affectionate expressions as none but eye and ear witnesses can conceive. When the vote of some old ministers was asked, their joy was so great that tears did interrupt their expressions." The Covenant was received with the same cordiality by the Convention of Estates.

In the month of September 1643, the city of London witnessed a spectacle equally interesting, but to Englishmen much more novel and extraordinary. On the 25th of that month, both houses of Parliament, with the Assembly of Divines, and the Scottish commissioners, met in St. Margaret's Church, Westminster. After divine service, the Solemn League was read, article by article, in the pulpit, from a parchment roll, the whole assembly standing uncovered, and swearing to it with their hands lifted up to heaven.

On this solemn occasion our countryman, Mr Henderson, delivered an animated address, in which he warmly recommended the duty as pleasing to God, exemplified in other kingdoms and Churches, and often accompanied with the most blessed fruits. "Had the Pope at Rome the knowledge of what is doing this day in England," he said in conclusion, "and were this Covenant written on the plaster of the wall over against him, where he sitteth Belshazzar-like in his sacrilegious pomp, it would make his heart to tremble, his countenance to change, his head and mitre to shake, his joints to loose, and all his cardinals and prelates to be astonished. The Word of God is for it, as you have been now resolved, by the testimony of a reverend Assembly of so many godly, learned, and great divines. In your own sense and experience, you will find that although, while you are assaulted with worldly cares and fears, your thoughts may somewhat trouble you; yet at other times, when upon seeking God in private or public, as in the evening of a well-spent Sabbath, your disposition is more spiritual, and leaving the world behind you, you have found access unto God through Jesus Christ, the bent of your hearts will be strongest to go through with this work. It is a good testimony that our designs and ways are agreeable to God, if we affect them most when our hearts are furthest from the world, and our temper is most spiritual and heavenly, and least carnal and earthly. As the Word of God, so the prayers of the people of God in all the Reformed Churches are for us and on our side. It were more terrible than an army, to hear that there were any fervent supplications to God against us. Blasphemies, curses, and horrid imprecations there be, proceeding from another spirit, and that is all."

the peace of these kingdoms. It may be proper here to say a few words respecting a deed which exercised such an important influence on the destinies of the Church and the nation. In this Covenant our fathers bound themselves and their posterity, first, To endeavour the preservation of the Reformed religion in the Church of Scotland, the reformation of religion in England and Ireland, "according to the Word of God and the example of the best Reformed Churches," and the bringing of the three Churches to the nearest possible conjunction and uniformity in religion; secondly, To the extirpation of Popery and Prelacy; thirdly, To the preservation of the rights of Parliament, of the liberties of the kingdoms, and of his majesty's person and authority; And, lastly, they pledge themselves to personal reformation and a holy life. Our limits prevent us from entering on a lengthened vindication of this Covenant from the numerous objections that have been brought against it. It is hardly neces sary to expose the vulgar prejudice, which, taking advantage of an obnoxious termn, would identify the extirpation of Popery and Prelacy with the extirpation of the persons of Papists and Prelatists. The only points of objection worthy of notice, are the mixture of things sacred and civil in the same bond, and the enjoining of it under civil penalties. The same answer may suffice for both; and is to be found in the extraordinary circumstances in which our ancestors were placed. A combined attack being made upon their civil rights and their religious liberties, this led them almost necessarily to unite both in their means of defence. So far as it can be shown that, in any case, they resorted to violence or compulsion to enforce the Covenant, we do not vindicate them; but indeed it cannot be proved that it was forced upon any, or that civil damage was incurred by any for simply refusing it. The truth is, that the great body of the people all ranks entered with heart and soul into the solemn pledge; and the acts of the Church and the State enjoining it, if candidly interpreted and compared with the commentary of their practice, will be found to have been nothing more than a judicial sanction of the measure, with a formal intimation that the Church would hold its opponents as enemies to religion, and that the State would regard them as enemies to the country, and on these respective grounds would treat them accordingly. But whatever errors or excesses may have characterized the mode in which it was managed by men, the work itself may nevertheless have been of God; and if the matter of that Covenant was agreeable to the divine will, if the nation voluntarily entered into this solemn engagement with the Lord of Hosts, it is not easy to show that either lapse of time of change of circumstances could dissolve the obliga tion.

witted our Scottish divines by getting the clause inserted in the Covenant which binds them to reform the Church of England, "according to the

