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miles in a winter night, yet when he came to the place, | of the world, call me to preach upon tops of mountains, he always missed his prey. I have known Mr Welsh ride three days and two nights without sleep, and preach upon a mountain at midnight on one of the nights. He had for some time a dwelling-house near Tweedside, and sometimes when Tweed was strongly frozen, he preached in the middle of the river, that either he might shun the offence of both nations, or that two kingdoms might dispute his crime." After all his dangers, he died peaceably in his bed in London, on the 9th January 1681.

The intrepidity and self-possession of this worthy minister, to which, no doubt, under Providence, he owed many of his escapes, are illustrated by the following anecdote :-On one occasion, being pursued with unrelenting rigour, he was quite at a loss where to flee, but depending on Scottish hospitality, he called at the house of a gentleman of known hostility to field-preachers in general, and to himself in particular, though he had never seen Mr Welsh before. He was kindly received. In the course of conversation, Welsh was mentioned, and the difficulty of getting hold of him. "I am sent," said Welsh, "to apprehend rebels: I know where he is to preach to-morrow, and will give you the rebel by the hand." The gentleman, overjoyed at this news, agreed to accompany his informant next morning. When they arrived, the congregation made way for the minister and his host. He desired the gentleman to sit down on the chair, at which, to his utter astonishment, his guest of the previous night stood and preached. During the sermon, the gentleman seemed much affected; and at the close, when Mr Welsh, according to his promise, gave him his hand, he said,-" You said you were sent to apprehend rebels, and I, a rebellious sinner, have been apprehended this day."

There is only one instance recorded in which Welsh spoke in a prophetic or foreboding strain, but it is one of the most remarkable we have met with. A profligate youth at the University of St Andrews, who had come to hear Mr Welsh preach, threw something at him in mockery, which struck him. Mr Welsh paused, and before the whole multitude, which was very large, said, "I know not who has put this public affront on a servant of Jesus Christ; but be he who he may, I am persuaded there will be more present at his death than are hearing me preach this day!" It turned out to be a son of Sir James Stanfield of Newmilns, near Haddington; and, strange to say, some years after, this unhappy youth was executed for the murder of his own father!

As a specimen of the manner in which the loyal and - peaceable Presbyterians who suffered at this period vindicated themselves, we might refer to the case of Mr Archibald Riddel, brother to the Laird of Riddel, who was charged, in 1680, with preaching at conventicles. Mr Riddel denied that he had been preaching in the fields, but allowed that he had done so in private houses, while the people stood without doors. Preaching even in private houses, without the consent of the incumbent of the parish, was now accounted high treason, as well as preaching in the fields. "Will you be content," said the Lord Advocate, "to engage not to preach in the fields after this?" "My Lord, excuse me," said Riddel, "for I dare not come under any such en gagement.' "This is strange," observed the Advocate, that Mr Riddel, who has had so much respect to authority as not to preach in the fields since the indemnity, will not, out of the same respect, be content to engage to behave hereafter as he has behaved heretofore." "My Lord Advocate, I can answer somewhat for the time past, but not for the time to come; I have not, since the indemnity, judged myself under a necessity to preach out of a house; but I know not but He who has called me so to preach, may, before I go out

"

yea, upon the sea; and I dare not come under any engagements to disobey his calls." "If I were of Mr Riddel's principles," said the Advocate," and did judge in my conscience that the laws of the land were contrary to the laws of God, and that I could not conform to them, I would judge it my duty rather to go out of the nation and live elsewhere, rather than disturb the peace of the land by acting contrary to its laws." "My Lord," replied Mr Riddel, "if I do any thing contrary to the laws, I am liable to the punishment due by the law." "That is not sufficient," said the Advocate; "a subject that regards the public good of the land, should, for the peace and welfare thereof, either conform to the law, or go out of the land." The reply of Mr Riddel to this reasoning, which has been the con venient logic of persecuting governments at all times, is worthy of notice. " My Lord, I doubt that argument would militate against Christ and his apostles as much as against us; for they both preached and acted otherwise, against the laws of the land; and not only did not judge it their duty to go out of the land, but the apostles, on the contrary, reasoned with the rulers,Whether it be better to obey God or man, judge ye.' "Will you promise not to preach in the open fields?" cried the judge from the bench. "My Lord, I am willing to undergo what sufferings your Lordship will be pleased to inflict on me, rather than come under such an engagement."

