Instead of being directed to offer up their adorations to one God,
the people were taught to divide them among an innumerable company
of inferior divinities. A plurality of mediators shared the honour
of procuring the divine favour with the “One Mediator between God and
man;” and more petitions were presented to the Virgin Mary and other
saints, than to “Him whom the Father heareth always.” The sacrifice
of the mass was represented as procuring forgiveness of sins to the
living and the dead, to the infinite disparagement of the sacrifice by
which Jesus Christ expiated sin and procured everlasting redemption;
and the consciences of men were withdrawn from faith in the merits of
their Saviour, to a delusive reliance upon priestly {22} absolutions,
papal pardons, and voluntary penances. Instead of being instructed to
demonstrate the sincerity of their faith and repentance, by forsaking
their sins, and to testify their love to God and man, by practising
the duties of morality, and observing the ordinances of worship
authorized by scripture, they were taught, that, if they regularly
said their _aves_ and _credos_, confessed themselves to a priest,
punctually paid their tithes and church‑offerings, purchased a mass,
went in pilgrimage to the shrine of some celebrated saint, refrained
from flesh on Fridays, or performed some other prescribed act of
bodily mortification, their salvation was infallibly secured in due
time: while those who were so rich and so pious as to build a chapel
or an altar, and to endow it for the support of a priest, to perform
masses, obits, and diriges, procured a relaxation of the pains of
purgatory for themselves or their relations, in proportion to the
extent of their liberality. It is difficult for us to conceive how
empty, ridiculous, and wretched, those harangues were which the
monks delivered for sermons. Legendary tales concerning the founder
of some religious order, his wonderful sanctity, the miracles which
he performed, his combats with the devil, his watchings, fastings,
flagellations; the virtues of holy water, chrism, crossing, and
exorcism; the horrors of purgatory, and the numbers released from it
by the intercession of some powerful saint; these, with low jests,
table‑talk, and fireside scandal, formed the favourite topics of the
preachers, and were {23} served up to the people instead of the pure,
salutary, and sublime doctrines of the Bible.[35]
The beds of the dying were besieged, and their last moments disturbed,
by avaricious priests, who laboured to extort bequests to themselves
or to the church. Not satisfied with exacting tithes from the living,
a demand was made upon the dead; no sooner had a poor husbandman
breathed his last, than the rapacious vicar came and carried off
his corpse‑present, which he repeated as often as death visited the
family.[36] Ecclesiastical censures were fulminated against those
who were reluctant in making these payments, or who showed themselves
disobedient to the clergy; and, for a little money, they were
prostituted on the most trifling occasions.[37] Divine service was
neglected; and, except on festival days, the churches, in many parts
of the country, were no longer employed for sacred purposes, but
served as sanctuaries for malefactors, places of traffic, or resorts
for pastime.[38]
Persecution, and the suppression of free inquiry, were the only
weapons by which its interested supporters were able to defend this
system of corruption and imposture. Every avenue by which truth
might enter was carefully guarded. Learning was branded as the parent
of heresy. The most frightful pictures were drawn of those who had
separated from the {24} Romish church, and held up before the eyes of
the people, to deter them from imitating their example. If any person,
who had attained a degree of illumination amidst the general darkness,
began to hint dissatisfaction with the conduct of churchmen, and to
propose the correction of abuses, he was immediately stigmatized as a
heretic, and, if he did not secure his safety by flight, was immured
in a dungeon, or committed to the flames. And when at last, in spite
of all their precautions, the light which was shining around did break
in and spread through the nation, the clergy prepared to adopt the
most desperate and bloody measures for its extinction.
From this imperfect sketch of the state of religion in this country,
we may see how false the representation is which some persons would
impose on us; as if popery were a system, erroneous, indeed, but
purely speculative, superstitious but harmless, provided it had not
been accidentally accompanied with intolerance and cruelty. The very
reverse is the truth. It may be safely said, that there is not one of
its erroneous tenets, or of its superstitious practices, which was not
either originally contrived, or afterwards accommodated, to advance
and support some practical abuse; to aggrandize the ecclesiastical
order, secure to them immunity from civil jurisdiction, sanctify their
encroachments upon secular authorities, vindicate their usurpations
upon the consciences of men, cherish implicit obedience to the
decisions of the church, and extinguish free inquiry and liberal
science.
