BOOK III.

AUGUST, A.D. 1661-1662.

Lord High Commissioner sets out for Court—His reception—Deliberations of the Council—Episcopacy resolved upon as the National Religion of Scotland—Glencairn, Rothes, and Sharpe appointed to carry the tidings to Edinburgh—King’s letter—Privy Council announce the overthrow of Presbytery—Forbid the election of Presbyterian Magistrates in Burghs—Prosecute Tweeddale—Ministers summoned to London to be episcopally ordained—Their characters—Their consecration—Grief of the Presbyterians—Re-introduction of Episcopacy—Restrictions on the press—Witchcraft—Synods discharged and Bishops ordered to be honoured by royal patent—Their consecration—Parliament restores their rank—Asserts the King’s supremacy—The Covenants declared unlawful—Act of fines—Defeated—Lord Lorn—Blair and other ministers deprived—King’s birth-day—Middleton’s visit to the West and South—Case of Mr Wylie—Brown of Wamphrey—Livingston, &c.—Middleton removed and Lauderdale appointed.

Leaving the government in the hands of the privy council,[20]Middleton, after parliament adjourned, set out for court, where he was received by the Earl of Clarendon, Lord Chancellor, the Duke of Ormond, and all the cavalier party, with the greatest congratulations for having quenched the fanatic zeal of Scotland, and carried his majesty’s prerogative beyond what any preceding monarch, when present, had ever claimed.

20.The chief members of which were—The Earl of Glencairn, chancellor; Crawford, treasurer; Rothes, president; Lauderdale, secretary. Members—Dukes of Lennox and Hamilton; Marquis of Montrose; Earls of Errol, Marischal, Mar, Atholl, Morton, Cassils, Linlithgow, Perth, Dunfermline, Wigton, Callender, Dundee, &c. &c.Wodrow, p. 87.

At a council held upon his arrival, Charles, who utterly detestedPresbytery, expressed himself highly gratified at the report of what he had done; but his councillors were divided. Lauderdale and some others, who knew perfectly that the established religion was deeply rooted in the affections of Scottishmen, were unwilling to hazard a change; and even some who wished an Episcopacy were yet averse to its being too rashly introduced.[21]Middleton, however, who had been previously tutored, immediately addressed the king—“May it please your sacred majesty: You may perceive by the account I have now given of your affairs in Scotland, that there is no present government as yet established in that church. Presbytery is, after a long usurpation, now at last rescinded—the covenant, whereby men thought they were obliged to it, is now declared to have been unlawful—and the acts of parliament, whereby it was fenced, are now removed; so that it is arbitrary to your majesty to choose what government you will fix there; for to your majesty this is by the last act of supremacy declared to belong. But if your majesty do not interpose, then Episcopacy, which was unjustly invaded at once with your royal power, will return to its former vigour.”

21.When the lords went first up to welcome the king, the question was debated what form of government should be established in the Scottish church. “Middleton and Glencairn were resolute for bishops, pronouncing they would both compose the church and manadge it to the king’s mind; Lauderdale opposed it stiffely, affirming the king should thereby lose the affectiones of the people of Scotland, and that the bishops should be so far from enlargeing the king’s power, that they would prove a burdine too heavy for him to bear; and therein he proved als true a prophet, as he was a faithful friend to the king. Within some few days, Glencairn came to visit Lauderdale, and told him he was only for a sober sort of bishops, such as they were in the primitive times, not lordly prelats. Lauderdale answered him with ane oath, that since they hade chosen bishops, they should have them higher than any that ever were in Scotland, and that he should find.”Kirkton, p. 134.

Glencairn followed, and affirmed that the insolence of the Presbyterian ministers had so disgusted all loyal subjects, that six for one longed for the Episcopalian government, which had ever inculcated obedience and supported the royal interest; whereas, Calvinism and Presbytery had never been introduced into any country without blood and rebellion, and instanced, with the most preposterous absurdity, the struggles for freedom at the Reformation—inFrance, during the civil war—in Holland, when they revolted from Spain—and now twice in Scotland; once by the Regent Murray, when Queen Mary was banished, and lastly in 1637. Rothes added, although he had not seen the rise of the innovations, yet he had witnessed the ruin of the engagement and the treatment of the king by that persuasion. Lauderdale contended that the proposition was of too great importance to be slightly determined, and required much thought and much information; for, upon their resolution, depended the quiet of the Scots—a people very unmanageable in matters of religion—and advised that either a General Assembly should be called, the provincial synods consulted, which, as composed of ministers and laymen, would acquaint his majesty with the inclinations of his subjects—or, he might call the ablest divines on both sides, and learn their sentiments, if neither of the other proposals were approved of. Middleton replied that all these methods would only tend to continue Presbytery; for it was probable the power of the ministers, which had been so irresistible of late, would preponderate in all. They would easily procure ruling elders of their own cast to be chosen, and both would be unwilling to resign the power they possessed; at all events, the leading men whom the inferior clergy must follow, durst not quarrel the resolutions of their rabbis, who would adhere to the oaths they had taken, and stoutly defend their own supremacy; besides, to call General Assemblies or synods, were to restore them, and thus to infringe the act rescissory.

The Earl of Crawford, whose treasurer’s rod was a desirable object for Middleton, had declined mingling in the debate, which the Chancellor of England observing, requested his majesty that he might be desired to give his opinion, in order that he might either disclaim Presbytery or displease the king, and thus put his principles or his place in jeopardy; for it appeared to be a settled rule among the courtiers of Charles, that whatever Scottishmen were allowed to interfere in the public affairs of their native country, should sacrifice either their conscience or their interest.

