HEAVY HITTING.
Here Sir John looked very indignant, then went on in a calmer tone: “What I cannot understand is, that ministers above all others should object to their own rights being protected. The principal uproar has been about some ministers who were appointed to parishes, but the people would not receive them, and even the presbytery refused to ordain them. Now, especially in the Church of Scotland, every student before he is licensed to preach the gospel has had a complete college education, and several years’ training in the divinity halls, and has undergone successfully very searching examinations conducted by eminent professors, and has, moreover, under presbyterial superintendence gone at least creditably through trials for licence, which included sermons on texts assigned to him. Could anything further be desired as a safeguard against unfit men being allowed to be ministers? It is from such that the patron, who is generally the largest proprietor in the parish, and has therefore the greatest interest in it, must make a selection and present a minister to a vacant parish church, not unfrequently to the church in which he worships. Well, these ‘Evangelicals’—ministers themselves, remember—wish it to be in the power of the members of a church (and you know what a mixture the membership is, of all sorts and conditions—good and indifferent, not to say bad) to reject the minister appointed by the patron,—a minister trained as I explained before,—and possibly from whim, or spleen, or spite at the patron, to object to his settlement, which can only be done by objecting to his preaching; and to prove their case, I grieve to say, they do not scruple at condemning his services as unedifying, or uninteresting, or unintelligible (very likely to them), or even unsound,—set them up for judges!—and do all in their power to blast the minister’s prospects. Does it not strike you, Mr. Martin, as something very strange that ministers should desire to commit themselves to such tribunals in preference to the existing ones?”
I was at a loss what to say and how to get out of the difficulty, when Sir John began again with great animation: “What they aim at seems to be a sort of preaching competition, where the man who has the knack of tickling the ears, or wheedling the affections, or flattering the vanities of a congregation, would certainly outweigh the man of more solid parts. The result would be that young ministers would prepare one or two taking sermons, and thereby secure parishes; and what ought to be a congregation of devout worshippers would become a congregation of critics; and some fussy nobody, by dint of sheer impertinence, would set himself—ay, even herself—up as ‘grieved at the prospect of the incalculable injury to be done to the highest interests of the parish,’ and with a long face say ‘she felt it her duty, her bounden duty, her painful duty,’ and stuff of that sort. Dissenting churches have oftener split on the election of preachers than any other thing, and bitter and disgraceful results have followed. In such cases votes are counted, not weighed. I know of a little insignificant ‘bodie,’—his neighbours called him ‘Little Gab,’—a creature who was in misery through his indolence and his intermeddling with other folk’s affairs to the neglect of his own. He was a Dissenter, and at the meetings for choosing a minister in the chapel he went to, he chattered and moved and objected and protested, and was so often on his feet with his ‘Moderator, I move,’ ‘Moderator, I object,’ ‘Moderator, by the forms of procedure, page, etc.,’ that he provoked a smart word from one of their best men every way—in education, position, and judgment. This set the bodie fairly up, and although he richly deserved more than he got, he spoke so glibly that he saddled the church with a minister of whom the late Dr. Hunter, on hearing his first sermon after his ordination—generally a man’s best—said to a friend as they came out of the church, ‘Ye’ll get that ane to bury.’ But that is by the bye.”
LITTLE GAB.
As Sir John now looked to me to say something, I merely added, “That was like the doctor. I think I know the church you refer to; Little Gab was a waspish bodie.”
He at once resumed: “I am surprised that a man of good sense and sound judgment like Mr. Barrie should be misled by the noisy demagogues—many of them otherwise good men, but on this subject perfect fanatics. I spoke to him on the subject the other night, but made no impression. Have you remonstrated with him? Did he say anything on the subject to you to-night?”
I told him what had passed at the manse. When he heard of Mr. Barrie’s firm resolve, he said very excitedly: “It’s utter folly—it’s sheer madness—it’s social suicide, bringing ruin on his family for a mere phantom of excited sentimentality! Let them stay in the Church and use constitutional means to reform abuses, if any exist. The Church of Scotland has had an honoured past, and must have a glorious future. They vowed to maintain and defend her; they are trying to divide and weaken her. Can they not wait patiently until events are ripe? Progress in a complicated body such as a church is gradual, and should be deliberate. The leaders of this movement are principally men who have risen to ecclesiastical eminence by their popular gifts. Not a few of them fought bitterly against the Dissenters in the Voluntary controversy (which, by the bye, seems shelved for good and all; the pace was too quick to last), and now they urge their brethren to secede if their absurd demands are not immediately conceded. I much doubt if the noisiest now will be the first to come out. If they do, I would not wonder to see them the first to rush back again, and change their ‘Retract! no, not a hair’s-breadth!’ into a breakneck stampede, in which they will crush past their deluded followers, and whine pitifully for pardon and place. The State has treated them well, too well, and is entitled to have its conditions fulfilled. They want the pay and the place, but kick at the terms—wish these all one-sided; and when the law steps in with quiet dignity and strict justice to protect the rights of proprietors, ministers, and people alike, and to insist on these being administered according to express statute, the men who vowed to abide by the law either set it at nought, or demand its subservience to their revolutionary ideas. They wish liberty without control, privileges without conditions, and power to exercise despotism without appeal. And because they cannot get it,—because they should not get it,—because, having respect to the welfare alike of Church and State, they must not get it, they keep crying out about tyranny and treason, and ‘spiritual independence,’ and what not.”
Sir John paused for a little, and I thought he had finished, but something seemed to strike him, and he at it again:
VIALS OF WRATH.
“By the bye, these folks call themselves the Non-Intrusion party. Was ever name so outrageously violated? Is a proprietor an intruder on his own estate? Only a desperate poacher would say yes. Is a man an intruder in his own house? None but a burglar would think so. Is a mother an intruder in her own nursery? Only a vile and cruel nurse, caught in the act of ill-treating the children, would have the audacity to conceive of such a monstrous anomaly. Yet these intruding non-intrusionists say to the State that fostered them and supports them, and that only wishes to have its fundamental principles respected, like the poacher, ‘Be off! you have no right here;’ like the burglar, ‘I want this, and will have it by hook or by crook’—crook should be put first; and like the nurse, ‘Get out of this nursery! you have no business here. I’ll do what I like, and if you oppose me I’ll take the children away from you.’ I may be carried away by the strong convictions that force themselves on me as I consider the whole proceedings, the wily, oily sophisms of these non-intrusionists; but excuse me, Mr. Martin, for saying that they should take Judas for their patron, and Herod the king—any of the Herods they like—for their foster-brother.”