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by fasting men (εἰ μὴ ὑπὸ νηστικῶν ἀνθρώπων), save on the anniversary of the day when the LORD's Supper is commemorated [Maundy Thursday]. Those holy fathers perhaps followed that rule by reason of certain local peculiarities convenient to that Church. As no one has laid before us any obstacle to rectification of this matter, we lay down -following the traditions of the Apostles and the Fathers (opiouev ἀποστολικαῖς καὶ πατρικαῖς ἐπόμενοι παραδόσεσι—that it is not right to break the fast of the Thursday of the last week in Lent, and thus to bring contempt upon the whole of Lent."

As men could not remain without food all day, it is obvious that the rule of the Church in the seventh century accorded with her practice in the fourth-the Holy Communion was celebrated at a very early hour. The testimony of several minor Councils might be cited, to confirm these canons, if it was needful to multiply illustrations of the same fact.

Lastly, putting all our evidence together, we do not see how any can fail to arrive at the conclusion, that the great and solemn act of Christian worship-of all acts of worship the greatest and most solemn the Holy Eucharist-was offered up in the morning; that it consecrated the coming day of work. It was received by men and women fasting. It was the first, the holiest food that was to be partaken of through the organs of the body. This custom the Church, being taught (as the canon says) by the Apostolical and Patristical traditions, maintained intact until the great religious convulsions of the sixteenth century, when the old foundations were indeed broken up. By schismatic bodies of men, who lowered the Blessed Sacrament to a mere type and form, it was received in the evening. Their leaven is infecting many members of our own Church. The plea of thus opposing the Church traditions of 1500 years, is the convenience of those who cannot communicate except in the evening. It is a hard case. Other similarly hard exceptions might be found to every single law and ordinance of the Church. Yield to one, let us yield to all. Let our Church rules be then those of simple expediency and convenience. Rather let us believe that God's Holy Spirit has guided the Universal Church from the beginning; that in this matter, as in many others, GOD sees not as men sees. Our duty plainly is to carry out the laws of the Catholic Church, and leave all the exceptional inconveniences in GoD's own hands, to deal with as He thinks well, trusting the issues entirely to His control. His good time He will bring good out of apparent evil, and finally work out His own glorious ends-the salvation of man, and His own everlasting dominion. When solicited to break through the Church's rule, whether for the purpose of allying ourselves to a party, or on the ground of mere convenience, may we have grace and strength enough given to us to reply, μes Tolútny σuvýdejav οὐκ ἔχομεν—οὐδὲ αἱ ἐκκλησίαι τοῦ Θεοῦ.

In

314

GRUB'S ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

No. II.

An Ecclesiastical History of Scotland, from the introduction of Christianity to the present time. Four Vols. By GEORGE GRUB, A.M. Edinburgh: Edmonston and Douglas. 1861.

IN resuming our review of this work, we shall pass over the middle ages, and commence with a period nearer to our own time. Our space will not permit us to examine closely into the history of the Reformation-so called-the causes which led to it, and the means by which it was carried out: it will be sufficient to note some of the leading features.

We need hardly remind our readers, how differently the great Ecclesiastical revolution was carried out in the two neighbouring countries of England and Scotland; the one was conservative, the other destructive; the one was a reformation,-in the proper sense of the word-the other was an overthrow, without any attempt to maintain the being of the Catholic Church. The reason of this is, that in the one case the Reformation was conducted by the Church herself, in conjunction with the royal power; in the other, by the nobility, in opposition to both. In Scotland, the power of the nobles far exceeded that of the English barons: the wars of the Roses, and the subsequent astute policy of Henry VII., had raised the royal power in exactly the same ratio as it had depressed that of the barons. In Scotland, when the clannish principle prevailed, even in the lowlands, the various districts owned allegiance far more to the baron than to the king: to such an extent was this carried, that the Abbacies and Priories in these districts, and even Bishoprics, were considered as appendages to the barony, and were generally held by some cadet of the family. We often even find lay-abbots and lay-priors, noblemen or their sons, who appropriated the conventual lands, and assumed the secular power and position of the Abbot or Prior, and even some of the Ecclesiastical functions: thus we find two illegitimate sons of James V.,-James, Commendator of the Priory of S. Andrew, and James, Commendator of Kelso and Melrose,--both attending a Provincial Synod at Edinburgh. We can see how easily, in the overthrow and confusion that followed the introduction of Protestant doctrines, the lay-abbots and commendators would retain the lands they held, and get, as many did, the Ecclesiastical title transformed into a civil one, and thus obtain both lands and lordship; and since it generally happened that the parochial tithes had been transferred to the monasteries, by far the greater part of Church property fell

