or frequently than the schoolmaster. A flood of light is thrown upon his
condition by such extracts as these:--"February 1, 1618.--The session
ordainis that Mr James Macqueine, schoolmaister, sal have of everie
baptisme 40d., and for everie mariadge half ane merk--viz., for ye
proclamation 40d. and of ye mariadge 40d.--for his better help." "March
8.--Ordainis ye wemenis penalties that commits fornication to be given to
Mr James Macqueine, schoolmaister." "August 1, 1619.--Given to Maister
James Macqueine, schoolmaister, 4s., seing thar was verie few bairnis at
the school." "August 29.--The qlk day given to Maister James Macqueine,
schoolmaister, 24s., and 10s., being Cristen Stories penaltie, according
to contract maid with him." "September 26.--Given to Maister James
Macqueine, 25s., in regaird of his povertie, and in respect he was to go
hame to ye Northe; in respect, also, of his reading in the kirk." "October
17.--The quilk day Mr James Macqueine, schoolmaister, desyrit earnestlie
some support, that he micht pass to ye Northe, seing thair was few or na
bairns at the schoole. The session heirwith advysit. Ordainis thre lib. to
be given to him."
"Maister James Macqueine's" successor suffered still more acutely from the
eternal lack of pence. "October 22, 1620.--Given to George Davidsone,
scholm{r.}, for reiding and singing in the kirk, at his request, 40s."
"November 19.--Lent to Mr George Davidsone, scholm{r.}, out of the box,
18s." "July 15, 1621.--The said day George Foster his penaltie given to
George Davidsone, schoolmaister and reiddar, becaus of his povertie."
"September 16.--George Davidsone, schoolmaister, earnestlie desyrit somqt
for his support out of the penalties, seing he had few bairnis in the
school. Given to him 20s." "October 7.--Given to George Davidson 20s. of
Thomas Greivis penaltie, the uther twentie given befor in respect of his
reiding and singing in the kirk, he being verie puir, having ane familie."
Soon the minister addresses plaintive appeals to the church in behalf of
the said schoolmaster, and at last the climax comes. "December 1,
1622.--The minister earnestlie desyrit the elderis to have ane cair of
George Davidsone, schoolmaister, now in great distress, being somqt
distract in his witt, and desyrit that George Shortus, officer, wald cause
some ane waik ilka nicht with him, and that the minister and he wald go
from hous to hous for his support. The elderis promeisit to help, and to
caus utheris to help." "December 8.--The minister desyrit bothe the
elderis themselfs to help George Davidsone, and to caus utheris, he being
almost now weill againe, seing he wald go over to Fyff againe. They
promeisit to do the same. Maister Johne (the minister) reportit that he
hyrit ane man on his owin expenss to go to Fyff for his father and brother
to come to him--viz., Patrick Watson--and that he gave him 20s., and that
his father has now come." "December 15.--The minister desyrit the elderis
to help George Davidsone, being now well, praised be God! Given be the
minister and elderis out of their purss, 45s." The schoolmaster's
departure is, however, delayed, for in the following year, 1623, his name
appears again. "March 9.--Given to George Davidson, 20 lib." "November
23.--This day collect at the kirk doore, for George Davidsone, being to
depairt, 50s. 8d."
Assistance to cripples constituted a repeated charge on the church funds.
"May 28, 1615.--Collect 4s., qlk was given to ane crepill." "Mairch 31,
1616.--Given to the belman for carrying ane puir cripple man off the
toune, 6 lib." "June 21, 1618.--Given to Jhone Finla 3s. for carrying away
ane crepill." "February 11, 1638.--Given to Alexander Storie, wricht, for
ane pair of stelts to Henrie Caning, crepill, 4s." "September 23.--Four
shillings given to carray away a crepill. We could get nane in the toune
to carray away this crepill the morn, becaus of their business."
