The King's

Vow.

Whiggamores

crushed.

ledged himself to be Sovereign of 'three Covenanted kingdoms,' and that God had 'moved me to enter a covenant with His people (a favour no other king can claime), and that He inclyned me to a resolutione, by His assistance, to live and dye with my people in defence of it. This is my resolutione, I professe it before God and you, and in testimony heirof, I desyre to renew it in your presence; and if it pleis God to lenthen my dayes, I houpe my actions shall demonstrat it.'1 This blasphemous vow was of a piece with the vulgar outrage on religion about to be perpetrated in Scone, and with the dishonour of the political opportunists, who publicly enforced the Covenants and Act of Classes, while they welcomed the return to Parliament of men who hated these bonds. The Church was made the confessional for aspirants to place, and Parliament a meeting-house for pious dissemblers, from the hour when Argyll became bewitched with the promises of relief from his bankruptcy, of advancement to ducal honours, and of the marriage of Charles to his daughter, Ann-a king's barter for a subject's honesty.2 Swashbucklers, such as James Turner, laughed at the credulity of the clergy.

Colonel Robert Montgomery was commissioned to crush the western army if it refused co-operation with the Nationalist party; but, while Parliament sat, he was able to report that General Lambert had routed the Covenanters at Hamilton on 1st December, and captured Ker, who was wounded. Ker was sent to an English prison, where he was consoled by sentimental letters from Samuel Rutherford. Strachan vainly made a final effort to rally the Whiggamores before he sought refuge at Cromwell's headquarters in Edinburgh. On 24th December the Castle of Edinburgh was delivered up, before Cromwell's heavy ordnance could pound it into submission, and soon the Lowlands, a few guerillas excepted, were in English hands.

The Estates agreed to the coronation of Charles, authorised that outward compliance with the Covenants should be the right of

1 Balfour, iv. 185; Act. Parl. Scot., VI. ii. 608a.

2 Gardiner, Hist. of Commonwealth, i. 349.

!

Resolutioners.

entrance to the Royalist ranks, and contemplated penal Acts against Origin of the
compliers with the Sectaries. Forgetting the old troubles over
jurisdiction, they menacingly ordered Robert Douglas to convene
the Commission of Assembly in Perth on 12th December, and to
obtain a judgment on the main question then at issue, namely,
whether it was lawful to reinstate those formerly purged out of
the army by the Act of Classes. A quorum, chiefly of Fife ministers,
assembled, and a majority, homologating the crafty proposition that
it was a virtue to follow a Covenanted King, resolved to reply in the
affirmative, that all persons except excommunicates, the forfeited,
vicious, Discovenanters and professed enemies of God's cause,
were eligible for defence of their country against the Sectaries.
That was the first resolution. The Commission received a second
query on 19th March as to the lawfulness of admitting to the
Committee of Estates persons formerly debarred, but now after
satisfaction admitted to the Covenant. On this point the second
resolution was not intended to afford a full answer; at the same
time, the Commission desired Parliament to admit to the Committee
all save a few 'pryme actors against the state.'1 Those who upheld
those resolutions were henceforth styled Resolutioners, and those
Remonstrants who protested against them were afterwards called
Protesters. The reply of the Commission gave great offence to
the anti-Malignant party, and several of their leaders—Wariston,
Chiesley, and others-dissociated themselves from assenters to the
new policy, and with army officers left their appointments on the
ground that there was a departure from principle. The Presbytery
of Stirling made a strong protest, which Cromwell caused to be
printed with the title: A Remonstrance of the Presbytery of Stirling
against the present conjunction with the Malignant party. The
tendency of the extremists of the Covenanting party was towards

2

1 Balfour, iv. 197, 270.

? Six hundred ministers adhered to the resolutions, and, with the exception of forty, all conformed to Episcopacy in 1661: Life of Blair, 362 note. Other authorities reckon there were seven hundred and fifty Resolutioners: Thurloe, State Pap., iv. 557-8; Baillie, Letters, iii. 299. 3 Row, Blair, 256.

humiliation.

an alliance with the English Sectaries, which caused the Commission, early in 1651, to issue an Act censuring those who complied with the Sectarian army. Some of the Protesters visited Cromwell in Glasgow

and discussed the situation with him.

This acknowledgment by the ministers was all the politicians wanted. An Act summoning fresh levies, the penitents included, was passed on 23rd December. This was the signal for the King's supporters to rush to church to be shriven and made eligible to attend at the coronation on New Year's Day. On the other hand, all that could be done for the slaves taken at Dunbar was to read their petition before enlisting other dastards, who met a worse fate at Church ordains Worcester. Before Parliament adjourned till 5th February, the fasting and Church, still anxious to secure a divine blessing on these dubious movements, ordained two preparatory services-Sabbath, 22nd December, being devoted to fasting and humiliation for the national sins, and the Thursday thereafter for the particular sins of the Stuart dynasty.1 Charles was dutiful and gracious enough to fast and mourn with his subjects. After the penance was over he slyly said, 'I think I must repent too that ever I was born.' As remarkable a scene took place in Largo church, when the worldling, Lauderdale, compeared to own his sin, and heard Mr. James Makgill descant on Rehoboam from the text, 'And when he humbled himself the wrath of the Lord turned from him.' Thereafter Lauderdale lifted up his right hand and swore both Covenants. General Middleton was even more docile, and donned the sackcloth uniform of a penitent excommunicate in Dundee church, on 12th January, in order to obtain his certificate. To keep the balance true, that very day in Perth, Strachan was excommunicated and 'delivered to the devil.' Everything was in train for the restoration of the power of the Crown.