Crawford perceived the Chancellor’s aim, and vehemently urged that provincial synods might be consulted, assuring his majesty,the king, that six for one in Scotland were in favours of Presbytery. “The offences of the reformers,” he warmly contended, “were not to be charged upon the Reformation: the best innovations were ever attended with much irregularity, and therefore it was better to continue that government which had now past all these hazards—at first unavoidable—than risk another, which, at its outset, must be unhappy in the same inconveniences. Nor did the act rescissory cut off Presbytery, for it was secured by acts of General Assemblies, which had been countenanced by his majesty’s father’s commissioners, and were yet unrepealed.”

The Duke of Hamilton supported him, and affirmed that the reason why the act rescissory had so easily passed, was, because his majesty had promised to continue Presbytery in his letter addressed to the ministers of Edinburgh. Clarendon closed the debate, by observing, that Crawford had owned all that ever was done in Scotland in their rebellion; “and God preserve me,” said he, “from living in a country where religion is independent of the state, and clergy may subsist by their own acts; for there all churchmen may be kings.” The king then told them that he perceived a majority were for Episcopacy, and therefore he resolved to settle it without any farther delay.

Immediately after, Glencairn and Rothes were dispatched to Edinburgh, accompanied by Mr Sharpe, to convey his majesty’s determination to the council. Were it not that, in humble life, we see men equally base and shameless where their own self-interest is concerned, we might wonder at the unblushing effrontery of the royal communication; yet the pitiful evasion and vile duplicity in which it was couched, render the king’s letter at once an object of detestation and contempt. That the reader may compare it with his former to the ministers of Edinburgh, I give it at full length:—

“Charles R. Right trusty and well-beloved cousins and councillors, We greet you well. Whereas, in the month of August 1660, We did, by our letters to the presbytery of Edinburgh, declare our purpose to maintain the government of the church of Scotland as settled by law; and our parliament having since that time not only rescinded all the acts since the troublesbegan, but also declared all these pretended parliaments null and void, and left to us the settling and securing of church government: Therefore, in compliance with that act rescissory, according to our late proclamation, dated at Whitehall the 10th of June, and in contemplation of the inconveniences from the church government, as it hath been exercised these twenty-three years past—of the unsuitableness thereof to our monarchical state—of the sadly experienced confusions which have been caused during the late troubles, by the violences done to our royal prerogative, and to the government, civil and ecclesiastical, settled by unquestionable authority, We, from respect to the glory of God and the good and interest of the Protestant religion; from our pious care and princely zeal for the order, unity, peace, and stability of that church, and its better harmony with the government of the churches of England and Ireland, have, after mature deliberation, declared to those of our council here our firm resolution to interpose our royal authority for restoring of that church to its right government by bishops, as it was before the late troubles, during the reigns of our royal father and grandfather, of blessed memory, and as it now stands settled by law. Of this our royal pleasure concerning church government you are to take notice, and to make intimation thereof in such a way and manner as you shall judge most expedient and effectual. And we require you, and every one of you, and do expect, according to the trust and confidence we have in your affections and duty to our service, that you will be careful to use your best endeavours for curing the distempers contracted during those late evil times—for uniting our good subjects among themselves, and bringing them all to a cheerful acquiescing and obedience to our sovereign authority, which we will employ, by the help of God, for the maintaining and defending the true reformed religion, increase of piety, and the settlement and security of that church in her rights and liberties, according to law and ancient custom. And, in order thereto, our will is, that you forthwith take such course with the rents belonging to the several bishopricks and deaneries that they may be restored and made useful to the church, and that according to justice and the standing law. And, moreover, you are to inhibit the assemblingof ministers in their several synodical meetings through the kingdoms until our further pleasure, and to keep a watchful eye over all who, upon any pretext whatever, shall, by discoursing, preaching, reviling, or any irregular or unlawful way, endeavour to alienate the affections of our people, or dispose them to an ill opinion of us and our government to the disturbance of the peace of the kingdom. So, expecting your cheerful obedience and a speedy account of your proceedings herein, We bid you heartily farewell. Given at our court, at Whitehall, August 14, 1661, and of our reign the thirteenth year, by his majesty’s command.” (Signed) “Lauderdale.”

The privy council received with all due humility this intimation of the royal pleasure; and, on the 6th of September, an act was drawn up and published, announcing to the people of Scotland the overthrow of their beloved Presbytery, under whose shade they had reposed with so much tranquility during the few last years of the much abused and unreasonably hated protectorate, and the re-establishment of that system against which their fathers had ever contended. A proclamation overturning the freedom of elections, accompanied the act for overturning the constitution of the church—so naturally and nearly are civil and ecclesiastical tyranny connected. The royal burghs were commanded, under the highest penalties, to elect none for their magistrates who were fanatically—an epithet which it now became fashionable to apply to the conscientious Presbyterians—inclined; and such and so sudden had been the change wrought by the transfer of power, that this illegal dictation was universally obeyed. Nor did their conduct towards one of their own number evince a greater regard for their own privileges or the rights of parliament, than their ready servility had done for the religion and liberty of their country. Tweeddale and Kincardine had pressed the council to request the king that he would consult provincial synods, who would declare the sense of the country; and, at all events, relieve his majesty from obloquy whatever might be the ultimate decision. This proposition, however, would have shown too much deference to men whom it was intended to bring to unconditional subjection, and was refused accordingly; but Charles was informed of Tweeddale’shesitation, and an order was procured for his imprisonment, not indeed ostensibly for his opinion delivered in council, but for what was or ought to have been still more sacred, for his judgment and voice in parliament, because he had spoken in vindication of Mr James Guthrie, and had not voted him guilty of death! It was to no purpose that he pled the freedom allowed in parliament, where he was a councillor upon oath and expressly indemnified by law for what was spoken there; and the danger which every member would thus incur who voted any person accused of treason innocent, if a majority should happen to find him guilty. He was sent prisoner to the Castle, and was only, upon his submission and petition, permitted to confine himself to Yester and three miles round, finding caution to the amount of one hundred thousand merks to answer when called for! Eight months after, when it was thought his discipline had taught him obedience, he was, through the mediation of the council, relieved; and, when his relation Lauderdale came into power, he joined his government.