into lay hands. The retaining of these temporalities, could only co-exist with the overthrow of the Church; a restoration of the Church would, in the eyes of these plunderers, include a restoration of the Church's property. There was then a strong personal and worldly inducement to take part with the Protestant party; we find therefore, that a great portion of the nobility supported the revolutionary party: they embraced Protestant doctrines, not because they were convinced of their truth, but because of the worldly advantages that accompanied them. It is only necessary to advert to that scourge of the Church, the Regent Murray, as the most striking instance of the fact, that the history of these times affords. Added to this, is the general corruption of morals, both among clergy and laity, and we shall cease to wonder that the Church of CHRIST and the true religion, so completely fell before its energetic enemies,-worldly power on the part of the nobles, and fanaticism on that of the people, excited to fury by Protestant preachers. Had the Bishops entered on the question of reform; had they used their power and influence to put down manifest abuses; had they met the Clergy in Synod, and deliberated on the state of affairs, perhaps the Church might have been saved: as it was, they did none of these things, and the Church was lost. It is well known that Knox was not opposed either to Bishops or to a ritual; and his influence, both with the lords of the Congregation and the common people, was so great, that there is no improbability in the supposition, that some compromise might have been come to, whereby the essentials of the Church would have been preserved; by which, in after years, when the crowns of England and Scotland were united, the Scottish Church would have assimilated itself to its southern sister. It is a popular error, as probably most of our readers are aware, to suppose that Knox was, in the modern sense of the word, a Presbyterian, or that the present Kirk owes its polity and doctrine to him; the true parents of both alike are Andrew and James Melville.

The abolition of the Episcopate was not an easy matter, as it was not wholly a religious question. Bishops were one of the estates of the realm, and it was doubtful whether an act of parliament was valid, unless sanctioned by the first estate, as well as the other two. To meet this, a sham Episcopate was invented, and men were nominated, who bore the title of Bishop, and exercised some of the functions, without any consecration. In 1572, a still greater anomaly was perpetrated, a certain number of men were appointed to the ancient sees, and actually consecrated in regular form by the laying on of hands, after the old example, while all the time those that performed this ceremony had themselves never been consecrated! This is the first time, as Mr. Grub remarks, that laying on of hands was practised in the Protestant community in Scotland. A return to the former state of things

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soon took place, and the shadow of consecration and ordination followed the substance, and departed too. But even after Presbyterianism triumphed, we find in the Parliament of 1592, and those subsequent, laymen sitting as the spiritual estate, bearing the titles of Bishops, Abbots, and Priors.

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The only way by which we can account for such a state of things, is to suppose that the Prelates generally, before the Reformation, had completely secularized themselves in the eyes of the world the Bishop, Abbot, or Prior, appears as a minister of state, or as a temporal lord, who lived as such, either at the court, or in his diocese or abbey; the religious functions being delegated to inferiors. The holders of these offices having so far forgotten their true position and duties, it is no wonder that the world forgot them too.