Payments for medical help were also frequently made. "May 28,
1615.--Gathered at the kirk door to give ane physician--viz., George
Adamson, in Dunbar--for curing Agnes Tailzeour, in Peffersyd, 40s., qrof
28s. given to the pottingar, and the rest to the said Agnes Tailzeour,
dauchter to Marion Peacock, in Peffersyde." "Januarii 3, 1641.--Given to
Agnes Richisone (hir bairne being still vehementlie diseast, and hir
husband at the camp), 20s. to buy cures." "Januarii 7, 1644.--Ane merk to
Elspethe Duns sonne, lyklie to be crepill. 20 shillings given to his
mother, to be given to the man wha promeised to do diligence to cure the
said; to be given for drogis." "July 20, 1645.--Given to Robert Ewart, in
Tyninghame, for curing James Brown, his leg, 3 lib. 4s. 4d." All this
links the church finance of the Scotland of that day with that of the
early Christians, for in the _Apologia_ of Justin Martyr and of Tertullus
we read that the early Christians contributed or collected, on the first
day of the week, money for widows, orphans, and others in distress, and
particularly for the relatives of poor slaves condemned to work in the
mines.
From the Kirk also was drawn much money that eventually found its way into
the pockets of the sea-robbers of the Mediterranean. The collections made
at the church door largely supplied the amounts necessary for effecting
the ransom of those luckless sailors who fell into the clutches of the
pirates. Hence we find:--"May 11, 1617.--Intimation maid to ye peple out
of pulpite to provyde something againe ye nixt Sabbothe according to thair
powar, for the relieving of Jhone Mure, in Dunbar, and some utheris, wha
was takin be ye Turkis on the sea, and deteinit be them in prison, seing
thair was ane collection to be maid throughout all ye kirks in the qtrie
to this effect." "May 18.--Collect at ye kirk doore for relief of them
that wer takin be ye Turkis, 5 lib. 18s. 4d.; the speciallis, or richest
of ye peple, being absent, quhas portionis were also to be socht fra
them;" and "May 7, 1620.--Collect at the kirk doore for the Scottishmen
lying in Algiers, taken by the Turkis, 3 lb. 17s. 4d."
Again and again we find in the pages of the Kirk Session Records
reflections of the history of the time. Thus on December 5, 1641,
"Intimation maid of collect the nixt Lord's day for ane pure honest woman,
spous to umquhile James Freeman. He was slain in Ireland, and quarteret,
as is allegit, for mainteining the Scottis Covenant." On February 29,
1622, "Earnest exhortations maid to the pepill anent ye contributions to
the Kirk of God in France. Collect this day efter the sermon threttie
pund, 8s. 2d.;" and on March 3, "Qtribut this day at ye kirk door to the
Kirk of France 3 punds, 11s. 10d." On August 28, 1646, a collection was
made in the parish church of Auchterhouse for the people of Cullen, who
had suffered much from the burning of their town by the Marquis of
Montrose on his march northward; and in 1746 the Falkirk beadle begged
the Kirk Session to lend him five shillings because of harsh treatment he
had endured at the hands of Prince Charlie's soldiers on their retreat
from England.
Among the miscellanea of church finance as concerning expenditure the
following should, undoubtedly, have place. The stool of
repentance--imposing and certainly not cheap--deserves some prominence.
"Given to Andrew Stone, wricht, 22s., and 2s. to his man, for mending and
repairing the stoole of repentance;" and "David Nimmo, wricht in Lintoun,
compeirit, and desyrit payment for making and repairing the stoole for
repentance. The minister and elders herewith advysit; deliverit to him,
out of the box, aucht pounds, and sax shillings to his sonne, and twentie
s. to James Paterson, mason," are two suggestive items. Alexander Sherrie
receives six shillings on April 19, 1635, "to buy poudder with to shett
the dowes in the kirk, becaus they filet the seitts." At Cullen Parish
Church, in the session records for 1703, the treasurer writes:--"For a
calf's skinn to be a cover to ye Kirke bible, 7s. For dressing ye skinn
bought to cover ye Kirke bible, and alm'd leither to fasten ye cover to ye
brods, and for sowing thereof, 10s. For keepers to ye clasps, brass nails
putting on ye stoods, and gluing loose leaves, 14s." Dr Russell, writing
in his "Reminiscences of Yarrow," about his father's pastorate in the Vale
of Ettrick, says, "At the first Martinmas of my father's incumbency, Robin
(Robert Hogg, the father of the Ettrick Shepherd) came to him and said,
'Sir, Mr Potts (the predecessor of Dr Russell's father) used always to
allow me five shillings of the collections in the kirk at this time, for
gathering the bawbees, in order to buy a pair of shoon!' But to his
disappointment, my father replied that he could not take it on him to make
this application of the public money." The beadle, however, sometimes got
the price of a pair of shoes; and in one book, in 1615, we have "_Nota_ (a
word scarcely ever used) That in all the gatherings for the poor there is
the price of ane pint of ale, that collect which is set doun in the
session-books, because of the pains which the clerk of the kirkmen taks in
going thrice aboot the toune, and ance efternoon. This custom of giving
sae mickle to the beadle has been ust of ald in this parish."
