Scotland under James I., 1603, had involved many fateful results to the smaller and weaker country. The dignity, wealth, and power of the English monarchy stood in such vivid contrast to the insignificance and helplessness of a 1603-1625. King of Scots, that it was inevitable that James should endeavour to make his authority as strong in Scotland as it was in England. He failed in his attempt to bring about a complete union of the kingdoms. For this, English opinion was not as yet ripe. He therefore set to work to remodel the institutions of Scotland after the fashion of those of England. He hoped in this way to make himself as powerful in Scotland as he believed that he was in his new kingdom. The Highlands of Scotland, ruled by the clan chieftains, were quite outside the royal power. Even in the Lowlands the king was kept in check by a powerful, selfThe Restoration of Episcopacy, seeking, and tumultuous nobility, and a strong, 1600-1610. strenuous, and popular clergy, who represented the new Scotland that the Reformation had produced. James's first object was to cut down the power of the Church, which, with its democratic leanings and love of absolute freedom from state control, stood in the strongest contrast to the law-abiding and king-respecting Church of England. "No bishop, no king," was James's generalisation from his Scottish experience. His great object was to restore Episcopacy in Presbyterian Scotland as the essential preliminary to the strengthening of the royal power. He had already, in 1600, set up nominal bishops in the Kirk. But these were mere state officials sitting in Parliament, without consecration, duties, or estates. Bit by bit James clothed these phantoms with power. In 1606, he drove Andrew Melville, the head of the Presbyterian opposition, into banishment, restored the bishops to their temporal lordships and estates, and set up Constant Moderators (in lieu of elective chairmen) in every Presbytery, putting in bishops when he could to hold these offices. In 1610 James persuaded a packed General Assembly at Glasgow to accept the bishops as moderators in each diocesan synod and as the ordainers of the clergy. The Scots bishops now got Episcopal consecration from England, and for the first time became realities in the Church, though simply as something added to the pre-existing Presbyterian system. In 1617 James visited Scotland. He told the Scots Parliament that the Scots were barbarians, and ought to learn the good customs of the English, since they had already adopted from their neighbours the vices of smoking and wearing fine clothes. In 1618, he forced the General Assembly at Perth to accept the Five Articles of Perth, which directed that the Communion should be received in a kneeling posture, - and that the chief Church festivals, such as Christmas and Easter, should be religiously observed. This was the limit of James's success. Despite bishops and the Perth Articles, the Scottish Church was still Calvinistic and Puritan. Charles I., with the advice of Laud, resolved to carry on the Charles I. and anti-Puritan policy a good deal further. In Scotland, 1633, he went to Edinburgh to be crowned 1625-1637. King of Scots. He was accompanied by Laud. At his coronation the Scots bishops wore "white rochets and copes of gold," and "bowed the knee" before a crucifix "curiously wrought on the tapestry at the back of the altar." Charles set up a new bishopric in Edinburgh, having as its Cathedral the noble collegiate Church of St. Giles. He ordered the clergy to wear "whites," that is surplices, during divine service. He desired now to set up a liturgy instead of the long prayers without book that the Scots loved. Laud, ever eager for uniformity, wished to bring in the English Prayer Book, while the Scots bishops wanted an independent form of prayer of their own. At last, in 1637, a compromise was arranged. A special Scots Prayer Book was drawn up, based almost altogether on the English services, except that in those very points for which Puritans disliked the English book, the doctrines of Laud's school were brought out with greater emphasis. But the attempt to impose on Scotsmen the " mass book" of "black Prelacy" brought about a storm that was not to abate until it had laid low the mighty fabric of despotism that Charles had striven to build up in all the three kingdoms. CHAPTER III. The Fall of the Monarchy of Charles I., the Long Parliament and the Great Rebellion. 1637-1649. The Beginnings 1. For many years the people of the three kingdoms had submitted patiently to the growing tyranny. About 1637 public opinion began to stir itself from its lethargy. The strong feeling against the of Resistance, ecclesiastical despotism of Laud first made 1637-1640. itself felt in the outburst of enthusiasm that made popular heroes of Prynne, Bastwick, and Burton. Hampden's stand against Ship Money stirred the nation to anger against arbitrary rule in things temporal. Ireland became silently aglow with indignation against Wentworth. But the resistance of the Scots to Laud's service book was the spark that first fired the train of resistance. The Scots Service Book and the National Covenant, 1637-1638. 2. In 1637 Laud's Liturgy was imposed on the Scottish Church by the king's command alone, neither Church nor Parliament being asked to ratify it by its authority On 23rd July the Dean of the new Cathedral of St. Giles' began to read the service to the congregation of waiting maids who, after the fashion of the time, were keeping places for their mistresses who went to church only for the sermon. His voice was soon drowned by shrieks of indignation. "The Mass is amongst us! Baal is in the Church," was the women's cry. A stool was thrown at his head, and the magistrates cleared the church of the congregation. The Dean then read the service through in the almost empty church, while the mob outside threw stones at the windows and banged violently at the locked doors. All Scotland sympathised with the Edinburgh rioters. The Prayer Book was denounced on political as well as religious grounds, as an English production forced on the Scots by an English king without the leave of Parliament