Then the marquis accompanied with several noblemen and gentlemen mounted in black, with his cloke and hat on, went down the street, and mounted on the scaffold with great serenity and gravity, like one going to his Father's house, and saluted all on it. Then Mr. Hutcheson prayed, after which his lordship delivered his speech, in which among other things he said, "I come not here to justify myself, but the Lord, who is holy in all his ways, righteous in all his works, holy and blessed is his name. Neither come I to condemn others. I bless the Lord, I pardon all men, and desire to be pardoned of the Lord myself. Let the will of the Lord be done, that is all I desire.——I was real and cordial in my desires to bring the king home, and in my endeavours for him when he was home, and had no correspondence with the adversaries army, nor any of them when his majesty was in Scotland, nor had I any hand in his late majesty's murder. I shall not speak much to these things for which I am condemned, lest I seem to condemn others.—It is well known it is only for compliance, which was the epidemical fault of the nation; I wish the Lord to pardon them. I say no more——but God hath laid engagements on Scotland. We are tied by covenants to religion and reformation, those who were then unborn are yet engaged, and it passeth the power of all the magistrates under heaven to absolve from the oath of God. These times are like to be either very sinning or suffering times, and let Christians make their choice, there is a sad dilemma in the business, sin or suffer, and surely he that will choose the better part will choose to suffer, others that will choose to sin will not escape suffering. They shall suffer, but perhaps not as I do (pointing to the maiden) but worse. Mine is but temporal, theirs shall be eternal. When I shall be singing, they shall be howling. Beware therefore of sin, whatever you are aware of, especially in such times.—And hence my condition is such now, as, when I am gone, will be seen not to be as many imagined. I wish, as the Lord hath pardoned me, so may he pardon them, for this and other things, and what they have done to me may never meet them in their accounts.——I have no more to say, but to beg the Lord that when I go away, he would bless every one that stayeth behind."
When he had delivered this his seasonable and pathetic speech, which with his last words is recorded at length in Naphtali[101]. Mr. Hamilton prayed, after which he prayed most sweetly himself, then he took his leave of all his friends on the scaffold. He first gave to the executioner a napkin with some money in it; to his sons in law Caithness and Ker his watch and some other things out of his pocket, he gave to Loudon his silver penner, to Lothian a double ducat, and then threw off his coat. When going to the maiden, Mr. Hutcheson said, My lord, now hold your grip sickker.——He answered, "You know Mr. Hutcheson, what I said to you in the chamber. I am not afraid to be surprised with fear." The laird of Shelmerlie took him by the hand, when near the maiden, and found him most composed. He kneeled down most cheerfully, and after he had prayed a little, he gave the signal (which was by lifting up his hand), and the instrument called the maiden struck off his head from his body, which was fixed on the west end of the tolbooth, as a monument of the parliaments injustice and the land's misery. His body was by his friends put in a coffin and conveyed with a good many attendants through Linlithgow and Falkirk to Glasgow, and from thence to Kilpatrick, where it was put in a boat, carried to Denune, and buried in Kilmunn church.
Thus died the noble marquis of Argyle, the proto-martyr to religion since the reformation from popery, the true portrait of whose character cannot be (a historian[102] says I dare not) drawn. His enemies themselves will allow him to have been a person of extraordinary piety, remarkable wisdom and prudence, great gravity and authority, and singular usefulness. He was the head of the covenanters in Scotland, and had been singularly active in the work of reformation there, and of any almost that had engaged in that work he stuck closest by it, when most of the nation quitted it very much, so that this attack upon him was a stroke at the root of all that had been done in Scotland from 1638, to the usurpation. But the tree of prelacy and arbitrary measures behoved to be soaked when planting, with the blood of this excellent patriot, staunch presbyterian, and vigorous assertor of Scotland's liberty, and as he was the great promoter thereof during his life, and stedfast in witnessing to it at his death, so it was to a great degree buried with him in Scotland, for many years. In a word, he had piety for a christian, sense for a counsellor, carriage for a martyr, and soul for a king. If ever any was, he might be said to be a born Scotsman.
The Life of Mr. James Guthrie.
Mr. James Guthrie son to the laird of Guthrie (a very honourable and ancient family) having gone through his course of classical learning at the grammar school and college, taught philosophy in the university of St. Andrews, where for several years he gave abundant proof that he was an able scholar. His temper was very steady and composed; he could reason upon the most subtle points with great solidity, and when every one else was warm his temper was never ruffled. At any time when indecent heats or wranglings happened to fall in when reasoning, it was his ordinary custom to say, "Enough of this, let us go to some other subject; we are warm, and can dispute no longer with advantage." Perhaps he had the greatest mixture of fervent zeal and sweet calmness in his temper, of any man in his time. But being educated in opposition to presbyterian principles he was highly prelatical in his judgment when he came first to St. Andrews, but by conversing with worthy Mr. Rutherford and others, and especially through his joining the weekly society's meetings there, for prayer and conference, he was effectually brought off from that way, and perhaps it was this that made the writer of the diurnal (who was no friend of his) say, "That if Mr. Guthrie had continued fixt to his first principles, he had been a star of the first magnitude in Scotland." Whenas he came to judge for himself, he happily departed from his first principles, and upon examination of that way wherein he was educated, he left it, and thereby became a star of the first magnitude indeed. It is said, that while he was regent in the college of St. Andrews, Mr. Sharp being then a promising young man there, he several times wrote this verse upon him,
If thou, Sharp, die the common death of men,
I'll burn my bill, and throw away my pen.
Having passed his trials, anno 1638, he was settled minister at Lauder, where he remained for several years. Anno 1646, he was appointed one of those ministers who were to attend the king, while at Newcastle, and likewise he was one of those nominated in the commission for the public affairs of the church, during the intervals betwixt the general assemblies. And in about three years after this, he was translated to Stirling, where he continued until the restoration, a most faithful watchman upon Zion's walls, who ceased not day and night to declare the whole counsel of God to his people, shewing Israel their iniquities, and the house of Jacob their sins.
After he came to Stirling, he again not only evidenced a singular care over that people he had the charge of, but also was a great assistant in the affairs of the church, being a most zealous enemy to all error and profanity. And when that unhappy difference fell out with the public resolutioners, he was a most staunch protestor, opposing these resolutions unto the utmost of his power, insomuch as after the presbytery of Stirling had wrote a letter to the commission of the general assembly, shewing their dislike and dissatisfaction with the resolutioners, after they had been concluded upon at Perth Dec. 14. 1650. Mr. Guthrie and his colleague Mr. Bennet went somewhat further, and openly preached against them, as a thing involving the land in conjunction with the malignant party, for which by a letter from the chancellor they were ordered to repair to Perth on Feb. 19th, 1651, to answer before the king[103] and the committee of estates for that letter and their doctrine: but upon the indisposition of one of them, they excused themselves by a letter, for their non-appearance that day, but promised to attend upon the end of the week. Accordingly on the 22d they appeared at Perth, where they gave in a protestation; signifying, that although they owned his majesty's civil authority, yet was Mr. Guthrie challenged by the king and his council for a doctrinal thesis which he had maintained and spoken to in a sermon,——whereof they were incompetent judges in matters purely ecclesiastical, such as is the examination and censuring of doctrines,—he did decline them on that account[104].