JAMES STUART, son to Mary Stuart queen of Scotland, was in his youth educated by the famous Buchanan, and brought up in the true reformed Protestant Presbyterian religion, then established in Scotland, which was by him more than once ratified when he was in his swaddling cloaths, as one well observes, Christ reigned in Scotland in his minority. The church had its various turns according to the dispositions of the regents, the king's favourite flatterers and court-parasites; but whenever he began to think of obtaining the crown of England, he began to introduce Episcopacy into the church of Scotland to gain the English nation. And though he was a habitual gross swearer, and such a master of dissimulation, that what he exalted at one time he set himself to destroy at another, he carried still a face of religion in profession while in Scotland. The church had many struggles, sometimes Israel, and sometimes Amalek prevailed; but as soon as he ascended the throne of England, he wholly assumed an arbitrary power and absolute supremacy over the church, which before he had long grasped at. And though he had sworn to maintain the Presbyterian form of church-government and discipline, &c. his desire of unlimited authority made him now relish Episcopacy to the highest degree: the bishops were his creatures. By bribery, falsehood and persecution he introduced prelacy into Scotland, created such bishops whom he knew would stick at nothing to serve his purpose. Such as opposed his measures in both kingdoms, especially Scotland, shared deep in his persecuting vengeance, some were imprisoned, others deprived of their offices, while numbers fled to foreign countries where they might serve God with a safe conscience. Toward the end of his reign he waxed still worse:—a high commission court was by him erected 1610: a set of wicked profane bishops installed about 1618, by the help of whom and other corrupt clergy, he got the five articles of Perth agreed to by a patched assembly that year—in 1621. He got them ratified by act of parliament, and then they began to be pressed with rigour. In England matters were but little better: a declaration was emitted for using sports and gaming on the Lord's day after sermon, which profanations continue there to this day. He had before wrote against the pope, threatening a malediction upon any of his posterity that should apostatize to popery; but now he hastened toward Rome; for, upon the match of his son with France, he agreed to the following articles, That all laws formerly made against popery should not be executed: 2. That no new laws should be made against Roman Catholics, but they should have a free toleration in England, Scotland and Ireland.—At the same time, to the arch-bishop of Embrun he acknowledged the pope's authority, and it is said, concluded on a convocation for that purpose at Dover or Boloign, in order to effect a more full toleration for papists. By his management in favours of popery, his son-in-law the Protestant king of Bohemia lost a kingdom.—In Scotland, several were incarcerate and fined for non-conformity. He had commanded Christmass communion to be kept at Edinburgh; but, by the Lord's immediate hand in the plague, he was in that defeated. The next year being 1624, he resolved to have it kept with great solemnity; but before that he was cut off on March 27, by what they call a Quartan ague, in the 59 year of his age[274], but (rather of poison as has been supposed) with such suspicious circumstances, says a historian, as gave occasion of inquiry into the manner of his death, in the first two parliaments of his son; all which came to nothing by their sudden dissolution—Welwood's memoirs, Calderwood, Burnet, Bennet's memorial of Britain's deliverances, &c.
PATRICK SCOTT, a gentleman in Fife, being a violent enemy to the cause of Christ and religion, after he had wasted his patrimony, had to take himself to several wretched shifts at court; and amongst others set forth a recantation under the name of Mr. David Calderwood then under banishment; in which, it was thought, he was assisted by the king. But this project failing, he set off for Holland in quest of Mr. David, with a design, as appeared, to have dispatched him. But providentially he was detained at Amsterdam till he heard that Mr. Calderwood was returned home. This made him follow. After which he published a pamphlet full of lies, intituled, Vox vera, but as true as Lucian's Historia. But after all his unlawful ungodly shifts, he became so poor (and at last died so miserable) that he had nothing to bury him: so that the bishop had to contribute as much as got him laid below ground for the good service he had done the king and bishops.—Calderwood.
Mr. WILLIAM FORBES (perhaps a son of the forementioned Forbes) was first made doctor in Aberdeen 1621 and 1622. When the people of Edinburgh had made choice of faithful Mr. Andrew Cant for their minister, the provost sent and brought this Forbes, as one whom he and the episcopal faction knew would please the king, and in this they succeeded to their desire; for he was not only a violent presser of Perth articles, but he also preached up Arminianism, and essayed to reconcile the papists and the church of Scotland together anent justification. And when complained of by some of the bailies and citizens of Edinburgh, all the redress they got was to be brought before the council and by the king's order handled severely by fining and banishment. When Charles I. came to Edinburgh 1633, he erected a new bishoprick there, to which he nominated this Forbes for bishop as one staunch to his interest. No sooner got he this power than he began to shew his teeth by pressing conformity both by word and writing, and for that purpose sent instructions to all the presbyteries within his jurisdiction. The people of Edinburgh were also threatened by the bishop's thunder; for on the first communion finding them not so obsequious as he would have had them, he threatened that, if life was continued, he should either make the best of them communicate kneeling or quit his gown; and who doubts of his intention to do as he had promised? But he soon found he had reckoned without his host; for before he could accomplish that, God was pleased to cut him off on the 12th of April following by a fearful vomiting of blood, after he had enjoyed this new dignity about two months. Burnet says, he died suspected of popery.—Burnet's history, and Stevenson's history, vol. 1.
