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                               The Story
                                 of the
                           Scottish Covenants

                               in Outline

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                   First Edition, F’cap 4to, May 1904
                  Second Edition, Crown 8vo, May 1904

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                               The Story
                                 of the
                           SCOTTISH COVENANTS
                               in Outline


                                   by


                         D. Hay Fleming, LL.D.

                        [Illustration: colophon]

                          Edinburgh and London
                      Oliphant, Anderson & Ferrier
                                  1904

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                               PRINTED BY
                          TURNBULL AND SPEARS,
                               EDINBURGH

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                                  Note


This short sketch was written as an Introduction to the recent edition
of the late Rev. J. H. Thomson’s “Martyr Graves of Scotland.” The
publishers having now resolved to issue my sketch separately as a
convenient summary of the covenanting struggle, I have revised and
considerably enlarged it.

No Englishman, it has been said, can distinguish the National Covenant
from the Solemn League and Covenant. It is to be feared that many
Scotchmen are in the same case. The Covenants, indeed, have been sadly
mixed up even by native historians; and comparatively few people seem to
have any idea of the number of these religious bonds.

                                                                D. H. F.

May 1904.

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                                Contents


 A Sifting-time, 1
 Three Kinds of Religious Bands or Covenants, 2
 Francis Wark’s Personal Covenant, 4
 Supposed Band, or Covenant, of 1556, 6
 Band of 1557, 7
 The Congregation, 9
 The Three Bands of 1559, 9
 Rupture of the French Alliance, 10
 Scots and English, 12
 Band of 1560, 13
 Treaty of Edinburgh, 14
 The Papal Jurisdiction abolished by Parliament, 14
 Confession of Faith ratified, 15
 Band of 1562, 15
 Queen Mary demits the Crown, 16
 Articles of 1567, 17
 St Bartholomew’s Massacre, 18
 Proposed Band of 1572, 19
 The King’s Confession of 1580-1, 21
 The General Band, 22
 The Band of 1589, 23
 Covenanting in 1590, 24
 The Band of 1592-3, 24
 Covenanting in 1596, 26
 Erection of Episcopacy, 28
 The Five Articles of Perth, 29
 The Revolt of 1637, 30
 The National Covenant, 31
 The King’s Covenant, 32
 Glasgow Assembly, 32
 The Treaty of Berwick, 33
 The Assembly of 1639, 33
 The Parliament of 1640, 34
 The English ask Help, 35
 The Solemn League and Covenant, 36
 The Covenant enjoined, 37
 Montrose’s Victories and Army, 38
 Philiphaugh, 39
 The Engagement, 40
 Charles the Second proclaimed King, 42
 Montrose’s Last Expedition, 42
 His Execution, 43
 A Covenanted King, 43
 Resolutioners and Protesters, 45
 The Restoration, 46
 Sharp’s Character, 46
 The King’s Honour, 47
 The Act Rescissory, 48
 Samuel Rutherfurd’s Death, 48
 Sharp’s Duplicity, 49
 How the King redeemed his Promise, 49
 Episcopacy re-established, 50
 Argyll and Guthrie, 51
 Ministers disqualified and ejected, 52
 The Church-Courts discharged, 53
 Court of High-Commission, 54
 Conventicles forbidden, 56
 Pentland Rising, 56
 The Indulgence, 58
 Conventicle Act of 1670, 59
 Public Worship, 61
 James Mitchell, 61
 The Ladies’ Covenant, 63
 The Cess, 63
 The Tragedy of Magus Muir, 64
 Rutherglen, Drumclog, and Bothwell Bridge, 65
 The Cameronians, 66
 The Effect of Persecution, 68
 The Test, 68
 The Children’s Bond, 70
 The Strategy of Claverhouse, 72
 The Apologetic Declaration, 75
 The Killing-time, 76
 Death of Charles the Second, 76
 James the Seventh, 77
 Priesthill and Wigtown, 77
 Three Harsh Acts of Parliament, 77
 Vitality of Conventicles, 78
 Dunnottar Prisoners, 79
 Argyll’s Rising and the Cameronians, 79
 The Toleration of 1687, 80
 Renwick’s Martyrdom, 81
 The Revolution, 81
 The Martyrs’ Monument in Greyfriars Churchyard, 82
 Estimated Number of the Victims, 82




                    SIGNING OF THE NATIONAL COVENANT
                        IN GREYFRIARS CHURCHYARD

                           28th February 1638

                  From the Picture by W. HOLE, R.S.A.

        Reproduced by permission of the Corporation of Edinburgh
                   and of H. E. Moss, Esq., the donor

                           ------------------

                  DESCRIPTION OF THE PROMINENT FIGURES

Beginning at the left hand is Johnston of Warriston showing a letter to
the Earl of Argyll, while Lord Eglinton is in the rear. Two ladies come
next—the Marchioness of Hamilton, in widow’s weeds, seated, with Lady
Kenmure standing beside her. The group around the tombstone includes
Lord Rothes in the act of signing the document, Lord Louden, Lord
Lothian, and the Earl of Sutherland; while Montrose is on the near side.
Then there are Hope of Craighall, with the Rev. Samuel Rutherfurd, and
in the foreground, standing on a tombstone, is the Rev. Alexander
Henderson.

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[Illustration: Signing of the National Covenant]

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                               The Story
                                 of the
                           SCOTTISH COVENANTS
                               in Outline


Scotland is pre-eminently the land of the Covenant, and the land is
flowered with martyr graves. When the covenanting cause was in the
ascendant, many were willing to appear on its side who cared little for
it in reality; but when it waned, and, after the Restoration, the time
of trial came, the half-hearted changed sides, or fell away like leaves
in autumn, and the love of many waxed cold. Then it was that the
faithful remnant stood revealed and grew still more faithful.

While they were opposed and oppressed by some of their former
associates, they were, on the other hand, reinforced by the accession of
outstanding men, like Richard Cameron and Thomas Forrester, who, in
their earlier years, had complied with Prelacy; and by others, like
James Renwick, Patrick Walker, and Sergeant Nisbet, who were born after
the persecution had actually commenced. Men, and even women, were found
ready and willing to endure all hardships, and to brave an ignominious
death, rather than relinquish or compromise the principles which they
held so dear, and to which, as they believed, the nation was bound by
solemn covenants.

[Sidenote: Bands or Covenants]

The story of religious covenanting in Scotland covers a long period. The
covenants, or bands as they were frequently called, may be divided into
three classes—public, semi-public, and private—and the influence of each
has been felt at some of the most critical periods in the history of the
country.

[Sidenote: Personal Covenants]

The private or personal covenant, in which the individual Christian gave
up himself, or herself, formally to the service of God, helped many a
one to walk straight in crooked and trying times. These private
transactions were neither less solemn nor less sacred because the
knowledge of them was confined to the covenanter and his Lord.

[Sidenote: A Specimen]

Many specimens of these old personal covenants have been preserved, and
they throw a vivid light on a type of earnest piety, which, it is to be
feared, is rather rare in the present day. One of these came into my
hands twenty years ago, inside a copy of Patrick Gillespie’s well-known
work, “The Ark of the Testament Opened.” The book was printed at London
in 1661, and is still in the original binding, but the old brown calf
had given way at the joints, and so one of the previous owners had it
rebacked. Fortunately, the binder preserved the fly-leaves, on which
there are a number of jottings and dates; and on one of them there is a
genuine personal covenant, written and signed by Francis Wark. He had
written this covenant on that side of the last fly-leaf which was next
to the board, and had then pasted the edges carefully down to the board,
so that no one could see that there was any writing there. After being
hidden for more than a century and a half, it was revealed by the
binder. As it is very short, it may be quoted as an example:—

    “I, Francis Wark, doe hereby testifie and declair that I, being
    a poor miserable sinner deserving hell and wrath, and that
    vengance is my due, and I, not being able to deliver myself from
    wrath nor satisfie the justice of God for my guilt, doe this day
    betake myself to the righteousnes of Jesws Christ, fulie
    renowncing all righteousnes in my self, and betakes me to his
    mercy; and likways that I take the true God, who made the heavns
    and the earth and gave me a being upon the world, to be my God
    and my portion (renowncing the devill the world and the flesh),
    and resigns up myself sowll and body to be his in tyme and
    through all the ages of endless eternity, even to him who is one
    God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; and I take Jesws Christ for my
    Saviour, my Priest, Prophet and King, and engadges to be for him
    and his glory, whill I have a being upon the earth: in witnes
    quhereof I have subscrived this with my hand, Glasgow the 21 day
    of May 1693,

                                                     “FRANCIS WARK.”

[Sidenote: God our Portion]

Documents of this kind help one to understand the reply of the
covenanter’s wife when the dragoons were driving away all the cattle in
her husband’s absence. A soldier, who had not altogether lost his
feelings of humanity, turned back to her and said: “Puir woman, I’m
sorry for you.” “Puir!” she exclaimed, “I’m no puir; the Lord is my
portion, and ye canna mak me puir!”

There is still some uncertainty as to the precise date when public or
semi-public religious covenanting was adopted in Scotland.

