1660-1] Establishment of Episcopacy 281 had been devised by James VI, Parliament simply registered decrees which had been drafted by the King and his Privy Council in London. The Commissioner chosen to represent the royal authority was John, Earl of Middleton, who, as a renegade Covenanter, announced in his own person the intentions of the Government. The work of the Parliament may be briefly summarised: it restored the constitution which had been fashioned by James VI, and which, as inherited by his son, had provoked the revolt that had brought forth the Covenants. By a Rescissory Act the proceedings of every Parliament since 1633 (those of 1650 and 1651, over which Charles himself had presided, being practically, though not nominally, included) were declared null and void, and the King was proclaimed "Supreme Governor of his Kingdom over all persons and in all causes." As a substantial evidence of its loyalty, the Parliament further voted an annual grant of £40,000 to the King an excess of liberality which, according to a contemporary loyalist," became the ruin of this Kingdom." It was an ancient custom of the Scots to nickname their Parliaments from some peculiarity that distinguished them; and the first Parliament of Charles came to be known as the "Drunken Parliament." As Charles was now "Supreme Governor of his Kingdom over all persons and in all causes," it only depended on his pleasure what Church should be imposed on the nation. It fell to the Privy Council, which met at Holyrood after the rising of the Parliament, to announce his momentous decision. In his letter of the previous year Charles had declared his intention of maintaining the Church "as it was settled by law"; and this Church, it was now decreed, was the Episcopal Church as it had been established by James VI and confirmed by his son. It was in September (1661) that the decree was announced; and, that no time. might be lost in giving it effect, four persons were sent to England in the following December to receive consecration, as there were no bishops in Scotland to communicate it. Among the four there were two who were to play very different parts and to bequeath very different memories. The one was James Sharp, who had been a prominent Resolutioner and was now Archbishop-elect of St Andrews. In the beginning of 1660 Sharp had been sent to London by his brother ministers to promote their interests in view of the expected Restoration. They had misjudged their agent; for Sharp returned to Scotland as an instrument of the Court, whose ecclesiastical policy he was to promote with all the astuteness and persistency which were the leading traits of his character. If Sharp was a born ecclesiastic, Robert Leighton, subsequently Archbishop of Glasgow, was a natural saint-a "Christianised Plato," Coleridge called him whose unhappy destiny it was to be cast in a time when saintly attributes seemed but the timid hesitations of a character incapable of strenuous conviction. To Leighton the strife between Episcopalian and Presbyterian appeared but "a drunken scuffle in the 282 Restitution of Lay Patronage [1662-3 dark"; as, however, he had once been a Covenanting Presbyterian and eventually accepted an archbishopric, his former brethren had an obvious rejoinder. The Privy Council had done its work in decreeing the re-establishment of Episcopacy; but the constitution required that Parliament should ratify its action. In May, 1662, therefore, Parliament again met, and completed the work of the Council by readmitting the Bishops to its sittings, and reinstating them in their "accustomed dignities, privileges, and jurisdictions, of which they had been deprived during the ascendancy of the Covenants." Another Act, passed on June 11, was the direct occasion of the subsequent conflict between the Government and a section of the people which is the dominant fact of Charles' reign. The Covenanting Parliament of 1649 had abolished lay patronage; and many of the existing ministers held their charges direct from their congregations and presbyteries. It was now enacted that by September 20 following all such ministers should receive presentation from their lawful patrons or demit their cures. When the appointed day came, it appeared that few of the ministers in the diocese of Glasgow had taken the prescribed step. At a sederunt in Glasgow, therefore, the Privy Council further ordained that, if any minister did not conform to the law by November 1, his parishioners should cease to attend his ministrations and to pay him his stipend. Even in the eyes of Sharp this action was "so rash a thing" that he could not have believed it "till he saw it in print." Convinced of its own impolicy, the Council postponed the day of grace till February 1, 1663; but, even when that day came, about a third of the whole ministry had still refused to give in their submission. Middleton had proved himself a rash and tactless administrator; and in the Secretary Lauderdale he had an enemy at Court who made the most of his blunders. Since the beginning of his administration there had been rivalry between the two for the first place in Charles' councils; but the influence of Lauderdale at