Although his majesty could establish Episcopacy by proclamation, the peculiar holiness which was supposed necessarily to belong to the office of a bishop, it was beyond his power to confer. This essential attribute of a prelate, which had passed, as was believed, untainted from the apostles, through all the corruption, vileness, and abomination of the church of Rome, had, by hands crimsoned in the blood of the saints, and defiled with all the pollutions of their brethren, been communicated to the dignitaries of the English hierarchy, upon whom it still rested in all its imaginary purity and vigour. But the feeble portion of the sacred virus that had reached Scotland upon a former occasion, when James VI. procured the innoculation of his hierarchate, was now confined to one aged and almost superannuated subject, Mr Thomas Sydeserf, formerly bishop of Galloway; and he had been excommunicated by a General Assembly. It was therefore resolved that a select number of the Scottish ministers should be consecrated by priests who had never been polluted by any unhallowed contact with Presbyterians; and Messrs Sharpe, Fairfoul,and Hamilton were summoned to London to receive the holy unction.

James Sharpe, designed for the primacy, was already the object of detestation to every one who had the smallest regard for the Presbyterian profession, or for consistency of principle. Andrew Fairfoul, promoted to the archbishoprick of Glasgow, possessed considerable learning, better skilled, however, in physic than in theology—a pleasant, facetious companion, but never esteemed a serious divine. He had taken the covenant and was first minister in Leith, then in Dunse. Mr James Hamilton, brother to Lord Belhaven, created bishop of Galloway, was also a covenanter, and minister of Cambusnethan. His abilities were not above mediocrity, and his cunning was more remarkable than his piety. They were, however, joined at London by Mr Robert Leighton, a man of a very different description, whose meek and gentle spirit, unfitted for the stormy region of political polemics, delighted more in communion with God than in contending with his fellows, and who, counting himself a stranger and a pilgrim upon earth, was only anxious to diffuse the gospel of the kingdom, and shed around him the charities of life. He was educated during the reign of pseudo-episcopacy, and never was a thorough Presbyterian. His character and views may be estimated from a circumstance which occurred during that period of his life when he was minister of Newbattle. Some of his zealous co-presbyters urging on him the duty of “preaching to the times,” (by no means an unnecessary one, however, in its proper place,) he mildly replied—“When so many of my brethren are preaching to the times, they may spare one poor minister to preach for eternity.” He had retired to London to enjoy the privacy he loved, and was unwillingly dragged forward to assist in carrying Episcopacy to Scotland.[22]

22.There is just one point in Leighton’s character that appears unaccountable, that is, after he had solemnly sworn the covenants, and enforced them upon others, how he could ever turn an Episcopalian.

A commission, under the great seal of England, was directed to the bishops of London and Worcester, and some other suffragansof the diocese of Canterbury, to officiate upon this important occasion; but an unexpected difficulty occurred by Dr Sheldon proposing to set aside the Presbyterian ordination altogether and commencede novo. Sharpe quoted the case of Bishop Spottiswood, whose Presbyterian ordination had been sustained when he was consecrated, and for a while resisted the proposal; but the other was peremptory, and would not hear of the validity of any other than prelatic imposition of hands; and Sharpe, who had now gone too far to recede for a trifle, submitted to enter his new profession by the lowest step, that he might attain the wretched object of his ambition—to him a woful eminence. In the month of December, they were with great pomp, and before a splendid assemblage of nobility at Westminster, passed and raised through the various degrees of the craft, from preaching-deacons to mitred bishops, in one day, which was concluded by a magnificent entertainment given by the new-made prelates to their English brethren and a select party of Scottish and English nobles.

Convinced at length of their error, the honest Presbyterians, of all parties, lamented that their intestine divisions should have been allowed to divert them from attempting the security of their religion, and that they should have indulged in bitterness of spirit against each other about matters of comparatively lesser moment, while the common enemy was making such rapid, though covert, advances against their establishment. Uncertain how long they might enjoy that liberty, they now throughout Scotland directed the attention of their hearers to the principles of their church, and the points in dispute between them and the Episcopalians[23]—they held congregational fasts in every corner of the land to lament over the misimprovement of their privileges and deprecate theimpending wrath of God—and they continued their parochial duties among a mourning people who, with a general sadness, anticipated the lamentable change. Their synods had been forbid; but they met with little interruption in their presbyterial duties till the bishops were installed, when they were informed that their power of ordination had ceased. This intimation was first made by the council to the presbytery of Peebles, when, in the month of December, they were proceeding to induct Mr John Hay to the kirk of Manner; and from thenceforth all presentations to benefices were ordered to be directed to the archbishops or bishops within whose diocese the vacant church might lie.

