impels all his acquaintances to regard
him in the light of a warm personal friend. He has often been deputed to
represent his Church in the great ecclesiastical gatherings of
Christendom, and "right royally has he performed that task, maintaining
the honour of his Church and country in the presence of the foremost
orators of the day.
His manly presence, his deep-toned voice, his broad sweep of thought
and majestic flights of eloquence, have stirred the hearts of listening
thousands, and done brave battle for the cause of God." His oratory has
been pronounced by many competent judges to be even more effective than
that of his friend and fellow-labourer, Dr. Punshon. Possessed of few of
the tricks of elocution, his voice has a peculiar depth and richness of
intonation which no mere elocutionary training can give, and, when
roused by a more than usually congenial theme, his utterances seem to be
positively inspired.
Among a host of other important undertakings, he has represented his
Church at the Young Men's Christian Association at the International
Conventions at Washington, Philadelphia, Albany, Indianapolis, and
Chicago; at the Evangelical Alliance in New York; and at the General
Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the Southern States. He
has also filled with eminent ability the offices of Co-Delegate of the
old Canada Conference, President of the Montreal Conference, and
Vice-President and President of the General Conference of the Methodist
Church of Canada.
Of late years he has devoted his best powers to the duties incidental
to his position as Principal of the Wesleyan Theological College at
Montreal.
The Canadian Portrait Gallery: Volume II, 1889
Family
George Douglas, Methodist minister
and educator was born on 14th October 1825 in Ashkirk, Scotland, youngest of
three sons of John Douglas and Mary Hood. 28 In November 1855,
he married Maria Bolton Pearson in Toronto, and they had four
daughters, one of whom died in childhood.
In the company
of his mother and two elder brothers, George Douglas arrived at
Montreal in July 1832 to join his father, who had immigrated the
previous year following a decline in his fortunes as a miller in
Scotland.
On 10 Feb. 1894 Douglas succumbed to pneumonia
and, following a simple service, he was buried in Mount Royal
Cemetery. Although his candour had engendered considerable
controversy, he had been almost universally admired for his
uncomplaining endurance of physical affliction and his
unwavering commitment to righteousness.
Research note:
• It is possible that an uncle, William Douglas (b. 1799) attended
Scotland’s Edinburgh University as a student in the Faculty of Arts for
three years (1816-1818). He became a schoolmaster in Edinburgh and lived
in the parish of St. George. He married Miss Margaret Usher [eldest
daughter of John Usher] in 1819.
Any contributions will be
gratefully accepted
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