A History of the Reformation Volume II Part 16

"that nane of us sall in tymeis c.u.ming pas to the Quenis Grace Dowriare, to talk or commun with hir for any letter without consent of the rest and commone consultatioun."[321]

They had the bitter satisfaction of knowing that although the French troops and officers of the Regent were too strong for them in the field, the insolence and rapine of these foreigners was rousing all ranks and cla.s.ses in Scotland to see that their only deliverance lay in the English alliance and the triumph of the Reformation. The _Band_ of 1560 (April 27th) included, with "the n.o.bilitie, barronis, and gentilmen professing Chryst Jesus in Scotland ... dyveris utheris that joyint with us, for expelling of the French army: amangis quham the Erle of Huntlie was princ.i.p.all."[322]

The Estates or Parliament met in Edinburgh on July 10th, 1560. Neither the French nor the English soldiers had left; so they adjourned to August 1st, and again to the 8th.[323]

Meanwhile Knox and the Congregation were busy. The Reformer excelled himself in the pulpit of St. Giles', lecturing daily on the Book of the Prophet Haggai (on the building of the Temple)--"a doctrine proper for the time."[324] Randolph wrote to Cecil, Aug. 15th:

"Sermons are daylie, and greate audience; though dyvers of the n.o.bles present ar not resolved in religion, yet do thei repayre to the prechynges, which gevethe a good hope to maynie that G.o.d wyll bowe their hartes."[325]

The Congregation held a great thanksgiving service in St. Giles'; and after it arranged for eight fully const.i.tuted churches, and appointed five superintendents in matters of religion.[326] They also prepared a pet.i.tion for Parliament asking for a settlement of the religious question in the way they desired.[327] At the request of the Estates or Parliament, Knox and five companions prepared _The Confessioun of Faith professit and belevit be the Protestantis within the Realme of Scotland_, which was ratified and approved as "hailsome and sound doctrine, groundit upoun the infallible trewth of G.o.dis Word." It was afterwards issued by the Estates as the "summe of that doctrin quhilk we professe, and for the quhilk we haif sustenit infamy and daingear."[328]

Seven days later (Aug. 24th), the Estates decreed that "the Bischope of Rome have na jurisdictioun nor authoritie in this Realme in tymes c.u.ming"; they annulled all Acts of previous Parliaments which were contrary to the Confession of Faith; and they forbade the saying, hearing, or being present at Ma.s.s, under penalty of confiscation of goods and bodily punishment at the discretion of the magistrates for the first offence, of banishment for the second, and of death for the third.[329] These severe penalties, however, were by no means rigidly enforced. Lesley (Roman Catholic Bishop of Ross) says in his _History_:

"The clemency of the heretic n.o.bles must not be left unmentioned, since at that time they exiled few Catholic on the score of religion, imprisoned fewer, and put none to death."[330]

One thing still required to be done--to draft a const.i.tution for the new Protestant Church. The work was committed to the same ministers who had compiled the Confession. They had been asked to prepare it as early as April 29th, and they had it ready for the Lords of the Congregation within a month. It was not approved by the Estates; but was ordered to be submitted to the next general meeting, and was meanwhile translated into Latin, to be sent to Calvin, Viret, and Beza in Geneva.[331] The delay seemed to some to arise from the unwillingness of many of the lords to see "their carnal liberty and worldly commoditie impaired";[332] but another cause was also at work. Cecil evidently wished that the Church in Scotland should be uniform with the Church in England, and had instructed Randolph to press this question of uniformity. It was a favourite idea with statesmen of both countries--pressed on Scotland by England during the reigns of James I.

and Charles I., and by Scotland on England in the Solemn League and Covenant. Randolph was wise enough to see that such uniformity was an impossibility.[333]

_The Confession of the Faith and Doctrine, Believed and Professed by the Protestants of Scotland_, was translated into Latin, and, under the t.i.tle _Confessio Scoticana_, occupies an honoured place in the collections of the creeds of the Reformed Churches. It remained the symbol of the Church of Scotland during the first stormy century of its existence. It was displaced by the Westminster Confession in 1647, only on the understanding that the later doc.u.ment was "in nothing contrary"

to the former; and continued authoritative long after that date.[334]

Drawn up in haste by a small number of theologians, it is more sympathetic and human than most creeds, and has commended itself to many who object to the impersonal logic of the Westminster Confession.[335]

The first sentence of the preface gives the tone to the whole:

"Lang have we thirsted, dear Brethren, to have notified to the Warld the Sum of that Doctrine quhilk we professe, and for quhilk we have susteined Infamie and Danger; Bot sik has bene the Rage of Sathane againis us, and againis Christ Jesus his eternal Veritie latlie now againe born amangst us, that to this daie na Time has been graunted unto us to cleir our Consciences as maist gladlie we wald have done."[336]

The preface also puts more clearly than any similiar doc.u.ment save the First Confession of Basel the reverence felt by the early Reformers for the Word of G.o.d and the renunciation of any claim to infallibility of interpretation:

"Protestand that gif onie man will note in this our confessioun onie Artickle repugnand to G.o.ds halie word, that it wald pleis him of his gentleness and for christian charities sake to admonish us of the same in writing; and we upon our honoures and fidelitie, be G.o.ds grace do promise unto him satisfaction fra the mouth of G.o.d, that is fra his haly scriptures, or else reformation of that quhilk he sal prove to be amisse."

The Confession itself contains the truths common to the Reformed creeds of the Reformation. It contains all the Oec.u.menical doctrines, as they have been called--that is, the truths taught in the early Oec.u.menical Councils, and embodied in the Apostles' and Nicene Creeds; and adds those doctrines of grace, of pardon, and of enlightenment through Word and Spirit which were brought into special prominence by the Reformation revival of religion. The Confession is more remarkable for quaint suggestiveness of t.i.tles than for any special peculiarity of doctrine.

Thus the doctrine of revelation is defined by itself, apart from the doctrine of Scripture, under the t.i.tle of "The Revelation of the Promise." Election is treated according to the view of earlier Calvinism as a means of grace, and an evidence of the "invincible power" of the G.o.dhead in salvation. The "notes by which the true Kirk is discerned from the false" are said to be the true preaching of the Word of G.o.d, the right administration of the sacraments, and ecclesiastical discipline rightly administered. The authority of Scriptures is said to come from G.o.d, and to depend neither "on man nor angels"; and the Church knows them to be true, because "the true kirk always heareth and obeyeth the voice of her own spouse and pastor."

Randolph says in a letter to Cecil (September 7th, 1560) that before the Confession was publicly read it was revised by Lethington and Lord James Stewart, who "dyd mytigate the austeritie of maynie wordes and sentences," and that a certain article which dealt with the "dysobediens that subjects owe unto their magistrates" was advised to be left out.[337] Thus amended it was read over, and then re-read article by article in the Estates, and pa.s.sed without alteration,[338]--"no man present gainsaying."[339] When it was read before the Estates:

"Maynie offered to sheede ther blude in defence of the same. The old Lord of Lynsay, as grave and goodly a man as ever I sawe, said, 'I have lyved maynie yeres, I am the eldest in thys Compagnie of my sorte; nowe that yt hathe pleased G.o.d to lett me see thys daye wher so maynie n.o.bles and other have allowed so worthie a work, I will say with Simion, _Nunc dimittis_.'"[340]

A copy was sent to Cecil, and Maitland of Lethington a.s.sured him that if there was anything in the Confession of Faith which the English Minister misliked, "It may eyther be changed (if the mater so permit) or at least in some thyng qualifieed"; which shows the anxiety of the Scots to keep step with their English allies.[341]

The authors of the Confession were asked to draw up a short statement showing how a Reformed Church could best be governed. The result was the remarkable doc.u.ment which was afterwards called the _First Book of Discipline_, or _the Policie and Discipline of the Church_.[342] It provided for the government of the Church by kirk-sessions, synods, and general a.s.semblies; and recognised as office-bearers in the Church, ministers, teachers, elders, deacons, superintendents, and readers. The authors of this Book of Discipline professed to go directly to Scripture for the outlines of the system of Church government which they advised their countrymen to adopt, and their profession was undoubtedly sincere and likewise just. They were, however, all of them men in sympathy with Calvin, and had had personal intercourse with the Protestants of France.

