[198] The jest attributed to Queen Elizabeth that she had made a bishop but marred a good preacher shows this.
[199] In the chief towns, just as in Geneva, there seems from early times to have been a common or "general session," although there were several congregations in each, as in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, and Perth.
[200] Even the Second Book of Discipline does not sharply distinguish between the lesser and greater eldership or presbytery; and Gillespie admits they were not distinguished in the primitive church, though he holds that both were needed in Scotland to do the work which the one presbytery did in the primitive church (infra, pp. [230]-[233]).
[201] [The Book of Common Order distinguishes between the weekly meeting of the ministers and elders in their assembly or consistory, and the weekly meeting of the congregation for the interpretation of the Scriptures (Dunlop's Confessions, ii. 411-413; Laing's Knox, iv. 177-179). For the nature and object of the exercise see infra, pp. [170]-[173].]
[202] [The bull, which is printed in Concilia Scotiæ, ii. 3, is dated "xiiij kalendas Junij pontificatus nostri anno nono," i.e., the 19th of May 1225.]
[203] See Schenkel's article, "Kirche," in Herzog's Real-Encyklopädie.
[204] Dunlop's Confessions, ii. 68; Laing's Knox, ii. 110.
[205] See Calvin's Institutes, book iv. chap. ii.—"As no city or village can exist without a magistrate and government, so the Church of God stands in need of a spiritual polity of its own. This is altogether distinct from the civil government, and is so far from hindering or impairing it, that it rather does much to aid and promote it."
[206] Dunlop's Confessions, ii. 413; Laing's Knox, iv. 203.
[207] Dunlop's Confessions, ii. 414-417; Laing's Knox, iv. 204-206. If this humanity is not observed in private as well as in public, there is danger lest instead of discipline we fall into a kind of Gehenna, and instead of correctors and educators become executioners of the brethren (Calvin).