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invaded this kingdom, desiring and requiring all not only not to join, act, or comply, with the enemy, but not to speak any good or favourable speeches of them, but exhorting all faithful and honest men to obey the lawful and just commands of the civil magistrate, for defence of our religion, king, and native country, against the enemies of them all, the sectaries, who have destroyed what was either pious, just, or honest, in their own country; and intend no less in this, if the Lord prevent it not, by animating all honest and godly people against them, excepting such as are excommunicate, profane, flagitious, or constant enemies of the Cause of God; read, voted, and passed." On the 12th of January, Middleton was relaxed from his excommunication, and did penance in sackcloth in the parish church of Dundee; and colonel Strachan was "excommunicated and delivered to the devil in the church of Perth the same day 1.

GUTHRIE, one of the ministers of Stirling, had made so much opposition to the Resolutions, that he and his colleague, Bennet, were cited to appear before the committee of estates at Perth, and ordered to remain warded in that town till his majesty's return from a progress to Aberdeen. This Guthrie was "a prime enemy to monarchy, a chief plotter of all the western remonstrance, division, and mischief, and a main preacher for the sectaries 2." On the 22d of February, they presented a protestation to the committee, in which they revive the old pretensions of their party, which had given king James so much trouble. "Whereas," they said, "the king's majesty and your lordships have been pleased upon a narrative relating to our doctrine and ministerial duties, to desire and require us to repair to this place against the 19th day of this instant; that after hearing of ourselves, such course may be taken as shall be found most necessary for the safety of that place wherein we serve in the ministry. Therefore, conceiving the judicatories of the church to be the only proper judges of our doctrine, and our carriage in those things that concern our ministerial calling; and we do for the respect we have to his majesty and your lordships' authority, compear at this time, being desirous to hear what is to be said unto us, and ready to answer thereunto; so we humbly protest, that our compearance is with preservation of the liberties and privileges of the church of Scotland, and of the ministers and servants of Jesus Christ, in these things that do relate to their doctrine and the duties of their ministerial function. And that though we be most willing

1 Balfour's Annals, iv. 236-240.

2 Ibid. iv. 248.

to render a reason of our writing to the General Assembly a letter, containing the grounds of our stumbling at the present resolutions of this kirk and state, in order to a levy, and of our preaching against these resolutions, as involving a conjunction with the malignant party in the land, which we hold to be contrary to the word of God, to the league and covenant, to our solemn engagements, and to the constant tenor of the declarations, remonstrances, warnings, causes of humiliation, and other resolutions of the kirk those years past; and to be destructive to the covenant and cause of God, and scandalous and offensive to the godly, and a high provoking the eyes of the Lord's glory. And of our protesting against an appealing from the desire and charge of the commission of the General Assembly in this particular, and in our persisting in preaching the same doctrine. Yet that our compearing before the king's majesty and your lordships doth not import an acknowledgment in us, that his majesty and your lordships are the proper judges in those things; and this protestation we make not for any disrespect to the king's majesty and your lordships' autho rity, not to decline or disobey the same in any thing civil, but from the tender regard which we have to the liberty and privileges of the church of Jesus Christ, which his majesty and your lordships and we are in a solemn way bound to maintain inviolable. We acknowledge that the king's majesty and your lordships are the lawful authority of the land, to whom we shall be most willing and ready to give obedience in all which we shall be commanded, according to the will of God; or if in any thing your commands shall fall out to be contrary to that rule, we shall patiently, in the Lord's strength, submit ourselves to any civil censure that ye shall think fit to inflict upon us. (Signed) Mr. James Guthrie, Mr. David Bennett.'

Guthrie's remonstrance was very ill received by the com mittee, and was sent to the commission of the kirk, requiring their opinion on it, and some ecclesiastical censure to be inflicted on the offenders. The commission condemned the remonstrance; but it was not for doctrine, but for sedition, that Guthrie and Bennet had been cited, although they contrived to make it appear that the committee had prosecuted them on that score. The commission acknowledged "that they do not find that the king's majesty and the committee of estates, in requiring the foresaid brethren to compear before them, or in ordaining them to stay at Perth or Dundee until a fuller meeting of the committee, have not trenched or encroached upon the liberties and principles of the kirk, or wronged the same in any ways; for, first, whereas in the first protestation, made upon the king and committee requiring the brethren to compear, and

their compearance, the ground of the protestation is laid down to be, that they were cited upon a narrative relating to their doctrine and ministerial duties, and that the judicatories of the kirk are the only and competent judges of these things. This is so far from evidencing any encroachment made by the king and committee upon the privileges of the kirk, that on the contrary, as thus laid down without any qualification, it importeth a great wronging of the just right of the civil magstrate, as if it were not proper to him in any case to judge of these matters, which is contrary to the doctrine of the whole reformed kirk in general, and particularly of this kirk of Scotland: to wit, that the civil magistrate has power and authority, and is obliged, in his civil and coercive way, to censure and punish idolatry, schism, unsound doctrine, ministers' neglect or perverseness in doing their ministerial duties and functions; and if he may and ought to censure and punish these things, may he not cite ministers to compear before him upon a narrative relating to things of that kind, without encroaching or wronging the liberties and privileges of the kirk?"