length prevailed, and Middleton was recalled from a position for which neither his character nor his previous career had even in a remote degree adapted him. Nevertheless the policy which he had inaugurated was the policy which the Government of Charles had deliberately adopted, and the action of his successors was but its logical and necessary consequence. It had been decreed that the Covenants were incompatible with the royal prerogative, and in the execution of the Marquis of Argyll and of the Protester, James Guthrie, the Government had proclaimed to the nation its judgment on the cause of which they had been the most prominent champions. Middleton was succeeded in the commissionership by John, Earl of Rothes, a man, according to Burnet, of "quick apprehension, with a clear judgment," but, as an illiterate debauchee, incapable of the serious statesmanship which his office demanded. Rothes was at first the tool of Lauderdale, but, as Lauderdale was to discover, not the most suitable 1663-4] Measures against Recusants 283 instrument for giving effect to his Scottish policy. In June, 1663, the Restoration Parliament met in its third and last session - Lauderdale himself being present- and crowned the work which had been begun under the administration of Middleton. One of its Acts restored the method of choosing the Lords of the Articles which had been devised by James VI, and which, as was said, virtually converted Parliament into the" baron court" of the King; and another authorised the raising of a militia of 20,000 foot and 2000 horse for the double purpose of suppressing disorder in Scotland, and of being a serviceable instrument in England should Charles ever have occasion to require it. But it was another Act, significantly known as "the Bishops' Dragnet," which was to have the most momentous consequences during the remainder of the reign. By this Act "against separation and disobedience to the royal authority," heavy fines were imposed on absentees from the parish churches, and a relation between subject and ruler was thus created which explains the chapter of woes that was to follow. The prime object of the Government was now to exact obedience to the new constitution in Church and State. It was in the case of the Church, however, that it had to encounter its chief difficulties; twothirds of the public business, it was said by a statesman of the time, directly or indirectly concerned religion. To enforce acceptance of the new religious order the Court of High Commission, which had proved so obnoxious in the reigns of James VI and Charles I, was revived (1664) at the suggestion of Archbishop Sharp. But more drastic means were required to coerce the spirit of resistance which had been evoked by the Restoration policy; and these means were now conveniently at hand. In the body of dragoons which had been levied with the sanction of Parliament the Government had an instrument which it could use with convincing effect on contumacious recusants. The Privy Council sought to enforce its decrees by the imposition of heavy fines; and, to ensure that the fines should be forthcoming, the dragoons were quartered on recalcitrant parties till they were "eaten up.' It was in the south-western counties Ayrshire, Wigtownshire, and Dumfriesshirethat the Government was most persistently defied; and it was in these shires that the Protesters had found the most numerous following, and where the largest body of ministers had demitted their cures rather than accept them at the hands of a lay patron. In place of these ejected ministers, incumbents had been subsituted (1663) who, for the most part, had had no previous training for their office, and whom a colleague of Lauderdale described as "insufficient, scandalous, imprudent fellows.' Thus the Westland Whigs, as they came to be called, had the choice of three alternatives-to attend the ministrations of "the King's curates,' to pay a heavy fine, or to be "eaten up by the dragoons." The dilemma had again arisen with which Scotland had been familiar since the Reformation-allegiance to a legitimate King or obedience to the 284 The Pentland Rising.. Letters of Indulgence [1666-9 dictates of conscience. The memory of the successful revolt against Charles I was an encouraging precedent; and, as the history of the reign proves, the recusants of the west were at all times prepared to follow it. The occasion came in November, 1666, when Sir James Turner, one of the commanders of the dragoons, who had made himself specially obnoxious, was seized and made prisoner by a party of the men of Galloway. This action proved to be the signal for revolt; joined by increasing numbers, the insurgents marched through Ayrshire and Lanarkshire, and in a body some 3000 strong, amid incessant winter rains, made their way towards Edinburgh. At Colinton, three miles to the west of the capital, they found themselves in a critical position; the inhabitants of the surrounding country were hostile; the forces of the Government were closing in upon them; and their only safety lay in a rapid retreat. At Rullion Green, on the southern slope of the Pentland Hills, they were overtaken and dispersed by the royal