[Sidenote: Supposed Band of 1556]

In speaking of his own preaching in 1556, Knox tells that, at that time,
most of the gentlemen of the Mearns “refuissed all societie with
idolatrie, and _band thame selfis_, to the uttermost of thare poweris,
to manteane the trew preaching of the Evangell of Jesus Christ, as God
should offer unto thame preachearis and oportunitie.” Dr M‘Crie
understood this to mean that these gentlemen “entered into a solemn and
mutual bond, in which they renounced the Popish communion, and engaged
to maintain and promote the pure preaching of the Gospel, as Providence
should favour them with opportunities.” In David Laing’s opinion, Knox’s
words do not necessarily imply that the mutual agreement or resolution
referred to actually assumed the form of a written “band” or covenant.
If it did, Knox has not embodied it in his “History,” nor is any copy
known to exist.

[Sidenote: Band of 1557]

But as to the reality, the nature, and the precise date of the band of
1557, there is no room for dubiety. Knox was on the Continent when it
was entered into; but he relates the circumstances which called it
forth, explains the object it was meant to serve, and gives a copy of
the document itself, as well as the names of the principal men who
signed it. The leaders of the Reforming party resolved to persist in
their purpose, to commit themselves and their all into God’s hands,
rather than allow idolatry manifestly to reign, rather than suffer the
subjects of the realm to be defrauded as they had been of the preaching
of Christ’s Evangel. “And that everie ane should be the more assured of
other, a commoun band was maid, and by some subscrived.”

Calderwood derived his copy of the document, and his account of the
circumstances which called it forth, from Knox. Fully forty years ago an
original copy of the band was found, and is now in the National Museum
of Antiquities, Edinburgh. It only bears five signatures, those of
Argyll, Glencairn, Morton, Lorne, and John Erskine. The day of the month
is left blank; but the one which Knox followed is dated “the thrid day
of December.” Knox also says that it was subscribed by many others. The
explanation probably is that (as in 1638) a number of original copies
were made, and signed by the leaders before being sent out for
additional names.

This band of 1557, like those of a later date, is remarkable for the
clearness, the directness, and the vigour of its language, but unlike
them it can hardly be regarded as a public document. To have exhibited
it then to all and sundry would have been to court persecution, perhaps
death. “To those who agreed with them,” says Buchanan, “they presented
bonds for their subscription. These first assumed the name of ‘the
Congregation,’ which those who followed afterward rendered more
celebrated.” Although there are barely two hundred and fifty words in
the band of 1557, the Protestant party is mentioned in it seven times as
the Congregation. It was nearly five months after the date of this band
before Walter Mill was consigned to the flames.

[Sidenote: Bands of 1559]

The year 1559 was rendered notable in Scotland by the return of Knox, by
the open rupture between the Congregation and the Queen Regent, and by
the rapid progress of Protestantism. In the summer of that year the
Reformers deemed it advisable to enter into at least three distinct
covenants, their respective dates being the 31st of May, the 13th of
July, and the 1st of August. None of the originals of these is known to
have survived, but copies of all the three have been preserved. They had
for their general object the advancement of the Reformation, but each
had its own distinctive traits and special end. The first was entered
into at Perth, the second at Edinburgh, and the third at Stirling. The
second was adopted in St Andrews as the “letteris of junctioun to the
Congregatioun,” and as such was taken by more than three hundred
persons.

[Sidenote: Rupture of French Alliance]

Not the least striking result of the Reformation was the complete
bursting up of the ancient alliance between France and Scotland, and the
drawing together of Scotland and England—that England which Scotland had
so long and so recently regarded as its “auld enemy.” The importance of
this result is frankly acknowledged by Teulet, one of the most
competent, careful, and candid of French historical students. He puts
the matter thus: “Scotland, which was for so many ages the devoted ally
of France, the rein, as our ancient kings said, with which they
restrained the encroachments of England, was unwilling to abdicate its
nationality and become a French province. Moreover, the unbridled
excesses of the French troops in Scotland, no less than the shameless
rapacity of the French agents, at last aroused a general spirit of
resistance, and England soon found in the rupture of the ancient
alliance between France and Scotland an ample indemnification for the
loss of Calais.”

[Sidenote: French Excesses]

The enormities of the French in Scotland were so great, that Mary of
Guise, in writing to her brothers, affirmed that the peasantry were in
consequence so reduced to despair that they frequently committed
suicide. Although these unbridled excesses are enough to explain the
revulsion of feeling towards the French, they do not quite account for
the sudden alteration towards the English. The change, indeed, was so
sudden and so unlikely that some Southerns thought, and naturally
thought, it was “a traine to betrappe” their nation.

[Sidenote: Scots and English]

So great had been the Scotch hatred of the English, that, from the
French who came over to help them after Pinkie, they were said to have
bought English prisoners, that they might have the pleasure of putting
them to death, although they could ill afford the price which they paid
ungrudgingly. This hatred, so bitter, so fierce, and so recent, could
not have been wiped out by any French oppression had not the Scots been
now finding themselves ranged on the same side as the English in the
great religious struggle, which was submerging old feuds, breaking up
old compacts, and turning the world upside down.

[Sidenote: Band of 1560]

The oppression by the French, and the help expected from the English
army, are both referred to in the band or covenant entered into on the
27th of April 1560. Knox says that this band was made by “all the
nobilitie, barronis, and gentilmen, professing Chryst Jesus in
Scotland,” and by “dyveris utheris that joynit with us, for expelling of
the Frenche army; amangis quham the Erle of Huntlie was principall.” He
does not name any other person who signed, although he copied the band
itself into his “History”; but the original document was found among the
Hamilton MSS., and it bears about a hundred and fifty signatures of
noblemen and gentlemen, including those of the Duke of Chatelherault,
the Earls of Arran, Huntly, Argyll, Glencairn, Rothes, and Morton, James
Stewart (afterwards the Regent Murray), and the Abbots of Kinloss,
Coupar, and Kilwinning. All those who adhibited their names did not do
so on the same day. Huntly signed on the 28th of April; Morton and
twenty-seven others on the 6th of May.

[Sidenote: Treaty of Edinburgh]

The French had fortified Leith, but were so hard pressed by the English
and the Scots that they were constrained to make the Treaty of
Edinburgh, with Queen Elizabeth’s representatives, on the 6th of July
1560. It was by that treaty, or rather—to be more strictly accurate—in
virtue of the concessions in the separate “accord” between the French
and the Scots of the same date, and which is referred to in the treaty,
that the Scots were able to throw off for ever the merciless tyranny of
their old allies and the unbearable yoke of the Papacy. These
concessions provided for a meeting of Parliament; and next month that
Parliament repealed the Acts favouring the Church of Rome, abolished the
Pope’s jurisdiction in Scotland, prohibited the celebration of mass
under pain of death for the third conviction, and ratified the
Confession of Faith drawn up by Knox, Wynram, Spottiswoode, Willock,
Douglas, and Row.

Mary Queen of Scots returned from France to her own country in August
1561, and a year later made her first northern progress, in which she
went as far as Inverness. Huntly, notwithstanding his having signed the
band of 1560, was regarded as the lay head of the Papists in Scotland,
and grave doubts were entertained by many of the Protestants as to the
results of this progress of the young Queen.

[Sidenote: Band of 1562]

Knox was then in Ayrshire, and, alarmed by the rumours which reached
him, he prevailed on many of the barons and gentlemen of that county to
enter into another band, or covenant, at Ayr, on the 4th of September
1562, in order to be prepared for any attempt that might be made to put
down Protestantism. It does not appear that it had any influence on the
course of events in the North, but it probably had a considerable,
though indirect, influence in restraining those in the South, who might
have been inclined to help Huntly had there been any prospect of their
being able to do so successfully. Those who took the band were not
called upon to show their faithfulness in the field. Huntly—through
perversity, stupidity, or suspicion—put himself completely out of the
Queen’s graces. His forces were defeated, he died on the field of
battle, one of his sons was executed, and another imprisoned.

[Sidenote: The Queen’s Demission]

On Thursday, the 24th of July 1567, the Queen, then a prisoner in Loch
Leven Castle, was prevailed upon (by threats, she afterwards said) to
demit the government in favour of her infant son, James, then thirteen
months old. The General Assembly had met on the preceding Monday in the
Over Tolbooth of Edinburgh; and on Friday, the 25th, the nobles, barons,
and commissioners of towns, who were present, agreed to and subscribed
certain “articles.”

[Sidenote: Articles of 1567]

These articles really formed a band for subverting the mass, destroying
monuments of idolatry, setting up the true religion through the whole
realm, increasing ministers’ stipends, reforming schools, colleges, and
universities, easing the poor of their teinds, punishing vice, crimes,
and offences, especially the murder of Darnley, defending the young
prince, bringing him up in the fear of God, and obliging future kings
and rulers to promise, before their coronation and inauguration, to
maintain, defend, and set forward, the true religion. The subscribers
also consented and offered “to reforme themselves according to the Booke
of God.” In all they numbered about eighty. Of these, two or three
certainly knew of the plot against Darnley before it was carried out;
and they may have subscribed these articles to avert suspicion.