2

3

Two miles north-west from Perth, overlooking the Tay, stood the ancient palace of Scone, and near by a new parish church, built 1 Cf. Patrick Gillespie's sermon, Rulers' Sins the Causes of National Judgments, or a Sermon preached at the fast upon the 26th Day of December 1650.

* Lamont, Diary, 25; Minutes of Presbyteries of St. Andrews and Cupar, 60, 61 (Abbotsford Club). 3 Balfour, iv. 240.

Charles II. at
Scone, Ist

out of the old abbey. To that sacred 'Mount of Belief' the Kings of Alban came to sit on the Lia Fail, or Stone of Destiny, and be crowned. There Charles II. also came to take his 'tottering crown' and brook his realm, although the fabulous palladium now rested on foreign soil. Coronation day was 1st January 1651, but Coronation of the brilliancy of that of 1633 could not be reproduced in the dead of winter, when many misfortunes had thrown a cloud over the land, January 1651. and dissipated its seasonable joy.' The bishops were gone, the English glory shone in a hostile camp, and sour Scots faces looked from beneath clerical hats and iron bonnets. Into the upholstered church the Prince, the Honours, and the Estates of Scotland were ushered. The elevated throne was vacant. A chair afforded the Prince a seat before the pulpit, in which the then Moderator, Robert Douglas, a kinglike man, with royal blood in his veins according to whisperers about Queen Mary, and a manly Resolutioner, was standing. Charles could not forget him of the dark Dunfermline days. The ancient ceremonial he had to conduct was to be shorn of the anointing as savouring of superstition, and to be made more effective by sustained advices. After prayer, the celebrant expounded the coronation of Joash and the covenant of Jehoiada, and drew out every parallel to the case of his Prince. The sins of the Stuarts had made theirs a tottering crown, which now would fall if Charles put on crown and sin together. Unction was a popish device, with the 'limbs of Antichrist,' put to the door, and to be exchanged for the unction of Grace. The Covenant bound the King to the nation and to God, and must be renewed for the maintenance of Reformed Religion, the extirpation of false religion-Popery, Prelacy, profanity -and the unification of the people under the Crown, Parliament, and Church in the enjoyment of the national liberties. The people expected their King to remember his father's sins and turn good like Joash, to purge the Court, cleanse the Church, and reform the masses and himself. With the tormenting spirit of a risen Buchanan or Melville he trounced all round, and while disowning extremists, said a chari

1 Baillie, Letters, iii. 127.

King Charles's oath.

table word for the enlistment of penitent Malignants. The Covenant was the sine qua non. Although 'prayers are not much in request at Court,' said he, the King must pray and prevail. He must avoid the guilt of his meddlesome grandsire, who laid the foundation for the mischief done by his father. On this doctrine Douglas besought a blessing.

The representatives of the people in the General Assembly marched in and formed a bodyguard at the pulpit stairs. The two fateful Covenants, 1638 and 1643, written on one fair parchment, were produced and tediously read. The Moderator proceeded to pray that grace might be given to Charles to keep his vows. Charles knelt, held up his right hand, then swore this oath :—

'I, Charles, King of Great Britain, France and Ireland, do assert and declare, by my solemn Oath, in the Presence of Almighty God, the Searcher of Hearts, my Allowance and Approbation of the National Covenant, and of the Solemn League and Covenant, above written, and faithfully oblige myself to prosecute the Ends thereof in my Station and Calling; and that I for Myself and Successors shall consent and agree to all Acts of Parliament enjoining the National Covenant and Solemn League and Covenant, and fully establishing Presbyterial Government, the Directory for Worship, Confession of Faith, and Catechisms, in the Kingdom of Scotland, as they are approven by the General Assemblies of this Kirk, and Parliaments of this Kingdom; and that I shall give my royal assent to Acts or Ordinances of Parliament passed, or to be passed, enjoining the same in my other Dominions: And that I shall observe these in my own Practice and Family, and shall never make Opposition to any of these, or endeavour any change thereof.1

Charles then subscribed the Covenants-(National, and Solemn League) to which the King's oath was subjoined. He ascended the platform, showing himself, and the Lyon-King demanded assent to his election. The audience responded, 'God save the King, Charles the Second.' He descended. He descended. The Moderator at the head of the clergy asked if he would take the Coronation Oath appointed by the first Parliament of James vi., and found him willing. He knelt again, lifted up his right hand, and swore the oath.

After being robed in

1 The Covenant signed by Charles is preserved in the Bodleian Library: Clarendon MSS., vol. 40 f. 80 (Cal. Clar. State Pap.,67, No. 347). Cf. Appendix. Act. Parl. Scot., VI. ii. 161, 7 Feb. 1649; Decl. Gen. Assem., 27 July 1649; Bute, Scottish Coronations, 192-3; Nicoll, 42-7. Cf. facsimile facing page 2 of this volume.