As specimens of religious offences—a gentleman was prosecuted for bringing home a millstone on a Sunday; another, for gathering gooseberries in time of sermon. It was found regarding Patrick Wilson, that he had sat up with a company drinking till after cockcrow, consuming in all eleven pints—that is, about two dozen quart bottles—of ale; he had struck a man, and railed in his drink at several gentlemen of the parish. ‘The brethren ordained Patrick to stand in sackcloth two Sabbaths, and pay four merks penalty.’
The Lady Frendraught,[105] who now lived at Kinnairdie, in the parish of Aberchirder, is a conspicuous subject of the discipline of the Strathbogie presbytery, on account of her being a papist. To leave this inoffensive lady in the quiet exercise of her own religious forms was not within the capabilities of the Christian charity of that day. It is no over-statement of the case that this ecclesiastical body set themselves to simply harass her out of her peculiar convictions—or rather professions; for they seem to have been content when they could effect an external conformity, and the horrible guilt of forcing a fellow-creature into a mere hypocrisy, seems never to have been present to their minds.
1645.
So early as 1636, the synod had sent one of their number to deal with her, and induce her to go to church; for a time she conformed. Two years after, a similar visitation of the lady had become necessary; so she and her daughter Elizabeth were summoned for ‘not hearing of the word, and not communicating.’ What came of this does not appear; but in 1643, a deputation of ministers was sent to deal with her according to the ordinance of the General Assembly, and to report her answer. It was soon after reported that ‘she promised to hear the word, and desired a time for further resolution.’ It was then agreed to give her some short space to decide on becoming ‘a daily hearer,’ but ‘if she refused, the process to go on against her.’ The poor lady once more promised ‘to hear the word, as she had done before,’ and it was resolved to ask the advice of the General Assembly on the point. Years passed on, without bringing her further than to agree to go to the church which her husband frequented—which was out of the bounds of this presbytery. What immediately happened after this does not appear; but, on the presbytery resolving (January 1647) again to proceed against her ladyship, it was reported that she was out of the country. A few months later, the commissioners of the General Assembly ‘granted her liberty to be ane ordinar hearer of the word at Forgue for a time.’ This, however, did not stop the process. The lady was hunted into another presbytery, where she seems to have kept them at bay for a little while. In June 1648, Mr John Reidford reported that he had spoken her, but ‘found no effect of his travels;’ he required further time. Soon after, the same minister reported that on a second interview, she expressed herself as ‘willing to hear the word in any kirk save Aberchirder and such as are within the presbytery of Strathbogie.’ This was not to be endured. She was immediately summoned as a contumacious person. On the day of call, she ‘compeared not;’ and Mr John Reidford, her parish minister, proceeded to give from his pulpit, on successive Sundays, a series of three admonitions addressed to her; then, in like manner, a series of three prayers. As her ladyship continued to disregard all proceedings in her case, the presbytery prepared itself to pass the awful doom of excommunication, when, behold! another act of concession on her part stays all: she agrees to be present at family worship in her own house—her husband was all this time a leading Covenanter—and promised also to hear sermon; whereupon the sentence was suspended for a time. In August 1649, the minister Reidford reported that she had ‘keepit sermon at Innerkeithing the last Lord’s day, and daily keepit family worship.’ This was not enough. They instruct Reidford ‘to shew her that, if she did not conform in all points, the sentence of excommunication would be pronounced before the next assembly.’ Reidford soon after pleaded for her, that she had heard three sermons; but the brethren ‘thought not that kind of hearing satisfactory.’ They ordained him to put her to a decided test at once, by offering her the Covenant: failing her subscribing that, Reidford was to pronounce sentence.
1645.
