1910-11.] 
Obituary Notices. 
689 
The Rev. Robert Flint (ob. Nov. 25, 1910, set. 73). 
By Rev. Bruce M‘Ewen, D.Phil. 
(Read November 6, 1911.) 
Both for his pre-eminent merit as a theologian and for long and faithful 
services in this Society a record is here made of the life of Professor Flint. 
That life was so exclusively, so whole-heartedly, and so successfully devoted 
to laborious study that little time or energy was left for other interests. 
Nature had perhaps unfitted him for taking any active part in ecclesiastical 
or political affairs : he certainly shrank from prominence in academic 
government, and steadily avoided many public distractions that offered 
themselves to one in his position; and therefore the fact is all the more 
notable of his having been a diligent Councillor of the Society for twenty- 
two years in succession, and a Vice-President during sixteen of them. 
The future Professor — almost forty years of his life were passed in 
University Chairs at St Andrews and Edinburgh — was born of humble 
parents, near Dumfries, in 1837. Very soon the family removed to Moffat, 
and later to Glasgow, it so happening that in each place only a wayside 
school was available for his early education. He entered the University 
of Glasgow in 1852, and completed his Divinity course with the highest 
distinction at the age of twenty. While awaiting licence to preach, he 
served as a lay missionary under the “ Elders’ Association ” of Glasgow — a 
distracting winter ; but out of it sprang a lifelong friendship with the late 
Dr James A. Campbell of Stracathro. On attaining his majority he became 
assistant to Norman Macleod, minister of the Barony, and was minister of 
the East Church of Aberdeen from 1859 to 1861. A call to the quiet country 
parish of Kilconquhar proved irresistible after his experiences of city life,, 
and there, during the next three years, he laid the foundations of his great 
teaching fame by a strenuous course of omnivorous reading. Academic 
recognition of his talents came speedily, and in 1864 he succeeded Professor 
Ferrier in the Chair of Moral Philosophy and Political Economy at 
St Andrews, defeating so strong a candidate as the late T. H. Green of 
Oxford. He was at once recognised as a power in the University ; he was 
wonderfully popular among his students, and a good standing in his class 
was specially prized. It is remembered of him that he never thought it 
necessary to barricade his house against the boisterous revelry of Kate 
Kennedy’s Day, and in the troubles that followed the suppression of that 
vol. xxxi. 44 
