[Illustration:
_A. Ritchie, Del^t._ —— _W. Douglas, Sr._
_Execution of the Marquis of Argyle, anno 1661._
_Vide page 40._
Edin^r. Pub^d. by Hugh Paton, Carver & Gilder to the Queen, 1841.
]
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ANNALS
OF THE
PERSECUTION IN SCOTLAND,
FROM THE
RESTORATION TO THE REVOLUTION.
BY JAMES AIKMAN, ESQ.,
AUTHOR OF “THE HISTORY OF SCOTLAND,” &c.
EDINBURGH: HUGH PATON, ADAM SQUARE.
M.DCCC.XLII.
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----------------------------
EDINBURGH: PRINTED BY HUGH PATON, ADAM SQUARE.
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CONTENTS.
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INTRODUCTION P. ix
BOOK I. A.D. 1604.-1660.
Presbytery, the favourite form of religion in Scotland with 1
the people, opposed by James VI.—At first opposed,
afterwards sanctioned, by Charles I.—Solemn League and
Covenant—Confession of Faith—Defeat of the Duke of
Hamilton and death of Charles—State of the Church—Charles
II. crowned—Divisions amongst the
Presbyterians—Resolutioners—Remonstrators—Protectorate of
Cromwell—State of religion during that
period—Restoration—Sharpe sent to London—Religious parties
in Scotland—Sharpe’s double dealing—Sudden change of
manners—Rejoicings—Fears of the Remonstrators—Difference
with the Resolutioners—First measures of the King—Promotes
the enemies and persecutes the friends of the
Covenant—Proceedings of the Committee of Estates, urged on
by Sharpe—King’s letter to the Edinburgh
ministers—Exultation of the Resolutioners—Persecute their
brethren—Committee of Estates order Lex Rex, &c. to be
burned—Proclamation against the Remonstrants—Interference
with regard to elections—Proclamation for a meeting of
Parliament
BOOK II. DECEMBER 1660 to 12th JULY 1661.
Lord High Commissioner arrives in Edinburgh—Parliament—Its 21
composition—Act of indemnity withheld—Lord Chancellor
restored to the Presidentship—Oath of
allegiance—Retrogression in reformation-work—Divine right
of Kings asserted—Solemn League and Covenant
repealed—Engagement approved,
&c.—Declaration—Resolutioners begin to perceive their
error—Middleton amuses the ministers of Edinburgh—Manner
of concocting the Act rescissory and of getting it
passed—Middleton’s interview with D. Dickson and part of
the Edinburgh presbytery—Distress of the
ministers—Dispersion of the synods—Concluding acts—Trial
of Argyle—his behaviour before and at the place of
execution—Trial of James Guthrie—his behaviour and
execution—Captain Govan —Prosecutions of Mr Traill of
Edinburgh—Mr Moncrief of Scone—Intrepid reply of his
wife—Mr Robert Macwaird of Glasgow—his striking picture of
the effects of the Restoration—his
accusation—defence—banishment—Swinton of Swinton—Sir John
Chiesly and Mr P. Gillespie’s escape—Parliament
rises—Samuel Rutherford
BOOK III. AUGUST, A.D. 1661-1662.
Lord High Commissioner sets out for Court—his 61
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 Wamphray—Livingston,
&c.—Middleton removed and Lauderdale appointed
BOOK IV. DECEMBER, A.D. 1662-1664.
State of the West and South—Bishops’ curates—their 96
reception—Tumult at Irongray—Commission sent to
Kirkcudbright and Dumfries—Field-preaching—Rothes and
Lauderdale arrive in Scotland—Parliament—Warriston’s
arrest and execution—Principal Wood of St Andrews and
other ministers silenced and scattered—Troops ordered to
enforce the Acts of Parliament—their outrages—Sir James
Turner—High Commission Court—its atrocities—Privy
Council—its exactions—prohibits private prayer-meetings or
contributing money for the relief of the sufferers—William
Guthrie of Fenwick laid aside—Donaldson of Dalgetty’s
case—Death of Glencairn—Political changes
BOOK V. JANUARY, A.D. 1665-1666.
Partial moderation of the King—Sir James Turner’s campaign 127
through Kirkcudbright and Galloway—Unpaid fines
levied—Students’ oaths—All meetings for religious purposes
forbid—Quietude of the country—Proclamation of the
council—Apologetical Relation—Sir James Turner’s third
campaign extended to Nithsdale—visits Mr Blackadder at
Troqueer—More troops raised—Rigorous acts more rigorously
enforced—Rising of the persecuted—they gather
strength—their operations—Defeated at Pentland—Prelatic
revenge—Testimony of the sufferers—Torture
introduced—Nielson of Corsack—Hugh M’Kail—Executions in
Edinburgh and the west country—William
Sutherland—Executions at Ayr
BOOK VI. JANUARY, A.D. 1667-1669.
Dalziel sent to the South and West—his cruelty, and that of 169
the inferior officers—Sir Mungo Murray—Sir William
Bannatyne—Arrival of the Dutch fleet—Crusade
abates—Forfeitures increase—Standing army
proposed—Convention of estates—Cess—King’s letter—West
country disarmed—Sir Robert Murray sent to Scotland—Army
partially disbanded—Political changes—Bond of peace—Trials
of Sir James Turner and Sir William
Bannatyne—Field-preaching proscribed—Michael Bruce—John
Blackadder—Attempt upon Sharpe’s life—Search for the
assassin—Remarkable escape of Maxwell of Monreith—Case of
Mr Robert Gray, merchant—Mrs Kelso and Mrs Duncan—Death of
Mr Gillon, minister of Cavers—Field-preaching and
family-worship punished—Mr Fullarton of Quivox before the
Council—Mr Blackadder patrols his “diocese” untouched
safely—Mr Hamilton, minister of Blantyre
BOOK VII. JULY, A.D. 1669-1670.
An indulgence proposed—partially accepted by the 187
ministers—Mr Hutchison’s address—Proclamation against
those who refused it—Archbishop of Glasgow’s
remonstrance—Parliament asserts the king’s supremacy—vote
the militia, and a security for orthodox
ministers—Field-meeting in Fife—Difference between
Presbyterians and prelatists in doctrine and
teaching—Curates disturbed—Lecturing forbid—Compromising
ministers—Success of the gospel—Remarkable meeting at the
Hill of Beath, &c.—Rage of the Primate—Strange escape of
four prisoners
BOOK VIII. JULY, A.D. 1670-1674.
Parliament—Act against conventicles—Bond—Leighton’s efforts 207
to reform the Episcopate—Council appoint a
committee—Leighton attempts an
accommodation—Conference—Rigid treatment of indulged
ministers—Conventicles increase—Implacability of the
prelates—Lady Dysart—Ascendency of
Lauderdale—Parliament—Finings—Indulgence—Dissensions of
the ministers—Sufferings of the indulged—Mr Forrester and
Mr Burnet abandon Prelacy—their testimony—Proceedings at
the meeting of estates—Mr Blackadder’s tour in
Fife—Ministers’ widows’ petition—its consequences—Sharpe’s
troubles
BOOK IX. A.D. 1674-1676.
