And huffingly doth this bonny Scot ride.
Bonny Scot, we all witness can,
That England hath made thee a gentleman.'
—(Vol. vi. 191.)
During the years that followed the union of the crowns, Scotland made considerable material progress, though still troubled by occasional disorder. The strife which for ages had made the border a theatre of desolation and rapine came, to a great extent, to an end, and signs of good husbandry and growing comfort began to appear in this wild district. The great house of Huntly, 'the cock of the North,' and the terror of the Reformation party, was balanced by the rival house of Argyle, and the barbarous Highlands were reduced in some degree to subjection to the Crown. The wealth of Scotland increased apace under the influence of trade comparatively free; and the political consequences were important in weakening the connection of the country with France. At the same time, the authority of the law, which, since the death of Murray, had been feeble, began to be again vindicated. The following, from a contemporary eye-witness, will show the progress of this revolution:—
'The Islanders oppressed the Highlandmen; the Highlanders tyrannized over their Lowland neighbours; the powerful and violent in the country domineered over the lives and goods of their weak neighbours; the Borderers triumphed in the immunity of their violences to the ports of Edinburgh; that treasons, murthers, burnings, thefts, reifs, heirships, hocking of oxen, breaking of mills, destroying of growing corns, and barbarities of all sorts were exercised in all parts of the country—no place nor person being exempt or inviolable—Edinburgh being the ordinary place of butchery, revenge, and daily fights.... These and all other abominations, which, settled by inveterate custom and impunity, appeared to be of desperate remeid, had been so repressed, punished, and abolished by your Majesty's care, power, and expenses, as no nation on earth could now compare with our prosperities.'—(Vol. vi. 283.)
Yet, though Scotland was growing in wealth, and the authority of the Crown was increasing, the nation, during the last years of this reign, abounded in discontent and disorder. The Scots seem to have felt bitterly the transference of their ancient Royal House to an alien and lately hostile country; and though they had no affection for James, they resented the visible loss of the monarchy. A High Commissioner and Council at Edinburgh could not supply the place of the sovereign; the evils of absenteeism began to be felt in the capital and the rural districts; and complaints were made that what had been a kingdom was now treated as a subject province. Dissatisfaction of this kind, however, was small, compared to the angry sentiments engendered by the long-standing quarrel between James and the Presbyterian clergy. Puffed up by the oriental flattery of the courtiers and prelates at Whitehall, that sagacious ruler formed the design of revolutionizing the Kirk in Scotland, and of restoring the mode of Church government which the Reformation had violently overthrown; and he proceeded to his work with a timid arrogance which provoked contempt and indignation alike. Many circumstances concurred to second a purpose, which in the next generation was to culminate in disaster and ruin to the House of Stuart. The pretensions of the Presbyterian ministry had disgusted many moderate persons; their despotic claims to spiritual domination had aroused the jealousy of the national estates; a large party among the nobility were ready to comply with the wishes of James; and though the nation was fanatically Protestant, a minority of it had no sympathy with what they thought was sacerdotal tyranny. The result was that, without seeming difficulty, Episcopacy was again set up in Scotland; the king was enabled to boast complacently that he had built up the chief pillar of the throne, and he even succeeded in introducing innovations into the simple ritual which had been established after the Reformation. James, however, prudently abstained from allying aristocratic selfishness with popular feeling, and did not venture to lay hands on the forfeited possessions of the Church, long in the ownership of lay families; and, on the whole, notwithstanding the tone of pompous dictation assumed by him, he avoided wounding powerful class interests when he insisted upon the return to 'Prelacy.' His bishops, indeed, were very different personages from the mitred tyrants who, a century before, had lorded it over thousands of vassals, and had exasperated Scotland by their pride and wickedness. They were, for the most part, needy and insignificant men, who thought a great deal more of 'making ends meet,' and of winning the royal ear by adulation, than of asserting the claims of the Church, and they had little in common with the class of the Beatons. Mr. Burton gives us a most interesting account of their difficulties and privations, and of the ignoble means some of them took to keep up their state. We quote an anecdote to that effect:—
'When I was in England his Majesty did promise to me the making of two serjeants-at-law, and I travailed with some to that effect, with whom I covenanted, if they were made serjeants by my means they should give me eleven hundred pounds sterling the piece, and the projector a hundred pounds of it for his pains. Now I have received ane letter, that these same men are called to be serjeants, and has received his Majesty's writ to that effect, and desires me to write to them anent that indenting. I beseech you to know if his Majesty's will is I be paid by that course or not.'—(Vol. vi. 265.)
This change, however, though it did not provoke a violent revolution in Scotland, created a large amount of discontent. The Presbyterian clergy declared that the Kirk had been contaminated and profaned; they kept up a sullen agitation; and many of their congregations only awaited an opportunity to revolt openly. Whenever James paid a visit to his Scottish dominions, which he occasionally did, his devout respect for the Anglican ritual, his reverence for 'my Lords, the Bishops,' and his assiduous care about forms and vestments, aroused indignation and contempt, and before his death it had become evident that a great religious movement was at hand. The King, however, continued to avert a passionate explosion during his life; he avoided acts of high-handed oppression; and it is remarkable that he expressed an unfavourable opinion of the wrong-headed personage who in the next reign was to precipitate the catastrophe and bring his son to ruin. We quote James's account of the character of Laud:—
'The plain truth is, that I keep Laud back from all places of rule and authority because I find he hath a restless spirit, and cannot see when matters are well, but loves to toss and change, and to bring things to a pitch of reformation floating in his own brain, which may endanger the steadfastness of that which is in a good pass, God be praised. I speak not at random. He hath made himself known to me to be such a one; for when, three years since, I had obtained of the Assembly of Perth to consent to five articles of order and decency in correspondence with this Church of England, I gave them promise by attestation of faith made, that I would try their obedience no further anent ecclesiastic affairs. Yet this man hath pressed me to incite them to a nearer conjunction with the liturgy and canons of this nation.'—(Vol. vi. 339.)