Mr. JOHN SPOTISWOOD was first minister at Calder; but by his undermining practice he got himself wrought into the bishoprick of Glasgow, and a lord of the session, 1609. From thence he jumped into the arch-bishoprick of St. Andrews 1615, and aspired still higher till he was made chancellor of Scotland. He was a tool every way fit for the court measures, as he could be either papist or prelate, provided he got profit and preferment. When in France with the Duke of Lenox, he went to mass, and in Scotland he had a principal hand in all the encroachments upon the church and cause of Christ from 1596 to 1637. And for practice a blacker character scarcely ever filled the ministerial office. An adulterer, a simoniack, a drunkard tippling in taverns till midnight, a profaner of the Lord's day by playing at cards and jaunting through the country, a falsifier of the acts of assembly, a reproacher of the national covenant;—for which crimes he was excommunicated by that venerable assembly at Glasgow 1638; after which, having lost all his places of profit and grandeur, he fled to England (the asylum then of the scandalous Scots bishops) where he died about the year 1639, in extreme poverty and misery; according to Mr. Welch's words, He should be as a stone cast out of a sling by the hand of God, and a malediction should be on all his posterity;—which all came to pass; his eldest son a baron came to beg his bread; his second son, president of the session, was executed in Montrose's affair; his daughter who married lord Roslin, was soon rooted out of all estate and honours. Their fruit shalt thou destroy from earth, and their seed from amongst the children of men[275].—Calderwood, Stevenson, &c.
JOHN LOGIE student in the university of Aberdeen, was such a malignant enemy to the work of reformation and the national covenant, that when commissioners were sent from Edinburgh there in the year 1638, in order to reconcile them to the covenant, while Mr. Henderson was preaching in the earl Marshal's closs for that purpose, he threw clods at them with great scorn and mockery. But in a few days, he killed one Nicol Ferrie a boy, because the boy's father had beat him for stealing his pease; and tho' he escaped justice for a time, yet he was again apprehended and executed in the year 1644. Such was the consequence of disturbing the worship of God and mocking the ambassadors of Jesus Christ.—Stevenson, &c.
CHARLES I. succeeded his father James VI. and exactly trod in the same steps, and with no better success. He grasped at the prerogative; and to establish absolute power, prelacy, superstition and Arminianism seemed his principal aim.—In England he infringed the liberties of parliament, and by his marriage the nations became pestered with papists: in Scotland he pressed Perth articles, the service book, and then, by Laud's direction, the book of canons which he and the rest of the bishops had compiled for them about 1637, contrary to his coronation-oath taken at Edinburgh 1633. But in these he was repulsed by the Scots covenanters 1639 and 1640.—Again, when he was confirming all oaths, promises, subscriptions and laws for establishing the reformation in the Scots parliament 1641, in the mean time, he was encouraging his Irish cut-throats to murder betwixt two or three hundred thousand innocent Protestants in Ireland, the letters that he had sent for that purpose being produced afterward. After his return to England, matters became still worse betwixt him and the English parliament; so that both parties took the field, in which by his means a sea of innocent blood was spilt, the Scots assisting the parliament as bound by the Solemn League, that he might overturn the covenanted interest in that land. Notwithstanding all his solemn engagements, oaths and confirmations of acts of parliament, by his direction, Montrose was sent down from court to raise an insurrection in the Highlands; by whom the bloody Irish were invited over, whereby in a few years many thousands of the covenanters his best subjects were killed.—But all his bloody schemes for overturning that covenanted interest that he had so solemnly bound himself to defend and maintain, proving abortive, he fell at last into the hands of Cromwel and the Independent faction, who never surceased, till they brought him to the block, Jan. 30. 1649. At his death, notwithstanding his religious pretences, (being always a devotee of the church of England) he was so far from repentance, that he seemed to justify the most part of his former conduct[276]—Civil wars of Gr. Br., Bailie's let., Bennet, Welwood and Guthrie's memoirs, &c.
JAMES, Duke of Hamilton, though none of the most violent prosecutors of the malignant interest against the reformation, yet was always one who conformed to his master Charles 1st's measures, and was by him sent down commissioner to the assembly 1630, which he commanded to dissolve (though they did not obey) and left it. He published the king's declaration against the covenants and covenanters. And though none of the most rigid, yet he may be justly accounted the head of the malignant faction in Scotland, from 1638 to 1648, since he, contrary to the solemn league and covenant, raised a large army in Scotland and went to England in behalf of the king. But he was shamefully defeated by Cromwel, and taken prisoner to London. After some time's confinement he was executed.—Bailie's Letters, Civil Wars, &c.