Divisions among the ministers respecting the church and 238
self-defence—Armed meetings—Severities increase—Lord
Cardross—Religious revivals in the North—Mr
M’Gilligan—Civil oppression—Home of Polwart—Finings—Durham
of Largo—Magistrates of Edinburgh—Sufferers sent to France
as recruits—Proclamation to expel the families of
gospel-hearers from the Burghs, and enforce the
conventicle act—Instructions for the indulged—Progress of
the gospel—Rage of the prelates—Mitchell tortured
BOOK X. A.D. 1676-1677.
Remarkable sacramental solemnities occasion harsher 256
measures—Council new-modelled—Committee for public
affairs—Kerr of Kersland—Kirkton—The expatriated pursued
to Holland—Colonel Wallace
BOOK XI. A.D. 1677.
Meeting of the ministers in Edinburgh—Prosecutions for not 265
attending the kirk—Lord Cardross—Conventicle at
Culross—Bond—Lauderdale comes to Scotland—Pretended
moderation—Alarm of the bishops—Carstairs attacks John
Balfour’s house—Council’s design of raising a standing
force—Resolutions of the West country
gentlemen—Conventicles increase—Communion at East
Nisbet—Common field-meeting—King authorizes calling in the
Highland clans
BOOK XII. A.D. 1678.
Privy Council forbids emigration—Mitchell’s trial and 286
execution—Highland host—Committee of the council arrive at
Glasgow—Deputation from Ayr sent to the Commissioner—Bond
refused—Committee proceed to Ayr—Earl of
Cassilis—Law-burrows—Case of Lord Cochrane—Ravages of “the
Highland Host”—their return home—Earl of Cassilis goes to
court—Duke of Hamilton follows—Complaints dismissed—State
of the country
BOOK XIII. JANUARY TO MAY, A.D. 1679.
Public teachers and students required to take the oath of 336
supremacy—A boy imprisoned for refusing—Husbands punished
for their wives’ contumacy—landlords for their
tenants’—Overture of the council—Country put under
military law—Reprisals—Outrages of the commissioners of
shires—Death of Sharpe—Escape of Veitch—Murder of
Inchdairney
BOOK XIV. MAY TO DECEMBER, A.D. 1679.
Outrages of the soldiery—Dissensions among the 359
persecuted—Commotions in the West—Rutherglen
declaration—Rising of the Presbyterians—Skirmish at
Drumclog—Royal troops retire to Edinburgh—Divisions among
the Presbyterians—Arrival of Monmouth—Battle of Bothwell
Bridge
BOOK XV. A.D. 1680.
Perplexity of the moderate ministers—Murder of Mr 397
Hall—Queensferry paper—Cargill joins Cameron—Sanquhar
declaration—Council’s proclamation in
reply—Reflections—Bond—Fresh plunderings by
Dalziel—Skirmish at Airs-moss—Death of Cameron—of
Rathillet—Cargill—Torwood excommunication—York arrives in
Edinburgh—Spreul tortured—Skene, Stewart, and Potter
executed—Effigy of the Pope burnt
BOOK XVI. A.D. 1681.
Edinburgh College shut—Isobel Alison and Marion Harvy 414
executed—Other executions—Search for covenanters—Thomas
Kennoway’s exploits—Mock courts held by Cornet Graham and
Grierson of Lag—Mr Spreul tried—acquitted—sent to the
Bass—John Blackadder, Gabriel Semple, and Donald Cargill
seized—Walter Smith, William Cuthil, and others
apprehended, tried, and executed
BOOK XVII. A.D. 1681.
Parliament—Act for securing the Protestant 437
religion—asserting the divine right and lineal succession
of their kings—for securing the peace of the country—Lord
Bargeny’s case—THE TEST—debate upon
it—Belhaven—Argyle—objections to its imposition—Argyle
takes it with an explanation—his trial—escapes from the
Castle—forfeited—Fraser of Brea—fined—banished
BOOK XVIII. A.D. 1681-1682.
Society-men—their first general meeting—State of the 452
country—Ure of Shargarton—Wavering of the
Episcopalians—Lanark declaration—burned at
Edinburgh—Harvey hanged—Mr P. Warner—York recalled to
court—New government—Robert Gray executed—Dalziel sent to
the west—Meeting at Priest-hill—at Tala-linn—Major White
and the Laird of Meldrum—their proceedings—Hume of Hume
executed—Lauderdale’s death
BOOK XIX. A.D. 1682-1683.
Persecution instigated by the curates in the South and 465
West—Noble conduct of a boy—Rapacity of the
military—Instructions of the council—exploits of
Claverhouse, Meldrum, &c.—Retributive justice—Justiciary
court—Lawrie of Blackwood—Circuit courts—Rye-house
plot—Scottishmen implicated—Various instances of
oppression
BOOK XX. A.D. 1684-1685.
Persecutions increase—“Killing Time”—Proscription and 481
plundering—Husbands fined for their wives’ non-attendance
at church—Torture—Executions—Campbell of Cessnock—Paton of
Meadowhead, &c.—Females sold for
slaves—Spence—Carstairs—Baillie of Jarvieswood—Circuit
courts—Porterfield of Douchal—Finings—Proceedings of the
society-men—Review of the state of the country during this
period—Death of Charles
BOOK XXI. A.D. 1685.
Accession of James VII.—Proceedings of the privy 510
council—Field murders—Northern
commission—Indemnity—Outrages in the south—Two women
drowned—John Brown, “the Christian
Carrier”—Parliament—Argyle’s expedition—Suspected persons
sent to Dunotter—Argyle defeated—taken—executed—Colonel
Rumbold—Nisbet of Hardhill and other sufferers
BOOK XXII. A.D. 1686-1688.
Conduct of the soldiers—A riot—Recantation of 533
Sibbald—Alexander Peden—Proceedings of the
society-men—Synod of Edinburgh—Parliament—Disputes among
the persecuted—Indulgence—Thanksgiving for the Queen’s
pregnancy—Seizure and death of Mr Renwick—Dr Hardy’s trial
and acquittal—Rescue of David Houston—Murder of George
Wood—Arrival of the Prince of Orange
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INTRODUCTION.
The first annunciation of the gospel in Eden to fallen man, was
accompanied with an assurance of persecution:—“I will put enmity between
thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise
thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” And the same was explicitly
renewed under the New Testament dispensation, where it is declared with
peculiar emphasis—“Yea, all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall
suffer persecution.” But, like “the primal curse, ’tis softened into
mercy;” nay more, it is transformed into a blessing—“Blessed are ye when
men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil
against you falsely for my sake: rejoice, and be exceeding glad; for
great is your reward in heaven.” That these promises have been made
good, the history of the Church in all ages bears testimony; and there
is no testimony stronger than that of the Church in Scotland, whether we
consider the fiery trials she has gone through, or the noble records her
martyrs have left to the truth and faithfulness of God.