troops led by Sir Thomas Dalziel, fifty falling in the action and about eighty being taken. The haunting dread of the statesmen friendly to the Restoration was the possibility of a national uprising such as had overthrown the authority of Charles I; and it was in cruel fear that the Privy Council proceeded to the punishment of the leaders of the rebellion. Over thirty were hanged in different towns; the rank and file were for the most part transported to the Barbados, and the agents of the Government were enriched by fines and confiscations. The results of Rothes' administration had not commended him to Charles, and he had, moreover, made an enemy of Lauderdale, whom he and Archbishop Sharp had been endeavouring to supplant. Again Lauderdale triumphed, and Rothes was deprived of the commissionership (September, 1667), Lauderdale himself taking his place. It had been the contention of Lauderdale that the Pentland Rising was the result of the oppressive measures of the late administration, and it was in a spirit of conciliation that he entered on his charge. Two military agents of the late Government, Sir James Turner and Sir William Bellenden, were disgraced and removed from their posts; and by what is known as the First Letter of Indulgence (1669) permission was given to such ejected ministers as had lived "peaceably and orderly" to occupy charges which happened to be vacant. But to accept the Indulgence implied the acceptance of Episcopacy, and only forty-two ministers succumbed to the temptation. Conventicles, hot-beds of sedition, as the Government regarded them, became more numerous than ever; and, which gave special ground for alarm, those who frequented them now began to carry weapons along with their Bibles. Against his will, therefore, Lauderdale was driven to a succession of measures which surpassed in severity those of his predecessor Rothes. In the second session of a Parliament, which had met in 1669, he passed what he called a "clanking act" against conventicles, which in spite of its stringency signally failed in its object. 1672-9] The "Highland Host."-Murder of Archb. Sharp 285 A second Indulgence (1672) equally missed its aim of bringing over the majority of the recalcitrant ministers, and only intensified the zeal of those who refused to profit by it. But there were other weapons at Lauderdale's disposal which might prove more effectual. Since the Reformation a succession of repressive statutes had been passed against Roman Catholics, which in their case had operated with deadly effect and which might be equally successful in the case of refractory Protestants. In 1674 all heritors and masters were declared responsible for the conformity of their tenants and servants; and in the following year "Letters of Intercommuning" (the Scottish form of the " "boycott") prohibited all intercourse with above a hundred persons, eighteen of whom were ministers. But, in the districts against which they were specially aimed, even these enactments proved of no avail; and in 1667 an Act of the Privy Council imposed a bond on heritors and masters for the loyal behaviour of all persons whatever who resided on their lands. To enforce this Act, which exasperated many who had shown no signs of disloyalty, Lauderdale took a step which was the crowning act of his coercive policy. To avert another rising, which every year made more probable, he quartered in Ayrshire a host of 6000 highlanders and 3000 lowland militia, with instructions to help themselves to whatever accommodation and necessaries they might find to their taste. The special business of the "Highland Host" was to disarm the denoted districts and to exact the bond from all who had hitherto refused it tasks which, after a month's luxurious living at free quarters, they performed to the satisfaction of the Government. A succession of tragic events (1679) brought Lauderdale's satrapy to a close. On Magus Muir, near St Andrews, Archbishop Sharp was murdered by a band of zealots, who in their own eyes were the instruments of Heaven in taking off an apostate and a persecutor of the saints. Within a month after Sharp's assassination the long-anticipated rising came to a head in the disaffected west. On May 29, the anniversary of the Restoration, a band of eighty armed recusants entered the village of Rutherglen, extinguished the festal fires, and burned all the Acts which had overthrown the Church of the Covenants. Three days later, at Drumclog in Ayrshire, they defeated John Graham of Claverhouse, who at a later day was to be their avenger of blood. Their next movement was on Glasgow, where they had many sympathisers; but the town was well garrisoned, and they were forced to retreat to Hamilton in Lanarkshire. Ever in dread of an uprising such as had produced the Covenants, the Government took vigorous measures to suppress the revolt before it attained more formidable proportions. Orders were issued for the levy of 15,000 men; and the Duke of Monmouth, who had married the heiress of Buccleuch, and was known to disapprove of the policy of Lauderdale, was sent down from England to command them. On June 22 the two armies faced each other at Bothwell Bridge on the |