The other case to which we here advert is that of Alexander Hume of Hume, in 1682. This worthy gentleman, whose only real offence consisted in his having attended conventicles, was accused, without any proof, of having had intercourse with some of the rebels; and indeed it was part of the cruel mockery of justice then practised, to insert as a preamble in every indictment against the Presbyterians, all the insurrec tions that had taken place, with the murder of Archbishop Sharp, though they bad nothing more to do with these acts than the judges who sat on the bench before them; a practice resembling that of the bloody inqui sitors of Spain, who clothed the victims whom they condemned to the fire for heresy with cloaks, on which hideous likenesses of monsters and devils were painted, to inflaine the bigotry and quench the sympathy of the spectators. It is said that a remission of Mr Hume's sentence came down from London several days before his execution, but was kept up by the Earl of Perth, a bigoted Papist and persecutor; and when his lady, Isobel Hume, fell on her knees before Lady Perth to entreat for her husband's life, urging that she had five small children, she was repulsed in the most insulting manner, and in terms which cannot here be repeated. On the scaffold, this pious and excellent sufferer vindicated his character from the aspersions of those who had thirsted for his blood. "The world represents me as seditious and disloyal," he said, "but God is my witness, and my own conscience, of my innocency in this matter. I am loyal, and did ever judge obedience unto lawful authority my duty, and the duty of all Christians. I was never against the king's just power and greatness; but all a Christian doth must be of faith, for what clasheth with the command of God cannot be our duty; and I wish the Lord may help the king to do his duty to the people, and the people to do their duty to the king." He then said,-" My conscience bears me witness, I ever studied the good of my country. I hope I shall be no loser that I have gone so young a man off the stage of this world, seeing I am to make so blessed an exchange as to receive eternal life, the crown of glory. I bless His name he made me willing to take share with his persecuted people; for I hope I shall also share with them in their consolations. Farewell all earthly enjoyments; farewell my dear wife and children-dear, indeed,

unto me, though not so dear as Christ, for whom I now suffer the loss of all things; I leave them on the tender mercies of Christ. And now, O Father, into thy hand I commend my spirit; Lord Jesus, receive my soul!" When the rope was put about his neck, he concluded by singing the last verse of the 17th Psalm,

"But as for me, I thine own face

In righteousness will see;

And with thy likeness, when I wake,

I satisfied shall be."

These instances are sufficient attestations of the fact, that there were many among the Presbyterians who suffered at this period perfectly unimpeachable in their loyalty, and whose only crime, even in the judgment of their accusers, was, that they would not, and could not, comply with the dictates of human authority when these conflicted with the Divine. And they show the falsehood of the pretence set up by the persecutors, that none were condemned during this period for their religion, but simply for sedition and rebellion. It is certain that there were some who went the length of disowning Charles and all his minions, and did not scruple to do so in the face of their persecutors; but the examples we have given (and many more might have been added) are sufficient to prove that, even in the case of those who went this length, it was not simply because they refused allegiance to the tyrant that they were condemned to die, but that they would have suffered with equal certainty, though they had professed the utmost loyalty, provided they qualified that profession by declaring that they could not obey him in matters of religion.