Christianity appears to have been introduced at a very early period, and
never to have been wholly extinguished by the idolatries of Rome, in the
south-western districts, where the Lollards of Kyle arose as harbingers
of the Reformation, some time towards the end of the fourteenth century.
In the year 1407, James Resby, an English presbyter, and a disciple of
Wickliffe, was burned for Lollardism in Scotland, especially for
interspersing these most dangerous dogmas in his sermons, “that a Pope
was not in fact the vicar of Christ; nor could any Pope be so, unless he
was holy;” besides forty other similar or worse conclusions, and his
tenets spread widely. He was followed, 1431, by Paul Craw,
“deprehendit,” says Knox, “in the Universitie of Sanct Androis, and
accusit of Heresie before suche as wer called Doctors of Theologie,” and
sent to expiate his errors in the flames. At his execution, they put
“ane ball of bras in his mouthe to the end that he sould not gif
confession of his faythe to the pepill, neyther yit that thai sould
understand the defence which he hade agains thair unjust accusation and
condemnation.”
The political anarchy and confusion which prevailed in Scotland at this
time, and in which the priests took an active share, seem to have
diverted their attention for a while from prosecuting their schemes
against the new obnoxious opinions; but when Luther shook the papacy,
and his doctrines gaining ground on every side, had stirred up their
slumbering hatred, the renovated warfare was announced by the martyrdom
of Mr Patrick Hamilton and of “the Scottish John Baptist,” as Mr George
Wishart has been styled. But the prelates, who had shut their eyes to
the signs of the times, grievously miscalculated. The ministry of these
two eminent men had produced on the already prepared population, a
disposition not only to profess the truth themselves, but also to
endeavour a national reformation; and their martyrdom hastened the
crisis. Instead of terrifying, it enraged the people against the
superstition which could require for its support the perpetration of
such deadly crime.
During the nominal reign of the unfortunate Mary, but more especially
after her flight into England, the cause rapidly progressed; and the
Regents, however different in character, were obliged by the
circumstances of the times in which they were placed, to aid in its
furtherance. The absurd constitution of Scotland, that allowed a child
unfit for governing himself to assume the power of governing a nation,
occasioned various changes. After the accession of James VI., till
previously to his marriage, he acquiesced in the presbyterial
government, which, upon his return from Denmark with his queen, he
declared in presence of the General Assembly to be “the purest kirk upon
earth,” and promised to defend it “against all deadly”—a promise he soon
forgot, and forced upon his reluctant subjects a mongrel Episcopacy.
This was followed up by his son Charles, who, after some preliminary
encroachments, sent down a liturgy with an order to adopt it.
July 23, 1637, was the remarkable day on which the Bishop of Edinburgh,
robed in his canonicals, attempted to introduce it in the High Church;
but no sooner had he opened the service-book, than an old woman, Janet
Geddes by name, threw her stool at his head, which was quickly followed
by a number of others, the whole congregation meanwhile crying out—“A
Pope! a Pope!” and both the bishop and dean were forced out of the
church, and driven home amid a shower of stones, hardly escaping with
their lives. Commotions followed, till a free General Assembly met at
Glasgow, November 21, 1638, where the Presbyterian form of church
government was declared and acted upon as the government of the church,
most agreeable to the gospel and the law of the land, which was
acknowledged by the king at the treaty of Dunselaw, June 18, 1639.
When the civil war broke out, the English parliament convened an
Assembly of Divines at Westminster, to which the General Assembly of the
Kirk of Scotland sent four of their chief ministers, not less
distinguished for their talents, than revered for their piety—Alexander
Henderson, Samuel Rutherfurd, George Gillespie, and Robert Baillie,
accompanied by Lord Maitland, afterwards Duke of Lauderdale, “a man of
excellent parts had they been blessed and improven; but as then his
reputation was entire.” The Confession of Faith, Catechisms, and
Directory for Worship, which were here agreed upon, were received and
sanctioned in their session 1648, and ratified by the Scottish
parliament. For defending these, the persecutions narrated in the
following pages were endured.
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ANNALS OF THE PERSECUTION.
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BOOK I.
A.D. 1604.-A.D. 1660.
Presbytery, the favourite form of religion in Scotland with the people,
opposed by James VI.—At first opposed afterwards sanctioned
by Charles I.—Solemn League and Covenant—Confession of
Faith—Defeat of the Duke of Hamilton and death of Charles—State
of the Church—Charles II. crowned—Divisions among the
Presbyterians—Resolutioners—Remonstrators—Protectorate of
Cromwell—State of religion during that period—Restoration—Sharpe sent
to London—Religious parties in Scotland—Sharpe’s double
dealing—Sudden change of manners—Rejoicings—Fears of the
Remonstrators—Difference with the Resolutioners—First measures of the
King—Promotes the enemies and persecutes the friends of the
Covenant—Proceedings of the Committee of Estates, urged on by
Sharpe—King’s letter to the Edinburgh ministers—Exultation of the
Resolutioners—Persecute their brethren—Committee of Estates
order Lex Rex, &c. to be burned—Proclamation against the
Remonstrants—Interference with regard to elections—Proclamation for a
meeting of Parliament.
Ever since the days of the Reformation, Scotland has been distinguished
by the attachment of her inhabitants to simplicity in the forms of their
religious worship, and a dislike to pomp or lordly power in their
ministers. Presbytery, of which these are the prominent features, has in
consequence always been the favoured mode of ecclesiastical polity with
the people; unfortunately her monarchs, previous to the Revolution of
1688, were as decidedly averse to it; and their tyrannical attempts to
substitute a hated hierarchy in its place, involved the country, for
three generations, in contention and bloodshed, persecution and
distress, till the struggle issued in the final expulsion of the Stuarts
from the throne.
James VI., after having given the Presbyterian church the royal
sanction, and paid it the highest encomiums as the “purest kirk upon
earth,” and having repeatedly promised and vowed “to support it against
all deadly,” spent the greater part of his life in endeavours to
overturn it. He succeeded in forcing upon an unwilling people a kind of
mongrel prelacy, and left to his son the hazardous task of finishing his
designed uniformity in religious worship between the two kingdoms.
Charles proceeded with more violence; and, by attempting to obtrude a
detested liturgy, he destroyed the fabric it had cost his father so much
king-craft to rear, and led to the remarkable renewing of the NATIONAL
COVENANT, which, early in the year 1638, was subscribed with
enthusiastic fervour by all ranks throughout the land. A free General
Assembly, convened at Glasgow in that year, November 21, accomplished
what has usually been termed the second glorious Reformation, by
restoring Presbytery to its primitive simplicity, and sweeping away all
the innovations against which they had so long struggled. The
proceedings of this assembly were afterwards solemnly confirmed by the
estates; and Scotland for a short period enjoyed a hollow peace, while
the king was contesting with his English parliament. Afraid, however, if
the king overcame in the contest, that they would hold their own
liberties by a very feeble tenure, they entered into a solemn league and
covenant with the parliament for the mutual preservation of their
religion and liberty, for promoting uniformity in worship and doctrine
between the two nations, and for exterminating popery, prelacy, and
schism: their weight decided the fate of the war.
