[38] His works that are now extant, make two folio volumes.—His treatise, de jure regni apud Scotos, was condemned by act of parliament, about two years after his death, which happened at Edinburgh on the 28th of September, 1582. These pamphlets going under the name of the witty exploits of George Buchanan, seem to be spurious, although it is true he pronounced many witty expressions, many of which have (I suppose) never been committed to writing, and some of which I could mention, were it here necessary.
[39] Mira et vera relatio de Davidis Black transmigratione in cœlestem patriam.
[40] Mr Robert Montgomery, minister in Stirling, had made a simoniacal purchase of the Arch-bishopric of Glasgow from the earl of Lennox, for which he was to give him five hundred pounds sterling of yearly rent. Accordingly on the 8th of March 1582. Montgomery came to Glasgow, with a number of soldiers, and pulled the minister in the pulpit by the sleeve, saying, "Come down sirrah;" the minister replied. "He was placed there by the kirk, and would give place to none who intruded themselves without order." Much confusion and bloodshed ensued in the town. The presbytery of Stirling suspended Montgomery, in which the general assembly supported them: Lennox obtained a commission from the king to try and bring the offenders to justice. Before that commission court met, the earls of Marr and Gowrie, the master of Oliphant, young Lochlevin, &c. carried the king to Ruthven castle, and there supplicated him to revoke his commission to Lennox, which he did: and the king ordered him to leave the country, which, after some delays, he also did, retiring to Berwick. Afterwards two persons concerned in the affair at Ruthven, were charged to leave the realm upon pain of corporal punishment, because the council had adjudged that affair to be treason against the king and government. The earl of Gowrie was ordered to leave the kingdom, notwithstanding he had, at the command of the council, confessed that the fact at Ruthven was treason.
[41] The persons concerned in the raid of Ruthven, assembled an army at Stirling and took the castle, from thence they sent a supplication to the king to redress their grievances. In the mean time, the earl of Gowrie, lingering about Dundee was apprehended and committed to prison, which discouraged the party at Stirling very much, so that they fled in the night, and got to Berwick; the captain of the castle and three others were hanged; Gowrie was likewise executed on the 2d of May 1584.
[42] Bennet, in his memorial, says, That while he (James) grasped at arbitrary power, to which he discovered an inclination thro' the whole of his reign, it has been observed, and not without good reason, that he made himself mean and contemptible to all the world abroad, though affecting to swagger over his parliament and people at home, which he did in a manner that was far from making or showing him great.
[43] Mr James Melvil was confined at last to Berwick, where he ended his days, Jan, 1614.
[44] The epigram is as follows,
Cur stant clausi Anglis libri duo, regia in arca,
Lumina cæca duo, pollubra sicca duo?
Num sensum, cultumque Dei tenet Anglia clausum,
Lumine cæca suo, sorde sepulta suo?
Romano et ritu, dum regalem instruit aram
Purpuream pingit religiosa lupam.
[45] Spotswood doth not ascribe any thing of the form of presbyterian church government to Mr. Knox, because they admitted of superintendents in the church in his time, which he thinks was Episcopacy: but says, That Mr. Andrew Melvil brought this innovation (as he is pleased to call it) from Geneva about the year 1575. Hist. p. {illegible} &c.
[46] The Protestation offered to the estates convened in Parliament at Perth, in the beginning of July, anno 1606.