At the head of those who set the authority of the government at defiance, and disowned all allegiance to the civil rulers, stood Richard Cameron. He was originally of the Episcopal persuasion, but having been led to hear the Gospel preached in the fields, he forsook the eurates, and took license from the outed ministers. He entered on his labours with all the ardour of a new convert, who, tracing his first serious impressions to field-preachings, could not bring himself to think with patience of those who availed themselves of the Indulgence. Finding that he could not help preaching against it, though he had come under a promise to refrain from it, he retired for a time to Holland, but returned after the stipulated period, in 1680, burning with a desire to disburden his conscience. His sermons were filled with predictions of the fall of the Stuarts, and the sufferings of Scotland which would precede it. But his course was brief; for in July of that same year, Bruce of Earlshall, a violent persecutor, came upon him and his followers with a troop of dragoons, at a meeting held in a desert place called Airsmoss. On seeing the enemy approach, and no way of escape, the people gathered close around their minister, when he offered up a short prayer, repeating thrice the memorable words," Lord, spare the green, and take the ripe!" He then turned to his brother Michael, saying "Come, let us fight it to the last; for this is the day that I have longed for and the death that I have prayed for-to die fighting against our Lord's avowed enemies; and this is the day we will get the crown." And there, accordingly, he died, fighting manfully back to back with his brother. The enemy, foiled in their object, which was to bring him to an ignominious end, wreaked their vengeance on the inanimate body of the hero. They cut off his head and hands, and carried them to his father, who was then confined in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, tauntingly inquiring if he knew to whom they belonged. "I know them, I know them," said the poor old man; are my son's, my dear son's. Good is the will of the Lord, who cannot wrong me nor mine." They were then fixed upon one of the ports of the city, the hands

"they

close to the head, with the fingers upwards, as if in the posture of prayer. "There," said Sir Robert Murray, "there's the head and hands of a man who lived praying and preaching, and died praying and fighting."

In the same skirmish at which Cameron fell, David Hackston of Rathillet was taken prisoner. Having been one of those present, though not active, at the death of Archbishop Sharp, a large reward was offered for his apprehension; and having fallen into the bands of his enemies, they determined to pour upon him all the vials of their wrath and revenge. Upon his trial, he boldly refused to own that the bishop's death was murder; and he was the first of those who, at the bar, openly declined the king's authority, as a usurper of the prerogatives of Jesus Christ. Being brought to the scaffold, first his right hand was struck off and then his left; he was then drawn by a pulley to the top of the gallows, and suffered to fall with all his weight three times; while yet alive, his heart was torn out of his body, and then-but we refrain from adding more. Even at this distance of time, the flesh creeps, and the blood runs cold, at the bare recital of the cruelties perpetrated, under the sacred name of justice, on this unhappy gentleman,

Had our space permitted, we might have spoken of Donald Cargill, who was executed about the same time; Alexander Peden, and other remarkable characters of the period. We shall only observe regarding them, that as the persecution waxed hot, they became more distinguished for that prophetic spirit which bas furnished as much ground of profane ridicule to their enemies, as matter of superstitious veneration to some of their indiscriminate admirers. Here, also, the middle course appears to be the safest and the most rational. That they were men of God cannot be questioned, for they were men of prayer; and that they were favoured with very extraordinary pre-impressions of what was to come, which were actually verified in many instances, cannot be denied, without questioning facts which have been amply attested. But in the case of many of them, and of Peden in particular, it is equally vain to deny that much must be ascribed to the workings of a heated imagination, excited almost to frenzy by the incessant watchings, turmoils, and apprehensions of a life embittered by persecution, and spent in lonely caves and gloomy deserts. Placed in such circumstances, they were exceedingly prone, if not to create ideal pictures of misery, at least to exaggerate the reality. If the remains of some of these worthies appear to us sometimes rhapsodical, and sometimes even bordering on irreverent familiarity, we must remember that, not only were the younger ministers of that period deprived by persecution of the advantages of a liberal education, or at least of leisure for study, but that, in order to feel their eloquence, we must have been born in the same century, and stationed on the same spot, and environed with the same perils as their hearers; and we ought not to criticize with the nicety of modern taste, productions which, homely enough as they came from the lips of the speaker, must have become still more so, after passing from mouth to mouth in the traditions of a devout but unlettered peasantry.f * Wodrow denies, on the best authority, the genuineness of the strange book entitled" Peden's Prophecies." —Vol. iv. 397.

We refer particularly to the Biographia Presbyteriana of Patrick Walker, and similar works, of which the enemies of Pres. byterians have taken so much advantage.

Printed and Published by JoHN JOHNSTONE, 2, Hunter Square, Edinburgh; and sold by J. R. MACNAIR & Co., 19, Glassford Street, Glasgow; JAMES NISBET & Co., HAMILTON, ADAMS & Co., and R. GROOMBRIDGE, London; W. CURRY, Junior, & Co., Dublin; W. M'COMB, Belfast; and by the Booksellers and Local Agents in all the Towns and Parishes of Scotland; and in the principal Towns in England and Ireland.