When the English hierarchy had fallen, and the king’s power was reduced,
an assembly of the most learned divines that perhaps ever met in
Britain, was called by authority of the English parliament. Assisted by
commissioners from Scotland, they drew up the admirable Confession of
Faith, with the Larger and Shorter Catechisms, still the standards of
our national church; but they differed on the Directory for Worship,
against which some of the most learned of the Independents dissented—a
prelude to more serious differences.
After Charles had been beaten out of the field, and was intriguing in a
variety of ways with the army and with the English parliament, a
majority in the Scottish estates, headed by the Duke of Hamilton, rashly
“engaged” by a secret treaty to attempt his rescue. The church opposed
war with England, as Charles would give only an equivocal pledge for
supporting the establishment of Presbytery in that country; and they
feared his duplicity in case he regained unrestricted power; and the
minority in the estates also “protested” against it. The engagers being
defeated at Preston, the protesters, whose leader was the Marquis of
Argyle, came into power, and Scotland separated into two parties.
Shortly after the defeat of the Scots, the king was brought to trial and
executed, in spite of their remonstrances, which, now that they were
divided among themselves and had no army to back them, were little
regarded.
At this time the church of Scotland reached her greatest pitch of
splendour. “For though,” says a contemporary historian, “alwayes since
the assembly at Glasgow the work of the gospel hade prospered,
judicatories being reformed, godly ministers entered, and holy
constitutions and rules daily brought into the church; yet now, after
Duke Hamilton’s defeat, and in the interval betwixt the two kings,
religion advanced the greatest step it had made for many years: now the
ministrie was notably purified, the magistracy altered, and the people
strangly refined. It is true, at this time hardly the fifth part of the
lords of Scotland were admitted to sit in parliament; but those that did
sitt were esteemed truly godly men; so were all the rest of the
commissioners in parliament elected of the most pious of every
corporation. Also godly men were employed in all offices, both civil and
military; and about this time the General Assembly, by sending abroad
visiters into the country, made almost ane entire change upon the
ministry in several places of the nation, purgeing out the scandalous
and insufficient, and planting in their place a sort of godly young men,
whose ministry the Lord sealed with ane eminent blessing of success, as
they themselves sealed it with a seal of heavy sufferings; but so they
made full proof of their ministry.
“Scotland hath been even by emulous foreigners called Philadelphia; and
now she seemed to be in her flower. Every minister was to be tried five
times a-year, both for his personal and ministerial behaviour; every
congregation was to be visited by the presbytery, that they might see
how the vine flowrished and the pomegranate budded. And there was no
case nor question in the meanest family in Scotland but it might become
the object of the deliberation of the General Assembly; for the
congregational session’s book was tried by the presbytery, the
presbytery’s by the synod, and the synod’s by the General Assembly.
Likeways, as the bands of the Scottish church were strong, so her beauty
was bright; no error so much as named; the people were not only sound in
the faith, but innocently ignorant of unsound doctrine; no scandalous
person could live; no scandal could be concealed in all Scotland, so
strict a correspondence there was between ministers and congregations.
The General Assembly seemed to be the priest with Urim and Thumim; and
there were not ane hundreth persons in all Scotland to oppose their
conclusions: all submitted, all learned, all prayed; most part were
really godly, or at least counterfeited themselves Jews. Than was
Scotland a heap of wheat set about with lillies, uniform, or a palace of
silver beautifully proportioned; and this seems to me to have been
Scotland’s high noon. The only complaint of profane people was, that the
government was so strict they hade not liberty enough to sin.
“But this season lasted not long.” The Presbyterians, who were averse to
the ruling party in England, as sectarians in religion and republicans
in politics, immediately proclaimed Charles II.; and commissioners were
sent to the Hague, where he was subsisting on the bounty of his sister,
to invite him upon conditions to assume the government. During the
negotiations, while the terms were discussing, he authorized Montrose,
already too well known for his cruelties, to attempt his unconditional
restoration by force; and it was not till he heard of his failure, that
he consented to take the oaths and become the covenanted king of
Scotland.
His arrival, however, instead of uniting, occasioned deep and
irreconcilable dissensions among the Scots—between those who distrusted,
and those who affected to believe, his professions; yet as the church
continued to maintain the ascendancy, they were kept within bounds till
after the fatal battle of Dunbar. But when it became necessary to supply
the loss occasioned by that disaster, they became apparent. The king
required that all those who had hitherto been excluded as malignants,
who had favoured the engagement, and were understood to be friendly to
his unlimited power, should be restored to offices of trust both in the
army and state: this was resisted by the strictest and most devout of
the Presbyterians, who, considering them as enemies to the church,
dreaded their admission into the king’s councils, while he himself was
suspected. The virtues of the king, and his inimitable improvement in
adversity, were deemed sufficient answer, and resolutions favourable to
their claims having been obtained by surprise from the major part of the
commission, a schism took place by the minority protesting against the
concession.
From this date the Presbyterians separated into two parties, who
distracted the country for several years by their violent contentions;
those who arrogated to themselves the praise of liberality and
loyalty—their superior regard for the decrees of the church and the
letter of the covenant—ranging under the name of resolutioners; while
those esteemed the most holy, indefatigable, and laborious ministers,
who preferred the spirit to the form of their religious constitution,
were numbered among the protesters. They were likewise called
remonstrators, from having followed up their protest by a remonstrance.
Meanwhile Charles was crowned at Scone with great solemnity, the Marquis
of Argyle, who was attached to the resolutioners, putting the crown upon
his head; but the divisions continued till Cromwell obtained the supreme
power, who granted free toleration to all sects, and liberty to the
Presbyterians in every thing, except permitting the General Assembly to
meet, which some of the more pious considered no bad service.
This period, down to the Restoration, has ever been considered as that
in the Scottish church most remarkably distinguished for the prevalence
of real personal religion; and it was evident that God was preparing a
people in this land for a day of hot and fiery trial. “I verily
believe,” says Kirkton, “there were more souls converted to Christ in
that short period of time than in any season since the Reformation,
though of treeple its duration. Nor was there ever greater purity and
plenty of the means of grace than was in their time. Ministers were
painful, people were diligent; and if a man hade seen one of their
solemn communions, where many congregations mett in great
multitudes—some dozens of ministers used to preach, and the people
continued as it were in a sort of trance (so serious were they in
spiritual exercises) for three dayes at least—he would have thought it a
solemnity unknown to the rest of the world. Besides, the ministers,
after some years, began to look at the questions about which they had
divided, as inconsiderable: also it was found error made no great
progress, the genius of the people being neither very curious nor easily
changed.”