23.The points in dispute between the Presbyterians and Episcopalians were of much more vital importance than modern Presbyterians seem to be aware of. They comprehended doctrinal points—the form of church government, the ceremonies, the festivals, and the forcible intrusion of the whole system upon the nation, in virtue of the king’s spiritual supremacy. The very essence of Christianity was at stake. The grand fundamental doctrine which Luther asserted at the Reformation, was, justification by faith, in opposition to justification by works; and a more clear statement of this essential article of Christian belief will nowhere be found than in his exposition of the Epistle to the Galatians—to this all was subsidiary. He found that attacking the rites, ceremonies, and fooleries of Rome was wasting shot against pitiful outworks, the fall of which was of no importance, while the main rampart and the citadel frowned defiance. It was the same with all the reformers; and it was now a revival of the old question. The Episcopalians were in general Arminians, and the Presbyterians contended for “the faith” once delivered to the fathers; and this faith was the doctrinal creed embodied in the covenants. This should always be kept in view. The other points were not of little moment; but this was the foundation.

The re-introduction of Episcopacy into Scotland was accompanied by a restoration of all the most severe restrictions upon the liberty of the press and a revival of the absurd and flagitious proceedings against poor, old, and friendless creatures, ignorantly or maliciously accused of witchcraft. The council, upon an information that George Swinton and James Glen, booksellers in Edinburgh, had printed and sold the speeches of the Marquis of Argyle and Mr James Guthrie, with other seditious and scandalous publications, such as the “Covenanter’s Plea,” ordered the Lord Advocate and Lord Provost of Edinburgh, to seize upon such books and papers, and prohibit them and the rest of the printers from printing any other books or pamphlets without a warrant from the king, parliament, or council; and, “for preventing false intelligence,” they granted liberty to a creature of their own, Robert Mein, keeper of the letter-office, Edinburgh, to print the Diurnal, then the only newspaper in the kingdom. Commissions for the trial of witches were at the same time issued to gentlemen in almost every shire, and great numbers of unfortunatecreatures, chiefly poor decrepit old women, were tortured and murdered upon the most contradictory, ridiculous, and incredible absurdities, which were alleged against them; or upon the incoherent ravings which, after being kept for nights without sleep, and tormented without intermission in the height of a delirium, they uttered as their confessions. And yet such convictions stand upon record as being in consequence of “clear probation” or voluntary confessions! But it is deserving of especial notice, that these trials took place chiefly in the north and the east—the districts least infected with “fanaticism.”[24]

24.The Dunbar witches were famous in East, as the Borrowstounness witches were in West, Lothian. It is, however, among the melancholy and unaccountable problems in the history of the human mind, that persons of excellent understanding were implicated in these and similar horrid transactions. In England, even Judge Hale condemned two. Had the witches, or wizards, been tried for operating upon the fears and the superstitions of their country folk, as the Africans in the West Indies and on their own coasts operate on the fears and superstitions of each other by theobi,bitter water, and other really noxious practices, their persecution might have been proper, and their punishment just; but, dancing reels with Satan, and flying through the air upon broomsticks, were accusations so truly ridiculous, that, how they came to be ever gravely listened to, is passing strange. Dr Hutchinson says, “the wordwitch, in old English, according to Dr More, signifiesa wise woman; in the vulgar Latin, it isvenefica,a poisoner.”Hist. Essay on Witchcraft, p. 183.

This eventful year was closed by a letter from the king, December 28, ordering the council to discharge by proclamation all ecclesiastical meetings in synods, presbyteries, and sessions, until authorized by the archbishops or bishops upon their entering upon the government of their respective sees; and requiring that all due deference and respect should be given by the lieges to these dignitaries, or, to use the words of the king, “that they have all countenance, assistance, and encouragement from the nobility, gentry, and burghs, in the discharge of their office and service to Us in the church; and that severe and exemplary notice be taken of all and every one who shall presume to reflect or express any disrespect to their persons or the authority with which they are intrusted”—an ominous and unholy introduction to a Christian ministry, which sufficiently marked the nature of the proposed establishment; bore witness to the known dislike of the peopletowards such a priesthood, and the strong probability that pastors created by royal patent, and sanctified by prelatic palmistry, would be received with any thing but respect or affection by the flock over whom they were to have the oversight.

The new year, 1662, was ushered in by a proclamation, January 9, from the privy council, announcing, in terms of the king’s letter, the final extinction of Presbytery. Formerly, such a decree would have encountered at any rate a formidable show of opposition from the denounced ecclesiastical judicatories; nor would they have separated without at least bearing testimony against this unwarrantable invasion of their legal right. But the blind confidence that the Presbyterians had so unaccountably reposed in the king, produced a species of fatuity; nor would they believe till they experienced the truth of the prognostications of the more discerning, who saw from the first the ill-dissembled hatred Charles bore to Presbyterianism as well as to piety. They were like men amazed at the greatness of the calamity; and although some few of them attempted to draw up petitions to the council, no united effort was made to vindicate the oppressed church.

