Bad as were the other courts in Scotland at this time, there was at least a probability that even a Presbyterian might by accident escape if accused, but before the High Commission no such thing was known. If proof was wanting, the declaration and the oath of allegiance were always at hand; and as the conscientious adherents of that persuasion were well known when brought before them, their trial was as short as their fate was certain. The exorbitant assumptions of the prelates were for some time supported by Rothes, but at length so disgusted the nobility, and brought such odium upon the court, that few of them would countenance its proceedings. While the uniform and flagrant injustice of their sentences rendered men desperate, who, rather than answer their summons, suffered themselves to be outlawed, or withdrew into voluntary exile in Ireland; till, in little more than a year and a half, the detested Crail court, as it was commonly called,[[42]] sank first into contempt and then into disuse.
[42]. It was so called, because Sharpe, who was the author of the court, and took precedence of all its members, had been minister of Crail.
Presbyterians in the north of Ireland being at this time also subject to persecution from the bishops, the ministers pursued in one country sought occasionally refuge in the other. John Cruickshanks and Michael Bruce who had fled to Scotland this year, and were preaching with much success to the conventicles in the west, were in consequence denounced as rebels, (June 23,) and power given to the officers and the commanders of the forces to seize them.
While the High Commission was in its vigour, the privy council was thrown into the background; yet in its temporary shade it was not unmarked by streaks of persecution, equally vivid with any of the lineaments of its co-tyrannous judicatories. The declaration was forced by them upon all who held places of public trust; and their exertions were stimulated by a letter from the king, commanding that “upon no terms was any explication or declaration to be admitted upon the subscription of any;” yet some few of the royal burghs refused, and several of the shires hesitated; but a peremptory proclamation produced a very general compliance—for the conscientious demitted their offices, and the privy council supplied their places with successors who were less scrupulous. Nor did any of the burghs evince the smallest inclination to assert their rights or privileges, or persist in any election that was disagreeable to the managers.
His majesty likewise called their attention early this year to the fines imposed by Middleton’s act, which the Presbyterians were beginning to think had been forgotten, and for which leniency Lauderdale had received much unmerited credit. After several communications and delays, it was finally intimated, in the month of November, by proclamation, that the iniquitous imposition would be exigible—the first moiety at Candlemas, and the other at Whitsunday 1665.
Prohibited from preaching, several of the “outted” ministers who resided in Edinburgh, with others of those who feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name, were in the habit of meeting together in those days of sad calamity for social prayer in private houses. This, also, was a nuisance that required to be removed; and information having been given by the prelates or their underlings, the council issued a warrant to the magistrates of the city, “to cause search to be made anent the keeping of any such meetings, and that they acquaint the Lord Chancellor with what they discover, and the persons names, that order may be taken about the same.” This was followed by a mandate for all such ministers as had hitherto been allowed to remain by suffrance in Edinburgh, or any burgh, instantly to remove to the distances required by their former act, under the severest penalties of law. But the most nefarious of their acts, and one opposed to every good or amiable feeling of the human heart, was that of April 29, forbidding any contribution to be made, or money collected, for the relief of those who had been ejected from their livings, banished from their friends, and prohibited from settling in places where themselves or their families might have earned an honest subsistence. The proclamation bears strong marks that its authors were ashamed of so gross a violation of the dictates of common humanity. It is worded in such an ambiguous manner as to be capable of the most severe application, yet so as to be explained away when requisite. For jesuitical falsehood, and heartless tyranny, the production is matchless:—“The lords of his majesty’s privy council being informed that, without any public warrant or authority, some disaffected persons to the present establishment, presume and take upon them to require contributions from such persons as they please, and do collect sums of money, which are, or may be, employed for carrying on of their private designs, prejudicial to the peace of the kingdom and his majesty’s authority; and considering that such courses and underhand dealing may strengthen seditious persons in their practices and designs, to disturb the peace, if they be not timeously prevented: Therefore, in his majesty’s name, they do prohibit and discharge all persons whatsomever, to seek or demand any contributions or supply, or to receive any sums of money. As likewise discharge all persons to grant or deliver any contributions to any persons whosoever shall require the same, unless it be upon occasions as have been publicly allowed and known, and heretofore practised; and that they have a special warrant and allowance of the lords of the privy council, or lords of the clergy within whose dioceses these collections are to be made. With certification, that if they contravene, they shall be proceeded against as persons disaffected to the present government, and movers of sedition.”[[43]]
[43]. Too much liberality in Christians towards their brethren, or even pastors, suffering in the cause of Christ, is a fault of very rare occurrence. There they often withhold more than is meet, and find in their experience that it tendeth to penury; for the Lord has many ways of taking from his people the money they think they can employ better than by lending to him; and perhaps many of the excellent persons who in this reign suffered the spoiling of their goods, might have to regret that they had not more freely contributed to supply the wants of their more needy fellow-christians. But no man knoweth either love or hatred from outward dispensations; and it is impossible for others to say, whether as a rebuke or a trial, the persecutors were permitted to plunder the devoted south and west.
