Majesty and his successors may settle, enact, and emit such constitutions, acts, and orders concerning the administration of the external government of the Church, and the persons employed in the same, and concerning all ecclesiastical meetings and matters to be proposed and determined therein, as they in their royal wisdom shall see fit": and all preceding acts contrary to this were rescinded, and made null and void. Burnet charges that Lauderdale had a deep design in passing this iniquitous measure, namely, the ingratiating himself with the Duke of York, the next heir to the crown, and an avowed Papist. He died before that event happened, and so far missed his aim; but James II., as we shall see, was prompt to avail himself of the weapon which treachery had put into his hands. It is also asserted that Lauderdale interpolated the words “ecclesiastical matters," after the bill had passed, but before it was touched with the sceptre.

Another act was intended to defend the clergy from the attacks of the Covenanters, who in the more turbulent parts of the country, were in the habit of breaking into their houses by night, beating them, their wives and children (like the Sepoys), and destroying their property. Some were assaulted on the highway with pistols and other deadly weapons, and subjected to the most degrading brutalities. The parishes were made liable for the injuries inflicted, if their perpetrators could not be discovered; and penalties were imposed on those who refused to pay the ministers' stipends. These statutes, though most just in themselves, were artfully employed to increase the hostility to the Church.

The Assertory Act was not suffered to remain a dead letter. Archbishop Burnet had incurred the displeasure of Lauderdale and other influential councillors for several reasons. He had gone to London after the battle on Pentland Hills, remon. strated against the severity with which the prisoners were treated, and urged the King to show the utmost leniency that could be afforded. He, with his clergy in synod assembled, had also remonstrated against the Indulgence, as both illegal and unwise, and given some substantial reasons why it should not be granted. He had also exposed the insidious attempts of the Earl of Tweedale for subverting the Church and restoring the

Covenanters to the power they had so long usurped and abused. Hence, by an arbitrary stretch of power, he had been suspended before the late meeting of Parliament, and ordered to keep himself to his diocese "till his offences were considered," in order that he might not be present and oppose the passage of the Act. That the iniquity might be perfected, he was now deprived by a Royal letter, and allowed to retire on a pension. This retirement lasted for four years, and he was then restored to his see.

Some forty of the Presbyterians availed themselves of the Indulgence, and were settled in different parishes; some, however, with a protest that "they had received their ministry from Christ, with full prescription from Him, for regulating them therein, and in the discharge thereof accountable to Him;" but promising that they "would now, having obtained the free exercise of their ministry, behave themselves as loyal subjects, and pray God to bless his Majesty and Council for their moderation." But now they were assailed by "the sincerer sort," who termed the Indulgence a snare, and bitterly denounced the Indulged for their backsliding, carnality, and self-seeking. They termed them "King's curates," as they had the established clergy "Bishop's curates ;" and called them "dumb dogs," and all the other genteel names contained in their exquisite vocabulary. They became bolder and more violent in their conventicles, and new acts became necessary to restrain them. The handful of regular forces in the Kingdom, and bodies of militia were employed from time to time to disperse them, and often light skirmishes ensued on their resistance, and a few were wounded, and even killed, on both sides. Troops were quartered in the more refractory districts, and it must be candidly allowed that there was a sad deficiency of christian love between them and the malcontents.

Among these Acts, one entitled the Conventicle Act, passed in 1670, stands conspicuous for its severity. It forbid any expelled minister to hold any religious meeting, except in their own house, and for their own family, and none others were to be present: every landed proprietor found guilty of violating the act, to be fined one-fourth of his or her annual rental, and persons of inferior condition in proportion: every field preacher

who disobeyed the act was to be punished with death and confiscation of goods. Of course the prelates are charged with procuring the passage of this and similar statutes, but we find that Archbishop Sharp, and the Bishops of Galloway, Aberdeen, Brechin, Caithness, and Dunblane, were all that attended this session, and that they all opposed the act as too severe.

