Church as Liberals and Radicals; but it will for many reasons be best henceforth to write of them as Presbyterians and Covenanters.
The Covenanters, then, had not been idle. Shortly after the Restoration they had, through a deputation of their elders and ministers, called upon their brethren of the Church to unite with them in an address to the King, praying him, as a member of the Covenant with themselves, to remember his obligations to that sacred institution and zealously to prosecute its blessed work in all his three kingdoms. Toleration in things religious was especially denounced as a vast mischief disguised under the specious pretence of liberty for tender consciences. Schismatics were to be stamped out as sternly as Papists and Prelatists; and by Schismatics were meant all men, members of their own Church no less than of others, who ventured to differ from them on any point of doctrine whatsoever.
The Committee of Estates, which had resumed its sittings, did not like the job. They called the deputation a private meeting of some protesting ministers, and clapped the leaders into prison.
A government had now been formed for Scotland. Middleton was Lord High Commissioner, a soldier of fortune who had been raised to the peerage for the occasion. He was also named commander-in-chief of the forces and governor of Edinburgh Castle. With him were associated Glencairn as Lord Chancellor, Lauderdale as Secretary of State, Rothes as President of the Council, and Crawford as Lord Treasurer. The first proceeding of this Parliament, known in the gossip of the time as the Drunken Parliament from the too frequent condition of its chiefs, was to pass a Rescissory Act, repealing all measures that had become law since the year 1633, including even those passed by the Parliament professing the authority of Charles himself. This was followed by an Act "concerning religion and Church government," in which, after some pious but vague protestations of the royal design to "encourage the exercise of religion both public and private, and to suppress all profaneness and disorderly walking," it was promised that the administration by sessions, presbyteries, and synods would not for the present be interfered with. That present, however, soon passed. On May 27th, two days before the anniversary of the Restoration of the Monarchy, the Act for the Restoration of Episcopacy was made law. A previous Act had ordained May 29th to be kept holy; and the opposition taken to this by those who objected to all holidays as idolatrous had in turn produced a measure which practically marks the beginning of that system of vague bullying, as Dr. Burton has happily called it, which was in no long time to pass into a persecution anything but vague. On December 15th, in Westminster Abbey, Sharp was consecrated Primate of Scotland, and at the same time Fairfoul was raised to the see of Glasgow, Hamilton to the see of Galloway, and the good and gentle Leighton to the see of Dunblane.
Meanwhile the English Parliament had by its Navigation Act crushed for the time the short-lived hopes of Scottish commerce, and was now busy with an Act of Indemnity. This had been practically one of the conditions of the Restoration, but Scotland had not been included in the bargain. Argyle was the first to suffer from the omission. He had gone up to London to pay his court to the new King, but had been refused an audience. He was arrested, and, after a short sojourn in the Tower, sent back to Edinburgh to stand his trial for high treason before the Estates. He was found guilty and beheaded in the High Street on May 27th, 1661, two days after the anniversary of the more shameful death which he had helped to bring upon Montrose. As he had been expressly pardoned during the King's short reign in Scotland for all acts committed by him against the Crown up to the year 1657, and as his accusers could find no evidence of communications with the Parliament after that time, he must have been acquitted had it not been for Monk, who at the last moment produced certain letters written by Argyle to him when acting for Cromwell. Johnstone of Warriston was another victim, whom, like Argyle, it was no hard matter for judges who had a mind that way to bring within the compass of the law of treason. He, however, managed to get across to the Continent before he could be arrested. He was tried and condemned in his absence. After two years of painful shifts and wanderings he was tracked down in France by a man known as Crooked-back Murray, and sent back to his fate. A third victim was James Guthrie, the most vehement and active of the Covenanters, the framer of the original Remonstrance and author of a seditious pamphlet called "The Causes of the Lord's Wrath." With him would probably have suffered Samuel Rutherford, a minister as zealous as Guthrie, but of more education and manners. Fortunately for him, he died before the reign of punishment began; and the Government was forced to content itself with ordering his book "Lex, Rex," to be burned by the hangman at the Cross of Edinburgh and at the gate of the University of Saint Andrews, where he had been Professor of Divinity. In 1662, an Act of Indemnity was made law, by which future punishment for the past was adjusted by a scale of fines.
Close on the heels of the Act of Indemnity followed one demanding from all persons holding any office of public trust a public abjuration of the Covenant, and another requiring all clergymen who had been appointed since 1649 to receive collation from the bishop of their diocese. Those who did not obey were, after a short respite, expelled from their parishes. Those who obeyed were regarded by their congregations as backsliders and self-seekers. Three hundred and fifty ministers were driven with their families from their homes in the depth of winter; and to supply their places new ministers were appointed, popularly known as the King's Curates. Another Act required attendance at the parish church on penalty of a fine graduated according to the rank of the absentee. Finally, to crown all, the Solemn League and Covenant was publicly burned at the market-cross of Edinburgh; and an aggravated copy of the English Five-mile Act against Non-jurors, known as the Mile Act, was passed, prohibiting all recusant clergymen from residing within twenty miles of their old parishes, within six miles of Edinburgh or any cathedral town, and within three miles of any royal burgh. The punishment for transgressing this law was to be the same as that for sedition.
Enough has now been said to show the nature of the bullying adopted by the Government. Over the years which still lie between us and the entry of Claverhouse on the stage I must pass more rapidly.
In 1663 Rothes succeeded Middleton as commissioner. The latter had been rash enough to measure his strength with Lauderdale, and had been signally worsted. To complete the legislative machinery a Conventicle Act was passed this year, declaring all assemblies of more than five persons, besides members of the family, unlawful and seditious. As most of their congregations had followed the expelled ministers into the wilderness, this new law so mightily increased the labours of the authorities that it was found necessary to institute a new tribunal of justice for the especial treatment of ecclesiastical offences. This was no less than a renewal of that old Court of High Commission which had been abolished by the Long Parliament twenty years before to the joy of the whole nation. To strengthen its hands a body of troops was sent down into the western shires, now the stronghold of the Covenant, to impose and exact the fines ordained by the Commission. Their leader was Sir James Turner, a man of some education, but rough and brutal. He had served on the Continent under Gustavus Adolphus, had fought under Leslie in the Presbyterian ranks, and had accompanied Hamilton with the Engagers into England. Turner, in his own memoirs, declares that he not only did not exceed his orders, but was even lenient beyond his commission. When, a few years later, in a momentary fit of indulgence, his acts were called in question by the Privy Council, the evidence hardly served to establish his assertion.
At length the West rose. On November 13th, 1666, four countrymen came into the little village of Dalry, in Galloway, in search of refreshment. There they found a few soldiers, driving before them a body of peasants to thresh out the corn of an old man who would not pay his fines. There was an argument and a scuffle: a pistol was fired and a soldier fell: the rest yielded. It was now too late to go back. Turner was posted at Dumfries with a considerable sum of money in his charge. It was determined to seize him. The four champions had now been joined by some fifty horsemen and a large body of unmounted peasants. Turner was made prisoner; and the money restored to the service of those from whose pockets it had been originally drawn.
The number of the insurgents had now risen to three thousand. They determined to march on Edinburgh, thinking to gather recruits on the way; but when they came within five miles of the city their hearts failed them. The weather was bitterly cold: provisions and arms were scarce: the peasantry of the more cultivated districts