Shortly before the Restoration, and within the few years that had elapsed since it had pleased God to remove a great number of his most eminent servants, who had sustained the heat and burden of the day, during the troublous times of civil dissension, others had been honoured to suffer death, imprisonment, or exile for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ; and of those who remained, the prelates were extremely anxious to get rid. Among them, William Guthrie of Fenwick was too conspicuous to escape. He had, through the interposition of the Earl of Eglinton and the Chancellor, been allowed to continue so long, but the crowds who were attracted to his church from the neighbouring and even distant parishes, and the blessing of God which in a remarkable manner followed his preaching, provoked the jealousy of the prelates, particularly Archbishop Burnet, who, when requested by Glencairn to overlook him, displayed his inveteracy by replying—“That shall not be done; it cannot be; he is a ringleader and keeper up of schism in my diocese;” and Glencairn was not long dead before he was suspended by his Grace. Such, however, was the respect in which Mr Guthrie was held, that it was with difficulty he could find a curate to pronounce his sentence, and not till he had procured him a guard of soldiers and bribed him with the sum of five pounds. But Mr Guthrie strictly forbade any opposition, and rather called them to fasting and prayer. Early on the Sabbath on which his church was declared vacant, he preached, as usual, two sermons from the latter part of that text, Hosea xiii. 9, “O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thine help”—only had the whole service over before nine o’clock.
Shortly after, the curate with a party of soldiers arrived, and, leaving the privates outside, entered the manse with the officers. Rudely accosting Mr Guthrie, he told him that the bishop and committee, after much lenity shown to him for a long time, were constrained to pass the sentence of suspension against him for not keeping presbyteries and synods with his brethren, and for his unpeaceableness in the church, of which sentence he was appointed to make public intimation unto him, and for which he had a commission under the Archbishop of Glasgow’s hand. Mr Guthrie answered—“I judge it not convenient to say much in answer to what you have spoken; only whereas you allege there hath been much lenity shown toward me—be it known unto you, that I take the Lord for a party in that, and thank him for it; yea, I look upon it as a door which God opened to me for preaching this gospel, which neither you nor any man else was able to shut, till it was given you of God. And as to that sentence passed against me, I declare before these gentlemen—the officers of the party—that I lay no weight upon it, as it comes from you or those who sent you: though I do respect the civil authority who, by their law, laid the ground for this sentence; and were it not for the reverence I owe to the civil magistrate, I would not surcease my preaching for all that sentence. And as to the crimes I am charged with, I did keep presbyteries and synods with my brethren; but I do not judge those who now sit in these to be my brethren, but men who have made defection from the truth and cause of God: nor do I judge those to be free or lawful courts of Christ that are now sitting.
“And as to my unpeaceableness, I know I am bidden follow peace with all men, but I know also I am bidden follow it with holiness; and since I could not obtain peace without prejudice to holiness, I thought myself obliged to let it go. And as for your commission, to intimate this sentence, Sir, I here declare I think myself called by the Lord to the work of the ministry, and did forsake my nearest relations in the world, and give up myself to the service of the gospel in this place, having received an unanimous call from the parish, and been tried and ordained by the presbytery; and I bless the Lord he hath given me some success, and a seal of my ministry upon the souls and consciences of not a few that are gone to heaven, and of some that are yet on their way to it. And now, Sir, if you will take it upon you to interrupt my work among this people, as I shall wish the Lord may forgive you the guilt of it, so I cannot but leave all the bad consequences that follow upon it, betwixt God and your own conscience. And here I do further declare before these gentlemen, that I am suspended from my ministry for adhering to the covenant and work of God, from which you and others have apostatized.”