[Sidenote: St Bartholomew’s Massacre]

[Sidenote: Proposed Band]

[Sidenote: Test Of Loyalty]

The dreadful massacre of the Huguenots, begun in Paris on St
Bartholomew’s day 1572, excited consternation and horror in Scotland.
Believing that all the other Protestants in Europe were to be similarly
dealt with, the Privy Council summoned a convention, to be held at
Edinburgh on the 20th of October, to consider the impending danger and
the means by which it might be averted. Unfortunately for the success of
the convention, the lieges had been summoned to meet at Jedburgh on the
22nd to make a raid upon the border thieves; and the Earl of Mar, then
Regent, was drawing near his end at Stirling. None of the nobles
and few of the lairds attended the convention; but a number of
proposals were agreed to, that they might be sent to the Regent
and the Privy Council. One of these proposals was that a public
humiliation, or fast, should be held throughout the whole of Scotland
during the last eight days of November. Another was that the Protestants
of the realm should enter into a solemn band, that they might be ready
on all occasions to resist the enemy. There is evidence to show that the
fast was observed in Edinburgh; but, if the band was ever drawn up, no
copy of it seems to have survived, nor any record of its having been
entered into. The suggestion, however, was not fruitless. In the
following January, Parliament enacted that no one should be
reputed a loyal subject to the King, but should be punished
as a rebel, who did not profess the true religion; and that
those who had made profession thereof, and yet had departed from their
due obedience to his Majesty, should not be received to his mercy and
favour, until they anew gave confession of their faith; and promised to
continue “in the confessioun of the trew religioun” in time coming, and
to maintain the King’s authority; and also that they would, “at the
uttermest of thair power, fortifie, assist and mantene the trew
preichouris and professouris of Christis religioun,” against all enemies
and gainstanders of the same, of whatever nation, estate, or degree, who
had bound themselves, or assisted, to set forward and execute the cruel
decrees of the Council of Trent, injuriously called, by the adversaries
of God’s truth, “The Haly League.” By this time the “Tulchan Bishops”
had been obtruded on the Church of Scotland.

[Sidenote: The King’s Confession]

All the earlier covenants were eclipsed in interest and importance by
the one drawn up by John Craig, and commonly called “The King’s
Confession,” sometimes “The Second Confession of Faith,” and sometimes
“The Negative Confession.” In it the corruptions of the Papacy are
denounced and renounced in terse language and with refreshing vigour. As
John Row puts it: “This wes the touch-stone to try and discern Papists
from Protestants.” And yet, notwithstanding its searching and solemn
words, it failed in at least one notable instance as a touch-stone. The
original document, signed by James the Sixth and his household on the
28th of January 1580-81, found its way to France, but fortunately was
sent back again to this country—to Scot of Scotstarvit—and is now in the
Advocates’ Library. This covenant was subscribed in 1581 by all ranks
and classes of the people.

Because of “the great dangers which appeared to hang over the kirk and
countrie,” a special meeting of the General Assembly was convened on the
6th of February 1587-8. In the fifteenth session, it was agreed that
ministers should “travell diligentlie with the noblemen, barons, and
gentlemen, to subscribe the Confession of Faith.” In accordance with
this resolution, the Negative Confession was again signed by the King,
and nearly a hundred other persons, including several of the leading
nobles, on the 25th of February, at Holyrood.

[Sidenote: The General Band]

The dread inspired by the approach of the Spanish Armada in 1588 led to
the preparation of another covenant, known as “The General Band.” The
subscribers did “solemnly swear and promise to take a true, effald and
plain parte with his Majestie amongst ourselves, for diverting of the
present danger threatned to the said [true and Christian] religion, and
his Majestie’s estate and standing depending thereupon.” There is record
evidence to show that it was subscribed by the King “and divers of his
Esteatis” before the 27th of July 1588.

[Sidenote: Band of 1589]

This was a time of special bands. At Aberdeen, on the 30th of April
1589, the King and many others subscribed a band, by which they bound
themselves together “for the defens and suretie of the said trew
religioun, his Hienes persone and estate thairwith conjoynit”; and for
the pursuit of “Jesuittis, Papistis of all sortis, thair assistaris and
pairttakaris,” including the Earls of Huntly and Errol, who had “cum to
the feildis with oppin and plane force and displayit baner, for the
persute, ruting-oute and exterminioun of his Majestie, and all uthiris
his gude and loving subjectis, trew professouris of the Evangell.”

[Sidenote: Covenanting in 1590]

On the 6th of March 1589-90, when King James was still beyond the German
Ocean with his bride, the Privy Council, frightened again by the rumours
of a foreign invasion, appointed commissioners to receive the
subscriptions of nobles, barons, gentlemen, and lieges of every degree,
to the King’s Confession of 1580-81, and to the General Band of 1588.
Robert Waldegrave was authorised to print these documents for that
special purpose; and they were issued by him, in 1590, in book form,
with blank pages after the Confession, and also after the General Band,
for signatures. The subscribing at this time is said to have been
universal.

[Sidenote: Band of 1592-3]

The discovery, in December 1592, of the documents known as the Spanish
Blanks, led to another royal expedition to the North in the following
February. While in Aberdeen, the King, several of his nobles, and about
a hundred and fifty of the prominent lairds, entered into another band.
It proceeds on the narrative that, being fully and certainly persuaded
of the treasonable practices and conspiracies of some of his subjects,
against “the estat of the true religioun presentlie professed within
this realme, his Majestie’s person, crowne, and libertie of this our
native countrie,” the subscribers faithfully bind and oblige themselves
“to concurre, and take an effald, leill, and true part with his
Majestie, and each one of us with others, to the maintenance and defence
of the libertie of the said true religioun, crown, and countrie, from
thraldom of conscience, conqueist, and slaverie of strangers, and [in]
resisting, repressing, and pursute of the cheefe authors of the saids
treasonable conspiraceis.”

The precise date of this band is not given, but it must have been
subscribed between the 1st and the 13th of March 1592-3, that is, in
1592 according to the old reckoning by which the year began on the 25th
of March, but in 1593 according to the present reckoning by which the
year begins on the 1st of January.

[Sidenote: Covenanting in 1596]

[Sidenote: Bochim]

In March 1596, the General Assembly, anxious “to see the Kirk and
ministrie purged,” determined to humble itself for the short-comings and
corruptions of the ministry, and resolved that a new covenant should be
made with God, “for a more carefull and reverent discharge of their
ministrie.” Accordingly, on Tuesday the 30th, “foure hundreth persons,
all ministers or choice professors,” met in the Little Kirk of
Edinburgh, and there entered into “a new league with God,” promising “to
walke more warilie in their wayes and more diligentlie in their
charges.” While humbling themselves, “there were suche sighes and sobbs,
with shedding of teares among the most part of all estats that were
present, everie one provoking another by their exemple, and the teacher
himself [John Davidson] by his exemple, that the kirk resounded, so
that the place might worthilie have beene called Bochim; for the
like of that day was never seene in Scotland since the Reformatioun.”
As a great many of the ministers were not present at this action,
it was ordered to be repeated in the synods, and in presbyteries
by those who were absent from their synod. It was likewise taken up in
parishes. In the Presbytery of St Andrews, “for testefeing of a trew
conversioun and change of mynd,” special promises and vows were made.
These referred to religious duties, in private, in the family, and in
public, including “the resisting of all enemies of relligioun, without
fear or favour of anie persone”; and also referred to such ordinary
duties, as taking order with the poor, and repairing bridges.[1]

-----

Footnote 1:

  Row and the younger M’Crie are apparently in error in stating that the
  covenant of 1580-81 was renewed in 1596. Long before that time,
  however, it had been assigned a place in the Book of Laureations of
  Edinburgh University, that it might be subscribed by the professors
  and students.

[Sidenote: Erection of Episcopacy]

[Sidenote: Articles of Perth]

James the Sixth’s hankering for Prelacy and its ritual continued to
increase after he crossed the Tweed in 1603. By the summer of 1610, “the
restoration of episcopal government and the civil rights of bishops” had
been accomplished; but, according to the best-informed of Scottish
Episcopalian historians, “there was yet wanting that without which, so
far as the Church was concerned, all the rest was comparatively
unimportant.” The Archbishop of Glasgow, and the Bishops of Brechin and
Galloway, were sent up, however, to the English court, and on the 21st
of October “were consecrated according to the form in the English
ordinal.” This qualified them on their return to give “valid ordination”
to the Archbishop of St Andrews (George Gladstanes) and the other
bishops. Gladstanes seems to have felt duly grateful to the King, whom
he addressed as his “earthly creator.” The Court of High Commission had
already been erected; and in 1612 Parliament formally rescinded the Act
of 1592, regarded as the charter of Presbytery. A General Assembly
held at Perth, in August 1618, agreed by a majority to the five
articles, afterwards known as “the Articles of Perth”; and they were
ratified by Parliament in August 1621.[2]

-----

Footnote 2:

  By the five articles of Perth—

        (1) Kneeling at the Lord’s Supper was approved;

        (2) Ministers were to dispense that sacrament in private houses,
          to those suffering from infirmity or from long or deadly
          sickness;

        (3) Ministers were to baptise children in private houses in
          cases of great need;

        (4) Ministers were, under pain of the bishop’s censure, to
          catechise all children of eight years of age, and the children
          were to be presented to the bishop for his blessing;

        (5) Ministers were ordered to commemorate Christ’s birth,
          passion, resurrection, ascension, and the sending down of the
          Holy Ghost.