The numbers who stood the test and suffered to the death, bear witness
that the religious state of the country at the Restoration, as given by
him, must be substantially true; as the numbers who apostatized make it
evident that many must have dissembled. “There be in all Scotland some
nine hundred paroches.”[1] “At the king’s return every paroch had a
minister, every village had a school, every family almost had a Bible;
yea, in most of the country, all the children of age could read the
Scriptures, and were provided of Bibles either by the parents or their
ministers. Every minister was a very full professor of the reformed
religion, according to the large Confession of Faith, framed at
Westminster by the divines of both nations. Every minister was obliged
to preach thrice a-week, to lecture and catechise once, besides other
private duties, wherein they abounded according to their proportion of
faithfulness and abilities. None of them might be scandalous in their
conversation or negligent in their office, so long as a presbyterie
stood; and among them were many holy in conversation and eminent in
gifts. The dispensation of the ministry being fallen from the noise of
waters and sound of trumpets, to the melody of harpers, which is alace
the last messe in the banquet. Nor did a minister satisfy himself except
his ministry had the seal of a divine approbation, as might witness him
to be really sent from God.”
Footnote 1:
These were divided into sixty-eight presbyteries, which were again
cantoned into fourteen synods, out of all which, by a solemn legation
of commissioners from every presbytery, they used to constitute a
national assembly.
“Indeed, in many places the spirit seemed to be poured out with the
word, both by the multitudes of sincere converts, and also by the common
work of reformation upon many who never came the length of a communion;
there were no fewer than sixty aged people, men and women, who went to
school, that even then they might be able to read the Scriptures with
their own eyes. I have lived many years in a paroch where I never heard
an oath; and you might have ridde many miles before you heard any: also,
you could not for a great part of the country have lodged in a family
where the Lord was not worshipped by reading, singing, and public
prayer. Nobody complained more of our church-government than our
taverners, whose ordinary lamentation was, their trade was broke, people
were become so sober.”[2]
Footnote 2:
Kirkton mentions that the English often offered the protesters the
government of the nation, which they refused, till Cromwell, “weary
with their scrupolosity, and being highly caressed by Mr (afterwards
Archbishop) Sharpe, his large proffers in behalf of the resolutioners,
was forced to allow them equal liberty, and so they continued in a
balance till after his death.—_Hist. of the Church of Scotland_, pp.
48-56.—Law, in his Memorials, has a similar statement. “It is not to
be forgotten, that from the year 1652 to the year 1660, there was
great good done by the preaching of the gospel in the west of
Scotland, more than was observed to have been for twenty or thirty
years before; a great many brought into Christ Jesus by a saving work
of conversion, which was occasioned through ministers preaching
nothing all that tyme but the gospell, and had left off to preach up
parliaments, armies, leagues, resolutions, and remonstrance, which was
much in use before, from the year 1638 till that time 52, which
occasioned a great number of hypocrytes in the church, who, out of
hope of preferment, honour, riches, and worldly credit, tooke on the
form of godliness but wanted the power of it.” P. 7.
Such was the delightful picture drawn by an eyewitness; and to render it
perfect and permanent, the Presbyterians longed with desire for the
restoration of their king, whose presence alone they believed would
remove the only spots that in their eyes dimmed its lustre—the
suspension of their General Assemblies, and the late sinful toleration.
As soon as there was the least prospect of the desirable event, several
ministers in Edinburgh—resolutioners—dispatched Mr James Sharpe to
London, with instructions to watch over the interests of the church,
particularly of their own party; and as they knew that the king had a
strong antipathy against the remonstrants, who, during his stay in
Scotland, had been assiduous in their upright though ungrateful
endeavours for his conversion, and incurred his displeasure and that of
his confidants by their uncourtly reproofs and uncompromising adherence
to their principles, they were anxious to separate themselves from this
the honestest portion of their brethren, and directed their agent
carefully to remind his majesty of the difference between them and their
more uncomplying opponents.
During the protectorate, as no persecution had been allowed on account
of religious opinions, a few in Scotland seem to have adopted the
tolerant maxims of the decried usurper; and although sectaries never
flourished in that soil, they seem to have been sufficiently numerous to
have excited the fears of the resolutioners, who, insensible to the
benefits they enjoyed under the toleration of Cromwell, and eager to
secure the liberties of their own kirk from the oppression of the
prelatists, were equally anxious to guard against any freedom being
allowed to those whom they termed fanatics.[3]
Footnote 3:
Mr Robert Douglas writes to Mr Sharpe, May 8, 1660:—“Your great errand
will be for this kirk. I am confident the king will not wrong our
liberties whereunto he himself is engaged. He needs not declare any
liberty to tender consciences here, because the generality of the
people and whole ministry have embraced the established religion by
law with his majesty’s consent. It is known that in all the times of
the prevailing of the late party in England, none here petitioned for
toleration, except some inconsiderable naughty men.” And the ministers
of Edinburgh, _i. e._ resolutioners, in a letter, May 10, to the Earl
of Rothes, who was going to meet the king at Breda, use the following
remarkable expressions: “He [the king] knows likewise how much the
people adhere to the establishment of the church; so that there is no
pretext for an indulgence to such as shall recede from it, but many
inconveniences would ensue upon the granting it.” Correspondence
between Messrs Douglas, Dickson, &c. with Sharpe. _Wodrow’s Introd._
There was, besides, a third party, who, although previously discernible
to those who understood the signs of the times, sprang up at once upon
the afflicted vision of the resolutioners, when the rays of royalty
again beamed above the horizon—a new race, who, having never been
acquainted with the work of reformation, nor with the just proceedings
of the nation, but weary of Presbyterian strictness, were ready to
condemn the covenant and all the loyal and honest acting of the
covenanters. These, consisting chiefly of young men of rank, were
prepared for any change, and were supposed, in general, to be rather
favourable to Episcopacy. A knowledge of this circumstance, and the
frequent representations of the alarming fact by his correspondents,
seem early to have influenced Sharpe to desert his employers and go over
to the enemy.
