From Robert Murray M’Cheyne by Andrew Bonar
He had a high standard in his mind as to the moral qualifications of those who shuld teach the young. When a female teacher was sought for to conduct an evening school in his parish for the sake of the mill-girls, he wrote to one interested in the cause: “She should be able to keep up in her scholars the fluency of reading, and the knowledge of the Bible and Catechism, which they may have already acquired. She should be able to teach them to sing the praises of God, with feeling and melody. But, far above all, she should be a Christian woman, not in name only, but in deed and in truth—one whose heart has been touched by the Spirit of God, and who can love the souls of little children. Any teacher who wanted this last qualification, I would look upon as a curse rather than a blessing—a centre of blasting, and coldness, and death, instead of a centre from which life, and warmth, and heavenly influence might emanate.”