[Sidenote: Revolt of 1637]

When Charles the First ascended the throne, in 1625, he found that the
northern church still lagged behind its southern sister. He resolved to
supply the defects, and the projects which he laid for this purpose had
a considerable influence on the events which subsequently brought him to
the block. Had he shown more caution and less haste, he might possibly
have succeeded in his attempts on the Scottish Church; but in Laud he
had an evil adviser. The storm burst in the High Church (St Giles) of
Edinburgh, when Dean Hanna tried to read the new liturgy, on the 23rd of
July 1637. With this tumult the name of Jenny Geddes has been
associated. The Presbyterian party, so long down-trodden, began to
assert their rights; and, finding that they would be better able to
withstand opposition if closely bound together, they determined to fall
back on the plan of their ancestors by entering into a solemn covenant.

As the basis of this covenant the King’s Confession of 1580-81 was
chosen, and to it two additions were made, the first, prepared by
Archibald Johnston of Warriston, is known as “the legal warrant,” and
the second, drawn up by Alexander Henderson of Leuchars, was the bond
suiting it to the occasion.

[Sidenote: National Covenant]

With these additions it was, and still is, known as “The National
Covenant”; and in that form it was sworn to and subscribed by thousands
of people, in Greyfriars Church and churchyard, on the 28th of February
1638, and by hundreds of ministers and commissioners of burghs next day.
Copies were sent all over the country, and were readily signed in almost
every district. The enthusiasm was unbounded. The King could not prevail
on the swearers to resile from their position, and therefore tried to
sow dissension among them by introducing a rival covenant. For this
purpose he likewise selected the King’s Confession of 1580-81; but
instead of Johnston’s and Henderson’s additions, he substituted the
General Band of 1588; and so the two documents combined in 1590 were
again brought together. This attempt to divide the Covenanters utterly
failed. The people now called the covenant completed by Johnston and
Henderson, “The Noblemen’s Covenant”; and the one sent out by Charles,
“The King’s Covenant.”

[Sidenote: Glasgow Assembly]

The General Assembly which met at Glasgow on the 21st of November 1638
was dissolved by the Royal Commissioner; but Henderson, who was
moderator, pointed to the Commissioner’s zeal for an earthly king as an
incentive to the members to show their devotion to the cause of their
heavenly King; and the Assembly continued to sit until it had condemned
and annulled the six General Assemblies held between 1606 and 1618, and
had made a clean sweep of the bishops, their jurisdiction, and their
ceremonies.

Next summer Charles marched with an English army into Scotland, only to
find a strong force of Covenanters, under Alexander Leslie, encamped on
Duns Law. Deeming discretion the better part of valour, the King entered
into negotiations, and the Treaty of Berwick followed. By it he agreed
that a General Assembly should be held in August, and thereafter a
Parliament to ratify its proceedings. The Assembly met, and by an Act
enjoined all professors and schoolmasters, and all students “at the
passing of their degrees,” to subscribe the Covenant. By another Act it
rejected the service-book, the book of canons, the High Commission,
Prelacy, and the ceremonies. Parliament duly met, but was prevented from
ratifying the Acts of Assembly by the Royal Commissioner, who adjourned
it from time to time, and finally prorogued it until June 1640.

[Sidenote: Assembly of 1639]

As that time drew nigh, the King tried again to postpone or prorogue it;
but it nevertheless met, and in the space of a few days effected a
revolution unexampled in the previous history of Scotland. It set bounds
to the power of the monarch. It ratified the Covenant, enjoining its
subscription “under all civill paines”; it ratified the Act of the
General Assembly of 1639, rejecting the service-book, Prelacy, etc.; it
renewed the Act of Parliament of 1592 in favour of Presbytery, and
annulled the Act of 1612 by which the Act of 1592 had been rescinded.

[Sidenote: Parliament of 1640]

The King had been preparing for the Second Bishops’ War, and the
Covenanters marched into England, Montrose being the first to cross the
Tweed. Again there were negotiations, and an agreement was at length
come to at Westminster in August 1641. Charles now set out for Holyrood,
and in the Scottish Parliament ratified the Westminster Treaty; and so
explicitly, if not cordially, approved of the proceedings of the
Parliament of 1640.

The Scots had now got all that they wanted from their King, although
many of them must have doubted his sincerity, and feared a future
revocation should that ever be in his power. This fear, coupled with a
fellow-feeling for the Puritans, and gratitude for the seasonable
assistance of the English in 1560, accounts for the readiness of the
compliance with the proposal of the Commissioners of the Long Parliament
who arrived in Edinburgh in August 1643.

[Sidenote: The English ask Help]

These Commissioners desired help from the Convention of Estates and from
the General Assembly, and proposed that the two nations should enter
into “a strict union and league,” with the object of bringing them
closer in church government, and eventually extirpating Popery and
Prelacy from the island.

[Sidenote: Solemn League and Covenant]

The suggestion that the league should be religious as well as civil
having been accepted, Henderson drafted the famous Solemn League and
Covenant.[3] It was approved by the Convention of Estates and by the
General Assembly on the 17th of August; and (after several alterations)
by the Westminster Assembly and both Houses of the English Parliament.

-----

Footnote 3:

  An international Protestant league was not a new idea. The Convention,
  which met at Edinburgh on the 20th of October 1572, had suggested that
  a league and confederacy should be made “with our nychtbouris of
  Ingland and uther cuntries reformit and professing the trew
  religioun,” that we and they be joined together in mutual amity and
  society to support each other, when time or occasion shall serve, “for
  mantenance of religioun and resisting of the enemies thairof.” In
  1585, the Scottish Parliament (understanding that divers princes and
  potentates had joined themselves, “under the Pape’s auctoritie, in a
  maist unchristiane confederacie, aganis the trew religioun and
  professouris thairof, with full intent to prosecute thair ungodlie
  resolutioun with all severitie”) authorised the making of a Christian
  league with the Queen of England, to be, in matters of religion, both
  offensive and defensive, even against “auld freindis and
  confederatis.” The league, or treaty, was finally concluded by
  commissioners, at Berwick-on-Tweed, on the 5th of July 1586.

[Sidenote: The Covenant enjoined]

In October the Commission of the General Assembly ordered that it should
be forthwith printed, and gave instructions for the swearing and
subscribing, presbyteries being ordered to proceed with the censures of
the kirk “against all such as shall refuse or shift to swear and
subscribe”; and the Commissioners of the Convention ordained that it
should be sworn by all his Majesty’s Scottish subjects under pain of
being “esteemed and punished as enemyes to religioune, his Majestie’s
honour, and peace of thir kingdomes.” In Scotland it evoked more
enthusiasm than in England; and, for a time at least, produced
marvellous unanimity.

[Sidenote: Montrose’s Army]

The Scots took part against the royal army in the battle of Marston Moor
(2nd July 1644); and soon afterwards Montrose, who had not approved of
the Solemn League and Covenant, made his way into Scotland with the
object of creating a diversion in favour of the King. Having raised an
army in the Highlands, which was strengthened by an Irish contingent, he
won a series of brilliant victories over the Covenanters at Tippermuir,
Aberdeen, Inverlochy, Auldearn, Alford, and Kilsyth.

Of Montrose’s army, Patrick Gordon, a royalist, wrote: “When God had
given there enemies into there handes, the Irishes in particulare ware
too cruell; for it was everiewhere observed they did ordinarely kill all
they could be maister of, without any motion of pitie, or any
consideration of humanitie: ney, it seemed to them there was no
distinction betuixt a man and a beast; for they killed men ordinarly
with no more feilling of compassion, and with the same carelesse neglect
that they kill ane henn or capone for ther supper. And they were also,
without all shame, most brutishlie given to uncleannes and filthie lust;
as for excessive drinkeing, when they came where it might be had, there
was no limites to there beastly appetites; as for godlesse avarice, and
mercilesse oppression and plundering or the poore laborer, of those two
cryeing sinnes the Scotes ware alse giltie as they.”