In February, 1733, a certain Jean Hall, a pauper in the parish of
Morebattle, dies, and on the 16th of the month James Robson, in Kirk
Yetholm, receives L3, 14s. 3d. for "cheese, tobacco, and pipes" provided
at the funeral. "The digging of the grave, the crying of deceased's
effects at the roup, and the ringing of the 'passing-bell' are all
provided for by the treasurer, out of his continually replenishing and
inexhaustible kirk-box." At one time thirty shillings is given for a
winding sheet for a "dead corpse" which came in on the sands of Aldhame,
and, at another, twenty-five shillings is given for one for a man "quha
came in Peffersand and was buryed the last week." Sometimes twelve
shillings is given to a man for reading and singing at the communion, and,
occasionally, as much as twenty pounds is given to buy a horse, "seing he
had ane horse deid latly, and fallen abak in meins;" or there is given out
of the penalties to Alexander Sherrie, "for mending and translating the
pulpitt, ane dollar." (In the writer's article, "Witchcraft and the Kirk,"
in the present volume, reference is made to expenditure occasioned by the
imprisonment and execution of witches.)
Help is given to Dundee for a new harbour, to North Esk for a bridge, and
to Glasgow because of a disastrous fire. Even "a collection for the
Northern Infirmity" is mentioned, but this is an obvious reference to the
Northern Infirmary.
One closing quotation must suffice:--"May 2.--The minister also shew to
the elderis that the bishop, at the last Provinciall Assemblie, haldin at
Edinburghe, the twentie of April 1619, ordainis everie minister to bring
ye contribution for ye students of ye new colledge in Saint Androis, and
everie minister to give it to ye moderator of the presbiterie quhair he
dwellis, that it micht be sent to Saint Androis. The minister shew to ye
elderis that ye kirk of Tyninghame was ordainit to pay thre lib. yerlie.
The elderis wer unwilling to grant thairto. The minister shew them that
everie kirk was appointit to pay, and that he wald give 20s. out of his
awin purse to that effect, seing thair was little in the box, and many
puir in the parishe. They grantit thairto, bot with some regraits." "May
9.--The said day takin out of the box 34s., and 6s. of Jhone Walker's
penaltie; and Maister Jhone (the minister) gave 20s. out of his awin purse
to make out thre lib. to be given for ye qtribution to ye studentis in the
new colledge at St. Androis." This is but one among many contributions
made by the minister to fulfil obligations resting on the kirk.
Witchcraft and the Kirk.
BY THE REV. R. WILKINS REES.
For centuries belief in witchcraft was an article of faith with dour and
brooding Scots. The Scot was made by Scotland; the country stamped an
indelible impress on every characteristic of its inhabitants. With much
truth it has been said, "From the cradle to the grave the Scotch peasant
went his way attended by the phantoms of this mysterious world; always
recognising its warnings, always seeing the shadows which it cast of
coming events, and so burdening himself with a weight of grim and eery
superstition, that we marvel he did not stumble and grow faint, seeing
that his dreary Calvinistic creed could have brought him little hope or
comfort. Nay, it is a question whether his superstition did not partly
grow out of, or was fostered by, his hard, cold religion. Superstition is
the shadow of Religion, and from the shadow we may infer the nature of the
substance or object that casts it."
There are traditions concerning witchcraft, even earlier than that of the
fourth century which credits his Satanic Majesty with such a hatred of St.
Patrick's sterling piety that he roused the whole tribe of witches against
him. St. Patrick fled from the determined assault, and finding, near the
mouth of the Clyde, a boat, set off in haste for Ireland. But running
water being ever an insuperable barrier in the path of a witch's progress,
these emissaries of Satan tore up a huge rock and hurled it after the
departing saint. With the proverbial inaccuracy of feminine aim they
missed their mark, but the mass itself ultimately became the fortress of
Dumbarton. In those early days the marvels of witchcraft were great and
many--Holinshed, among others, has chronicled the same--and, at the close
of the seventh century, King Kenneth, fearful of his own safety and the
stability of his throne, decreed that jugglers, wizards, necromancers, and
such as call up spirits, "and use to seek upon them for helpe, let them be
burnt to death."
