CHAPTER VI.
THE OLD SCOTTISH CONFESSION OF 1560.
Knox, in his 'History of the Reformation,' has stated that the preparation of this Confession was entrusted to the same six ministers who were commissioned to draw up the Book of Discipline—viz., Wynram, Spottiswoode, Willock, Douglas, Row, and himself.[102] It has been frequently taken for granted that the Confession was prepared and revised within four days after the formal charge to frame it was issued by the Parliament, and that the Book of Discipline was not ordered to be prepared till after the Parliament of 1560 was adjourned. It is evident, however, from the dates specified in the Introduction, and at the conclusion of the copy of the Book of Discipline engrossed by Knox,[103] that the original charge to frame it had been granted on the 29th April 1560, or just two days after the nobles and barons signed one of those "godly bands" or covenants[104] by which they pledged themselves to stand by each other in setting forward the Reformation of religion according to God's Word; and it can hardly be supposed that that book should have been taken in hand some months before the Parliament met, and that no attempt should have been made in this interval to prepare materials for the 'Confession of Faith.' Besides, Knox has not stated that within four days after the charge was formally issued the Confession was prepared, but only that it was presented, so that we may hold with Dr M'Crie that "the ministers were not unprepared for this task," which was then formally devolved on them by the Parliament. Knox has further stated that the Confession was accepted by the Parliament in the form in which it was laid before them without change of a single sentence.[105] Others supplement his statement by explaining that before it was publicly presented it was submitted privately to certain lords of Parliament, and by their direction was handed for revision to the rather time-serving Wynram and the anon Alleged Omission of a Chapter. time-serving and vacillating Laird of Lethington, who softened many harsh expressions in it, and even recommended the omission of a chapter or part of a chapter from it. This they say was a chapter bearing the title, "Of the obedience and disobedience due from subjects to magistrates."[106] But the chapter on the "Civil Magistrate" still found in the Confession treats so fully and expressly of the obedience due to magistrates, that it is difficult to see how place could ever have been sought for an additional chapter on the same subject. There may possibly at first have stood in the chapter still retained some such clause or sentence regarding the limits of obedience as we find in the corresponding chapter of some of the Genevan symbolical books,[107] and this may have been the matter deemed unfit to be "entreated of" at that time, and recommended by the revisers to be omitted; or it may be that, after all, their recommendation and the suggestions of the English ambassador on the subject were not followed in this instance, and that we have the chapter still as it was originally framed by Knox and his associates.[108]
In endeavouring to form an estimate of the real merits of this Confession, we must make due allowance for the circumstances in which it was composed. Even though we suppose that the materials of it had been collected beforehand, only four days seem to have been allowed to the committee to put them into final shape.
We must not look either on the one hand for an exhaustive and logical elaboration of the several doctrines of the system and nicely balanced statement of complementary truths, or on the other for a careful avoidance of incidental expressions which seem dogmatically to determine points not fully or directly handled in the places where we should have expected them to be so. Yet, if we make such due allowance, look at it from the proper point of view, and peruse the work not only in the now obsolete Scotch, but also in the neat Latin version which often accompanies it, and is said to have been the work of Archbishop Adamson,[109] we shall not Character of the Confession. hesitate to own that it holds a distinguished place among the Confessions of that age, and is a credit to our reformer and his associates. Coinciding not infrequently in expression and agreeing generally in its definitions of doctrine with the other Reformed or Calvinistic Confessions (an agreement which its framers explicitly testified by inserting among the subordinate standards of their church, first Calvin's Catechism, and a few years after the Later Helvetic Confession and the Heidelberg Catechism), the Scottish Confession of 1560 had characteristics of its own,—a framework rather historical than dogmatic, and a liberal and manly, yet reverent and cautious spirit. It probably contributed to mould the early Scottish theology into a form somewhat less minute and rigid than the Swiss, yet considerably less vague and indefinite than the earlier English.
The first topic deserving of notice, from the place it holds both in the preface and in the body of this treatise, is the distinct and hearty acknowledgment of the supreme authority of the written Word of God, or "the buiks of the Auld and New Testamentis," which books are briefly but sufficiently defined as those "quhilk of the ancient have been reputed canonicall."[110] In these they affirm "that all thingis necessary to be beleeved for the salvation of mankinde is sufficiently expressed," and to these they desire in all things to conform, protesting that, if any man should note any article or sentence in their Confession contrary to the Scriptures, and should "of his gentleness" admonish them of the same, they "do promise unto him satisfactioun fra the mouth of God, that is, fra His Haly Scriptures, or else reformation of that quhilk he sal prove to be amisse."[111]
The Fall and the Remedy.
In the opening chapter the unity and attributes of God, and the trinity of persons in the Godhead, are briefly but definitely treated of.[112] In subsequent chapters the divinity of our blessed Lord is fully asserted, and the "heresies of Arius, Marcion, Eutyches, Nestorius, and sik uthers as either did denie the eternitie of His Godhead, or the veritie of His humaine nature, or confounded them or zit devided them," are specifically rejected.[113] The second chapter treats of the creation and fall of our first parents, while the third treats of the effects of the fall in language no less explicit than that of the other Protestant Confessions, Lutheran and Reformed; and as it not only clearly embodies the teaching of our reformers on this subject, but gives a brief summary of their views regarding the application of the Gospel remedy, it may be as well I should quote it at length. It is as follows: "Be quhilk transgressioun, commonlie called original sinne, wes the image of God utterlie defaced in man, and he and his posteritie of nature become enimies to God, slaves to Sathan, and servandis unto sin.[114] In samekle that deith everlasting hes had and sall have power and dominioun over all that have not been, ar not, or sall not be, regenerate from above: quhilk regeneratioun is wrocht be the power of the Holie Gost, working in the hartes of the elect of God ane assured faith in the promise of God reveiled to us in His Word, be quhilk faith we apprehend Christ Jesus with the graces and benefites promised in Him."[115]
The Eternal Decree.