An obsequious crowd of nobility, clergy, and gentry, awaited the arrival of the new bishops, and obeyed to the letter the orders of the king. From Cockburnspath to the capital, their numbers increased; and, as the procession rolled on, it assumed more the splendour of some earthly potentate marching to take possession of a newly-acquired conquest, than that of spiritual guides entering upon the humble duties of a gospel ministry. They were greeted on their approach to Edinburgh with martial music, and received at the gates by the magistrates in their robes,[25]and spent several successive days in sumptuous entertainments. The primate, vieing with the chief nobility in the elegance of his equipage as well as the magnificence of his banquets, displayed upon the occasion a handsome London-built chariot, and was attendedby lackeys in purple liveries. Shortly afterwards, in great pomp, he took possession of his see;[26]then, returning to Edinburgh on the 7th of May, consecrated other six bishops in the Abbey of Holyrood-house.

25.Lamont gives the following account of Sharpe’s visit on this occasion:—“As for Mr Sharpe, he came to Fiffe, Apryl 15th, and dyned that day at Abetsaa, Sr. Andrew Ramsays, formerly provest of Edenboroughe, his house, and that night came to Lesly, being attended by divers both of the nobilitie and gentrie. The nixt day being Weddensday, the 16th Apr., he went to St Androws from Lesly, attended from the Earle of Rothes his house, with about 60 horse; bot by the way divers persons and corporations (being wretten for in particular by the said Earle of Rothes a day or two before) mett him, some at ane place and some at ane other, viz. some from Fawkland, Achtermowghtie, Cuper, Craill, and about 120 horsemen from St Androws and elsewhere; so that once they were estimat to be about 7 or 8 hundred horse. The nobilitie ther were, Earle of Rothes, Earle of Kelley, Earle of Leven, and the Lord Newarke; of gentrie, Ardrosse, Lundy, Rires, Dury, Skaddowory, Doctor Martin of Strandry, and divers others. All the way the said Archbishope rode thus, viz. betwixt two nobelmen, namely, Rothes on his right, and Kelley on his left hand. No ministers were present ther safe Mr William Barclay, formerly deposed out of Fawkland, and Mr William Comry, minister of St Leonards Colledge, that came foorth with the Bishope his sone out of St Androws to meit his father. (He dwells in the Abbey in Mr George Weyms house, that formerly belonged to B. Spotswoode, Archb. of St Androws.) That night ther supped with the said Bishope, the Earles of Rothes, Kelley, Newarke; Ardrosse, Lundy, Strandry, and divers others; and divers of this dined with him the nixt day. As for Rothes and Ardrosse, they lodged with him all night. On the Sabbath after, he preached in the towne church in the forenoone, and a velvet cushion in the pulpitt before him. His text, 1 Cor. ii. 2. ‘For I determined to knowe nothing amonge you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.’ His sermon did not run mutch on the words, bot in a discourse of vindicating himselfe and of pressing of episcopacie and the utilitie of it; shewing, since it was wanting, that ther hath beine nothing bot trowbels and disturbancies both in church and state. Apryl 30, 1662, he tooke journey for Edenboroughe, being accompanied with about 50 horse, most of them of the citie of St Androws; and, in his way, he gave the Ladys at Lundy a visit at Lundy: he cam with only 5 or 6 horse, and himselfe staid a short whille, toke a drink (bot did not dine), and was gone againe.”Diary, p. 183-4.

26.Leighton alone declined all public show. When he understood the manner in which it was proposed to receive them, he left the cavalcade at Morpeth, and came privately to Edinburgh. Afterwards, he told Dr Burnet, “he believed they were weary of him, for he was very weary of them.”

This ceremony, which had been deferred till the arrival of the Commissioner, was conducted in the grandest and most imposing style. His Grace, with all the nobles and gentlemen who had come to town to attend parliament, together with the magistrates of the city, were present; and none were admitted but by tickets. The two archbishops who officiated were in their full canonicals—black satin gowns, white surplices, lawn sleeves,copes, and all the long desecrated garments, known to the Presbyterians of that day by the contemptuous epithet of their forefathers—“Rags of Rome.” The others wore black satin gowns. The passage leading from the pews, where the bishops elect sat, to the altar, and the space before the altar, were covered with rich carpets. Mr James Gordon, one of the northern ministers, preached the consecration sermon from 1 Cor. iv. 1. “Let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God;” in which, pointing out the errors of the former, he exhorted the new prelates to beware of encroaching on the nobles, nor exceed the bounds of their sacred function. They were then led from their places by the archbishop of Glasgow, and by him presented to the primate who presided, and set them apart according to the ritual of the church of England, and to whom they vowed clerical obedience during all the days of their lives. The bishops this day consecrated were—Dunkeld, George Halyburton, late minister of Perth;Ross, George Patterson, minister of Aberdeen;Moray, Murdoch Mackenzie, minister of Elgin;Brechin, David Strachan, minister of Fettercairn;Argyle, David Fletcher, minister of Melrose;The Isles, Robert Wallace, minister of Barnwell, Ayrshire;[27]none of whom were men either of distinguished talents or exemplary piety, and all had appeared zealots in the cause of the covenant. Common report attributed to them a private dissoluteness of character which might be exaggerated; but for their apostacy from a cause which they had urged with more than ordinary heat, no apology was ever attempted. Conviction could not be alleged, and as self-interest appeared the only ostensible reason, they sunk in the estimation of the people in proportion to the respect in which they had been previously held; while they returned the contempt with which they were deservedly treated by hatred and persecution—a consequent usual with renegades, who ever remorselesslypursue to degradation and death the steadfast members of the religion they have betrayed, whose unshaken integrity is a standing reproof of their temporizing baseness.

