“An attempt was made to have another General Assembly at Edinburgh, July 1654; but before it was constituted, it was dissolved, as before, by the soldiers. Cromwell gave great support to the Protesters, and bore hard upon the Resolutioners.”[424]
In prosecuting our illustrative notices of its rapid decline, and fall, and abolition, by these concurrent circumstances, we are now relieved, in some measure, from adhering to the precise form of the Introductions to the Acts of each successive Assembly, which we have heretofore adhered to, and we are constrained to present the transactions for some years after the Assembly 1649 in a somewhat different shape—as a mere historical conclusion to the Acts of the Assemblies which are recognised; and although we shall give all the information we can glean connected with the Assemblies that were held subsequently, these, it must be remembered, have no such claim to the character of authenticity as that which belongs to the antecedent proceedings. The subsequent details, therefore, must be regarded, not as a record of the Acts of the Established Presbyterian Kirk, but as a mere historical sketch of Presbyterianism in Scotland, during a period of about five years. Presbytery remained, indeed, in a state of complete abeyance, as the Established Church Government of Scotland, during a period of forty years, when it was restored at the Revolution.
There are not, it is believed, any authorized minutes extant, of the Assemblies 1650, 1651, or 1652. The proceedings of the Commission of the General Assembly 1650, from July of that year to July 1651, fill a large volume of above 400 folio pages. A very few pages are extant of the Acts of the Commission of the Assembly 1651, (from August, 1651, to May 14, 1652,) not more than eleven pages. The Acts of the Commission of the Assembly, 1652, (from August, 1652, to May 30, 1653,) fill twenty-nine pages. The whole Acts and proceedings of these Commissions, from 1650 to 1653, could not be comprised in fewer than two very closely printed 8vo volumes of above 500 pages each. None of these Acts, although some of them are in print, ever possessed any authority except over a section of the Church, many of the other ministers and elders having protested against them, and held them to be null and void. Even, therefore, if these were accessible, (which they are not at present,) it would be altogether beyond the compass of this work to include them. Such of them, however, as we have been able to pick up from the controversial pamphlets and chronicles of the times, may be given in this supplement, not as being in any degree authoritative or legitimate Acts of the Kirk, but merely as illustrations of the history of those dark and troublous times.
The period to which our attention is now directed, is one which excites a painful interest. It is pregnant with lessons of infinite value: it presents the most humiliating views of human nature; and, while the hallowed name, and rites, and spirit of religion were desecrated by its pretended votaries—by the clergy of that age, in particular, without distinction of parties—these memorials present to view an incarnation of all the worst passions by which human beings are agitated.
“Each—for Madness ruled the hour—
Would try its own persuasive power.”
Referring to the Acts of the Assembly 1649 as the most unexceptionable record, both of its proceedings and the spirit by which it was actuated, it will be observed, that, at its close, it appointed the next meeting of an Assembly to be held at Edinburgh, the second Wednesday of July, 1650, having, as usual, named Commissioners to act during the interval which followed.
In order to pave the way for the various extracts subjoined, it seems proper to give an outline of some domestic occurrences in Scotland during the year 1649, which have not already been adverted to, but which are calculated to throw light upon the state of society in this country at the period alluded to.
A detail has already been given of the events by which Argyle and the Kirk gained a complete ascendency in the government of Scotland, to the exclusion of all the loyal and moderate men, of whatever rank or condition; and the power thus acquired was not permitted to slumber in a state of inactivity. The Whigamore Parliament, purged as it had been of every countervailing element, proceeded, in the beginning of March, to enforce the Act of Classes, (so called, from the classification of those who were excluded from the public service into various grades,) and they began with the highest functionaries of the State. The Earl of Crawford was removed from the office of Treasurer, and his place supplied by a commission, of which Argyle, Eglinton, Cassilis, and Burlie were the members; and Sir James Carmichael, the Deputy, was displaced, to make way for his own son, who was a minion of Loudoun’s, The Earl of Roxburghe was ousted as Lord Privy Seal, and the Earl of Sutherland substituted in his room. Cassilis and Lothian were appointed conjunct Secretaries in place of Lanerick, proscribed. Gibson of Durie was superseded, and Johnston of Wariston named Clerk-Register; and Thomas Nicolson supplied the vacancy created by Johnston’s promotion, in the office of Lord Advocate. They displaced no fewer than eight Judges of the Court of Session, and appointed others in their places. Lords Couper and Cassilis were appointed extraordinary Lords of Session, and the latter held no fewer than three of the highest posts in the executive departments of the State; and they ordained George Marquis of Huntly “hes head to be choped off from hes bodey, at the Crosse of Edinbrughe, one Thursday, the 22 of Marche, this zeire, wich wes performed”—the Duke of Hamilton, the Earl of Holland, and Lord Capell, having, on the 9th of that month, been subjected to the same penalties in England, for their resistance to lawless power; while three separate gifts and grants, in favour of Loudoun, were passed the first Exchequer day that was holden; and, in the north, about the same time, the Lord Reay and other loyalists were defeated and taken prisoners, and Inverness subjected to military conquest.[425]
Nor was the Commission of the Kirk supine at that dismal season. From the middle of September to the middle of October, it held a Visitation for Angus and Mearns: it deposed eighteen ministers, and suspended five for “insufficiencie for the ministrie, famishing of congregations, silence in the tyme of the leatte engagement against Englande, corruptions in life and doctrine, malignancie, drūkenes, and subscriving of a divisive band,” &c.[426] These were not the only ecclesiastical achievements of the Commission; for, besides several other depositions, a Committee of Assembly visited St Andrews, concussed Baron, one of the professors, to demit his office; and, by a system of terror, endeavoured to crush the seeds of malignancy among the teachers and youth in that university. Cant and Rutherford were the presiding spirits on those occasions: “Mr Samuell Rutherfurd [who] altho lousse in hes zouthe, hes beine from his first begining a suorne enimey to Monarchey, as hes wrettings testifie, [Lex Rex, &c.,] a hatter of all men not of hes oppinion, and one quho if neuer so lightlie offendit, vnreconcilable; woyd of mercey and charity, altho a teacher of both to others.”[427]