In May, he went upon an embassage to Charles at Breda, and there was
confirmed in the treachery which he completed shortly after the king’s
landing in England. His villanous hypocrisy in managing the overturn of
the polity he was dispatched to support, was consummate; yet now, when
we know the part he played, it is not difficult to perceive, in his most
specious letters, an overacting which must have betrayed him to men less
confiding than his employers.[4] Besides preventing all access to the
king, and representing the chief leaders in Scotland as favourable to
prelacy, he dissuaded his friends from addressing against it, and
cruelly widened the breach between them and the protesters. His ambition
was stimulated by his revenge; he wished to gratify his private
resentment against the most eminent of the latter—Samuel Rutherford,
James Guthrie, and Lord Warriston. Yet, however much we may detest the
traitor, it is matter of high gratulation that his mission failed; for,
had he acted faithfully and succeeded, he would have procured for
Scotland an iron yoke of political presbytery, which might indeed have
preserved the beloved polity secured by acts of parliament, by
prohibitions, and by every civil pain and penalty by which churchmen
support their power; but he would have destroyed religious liberty, and
delivered the nation over to a thraldom which would have been worse, as
it would probably have been more permanent, than the prelacy that
ensued—it would, it is likely, have been more moral, but it might not
have been less oppressively severe.[5]
Footnote 4:
“I profess,” says Mr Douglas, “I did not suspect Mr Sharpe in
reference to prelacy more than I did myself, nor more than the
apostles did Judas before his treachery was discovered.” _Wodrow’s
Introd._
Footnote 5:
There is much retribution in this world, although it be not the place
of final account. Here especially God punishes his own people. The
wicked may prosper in their wickedness—“he sees their day is
coming”—but the Lord will never suffer his children to sin with
impunity. This was remarkably exemplified in the case of these good
men, who were now so anxious to prevent their brethren from enjoying
liberty of conscience, in order that they themselves might engross the
royal favour and the chief places in the church; their own agent
betrayed them; and the very means they were using to accomplish their
improper and selfish aims, were turned against them, and became the
instruments of their correction.
When Charles was at last restored to the wishes and prayers of his
people, as if some enchanter’s wand had touched the frame of society,
the whole kingdom in an instant changed, and, from a state of grave
seriousness and exemplary decency, burst out into one disorderly scene
of riot and revelry; and the day of thanksgiving for this happy event
was celebrated in Edinburgh in a manner that had been very unusual in
that capital for at least a quarter of a century. After sermon, the
magistrates proceeded to the cross, on which was a table covered with
sweatmeats, and the well ran with wine; there, amid the flourishing of
trumpets and the beating of drums, the royal healths were drank, and
three hundred dozen of glasses broken in honour of the day! On the
Castle Hill, fireworks were exhibited, the principal figures in which
were Cromwell and the Devil, who, after diverting the multitude with a
flight and pursuit, exploded and disappeared amid shouts of applause.
The considerate part of the community viewed the unconditional recall of
the king with very different sensations; but these, in that frantic
hour, were few in number, and chiefly consisted of the remonstrators,
whose dark forebodings were deemed the offspring of their own guilty
consciences accusing them of their former disloyalty. In vain did they
ask for evidence of his being changed from what he was, before they
could trust their liberties into his hands without security. They had
all along been jealous of Sharpe, and their suspicions had been
heightened by some surmises of his transactions at London; but all their
advances towards their brethren had been repulsed by the resolutioners,
who put the most unbounded confidence in that traitor’s assurances of
the king’s friendly countenance towards themselves, and his intended
vengeance upon them. The first measures of Charles, however, put an end
to the differences of the truly pious among both parties, who were soon
undeceived, and sent to the furnace to be refined together.
All the high offices of Scotland were disposed of to men either of no
religion, or of that very accommodating kind which is always found on
the side of interest and power. Middleton, a soldier of fortune, created
an Earl, was appointed commissioner to hold the next parliament; the
Earls Glencairn had the chancellorship—Crawford, the treasury—Rothes,
president of the council—and Lauderdale, secretary of state, and one of
the gentlemen of the bedchamber, (the only Scottishman admitted to this
honour;) Sir Archibald Primson was clerk-register; and Sir John
Fletcher, king’s advocate. Meanwhile, those who were esteemed the
leaders of the covenanters, although they had ever sturdily maintained
their loyalty, after the greater part of the others had yielded, were
thrown into prison and threatened with prosecutions for treason. The
Marquis of Argyle was seized at London, whether he had gone to
congratulate the king, and sent to the tower; and orders were forwarded
to Scotland, to Major-General Morgan, commander-in-chief, to secure Sir
James Stewart, provost of Edinburgh; Sir Archibald Johnstoun, Lord
Warriston; and Sir John Christy of Carswell. Warriston escaped for the
time; but the other two were arrested in a somewhat ludicrous manner.
The General having heard that Christy was in town upon private business,
waited upon the Provost, and required him, in virtue of his office, to
apprehend Sir John and carry him to the Castle, which his lordship
having done, when he was about to take leave, with many expressions of
regret, he was informed “that it behooved him to bear his friend
company;” nor did he obtain a release till about ten years after.
Until the meeting of a new parliament, the administration of Scottish
affairs was intrusted to the surviving members of the committee of
estates, nominated by the last Scottish parliament; and as they had all
concurred with the king in swearing the National and Solemn League and
Covenant, it was expected that they would at least be favourable to the
established religion of the land; but it very soon appeared how little
confidence can be placed in the professions or even oaths of public men,
when the stream runs in an opposite direction. Their first meeting, at
which the chancellor presided, was held in Edinburgh, August 23, and
their first act was a proper prelude to the tyranny about to be
inflicted on their country.
On that day, a few of the protesters, who had in vain endeavoured to
convince their brethren of the critical situation in which the
Presbyterian church stood, met at Edinburgh to draw up a humble address
and supplication to the king, suited to the emergency. They were in all
nine ministers, of whom the chief were Mr James Guthrie of Stirling, and
Messrs Traill, and John Stirling of Edinburgh, with two ruling elders.
As the meeting and its object were no secrets, the chancellor and
committee dispatched messengers, who seized their papers, containing a
scroll of their supplication, with copies of some letters to their
brethren in Glasgow, requesting a full meeting for considering the
subject; and immediately after issued a warrant for imprisoning in
Edinburgh Castle the whole of those who had been present at the unlawful
conventicle—terms about to become of frequent use and of fearful import.
The scroll consisted of declarations of their abhorrence of the murder
of his majesty’s royal father, and the actings of the late usurping
power—of thankfulness for the Lord’s preservation of his own sacred
person, and for his quiet restoration without the effusion of Christian
blood—professions of zeal for the glory of God, the good of the church,
and faithful and loyal tenders of all the duties of honour, subjection,
and obedience, due from humble and loving subjects to their native and
lawful sovereign; but they expressed their fears of the popish
prelatical and malignant party, of their attempting the overthrow of the
pure religion as established, and the re-introduction of all the
corruptions which were formerly cast out;[6] and they reminded his
majesty of his and their solemn engagements to God, of the Lord’s mercy
to him and them, and their mutual obligations to faithfulness in the
performance of their vows.