27.George Wiseheart, chaplain to Montrose, and author of the elegant Latin romance which goes under the name of his memoirs, was consecrated bishop of Edinburgh at St Andrews, on the 3d of June, and Mr David Mitchell, minister of Edinburgh, bishop of Aberdeen. Sydeserf had Orkney.

Next day, May 9, the parliament met; and their first act was to restore the bishops to the exercise of their episcopal function, precedence in the church, power of ordination, inflicting of censures, and all other acts of church discipline; and this their office they were to exercise only with “the advice and assistance of such of the clergy as they should find to be of known loyalty and prudence.” Without entering into any of the puzzling questions respecting the divine right of any form of church government, they at once founded their Prelacy upon a principle most repugnant to Presbytery—the spiritual supremacy of the king—“Forasmuch as the ordering and disposal of the external government and policy of the church doth properly belong unto his majesty as an inherent right of the crown, by virtue of his royal prerogative and supremacy in causes ecclesiastical.” In the preamble were narrated as the causes of its re-establishment, the disorders and exorbitancies that had been in the church, the encroachments upon the prerogative and rights of the crown, the usurpations upon the authority of parliaments, and the prejudice inflicted on the liberty of the subject ever since the invasion made upon the bishops and episcopal order—a form of church government pronounced most agreeable to the word of God, most convenient and effectual for the preservation of truth, regularity, and unity, most suitable to monarchy, and the peace and quiet of the state: “Thereforehis majesty and his estates did redintegrate the state of bishops to their ancient places and undoubted privileges in parliament and all their other accustomed dignities.” Nor was it among the least strange enactments of this extraordinary act, that whatever his majesty, with the archbishops and bishops, should determine respecting the external order of the church, were “previously” declared valid and effectual.

Immediately upon this act being passed, a deputation of six members, two noblemen, two barons, and two burgesses, was sent to the prelates, who were waiting in the primate’s lodgings to invite them to take their seats. They were accordingly conductedin state to the House—the two archbishops first, walking between two noblemen, the Earls of Kellie and Wemyss, and the bishops following, attended by the barons, gentlemen, and the magistrates in their robes. When they entered, a congratulatory speech was made them from the throne, the act restoring them was read, and the parliament adjourned on purpose that the spiritual lords might have the pleasure of dining with his Grace, the Commissioner, who, to do them the greater honour, walked on foot with them in procession to the Palace. They were preceded by six macers with their maces, next three gentlemen-ushers, then the purse-bearer uncovered. The Commissioner and Chancellor followed, with two noblemen on their right and the two archbishops on their left. A select party of noblemen and members of parliament, with the bishops, made up the goodly company, who, “at four of the clock, sat down to ane sumptuous entertainment, and remained at table till eight.”

The bishops, as now thrust upon the Scottish church, differed widely from those intruded by James VI. They pled no scriptural authority, but an act of parliament, as the source of their power, and acknowledged, in its fullest sense, a temporal prince as the supreme head of the church. The old bishops were only a set of constant moderators in the synods and presbyteries, possessing merely a sort of negative voice, and were nominally at least responsible to the General Assembly; but the whole form of Presbytery was now swept away, and the prelates were amenable to no church courts; nor could any assembly of ministers meet, but under their sanction, or by their permission.

Having subverted the religion of the country, the next and most natural step was to eradicate, if possible, the principles of civil liberty. The sycophantish estates, therefore, proceeded to declare rebellious and treasonable those positions for which their fathers had contended unto blood, and which their children asserted at the point of the sword:—That it is lawful in subjects, upon pretence of reformation, or any other pretence whatsoever, to enter into leagues or covenants, or to take up arms against the king: or that it is lawful for subjects, pretending his majesty’s authority, to take up arms against his person or those commissionated byhim, or to suspend him from the exercise of his royal government, or to put limitations on their due obedience and allegiance. As, notwithstanding the acts of the former session, the Presbyterians did not conceive themselves loosened from what they considered the oaths of God—ratified by the highest ecclesiastical and civil authorities of the land—the National Covenant, and the Solemn League and Covenant, these were now declared unlawful oaths; the subjects were relieved from their obligations; the acts of Assembly respecting them, which had received the sanction both of the parliament and of the king, but had hitherto escaped notice, were annulled; and all ratifications, by whatsoever authority, cassed and made void. At the same time, it was enacted, that if any person should, by writing, printing, praying, preaching, or remonstrating, express any thing calculated to create or cherish dislike in the people towards the king’s supremacy in causes ecclesiastic, or of the government of the church by archbishops and bishops, as now settled, they were to be declared incapable of enjoying any place or employment, civil, ecclesiastical, or military, and liable to such farther pains as the law directs; that is, liable to the pains of that detestable statute against leasing-making, of whose extent a notable specimen was speedily given in the case of Argyle. This was followed by an act obliging all persons in public trust to subscribe a declaration in which the whole of the transactions, since the commencement of the troubles, were affirmed to have been illegal and seditious, and the covenants unlawful oaths, unwarrantably imposed against the fundamental laws and liberties of the kingdom, and not obligatory either on themselves or others.

