FORRESTER, Rev. Thomas, was the third minister of Melrose after the reformation, the second being Mr John Knox, a nephew of the Reformer, whom Forrester succeeded in 1623. This reverend divine was a very extraordinary character in his time. While the attempts of Charles I. to complete an episcopal system of church-government in Scotland, were the subject of violent and universal discontent, at least in the southern parts of the kingdom, Forrester appears to have beheld them with the utmost gratulation and triumph, giving way to his feelings in occasional satires upon those who opposed the court. His vein of poetry is generally allowed to have been of no mean order; and even in a later age, when many of the allusions are unintelligible, its poignancy is sufficiently obvious. This was accompanied by a general eccentricity of conduct and opinion, which was highly absurd and indecorous. For instance, he publicly declared that some kinds of work might be done on the Lord's day; and, as an example to his people, brought home his corn on that day from the harvest field. He maintained that the public and ordinary preaching of the word, was no necessary part of divine worship, that the reading of the liturgy was preferable to it, and that pastors and private Christians should use no other prayers, than what were prescribed by authority. He made no scruple to declare, that the reformers had done more harm to the Christian church, than the Popes at Rome had done for ten ages. It may easily be supposed, that a man who acted upon maxims so opposite to the spirit of the age, could.. not be very popular, either with his brethren or the public. Accordingly, among the acts of the general assembly of 1638, when the authority of the court was set at defiance, we find the deposition of Mr Thomas Forrester, accused of popery, Arminianism, and other offences.
The reverend satirist appears to have indulged himself in a characteristic revenge. He composed a mock litany, in which the most respected characters of the day, and the most solemn of their proceedings, were profanely ridiculed. It begins with an allusion to the assembly by which lie had been deposed.
From Glasgow Raid, to which mad meeting
Huge troops from all quarters came fleeting,
With dags and guns in form of war,
All loyal subjects to debar;
Where bishops might not show their faces,
And mushroom elders filled their places:
From such mad pranks of Catherut,
Almighty God deliver us!
From sitting in that convocation,
Discharged by open proclamation,
Who did not stir till they had ended
All the mischief they had intended;
From all their cobbling knobs and knacks,
Set out in form of public acts,
And all such pranks. &c.
From a subsequent stanza, it might perhaps be inferred, that Forrester had endeavoured to publish a pamphlet in favour of the episcopal cause, but was prevented by the covenanters having command of the printing house:—
From usurping the king's press,
So that no book could have access,
Which might maintain the king's just title,
Or cross the covenant ne'er so little;
