John Watson (“Ian Maclaren”)

1850–1907 · Scottish Free Church minister & novelist (pen name Ian Maclaren)

John Watson (1850–1907) was a Free Church of Scotland minister who won fame as a novelist under the pen name Ian Maclaren. His sentimental tales of rural Scottish life, above all Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush (1894), sold hundreds of thousands of copies and made him a leading figure of the “Kailyard” school. The compassionate aphorism now pinned on Plato began as a line of his pastoral counsel.

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“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle”

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