for the process to be halted, the majority of the congregation had to dissent and their reasons judged by the presbytery. If these were grounded on “causeless prejudices,” then the settlement was to go ahead.
By drawing a line, the directory showed that the Church had turned its back on congregationalism. However, the intensity of the debate about the people’s role had ensured that the genie of popular rights was out of the bottle. The vicissitudes of the Restoration era were to ensure that issue was not going to go away, but rather reappear in the subsequent generation with renewed vigor.
1. See David Stevenson,“The early Covenanters and the federal union of Britain” in Union, Revolution and Religion in 17th-century Scotland. (Aldershot: 1997), 163–81.
2. RPCS , vii, 427.
3 Godfrey Davies, The Early Stuarts 1603–1660. Matrix: The Oxford History of England, 2nd. Edn. (OUP: 1959), 135–36.
4. APS., vi, 41. The Solemn League and Covenant was approved by the convention of estates on the 17 August 1643, and in London on the 25 September.
5. J. P. Kenyon, The Stuart constitution, 1603–1688. (Cambridge 1966), 252.
6. An ordinance for the calling of an assembly of learned and Godly divines, to be consulted with by the Parliament, for the settling of the government of the Church [12 June 1643]; the assembly was to consist of 121 clergymen, 10 lords and 20 MPs. Kenyon, 261 & 255.
7. George Gillespie (1613–48): former chaplain to the earl of Wemyss, ordained to Wemyss, without episcopal collation, in 1638; translated to Edinburgh in 1642; a resolute opponent of episcopacy.
Robert Douglas (1594–1674) admitted to Kirkcaldy 2nd. charge in 1628, called to Edinburgh in 1639; elected moderator in 1642, 1645, 1647, 1649 and 1651; probably the Kirk’s leading figure after the death of Henderson; although a commissioner, did not actually attend at Westminster.
Samuel Rutherford (1600–61) became minister at Anwoth (Kirkcudbright) in 1627; denounced and eventually exiled to Aberdeen for his resistance to the Five Articles and episcopal arminianism; appointed Professor of divinity at St Andrews in 1639; published books defending presbyterianism and setting limits on the authority of the secular power; highly regarded internationally as a Reformed Church theologian; deprived and indicted for treason after the Restoration.
John Maitland (1616–82) 2nd Earl and 1st Duke of Lauderdale; a Covenanter, but remained a royalist, and was prominent in arranging the Engagement of 1647; captured at Worcester and imprisoned until Restoration, when he was appointed Secretary of State; notorious for his policy regarding presbyterians after episcopacy restored.
For Baillie, Henderson and Wariston, see above. John Kennedy, 6th Earl of Cassillis, did not attend at Westminster.
8. The whole works of the Rev John Lightfoot, D.D., minister of Catharine Hall, Cambridge, ed., John Rogers, (London: 1824), vol. xiii, “The journal of the proceedings of the assembly of divines, from January 1st, 1643 to December 31, 1644,” 98.
9. Baillie, 129. It was a moot point, in that the literal meaning of the Greek verb cheirotoneo, was “to stretch out one’s hand.” In classical Greek, this was used in connection with signifying one’s vote, but the early Church also used the word to mean “lay hands on.”
10. Ibid.
11. February 10, 1645, Act of the General Assembly of the kirk of Scotland, approving the propositions concerning kirk government and ordination of ministers, Pitcairn, 121.
12. “Notes of debates and proceedings of the Assembly of divines and other commissioners at Westminster, February 1644 to January 1645, by George Gillespie, minister at Edinburgh, from unpublished manuscripts,” ed, David Meek, in The presbyterian’s armoury: the works of Mr George Gillespie in two volumes. Edinburgh: 1846, 9. [hereinafter cited as Gillespie, “Notes”].
13. See Robert S. Paul, The Assembly of the Lord, (Edinburgh: 1985), 314.
14. Lightfoot, Journal, 230.
15. Ibid., 232
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid., 231.
18. Ibid., 231.
19. Baillie, Letters, ii, 182.
20. Lightfoot, 232.
21. Ibid., 233; “any” appears in Lightfoot’s record of the day’s vote, but it is absent from the minutes.
22. Paul, Assembly of the Lord, 322.
23. See, Minutes of the sessions of the Westminster Assembly of divines, Alexander F. Mitchell, & John Struthers, (eds.) (Edinburgh: 1874).
24. Lightfoot, Journal, 231.
25. Ibid., 250.
26. Ibid., 253.
27. 7 February 1645. Gillespie, Notes, 120.
28. 6 January 1644; Act anent presentation of ministers, APS, 66.
29. Wodrow mss [NLS Wod.Fol.xxviii, 28], “Concerning the people’s interest in calling them pastoris”: notes on calling of ministers addressed to Rev William Tweedie [of Slamanan, Linlithgow presbytery]. Anon. c.1650.
30. Makey, Church of the Covenant, 78.
31. Young, John R., “Scottish covenanting radicalism, the commission of the kirk and the establishment of the parliamentary
