BY THE REV. D. BEATON, WICK.
(Continued from page 55.)
MARCHIONESS OF ARGYLL.
LADY MARGARET DOUGLAS, as she was before her marriage, was the second daughter of William, seventh Earl of Morton. Her father, one of the richest noblemen in Scotland, was an enthusiastic supporter of Charles I. in his effort to set up Episcopacy in Scotland. He sold his property of Dalkeith and other estates, yielding an annual rental of £100,000 Scots, in order that he might advance the cause of the King. Lady Margaret was born about 1610, and at an early age was espoused to Archibald, Lord Lorn, afterwards eighth Earl and first Marquis of Argyll. Lady Margaret and her husband were of one mind in ecclesiastical matters, both being staunch supporters of the Presbyterians. Anderson says:—”We are not exactly informed as to the time and circumstances in which either of them became the subject of serious religious impressions, but, in both cases, it appears to have been early. True religion shed its hallowed and ennobling influences over their domestic life, sweetening its enjoyments as well as lightening its trials, and rendered their whole deportment a living epistle of Christ, known and read of all men. It was the custom of the Marquis to rise at five o’clock in the morning, and to continue in private till eight o’clock; and, besides family worship and private prayer in the morning and evening, he usually prayed with his lady at the same seasons, his valet and her maid servant being present.” It was a fit preparation for those years of heart-rending sorrow through which both had to pass. Both evidently enjoyed the pure preaching of the Gospel, and were privileged to enjoy the ministrations of David Dickson for two years at Inveraray.
The Marchioness’s trials may be said to have begun with the worldly wise scheme on which her husband, the Marquis, embarked, to bring about an alliance between his daughter and Charles I. Argyll, on Charles’s arrival in Scotland in 1650, suggested to him that the best possible evidence he could give of his interest in the Presbyterian cause was by marrying into some family of rank which was devoted to that cause. But the Marquis went further, and herein is seen his worldly ambition which was to bring to him and his household such bitter sorrow, for he suggested to Charles that he should marry Lady Anne Campbell, his own daughter. Charles consented to the proposal, but it must have been with a mental reservation. At least, he never fulfilled his promise. The Lady Anne, all unsuspecting of what was awaiting her, buoyed up her mind with hopes of being Queen of Britain, and in these fond dreams of her young inexperienced heart she was encouraged by her father. When she was made to realise that Charles never meant to make her his queen, the blow fell upon her with staggering effect. Her reason, unable to stand the strain, gave way, and she became quite insane. The worldly wisdom which planned this scheme, which after all miscarried, had disastrous results, and the price paid for worldly ambition must have been terrible to a parent’s heart. Kirkton says, all that the “poor family had by the bargain was a disappointment so grievous to the poor young lady, that of a gallant young gentlewoman, she lost her spirit and turned absolutely distracted.” “So,” he further adds, “unfortunately do the back wheels of private designs work in the puppet plays of the public revolutions in the world.”
It is not known definitely whether the Marchioness was opposed to the match or not, but Anderson thinks there are good grounds for believing that she entertained a very low opinion of Charles long before he showed himself in the darker and more reprehensible features of his character. This surmise is founded on the following anecdote:—When Charles came to Scotland in 1650, he found it exceedingly difficult to act as a saint, though he had very little difficulty in taking paths and making promises that would require him to be one. His dissolute habits greatly offended the more serious-minded of his courtiers, and Argyll was asked to remonstrate with the Prince. Argyll’s opportunity at last came on a Sabbath evening at Stirling, and he faithfully, with all humility, pointed out to Charles the sinfulness of his behaviour. Charles, like the hypocrite that he was, professed to be deeply affected, and even shed tears, and “so earnest,” says Anderson, “did the matter to all appearance become, that they prayed and mourned together till two or three o’clock in the morning.” The Marquis was deeply impressed with the seeming contrition of Charles, and made known to his lady the happy night he had spent with Charles. The Marchioness took quite a different view of the matter, and plainly expressed herself to her husband that it was her belief that Charles’s tears were only crocodile tears, and that the Marquis would yet pay dearly for remonstrating with the dissolute Prince, an estimate of Charles’s character which had a painful realisation in the coming years. Charles never forgot nor forgave the man who dared to reprove him, and when Charles felt himself secure upon the throne, the long cherished feelings of revenge found satisfaction in the execution of Argyll.