[Sidenote: Retaliation]

The same writer tells how the Irish were repaid for their cruelty by the
victorious army of David Leslie at and after the battle of Philiphaugh
(13th September 1645); and how their sin was then visited, not only upon
themselves, but most brutally and pitilessly upon their wives and
followers.[4]

-----

Footnote 4:

  The various accounts of the slaughter are rather contradictory in
  their details. It may be noted, too, that—while Patrick Gordon says
  that fifty Irishmen were promised safe quarter and yet were killed—it
  was urged, in defence of the four prisoners condemned by the Scottish
  Parliament, that the quarter they had received was not against the
  orders of the Commander-in-Chief at Philiphaugh, as he only forbade
  the giving of quarter to the Irish. Nearly a year before (24th October
  1644) the English Parliament had declared that “no quarter shall be
  given hereafter to any Irishman, nor to any Papist whatever born in
  Ireland, which shall be taken in hostility against the Parliament,”
  either on the sea or in England or in Wales; and ordained that they
  should be excepted “out of all capitulations, agreements or
  compositions,” and when taken should be forthwith put to death. The
  massacres of 1641-1642 had not been forgotten.

[Sidenote: The Engagement]

On the 26th of December 1647, when the King was in Carisbrooke Castle,
in the Isle of Wight, he entered into an agreement in presence of three
Scottish Commissioners—Loudoun, Lauderdale, and Lanark—in which he
intimated his willingness to confirm the Solemn League and Covenant, by
Act of Parliament in both kingdoms, provided that no one who was
unwilling to take it should be constrained to do so; he was also to
confirm by Act of Parliament in England, for three years, presbyterial
government and the Westminster Assembly’s Directory for Worship,
provided that he and his household should not be hindered from using the
service he had formerly practised; and further, an effectual course was
to be taken by Parliament and otherwise for suppressing the opinions and
practices of Anti-Trinitarians, Anabaptists, Antinomians, Arminians,
Familists, Brownists, Separatists, Independents, Libertines, and
Seekers.

On the other hand, Scotland was, in a peaceable way, to endeavour that
the King should be allowed to go to London in safety, honour, and
freedom, there to treat personally with the English Parliament and the
Scottish Commissioners; and should this not be granted, Scotland was to
emit certain declarations, and send an army into England for the
preservation and establishment of religion, for the defence of his
Majesty’s person and authority, for his restoration to power, and for
settling a lasting peace.

This agreement was known as “The Engagement”; and the same name was
applied to the expedition which, in furtherance of its object, the Duke
of Hamilton led into England, only to be crushed by Cromwell at Preston
in August 1648.

[Sidenote: Charles II. proclaimed King]

The Scottish Commissioners in London did what they could to prevent the
execution of Charles the First, and on the 5th of February 1649—six days
after the scene in front of Whitehall—the Parliament of Scotland caused
his son to be proclaimed at the Market Cross of Edinburgh, as King of
Great Britain, France, and Ireland. The Scots were determined that he
should be their King, but they were as determined that he should not
override either the General Assembly or the Parliament.

He did not like their conditions, and the first negotiations were
abortive.

Montrose organised another expedition, which collapsed at Carbisdale on
the 27th of April 1650; and on the 21st of May the gallant Marquis was
ignominiously hanged at the Market Cross of Edinburgh, and his
dismembered body buried among malefactors in the Burgh Muir.

[Sidenote: King and Covenants]

The Prince had “already endeavoured to procure assistance from the
Emperour, and the Electours, Princes, and States of the Empire, from the
Kings of Spaine, France, and Denmarke, and most of the Princes and
States of Italy,” and had only obtained “dilatory and generall
answeres.” All his friends, he said, advised him “to make an agreement
upon any termes with our subjects of Scotland”; and he took their advice
as the only means of obtaining this crown and recovering his other
kingdoms. He offered to subscribe and swear the National Covenant, and
the Solemn League and Covenant, before landing at the mouth of the Spey,
and he accordingly did so on the 23rd of June 1650.

On the 16th of August he agreed to the Dunfermline Declaration,
deploring his father’s opposition to the work of reformation, confessing
his mother’s idolatry, professing his own sincerity, declaring that “he
will have no enemies but the enemies of the Covenant, and that he will
have no friends but the friends of the Covenant,” and expressing his
detestation of “all Popery, superstition, and idolatry, together with
Prelacy, and all errors, heresie, schism and profaneness,” which he was
resolved not to tolerate in any part of his dominions.

[Sidenote: Dunbar and Scone]

Notwithstanding Cromwell’s notable victory at Dunbar on the 3rd of
September, and the dissatisfaction of the more rigid Covenanters, now
known as Remonstrants, Charles was crowned at Scone on the 1st of
January 1651, when he again swore and subscribed the National Covenant,
and also the Solemn League and Covenant. The Marquis of Argyll placed
the crown on his head, and Robert Douglas preached the sermon. The
attempt to counteract Cromwell’s power in Scotland by an invasion of
England was unsuccessful. The Committee of the Scottish Estates was
captured at Alyth before the end of August; and Cromwell obtained his
“crowning mercy” at Worcester on the 3rd of September. The young King,
after many adventures and narrow escapes, was glad to find himself again
on the Continent.

[Sidenote: Resolutioners and Protesters]

In December 1650, after obtaining the opinion of the Commissioners of
the General Assembly, the Scottish Parliament had “admitted manie, who
were formerlie excluded, to be imployed in the armie”; and in June 1651
had rescinded the Acts of Classes, by which certain classes of
delinquents had been shut out of places of public trust. Those who were
in favour of admitting these men were known as Resolutioners; and their
opponents, as Protesters. This unfortunate dispute split the
Presbyterians into two sections, and their contentions had not come to
an end when the Restoration of Charles was effected in 1660.

[Sidenote: The Restoration]

That Restoration was mainly brought about by General Monk. When it was
seen to be inevitable, the leading Resolutioners sent James Sharp,
minister of Crail, to London, to look after the interests of the
Scottish Church. He was diplomatic and astute, and, in the opinion of
his brethren, honest and trustworthy. His letters, bristling with
devotional expressions, “seem,” as Hugh Miller puts it, “as if strewed
over with the fragments of broken doxologies.” After it was too late,
they found that he had betrayed his trust, and completely hoodwinked
them.

[Sidenote: The King’s Honour]

The General Assembly had been suppressed under Cromwell’s iron rule, and
the Church of Scotland was otherwise handicapped at this period; but
something effective might have been done to safeguard her rights had the
Resolutioners not been deceived by Sharp, although it would have been
impossible to make Charles the Second safe, either by the renewal of
former or by additional obligations, even if the Scots had been able to
impose these upon him. Such a man could not be tied by oaths. At his
Restoration, those in power trusted to his honour, and of that virtue he
had wondrously little.

His entry into London had been timed to take place on the 29th of May
1660—the thirtieth anniversary of his birthday. Some of the leading
Protesters, fearing the overthrow of Presbytery, met in Edinburgh, on
the 23rd of August, to draw up a supplication to the King. The Committee
of Estates arrested them, and imprisoned them in the castle.

[Sidenote: The Act Rescissory]

A few days afterwards Sharp brought a letter from his Majesty, in which
he said: “We do also resolve to protect and preserve the government of
the Church of Scotland, _as it is settled by law_, without violation.” A
suggestion that this might be understood in two ways, was condemned as
“an intolerable reflection” on the King. The Scottish Parliament, on the
28th of March 1661, rescinded the Parliaments which had been held in and
since 1640, and all the Acts passed by them. Thus all the civil sanction
which had been given to the Second Reformation was swept away at a
stroke. Early next morning, Samuel Rutherfurd—whose stipend had been
confiscated, whose “Lex Rex” had been burned, and who had been cited to
answer a charge of treason—appeared before a court that was higher than
any Parliament, and “where his Judge was his friend.”

A month after this, Sharp professed, in a letter to James Wood, that he
was still hopeful that there would, “through the goodnes of God,” be no
change; and affirmed that, as he had, “through the Lord’s mercy,” done
nothing to the prejudice of the liberties and government of the Church,
so he would not, “by the grace of God,” have any accession to the
wronging of it.

[Sidenote: Duplicity]

He was then on the eve of setting out for London with Glencairn and
Rothes. They returned in the end of August, bringing with them a letter
intimating the King’s determination to interpose his royal authority for
restoring the Church of Scotland “to its right government by bishops as
it was by law before the late troubles”; and justifying his action by
his promise of the previous year. Candid Episcopalians admit that this
dealing shook all confidence in the sincerity of Charles.

[Sidenote: Episcopacy Re-established]

In October Sharp again went to England; in November he was appointed
Archbishop of St Andrews; and in December he was consecrated in
Westminster Abbey, after being privately ordained as a deacon and a
priest. The Scottish Parliament, on the 27th of May 1662, passed the
“Act for the restitution and re-establishment of the antient government
of the church by archbishops and bishops.” The preamble of this Act
acknowledges that “the ordering and disposall of the externall
government and policie of the Church doth propperlie belong unto his
Majestie, as are inherent right of the Croun, by vertew of his royall
prerogative and supremacie in causes ecclesiasticall.” The Oath of
Allegiance, which had been adopted by Parliament on the 1st of January
1661, contained the clause: “I acknowledge my said Soverane only supream
governour of this kingdome over all persons and in all causes.”