But when we ask what these "innocent" field preachers did, we are enlightened with the following precious teaching from one Carstairs, who had taken refuge in Holland, but sent "a savoury testimony to the Saints" in Scotland. "It seems it is coming to a pitched battle between Michael and his angels and the dragon and his angels there. Angels of Michael, fight and stand fast-quit yourselves like men under the colours and conduct of such a Captain-general, and so noble and renowned a quarrel, wherein and in whom it were better, if possible, to be ruined, than to reign with his enemies, if all Cæsars." Another, named John Blackadder, proclaimed in a sermon at Galashiels, that "to pay cess to Charles II. was to offer sacrifice to devils ;" and in another, at Kelso, he impiously said :—“ Ask any old, dying woman if she had any evidence of salvation? She will tell you, 'I hope so, for I believe the Apostles' Creed, I am taken with the Lord's Prayer, I know my duty to be the ten Commandments.' But I tell you, sirs, these are but old, rotten wheelbarrows to carry souls to hell. These are but idols that the false prelates' curates have set up to obstruct the Covenant and the work of God in the land." Such rant and blasphemy are extolled by their admirers in modern days as the very embodiment of the Gospel! It must be mentioned, also, as a proof how circumstances alter cases, that the Conventicle Act, limited to three years in Charles II.'s time, was revived in 1746, against the peaceable and orderly clergy of the Episcopal Church, and continued in force for several (40) years, and that with the approbation of the then dominant Presbyterians.

Bishop Leighton was appointed administrator of the Diocese of Glasgow, and remained there until 1674. His rule was not very successful. When the clergy complained to him of the cruelties and outrages they were suffering from the ferocious people among whom they had to minister, he very coolly recom

mended them to have recourse to prayers and tears, a remedy which they had already exhausted, and which only excited the merriment of their persecutors. He coquetted with the Presbyterians and made offers of large concessions, but his leniency and moderation met with no response, but that of hostility; and his well meant efforts were denounced as snares, Satanic delusions, and even as persecutions. He held some conferences with one Hutchison and others, who were reputed more sensible and moderate than the rest, but while he was flattering himself with the fond opinion that he had made a great impression, he received the curt reply-"We are not free in conscience to close with the propositions made by the Bishop of Dumblane as satisfactory." At one of these conferences his nose happened to bleed, and this was trumpeted forth as a Divine testimonial of the badness of his cause. Leighton then undertook a mission through the more disaffected portions of the Diocese, in company with some of his Presbyters, and preached on the nature and constitution of the Christian Church; but whatever good effects were produced for the time, they were speedily dispelled by visits from their own factious and noisy teachers. These enlightened souls "were debarred by an imperious conscience from entering into any terms of composition with the impure spirit which had issued from the bottomless pit, and was blasting their goodly Zion, and they dreaded the condemnation of Saul in the war of Amalek, should they spare any part of the Babylonish system from utter extirpation." By these abortive attempts Leighton exposed himself to the well founded censures of his brother Churchmen, and he found it necessary to make the following declaration at the close of the conferences :My sole object has been to secure peace and to advance the interests of true religion. In following up this object I have made several proposals, which I am fully sensible, involved great diminutions of the just rights of Episcopacy. Yet since all Church power is intended for edification, and not for destruction, I thought that in our present circumstances, Episcopacy might do more for the prosperity of Christ's Kingdom by relaxing some of its just pretensions, than it could by keeping hold of all its rightful authority. It is not from any mistrust of the soundness of our cause that I have offered these abate

ments; for I am well convinced that Episcopacy has subsisted from the apostolic ages of the Church. Perhaps I may have wronged my own order in making such large concessions; but the unerring Discerner of hearts will justify my motives, and I hope ere long to stand excused with my own brethren. You have thought fit to reject our overtures without assigning any reason for the rejection, and without suggesting any healing measures in the room of ours. The continuance of the divisions through which religion languishes must consequently lie at your door. Before God and man I wash my hands of whatever evils may result from the rupture of this treaty. I have done my utmost to repair the temple of the Lord, and my sorrow will not be embittered by compunction, should a flood of miseries hereafter rush in through the gap you have refused to assist me in closing." We have quoted this at length to show the goodness of heart of this excellent prelate, and also his want of practical wisdom. Concessions only emboldened the insolent faction with which he had to deal: offer them an inch and forthwith they demanded an ell. Leighton soon got wearied of his troublesome office, for which he found himself unfitted, and resigned in 1674. He then changed his residence to England, and lived in retirement and peace the rest of his days. Archbishop Burnet was restored to Glasgow in September of the same year.

In 1673 that "pious young man" James Mitchell returned to Scotland privately, married, and hired a tobacconist's shop in Edinburgh, close to the Primate's residence. It soon became a receptacle of many of the worst characters of his sect, and he resumed his plan for the assassination of the Primate. Having attracted suspicion, from the strangeness of his appearance, "being a lean, hollow-cheeked man, of a truculent countenance, and the air of an assassin," he was arrested. Two loaded pistols were found on him, and he was conveyed to the Archbishop's palace. A crowd accompanied him, but as soon as Sharp set eyes upon him, he exclaimed, "You are the man!" so firmly had his features been impressed on his memory. He confessed his guilt before a committee of the Privy Council, but when brought to trial, in February, 1674, he retracted it, and was committed, a close prisoner, to