It was a system not more repugnant to the religion {25} of the
Bible, than incompatible with the legitimate rights of princes,
and the independence, liberty, and prosperity of kingdoms; not more
destructive to the souls of men, than to domestic and social happiness,
and the principles of sound morality. Considerations from every
quarter combined in calling aloud for a radical and complete reform.
The exertions of every description of persons, of the man of letters,
the patriot, the prince, as well as the Christian, each acting in his
own sphere for his own interests, with the joint concurrence of all as
in a common cause, were urgently required for extirpating abuses, of
which all had reason to complain, and for effectuating a revolution,
in the advantages of which all would participate. There was, however,
no reasonable prospect of accomplishing this, without exposing, in
the first place, the falsehood of those notions which have been called
speculative. It was principally by means of these that superstition
had established its empire over the minds of men; behind them
the Romish ecclesiastics had intrenched themselves, and defended
their usurped prerogatives and possessions; and had any prince or
legislature endeavoured to deprive them of these, while the great body
of the people remained unenlightened, it would soon have been found
that the attempt was premature in itself, and replete with danger to
those by whom it was made. To the revival of the primitive doctrines
and institutions of Christianity, by the preaching and writings of
the reformers, and to those controversies by which the popish errors
were confuted from scripture, (for {26} which many modern philosophers
seem to have a thorough contempt,) we are chiefly indebted for the
overthrow of superstition, ignorance, and despotism; and, in fact, all
the blessings, political and religious, which we enjoy, may be traced
to the Reformation from popery.
How grateful should we be to divine providence for this happy
revolution! For those persons do but “sport with their own
imaginations,” who flatter themselves that it must have taken
place in the ordinary course of human affairs, and overlook the
many convincing proofs of the superintending direction of superior
wisdom in the whole combination of circumstances which contributed
to bring about the Reformation in this country, as well as throughout
Europe. How much are we indebted to those men, who, under God, were
the instruments in effecting it, men who cheerfully hazarded their
lives to achieve a design which involved the felicity of millions
unborn; who boldly attacked the system of error and corruption, though
fortified by popular credulity, by custom, and by laws, fenced with
the most dreadful penalties; and who, having forced the stronghold of
superstition, and penetrated the recesses of its temple, tore aside
the veil that concealed the monstrous idol which the world had so long
ignorantly worshipped, dissolved the spell by which the human mind
was bound, and restored it to liberty! How criminal must those be, who,
sitting at ease under the vines and fig‑trees, planted by the labours
and watered with the blood of these patriots, discover their disesteem
of the invaluable {27} privileges which they inherit, or their
ignorance of the expense at which they were purchased, by the most
unworthy treatment of those to whom they owe them――misrepresent their
actions, calumniate their motives, and load their memories with every
species of abuse![39]
The reformed doctrine had made considerable progress in Scotland
before it was embraced by Knox. Patrick Hamilton, a youth of royal
lineage,[40] obtained {28} the honour, not conferred upon many of his
rank of first announcing its glad tidings to his countrymen, and of
sealing them with his blood. He was born in the year 1504; and being
designed for the church by his relations, the abbacy of Ferne was
conferred upon him in his childhood, according to a ridiculous custom
which prevailed at that period. But, as early as the year 1526, and
previous to the breach of Henry VIII. with the Romish see, a gleam
of light was, by some unknown means,[41] imparted to his mind, amidst
the darkness which brooded around him. His recommendations of ancient
literature, at the expense of the philosophy which was then taught in
the schools, and the free language which he used in speaking of the
corruptions of the church, had already drawn upon him the suspicions
of the clergy, when he resolved to leave Scotland, and to improve his
mind by travelling on the continent. He set out with three attendants,
and, attracted by the fame of Luther, repaired to Wittemberg.
