Rev Neil
Douglas, poet
Nel iDouglas, [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) .
Any contributions will be
gratefully accepted
Errors and Omissions
|
|
The Forum
|
|
What's new?
|
We are looking for your help to improve the accuracy of The Douglas
Archives.
If you spot errors, or omissions, then
please do let us know |
|
If you have met a brick wall
with your research, then posting a notice in the Douglas Archives
Forum may be the answer. Or, it may help you find the answer!
You may also be able to help others answer their queries.
Visit the
Douglas Archives Forum.
|
|
We try to keep everyone up to date with new entries, via our
What's New section on the
home page.
We also use
the Community
Network to keep researchers abreast of developments in the
Douglas Archives. |
|
|
|
|
|
2014 Clan Douglas Gathering
|
Consideration is being given to holding a Clan Douglas
Gathering in Scotland in the summer of 2014. If this is something that
you would be interested in being part of, then please visit our
Community Network and make your views known.
You can tell us when you think the Gathering should be held, where it
should be held, and events and activities that you would like to see as
being part of the Gathering.
|
