Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Dowden, John
DOWDEN, JOHN (1840–1910), bishop of Edinburgh, born in Cork on 29 June 1840, was second son of John Wheeler Dowden, 'a staunch presbyterian,' and his wife Alicia Bennett, 'a devout churchwoman.' His elder brother is Edward Dowden, professor of English literature in Dublin University. The family came from the south of England in the seventeenth century. John was educated at Cork, and at the age of sixteen gained a classical scholarship at Queen's College in that town, whence he proceeded in 1858 to Trinity College, Dublin. His tutor was his cousin, George Salmon [q. v. Suppl. II]. His college career was distinguished; he graduated B.A. in 1861, being senior moderator in ethics and logic, and in 1864 he passed through the divinity school with first classes in all the examinations. He was ordained deacon in 1864 by Dr. Verschoyle, bishop of Kilmore, and priest next year. He married and for three years he was curate of St. John's, Sligo, until in 1867 he was appointed perpetual curate of Calry church, near Sligo, where he remained for eight years through the period of the disestablishment of the Irish church. From 1870 he also acted as chaplain to Earl Spencer, the lord-lieutenant of Ireland, and from 1872 was assistant minister of St. Stephen's church, Dublin.
A friend, the Rev. Percy Robinson, then headmaster of the boys' school at Glenalmond, to which was attached the theological college of the episcopal church of Scotland, was responsible for Dowden's association with the Scottish episcopal church. In 1874 he accepted the post of Pantonian professor of theology at Glenalmond. At the outset there was only one student, and the comparative leisure enabled Dowden to apply himself especially to ecclesiastical history and liturgiology. A fire in 1875 led to the removal of the few students to rooms in Edinburgh, until in 1880 the theological hall of the Scottish episcopal church was established, and Dowden became principal. At the same time he was made a canon of St. Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh; in 1876 Dublin University had conferred upon him the degree of D.D. The success of the hall was largely due to Dowden, whose attractive personality and erudition won the loyal admiration of his students. The subsequent expansion and growth of the episcopal church owed much to the hall's prosperity under Dowden's guidance. On the death of Henry Cotterill, bishop of Edinburgh, in 1886 Dowden was as a consequence chosen to be his successor, after Canon Liddon's refusal. Dowden was consecrated on 21 Sept., when Dr. Salmon in a remarkable sermon on episcopacy in relation to unity defined generally the new bishop's theological position. The respect and affection in which the bishop was held by all sections of Edinburgh society was strikingly shown in 1904, when the degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him by Edinburgh University, and his portrait by Mr. John Bowie, A.R.S.A., presented to him by a large committee of his laymen. Under Dowden's leadership his church and diocese prospered. Declining to regard the Scottish episcopal church as a mere appendage of the Church of England, he was a keen promoter of the movement which in 1904 established the consultative council on church legislation. In 1905 the council undertook the revision of the canons, and on an appendix to the new code of proposals for revision of the services Dowden worked till death. While he was bishop Dowden continued his liturgical and historical studies and retained the post of Bell lecturer at the theological hall, lecturing there once a week to keep himself in touch with the students. In the annotated Scottish communion office which appeared in 1884 he illustrated his happy faculty of combining exact scholarship with literary style. It was the precursor of 'The Workmanship of the Prayer Book' (1899; 2nd enlarged edit. 1902), which quickly became a classic of liturgical criticism. A supplementary volume, 'Further Studies in the Prayer Book,' appeared in 1908 and 'The Church Year and Calendar' for the 'Cambridge Handbooks of Liturgical Study' in 1910. In 1885-6 the bishop delivered the Donnellan lectures in the University of Dublin. He was select preacher at Dublin in 1886-7 and at Cambridge in 1888. In 1886 a committee under Dowden's convenership founded the Scottish History Society, and for the society Dowden edited in 1893 'The Correspondence of the Lauderdale Family with Archbishop Sharp,' 'The Chartulary of the Abbey of Lindores' in 1903, and in 1908, assisted by W. A. Lindsay, K.C., and Dr. J. Maitland Thomson, 'Charters, Bulls, and other Documents relating to the Abbey of Inchaffray.' A more popular result of his historical inquiries was 'The Celtic Church in Scotland,' published in 1894. In 1896 he went to Aiuerica to lecture before the General Theological Seminary in New York. The lectures were published in 1897 as 'Outlines of the History of the Theological Literature of the Church of England, from the Reformation to the close of the Eighteenth Century.' In 1901 he delivered the six Rhind lectures before the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, which with revision and additions were published after the author's death in 1910 as 'The Mediæval Church in Scotland; its Constitution, Organisation, and Law.'
In 1890 Dowden's health failed, but a complete recovery followed. He died suddenly on 30 Jan. 1910, and is buried in the Dean cemetery, Edinburgh. A memorial tablet in bronze, giving a full figure of Dowden in episcopal robes, designed by Sir Robert Lorimer, and modelled by Mr. Deuchars, with a Latin inscription, was placed in the floor of the north side of the choir in Edinburgh Cathedral on 27 Oct. 1911. His library was bought by public subscription after his death and placed in the chapter house of the cathedral (Scottish Chronicle, 3 Nov. 1911).
Dowden married in 1864 Louisa, only daughter of Francis Jones, civil engineer. His widow, two sons, and four daughters survive him.
In addition to the works mentioned, Dowden printed various charges, sermons, and pamphlets, and at his death was engaged in rewriting 'Keith's Catalogue of Scottish Bishops,' of which portions appeared in the 'Scottish Historical Review'; this was completed by Dr. J. Maitland Thomson and published in 1912.
[A biographical sketch of Bishop Dowden by his daughter, Alice Dowden, is prefixed to The Mediæval Church in Scotland, 1910; The Times, 1 Feb. 1910; Guardian, 14 Jan. and 4 Feb. 1910; Men and Women of the Time, 1899; a life by Antony Mitchell, bishop of Aberdeen, is in preparation (1912).]