Events swiftly ran their course in England and Scotland, and the Restoration, with years of nameless sorrow in its train, at last came. Charles ascended the throne of his fathers. To the Marchioness the mad, hilarious joy, with which the Restoration was received by so many in Scotland, filled her with deep feelings of fear and alarm. And these feelings were to be justified by events that were already hastening to their accomplishment.
Attention has been already directed to the reception that the Marquis met with when he went up to London to pay homage to Charles. The cruel, vindictive spirit of Charles, cherished for years, showed itself in a peremptory order to imprison Argyll. Kirkton maintains that he “died a sacrifice to royal jealousy and revenge”—a verdict that has much to confirm it. During his imprisonment, the Marchioness, dreading the worst, made an attempt to get her husband out of prison. The plan was that she would don her husband’s clothes and remain in prison while the Marquis would don his wife’s, and escape out of prison in this way. The plan, however, miscarried by the Marquis’s determination to stand by the cause he had espoused, and suffer the uttermost. When the death sentence was passed on the Marquis, his devoted lady hastened to the prison. “She was there,” says Anderson, “before he reached it, and on his entrance a most affecting interview took place between them. ‘They have given me till Monday,’ said he, on seeing her, ‘to be with you, my dear, therefore let us make for it.’ The afflicted wife, in the agony of grief, burst into a flood of tears, and embracing him, exclaimed, ‘The Lord will require it, the Lord will require it!’ The meeting between the condemned man and his wife was very affecting—all in the room being moved to tears. The Marquis at last getting some command of himself restrained his tears, and, turning to his beloved wife, affectionately addressed her: ‘Forbear, forbear,’ he said, ‘truly I pity them; they know not what they are doing; they may shut me in where they please, but they cannot shut out God from me: for my part, I am as content to be here as in the Castle, and as content in the Castle as the Tower of London, and as content there as when at liberty, and I hope to be as content upon the scaffold as any of them all.'”
The Marchioness made an appeal to Middleton on behalf of her husband. He had been deeply indulging in strong drink, but he received her graciously. When she announced the subject of her interview, Middleton told her plainly that he could not grant her request, for he had received strict injunctions from Charles to behead the Marquis. On the day of his execution, the Marchioness, along with Mr. John Carstares, spent the forenoon of the day wrestling with God, pleading that the Lord would seal his charter with the words: “Son, be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee!” This request was graciously granted, for it is related that the Marquis, after settling some matters in connection with his worldly affairs, rose, and, bursting into tears, said:—”I see this will not do; I must declare what the Lord hath done for my soul! He has just now, at this very instant of time, sealed my charter in these words: ‘Son, be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee.'”
The Marchioness bore the heavy stroke with Christian resignation. Law, in his Memorials, says, in reference to her: “His lady, Lady Margaret Douglas, a lady of singular piety and virtue, bore this sad stroke—with other, both personal and domestic, afflictions—with great patience and incredible fortitude, giving herself always to prayer and fasting, and ministering to the necessity of the saints.” Mr. John Carstares, who proved a true friend to her in her great grief, wrote, saying: “He [God] hath given the highest security, ‘that all things (having a special look at all their afflictions, as the context, in the confession of most, if not all, judicious commentators, putteth beyond debate) shall work together for good to them that love God, and are the called according to His purpose’; where he hath, to speak so with reference to His Majesty, condescended some way to abridge His own sovereignty and absolute dominion, engaging Himself by covenant, that, though He may do what He will, yet He shall will to do nothing but what shall be for His people’s good, so that in all His dispensations towards them His absolute dominion and His goodwill shall be commensurable and of equal extent, the one of them never to be stretched one hair’s breadth beyond the other. And even in the most dark, involved, intricate, abstruse, and mysterious providences wherein they can read and take up least of His mind, and wherein He (seeming to walk either in the greatest absoluteness of His dominion or in the sharpest severity of His justice) refuseth to give particular account of His matters and motions, He hath wonderfully stooped and condescended to give this general, sweetly satisfactory account: That they shall work for good, even their spiritual good and profit, to the purging of sin and their further participation of His holiness.”