That persons accused of witchcraft suffered death is unquestionably true,
as in the cases of the Earl of Mar in 1479, and Lady Janet Douglas in
1537, the executions of whom are foul blots on the pages of history. But
it can hardly be said that it was witchcraft as an offence against
religion or as mere superstition that was so punished. It was rather
witchcraft in its political bearings--generally, in fact, as connected
with treason and not with sorcery--that received condemnation.
But with the advent of Calvinism--the natural turn of the Scottish nation
for metaphysical discussion induced them to receive the doctrines of the
Reformation with general interest and favour--it would seem that the
"crime" of witchcraft was looked upon in a somewhat different light. In
1563 the Scottish Parliament by statute, for which John Knox was a chief
agitator, formally constituted witchcraft and dealing with witches a
capital offence. "That all who used witchcraft, sorcery, necromancy, or
pretended skill therein, and all consulters of witches and sorcerers,
should be punished capitally" (Erskine's "Institutes," p. 706). And
henceforth the irreligion of witchcraft caused it to be regarded as an
offence against the law of the country, and the Kirk and its connections
played an important part in the stern measures adopted for its
suppression, doing their work with resolute determination and fanatical
zeal. The authority of the ministry was great; its influence
preponderated. Its friends were the allies, its opponents the enemies, of
heaven. The theocracy which the clergy asserted on behalf of the Kirk was
not so distinctly understood, or so prudently regulated, but that its
administrators too often interfered with the civil rule. Old Mellvin's
words were suggestive of much when, grasping King James the Sixth's
sleeve, he told him that in Scotland there were two kingdoms--that in
which he was acknowledged monarch, and that in which kings and nobles were
but God's silly vassals; and the clergy were but too apt to assert the
superiority of the latter, which was visibly governed by the assembly of
the Kirk in the name of their unseen and omnipotent Head. To disobey the
king might be high treason, but to disobey the kirk, acting in the name of
the Deity, was a yet deeper crime, and was to be feared as incurring the
wrath which is fatal both to body and soul. With severity the Presbyterian
teachers inflicted church penances, and with rigour they assumed dominion
over the laity in all cases in which religion could be possibly alleged
as a motive or pretext, that is to say, in almost all cases whatever.
Led by their clergy, and believing fully as they did in the literal
interpretation of all Biblical imagery and the personal appearances of the
devil, the people of Scotland waged a fierce unresting war against a great
number of ill-fated individuals, whose only ground for being attacked was
some physical or mental peculiarity, or who suffered simply because of the
malice or ignorance of their accusers. At one time, stupid justices,
instigated by foolish clergymen, consigned to torture and the stake almost
every old woman dragged before them, even though brought only by the spite
of malicious neighbours. In his preface to the _Bibliotheque de Carabas_
edition of Robert Kirk's "Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns, and
Fairies," Mr Andrew Lang says: "Some of the witches who suffered at
Presbyterian hands were merely narrators of popular tales about the state
of the dead. That she trafficked with the dead, and from a ghost won a
medical recipe for the cure of Archbishop Adamson of St. Andrews, was the
charge against Alison Pearson.... 'She was execut in Edinbruche for a
witch.'" On several occasions, commissions were issued by King James for
the purpose of "haulding Justice Courtis on Witches and Sorceraris." The
commissioners gave warrants in their turn to the minister and elders of
each parish in the shire to examine suspected parties and to frame an
indictment against them. And as a rule the accused were overwhelmed by a
huge heap of rumoured or concocted evidence, composed of exaggeration,
prejudice, and credulity, wellnigh incredible. Even Sir George Mackenzie,
Lord Advocate of Scotland during the time of the greatest fury, admitted
the indiscretion of ministerial zeal, and recommended that the wisest
ministers should be chosen, and that those selected should proceed with
caution. "I own," says the Rev. John Bell, Minister of the Gospel at
Gladsmuir, in his MS., "Discourse of Witchcraft," 1705, "there has been
much harm done to worthy and innocent persons in the common way of finding
out witches, and in the means made use of for promoting the discovery of
such wretches, and bringing them to justice; that oftentimes old age,
poverty, features, and ill fame, with such like grounds, not worthy to be
represented to a magistrate, have yet moved many to suspect and defame
their neighbours, to the unspeakable prejudice of Christian charity; a
late instance whereof we had in the west, in the business of the sorceries
exercised upon the Laird of Bargarran's daughter, anno 1697, a time when
persons of more goodness and esteem than most of their calumniators were
defamed for witches, and which was occasioned mostly by the forwardness
and absurd credulity of diverse otherwise worthy ministers of the gospel,
and some topping professors in and about the city of Glasgow."