By another retrospective act, repeating the restoration of patronage, it was ordained that all the ministers who had entered to parishes since the year 1649, had no right to their stipends; and their charges were pronounced vacant, until they should procure presentations anew from the lawful patrons and collocation from the bishop of the diocese which he was enjoined to give to the present incumbents, upon application, before the 20th of September following, failing which, the presentation was to fall to the bishopjure devoluto; and, to conclude the series of enactments intended to establish Episcopacy upon a firm and immovablefoundation, amid the ruins of Presbytery, all professors and teachers in universities and colleges were required to take the oath of allegiance on pain of deprivation—all ministers were ordered to attend the diocesan synods and pay all clerical obedience to their superiors under the like penalty—and all meetings in private houses, for religious exercises, which might tend to alienate this people from their lawful pastors, were strictly forbidden. Nor were any persons to be permitted to preach in public or private, to teach any school, or act as tutor in the family of any person of quality, without the license of the ordinary of the diocese.

Ecclesiastical matters being thus arranged, and the session apparently drawing to a termination, Lauderdale so strongly pressed a bill of indemnity, that Middleton could no longer get it avoided; but he introduced, as an accompaniment, the act of fines, which in numerous instances rendered it nugatory.

Last year a complaint had been made to parliament of the losses sustained by the Earl of Queensberry from the forces under Colonels Strachan and Kerr in 1650, estimated at two thousand pounds sterling, when a committee, consisting of the Earl of Eglinton, Lord Cochrane, the Sheriff-depute of Nithsdale, and some others, was appointed to meet at Cumnock, to inquire who had served in that army, and to proportion the same upon such of the guilty as were able to pay, which was accordingly done; and a number of gentlemen who were opposed to the measures of the present government, were assessed to make good the damage alleged to have been suffered by his lordship. This easy but arbitrary method of rewarding his supporters, and punishing or silencing his opponents, having excited no murmurs among the pusillanimous legislators, the plan was now followed out by the Commissioner, and a secret committee appointed to inquire who had been the most eminent compliers under the usurpers, in order that their estates might be taxed to raise a sum sufficient to compensate the king’s friends for what they had suffered as malignants during the time of the late troubles. Their report included nearly nine hundred noblemen, gentlemen, and tenants; and the money to be produced from their fines amounted to about eighty-five thousand pounds sterling—an enormous sum at that time, to bearbitrarily and vexatiously levied by political adversaries without any check, there being neither accusation nor trial, nor any crime alleged, of which those who now assumed the name of the king’s friends, had not, in general, been far more guilty than they.

The act of fines, iniquitous and unjust in principle, was rendered still more so by the manner in which the list was made up. It included the names of many who were dead, absent from the country, or infants at the breast at the time! They were represented as favouring the usurpers. Others were inserted from private revenge; and several were named who were living upon the parish. But the chief weight of the imposition was intended to fall upon such as had been distinguished for eminent piety and a consistent Christian walk in their different stations, who were deemed singular in a time of general profession, when religion was the fashion, but who were destined to show the power of the gospel in a day of general apostacy, when religion was persecuted and a profession ridiculed.

Lauderdale, who saw that the produce of these fines was intended to strengthen the Commissioner’s party, strenuously, though ineffectually, endeavoured to thwart the measure; and Middleton, justly supposing that such conduct would cool the king’s affection for his secretary, dispatched Tarbet to London to complete his ruin. The ostensible purpose of his mission was to submit the act of indemnity to the king, and to obtain his sanction to a clause for excepting twelve persons, to be named by the parliament, from the benefit of the act, as incapable of holding any place of public trust. Lauderdale knew that he was aimed at, and exerted his every art and influence to prevent the exception as unjust, but the Duke of York and the English Chancellor, who were jealous of his influence, supported the clause; and the king gave his consent to the proposed exception.

An incident which he could not have foreseen—so capricious is the fate of royal favourites—prevented his fall, and gave him the ascendancy his enemies were seeking to destroy. Middleton, who wished to procure for himself Argyle’s estates, when disappointed by their gift to his son, harassed the young Earl by every means in his power, and procured that they should be burdenedwith an immense debt, which so irritated his lordship, that he expressed himself very freely in a confidential letter to Lord Duffus, saying, “he hoped that he would procure the friendship of Clarendon,” and, in reference to the proceedings in parliament, used these words—“then the king will see their tricks.” This letter being intercepted at the post-office, a capital charge of lying between the king and parliament was founded upon it, and a letter written to the king, requesting that Argyle might be sent down prisoner to stand trial. At Lauderdale’s earnest entreaty, he was sent down not a prisoner, and with express instructions that no sentence should be executed till his majesty saw and approved it. Lorn, when brought to trial, convinced that any defence before such a tribunal would be vain, made none, but threw himself on the royal mercy, declaring the innocence of his intentions, and noticing gently the provocation he had received. He was pronounced guilty of death by parliament, but the king shortly after remitted his punishment.

During these discussions, Tarbet had been gradually undermining Lauderdale’s influence, and, by his insinuating manners, had so far gained on Charles, that the fall of the favourite seemed on very distant or doubtful event, when the indiscretion of Middleton or his friends blighted all their flattering prospects. Afraid openly to attack the present ministers, an act was brought into parliament for incapacitating twelve persons by ballot, and lists were so formed that Lauderdale and Crawford were included in the number; and so anxious was Middleton to insure their dismissal, that, as soon as the act passed, he ratified it without ever communicating it to the king. Lauderdale, who had been apprised of the whole proceedings by the vigilant gratitude of Argyle before the official intelligence reached court, seized the opportunity of representing the affront offered to his majesty in such glaring colours, that, when the act arrived, he refused it his sanction, with a sarcastic remark, that the proceedings of his Scottish ministers were like those of madmen, or of men that were perpetually drunk.