The lady, with the ingenuity of her sex, contrived once more to put them off—she told Reidford she would take a thought about it. Meanwhile, she amused them with hopes by continuing to attend church; telling them ‘she was not fully satisfied for subscribing the Covenant.’ But even female wit could not hold out for ever against such a siege. In June 1650, after an incessant harassment of fourteen years, she gave them ‘satisfaction’ by subscribing the Covenant, and thus abjuring in words the faith she still held in her heart. Little more than two years had elapsed, when the presbytery learned that she had ‘relapsed to popery,’ and appointed commissioners to confer with her on the subject. It was found she was now obstinate in her original belief, ‘professing, moreover, that she repented of her former repentance more than of any sin that ever she committed, and thought that she had reason to repent all her lifetime for subscribing the National Covenant and Solemn League and Covenant.’ Then took place a renewal of the same tedious dealings with the lady, ending at last in 1654, in a peremptory order for her excommunication. By that time, however, excommunication had lost much of its terrors, as Cromwell, then master of Scotland, would not allow the sentence to have any consequences in respect of civil rights.
Many traits of barbarous manners occur in the record, shewing that the clergy had somewhat rough materials to deal with, in their efforts to build up a perfect system. Many offences of a violent, and even sanguinary character, are noticed. There were also several persons so far left to a wicked nature as to hold the dicta of the reverend presbytery itself in contempt. For instance, John Tulloch, on being summoned regarding an irregularity with Elspeth Gordon, answered, ‘the devil a care cared he for their excommunication; excommunicate him the morn [to-morrow] if they pleased.’ Three witnesses attested regarding James Middleton, that, on his being rebuked by the minister, they heard him say that ‘he cared not for him, nor any minister in Scotland;’ and when the minister threatened to put him in the jougs, they heard him say that ‘neither he nor the best minister within seven miles durst do so much.’ One William Gordon, in Dumbennan parish, declined (June 1652) the authority of the presbytery, in consideration of the many sad experiences he had had of the usurpation of civil power by the Presbyterian government, and its ‘tyrannous persecuting of men’s consciences who, out of tender scruples, did differ from their opinions in matters indifferent and circumstantial; as also, finding that the greatest part of their prayer and preaching doth more tender the advancement of their private interest and faction than the propagation of the gospel; and seeing their frequent railing against the authority and civil power which God hath set over us, whereby the people’s minds are kept unsettled and averse from the cordial union of both nations, which, by God’s great mercy, we are now like to enjoy.’ He declared himself separate from them, and that he would ‘no more esteem of their excommunication than they did formerly of the pope.’ On sentence of excommunication being passed on this recusant, ‘he lookit very frowardly, and uttered himself most proudly and maliciously.’
1645.
The opinion of the royalist party regarding the general condition of the nation at the time when the Covenanting spirit was at its height is sketched by one of their number. ‘Seven years,’ says he, ‘had this terrible distemper of the unparalleled Covenant ruled, or rather overruled this kingdom.... It was now grown to ane height, and had cast this nation in a new mould, for the laws were rolled up in oblivion, the College of Justice was discharged from sitting, and over all the land the ordinary seats of justice were no more frequented, only the private committees in every shire and county ordained what they list, and must not be controlled, under pain of a fearful plunder. Nor was it right or wrong that must be decided by these committees, but grievous exactions and heavy subsidies, with new stents, almost every quarter, of horse and foot levies.... The poor was not pitied nor the rich respected; the good man was not remembered nor the virtuous man rewarded: only the soldier was in esteem and enriched, who could murder, kill, and oppress.’—Pa. Gordon.
At the same time, the general expressions of the church of the day involve heavy charges against the clergy themselves, partly founded perhaps on actual offences in their case, and partly the result merely of the disposition to think every grace of poor human nature insufficient, in comparison with the ideal religious standard set up. Thus we find the Commissioners of the General Assembly denouncing ‘the enormities and corruptions observed to be in the ministry,’ and making out a list which is difficult to reconcile with our ideas of the boasted golden age of the Scottish Presbyterian polity. There is ‘much fruitless conversing in company,’ ‘great worldliness,’ ‘slighting of God’s worship in families,’ ‘want of gravity in carriage and apparel,’ ‘tippling and bearing company in untimeous drinking in taverns,’ ‘discountenancing of the godly,’ even a want of decent observance of the Sabbath. ‘There are also to be found amongst us [some] who use small and minced oathes.’[106]