The abbot insisted that Knox should proceed to impugn the warrant which he had taken from scripture for his article. “Protesting,” said the Reformer, “that this mekle is win, that the sacrifice of the messe being denied by me to be a sacrifice propitiatorie for the sins of the quick and the dead (according to the opinion thereof before conceaved), hath no patron at the present, I am content to procede.”—“I protest he hes win nothing of me as yit, and referres it to black and white contened in our writing.”—“I have openlie denied the masse to be an sacrifice propitiatorie for the quick, &c., and the defence thereof is denied. And, therefore, I referre me unto the same judges that my lord hath clamed.”—“Ye may denie what ye pleis; for all that ye denie I tak not presentlie to impung; but whair I began, there will I end, that is, to defend the messe conform to my artickle.”—“Your lordship’s ground,” said Knox, after some altercation, “is, thatMelchizedeck is the figure of Christe in that he did offer unto God bread and wine, and that it behoved Jesus Christ to offer, in his latter supper, his body and blude under the forms of bread and wine. I answer to your ground yet againe, that Melchizedeck offered neither bread nor wine unto God; and, therefore, it that ye would thereupon conclude hath no assurance of your ground.”—“Preve that,” said the abbot. Knox replied, that according to the rules of just reasoning, he could not be bound to prove a negative; that it was incumbent on his opponent to bring forward some proof for his affirmation, concerning which, the text was altogether silent; and that until the abbot did this, it was sufficient for him simply to deny. But the abbot said, he “stuck to his text,” and insisted that his antagonist should show for what purpose Melchizedec brought out the bread and the wine, if it was not to offer them to God. After protesting that the abbot’s position remained destitute of support, and that he was not bound, in point of argument, to show what became of the bread and wine, or what use was made of them, Knox consented to state his opinion, that they were intended by Melchizedec to refresh Abraham and his company. The abbot had now gained what he wished; and he had a number of objections ready to start against this view of the words, by which he was able at least to protract and involve the dispute. And thus ended the first day’s contest.
When the company convened on the following day, the abbot proceeded to impugn the view which hisopponent had given of the text. He urged, first, that Abraham and his company had a sufficiency of provision in the spoils which they had taken from the enemy in their late victory, and did not need Melchizedec’s bread and wine; and, secondly, that the text said that Melchizedec brought them forth, and it was improbable that one man, and he a king, should carry as much as would refresh three hundred and eighteen men. To these objections Knox made such replies as will occur to any person who thinks on the subject. And in this manner did the second day pass.
When they met on the third day, the abbot presented a paper, in which he stated another objection to Knox’s view of the text. After some more altercation on this subject, Knox desired his opponent to proceed, according to his promise, to establish the argument upon which he had rested his cause. But the abbot, being indisposed, rose up, and put into Knox’s hand a book to which he referred him for the proof. By this time, the noblemen and gentlemen present were completely wearied out. For, besides the tedious and uninteresting mode in which the disputation had been managed, they could find entertainment neither for themselves nor for their retinue in Maybole; so that if any person had brought in bread and wine among them, it is presumable that they would not have debated long upon the purpose for which it was brought. Knox proposed that they should adjourn to Ayr and finish the dispute, which was refused by the abbot, who said he would come to Edinburgh for that purpose, provided he couldobtain the queen’s permission. Upon this the company dismissed.
The dispute was never resumed, though Knox says that he applied to the privy council for liberty to the abbot to come to Edinburgh for this purpose. Kennedy died in August 1564.It has been said that he was canonized as a saint after his death,[90] and Dempster makes him both a saint and a martyr.[91] I have not seen his name in the Romish calendar, but I find (what is of as great consequence) that the grand argument upon which he insisted in his disputation with the Reformer has been canonized.For in the calendar, at “March 25,” it is written, “Melchezedec sacrifeit breid and wyne in figure of ye bodie and bloud of our lord, whilk is offerit in ye messe.”[92] Doubtless, those who knew the very month and day on which this happened, must have been better acquainted with the design of Melchizedec, than either Moses or Paul.
