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Rev Neil Douglas, poet
Neil Douglas, [pseud. Britannicus] (1750 – 9 January 1823), who used
the pseudonym 'Britannicus', was a poet and minister of the Relief
church.
He was educated at the University of Glasgow, and married
Mary Anne Isabella Millar on 26 August 1787. As minister of the
Relief church at Cupar, Fife, he published Sermons on Important
Subjects, with some Essays in Poetry in 1789. Among the poems are
two extremely loyal odes on the king's illness and recovery, to
which their author referred nearly thirty years later when charged
with disaffection to the royal family. Under the pseudonym of
Britannicus, Douglas next published A Monitory Address to Great
Britain in 1792, lamenting the degeneracy of the times and calling
upon the king to abolish the anti-Christian practices of the slave
trade, duelling, and church patronage. That same year he published
The African Slave Trade, and the year after, Thoughts on Modern
Politics, also concerned with the slave trade.
By 1793
Douglas had moved to Dundee, where he officiated as a minister of
relief charge at Dudhope Crescent. The following year he brought out
The Lady's Scull, a sermon in verse upon the text ‘A place called
the place of a skull’. Another collection of sermons, Britain's
Guilt, Danger, and Duty, appeared in 1795, and Dialogues on the
Lord's Supper and The Duty of Pastors in 1796.
In the summer
of 1797 Douglas, who was fluent in Gaelic, went on a mission to
remote regions of Argyll, after first collecting some funds by
preaching at Dundee and Glasgow Messiah's Glorious Rest in the
Latter Days, published that year. On his return he described his
experiences in a series of letters published as A Journal of a
Mission to Part of the Highlands of Scotland in 1799. At this time
he issued proposals for publishing the Psalms and New Testament in
Gaelic, but abandoned the project through lack of encouragement.
After resigning his charge at Dundee, Douglas moved in 1798 to
Edinburgh, where he published Lavinia, based on the book of Ruth. He
moved afterwards to Greenock, where he published Leonidas and Sign
of the Times in 1805. That year Douglas settled in Stockwell Street,
Glasgow, and in 1807 he published The Messiah's Proper Deity. About
1809 he seceded from the Relief church to set up on his own account
as a ‘preacher of restoration’, or ‘universalist preacher’. As such
he published The Royal Penitent in 1811, on the repentance of King
David, then King David's Psalms in 1815. His sermons advocated
peaceful political reform, and he was a delegate to the Convention
of the Friends of the People in Edinburgh.
In 1817, while
promulgating his restoration views in Glasgow, Douglas was indicted
for sedition in drawing a parallel between George III and
Nebuchadnezzar, the prince regent and Belshazzar, and representing
the House of Commons as a den of thieves. He appeared before the
high court of justiciary, Edinburgh, on 26 May, aged sixty-seven
and, in his own words, ‘loaded with infirmities’. Cockburn, one of
his four advocates, after referring to him as ‘a poor, old, deaf,
obstinate, doited body’, says: The crown witnesses all gave their
evidence in a way that showed they had smelt sedition because they
were sent by their superiors to find it. The trial had scarcely
begun before it became ridiculous, from the imputations thrown on
the regent—and the difficulty with which people refrained from
laughing at the prosecutors, who were visibly ashamed of the scandal
they had brought on their own master.
A unanimous verdict of
acquittal was returned, and Douglas left the court loyally
declaring, ‘I have a high regard for his Majesty and for the Royal
Family, and I pray that every Briton may have the same’. He had
prepared for the worst, as he published soon after the trial An
Address to the Judges and Jury in a Case of Alleged Sedition, which
was intended to be delivered before sentence was passed.
Douglas was not perceived as belonging to the Scottish
establishment, and was described as a ‘wavering nonconformist’. A
Catechism with Proofs, published in 1822, gives a statement of the
religious views of Douglas and his church. ‘The analogy’, attributed
to him, is found in A Collection of Hymns for universalists (1824).
He also wrote numerous tracts, such as ‘Causes of our public
calamity’, ‘The Baptist’, ‘A word in season’, and others.
Douglas died at Glasgow on 9 January 1823, aged seventy-three. His
wife had died before him, and his only surviving son, Neil Douglas,
was a constant source of trouble to him and narrowly escaped hanging
(see his trial for ‘falsehood, fraud, and wilful imposition’, 12
July 1816, in the Scots Magazine, 78.552–3) .
