(Continued from page 429).
During the Duke of Lennox’s absence in London the petitioners spared no pains to strengthen their case. Men of light and leading were summoned to the capital to await the King’s answer. On 17th October the long expected answer arrived and was proclaimed at the market cross to expectant thousands. The Privy Council in so far as it was called for ecclesiastical purposes was ordered to dissolve at once; all strangers were to return to their homes within twenty-four hours; the courts of justice were to be removed from Edinburgh and Charles assumed entire responsibility for the Liturgy. The restrained fury of the mob broke loose and took the law into its own hands. Meetings of the nobility, gentry, burgesses, and ministers were held at which the situation was discussed and action decided on. In the midst of all the tumult the cool and collected conduct of Henderson was an invaluable asset to the Covenanting cause. A more volatile nature might have ruined the cause by rashness and precipitate action.
On the 18th October the National Petition was presented to the Scottish Privy Council. The first name is that of the Earl of Sutherland. It is probably owing to this fact that he is said to have been the first to subscribe the National Covenant in 1638. Events of the greatest importance followed in quick succession and on Wednesday, 28th February, the National Covenant was signed in Greyfriars Church by the nobility and the gentry. On Thursday, 1st March, it was signed by the ministers in Tailors’ Hall in the Cowgate and on Friday and Saturday, 2nd and 3rd March, in Trinity College Church at the foot of Leith Wynd by the people of Edinburgh. It was a time of tremendous enthusiasm and religious revival. Henderson is credited with drawing up the third part of the National
Covenant and in the momentous days that followed its signing he was playing his part as a wise and faithful leader of his brethren and the people in the ecclesiastical storm that was raging so fiercely.
It was, however, in the famous Glasgow Assembly which met in that city on the 21st November, 1638, that Henderson was as a strong pillar in the house of the Lord. As the history of this famous Assembly is to be dealt with in detail at our Synod in May we need not say much about it here. The procedure afforded a splendid field for the ecclesiastical jurists of the day with their nimble wits and obstructive tactics. Henderson calmly guided the storm-tossed ship safely through the troubled waters. The obstructionists, whether high or low, lay or cleric, found in the Moderator one who had a high sense of the issues at stake and with remarkable calmness and wisdom he set aside the objections offered. When the Assembly rose from its labours Episcopacy of the Laudian, Jacobean and Caroline type were pulled up root and branch. It was an extraordinary piece of work accomplished in so short a time and it shows that notwithstanding the opposition the Covenanters met with that the country was ripe for the change. During the Assembly after the deposition of the Bishops the Commissioner from St. Andrews put in a plea to have Alexander Henderson for their minister. Edinburgh also had its eye on Henderson. He told the Assembly that he desired no change. “I am now growing an old, withered, and dry tree,” he said, “and it is a pity to transport such an one lest it bring forth no fruit.” When the matter was put to the vote Edinburgh won the day. On the last day of the epoch making Assembly (20th December), Henderson delivered the usual moderatorial closing address in which acknowledgment was made of God’s great goodness to them. According to tradition (though this has been called in question) the last sentence he uttered had an almost prophetic ring: “We have now cast down the walls of Jericho; let him that rebuildeth them beware of the curse of Heil the Bethelite.” These are words to which
the modern builders of what was once cast down would do well to give heed.
Charles during all these happenings was nursing his anger which was soon to have an outgate. The royal troops marched northwards and soon the Covenanter troops were face to face with them. Neither was keen for fighting. Henderson and Johnston of Wariston were present with Covenanter troops and took part in the negotiations which were entered into. Though the agreements come to did not satisfy either party yet the Scots from an ecclesiastical point of view gained practically all their desires. The King, it is true, would not acknowledge the Acts of the Glasgow Assembly but he announced that a free General Assembly would meet on 6th August and a Parliament on the 20th of the same month. On 1st July the customary proclamation of the calling of the Assembly was made and when it was discovered that the deposed prelates were invited, riots broke out. Charles originally intended to be present at the Assembly but, making the recent riots an excuse, he asked Hamilton to be present. On Hamilton refusing, the Lord Treasurer, Traquair, was appointed. In addressing the Lord High Commissioner Henderson said: “We beseech you to see that Caesar has his own; but let not Caesar have what is due to God and belongs to Him.” He was succeeded in the Moderator’s chair by Rev. David Dickson, Irvine, but though not in the chair Henderson was the guiding mind among the Commissioners of Assembly. In 1640 he was chosen Rector of Edinburgh University, an office which he enjoyed by re-election for five and a half years.
When what was known as the Second Bishops’ War broke out and the Scottish Army marched over the Border Henderson was with them. On the 27th August the Royalist and the Covenanter forces came face to face at Newburn. On the following day hostilities began and ended in a victory for the Scots. Henderson, who was with the Scottish army, preached in St. Nicholas’ Church in Newcastle. On 2nd October the representatives of the
Covenanters among whom was Alexander Henderson entered into negotiations with Charles at Ripon. Great events were taking place in England and when Henderson returned after the ratification of the Treaty of Ripon it was with feelings of intense relief. The Acts of the Edinburgh Parliament were legalised and a clause was inserted that in no distant future presbytery would take the place of Episcopacy. On his return to Scotland he was busy with pen and voice defending the Covenanter cause.
When the General Assembly met in 1641 discussion took place in connection with a motion by Henderson that a catechism, a confession, a directory for worship, and a form of church government should be prepared. The task was unanimously entrusted to himself. In this year he petitioned to be relieved from his Edinburgh charge—his voice was weak and his general health bad he said. But Edinburgh was not willing to lose such a man and Henderson, after tokens of the people’s appreciation, remained in his charge.
When the Westminster Assembly was called together in 1643 Henderson was one of the Commissioners appointed from Scotland. In this famous gathering he was an outstanding man especially when the prolonged debates on church government took place. While negotiations with Charles were proceeding Henderson’s health failed him. The constant strain of church affairs and his constant attendance at the Westminster Assembly undermined his health. He was now sixty-four but into the few last years of his life there was crowded work that others might have found sufficient for a life-time. The human frame and mind could stand the strain no longer. He returned home to Edinburgh to die, after being absent three years in London, on the 19th August, 1646. Wodrow tells how, in the presence of Sir James Stewart, Henderson said: “Well, I am now near the end of my race, hasting home, and there was never a schoolboy more desirous to have the play than I am to have leave of this world and in a few days I will sicken and die. In my sickness I will be much out of ease to speak of anything, but I desire that you will be with me as much as you can, and you shall see all
will end well.” Henderson lived a strenuous life. He was buffeted by open enemies and false friends. Wrong motives were imputed to him but, through good report and evil report, he kept on the way and like a greater Soldier of the Cross he could say: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love His appearing” (II. Tim. iv. 7-8).