Luther and Melanchthon were highly pleased with his zeal; and, after
retaining him a short time with them, they recommended him to the
university of Marburg. This university was newly erected by that
enlightened prince, Philip, landgrave of Hesse, who had placed at its
head the {29} learned and pious Francis Lambert of Avignon. Lambert,
who had left his native country, and sacrificed a lucrative situation,
from love to the reformed religion, conceived a strong attachment to
the young Scotsman, who imbibed his instructions with extraordinary
avidity. While he was daily advancing in acquaintance with the
scriptures, Hamilton was seized with an unconquerable desire of
imparting to his countrymen the knowledge which he had acquired. In
vain did Lambert represent to him the dangers to which he would be
exposed; his determination was fixed; and, taking along with him a
single attendant, he left Marburg, and returned to Scotland.[42]
The clergy did not allow him long time to disseminate his opinions.
Pretending to wish a free conference with him, they decoyed him to
St Andrews, where he was thrown into prison by archbishop Beatoun, and
committed to the flames on the last day of February 1528, and in the
twenty‑fourth year of his age. On his trial he defended his opinions
with firmness, yet with great modesty; and the mildness, patience,
and fortitude, which he displayed at the stake, equalled those of
the first martyrs of Christianity. He expired with these words
in his mouth: “How long, O Lord, shall darkness cover this realm!
How long wilt thou suffer this tyranny of men! Lord Jesus, receive
my spirit!”[43] “The murder of Hamilton,” {30} says a modern
historian,[44] “was afterwards avenged in the blood of the nephew
and successor of his persecutor;” and the flames in which he expired
were, “in the course of one generation, to enlighten all Scotland, and
to consume, with avenging fury, the Catholic superstition, the papal
power, and the prelacy itself.”
The good effects which resulted from the martyrdom of Hamilton soon
began to appear. Many of the learned, as well as of the common people,
in St Andrews, beheld with deep interest the cruel death of a person
of rank, and could not refrain from admiring the heroism with which
he endured it. This excited inquiry into the opinions for which he
suffered, and the result of inquiry in many cases was a conviction
of their truth. Gawin Logie, principal of St Leonard’s college, was
so successful in instilling them into the minds of the students
under his care, that it became proverbial to say of any one who
was suspected of Lutheranism, that “he had drunk of St Leonard’s
well.”[45] Under the connivance of John Winram, the subprior, they
also secretly spread among the noviciates of the abbey.[46]
These sentiments were not long confined to St Andrews, and everywhere
persons were to be found {31} who held that Patrick Hamilton had
died a martyr. Alarmed at the progress of the new opinions, the clergy
adopted the most rigorous measures for their extirpation. Strict
inquisition was made after heretics; the flames of persecution were
kindled in all quarters of the country; and, from 1530 to 1540, many
innocent and excellent men suffered the most inhuman death.[47] Henry
Forrest, David Straiton, Norman Gourlay, Jerom Russel, Kennedy, Kyllor,
Beveridge, Duncan Sympson, Robert Forrester, and Thomas Forrest, were
the names of those early martyrs, whose sufferings deserve a more
conspicuous place than can be given to them in these pages. A few,
whose constancy was overcome by the horrors of the stake, purchased
their lives by abjuring their opinions. Numbers made their escape to
England and the continent; among whom were the following learned men,
Gawin Logie, Alexander Seatoun, Alexander Aless, John Macbee, John
Fife, John Macdowal, John Macbray, George Buchanan, James Harrison,
and Robert Richardson.[48] Few of these exiles afterwards returned
to their native country. England, Denmark, Germany, France, and even
Portugal, offered an asylum to them; and foreign universities and
schools enjoyed the benefit of those talents which their bigoted
countrymen were incapable of appreciating. To maintain their authority,
and to preserve those corruptions from which they derived their wealth,
the clergy would willingly have driven into banishment {32} all the
learned men in the kingdom, and quenched for ever the light of
science in Scotland.