[Sidenote: Argyll and Guthrie]

The Solemn League and Covenant had already been burned by the hangman in
London; and the long and bloody persecution in Scotland had already
begun. An example had been made of the Marquis of Argyll, and of James
Guthrie, the minister of Stirling. Both suffered at the Market Cross of
Edinburgh in the same week, Argyll on Monday, the 27th of May, and
Guthrie on Saturday, the 1st of June, 1661. To secure Argyll’s
conviction, Monk was base enough to give up several of his letters
proving his hearty compliance with the Usurper’s government after it was
established. The case for the prosecution was closed before the letters
arrived; but they were nevertheless received and read.

Sir George Mackenzie—later to acquire an unenviable notoriety as the
Bluidy Mackenyie—was one of his advocates, and in his opinion the
Marquis suffered mainly for the good old cause. Guthrie had never
compromised himself in any way with Cromwell, who described him as the
little man who would not bow.

[Sidenote: Ministers Disqualified]

The Parliament of 1662 not only re-established Prelacy, but decreed that
no minister, who had entered after the abolition of patronage in 1649,
should have any right to his stipend unless he obtained presentation
from the patron and collation from the bishop; and that ministers who
did not observe the Act of 1661, appointing the day of the King’s
restoration as an annual holy day unto the Lord, should be incapable of
enjoying any benefice. It also declared that the Covenants were unlawful
oaths, and enacted that no one should be admitted to any public trust or
office until he acknowledged in writing that they were unlawful.

[Sidenote: Ministers Ejected]

These Acts of Parliament were speedily followed up by the Privy Council,
which, in September 1662, ordered all ministers to resort next month to
their respective bishop’s assemblies; and in October commanded all the
ministers entered since 1649, and who had not since received the
patron’s presentation and the bishop’s collation, to quit their
parishes. By this latter Act it has been reckoned that fully three
hundred ministers were turned out of their charges.

[Sidenote: Church-Courts Discharged]

When Prelacy was established in 1610, James the Sixth was much too
politic to close the ecclesiastical courts which had been set up and
carried on by the Presbyterians. “Honest men” continued to maintain in
them “both their right and possession, except in so far as the same were
invaded, and they hindered by the bishops.” But, by command of Charles
the Second, synods, presbyteries, and kirk-sessions had now been (by a
proclamation of 9th January 1662) expressly discharged “until they be
authorized and ordered by the archbishops and bishops upon their
entering unto the government of their respective sees.” At his first
Diocesan Synod, Sharp took care that ruling elders should have no
standing in his presbyteries, or “meetings of the ministers of the
respective bounds”; and he likewise circumscribed the power of these
“meetings.” Instructions were also given that each minister should
“assume and choose a competent number of fitt persons, according to the
bounds of the parish,” to assist in session, etc.

[Sidenote: Court of High Commission]

Early in 1664 the King resolved to re-erect, by virtue of his royal
prerogative, the Court of High Commission, to enforce the Acts “for the
peace and order of the Church, and in behalf of the government thereof
by archbishops and bishops.” The extraordinary power vested in this
court was increased in range by the general clause, authorising the
Commissioners “to do and execute what they shall find necessary and
convenient for his Majesty’s service in the premises.” Any five of the
Commissioners could act, if one of them were an archbishop or bishop. No
provision was made for any appeal from the judgment of this court. Of it
a learned member of the bar has said: “All law and order were
disregarded. The Lord Advocate ceased to act as public prosecutor, and
became a member of this iniquitous tribunal. No indictments were
required; no defences were allowed; no witnesses were necessary. The
accused were dragged before the Commissioners, and compelled to answer
any questions which were put to them, without being told of what they
were suspected.” The court could order ministers “to be censured with
suspension or deposition”; and could punish them and others “by fining,
confining, committing to prison and incarcerating.” For nearly two years
this court harassed and oppressed the Nonconformists of Scotland.

[Sidenote: Origin of Pentland Rising]

Towards the close of 1665, conventicles were, by royal proclamation,
forbidden under severe penalties. The officiating ministers, and those
harbouring them, were threatened with the highest pains due to sedition,
and hearers were subject to fining, confining, and other corporal
punishments.

Such measures could hardly be expected to beget in the people an ardent
love for Prelacy; and when opposition was manifested in the south-west
of Scotland, troops, under Sir James Turner, were sent to suppress it.

[Sidenote: Torture and Execution]

At length the harshness of a handful of soldiers to an old man, at Dalry
in Galloway, led to a scuffle with a few countrymen, and the success of
the latter led to the untimely rising which was suppressed by General
Dalyell at Rullion Green on the 28th of November 1666. In that
engagement the slain and mortally wounded Covenanters numbered over
forty. On the 7th of December ten prisoners—all of whom, save one, had
been promised quarter—were hanged at the Market Cross of Edinburgh. In
less than a month, fully twenty more prisoners had been hanged at
Edinburgh, Glasgow, Irvine, Ayr, and Dumfries. Two of these—Neilson of
Corsack and Hugh M’Kail—were tortured in the boots. Never before had
drums been used in Scotland to drown the voice of a victim dying on the
scaffold. At this time it was introduced at Glasgow.

Had the rising not been so ill-timed, it would probably have been much
better supported. After its suppression, Rothes and Dalyell wrote
gloomily of the condition of Ayrshire; but Dalyell was not the man to
shrink from quelling incipient rebellion by force. Compared with his
measures, those of Sir James Turner were mild, although they had driven
the sufferers to despair. Finding that his own influence was in peril
through the alliance between the military and ecclesiastical party,
Lauderdale broke up this brutal administration.

[Sidenote: The Indulgence]

The first indulgence (granted in the summer of 1669) was fated, as its
successors were, to be a bone of contention among the Covenanters. It
was condemned by the more scrupulous because of its restrictions; and
because, as they held, compliance with it involved the owning of the
royal supremacy in ecclesiastical matters. Many refused to hear the
indulged ministers, and some would have nothing to do with those
non-indulged ministers who did not denounce the indulgence. It was also
disliked and resented by Alexander Burnet, Archbishop of Glasgow, and
his diocesan synod, but for very different reasons. They objected to
indulged Presbyterian ministers being exempted from Episcopal
jurisdiction, and objected all the more because, in some districts, the
people would not countenance either doctrine or discipline under
Episcopal administration.

[Sidenote: Conventicles]

The ejection of the ministers, and the filling of their places by the
miserable substitutes then termed “curates,” had led to the keeping of
conventicles, and as the indulgence, like the proclamation of 1665,
failed to put an end to these unauthorised religious services, it was
resolved to put them down with a strong hand. Parliament decreed, in
1670, that non-indulged, outed ministers, or other persons not allowed
by the bishops, who either preached or prayed in any meeting, “except in
ther oune housses and to those of ther oune family,” should be deemed
guilty of keeping conventicles, and should be imprisoned until they
found caution not to do the like again, or bound themselves to leave the
kingdom; and those who conducted, or convocated people to,
field-conventicles, were to be punished by death and confiscation of
their goods, and hearers were to be severely fined. The Act explained
that a house-conventicle became a field-conventicle if there were more
persons present than the house contained, so that some of them were
outside the door.

That this might not be a dead letter, a reward of five hundred merks was
offered to any one who captured a holder of, or convocater to,
field-conventicles; and these captors were not to be punished for any
slaughter that might be committed in apprehending such delinquents. Even
with such a law hanging over their heads, the faithful Covenanters were
not prepared to give up their conventicles. The Word of Life was much
too precious to be thus parted with. They did not intend, however, to
permit the oppressors to drive them or their preachers as lambs to the
slaughter, and so they henceforth carried arms for defence.

[Sidenote: Public Worship]

As no general attempt had been made, since the Restoration, to alter the
services of the Church, save to a very slight degree, the worship of
Conformists and Nonconformists was practically the same. Now, however,
“many Conformists began to dispute for a liturgy and some to preach for
it; but the fox Sharp was not much for it, only because he had no will
to ride the ford where his predecessor drowned.”

[Sidenote: James Mitchell]

An unsuccessful attempt to rid the country of Sharp had been made in
1668 by James Mitchell, who several years afterwards was apprehended;
but no proof could be adduced against him, until, on the Lord
Chancellor’s promise to save his life, he confessed. The Chancellor and
Treasurer-Depute swore that they heard him make his confession before
the committee; Lauderdale and Sharp swore that they heard him own it
before the Privy Council. They denied all knowledge of any promise of
life, although the promise had been duly minuted; and the request of
Mitchell’s advocates, that the Register of the Privy Council should be
produced, or the clerks obliged to give extracts, was rejected; and the
prisoner was sentenced to be hanged.

In Lord Fountainhall’s opinion, this was one of the most solemn criminal
trials that had taken place in Scotland for a hundred years; and it was
generally believed that the law was strained to secure a conviction. He
adds: “It was judged ane argument of a bad deplorat cause that they
summoned and picked out ane assysse [_i.e._, a jury] of souldiers under
the King’s pay, and others who, as they imagined, would be clear to
condemne him.” The Privy Council would have granted a reprieve, but
Sharp would not consent. On him was laid the chief blame of Mitchell’s
torture in 1676 and execution in 1678.