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BAPTISM, the rite with which an approved course of discipline was crowned, was regarded by the primitive Christians with sentiments of extraor dinary reverence. Independently of the sacred interest that was attached to it, as an orclare of the Saviour, instituted among the last worde ne spoke on earth, and associated with the protowe of his gracious presence and bewing to the mos of the world;-independently, t00, of te laat able spiritual blessings of which it was the K2% and which, no doubt, were the primary asses of all the value set upon it, it acquired an adreste tious importance of no ordinary k od in the en Ina ordnande was d'apensed at all timer, in of men, who could not arrive at it but by a courte private and in poble, by night and by day. Thes of laborious and prolonged preparation,-into woment that a cauchumen had satisfactorily comwhose minds the sentiment was instilled from day pleted bis appointed probation, he might claim to day, that baptism would sever them from the the administration of baptism, and the zeal of the world, and seal their union to Christ as their spiri- primitive age was always so ready to give encourtual master; and whose desires to attain that dis-agement to the young convert, that his pastor tinguished honour were for two or three years would have complied with his wishes by admitting before wound up to a pitch of the highest excite-him to the holy rite, at whatever period his noviment. Previously to their reception of the initia- ciate was ended. But as a large proportion of tory rite, they were scarcely recognised as in the the candidates for baptism were adults,-persons ranks of Christians. They were regarded, indeed, of mature years, who came from the ranks of as standing a step higher than Jews or heathens, heathenism to join the Christian society, and as but still occupying the lowest grade in the Church, great numbers were always passing through their -were treated by the faithful with the condescend-appointed trials at the same time, it became cusing sympathy and tenderness shown by superiors to those beneath them, not with the kiss of peace, and the overflowings of affection bestowed upon the brethren, and spoken of by names, implying that they were as yet in a state of non-existence in regard to the profession of Christianity. The ceremony that ushered them into Christian society, naturally drew to itself, in the circumstances, all the interest of an event, that constituted an era in their religious history; and not more ardently does the minor long for the period that will raise him to the dignity of manhood, and give No. 145. OCTOBER 9, 1841,-14d.]

tomary to introduce these into the Church in a body; and hence two or three periods in the year, such as the days that preceded the celebration of any of the great festivals, were selected as the most convenient for baptizing them. The place where the rite was performed was long as unsettled and fluctuating as the time,-the ordinance being administered indifferently, in a house or a prisonby a river side, or the sea shore, in salt water,

• Persons baptized were said to be illuminated, from their being then enlightened in a knowledge of the mysterics prabody con cealed from them,-to be approved and perfect na having passed through the state of the catechumens with approbation. [SECOND SERIES,

Vot. III.

or in fresh, according to the convenience or situ- | in cleansing the whole man, and removing all the ation of the party. But in after-times, when the stains and defilements of sin, it was supposed that form of Christian worship was duly established, it the recipients, when baptized immediately before was usual to administer the ordinance in a bap-death, would enter into heaven in greater purity; tistery or font, belonging to the church, situated and also, because a tedious and troublesome course at first in the porch, as emblematical of the rite of discipline was imposed on all who did not walk being the entrance into the society of the faithful; up to their baptismal engagements, or who, after but afterwards fenced in the body of the church receiving the rite, contracted foul impurities, and itself. It was a spacious receptacle, contrived as returned to their former habits of vice. Persons, well for the accommodation of several persons at however, who entertained such notions of the a time, which the number of the candidates often efficacy of baptism, and of its indispensable necesmade necessary, as adapted to the mode of baptiz-sity to salvation, would not always find themselves ing then generally adopted. In situations where in a condition to enjoy the comforts of the ordithere was a scarcity of water, or in cases of sick-nance; and circumstances frequently occurred, ness and imminent danger, the ordinance was administered by sprinkling,-and this being in the latter circumstances generally performed at the bed-side of the convert, received the name of clinick baptism;-a form which, however necessary it was considered, was yet looked upon as imperfect, and as interposing an obstacle to the future advancement of the person so baptized to any of the offices of the ministry. With the exception of such cases, however, the mode which seems to have been most prevalent was by immersion; and, while, from the greatest number of the primitive Christians being natives of the warm climates of the East, it was most suited to their habits to plunge the whole body under water, it was thought that this practice more fully answered to the idea of being buried with Christ in baptism; and their coming out of the element, to that of rising with him to newness of life. The wooden structure in which it was performed, was divided by a partition wall, for the orderly and decent accommodation of the persons about to be baptized. The men were waited upon by deacons, the women by deaconesses,—and the ceremony was gone through always in presence of the assembled congregation, from which, however, they were separated by the little tenement appropriated for the action.