Various causes contributed to prevent these violent measures from
arresting the progress of the truth. Among these the first place is
unquestionably due to the circulation of the Scriptures in the vulgar
language. Against this the patrons of ignorance had endeavoured to
guard with the utmost jealousy. But when the desire of knowledge has
once been excited among a people, they easily contrive methods of
eluding the vigilance of those who would prevent them from gratifying
it. By means of merchants who traded, from England and the continent,
to the ports of Leith, Dundee, and Montrose, Tindall’s translations of
the scriptures, with many protestant books, were imported. These were
consigned to persons of tried principles and prudence, who circulated
them in private with great industry. One copy of the Bible, or of the
New Testament, supplied several families. At the dead hour of night,
when others were asleep, they assembled in a private house; the sacred
volume was brought from its concealment; and, while one read, the
rest listened with mute attention. In this way the knowledge of the
scriptures was diffused, at a period when it does not appear that
there was a single public teacher of the truth in Scotland.[49]
Nor must we overlook another means which operated very extensively in
alienating the public mind {33} from the established religion. Those
who have investigated the causes which led to the Reformation on the
continent, have ascribed a considerable share of influence to the
writings of the poets and satirists of the age. Poetry has charms for
persons of every description; and in return for the pleasure which
it affords them, mankind have in all ages been disposed to allow a
greater liberty to poets than to any other class of writers. Strange
as it may appear, the poets who flourished before the Reformation
used very great freedom with the church, and there were not wanting
many persons of exalted rank who encouraged them in this species
of composition. The same individuals who were ready, at the call of
the pope and clergy, to undertake a crusade for extirpating heresy,
entertained poets who inveighed against the abuses of the court of
Rome, and lampooned the religious orders. One day they assisted at an
_auto‑da‑fe_, in which heretics were committed to the flames for the
preservation of the catholic church; next day they were present at the
acting of a pantomime or a play, in which the ministers of that church
were held up to ridicule. Intoxicated with power, and lulled asleep by
indolence, the clergy had either overlooked these attacks, or treated
them with contempt; it was only from experience that they learned
their injurious tendency; and before they made the discovery, the
practice had become so common that it could no longer be restrained.
This weapon was wielded with much success by the friends of the
Reformed doctrine in Scotland. Some of their number had acquired
{34} great celebrity among their countrymen as poets; and others,
who could not lay claim to high poetical merit, possessed a talent
for wit and humour. They employed themselves in writing satires, in
which the ignorance, the negligence, and the immorality, of the clergy
were stigmatized, and the absurdities and superstitions of the popish
religion exposed to ridicule. These poetical effusions were easily
committed to memory, and were circulated without the intervention of
the press, which was at that time entirely under the control of the
bishops. An attack still more bold was made upon the church. Dramatic
compositions, partly written in the same strain, were repeatedly
acted in the presence of the royal family, the nobility, and vast
assemblies of people, to the great mortification, and the still
greater disadvantage, of the clergy. The bishops repeatedly procured
the enactment of laws against the circulation of seditious rhymes,
and blasphemous ballads; but metrical epistles, moralities, and
psalms, in the Scottish language, continued to be read with avidity,
notwithstanding prohibitory statutes and legal prosecutions.[50]
In the year 1540, the reformed doctrine could number among its
converts, besides a multitude of the common people, many persons of
rank and external respectability: among whom were William, earl of
Glencairn; his son Alexander, lord Kilmaurs; William, earl of Errol;
William, lord Ruthven; his daughter Lillias, wife of the master of
Drummond; John Stewart, {35} son of lord Methven; Sir James Sandilands,
Sir David Lindsay, Campbell of Cesnock, Erskine of Dun, Melville
of Raith, Balnaves of Halhill, Straiton of Lauriston, with William
Johnston, and Robert Alexander, advocates.[51] The early period
at which they were enrolled as friends to the Reformation, renders
these names more worthy of consideration. It has often been alleged,
that the desire of sharing in the rich spoils of the popish church,
together with the intrigues of the court of England, engaged the
Scottish nobles on the side of the reformed religion. At a later
period, there is reason to think that this allegation was not
altogether groundless. But at the time of which we now speak, the
prospect of overturning the established church was too distant and
uncertain, to induce persons, who had no higher motive than to gratify
avarice, to take a step by which they exposed their lives and fortunes
to the most imminent hazard; nor had the English monarch yet extended
his influence in Scotland, by those arts of political intrigue which
he afterwards employed.