In the last forty years of the sixteenth century, we have the astounding
aggregate of no less than eight thousand persons who suffered, almost
invariably by burning, for witchcraft. For about the first decade, not
more, perhaps, than forty were so punished in a year, but towards the
close of the period alluded to, the annual death-roll probably reached
five hundred. The total number of victims, strange to say, represented
even a larger proportion than those of the Holy Office, during a
corresponding space of time. That during one period the Kirk should have
been more disposed to kindle the pile than was the Inquisition, is,
without doubt, a startling fact.
For a time, at any rate, the population seemed divided into only two great
classes, witches and witchfinders. The dark tales of witchcraft were not
even relieved by fairy folk-lore. There was, perhaps, no little truth in
what Cleland said in his "Effigies Clericorum," when he attributed the
disappearance of Scottish fairies to the Reformation. In writing of
Parnassus, he proceeds:--
"There's als much virtue, sense, and pith,
In Annan, or the Water of Nith,
Which quietly slips by Dumfries,
Als any water in all Greece.
For there, and several other places,
About mill-dams, and green brae faces,
Both Elrich elfs and brownies stayed,
And green-gown'd fairies daunc'd and played:
When old John Knox, and other some,
Began to plott the Haggs of Rome;
Then suddenly took to their heels,
And did no more frequent these fields;
But if Rome's pipes perhaps they hear,
Sure, for their interest they'll compear
Again, and play their old hell's tricks."
As far as fairydom survived, however, it was regarded as under the same
guilt as witchcraft.
The harsh forbidding creed of the Kirk had its influence in every
direction; and music, instrumental at any rate, fell under its ban.
During the sway of the Covenant, indeed, the Scottish minstrels were
popularly supposed to be under the special care and protection of the
devil. The Reverend Robert Kirk, author of the "Secret Commonwealth,"
attributed certain impressions produced by music to diabolical influence.
"Irishmen," says he, "our northern Scottish, and our Athole men are so
much addicted to, and delighted with harps and musick, as if, like King
Saul, they were possessed with a forrein sport; only with this difference,
that musick did put Saul's play-fellow asleep, but roused and awaked our
men, vanquishing their own spirits at pleasure as if they were impotent of
its powers, and unable to command it; for wee have seen some poor beggars
of them chattering their teeth for cold, that how soon they saw the fire,
and heard the harp, leap thorow the house like goats and satyrs." Without
enlarging on the subject, may we not conclude that such an estimate of
instrumental music as became common, especially in Covenanting days, had
much to do with the prolonged antipathy of the Kirk to its introduction in
worship?
But the Presbyterians went even further than this. At one time they
declared that the bishops were cloven-footed and had no shadows, and that
the curates themselves were, many of them, little better than wizards. The
Episcopalians seem to have been regarded by the Presbyterians with little
more favour than the Red Indians were by the early Puritan settlers in
America. The extraordinary story of Salem witchcraft shows us that the
Puritan clergy assured their people that the Red Indians were worshippers
and agents of Satan; and we can but faintly imagine the effect of this
belief on the minds and tempers of those who were thinking of the Indians
at every turn of daily life. The common people, always susceptible to
exaggeration, had been preached into such a holy hatred of popery that
they saw its type and shadow in everything which approached even to
decency in worship; so that, as a satirist expressed it, they thought it
impossible they could ever lose their way to heaven, provided they left
Rome behind them.
On the other hand, John Knox was deemed a skilful wizard by the Catholics
in Scotland; it was even said that in the churchyard of St. Andrews he
raised Satan himself, wearing a huge pair of horns on his head, at which
blood-curdling sight Knox's secretary became insane and died. And in old
Kirkton's "Secret and True History," in his picturesque account of the
curious scene which was witnessed in Lithgow upon the anniversary of the
King's restoration, we see that the Episcopal party lost no favourable
opportunity of turning the tables on their opponents. In the pageant they
had an arch, in the midst of which was a litany:
"'From Covenants with uplifted hands,
From Remonstrators with associate bands,
From such Committees as govern'd this nation,
From Church Commissioners and their protestation,
Good Lord deliver us.'