JAMES GRAHAM, Earl, afterwards Marquis, of Montrose, in the year 1638, took the covenanters side, was a prime presser of the covenants, was one of the commissioners sent to Aberdeen 1638 for that purpose, and in 1639, was sent north to suppress the malignant faction of the Huntleys. The same year he was ordered north again to quell Aboyn and the Gordons, which he routed at the bridge of Dee. He commanded two regiments of the covenanters under general Lesly for England 1640, and led the van of the army for England. But shifting sides 1643, he offered to raise forces for the king, came from court, and set up the king's standard at Dumfries. From thence he went to the north and joined M'Donald with a number of bloody Irishes, where they plundered and wasted the country of Argyle, marched southward and gained six battles over the covenanters, viz. at Trippermoor, Aberdeen, Inverlochy, Alfoord, Aldearn and Kilsyth, where many, some say, thirty thousand of the Covenanters were killed. But at last was defeated at Philiphaugh by Lesly 1645. For this conduct he was excommunicated by the general assembly. He went abroad and there remained till the year 1650, that when the treaty was on the very anvil with Charles II. he received another commission from him to raise a new insurrection in the north, but was defeated by colonels Strahan, Ker, and Halkel, and afterwards taken in the laird of Ason's ground, and brought to Endluish, where he was condemned to be hanged on a gallows thirty feet high two hours, and then quartered, and his legs and arms hung up in the public places of the kingdom, May 21st, 1650. Mr. Blair and some other ministers were sent to him to use means to persuade him to repentance for his former apostate and bloody life, but by no means could they persuade this truculent tyrant and traitor to his country to repent. He excused himself, and died under the censure of the church, obstinate and utterly impenitent.—Montrose, Guthrie, and Blair.
WILLIAM MONRO, a kind of gentleman in the parish of Killern, was a hater of God and every thing religious; for while Mr. Hog was minister there sometime before the restoration, a gentleman in the parish having one of his family dead, intended to bury in the church; but, this being contrary to an act of the general assembly, Mr. Hog refused it. But Monro, being a brisk hectoring fellow, promised to make their way good in spite of all opposition. Accordingly, when they came to the church door, Mr. Hog opposed them: whereupon Monro laid hands on him to pull him from the door; but Mr. Hog, being able both of body and mind, wrested the keys from the assailant, telling him, that if he was to repel force by force, perhaps he would find himself no gainer: withal, telling the people, that that man had grieved the Spirit of God, and that they should either see his speedy repentance, or then a singular judgment upon him. He went on in his wicked courses a few months, till in one of his drunken revels, he attacked a mean man, and threw him in the fire. The poor man in this extremity drew out the wretch's own sword, and thrust it through his belly; on which his bowels came out, and so he expired in a miserable condition.—Memoirs of the life of Mr. Hog.
JOHN, Earl of Middleton, at first lifted arms with the covenanters, and had a share of the victory of the Gordons at the bridge of Dee. Yea, he was so zealous in that profession, that one time having sworn the covenants, he said to some gentlemen present, that it was the pleasantest day he ever saw, and if he should ever do any thing against that blessed day's work, he wished that arm (holding up his right arm) might be his death. But finding presbyterian discipline too strict for a wicked vitious life, he shifted sides and became major general to duke Hamilton 1648, and came upon a handful of covenanters at a communion at Machlin muir; and, contrary his promise, killed a number of them. He became a great favourite of Charles II. and laid a scheme to take him from the convention of estates to the north to free him of any further covenant engagements, for which he was excommunicated by the church; and though the sentence was taken off upon his feigned repentance, yet it was never by him forgot, till he got the blood of the pronouncer, Mr. Guthrie. After the restoration, he was advanced to great honour, and sent down commissioner to the parliament 1661, where he got the covenanted work of reformation wholly overturned by the infamous act rescissory,—oath of allegiance,—act establishing episcopacy and bishops in Scotland,—the act against the covenants, &c. But this would not do; he must have a glut of the blood of Argyle and Mr. Guthrie: and more, he behoved to come west, and grace that drunken meeting at Glasgow by whom several hundred of the faithful ministers were thrust out. From thence he arrived at Air, where he and some more drunken prelates drank the devil's health at the Cross in the middle of the night. It were endless almost to sum up the cruelties by his orders exercised upon those who would not conform to prelacy for the space of two years; in so much that he imposed no less than the enormous sum of one million seventeen thousand and three hundred and fifty pounds in the parliament 1662 of fines. So that in the south and western parts of Scotland, men either lost their consciences or their substance. But being complained of at court, that he had amerced large sums into his own hands, he hastened up, but was but coldly received by the king, (who had now got his turn done by him) Lauderdale being now his rival: He lost his office and honour, and lived sober enough, till as an honourable kind of banishment, he was sent off as governor to Tanguirs on the coasts of Africa; but he lived but a short and contemptuous life there, till the justice and judgment of God overtook him; for, falling down a stair, he broke the bone of his right arm; at the next tumble the broken splinter pierced his side; after which he soon became stupid, and died in great torment. This was the end of one of those who had brought the church of Scotland on her knees by prelacy.—Wodrow.