TRIAL OF THE REV. NIEL DOUGLAS,
BEFORE THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICIARY, AT EDINBURGH, ON
THE 26th May 1817
Lord Justice Clerk.—Niel
Douglas,—Attend to the Indictment against you, which is now
to be read. "Niel Douglas, Universalist Preacher,
residing in Stockwell Street of the city of Glasgow, you are
Indicted and Accused, at the instance of Alexander
Maconochie of Meadowbank, his Majesty's Advocate for his
Majesty's interest: That Albeit, by the laws of this and of
every other well-governed realm, Sedition, more especially
when committed by a minister or by a person exercising the
functions of a minister, in the performance of divine
worship, is a crime of a heinous nature, and severely
punishable: Yet True It Is And Of Verity, that you the said
Niel Douglas are guilty of the said crime, aggravated as
aforesaid, actor, or art and part:
In So Far As, on
the 9th day of March 1817, or on one or other of the days of
that month, or of the months of February or January
immediately preceding, in a house, hall or room, called the
Andersonian Institution Class-Room, situated in John Street
of the said city of Glasgow, you the said Niel Douglas,
being a minister, pr exercising the functions of a minister,
did, in the course of divine worship, wickedly,
slanderously, falsely and seditiously utter, before crowded
congregations, chiefly of the lower orders of the people,
prayers, sermons or declamations, containing wicked,
slanderous, false and seditious assertions and remarks, to
the disdain, reproach, and contempt of his Majesty, and of
his Royal Highness the Prince Regent, in their persons as
well as in their offices; and also to the disdain, reproach
and contempt of the House of Commons, and of the
administration of justice within the kingdom; all which
wicked, slanderous, false and seditious assertions and
remarks, were calculated and intended to the hurt, prejudice
and dishonour of his Majesty, and of his Royal Highness the
Prince Regent, both in their persons and offices; to
withdraw from the Government and Legislature the confidence
and affections of the people; and, by engendering discord
between the King and the people, to inflame the people with
jealousy and hatred against the Government, and to fill the
realm with trouble and dissension. More ParTicularly, time
and place foresaid, you the said Niel Douglas did wickedly,
slanderously, falsely and seditiously, in the course of the
prayers, sermons or declamations uttered by you, assert and
draw a parallel between his Majesty and Nebuchadnezzar King
of Babylon, remarking and insinuating that, like the said
King of Babylon, his Majesty was driven from the society of
men for infidelity and corruption: And you, then and there,
did further wickedly, slanderously, falsely and seditiously
assert, that his Royal Highness the Prince Regent was a poor
infatuated wretch, or a poor infatuated devotee of Bacchus,
or use expressions of similar import: And you, then and
there, did wickedly, slanderously, falsely and seditiously
assert and draw a parallel between his Royal Highness the
Prince Regent and Belshazzar King of Babylon; remarking and
insinuating that his Royal Highness the Prince Regent, like
the said King of Babylon, had not taken warning from the
example of his father; and that a fate similar to that of
the said King of Babylon awaited his Royal Highness the
Prince Regent, if he did not amend his ways, and listen to
the voice of his people: And Further, time and place
foresaid, you did wickedly, slanderously, falsely and
seditiously assert that the House of Commons was corrupt,
and that the members thereof were thieves and robbers; that
seats in the said House of Parliament were sold like
bullocks in a market, or use expressions of similar import:
And FurTher, time and place foresaid, you did wickedly,
slanderously, falsely and seditiously assert, that the laws
were not justly administered within this kingdom j and that
the subjects of his Majesty were condemned without trial,
and without evidence, or use expressions of similar import.
And you the said Niel Douglas having been apprehended and
taken be/ore Robert Hamilton, Esquire, Sheriff-depute of the
county of Lanark, did, in his presence, at Glasgow, emit
three several declarations, dated the 15th, 17th and 18th
days of March 1817: Which declarations being to be used in
evidence against you, will be lodged in due time in the
hands of the Clerk of the High Court of Justiciary, before
which you are to be tried, that you may have an opportunity
of seeing the same. At Least, time and place foresaid, in
the course of divine worship, prayers, sermons or
declamations were wickedly, slanderously, falsely and
seditiously uttered, containing the foresaid wicked,
slanderous, false and seditious assertiohs, remarks and
insinuations, by a person who was a minister, or who
exercised the functions of a minister; and you the said Niel
Douglas are guilty thereof, actor, or art and part. All
Which, or part thereof, being found proven by the verdict of
an Assize, before the Lord Justice-General, the Lord
JusticeClerk, and Lords Commissioners of Justiciary, you the
said Niel Douglas Ought to be punished with the pains of
law, to deter others from committing the- like crimes in all
time coming. James Wedderburn, A. D." |
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gratefully accepted
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