About a year after her husband’s execution the Marchioness met with a new trial in the condemnation of her eldest son, Lord Lorn, to death—a sorrow from which she was to a great extent relieved by the non-execution of the sentence. The Marchioness lived seventeen years after the execution of her husband. Her exemplary character and virtues are set forth in a letter written by the Rev. Mr. Gillies, which may be quoted at length:—“Neither shall I stay to tell you,” he says, “before this what is so well known to all who knew or heard tell of her, how much the Lord had enabled her to bear many a heavy cross, through a long tract of time during her widowhood, besides what had passed the rest of her life, which seldom wanted some remarkable cross. Of her it might well be said that she endured a sore, a tedious, and constant fight of afflictions (old ones continued and new ones frequently superadded), yet she was enabled to bear through with that faith, patience, submission, and Christian magnanimity that were very visible, commendable, and exemplary, and (which I cannot forget, being a thing that I often admired) such diligence and assiduity in following the duties of praying, reading, hearing, praise, all the acts of worship, a constant waiting upon all ordinances and duties, public and private, and even upon the weekly catechising, at which she delighted to be present, and by which she confessed that she had ever profited much; all these she so attended that it was a rare thing to find her in an omission to as to any of them. And as if a child under the inspection of a teacher, or one put to task (and indeed she did task herself), so did she follow and keep close to these duties, being conscious that she had One who stood over her head always, that was witness to all her ways, to whom she must ere long give an account of herself. The rest of her time she did spend in overseeing her children or grandchildren (of which there were still a number about her), and Christian entertainment of such as came to visit her, with such exemplary gravity and sobriety, and other good entertainment, as was much observed and commended; moreover, her cheerfully welcoming and helping such as came for help, or advice for their bodily diseases. For this she was so famous that they came frequently and in great numbers. Of such she never wearied, nor was dissatisfied with their coming, except in so far as they did disappoint themselves (as she in her humility deniedly expressed it) by putting such confidence in her skill, which she said was no skill; yet the experience that so many had, of the Lord’s blessing, with good success, the advices and helps she gave brought so many to her, who seldom missed of the intent of their coming and diverse of them would have within some time returned to show what the Lord had done to them by her means, and to give her thanks, for which she was very thankful to Him who had so blessed what she did. And that she might be the more useful this way, she had always good store of medicaments beside her; many of them brought from the apothecaries, but most of them she caused make herself, never adventuring to give anything but what she knew was safe, and could do no hurt. Neither was she behind any in the generation for charity to the poor distressed, especially to such as were of the household of faith. Great numbers of poor people did flock to her; nor could the coldest weather and most dangerous storms hinder them to come to her from afar, although they knew they were to pass over ferries (the place of her residence being surrounded by waters), and it was the observation of neighbours about, that her being there brought multitudes on them; but to these she was so liberal as I need only say, that I am persuaded she gave with as much Christian compassion as any, ‘drawing out the soul to the hungry,’ etc., and that the receivers themselves were oftentimes astonished when they got so largely, as that in many miles, they got not so much from all as from her alone, and it was the admiration of many how this could hold out with her; but God blessed all. And when sometimes it was told her that many of those she gave to were but cheats and rogues (as indeed many of them were), she would freely answer, ‘While we have opportunity let us do good to all men, but especially to the household of faith,’ and that she gave what she gave to them, not as to cheats, but as to needy persons; and that if she gave with a single eye she would be accepted, whatever they were, and whatever use they made of what she gave ; yet did she little regard profane randy beggars though even these still got something by her order ; and when with any whom she had ground to believe were of the household of faith, to these she was most liberal, and gave them with such compassion and kindness as did show what a living member of Christ’s body she was. Whilst she was daily exercised for most part as I have now hinted, she did not trouble herself with household affairs (except in causing provide things necessary for housekeeping), having laid over these matters entirely on some whom she trusted, of whose skill and fidelity she had long experience, and her being exonerated of this care and burden she often acknowledged as a great ease to her, and a great help to her, being taken up with things of another nature, which was her main work and delight.” Such is the character given of the good Marchioness by one who knew her well. ” Her life,” he further adds, “is well known to have been filled with godliness, righteousness, sobriety, charity, and all Christian virtues, with a constant adherence to the truths and ways of God, without any fall or stain upon any part of her life.”
(To be Continued.)