Their form of government is clearly inspired by Calvin's ideas as stated in his _Inst.i.tution_, and follows closely the Ecclesiastical Ordinances of the French Church. The offices of superintendent and reader were added to the usual threefold or fourfold Presbyterian form of government. The former was due to the unsettled state of the country and the scarcity of Protestant pastors. The _Superintendents_ took charge of districts corresponding not very exactly with the Episcopal dioceses, and were ordered to make annual reports to the General a.s.sembly of the ecclesiastical and religious state of their provinces, and to preach in the various churches in their district. The _Readers_ owed their existence to the small number of Protestant pastors, to the great importance attached by the early Scottish Reformers to an educated ministry, and also to the difficulty of procuring funds for the support of pastors in every parish. They were of two cla.s.ses--those of a higher grade, who were permitted to deliver addresses and who were called _Exhorters_; and those of the lower grade, whose duty it was to read "distinctly" the Common Prayers and the Scriptures. Both cla.s.ses were expected to teach the younger children. _Exhorters_ who studied theology diligently and satisfied the synod of their learning could rise to be ministers. The Book of Discipline contains a chapter on the patrimony of the Church which urges the necessity of preserving monies possessed by the Church for the maintenance of religion, the support of education, and the help of the poor. The presence of this chapter prevented the book being accepted by the Estates in the same way as the Confession of Faith. The barons, greater and lesser, who sat there had in too many cases appropriated the "patrimony of the Kirk" to their own private uses, and were unwilling to sign a doc.u.ment which condemned their conduct. The Book of Discipline approved by the General a.s.sembly, and signed by a large number of the n.o.bles and burgesses, never received the legal sanction accorded to the Confession.

The General a.s.sembly of the Reformed Church of Scotland met for the first time in 1560; and thereafter, in spite of the struggle in which the Church was involved, meetings were held generally twice a year, sometimes oftener, and the Church was organised for active work.

A third book, variously called _The Book of Common Order_,[343] _The Order of Geneva_, and now frequently _Knox's Liturgy_, was a directory for the public wors.h.i.+p and services of the Church. It was usually bound up with a metrical version of the Psalms, and is often spoken of as the _Psalm Book_.

_Calvin's Catechism_ was translated and ordered to be used for the instruction of the youth in the faith. Later, the _Heidelberg Catechism_ was translated and annotated for the same purpose. They were both superseded by _Craig's Catechism_, which in its turn gave way to the _Larger_ and _Shorter Catechisms_ of the Westminster Divines.[344]

The democratic ideas of Presbyterianism, enforced by the practical necessity of trusting in the people, made the Scotch Reformers pay great attention to education. All the leaders of the Reformation, whether in Germany, France, or Holland, had felt the importance of enlightening the commonalty; but perhaps Scotland and Holland were the two countries where the attempt was most successful. The education of the people was no new thing in Scotland; and although in the troublous times before and during the Reformation high schools had disappeared and the Universities had decayed, still the craving for learning had not altogether died out. Knox and his friend George Buchanan had a magnificent scheme of endowing schools in every parish, high schools or colleges in all important towns, and of increasing the power and influence of the Universities. Their scheme, owing to the greed of the Barons, who had seized the Church property, was little more than a devout imagination; but it laid hold on the mind of Scotland, and the lack of endowments was more than compensated by the craving of the people for education. The three Universities of St. Andrews, Glasgow, and Aberdeen took new life, and a fourth, the University of Edinburgh, was founded. Scotch students who had been trained in the continental schools of learning, and who had embraced the Reformed faith, were employed to superintend the newly-organised educational system of the country, and the whole organisation was brought into sympathy with the everyday life of the people by the preference given to day schools over boarding schools, and by a system of inspection by the most pious and learned men in each circle of parishes. Knox also was prepared to order compulsory attendance at school on the part of two cla.s.ses of society, the upper and the lower--the middle cla.s.s he thought might be trusted to its own natural desire for learning; and he wished to see the State so exercise power and patronage as to lay hold on all youths "of parts" and compel them to proceed to the high schools and Universities, that the commonwealth might get the greatest good of their service.

The form of Church government given in the _First Book of Discipline_ represented rather an outline requiring to be filled in than a picture of what actually existed for many a year after 1560. It provided for a form of Church government by ecclesiastical councils rising from the Session of the individual congregation up to a National a.s.sembly, and its first requisite was a fully organised church in every parish ruled by a minister with his Session or council of Elders and his body of Deacons. But there was a great lack of men having the necessary amount of education to be ordained as ministers, and consequently there were few fully equipped congregations. The first court in existence was the Kirk-Session; it was in being in every organised congregation. The second in order of time was the General a.s.sembly. Its first meeting was in Edinburgh, Dec. 20th, 1560. Forty-two members were present, of whom only six were ministers. These were the small beginnings from which it grew. The Synods came into existence later. At first they were yearly gatherings of the ministry of the Superintendent's district, to which each congregation within the district was asked to send an Elder and a Deacon. The Court of the Presbytery came latest into existence; it had its beginnings in the "weekly exercise."