or General Assembly. As Charles persisted in upholding it, all Scotland fell away from his obedience. The nobles, who had hitherto supported the king against the clergy, now joined hands with their old enemies and took the lead in the national movement. Prominent among them were Archibald Campbell, the strong and politic, but cunning, greedy, and cowardly Earl of Argyll, and James Graham, the highsouled and chivalrous Earl of Montrose. The learned and strenuous Alexander Henderson led the revolt of the ministers. Through these men four Committees of the nobility, gentry, clergy, and burgesses were drawn up. They were called The Tables, and for all practical purposes made themselves the rulers of Scotland. In March 1638 all classes joined together in signing the National Covenant. This was a renewal of the Covenant of 1581 with additional articles. By it the Scots pledged themselves to abhor " Papistry, as now damned and confuted by the Word of God and Kirk of Scotland," and to uproot all traces of its idolatries; to uphold the king's lawful authority, and to pledge themselves to "labour by all means lawful to recover the purity and liberty of the Gospel as it was established before recent novations." Charles made an effort to prevent Scotland from slipping entirely away from his authority. He saw that he had gone too far, and sent down as his representative James Hamilton, Marquis of Hamilton, a weak, self- The Glasgow seeking courtier, anxious for compromises. Assembly and It was a great triumph for the Scots opposi- the Abolition tion when Hamilton revoked the Prayer Book of Episcopacy, and summoned a General Assembly at Glasgow for November 1638. But the Assembly claimed jurisdiction over the bishops, whereupon Hamilton declared it dissolved. The Assembly, maintaining that the State had no right to interfere with the spiritual power, went on with its work all the same, and abolished Episcopacy. 1638. The Marquis of Huntly, head of the great Gordon clan, strove to raise the north-east in the king's favour, but was put down by Montrose. Charles thereupon resolved to coerce his unruly subjects by an English army. But the pressed men, who gathered together at Berwick to fight the Scots, were badly trained and out of sympathy with The First the king's policy. The Scots army which Bishops' War, encamped against them on Dunse Law (a 1639. solitary hill over against Dunse, a town twelve miles from Berwick) was enthusiastic and well drilled, many of the troops, like the general, Alexander Leslie, having fought hard and well for the Protestant cause in Germany. Charles found that his men would not stand fire, and that it was useless to continue the campaign. On 18th June he signed with the rebels the Treaty of Berwick, by which it was agreed that the civil and religious grievances of Scotland should be settled by a free Parliament and Assembly. Before long the General Assembly and Parliament met and declared once more for the abolition of Episcopacy. Charles loved bishops so well that he broke his word, adjourned their sessions, and again resolved to have recourse to the sword. 3. Wentworth came over from Ireland to England and was made Earl of Strafford. His strong head and clear eye made him necessary to the weak king in such a crisis, The Short 1640. and for the first time Charles really gave him Parliament, his confidence. Strafford saw that Charles April-May, could not succeed if he blindly set himself against public opinion, and urged him to summon a Parliament. Very reluctantly Charles took his advice, and on 13th April 1640 his Fourth Parliament gathered together at Westminster. John Pym, a Somerset gentleman of great courage, resolution, oratorical skill, and statecraft, became the leader of the Commons. Hampden, the hero of the resistance to Ship Money, ably seconded his efforts. Pym demanded that redress of grievances should go before supply. Charles offered to give up Ship Money in return for twelve subsidies-nearly a million of money. But the Commons wanted to get more and give less. Ón 5th May Charles dissolved Parliament just as the Commons were preparing to express their sympathy with the Scots. It was known as the Short Parliament. The Second 1640. 4. The dauntless Strafford still persuaded the king to wage offensive war against the Scots, and an army was again got ready for a Second Bishops' War. Bishops' War, But the pressed troops were mutinous and discontented. Several regiments showed their Puritan sympathies by breaking open churches and making bonfires of Laud's new communion rails. At home an obstinate passive resistance made the continued levy of Ship Money excessively difficult, while the rumour that the wild Irish army was to be brought over by Strafford to take away Englishmen's liberty, spread a general indignation. The Scots did not wait for Charles's advance, but crossed the Tweed at Coldstream. For the first time in history, a Scots army marched through Northumberland amidst the welcome of the inhabitants. Even the fierce Highlanders, with their bows and arrows, plundered none save “Popish recusants" and the bishop and chapter of Durham. On 28th August, the English strove to defend the passage of the Tyne at Newburn, a few miles higher up than Newcastle. But the Scots, from the high ground on the north of the river, poured a well-directed fire on their enemies drawn up on the flat southern bank. The English broke and fled, and the Scots dashed through the river and occupied their position. Despairing of further resistance, Charles again entered into negotiations. In October, the Treaty of Ripon left Northumberland and Durham in the hands of the Scots as a security for the payment of the £850 a day which the king promised to pay the troops until the permanent settlement was effected. This was at last arranged in 1641, on terms that left all Scotland in the hands of the Presbyterians. 5. Charles, at his wits' end for money, now summoned a Great Council at York. This was a gathering of peers alone, and was a revival of the old Parliaments of nobles, which had fallen into disuse since the setting up of the Parliament of the Three Estates. The Council at York. |