From the peculiar notions entertained of the virtues of baptism, there gradually arose several superstitious customs, one of the most prevalent of which was that of postponing the reception of the rite till an indefinite period after the catechumenship had terminated. In the beginning of the third century, the spirit of the age, which was peculiarly prone to multiply observances, and to cherish a reverence for time and seasons, prompted many even of the greatest and most pious men of the time, to defer their baptism till the close of life. Witness the well-known cases of Constantine and Constantius, both of whom, though they had long made a public profession of Christianity, remained unbaptized till they were on their deathbeds, and the not less notorious example of Theodosius, who, though all his lifetime sustaining an eminent character for piety, did not apply for baptism till he was overtaken by a dangerous illness, from which, however, he afterwards recovered. The reason of this delay of baptism was, that the ordinance, being thought of the greatest efficacy

which, depriving them of the means and oppor
tunity of obtaining it, led them to sigh, with litter,
but unavailing regret, over the custom that occa
sioned its postponement. The history of Gregory
Nazianzen affords a remarkable case in illustration
of this. Having received from his earliest years
a pious, as well as a liberal education, he was a
zealous Christian from the time he arrived at ma-
turity, and was fit for entering the world. To
complete his classical studies, he was sent, accord-
ing to the custom of his age, to Athens; and dur-
ing his voyage to that celebrated seat of learning
and science, he was overtaken by a storm, which
threatened to consign the ship, and all who were
on board, to a watery grave. While the rest of
the passengers were giving themselves up for lost,
and were bitterly hewailing the sad and untimely
fate that apparently awaited them, Gregory was
engrossed with reflections of another and more
serious description. The apprehension of death
and another world, had summoned him to review
his past life, and nothing so pained him as the
thought of his being unbaptized, and thereby un-
entitled to the privileges of the Christian life.
This reflection, brought home to him by the cir-
cumstances, in the most vivid and alarming man-
ner, wrung from him the most passionate excla-
mations of sorrow: he tore his clothes-threw
himself on the floor-uttered such loud and pierc-
ing cries, that the very sailors, laying aside the
sense of the common danger, came and sat beside
him, weeping from sympathy. Recollecting him-
self, he addressed his prayers to heaven, pleading
before God that he was his by private dedication
in his early years, and that now, a second time, he
devoted himself to God, which he would assuredly
confirm by a public baptism, the moment he ar-
rived on land, were it the Divine will to deliver
him.

Scarcely less importance was attached to the person by whom, and the place at which, the ordinance was administered. Some would not be baptized except by some pastor eminent for his orthodoxy and piety, and were content to wait till they had an opportunity of receiving it from the hands of their favourite idol,-as Augustine used to boast, that he had been admitted to baptism by the celebrated Ambrose. Some fancied, that to be plunged in the stream whose waters were poured over the sacred person of the Redeemer, was alone