After this follow several chapters on the history of the promises of redemption, the preparation for the coming of the promised Redeemer, the dignity and constitution of His person, His incarnation, sufferings, and death, His resurrection and ascension, and the blessed effects resulting from them to His people. In another of these chapters distinct reference is made to "the eternall and immutable decree" from which the appointment of the God-man as our Redeemer, and "al our salvatioun springs and depends";[116] and in another all that is good in us is traced up to that decree of the eternal God who of mere grace elected us in Christ Jesus His Son before the foundation of the world was laid. The same mysterious subject is again referred to in the sixteenth chapter, which treats of the church, and, like the earlier Confession used by Knox's congregation at Geneva and our later Confession, identifies that invisible but real church, which is "the bodie and spouse" of Christ Jesus, with the elect of all ages, nations, and tongues, so that "as without Christ Jesus there is nouther life nor salvation, so sal there nane be participant therof bot sic as the Father hes given unto His Sonne," and who in time come unto Him.[117] Many individual expressions occurring in these chapters can be clearly traced to one or other of Calvin's Confessions, or to the earliest edition of his Institutes;[118] but the only Confession I can remember in which a similar, though shorter, history of the preparation for the coming Redeemer is Alasco's Influence. given, is the 'Summa Doctrinæ' of John Alasco,[119] which may be regarded as the Confession of Faith, not only of the ministers but also of the members of the church of the foreigners in London. Knox was brought into contact with them both in London and in Frankfort, agreed with them generally in opinion, and largely adopted their forms and arrangements in matters of worship and discipline.
A group of chapters[120] treats of the nature and work of the Holy Spirit, the cause of good works, the works which are reputed good, the perfection of the Law of God, and the imperfection of man. Those who have overlooked the explicit statement in the third chapter concerning the depravity of man have generally overlooked or failed to perceive the full significance of the emphatic statements in the twelfth chapter regarding our entire dependence for spiritual renovation, and all good, on the Holy Spirit. The words are: "Of nature we are so dead, so blind, and so perverse, that nether can we feill when we ar pricked, see the licht when it shines, nor assent to the will of God when it is reveiled, unles the Spirit of the Lord Jesus quicken that quhilk is dead, remove the darknesse from our myndes, and bowe our stubburne hearts to the obedience of His blessed will;"[121] and again, "As we willingly spoyle ourselves of all honour and gloir of our awin creation and redemption, so do we also of our regeneration and sanctification."[122] These statements, however they may be viewed by others, seem to me no less explicit than those of the later Confession, which have been sometimes contrasted with them. "This effectual call is of God's free and special Grace alone, not from anything at all foreseen in man, who is Justification. altogether passive therein until, being quickened and renewed by the Holy Spirit, he is thereby enabled to answer this call, and to embrace the Grace offered and conveyed in it."[123] The last of this group of chapters contains the fullest and most direct exposition the Confession embodies of the views of its framers in the article of Justification. It is as follows: "It behovis us to apprehend Christ Jesus with His justice and satisfaction, quha is the end and accomplishment of the Law, be quhome we ar set at this liberty that the curse and malediction of God fall not upon us, albeit we fulfill not the same in al pointes. For God the Father, beholding us in the body of His Sonne Christ Jesus, acceptis our imperfite obedience as it were perfite, and covers our warks, quhilk ar defyled with mony spots, with the justice of His Sonne."[124] To the same effect it is said in chapter xxv. that "albeit sinne remaine and continuallie abyde in thir our mortall bodies, zit it is not imputed unto us, bot is remitted and covered with Christ's justice."[125] It has been questioned, however, whether we have in these statements the doctrine taught generally in the reformed churches regarding the articulus stantis vel cadentis ecclesiæ. This can be a question only with those who forget that the church which received this Confession, and required her adult members to assent to the heads of it, appointed for the instruction of her youth the Catechism in which this doctrine of Calvin is stated in his own words; and that the very men[126] who in 1560 drew it up, in 1566, along with their brethren of the General Assembly, declared of the Later Helvetic Confession—which is admitted to contain what has been termed "the Lutherano-Calvinian view" of justification—that therein was "most faithfully, holily, piously, and indeed divinely explained" what they themselves had for eight years been constantly teaching, and still by the grace of God continued to teach, and that in consequence they felt constrained not only to express their approval, but their "exceeding commendation of every chapter and of every sentence," save the one relating to holidays.[127] It may be taken for granted that they knew their own meaning, and that of their Swiss brethren;[128] the more especially as in our day Stähelin, whose impartiality and historical reputation will not be challenged, has adduced the statement in chapter xv. as one of his proofs that Calvin himself could not have framed the Scotch Confession otherwise than Knox has done.[129]