During the two last years of the reign of James V., the numbers of the
reformed rapidly increased. Twice did the clergy attempt to cut them
off by a desperate blow. They presented to the king a list, containing
the names of some hundreds, possessed of property and wealth, whom
they denounced as heretics; and endeavoured to procure his consent
to their condemnation, by flattering him with the immense riches {36}
which would accrue to him from the forfeiture of their estates. When
this proposal was first made to him, James rejected it with strong
marks of displeasure; but so violent was the antipathy which he at
last conceived against his nobility, and so much did he fall under
the influence of the clergy, that it is highly probable he would have
yielded to the solicitations of the latter, if the disgraceful issue
of an expedition, which they had instigated him to undertake against
the English, had not impaired his reason, and put an end to his
unhappy life, on the 13th of December, 1542.[52]
{37}
PERIOD II.
FROM THE YEAR 1542, WHEN HE EMBRACED THE REFORMED RELIGION,
TO THE YEAR 1549, WHEN HE WAS RELEASED FROM THE FRENCH GALLEYS.
WHILE this fermentation of opinion was spreading through the nation,
Knox, from the state of his mind, could not remain long unaffected.
The reformed doctrines had been imbibed by several persons of his
acquaintance, and they were the topic of common conversation and
dispute among the learned and inquisitive at the university.[53] His
change of views first discovered itself in his philosophical lectures,
in which he began to forsake the scholastic path, and to recommend
to his pupils a more rational and useful method of study. Even this
innovation excited against him violent suspicions of heresy, which
were confirmed, when he proceeded to reprehend the corruptions {38}
that prevailed in the church. He was then teaching at St Andrews; but
it was impossible for him to remain long in a town, which was wholly
under the power of cardinal Beatoun, the chief supporter of the
Romish church, and a determined enemy to all reform. Accordingly he
left that place, and retired to the south of Scotland, where he avowed
his belief of the protestant doctrine. Provoked by his defection, and
alarmed lest he should draw others after him, the clergy were anxious
to rid themselves of such an adversary. Having passed sentence against
him as a heretic, and degraded him from the priesthood, the cardinal
employed assassins to waylay him, by whose hands he must have fallen,
had not providence placed him under the protection of Douglas of
Langniddrie.[54]
{39} The change produced in the political state of the kingdom by
the death of James V. had great influence upon the Reformation. After
a bold but unsuccessful attempt by cardinal Beatoun, to secure to
himself the government during the minority of the infant queen, the
earl of Arran was peaceably established in the regency. Arran had
formerly shown himself attached to the reformed doctrines, and he
was now surrounded with counsellors who were of the same principles.
Henry VIII. laid hold of this opportunity for accomplishing his
favourite measure of uniting the two crowns, and eagerly pressed a
marriage between his son Edward and Mary, the young queen of Scots.
Notwithstanding the determined opposition of the whole body of the
clergy, the Scottish parliament agreed to the match; commissioners
were sent into England to settle the terms; and the contract of
marriage was drawn out, subscribed, and ratified by all the parties.
But through the intrigues of the cardinal and queen‑mother, the
fickleness and timidity of the regent, and the violence of the
English monarch, the treaty, after proceeding thus far, was broken
off; and Arran not only renounced connexion with England, but abjured
the reformed religion publicly in the church of Stirling. The Scottish
queen was soon after betrothed to the dauphin of France, and sent
into that kingdom; a measure which, at a subsequent period, nearly
accomplished the ruin of the independence of Scotland, and the
extirpation of the protestant religion.