ICONOCLASTIC ZEAL IN THE NORTH.
"The high altar at Aberdeen"—so we read in Douglas's East Coast of Scotland, published at the end of last century—"a piece of the finest workmanship of anything of the kind in Europe, was hewn to pieces in 1649, by order of the parish minister. The carpenter employed for this infamous purpose, struck with the noble workmanship, refused to lay a tool on it; till the more than Gothic priest took the hatchet from his hand, and struck the first blow." Elsewhere Douglas, who displays a heart hatred of the image-breakers, remarks that, "so violent was the zeal of that reforming period against all monuments of idolatry, that perhaps the sun and moon, very ancient objects of false worship, owed their safety to their distance."