Word of God," by which they say they tacitly | understood Independency, while the Scots understood it of their beloved Presbytery. We have already seen that if there was any address shown in the concoction of the League, the praise is due to the Scots, who succeeded in getting more than they ever expected from the English, when they prevailed on them to make it a religious as well as civil bond. They certainly understood Presbytery to be the system most agreeable to the Word of God, and to the example of the best Reformed Churches; but it is quite a mistake to suppose that they were "taken in" by Sir Harry Vane, or artfully led to expect the conformity of England as the bribe for their assistance to the English Parliament. The truth is, that our ancestors entered into this League with England rather in the hope, and with the desire, that they might be brought into a nearer conformity with the Presbyterian discipline, than with any sanguine expectation of seeing this accomplished. They never supposed that England would submit to their form without some alteration suited to their circumstances, and accordingly they joined with them in constructing a new Confession and Directory. "We are not to conceive," says Henderson, in a letter dated 1642, "that they will embrace our form. A new form must be set down for us all. And although we should never come to this unity in religion and uniformity in worship, yet my desire is to see what form England shall pitch upon before we publish ours." In short, nothing is more apparent, from the whole of their correspondence, than that they went up to the Westminster Assembly with very slender hopes of being able to prevail on the English to submit to Presbytery; and the success which attended their exertions to do so, filled their hearts with unfeigned astonishment, as well as gratitude to that God, whose hand they constantly recognised in all their proceedings. The seven years of ensuing providence," says Henderson, in the dedication of a sermon, preached in 1644, " may carry us as far beyond the present intentions, whether of the enemies of religion or our own, as the seven years past have done beyond our former intentions and theirs. The pulling down of Popery in the Christian world, and the pulling down of Prelacy in Britain, are equally feasible to the Almighty, who delighteth to turn our difficulties and impossibilities into the glorious demonstrations of his divine power, and who putteth motions into the hearts of men, which they turn into petitions and endeavours, and God by his power, bringeth forth into reality and action: the conception, birth, and perfection, is all from himself."

But it is time to take some notice of the labours of our Scottish ministers in the Westminster Assembly. This famous Assembly was convened by orders of the English Parliament, on the 1st of July 1643. It was to consist of one hundred and twenty divines, with thirty lay assessors, of whom ten were lords and twenty were commoners. Baillie's Lettera, MS., vol. ii., p. 305.

The

divines were, for the most part, clergymen of the Church of England, selected not for their peculiar views on the point of Church government, but for their well known learning, piety, and abilities. Some of them were keen advocates of Prelacy, but these, so soon as they saw how matters were likely to be carried, retired from the Assembly. A convocation of more grave, judicious, and learned divines, was never, perhaps, collected in Christendom. Their theological writings, which still continue to be standard works in the department which they occupy, amply confirm this commendation; and above all, the Westminster Standards," as Presbyterians have denominated the Confession of Faith, Larger and Shorter Catechisms, and other formularies of the Church of Scotland, which were the result of their labours, would be sufficient to entitle their memory to the veneration and respect of all who love the truth. The Parliament of England having solicited the General Assembly to send up some of their number as Commissioners to this Assembly, the following four ministers were appointed: Alexander Henderson, Samuel Rutherfurd, Robert Baillie, and George Gillespie. With these were associated the following elders: the Earl of Cassillis, Lord Maitland, and Sir Archibald Johnston of Warriston. Our worthy Commissioners reached London in November 1643, and on being introduced to the Assembly at Westminster, were cordially welcomed by a speech from Dr Twiss, their learned and excellent prolocutor. The following description of the appearance of the Assembly, as it presented itself to our Commissioners, is from the pen of Mr Baillie, and is given in his usual homely and graphic style:-" The like of that Assembly I did never see, and, as we hear say, the like was never in England, nor any where is shortly like to be. No mortal man may enter to hear or see, let be to sit, without an order in writ from both houses of Parliament. They did sit in Henry the Seventh's Chapel, but since the weather grew cold, they did go to Jerusalem Chamber, a fair room in the abbey of Westminster, about the bounds of our College forehall. At the upmost end there is a chair set on a frame, a foot from the earth, for the Prolocutor, Dr Twiss. Before it, on the ground, stand two chairs for the Assessors, Dr Burgess and Mr White. Before these two chairs, through the length of the room, stands a table, at which sit the two scribes. The house is all well hung, and has a good fire, which is some daintes at London. Foranent the table, upon the Prolocutor's right hand, there are three or four rankes of formes; on the lowest we five do sit, upon the others at our backs, the members of Parliament deputed to the Assemblie. On the formes foranent us, on the Prolocutor's left hand, are four or five stages of formes ranged round the room, whereupon their divines sit as they please. We meet every day of the week but Saturday. We sit commonly from nine to one or two afternoon. The Prolocutor at the beginning and end has a short prayer. Ordinarily there will be pre

sent about three score of their divines. After the prayer, the scribe reads the proposition and Scriptures, whereupon the Assembly debates in a most grave and orderly way."