The abbot, and his friends, having circulated the report that he had the advantage in the disputation, Knox, in 1563, published the account of it from therecords of the notaries, to which he added a prologue and short marginal notes. The prologue and his answer to the abbot’s first paper, especially the latter, are pieces of good writing.I have been the more minute in the narrative of this dispute than its merits deserve, because no account of it has hitherto appeared, the tract itself being so exceedingly rare, as to have been seen by few for a long period.[93]
Another priest who defended the Roman catholic cause at this time was Ninian Wingate. He had been schoolmaster of Linlithgow, from which situation he was removed by Spotswood, superintendent of Lothian, on account of his devoted attachment to popery. In the month of February 1562, he sent to Knox a writing, consisting of eighty‑three questions upon the principal topics of dispute between the papists and protestants, which he had drawn up in the name of the inferior clergy, and laity, of the catholic persuasion in Scotland. To some of these, particularly the questions which related to the call of the protestant ministers, the Reformer returned an answer from the pulpit, and Wingate addressedseveral letters to him, complaining that his answers were not satisfactory.These letters, with addresses to the queen, nobility, bishops, and magistrates of Edinburgh, Wingate committed to the press, but the impression being seized in the printer’s house, (according to bishop Lesley,) the author made his escape, and went to the continent.[94] Knox intended to publish an answer to Wingate’s questions, and to defend the validity of the protestant ministry; but it does not appear that he carried his design into execution.[95]
In the beginning of 1563, Knox went to Jedburgh, by appointment of the General Assembly, to investigate a scandal which had broken out against PaulMethven, the minister of that place, who was suspected of adultery.Methven was found guilty, and excommunicated.[96] Having fled to England, he sent a letter to the General Assembly, professing his willingness to submit to the discipline of the church, but requesting that the account of his process should be deleted from the records of the church.The Assembly declared that he might return with safety to his native country, and that he should be admitted to public repentance, but refused to erase the process from their minutes.[97] He afterwards returned to Scotland; and a severe and humiliating penance was prescribed to him. He was enjoined to appear at the church‑door of Edinburgh, when the second bell rang for public worship, clad in sackcloth, bareheaded, and barefooted; to stand there until the prayer and psalms were finished, when he was to be brought into the church to hear sermon, during which he was to be “placeit in the public spectakell above the peiple.” This appearance he was to make on three several preaching‑days, and on the last of them, being a Sabbath, he was, at the close of the sermon, to profess his sorrow before the congregation, and to request their forgiveness; upon which he was again to be “clad in his awin apparell,” and received into the communion of the church.He was to repeat this course at Dundee and at Jedburgh, where he had officiated as minister.[98] Methven went througha part of this humbling scene, with professions of deep sorrow; but being overwhelmed with shame, and despairing to regain his lost reputation, he stopped in the midst of it, and again retired to England.[99] Prudential considerations were not wanting to induce the reformed church of Scotland to stifle this affair, and to screen from public ignominy a man who had acted a distinguished part in the late reformation of religion. But they refused to listen to these; and by instituting a strict scrutiny into the fact, and inflicting an exemplary punishment upon the criminal, they “approved themselves to be clear in this matter,” and effectually shut the mouths of their popish adversaries.
The mode of public repentance enjoined on this occasion was appointed to be afterwards used in all cases of aggravated immorality.[100] There was nothing in which the Scottish reformers approached nearer to the primitive church than in the rigorous and impartial exercise of ecclesiastical discipline, the relaxation of which, under the papacy, they justly regarded as one great cause of the universal corruption of religion. While they rejected many of the ceremonies which were introduced into the worship of the christian church during the three first centuries, they, from detestation of vice, and a desire to restrain it, did not scruple to conform to a number of their penitential regulations. In some instances they might carry their rigour against offenders to anextreme; but it was a virtuous extreme, compared with the dangerous laxity, or rather total disuse of discipline, which has gradually crept into almost all the churches which retain the name of reformed: even as the scrupulous delicacy with which our forefathers shunned the society of those who had transgressed the rules of morality, is to be preferred to modern manners, by which the vicious obtain easy admission into the company of the virtuous.
“’Twas hard, perhaps, on here and there a waif,
Desirous to return, and not received: