Records of the Kirk of Scotland / containing the Acts and Proceedings of the General Assemblies from 1638 downwards, as authenticated by the clerks of assembly.

by Church of Scotland. General Assembly

[133] Burnet, p. 109.

[134] Dr M‘Crie’s Collection of Pamphlets, verified by certified copy among the Records of the Church.

[135] Folio MS., f. 46. There is no date to this Letter in the copy from which we transcribe; but it was probably written about the time the Assembly 1638 dissolved itself on 20th December, when the Supplication to the King from the Assembly was adopted, (vide p. 41 of these Records.) Baillie, in his 11th Letter, dated September 28, 1639, gives the following account of the reception of that Supplication; and it is interesting as an index to the state of feeling on the part both of the King and Covenanters. It is stated in the Folio MS., that the Supplication to the King was “sent up wᵗ Mr George Winrahame,” who was probably, therefore, the bearer both of it and of this Letter to Hamilton. Baillie says (vol. i. p. 150), “The Supplication which we decreed in the Assembly of Glasgow to be sent to the King, could hardly be got presented. However, many would have ventured to have gone with it though their heads should have gone therefor; yet understanding of the King’s wrath and the danger there was, even in peaceable times, for any subject to play the ambassador, or capitulate with the Prince when he did not call for or his council did not send up, which by law and his declared will is appointed to be his only informer in high points of state; also hearing oft words from court of great spite against the very lives of most of our nobles, gentry, and ministry, who were able to agent our business, it was resolved that none of note or parts should go up, without greater assurance of their return than could for that time be expected; and withal, a gentleman of the Marquis of Hamilton’s acquaintance, Mr George Winram, undertook, on all hazards, to deliver to the Marquis the Supplication, and, upon his refusal, to give it to the King himself. He was no worse than his word, as, indeed, some of our fair undertaking statesmen thereafter did prove. He went to Court, shewed the Marquis his errand. His Grace acquainted the King, who was pleased that it should be received. His Grace took it, and on his knee read it to his Majesty in the Council. The best answer it got was, ‘When they have broken my head, they would put on my cowl.’”

[136] It will be observed that there is a discrepancy as to Sessions and Dates during the earlier sederunts of the Assembly—the third being entirely omitted in this Report or blended with the second, while Baillie and the Clerk’s abstract give a different arrangement; but we deem it our duty to adhere inflexibly to the text as it stands.—Ed.

[137] This gentleman was son-in-law of the Bishop of Orkney.—Ed.

[138] The Deposition of the Bishop of Brechin is omitted in the Glasgow Folio MS., and is therefore supplied from Mr Laing’s Copy.

[139] “The Bishops’ Doom. A Sermon preached before the General Assembly which sat at Glasgow anno 1638, on occasion of pronouncing the Sentence of the greater Excommunication against eight of the Bishops, and deposing or suspending the other six. By Mr Alexander Henderson, moderator of that and several subsequent Assemblies. With a Postscript on the present decay of church-discipline. Edinburgh: Printed by John Gray and Gavin Alston. Sold by them at their printing-house in Jackson’s close, and by W. Gray bookseller in the east corner of the Exchange. MDCCLXII.

“Advertisement.—It must be observed in justice to the venerable author of the following sermon, that by the journal of the general assembly 1638, he had only allowed him from the evening of the preceding day to study that sermon. His thoughts, amidst such a multiplicity of work as was then on his hand, behoved also to be much perplexed; and his sermon, though subjoined at the end of that journal, seems only to have been taken down in the time of delivery by an amanuensis. Yet, mank as such a fragment is, it seems worthy of being preserved; and the same will, it is hoped, prove useful not only for vindicating the practice of that assembly, but also for stirring up others to attempt a faithful discharge of the like duty, upon grounds equally relevant, as necessary not only for reclaiming the impenitent, but also as an indispensable testimony to the truth of our Lord’s dominion over the Church.”

[140] Mr Stevenson, in his “History of the Church and State of Scotland,” (1753, et ann. sequen,) after giving the closing speeches of Henderson and Argyle, concludes his account of the Assembly, 1638, in these terms:—“The Assembly being thus happily concluded, Mr Henderson said—We have now cast down the walls of Jericho: let him that rebuildeth them beware of the curse of Hiel the Bethelite.” As Mr Stevenson does not state on what authority this is given, and as it is not mentioned in any other work that we have chanced to see, we merely add it in a note, (the expression being frequently referred to,) without having before us any contemporary voucher for its accuracy.

[141] Although Lowdoun and Johnston, as we have seen (vide their Speeches, Report, p. 167), attempted to explain away the effect of the several Acts of Parliament to which we refer, yet it is due to the truth of history to say, that there is no mistaking the tenor and effect of those Acts. By the 1st Act of King James VI., 18th Parliament (9th July, 1606), the power and prerogative of the King are declared “over all estates, persons, and causes whatsoever, within the said Kingdom.” And by the very next Act (2d), he is declared to be “Soveraigne Monarch, absolute Prince, Judge, and Governour over all persons, estates, and causes, both spiritual and temporall;” and, further, the previous Acts by which Bishops had been ousted or denuded of their titles, privileges, and benefices, are rescinded, and the order “restored and redintegrated,” to all intents and purposes. Again, in 1612 (23d Oct.), there is another Act, ratifying the ecclesiastical arrangements made by the packed and bribed Assembly at Glasgow in 1610, which were out-and-out Episcopalian. Furthermore, there was an Act, 26th June 1617, anent the election of Archbishops and Bishops; and, finally, on the 4th of August 1621, there was another Act of Parliament ratifying the 5 Articles of Perth, adopted by another packed Assembly in August 1618. All these statutes, and the surreptitious and corrupt Acts of Assemblies which they ratified, were doubtless infamous encroachments on the liberties of the subject and the legitimate laws of the Church; but still they were the law of the land, emanating from the supreme authority of Parliament, and which Parliament alone could rescind. Johnston (the Clerk of Assembly) said—“I know certainlie that this office of Bishop was never established by any Act of Parliament in Scotland;” and Lowdoun averred that “the Act 1612 does not ratifie that which is concludit in Glasgow Assembly which now is condemned; that ground being taken away, the ratification also falls.” Johnston’s statement is contradicted by the statute-book; Lowdoun’s statement and his inference are equally contradicted, and inconsistent with themselves; for, if the Act 1612 had not ratified the Acts of the Assembly 1610, how could the condemnation of these by the Assembly 1638, infer that the ratification thereby fell? There is reason to apprehend, that the Assembly of 1638 was mystified by such statements—the Acts of Parliament and Assembly not being then, as now, accessible to the community generally—and hence we may ascribe some of the stretches of ecclesiastical authority at that Assembly, to malinformation as well as to passion.