The work had been rapidly done. Barely a year had elapsed between the return of Knox to Scotland and the establishment of the Reformed religion by the Estates. Calvin wrote from Geneva (Nov. 8th, 1559):

"As we wonder at success incredible in so short a time, so also we give great thanks to G.o.d, whose special blessing here s.h.i.+nes forth."

And Knox himself, writing from the midst of the battle, says:[345]

"We doe nothing but goe about Jericho, blowing with trumpets, as G.o.d giveth strength, hoping victorie by his power alone."[346]

But dangers had been imminent; shot at through his window, deadly ambushes set, and the man's powers taxed almost beyond endurance:

"In twenty-four hours I have not four free to naturall rest and ease of this wicked carca.s.s ... I have nead of a good and an a.s.sured horse, for great watch is laid for my apprehension, and large money promissed till any that shall kyll me."[347]

If the victory had been won, it was not secured. The sovereigns Mary and Francis had refused to ratify the Acts of their Estates; and it was not until Mary was deposed in 1567 that the Acts of the Estates of 1560 were legally placed on the Statute Book of Scotland. Francis II. died in 1560 (Dec. 5th), and Mary the young and widowed Queen returned to her native land (Aug. 19th, 1561). Her coming was looked forward to with dread by the party of the Reformation.

There was abundant reason for alarm. Mary was the Stuart Queen; she represented France, the old hereditary ally; she had been trained from childhood by a consummate politician and deadly enemy of the Reformation, her uncle the Cardinal of Lorraine, to be his instrument to win back Scotland and England to the deadliest type of Romanism. She was a lovely creature, and was, besides, gifted with a power of personal fascination greater than her physical charms, and such as no other woman of her time possessed; she had a sweet caressing voice, beautiful hands; and not least, she had a gift of tears at command. She had been brought up at a Court where women were taught to use all such charms to win men for political ends. The _Escadron volant de la Reine_ had not come into existence when Mary left France, but its recruits were ready, and some of them had been her companions. She had made it clearly understood that she meant to overthrow the Reformation in Scotland.[348] Her unscrupulous character was already known to Knox and the other Protestant leaders. Nine days before her marriage she had signed deeds guaranteeing the ancient liberties and independence of Scotland; six days after her marriage she and her husband had appended their signatures to the same deeds; but twenty days before her wedding she had secretly signed away these very liberties, and had made Scotland a mere appanage of France.[349] They suspected that the party in France whose figure-head she was, would stick at no crime to carry out their designs, and had shown what they were ready to do by poisoning four of the Scotch Commissioners sent to Paris for their young Queen's wedding, because they refused to allow Francis to be immediately crowned King of Scotland.[350] They knew how apt a pupil she had already shown herself in their school, when she led her boy husband and her ladies for a walk round the Castle of Amboise, to see the bodies of dozens of Protestants hung from lintels and turrets, and to contemplate "the fair cl.u.s.ters of grapes which the grey stones had produced."[351]

It was scarcely wonderful that Lord James, Morton, and Lethington, were it not for obedience' sake, "cared not thoughe theie never saw her face," and felt that there was no safety for them but in Elizabeth's protection. As for Knox, we are told: "Mr. Knox is determined to abide the uttermost, and others will not leave him till G.o.d have taken his life and theirs together."[352] What use might she not make of these fascinations of hers on the vain, turbulent n.o.bles of Scotland? Is it too much to say that but for the pa.s.sionate womanly impulse--so like a Stuart[353]--which made her fling herself first into the arms of Darnley and then of Bothwell, and but for Knox, she might have succeeded in re-establis.h.i.+ng Popery in Scotland and in reducing Protestant England?

