Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: ROBERT LEIGHTON. IOBERT LEIGHTON was the ] eldest son of Alexander Leighton, a Scotchman by birth, and a doctor in divinity, who in the early part of the seventeenth century was condemned by the Star Chamber to mutilation and eleven years' imprisonment for having written two books, called "The Looking-glass of the Holy War," and "Zion's Plea or Appeal to the Parliament." Robert was at an early age sent for his education to Scotland, where he soon shewed a proficiency in the learned languages above his fellow-students, insomuch that, as Burnet says, he came to have "the greatest command of the purest Latin that ever he knew in any one." But while he was thus conquering the difficulties of learning, he was engaged in the higher work of subduing his spirit to a sense of divine things, and a contempt for wealth and reputation; a consequence of which was that he came to have the lowest thoughts of himself possible, with such a command of his passions that he was not only seldom or ever seen moved as other men, but never guilty of uttering an idle word. Nor could it ever be said that this habit of mind partook of asceticism; for while he elected his own estimate of himself and of the world, he was entirely free from censuring others, or imposing upon them his own views of the conduct of life. When he had finished his academical studies he was sent by his father to France, where he spent some years, and learned to speak the French language like a native of that country. After his travels he returned to Scotland, and having passed his trials for the ministry with the approbation of his judges, he was ordained minister of Newbattle, in the presbytery of Dalkeith, six miles from Edinburgh. While yet very young, he attained to his greatest excellence in preaching, exhibiting that subl...