[Sidenote: The Ladies’ Covenant]

According to Dr Hickes, several ladies of great quality, in January
1678, kept a private fast and conventicle in Edinburgh, to ask God to
bring to nought the counsels of men against his people; and before they
parted they all subscribed a paper, wherein they covenanted, to the
utmost of their power, to engage their lords to assist and protect God’s
people against the devices taken to reduce them to order and obedience.
Next month the Highland Host plundered covenanting Ayrshire and
Clydesdale.

[Sidenote: The Cess]

The Scottish Convention of Estates, professedly regarding field
conventicles as “rendezvouses of rebellion” with which the ordinary
military forces could not successfully cope, and desiring that the
“rebellious and schismatick principles may be rooted out by lawfull and
sutable means,” resolved, in July 1678, to offer the King £1,800,000
Scots, for securing the kingdom against foreign invasion and intestine
commotions. The payment was to be spread over five years, and the money
raised by five months’ cess in each of these years. Many Covenanters
denounced the paying of this cess as an active concurring with the
Lord’s enemies in bearing down his work. Some, however, thought it
better to pay than to furnish the unscrupulous collectors with a pretext
for destroying their goods, and extorting more than was due. The cess
thus became a cause of division, as well as an instrument of oppression.

[Sidenote: Sharp’s Death]

The hated Sharp fell into the hands of nine Covenanters at Magus Muir on
the 3rd of May 1679. Seven of the nine had no misgivings as to what they
should do in the circumstances; and they unscientifically butchered him
in presence of his servants and daughter. For that deed none were
responsible save those who were there; but many were afterwards brought
to trouble for it, and not a few, who were perfectly innocent, chose to
suffer rather than brand it as murder.

[Sidenote: Bothwell Bridge]

Some of those who took an active part in the tragedy of Magus Muir were
present at Rutherglen, on Thursday, the 29th of May, when the bonfires
which had been kindled in honour of the King’s birthday were
extinguished, and when the Act Rescissory and other obnoxious Acts were
publicly burned. On Saturday, Claverhouse set out from Glasgow to make
some investigations concerning this outrage, and next morning he
attempted, but in vain, to disperse an armed conventicle at Drumclog. On
this occasion he added nothing to his military reputation; and fled from
the field as fast as his wounded charger could carry him. Three weeks
later (22nd June 1679) the Covenanters, divided in counsel and badly
officered, were slaughtered by hundreds at Bothwell Bridge; and the
thousand and more prisoners who were taken were shut up in Greyfriars
church-yard, Edinburgh. Some of these prisoners were executed; some
escaped; many, after lying for weeks in the open church-yard, were
induced to purchase their release by binding themselves never to carry
arms against the King or his authority; and two hundred, after enduring
sufferings worse than death, were drowned next December off the coast of
Orkney.

[Sidenote: Cameronians]

Donald Cargill and Richard Cameron now became the leaders of the more
thorough-going Covenanters—a small and select party as strong in faith
as weak in numbers. They were sometimes known as “Cargillites,” more
commonly as “Cameronians.” On the first anniversary of Bothwell Bridge,
a score of them rode into Sanquhar, and there emitted a declaration in
which they cast off their allegiance to the King, declared war against
him, and protested against the succession of James, Duke of York.

The Privy Council replied by offering a reward of five thousand merks
for Richard Cameron, dead or alive, and three thousand for his brother
or Cargill. On the 22nd of July, both of the Camerons fell at Ayrsmoss;
and a year later (27th July 1681) Cargill, who had excommunicated the
King and some of the leading persecutors, triumphed over death at the
Market Cross of Edinburgh.

[Sidenote: Effect of Persecution]

Those who could not be charged with the breach of any law were asked if
they owned the King’s authority. If they disowned it, or qualified their
acknowledgment, or declined to give their opinion, they were deemed
guilty of treason. But, as Alexander Sheilds says: “The more they
insisted in this inquisition, the more did the number of witnesses
multiply, with a growing increase of undauntedness, so that the then
shed blood of the martyrs became the seed of the Church; and as, by
hearing and seeing them so signally countenanced of the Lord, many were
reclaimed from their courses of complyance, so others were daylie more
and more confirmed in the wayes of the Lord, and so strengthened by his
grace that they choose rather to endure all torture, and embrace death
in its most terrible aspect, than to give the tyrant and his complices
any acknowledgment, yea not so much as to say, _God save the King_,
which was offered as the price of their life.”

[Sidenote: The Test]

On the 31st of August 1681, Parliament passed an “Act anent Religion and
the Test.” By this Act, every person in public trust or office in
Scotland was ordered to take the Test Oath, or be declared incapable of
all public trust, and be further punished by the loss of moveables and
liferent escheat. By the oath, the swearers bound themselves to adhere
to the Confession of Faith of 1560; to disown all principles
inconsistent therewith, whether popish or fanatic; to own the King as
“the only supream governour of this realme, over all persons and in all
causes, as weill ecclesiastical as civill;” to defend all the rights,
prerogatives, and privileges of the King, his heirs, and lawful
successors; never to enter into covenants or leagues, nor to assemble
for consulting or treating in any matter of state, civil or
ecclesiastic, without his Majesty’s special command or express license;
never to take up arms against him or those commissioned by him; never to
decline his power and jurisdiction; and they owned that no obligation
lay on them by the National Covenant, or by the Solemn League and
Covenant, or otherwise, “to endeavour any change or alteration in the
government, either in Church or State, as it is now established by the
laws of this kingdom.” Through the imposing of this complicated Test,
many were brought to trouble, and not a few declined it at all hazards.

[Sidenote: The Children’s Bond]

One of the most curious and suggestive documents of this period is known
as “The Children’s Bond.” In 1683, “when there was no faithful minister
in Scotland,” a number of children in the village of Pentland, who had
formed themselves into a society for devotional purposes, solemnly
entered into a covenant, of which the following is a copy:—

    “This is a covenant made between the Lord and us, with our whole
    hearts, and to give up ourselves freely to him, without reserve,
    soul and body, hearts and affections, to be his children, and
    him to be our God and Father, if it please the holy Lord to send
    his Gospel to the land again: that we stand to this covenant,
    which we have written, between the Lord and us, as we shall
    answer at the great day; that we shall never break this covenant
    which we have made between the Lord and us: that we shall stand
    to this covenant which we have made; and if not, it shall be a
    witness against us in the great day, when we shall stand before
    the Lord and his holy angels. O Lord, give us real grace in our
    hearts to mind Zion’s breaches, that is in such a low case this
    day; and make us to mourn with her, for thou hast said, ‘them
    that mourn with her in the time of her trouble shall rejoice
    when she rejoiceth, when the Lord will come and bring back the
    captivity of Zion;’ when he shall deliver her out of her
    enemies’ hands, when her King shall come and raise her from the
    dust, in spite of all her enemies that will oppose her, either
    devils or men. That thus they have banished her King, Christ,
    out of the land, yet he will arise and avenge his children’s
    blood, at her enemies’ hands, which cruel murderers have shed.”

On the back of the document was written:—

    “Them that will not stand to every article of this covenant
    which we have made betwixt the Lord and us, that they shall not
    go to the kirk to hear any of these soul-murdering curates, we
    will neither speak nor converse with them. Any that breaks this
    covenant they shall never come into our society. We shall
    declare before the Lord that we have bound ourselves in
    covenant, to be covenanted to him all the days of our life, to
    be his children and him our covenanted Father.

    “We subscribe with our hands these presents—

    “BETERICK UUMPERSTON.
    JANET BROWN.
    HELEN MOUTRAY.
    MARION SWAN.
    JANET SWAN.
    ISOBEL CRAIG.
    MARTHA LOGAN.
    AGNES AITKIN.
    MARGARET GALLOWAY.
    HELEN STRAITON.
    HELEN CLARK.
    MARGARET BROWN.
    JANET BROWN.
    MARION M’MOREN.
    CHRISTIAN LAURIE.”

[Sidenote: Beatrix Umpherston]

Unfortunately, it is not known who drafted this covenant, nor whether it
originated in the spontaneous desire of any of these devout children.
Such a child as Emilia Geddie would have been quite competent to frame
such a paper. Beatrix Umpherston, whose name heads the list, was then
ten years old. She married the Rev. John M’Neil, and died in her
ninetieth year.

[Sidenote: The Strategy of Claverhouse]

In a report which Claverhouse gave in this year to the Committee of
Privy Council, explaining how he had quietened Galloway, the following
passages occur:—

    “The churches were quyte desert; no honest man, no minister in
    saifty. The first work he did was to provyd magasins of corn and
    strawe in evry pairt of the contry, that he might with
    conveniency goe with the wholl pairty wherever the King’s
    service requyred; and runing from on place to ane other, nobody
    could knou wher to surpryse him: and in the mean tyme quartered
    on the rebelles, and indevoured to distroy them by eating up
    their provisions; but that they quikly perceived the dessein,
    and soued their corns on untilled ground. After which, he fell
    in search of the rebelles, played them hotly with pairtys, so
    that there wer severall taken, many fleid the contry, and all
    wer dung from their hants; and then rifled so their houses,
    ruined their goods, and imprisoned their servants, that their
    wyfes and schildring were broght to sterving; which forced them
    to have recours to the saif conduct, and made them glaid to
    renounce their principles.... He ordered the colecttors of evry
    parish to bring in exact rolls, upon oath, and atested by the
    minister; and caused read them evry Sonday after the first
    sermon, and marque the absents; who wer severly punished if
    obstinat. And wherever he heard of a parish that was
    considerably behynd, he went thither on Saturday, having
    aquainted them to meet, and asseured them he would be present at
    sermon; and whoever was absent on Sonday was punished on Monday;
    and who would not apear either at church or court, he caused
    arest there goods, and then offer them saif conduct: which
    broght in many, and will bring in all, and actually broght in
    tuo outed disorderly ministers.”

