Thomas Chalmers, born in Fife, Scotland, was ordained as Presbyterian minister for Kilmeny parish in Fife in 1803. After reading William Wilberforce's Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System (1797), Chalmers became an evangelical preacher and by 1815 began to be known as a great pulpit orator.

In 1819 Chalmers was given the ministry at St. John's, the largest and poorest parish in Glasgow, Scotland. He made strides in ameliorating the impoverished conditions of his parishioners before accepting the chair of moral philosophy at the University of St. Andrews in 1823. In 1828 he accepted a professorship at the University of Edinburgh in divinity.

Chalmers was a leader in the Evangelical Party in the Church of Scotland, a movement advocating for church indepencence from civil interference and the right of parishioners to choose their minister. After the Disruption of 1843, when over 200 commissioners walked out of the Church of Scotland General Assembly, Chalmers was made the first moderator of the Free Church of Scotland. He later served as principal of New College, founded for ministerial training in Edinburgh.

[Information retrieved from the Encyclopedia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Thomas-Chalmers.]