Thomas Guthrie FRSE (12 July 1803 – 24 February 1873) was a Scottish divine and philanthropist, born at Brechin in Angus (at that time also called Forfarshire).

[4] He was licensed to preach in the Church of Scotland from 1825,[5] but having established a reputation as an evangelical he had difficulty securing a parish and instead spent two years studying medicine and science in Paris.

[6]: 46  Following his return from Paris and a period of varied employment, including as a bank manager, he was eventually offered the living of Arbirlot in Angus by the Hon William Maule in 1830.

[5] Guthrie expressed serious concern that the Manse Fund would stretch the generosity of Free Church people to the limit but his fears were unfounded.

Numerous ministers and their families owed a huge debt of gratitude to Guthrie for providing the resources to build manses so that the gospel could continue to prosper not just in the Highlands but across the whole of Scotland.

[9] Dr Guthrie's most enduring legacy was the Ragged Schools which had a unique curriculum; education, regular meals, clothes, "industrial training" and Christian instruction.

Guthrie describes the daily routine; "in the morning they are to break their fast on a diet of the plainest fare, – then march from their meal to their books; in the afternoon they are again to be provided with a dinner of the cheapest kind, – then back again to school; from which after supper, they return not to the walls of an hospital, but to their own homes.

There, carrying with them a holy lesson, they may prove Christian missionaries to those dwellings of darkness and sin" Thomas Guthrie, Seed-Time and Harvest of Ragged Schools,.

Guthrie was no great fan of corporal punishment and instead encouraged staff to win over children with kindness; "these Arabs of the city are wild as those of the desert, and must be broken into three habits, – those of discipline, learning and industry, not to speak of cleanliness.

With these alas they are too familiar at home, and have learned to be as indifferent to them as the smith's dog to the shower of sparks" Thomas Guthrie, Seed-Time and Harvest of Ragged Schools,.

I have the satisfaction, when I lay my head upon my pillow, of always finding one soft part of it: and that is, that God has made me an instrument in His hand of saving many a poor creature from a life of misery and crime" Thomas Guthrie and Sons, Autobiography and Memoirs (London, 1896, p 496).

His legacy was that through his vision and love for his Saviour, the Ragged School movement was established which in turn plucked thousands of little brands from a life of poverty and crime, and brought them to know the ultimate friend of sinners.

Guthrie’s work on total abstinence reached its climax with preaching a series of sermons on Luke 19 v 41 and their publication under the title, 'The City, Its Sins and Sorrows’ in 1857.

This man, while resident in Scotland, had lived a dissolute lifestyle but one day found himself wandering in to St John’s Free Church.

Toward the end of his sermon he leaned his huge frame over the pulpit and said with great feeling: "There are few families among us so happy as not to have had some one near and dear to them either in imminent peril hanging over the precipice, or the slave of intemperance altogether sold under sin."

Among his writings are The Gospel in Ezekiel (1855) and Plea for Ragged Schools (1847),[14] and The City, its Sins and Sorrows (1857), "Christ and the Inheritance of the Saints" (1858), "The Way to Life", Speaking to the Heart", the "Life of Robert Flockhart", "Man and the Gospel" (1865), "The Angels Song" (1865), "The Parables" (1866), "Our Fathers Business" (1867), "Out of Harness" (1867), "Early Piety" (1869), "Studies of Character" (1868–70) and "Sundays Abroad" (1871), "The Sunday Magazine"[15] Thomas Guthrie died at St Leonards-on-Sea in Sussex[16] in 1873 and was buried in The Grange Cemetery, Edinburgh.