scribes it as ‘the completest place of worship I have ever seen.’ Crombie did not intermeddle in theological disputes, but he ably defended his coreligionists from a charge of schism, and exhibited his divergence from the puritan standpoint by advocating Sunday drill for volunteers in time of public danger. In September 1783 he was made D.D. of St. Andrews. Crombie deserves great credit for his attempt to establish in Belfast an unsectarian college, which would meet the higher educational wants of Ulster. The idea was not a new one [see Campbell, William, D.D.], nor was Crombie the first to endeavour to carry it out [see Crawford, William, D.D.] His plan differed from Crawford's by making no provision for instruction in theology, thus anticipating the modern scheme of the Queen's Colleges. The prospectus of the Belfast Academy, issued on 9 Sept. 1785, at once secured the warm support of leading men in Belfast, of all denominations. Funds were subscribed, the Killeleagh presbytery (then the most latitudinarian of those under the general synod) sending a donation of a hundred guineas. The prospectus contemplated academic courses extending over three sessions. The scheme was ambitious, and included a provision of preparatory schools. The academy was opened in February 1786; Crombie, as principal, undertaking classics, philosophy, and history. The same political complications which led to the collapse of the Strabane Academy frustrated Crombie's original design. The Belfast Academy soon lost its collegiate classes; but as a high school it maintained itself, acquired great vogue under Crombie's successor, William Bruce (1757–1841) [q. v.], and still flourishes. Crombie's labours broke his strength, and his health declined; yet he continued to discharge all his engagements with unflagging spirit. On 10 Feb. 1790 he attended a meeting of the Antrim presbytery, at which two congregations were added to its roll, and he was appointed to preside at an ordination on 4 March. On 1 March he died. He was married on 23 July 1774 to Elizabeth Simson (d. 1824), and left four sons and one daughter. His portrait is in the possession of a descendant in America; a small copy is in the vestry of his meeting-house, representing a face of much firmness and sweetness of expression.
He published: 1. ‘An Essay on Church Consecration,’ &c., Dublin, 1777, 12mo (published anonymously in February); 3rd edit. Newry, 1816, 12mo (a defence of the presbyterians, who had lent their meeting-house to the episcopalians during the rebuilding of the church, against a charge of schism). 2. ‘The Propriety of Setting apart a Portion of the Sabbath for the purpose of acquiring the Knowledge and use of Arms,’ &c., Belf. 1781, 8vo. (answered by Sinclare Kelburn, in ‘The Morality of the Sabbath Defended,’ 1781; neither publication is mentioned in Cox's ‘Literature of the Sabbath Question,’ 1865). 3. ‘Belfast Academy,’ Belf. 1786, 8vo (an enlarged issue in January of the newspaper prospectus). Also two ‘Volunteer Sermons,’ Belfast, 1778 and 1779, 8vo.
[Wesley's Journal (8 June 1789); Belfast News-Letter, 5 March 1790; Memoir of Crombie in Disciple (Belfast), April 1883, p. 93 sq.; extracts (furnished for that memoir) from Perth Baptismal Register (in General Register House, Edinburgh), Glasgow Matriculation Book, records of St. Andrews University, minutes of Strathbogie, Elgin, and Antrim presbyteries; also additional information from Funeral Sermon (manuscript) by James Bryson, 14 March 1790, in Antrim Presbytery Library, at Queen's College, Belfast, and from records of First Presbyterian Church, Belfast. Witherow's History and Literary Memorials of Presbyterianism in Ireland, 2nd ser. 1880, p. 212, gives a brief notice of Crombie.]
CROME, EDWARD (d. 1562), protestant divine, was educated at Cambridge, taking the degrees of B.A. in 1503, M.A. in 1507, and D.D. in 1526. He was a fellow of Gonville Hall; but although his friend Archbishop Cranmer, also a Cambridge man, speaks of him as having been 'president of a college in Cambridge,' his name does not appear in the lists of heads. It may be that he acted as deputy to Dr. Bokenham, master of Gonville Hall, who was seventy-seven years of age when he resigned in 1536. In 1516 Crome was university preacher. He resided without interruption at Cambridge until he attracted the king's notice by his approval of Cranmer's book demonstrating the nullity of his marriage with Catherine of Arragon, and by his action as one of the delegates appointed by the university, 4 Feb. 1530, to discuss and decide the question of the same purport proposed by the king. During the following Lent he was three times commanded to preach before the king, and shortly after (24 May) was one of the representatives of his university who, together with a like number from Oxford, assisted the Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop of Durham in drawing up a condemnation of the opinions expressed in certain English religious books, such as ‘The Wicked Mammon’ and ‘The Obedience of a Christian Man,’ which assailed the doctrines of purgatory, the merit derived from good works, invocation of saints, confession, &c.
It was probably about this time that he became parson of St. Antholin's Church in
