BONAR, HORATIUS (1808–1889), Scottish Presbyterian divine, was born in Edinburgh on the 19th of December 1808, and educated at the high school and university of his native city. After a term of mission work at Leith, he was appointed parish minister of Kelso in 1837, and at the Disruption of 1843 became minister of the newly formed Free Church, where he remained till 1866, when he went to the Chalmers memorial church, Edinburgh. He had in 1853 received the D.D. degree from Aberdeen University, and in 1883 he was moderator of the general assembly of his church. He died on the 31st of July 1889. Bonar was a prolific writer of religious literature, and edited several journals, including the Christian Treasury, the Presbyterian Review and the Quarterly Journal of Prophecy; but his best work was done in hymnology, and he published three series of Hymns of Faith and Hope between 1857 and 1866 (new ed., 1886). Nearly every modern hymnal contains perhaps a score of his hymns, including “Go, labour on,” “I heard the voice of Jesus say,” “Here, O my Lord, I see Thee face to face,” “When the weary, seeking rest.”
See Horatius Bonar, D.D., a Memorial (1889).