Before James' accession to the crown of England, all the old hierarchy of Scotland had departed this life, except one, and he did not live to see the union of the crowns :

"On the twenty-fourth of April, while the king was on his progress towards London, James Beaton, Archbishop of Glasgow, died at Paris, in the eighty-sixth year of his age: and thus, at the very time that the British kingdoms were united under one sovereign, the last member of the old Scottish hierarchy, the last of those Bishops who had exercised canonical jurisdiction under the authority of the Roman see, was taken away. Beaton had remained abroad since the year 1560, but he had all along been the faithful servant of Mary and her son. In 1598, a special Act of Parliament had been passed in his favour, restoring and confirming his honours, dignities, and possessions, and dispensing with his acknowledgment of the established religion. Archbishop Beaton was a munificent benefactor of the Scottish College at Paris, and was reverenced as its second founder."-Vol. II. p. 279.

Hardly had the old succession died out, when James showed his wish to see it restored :

"Soon after the death of Archbishop Beaton, he nominated John Spottiswood, minister of Calder, to the see of Glasgow. The letter of nomination, which is dated Hampton Court, the twentieth day of July, 1603, mentions that the Archbishopric was vacant by the decease of James Beaton, late lawful Archbishop thereof;' and in respect of the learning, loyalty, and good life of Spottiswood, appoints him to the benefice. The language used shows how completely the office was viewed as a civil dignity, to be bestowed indeed in time to come, as provided by the laws, on Protestant ministers only, but capable, in itself, of being held by a Roman Catholic Prelate."—Ib. p. 283.

No consecration, however, took place till 1610. The two grand mistakes which were made, at the restoration of the Episcopate, and which, more than anything else, conduced to its future overthrow, were the maintaining the royal prerogative, and the making

the Bishops officers of state: it was a fatal step when Spottiswood was appointed Chancellor of the kingdom in 1635.

"No Churchman [Ecclesiastic] had held that dignity since the Reformation, and the promotion of Spottiswood excited great murmurs, not only among the Presbyterians, who professed to condemn the union of ecclesiastical and secular functions in the same person, but also among the nobles, who had become accustomed to regard the high offices of state as exclusively their own. The chancellors had frequently thwarted the ecclesiastical policy of the sovereign, and hindered the execution of measures, which were thought conducive to the good of the Church. The new appointment was probably made to obviate such evils, but the dissatisfaction which it caused, was much more than sufficient to counterbalance any good that could have resulted in this respect."Ib. p. 353.

No less disastrous was the claim of the royal prerogative; its exercise by Charles I., in ordering a Book of Canons without the concurrence of a Synod, is too well known to need more than a reference. It may be perfectly true, that no circumstances could have prevented the Puritan rebellion, short of entire overthrow of the Church; yet it is quite possible, that had the Ritual and Canons been the work of the Church in Synod, and issued by purely ecclesiastical, instead of royal authority, at the Restoration under Charles II., the Church would have more resembled that of England than it did.

We do not intend to follow the history through the dreary time of the usurpation, a period which the modern Presbyterian looks back upon as the palmy age of his religion, in which his community was all-powerful; when her doctrines were everywhere taught, and her discipline everywhere exercised. Al true history, however, clearly shows that this outward conformity was an unnatural restraint, and only concealed the rottenness within. A species of espionage was instituted, which penetrated to every family and household;1 every one knew that his neighbour's eye was upon him, and the ear of the minister open to receive every complaint against each other of his parishioners, and the Kirk Session ready to try every delinquent :

"The Congregational Session's Book was tried by the Presbytery, and the Presbytery's book by the Synod, and the Synod's book by the

This

1 This system of espionage continued till the disruption in a modified form : it happened to the writer of this article to have to consult the superintendent of police about a certain robbery, the perpetrator of which was never discovered. disruption," said the superintendent, "is the greatest misfortune to us possible, for before it took place, I had only to go and ask the minister, and he was certain to know something about it; for, you see, every parishioner liked to stand well with the minister, so as soon as his neighbour did anything wrong, he went and told the minister, and the minister immediately told us.' This was, we suppose, the Presbyterian form of auricular confession.

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