Excerpt from John Hunter, D. D: A Life Some apology may reasonably be required Of a son who presumes to write the biography of his father. In this case there are two reasons why a sound rule should be broken. My father was so diflident that he would have shrunk from the idea of a biography of himself. Only the knowledge that it was being written by one Of his sons would at all have reconciled him to it. And, secondly, he was not a letter-writer and did not keep a diary. He did not use letters as a medium Of thought. He only wrote them when he had to, and then briefly. They give news and are full of feeling, but he seldom elaborated in them the ideas with which his mind was occupied. A bundle Of his letters and notes, therefore, would not give a just or adequate conception of the man and his mind to anyone who did not know him in other ways. In this respect his frequent letters to the Press are more revealing than his personal letters, and his prayers and sermons are most revealing of all. In these circumstances it would have been unfair to task anyone else with the difficulties of preparing a biography. It has involved a careful sifting of the mass Of mss. Which he left and much correspondence with those who knew him. The death Of my mother fifteen months ago meant the loss of the most valuable source Of information. The reconstruction of some periods of his life would have been difficult if I had not had the generous help of his friends. To those who wrote reminiscences and appreciations and sent letters - their names, I think, are all recorded in the pages that follow - I give most sincere thanks also to the Secretaries Of the four churches to which he ministered for per mission to read their minute-books. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.