sufficient to the purifying of the flesh,-as Con- | tory, an anecdote is told of an African negro slave, stantine, who was on his progress to the Jordan who, after having passed satisfactorily through for that purpose, when his journey was arrested the state of catechumen, and been entered on the by death. Others considered it their duty to de- lists for baptism, suddenly fell into a violent fever, lay baptism till they attained thirty years of age, which deprived him of the faculty of speech. the period at which Christ was baptized,-as Having recovered his health, but not the use of Eusebius was not baptized when elected Bishop his tongue, on the approach of the baptismal seaof Cesarea, and Perpetua till she was thrown into son, his master bore public testimony to his prinprison, a little before her martyrdom. While an- ciples, and the Christian consistency of his conother class selected one of the annual festivals, as duct, in consequence of which he was baptized, the fittest season for their baptism,-Epiphany, along with the class of catechumens to which he as the time when Christ was baptized,-or Easter, belonged. The profession of faith being ended, that they might die with him,-or Whitsuntide, and a prayer being offered, that as much of the that they might celebrate with due honour the element of water as should be employed might be descent of the Holy Ghost. All these customs sanctified, and that all who were about to be baporiginated either in the fancy and caprice of indi- tized might receive, along with the outward sign, viduals, or in a superstitious attachment to times, the inward invisible grace, the minister breathed places, and persons,-when Christians had begun on them, symbolically conveying to them the into rest the efficacy and virtue of the ordinance less fluences of the Holy Spirit,-an act which, in on the thing signified, than on the outward cir- later times, was followed by anointing them with cumstances with which the celebration was asso- oil, to indicate that they were ready, like the ciated. wrestlers in the ancient games, to fight the fight The rite of baptism was originally administered of faith. The preliminary ceremonies were brought in a very simple manner, the apostles and their to a close by his tracing on the foreheads of all contemporaries contenting themselves with an ap- the sign of the cross; an observance which, as propriate prayer, and the subsequent application we formerly remarked, was frequently used on the of the element of water. At an early period, most common as well as sacred occasions by the however, a variety of ceremonies was introduced, primitive Christians, and to which they attached with the pious though mistaken view of convey- a purely Christian meaning,-that of living by ing a deeper and more solemn impression of the faith on the Son of God. All things being preordinance; and affording, by each of them, a sen- pared, and the person about to be baptized having sible representation of the grand truths and spiri- stripped off his garments, the minister took each tual blessings of which it is significant. The by the hand, and plunged him thrice under the baptismal season having arrived, those catechu- water, pronouncing each time the name of the mens who were ripe for baptism, and who were three persons in the Godhead. The newly bapthen called competentes, or elect, were brought to tized having come out of the water, was immedithe baptistery, at the entrance of which they stop- ately dressed by some attendants in a pure white ped, and then mounting an elevated platform, garment; which signified, that having put off his where they could be seen and heard by the whole old corrupt nature, and his former bad principles congregation of the faithful, each, with an audible and practices, he had become a new man. A very voice, renounced the devil and all his works. The remarkable example of this ceremony occurs in manner in which he did this, was by standing with the history of the celebrated Chrysostom. The his face towards the west, and with some bodily conspirators who had combined to ruin that great gesture, expressive of the greatest abhorrence, and good man in Constantinople, resolved on declaring his resolution to abandon the service of striking the first blow on the eve of an annual Satan, and all the sinful works and pleasures of festival, at the hour when they knew he would be which he is the patron and the author. This re- alone in his vestry, preparing for his duty to the nunciation being thrice repeated, the candidate candidates for baptism. By mistake, they did not elect turned towards the east, the region of natu- arrive till he had begun the service in the church. ral light, and therefore fit emblem of the Sun of Heated with wine, and goaded on by their malig Righteousness,made three times a solemn pro- nant passions, they burst into the midst of the mise and engagement to become the servant of assembly, most of whom were young persons, in Christ, and submit to all his laws. After this he the act of making the usual profession of their repeated the Creed deliberately, clause by clause, faith, and some of whom had already entered the in answer to appropriate questions of the minister, waters of the baptistery. The whole congregation as the profession of his faith. It was deemed an were struck with consternation. The catechuindispensable part of the ceremony, that this con- mens fled away naked and wounded to the neighfession should be made audibly, and before many bouring woods, fields, or any places that promised witnesses; and in those rare and unfortunate in- them shelter from the massacre that was perpestances, where the applicants for baptism possessed trated in the city. And next morning, as soon as not the power of oral communication, this duty it had dawned, an immense meadow was seen was performed through the kind offices of a friend, covered all over with white,-on examining which, who, testifying their desire to receive the ordi- it was found to be filled with catechumens who nance, acted as their substitute. In ancient his-had been baptized the night before, and who were

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