[Sidenote: The Success of Claverhouse]

So this booted apostle of Episcopacy confessedly caused men to renounce
their principles by driving them from their haunts, rifling their
houses, ruining their goods, imprisoning their servants, and bringing
their wives and children to starvation! And so he filled the deserted
churches by causing an attested roll to be read every Sabbath after the
first sermon, and severely punishing the absentees, if obstinate. In
extreme cases he even attended church himself, and those who were absent
on Sabbath were dealt with on Monday. But, ere long, measures much more
severe were to be adopted.

[Sidenote: Apologetic Declaration]

[Sidenote: The Killing-time]

The devout and gentle but resolute Renwick, having been sent to Holland
for ordination, returned in the autumn of 1683 to the arduous and
dangerous post which had been so honourably held by Cameron and Cargill,
and they could not have had a worthier successor. In November 1684, the
Cameronians published their “Apologetick Declaration and Admonitory
Vindication,” in which they adhered to their former declarations against
Charles Stuart, and warned those who sought their lives or gave
information against them, that in future they would regard them as the
enemies of God and of the covenanted work of reformation, and would
punish them as such. The Privy Council met this declaration by ordaining
that those who owned it, or would not disown it upon oath, should be
immediately put to death whether they had arms or not. This was to be
always done “in presence of two witnesses, and the person or
persons having commission from the Council for that effect.”
The darkest time of the persecution, the period specially known
as “the killing-time,” had now arrived; prisoners had already been
hurried to death three hours after receiving sentence.

The infamous Lauderdale had been constrained to demit his office in
1680, and his life in 1682; Rothes had predeceased him by a year; and
now they were to be followed into another world by the crowned scoundrel
(otherwise “His most Sacred Majesty”) for whose favour they had
persecuted the followers of that cause which all three had sworn to
maintain. By the death of Charles the Second, on the 6th of February
1685, no relief came to those who were hunted like partridges on the
hills of Scotland.

[Sidenote: Priesthill and Wigtown]

The heartless sensualist was now to be succeeded by him who combined
unrelenting bigotry with lechery. Charles had long been suspected of
more than secret leanings to the Church of Rome; James was an avowed and
ardent Papist. It was on the 1st of the following May that, under
Claverhouse, the dread scene was enacted at Priesthill, when John Brown
was taken to his own door, and shot in presence of his wife and child;
and on the 11th of the same month that this cold-blooded cruelty was
rivalled by Lag at Wigtown, when Margaret Wilson and Margaret Lauchlison
(or M’Lauchlan) were tied to stakes and drowned by the rising tide.

[Sidenote: Conventicles]

Between these two tragedies, the Scottish Parliament of the new King
distinguished itself by passing three harsh Acts. One of these declared
it treason to give or take the Covenants, to write in defence of them,
or to own them as lawful or binding; the second declared the procedure
of the Privy Council to have been legal in fining husbands “for their
wives withdrawing from the ordinances”; and by the other the penalty of
death and confiscation of goods was adopted as the punishment to be
inflicted on hearers as well as on preachers at either house or field
conventicles. Yet even with this stringent Act it was impossible to put
down conventicles. It was not for the mere satisfaction of opposing a
tyrannical and bloodthirsty Government that the frequenters of
conventicles were willing to risk so much. Renwick’s sermons show that
he was a faithful preacher of the Gospel; and those who had realised in
their own experience that it was the power of God unto salvation were
anxious at all hazards to listen to the Word when proclaimed by such a
devoted and fearless messenger.

[Sidenote: Dunnottar Prisoners]

In order to cope more successfully with the expected rising of the Earl
of Argyll, 184 captive Covenanters, collected from various prisons,
were, in May 1685, marched from Burntisland to Dunnottar. A few escaped
by the way. The others suffered a rigorous and cruel imprisonment. For
several days they were, male and female, confined in a single vault,
dark, damp, and unfurnished. During the course of the summer some
escaped, some died, some took the obnoxious oaths. Of those who were
brought back to Leith and examined before the Privy Council, on the 18th
of August, a considerable number were already under sentence of
banishment, and now 51 men and 21 women were similarly sentenced, and
forbidden to return to Scotland, without special permission, under pain
of death.

[Sidenote: The Toleration]

Argyll’s rising was a failure. He was captured, brought to Edinburgh,
and there beheaded on the 30th of June 1685, not for the rising, but
because in November 1681 he had ventured to take the Test with an
explanation. Being dissatisfied with Argyll’s Declaration and with his
associates, Renwick and his followers stood aloof from that rising; but,
on the 28th of May 1685, they had, at Sanquhar, formally protested
against the validity of the Scottish Parliament then in session, and
also against the proclamation of James, Duke of York, as King. They also
refused to take any benefit from the toleration, which he granted, by
his “sovereign authority, prerogative royal, and absolute power,” on the
28th of June 1687—a toleration which was gratefully accepted by many of
the less scrupulous Presbyterian ministers. Although Argyll’s attempt to
overturn the throne of James the Seventh was unsuccessful, the time
came, in December 1688, when he had to escape from the country, which
was no longer to be his. Next April the Scottish Convention of Estates
pointed out that he had assumed the regal power in Scotland, and acted
as king, without taking the oath required by law, whereby the king is
obliged to swear to maintain the Protestant religion, and to rule the
people according to the laws.

[Sidenote: The Revolution]

Renwick, who glorified God in the Grassmarket on the 17th of February
1688, was the last Covenanter who suffered on a scaffold. He and his
followers, by maintaining an unflinching protest against the reign of
James, had helped to hasten his downfall. When the Convention of Estates
met in Edinburgh, the Cameronians gladly volunteered to defend it; and
showed their loyalty by raising in a single day, without tuck of drum,
eleven hundred and forty men as a regiment for King William’s service.

Episcopacy was abolished by the Scottish Parliament (22nd July 1689) as
an insupportable grievance; and (7th June 1690) Presbytery was
re-established, and the Westminster Confession of Faith ratified; but
the Covenants were ignored, and on that account the sterner Cameronians
still stood apart, and, with that dogged tenacity which had
distinguished them in the past, they held together, although for many
long years they had no minister.

[Sidenote: The Martyrs’ Monument]

 [Sidenote: Estimated Number of Victims]

On the Martyrs’ Monument in the Greyfriars Churchyard, Edinburgh, it is
stated that, between Argyll’s execution and Renwick’s, there “were
one way or other murdered and destroyed for the same cause about
eighteen thousand.” This estimate is not given upon the
original monument, erected in 1706 through the instrumentality
of James Currie (Beatrix Umpherston’s stepfather), and now
preserved in the interesting and well-appointed Municipal Museum in
the Edinburgh Corporation Buildings. That monument was repaired, and a
compartment added to it, in 1728 or 1729; and the present monument
supplanted it in or about 1771. The estimate has apparently been taken
from Defoe’s “Memoirs of the Church of Scotland,” first published in
1717. It therefore includes those who went into exile, those who were
banished, those who died from hunger, cold, and disease contracted in
their wanderings, and those who were killed in battle, as well as those
who were murdered in the fields or executed with more formality. The
numbers which he sets down under some of these classes are only guesses,
and seem to be rather wild guesses. An estimate approaching more closely
to the real number might be made, and would doubtless show a much
smaller, though still a surprisingly large, total. But the exact number
of those who laid down their lives, in that suffering, or heroic, period
of the Church of Scotland, will not be known until the dead, small and
great, stand before God, and the Book of Life is opened. Of many of them
no earthly record remains.

                “The shaggy gorse and brown heath wave
                 O’er many a nameless warrior’s grave.”

[Sidenote: Heroic Sufferers]

Not a few of the sufferers endured torments more terrible than death.
Some were tortured with fire-matches, which permanently disabled their
hands; some had their thumbs mercilessly squeezed in the thumbikins;
some had their legs horribly bruised in the boots; and some were kept
awake by watchful soldiers for nine consecutive nights. It is not
surprising that nervous, sensitive men occasionally shrunk back in the
day of trial. The wonder is that so many stood firm.

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                           TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE


Punctuation has been normalized. Spelling and hyphenation have been
retained as they were in the original book, some of which would not be
considered standard.

Page headers have been represented as sidenotes.

Italicized phrases are presented by surrounding the text with
_underscores_.