Footnote 6:
These excellent men, for such undoubtedly they were, who had enjoyed
undisturbed liberty of conscience and freedom of religious worship
under Cromwell, thus adverted to that period, and thus would have
requited their protectors.—“Neither are we less apprehensive of the
endeavours of the spirit of error that possesseth sectaries in these
nations, which, as it did at first promote the practice of a vast
toleration in things religious, and afterwards proceeded unto the
framing of the mischief thereof into a law, so we doubt not but it
will still be active unto the promoting and procuring the same under
the specious pretence of _Liberty for tender consciences_. The effects
whereof have, in a few years past, been so dreadful, that we cannot
think of the continuing of it, but with much trembling and fear.” Then
follows a text upon which the whole annals of the persecution will
form a most striking and instructive commentary. “Therefore, knowing
that to kings, princes, rulers, and magistrates appertains the
conservation and purgation of religion, and that unity and peace be
preserved in the church, and that the truth of God be kept pure and
entire, that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed, all
corruptions or abuses in discipline and worship prevented or reformed,
and all the ordinances of God duly settled, administered, and
observed, We, your majesty’s most humble subjects, do, with bowed
knees and bended affections, humbly supplicate your majesty that you
would employ your royal power unto the preservation of the reformed
religion in the church of Scotland, in doctrine, worship, discipline,
and government, and unto the carrying on of the work of uniformity in
religion in the churches of God in the three kingdoms, in one
confession of faith, form of church-government, directory for worship,
and catechizing; and to the extirpation of popery, prelacy,
superstition, heresy, schism, profaneness, and whatever shall be found
contrary to sound doctrine,” &c.
They were therefore charged with proceedings expressly derogatory to his
majesty’s royal prerogative, and tending to the disturbance of the
present peace of his majesty’s dominions; and next day the committee of
estates prohibited, by proclamation, all unlawful and unwarrantable
meetings and conventicles in any place within the kingdom of Scotland
without his majesty’s special authority; and likewise all seditious
petitions and remonstrances under what pretext soever which might tend
to the disturbance of the peace of the kingdom, or alienating or
diminishing the affections of his majesty’s subjects from their due
obedience to his majesty’s lawful authority, and that under the highest
pains. Sheriffs and magistrates of burghs were ordered to be careful
within their respective bounds, that no such pernicious or dangerous
meetings should be permitted, but that they should be prevented,
hindered, and made known to the executive. These proceedings were
ostensibly directed against the remonstrants alone, but were intended to
answer the double purpose of overawing the elections for the ensuing
parliament, and paving the way for the complete overturn of freedom in
the state and presbytery in the church.
Mr Sharpe, on his arrival from London, gave a keener edge to the
proceedings of the committee, and, by his duplicity, prevented the good
men among the resolutioners from taking any steps, either for their own
security or the relief of their oppressed brethren. In answer to an
epistle from his employers to the king, entreating his favour and
countenance for their church, he brought the following, addressed to Mr
Robert Douglas, minister, Edinburgh, to be by him communicated to the
presbytery:—
“Charles R., trusty and well beloved, we greet you well. By the letters
you sent to us with this bearer, Mr James Sharpe, and by the account he
gave of the state of _our church_ there, we have received full
information of your sense of our sufferings and of your constant
affection and loyalty to our person and authority: And therefore we will
detain him here no longer—of whose good services we are very
sensible—nor will we delay to let you know by him our gracious
acceptance of your address, and how well we are satisfied with your
carriage and with the generality of the ministers of Scotland in this
time of trial, whilst some, under specious pretences, swerved from that
duty and allegiance they owed to us. And because such, who by the
countenance of usurpers have disturbed the peace of that our church, may
also labour to create jealousies in the minds of well-meaning people, we
have thought fit by this to assure you, that, by the grace of God, we
resolve to discountenance profanity and all contemners and opposers of
the ordinances of the gospel. We do also resolve to protect and preserve
the government of the church of Scotland as it is settled by law,
without violation, and to countenance in the due exercise of their
functions all such ministers who shall behave themselves dutifully and
peaceably as becomes men of their calling. We will also take care that
the authority and acts of the General Assembly at St Andrew’s and
Dundee, 1651,[7] be owned and stand in force until we shall call another
General Assembly, which we purpose to do as soon as our affairs will
permit. And we do intend to send for Mr Robert Douglas, and some other
ministers, that we may speak with them in what may further concern the
affairs of that church. And as we are very well satisfied with your
resolution not to meddle without your sphere, so we do expect that
church judicatories in Scotland and ministers there will keep within the
compass of their station, meddling only with matters ecclesiastick, and
promoting our authority and interest with our subjects against all
opposers: and that they will take special notice of such who, by
preaching, or private conventicles, or any other way, transgress the
limits of their calling by endeavouring to corrupt the people, or sow
seeds of disaffection to us or our government. This you shall make known
to the several presbyteries within that our kingdom. And as we do give
assurance of our favour and encouragement to you, and to all honest,
deserving ministers there, so we earnestly recommend it to you that you
be earnest in your prayers, publick and private, to Almighty God, who is
our Rock and our Deliverer, both for us and for our government, that we
may have fresh and constant supplies of his grace, and the right
improvement of all his mercies and deliverances to the honour of his
great name, and the peace, safety, and benefit of all our kingdoms; and
so we bid you heartily farewell.”
Footnote 7:
The acts of these Assemblies were almost entirely levelled against the
remonstrators.
Delighted with this most gracious epistle, the Edinburgh presbytery
printed and caused it to be transmitted to all the presbyteries in
Scotland, praised it from their pulpits, and procured a silver box to
preserve the precious original. It was not to be supposed that, under
language so explicitly guaranteeing the government of the church of
Scotland, as settled by law, that, by any lurking inuendo, Episcopacy
could be meant, the resolutioners therefore considered the day as their
own, and, with premature speed, hasted to chant their victory. They
warmly thanked his majesty for his letter, which they told him in their
address they had received upon a day formerly devoted by them to
mourning, September 3,[8] which had revived their spirits, and excited
them to bless the Lord who had put such a purpose in his royal heart to
preserve and protect the government of the church without violation; nor
was the “choice of such an able and faithful person,” as Lauderdale,
“for the weighty employment of secretary less an object of gratulation!”
But while we look back with pity upon the speedy dissipation of all the
good men’s hopes and anticipations, it is impossible not to feel that
they in some measure merited them for the facility with which they
allowed themselves to become the dupes and the tools, in persecuting
their own brethren, of these very men by whom they themselves were
afterwards persecuted.
Footnote 8:
The anniversary of the battles of Dunbar and Worcester—an ominous
coincidence as it turned out. Another was remarked at the time. “It
was a sad observation, that that very day of the month being the 23d
of August, on which the protesters were apprehended, was the very same
day whereon 100 years before the popish religion had been abolished,
and the true religion established in parliament; and some feared this
might be the turning of the tide backwards.” _Kirkton_, p. 73.
Sharpe, whose composition the letter was, followed out his plan of
dividing the ministers. He was well aware that the remonstrators were
the most acute and least liable to be imposed upon of the Presbyterians;
he knew also that they suspected him, and he hated them; he therefore,
by an insinuation in it, pointed them out as persons who, under specious
pretences, had swerved from their duty during the usurpation; and the
church judicatories hastened to inflict punishment upon them for this
indefinite crime—“Our synods after this,” says Kirkton, “doing little
other thing than censuring and laying aside those of that way. And
though the preceding harvest before the king’s return all the synods of
Scotland hade agreed to bury by-past differences, yet, upon the receipt
of this blessed letter, the old wounds opened; and wherever the public
resolution-men were the plurality, the protesters were censured upon the
burried differences. In the synod of Merse, they laid aside five
ministers; in Lothian, many were laid aside both in Lithgow and Biggar
presbyteries; so it was in Perth and in the north: and the truth is, had
not the course of synods been interrupted by the introduction of
bishops, few had keeped their places who were afterwards ejected by that
infamous proclamation at Glasgow in the year 1662.”
