Excerpt from Bishop Burnet's History of His Own Time, Vol. 1: From the Restoration of King Charles the Second to the Treaty of Peace at Utrecht, in the Reign of Queen Anne

Upon his return to his native country, Scotland, he was appointed to the living of Saltoun, but he declined accepting it until, after a four months' probation, he was unanimously requested to do so by his parishioners. He was then, in the year 1665, ordained priest by the bishop Of Edinburgh. During the five years he remained at Saltoun, he preached twice every Sunday, and once more during the week he catechised three times during the same period, so as to examine every parishioner, old and young, thrice in the compass of a year: he went round his parish from house to house, instructing, reproving, or comforting the inhabitants as occasion required; those who were sick he visited twice a day; he admi nistered the sacrament four times in the year, personally instructing all that gave notice they intended to receive it: all that remained above his own necessary subsistence, in which he was very frugal, he distributed in charity. A particular instance of his liberality was related by a person who then lived with him, and who afterwards was with him at Salisbury. One of his parishioners was distrained upon for debt, and came to our author for some small assistance, who inquired how much would again set him up in his trade. The debtor named the sum, which a servant was immediately ordered to pay him Sir, ' said the domestic, it is all we have in the house.' Well, well, ' replied Burnet, pay it to this poor man you do not know the pleasure there is in making a man glad.' Thus, as he knew the con perns of his whole parish, treated them with tenderness and care, and set them a fair example of every article of that duty which he taught them, he soon' gained their affections, not excepting the presbyterians although he was then the only man in Scotland that made use of the prayers in the English church liturgy *2 In 1669, the University of Glasgow elected him to be the Professor Of Divinity, and the admirable Dr. Leighton succeeded in persuading him to quit his parish and accept the chair.'

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