Cecil himself was not without his fears, and urged the Protestants in Scotland to stand firm. Randolph's answer shows how much he trusted Knox's tenacity, however much he might sometimes deprecate his violence:

"Where your honour exhortethe us to stowteness, I a.s.sure you the voyce of one man is hable in one hower to put more lyf in us than five hundred trompettes contynually bl.u.s.teringe in our eares."[354]

He was able to write after Mary's arrival:

"She (Mary) was four days without Ma.s.s; the next Sunday after arrival she had it said in her chapel by a French priest. There were at it besides her uncles and her own Household, the Earle of Montrose, Lord Graham ... the rest were at Mr. Knox sermon, as great a number as ever was any day."[355]

Mary's advisers, her uncles, knew how dangerous the state of Scotland was for their designs, and counselled her to temporise and gradually win over the leading Reforming n.o.bles to her side. The young Queen entered on her task with some zest. She insisted on having Ma.s.s for her own household; but she would maintain, she promised, the laws which had made the Ma.s.s illegal in Scotland; and it says a great deal for her powers of fascination and dissimulation that there was scarcely one of the Reforming n.o.bles that she did not win over to believe in her sincerity at one time or another, and that even the sagacious Randolph seemed for a time to credit that she meant what she said.[356] Knox alone in Scotland read her character and paid unwilling tribute to her abilities from his first interview with her.[357]

He saw that she had been thoroughly trained by her uncles, and especially by the Cardinal of Lorraine, and that it was hopeless to expect anything like fair dealing from her:

"In verry dead hir hole proceadings do declayr that the Cardinalles lessons ar so deaplie prented in hir heart, that the substance and the qualitie ar liek to perische together. 1 wold be glaid to be deceaved, but I fear I shall not. In communication with her, I espyed such craft as I have not found in such aige."[358]

Maitland of Lethington thought otherwise. Writing to Cecil (Oct. 25th, 1561) he says:

"You know the vehemency of Mr. Knox spreit, which cannot be brydled.... I wold wishe he shold deale with her more gently, _being a young princess unpersuaded_."[359]

It was thought that Mary might be led to adopt the Reformation if she were only tenderly guided. When Mary's private correspondence is read, when the secret knowledge which her co-religionists abroad had of her designs is studied and known, it can be seen how true was Knox's reading of her character and of her intentions.[360] He stood firm, almost alone at times among the leading men, but faithfully supported by the commons of Scotland.[361]

Then began the struggle between the fascinating Queen, Mary Stuart, one of the fairest flowers of the French Renaissance, and the unbending preacher, trained in the sternest school of the Reformation movement--a struggle which was so picturesque, in which the two opponents had each such strongly marked individuality, and in which the accessories were so dramatic, that the spectator insensibly becomes absorbed in the personal side of the conflict, and is tempted to forget that it was part of a Revolution which was convulsing the whole of middle and western Europe.

A good deal has been written about the rudeness with which Knox a.s.sailed Mary in public and in private, and his conversations with her are continually referred to but seldom quoted in full. It is forgotten that it was Mary who wished to try her gifts of fascination on the preacher, just as Catherine de' Medici tried to charm de Beze before Poissy; that Knox never sought an interview; that he never approached the Court unless he was summoned by the sovereign to her presence; that he was deferential as a subject should be; and it was only when he was compelled by Mary herself to speak on themes for which he was ready to lay down his life that he displayed a sternness which monarchs seldom experience in those to whom they give audience. What makes these interviews stand forth in history is that they exhibit the first clash of autocratic kings.h.i.+p and the hitherto unknown power of the people. It was an age in which sovereigns were everywhere gaining despotic power, when the might of feudal barons was being broken, when the commonalty was dumb. A young Queen, whose training from childhood had stamped indelibly on her character that kings.h.i.+p meant the possession of unlimited autocratic privileges before which everything must give way, who had seen that none in France had dared dispute the will of her sickly, dull boy-husband simply because he was King, was suddenly confronted by something above and beyond her comprehension:

"'What have ye to do,' said sche, 'with my marriage? Or what ar ye within this Commounwealth?' '_A subject borne within the same_,'

said he, 'Madam. And albeit I neather be Erle, Lord, nor Barroun within it, yitt hes G.o.d maid me (how abject that ever I be in your eyes) a profitable member within the same.'"[362]

Modern democracy came into being in that answer. It is curious to see how this conflict between autocratic power and the civil and religious rights of the people runs through all the interviews between Mary and Knox, and was, in truth, the question of questions between them.[363]

It is unnecessary to tell the story of the seven years of struggle between 1560 and 1567. In the end, Mary was imprisoned in Lochleven Castle, deposed, and her infant son, James VI., was placed on the throne. Lord James Stewart, Earl of Moray, was made Regent. The Estates or Parliament again voted the Confession of Faith, and engrossed it in their Acts. The Regent, acting for the sovereign, signed the Acts. The Confession thus became part of the law of the land, and the Reformed Church was legally recognised in Scotland.