Nor was the committee idle; Mr Patrick Gillespie, principal of Glasgow
College, was brought prisoner to Edinburgh Castle, and Mr Robert Row,
minister of Abercorn, and W. Wiseheart of Kinniel, were confined to
their chambers in the town. Having forbid any meetings for petitioning,
they proceeded to display their antipathy to those principles of
freedom, for which their fathers had contended, by emitting a
proclamation against Rutherford’s Lex Rex—a work which was held in high
estimation by the covenanters, as it advocated the cause of liberty and
the legitimate limitations on power, with an energy and clearness the
enemies of freedom could not bear; and another work, supposed to be
written by Mr James Guthrie, entitled “The Causes of God’s Wrath against
Scotland,” which enumerated the sins of the land, princes, priests, and
people, with a faithfulness that was intolerable. They declared these
two books to be full of seditious and treasonable matter, animating his
majesty’s good subjects to rise up in rebellion against their lawful
prince and sovereign, and poisoning their hearts with many seditious and
rebellious principles, prejudicial to his royal person and authority,
and to the peace of the kingdom. All, therefore, possessed of copies of
the obnoxious publications were required to deliver them up to the
king’s solicitor within a certain time, under pain of being considered
enemies to his majesty’s authority, and liable to be punished
accordingly. They were both burnt at the cross—a favourite, if not a
very convincing, mode of answering such like productions. With revolting
meanness, they at the same time caused the inscriptions to be effaced
from the tombs of Alexander Henderson in Edinburgh, and George Gillespie
at Kirkaldy—men who needed not the frail remembrance of a monumental
stone to make their memories live in the recollection of their country,
and whose services have more lasting record than a graving-iron could
bestow.
Some few days after, they made a still more explicit disclosure of their
aversion to the “good old cause”—a sneering form of expression become
fashionable among the courtiers—by another proclamation directed against
the remonstrants and their adherents, not only forbidding meetings for
consultation, which were still legal, but likewise any adverting, in
their sermons or otherwise, to the state of the church, or the danger to
be apprehended from the introduction of the exploded and hated
prelatical offices and forms; and, as they knew the effect of popular
preaching, they appear to have been most anxious at once to suppress all
pulpit opposition to the course they were about to pursue.
Of the watchmen upon the Scottish Zion, the remonstrants had been the
most wakeful and most jealous of encroachments upon the established
covenanted constitution of the church and state, and the committee were
assured, that when they apprehended danger, they would not be silent;
they therefore expressly commanded that none, in sermons, preachings,
declamations, or speeches, should presume to reflect on the conduct of
his majesty or his progenitors, misconstrue his proceedings, or meddle
in his affairs or estate, present, bygone, or in time coming, under the
highest penalties; and if any who heard what could be construed into
slander against the king did not reveal it, they were to be liable to
the same punishment as principals. This proclamation, the anti-type of
so many furious attacks upon the liberty of the lieges, was calculated
to ensnare those who, being accustomed openly to speak their sentiments,
were not prepared at once to renounce all mention of public affairs in
common conversation or public discourses, whether ministers, elders, or
private gentlemen; and numbers of each description were immediately made
to feel its oppressive weight.
Had a free election been allowed, notwithstanding the loyal phrenzy of
many, and the hypocritical pretensions of more, there might some
troublesome members have procured admission to the estates; but those
whose influence and opposition were most dreaded, being by this
proclamation placed in very delicate circumstances—as evidence of
unguarded expressions might easily have been procured—were happy to
escape censure, and did not stand forward at the only time when they
could have done so with some probability of success, in support of the
constitution, freedom, and religion of their country. The committee,
however, did not rest here: with the most unblushing effrontery,
although conscious themselves of having to a man complied with the
English, they hung out a threat of prosecution for this common and
inevitable fault, which damped all who seemed inclined to assert the
independence of a Scottish parliament, or the privileges they had
obtained from the crown during the late struggle.[9]
Footnote 9:
Of the nature of these prosecutions, the reader may form some idea
from the following:—“Mr James Nasmyth, minister of the gospel at
Hamilton, was sisted before the committee for words alleged to have
been spoken by him many years ago. About the year 1650, when Lambert
was in the church, it was alleged he pressed his hearers to employ
their power for God, and not in opposition to the gospel, otherwise
they might expect to be brought down by the judgement of God as those
who went before were!” _Wodrow_, vol. i. p. 12.
Besides to pinion the country gentlemen more effectually, they tendered
a bond to all of whom they were suspicious, which they obliged them to
sign, with a sufficient cautioner, each binding themselves—besides
disowning the remonstrance—that they should not in any way or manner,
directly or indirectly, plot, contrive, speak, or do any thing tending,
or what might tend, to the hurt, prejudice, or derogation of his
majesty’s royal person or any of that royal family—that they should not
do any thing, directly or indirectly, tending, or that might tend, to
the breach or disturbance of the public peace, nor connive or concur
with any person whatsoever who should contrive any such thing; but, to
the utmost of their power, stop and let any such plot and doing, and
appear personally before the committee, sub-committee, or parliament,
upon a lawful citation; and, in case of failure, the parties bound
themselves to pay a high fine, besides whatever other punishment might
be inflicted.
For a justification of proceedings so unwarrantable, we must look to the
sequel; it was not because the parties accused were inimical either to
kingly government or to the person or right of Charles, but because the
plan was already formed for sweeping from the face of the country, had
it been possible, whatever was lovely or of good report—whatever in the
institutions of the state or the polity of the church was calculated to
present any obstruction to the tide of obscene licentiousness and
faithless despotism that was now fast flowing upon them. Their stretches
of power against the liberties of the country, do not, however, seem to
have occasioned any remonstrance; and the synod of Lothian was amused
with a proclamation for calling a General Assembly, which Mr William
Sharpe had submitted for their amendment; but the last acts of the
committee, levying a cess, excited some remark as to the legality of the
tax or their power to exact it.
On the 1st of November, a proclamation announced the meeting of
parliament; and the same day another, that the king had committed to
them the consideration and judging of the conduct of all his subjects
during the late troubles, from whom alone he would receive any
applications, and promising, after his honour and ancient royal
prerogative were vindicated, he would grant a free, full pardon and
indemnity—a promise which, although conveyed in very specious language,
and accompanied by an assurance that there was nothing his royal bosom
was more desirous of than that his people should be blessed with
abundance of happiness, peace, and plenty, was received with suspicion,
and, like almost all the other acts of grace, afforded little relief to
the unfortunate, while it secured the persons and plunder of those who
had pillaged and oppressed them.
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