One of the most significant figures in Scottish theological thought in the early nineteenth century was a layman, Thomas Erskine, who combined his role as Laird of Linlathen with that of a theological writer and correspondent of very considerable influence, in Scotland and further afield. Erskine began as a moderate Calvinist, but in 1828 he published his Unconditional Freeness of the Gospel which provoked a storm of criticism for its advocacy of universal pardon, and he became the principal target of orthodox criticism during the controversy surrounding John Macleod Campbell in 1828-31. Erskine’s final position was that of a Liberal Universalist.
This study of the decline of Calvinist orthodoxy provides a glimpse in microcosm of a process which was soon to affect Scottish religion in general in the latter part of the nineteenth century.
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