The Scottish Commissioners soon found ample employment. After the labours of the day in the Assembly, they were engaged in committees, or in writing letters and pamphlets, till the midnight chimes at Westminster rung them to bed. They had no conception that they would have been so long detained in London, for the Assembly continued to sit, with little interruption, for nearly five years. The chief burden of the debates fell upon our divines, who were harassed by them night and day. Many an anxious look did they cast towards home; and often did they plead that they might be allowed to return to their quiet duties in their own parishes; but their duty to the church and nation forbade it. "Many a perplexed night have we of it," says Baillie. "If our neighbours at Edinburgh tasted the sauce wherein we dip our venison, their teeth would not water so fast to be here as some of them do."

The first point that came before the Assembly, and which occupied the greater part of their time, was the thorny question of Church government. Our Scots ministers soon found, to their high satisfaction, that the great body of the Assembly were favourably disposed to the Presbyterian discipline. And had the matter been left to the mere force of numbers, little time would have sufficed to decide it. Out of an Assembly, consisting of seventy or eighty members, there were only seven Independents, and one or two Erastians. In this insignificant minority, however, there were two or three possessed of considerable talents for public speaking and ingenuity in debate, and they contrived to take up the Assembly's time, by pertinaciously disputing every inch of ground, and protesting against every decision. The Assembly, anxious for unanimity, bore all this with astonishing patience. The Independents occupied them no less than three weeks, in debating the point of sitting at a communion-table. "The unhappy Independents," says Baillie, "would mangle that sacrament. No catechising, nor preparation before; no thanksgiving after; no sacramental doctrine or chapters in the day of celebration; no coming up to any table, but a carrying of the elements to all in their seats athort the church yet all this, with God's help, we have carried over them to our practice. We must dispute every inch of ground. Great need had we of the prayers of all God's people." This obstinacy was the less justifiable on the part of the Independents, as the Scottish ministers had agreed to drop a variety of their ancient practices in order to please them. It had been customary before this in Scotland for the minister to kneel in the pulpit when engaged in prayer, and the people also seem to have followed this practice in the church; this, however, they agreed to alter, says Baillie, as "besides the Independents' vehemencie against it, there is no such custom here

used by any." They also agreed to give up the practice of two prayers before sermon, the office of readers, and other subordinate forms of conducting the worship. †

Many days were spent on the question as to ruling elders. But the most important and lengthened debate in this Assembly, was regarding the divine right of Presbyterial government, including the question, Whether many congregations may, and by divine institution ought to be under one Presbyterial government. After a debate which occupied thirty days, the divine right of Presby tery was carried by an overwhelming majority. The Independents entered their dissent, and, as is usual with the losing party, complained of unfair usage. But never was the charge made with less feasibility. The length of time during which the discussion was protracted, shows that ample opportunity had been given them to bring forward their objections; and the debate, which was afterwards published at length, shows how ably and fairly they had been met. It is remarkable that, notwithstanding the earnest desires of the Assembly, and their own promises, the Independents, though they were constantly finding fault with the Presbyterial form, would never present any model of their own in its place.

In these debates our countrymen took an active and important share. To the masterly manage ment and sagacious counsels of Henderson, the Assembly owed, in a great measure, the happy unanimity which prevailed among them. To the services of George Gillespie, who was then in the prime of life, his colleague, Mr Baillie, bears repeated testimony: "None in all the Assembly did reason more pertinently than Mr Gillespie; he is an excellent youth; my heart blesses God in his behalf. I admire his gifts, and bless God, as for all my colleagues, so for him in particular, as equal in these to the first in the Assembly." On arriving in London, Gillespie went straight to the Assembly, and stood behind the crowd while Goodwin was pleading the cause of Inde pendency. He was observed by Henderson, who mentioned his arrival to the Prolocutor; and Gillespie was requested to come forward and reply. In vain he pleaded to be excused,—he was obliged to come forward, squeezing his way through the crowd in his travelling boots; and, covered with blushes, he commenced a speech which occupied an hour and a half, and ended in a triumphant demolition of the Independent's logic. On

Baillie's Let., MS. ii. 58.

Among other points, to please the English, our Scottish divines

agreed to the reading of the Psalm line by line, a practice hithert unknown in Scotland. "Then," says Lightfoot, "was our Diret tory read over to the Scots Commissioners, who were absent at the passing of it; and Mr Henderson disliked our permission of any to -(Diary of the Assembly, Lightfoot's Works, vol. xii, p. 344. Our fathers, like Calvin, seem to have taken great pains, fro early period, to instruct the people in Psalmody. From a curios document in the handwriting of Calderwood, it appears that "mell, women, and children were exhorted to exercise themselves in e Psalms, and that sundry musicians of best skill and affection, for furtherance of the act of Parliament anent the instructing of the youth in musick, have sett down common and proper tunes to the whole Psalms, according to the diverse formes of meeter." The consequence was, that some can sing all, or the maist part, th out buik, and some that cannot read, can sing some Psalnes."

read the Psalm line by line; and this business held us some debate.

(Bannatyne Miscellany, p. 231.)