AND SO AFTER ALL the clamour that was made about the tyranny of the king and the bishops in trenching upon the liberties fo the kirk, she herself has voluntarily laid her liberties at the feet of a lay committee of the estates. It would be difficult to account for the inconsistencies of men, and especially of the presbyterian ministers, in this the "golden age of their church," upon any other principle than that which has been communicated to the church by the Holy Spirit, that He hath sent a strong delusion upon presbyterians to believe a lie. The act of classes still continued to operate against many gentlemen who were entitled by birth and abilities to serve in parliament and in the courts of law; but who, on account of their known loyalty and attachment to the king, were by the deluded patriots styled malignants. In order to have this act repealed, the king and estates proposed the following question to the commission of the kirk" Whether or not it be sinful and unlawful for the more effectual prosecution of the Public Resolutions, for the defence of the cause of the king and the kingdom, to admit such to be members of the committee of estates, who are now debarred from the public trust, they being such as have satisfied the kirk for the offence for which they were excluded, and are since admitted to enter into covenant with us." The commission shirked a direct answer under the allegation that on that subject their opinion was already known; but under such a general and ambiguous answer, the

1 Balfour's Annals, iv. 286-287

commission might afterwards censure and raise a clamour against the repeal, and, therefore, on the 23d of April, the committee wrote again, demanding a peremptory answer. Being so urged the commission then replied ". . . . As for the Solemn League and Covenant, the Solemn Acknowledgment and Engagement, and former declarations emitted by this church (which are set down as grounds in the narrative of the act of classes), we do find theydo not particularly determine any definite measure of time, of excluding persons from places of trust for by-past offences, but only bind and oblige accordingly to punish offenders, as the degree of their offences shall require or deserve, or the supreme judicatories of the kingdom, or others having power from them for that effect, shall judge convenient, to purge all judicatories and places of power and trust, and to endeavour that they may consist of, and be filled with, such men as are of known good affection to the Cause of God, and of a blameless christian conversation which is a moral duty commanded in the word of God, and of perpetual obligation, so that nothing upon the account of those grounds doth hinder, but that persons formerly debarred from places of power and trust for their offences, may be admitted to be members of the committee of estates, and the censures inflicted upon them by the act of classes may be taken off and rescinded without sin, by the parliament, in whose power it is to lengthen or shorten the time of those censures, as they shall think just and necessary." Inasmuch as these offences were of a religious nature, this recognition of the power of parliament is a regular homologation, as they call it, of erastianism; but let the kirk reconcile that with their denial of the supremacy of the crown. However, they concluded their permission with their usual condition, which to many operated as an effectual barrier," provided they be men that have satisfied the kirk for their offences, have renewed and taken the covenant, and be qualified for such places, according to the qualifications required in the word of God, and expressed in the Solemn Acknowledgment and Engagement1."

On receiving this document the parliament repealed the most unjust, arbitrary, and disloyal act of classes, by which, those who were excluded from their seats in parliament were restored, and those who had been dismissed or rendered incapable of holding public offices were declared to be capable of

1 Wodrow's Introduction, vol. i. p. 3; Glasgow Edition, 1838.-Cruickshank's Hist. State and Sufferings of the Church of Scotland, 1749, vol. i. 51.—Balfour's Annals, iv. 301-306.

serving his majesty in any capacity; but not, however, as lord Clarendon says, till they were obliged "to stand publicly on the stool of repentance, in acknowledgment of their former transgressions." Guthrie and Gillespie, with their party, the REMONSTRATORS, were mightily offended at their brethren in the commission, and at the parliament; and they howled out their complaints and maledictions on both parties from their pulpits, which at that time were the usual places for advertisements and public information. They maintained, that to take in men of known enmity to the Cause, was in some sort to betray it, because it was giving them the power to play the traitor; and to admit them to a profession of repentance was a profanation and a mocking of God, as their compliance was a sham to enable them to get into commands, and therefore a blessing could not be expected on an army so constituted1." BEFORE THE COMMISSION rose they drew up a short exhortation and warning to the ministers and professors, dated Perth, 30th of March, in which, after much lamentation for the sins of

the land, they say, "Let us wait upon Him who hideth himself from the house of Jacob; let us cry unto the Lord of Hosts, who hath delivered us, and doth deliver us [from prelacy], and in him let us trust that he will yet deliver us [from the sectaries]; though for a small moment he hath forsaken us, yet with great mercies he will gather us." They likewise say"If you tender true religion, you see how the sectaries shew themselves plain enemies thereto, and maintain that impious monster of toleration, though religion were not the question. Let loyalty to your king, the only king in the world who is in a religious covenant with God and his people, animate you against those who are his enemies, because he is a king, and because covenanted." The remonstrators appear to have been in a minority in this meeting, for the "commission inhibited and discharged all ministers to preach, and all ministers and professors to detract, speak, or write, against the late public Resolutions 2."

IN JULY, THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY met at St. Andrews, when Guthrie and his party protested against the late resolutions, and against the Assembly itself, as not being a lawful and free meeting. The Assembly cited the protesting ministers, deposed three of them, and suspended one; and Baillie affirms that "Mr. James Guthrie, and Mr. Patrick Gillespie, are going on with their work to destroy our state and rend our kirk." Guthrie desired the prayers of Gillespie and his other pro

Burnet's Own Times.

Balfour's Annals, iv. 318-328.

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