Knowing the aversion of the Presbyterian ministers to the proposed changes, the privy council, before the bishops returned from court, endeavoured to overawe them and prevent opposition.They began with Mr Robert Blair, an eminent and aged minister, that it was necessary to remove from his charge at St Andrews to make room for Sharpe, to whom he was particularly obnoxious on account of his having the preceding year, by order of the presbytery, faithfully reproved him for his deceitful dealings at court and his proudly grasping after the archbishoprick. Although at an advanced age and in delicate health, the venerable saint was summoned before the council at Edinburgh, and examined as to his steadfastness in the principles he had professed through a long and honourable life: when it was found that he held fast his integrity, he was first sequestered from his parish, and confined successively to Musselburgh, Kirkaldy, and Couston; and then, in his last sickness, forced to send in his presentation to the council, to prevent his being dragged to Edinburgh while labouring under a mortal disease.

Upon the bishops’ arrival, it was deemed necessary to make an example of some of the most steadfast and distinguished Presbyterians in the west, as that part of the country had ever been remarkable for attachment to their profession. The Chancellor was, in consequence, directed to require the attendance of such ministers as he thought fit; and, by the suggestion of the prelates, wrote to Messrs John Carstair, Glasgow; James Nasmyth, Hamilton; Matthew Mowat and James Rowat, Kilmarnock; Alexander Blair, Galston; James Veitch, Mauchline; William Adair and William Fullarton, at St Quivox, as if he had merely wished the assistance of their advice. Upon their arrival, however, in Edinburgh, they were charged with holding disloyal principles, and particularly with some expressions they had used in their sermons. From the charge of disloyalty, they easily vindicated themselves, and desired that the particular passages in the offensive sermons might be pointed out; but these the Chancellor was unable to produce, and they were dismissed from their first interview, with a hint that the easiest way to get rid of further trouble, would be to comply with the king’s pleasure and acknowledge his bishops. When they would not consent to this, they were detained in town till the parliament met. No valid charges, however, being found against them, they were carried before theLords of the Articles, and commanded, as a test of their loyalty, to subscribe the oath of allegiance.

As they were the first Presbyterian ministers to whom this oath had been tendered, they required a few days to consider—for they deemed it an object of high importance that they should be fully satisfied in their own minds as to their line of duty—lest, on the one hand, they should wound their consciences by the sin of denying the supreme kingship of Christ in his church, or incur the charge of disloyalty by refusing obedience to him whom they considered their rightful sovereign. They therefore set apart some time for solemn prayer to ask of the Lord light and direction. Then, after serious deliberation, they gave in their explication of the oath—which contained a brief but distinct statement of the principles upon which they and all the succeeding consistent Presbyterians refused to subscribe—what continued afterwards always to be pressed upon them under the false and insidious name of the oath of allegiance, while in fact and verity it was an explicit oath of supremacy. “They heartily and cheerfully acknowledged his majesty as the only lawful supreme governor under God within the kingdom, and that his sovereignty reached all persons and all causes, as well ecclesiastic as civil, having them both for its object; albeit it be in its own nature only civil, and extrinsic as to causes ecclesiastical; and, therefore, they utterly renounced all foreign jurisdictions, powers, and authorities, and promised with their utmost power to defend, assist, and maintain his majesty’s jurisdiction aforesaid.” For this explanation six of the ministers—Messrs Adair and Fullarton having through favour been passed over—were committed close prisoners to the public jail, where they were confined for several weeks; and the paper being laid before parliament, it was put to the vote—“whether process them criminally or banish them?”—when it was carried to banish them. Upon a representation to the commissioner by Mr Robert Dougal, that the sentiments of the explication were sound and orthodox, and such as would be approved by the whole reformed churches abroad, the sentence of banishment was changed into deprivation. But their churches were declared vacant, and they were ordained to remove their families and leave the possession of their manses andglebes at Martinmas next, their stipends for the current year were seized, and themselves forbid to reside within the presbyteries where their churches lie, or within the cities of Glasgow or Edinburgh.

Conscientious ministers were not only entrapped by these tyrannical yet pitiful devices, but likewise harassed by the rigorous enforcement of the act for celebrating the king’s birth-day as an “holyday.” A proclamation was issued ordering its observance by the ministers, under pain of deprivation; and numbers were deprived of their year’s stipend for non-observance.[28]But such had been the retrograde progress from the sobriety of their former profession, that within little more than one short year, the return of this holyday had become throughout the land the signal of universal riot and drunken uproar, particularly in these towns that had the misfortune to be burghs. On this occasion, Linlithgow signalized itself, not only by its outrageous loyalty, but by its shameless and profane contempt for the bonds their fathers had held so sacred, and they themselves had solemnly sworn to observe. After the farce of church-going which occupied the forenoon, bonfires were kindled in every corner of the streets in the afternoon. The magistrates, accompanied by the Earl of Linlithgow, assembled in the open area before the council-house, around a table covered with comfits, the beautiful gothic fountain all the while spouting from its many mouths French and Spanish wines, when the curate opened the evening service by singing a psalm and repeating what was either a long blessing or a short prayer. The company then tasted the confections and scattered the rest among the crowd. An irreverent pageant closed this part of the performance.

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