BY THE REV. CHARLES THOMSON, OF NORTH SHIELDS
(LATTERLY FREE CHURCH MINISTER, WICK).
V.
(Continued from p. 431).
FROM 1686 till the Revolution, the persecutions of John Steel were in nowise abated. New advertisements were put up, renewing the offer of a thousand merks for his head. Soldiers surrounded his house at all hours of the night and day; and the murderer of John Brown of Priesthill, the indefatigable and “bludie” Claverhouse, watched for him, evening and morning, searching the muirs, and glens, and mountains. But Steel was safe, for he was hid under the shadow of the Almighty’s hand till all those calamities were overpassed. After a hot persecution of nine years’ duration, he was delivered from his sufferings by the Revolution of 1688. His name appears, along with a multitude of others, in the Act of Parliament rescinding fines and forfeitures. He then returned, and occupied his lands in peace; but neither for the nine years’ rent, which Airley had lifted, nor for the damage done by the persecutors, and by Huge Bawties, did he ever receive any compensation. His unbending firmness, however, did not pass unnoticed by the revolutionary Government; and he received, from the Marquis of Douglas, a Captain’s commission in the 26th, or Cameronian regiment. In 1689 the Parliament of Scotland passed an Act abolishing prelacy, and all superiority of any office in the Church of that kingdom, above presbyters; and, in the following year, another Act was passed, restoring such of the Presbyterian ministers who had been thrust from their churches since the 1st of January 1661, as were yet alive, to the free exercise of their ministry in their respective parishes; and appointing that the Episcopalian incumbents should desist from their ministry in those parishes, and remove themselves from the manses thereunto belonging, that the Presbyterian ministers, formerly thrust out, might again peaceably enter in; and the Privy Council was appointed to see this Act put in execution. In pursuance of this enactment, Captain John Steel had a district allotted to him, from the churches of which he was commissioned to expel the Episcopalian incumbents. Notwithstanding the dreadful sufferings to which he had been subjected by those very men, he did not retaliate in the day of his power, for he was possessed of another spirit than theirs, but executed his commission in as mild and gentle a manner as possible. His orders were to make, with his sword, a small cut in the incumbent’s gown, and, in the King’s name, to order him out of the Church of Scotland. He used to relate an anecdote of the curate’s wife of Dalserf, which showed the great affection she had for her husband. When Steel and his men had entered the curate’s house, and he had drawn his sword to make the requisite incision in the curate’s gown, she screamed out, “Oh, my dear Joseph!” rushed between him and the armed men; and earnestly offered her own life to save her dear Joseph’s. The captain, deeply affected, vainly assured her that he would do her husband no bodily harm; at length, he ordered his men to withdraw, laid down his own weapon, and succeeded in quieting her mind by convincing her that her Joseph’s life was in no danger. He was employed far and near in expelling the Episcopalian incumbents; and it is most likely that he resigned his commission as soon as the Church was cleansed of those intruders.
How long John Steel lived subsequently to the Revolution is not known, but it appears that he was alive, and repaired his house, nineteen years after, for in the wall of the old mansion at Waterhead there was a stone inscribed—
“Praise God.
J. ————— S.
1709.”
It is probable that he was so impoverished, by the repeated spoilings of his goods, and destruction of his property, to which he, during the persecution, had been subjected, that he could not repair his dilapidated mansion before 1709; and the inscription on the stone may be viewed as an expression of the pious Covenanter’s gratitude to God for having preserved him amidst all the perils to which he had been exposed; and for enabling him and his family to enjoy, in the evening of his life, a comfortable habitation. He lies buried in Lesmahagow Churchyard, where a plain thruch-stane,* without a name, marks his grave. His great-great-grandson, and representative, Mr William Steel, still inherits his lands, and resides in the house of Waterhead, which he lately rebuilt, and fixed in a conspicuous part of it the stone above-mentioned.† The Confessor’s descendants are numerous and respectable, and, in 1832, ranked among their number four ministers and two preachers of the Church of Scotland. In the Muirlands of Lesmahagow, his memory is held in great veneration, and often does the grey-headed peasant relate to his assembled children the wonderful deliverances of their “great fore-elder.”
* Thruch-stane, i.e., through-stone, a flat tombstone.
† This was in 1832.
The Presbyterian branch of the vine which the Covenanters watered with their blood still flourishes in Scotland, and is fruitful. Would that the Great Husbandman would purge it, that it might bring forth more fruit—even as in the days of old!
“Lord God of Hosts! we thee beseech,
Return now unto thine;
Look down from heaven in love, behold
And visit this thy vine.”
The two last bloody kings of the House of Stuart invaded the dignities and prerogatives of the King of Zion. They set themselves, and took counsel together with a corrupt hierarchy, an abandoned nobility, and a cruel soldiery, against the Lord, and against His anointed, saying, “Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us: but He that sitteth in the heavens laughed, the Lord had them in derision. He spoke to them in wrath, and vexed them in His sore displeasure.” Charles II. was cut off, in the midst of his unclean revelries, by a stroke. The messengers of the Man of Sin were his counsellors and his comforters in his dying moments; and he went down to the grave with the Popish Lie in his right hand. “Thy pomp is brought down to the grave—the sound of thy viols: the worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee.” James II., whose minions had sworn to break down the carved work of the sanctuary, and to lay waste the dwellings of the righteous for a hunting field, was cast out of his kingdom as an abominable branch. “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! art cut down to the ground, thou that didst weaken the nations. For thou hadst said in thy heart, ‘I will ascend above the heavens; above the stars of God I will exalt my throne; I will sit in the mount of the congregation in the sides of the north.’ Thy saints that saw thee did narrowly look upon thee, they well considered thee. ‘Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, that shook the kingdoms, that destroyed the churches, that never dismissed his prisoners to their own homes? All the kings of the nations—all of them—lie down in glory, each one in his own sepulchre. But thou wast not joined to thy fathers in burial because thou hadst destroyed thy country, thou hadst slain thy people. And Jehovah, God of Hosts arose against thy children, and He cut off from them the name, and the remnant, and the son, and the son’s son. ‘I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart, for thou hast destroyed the wicked, thou hast put out their name for ever and ever.'”
What a contrast to their persecutors is exhibited by the Martyrs and Confessors of the Scottish Church! What Christian does not shudder when he reflects on the former? and who does not exult when he thinks on the latter? How very clearly do the lives of those holy men and women demonstrate, that though “the treasure was in earthen vessels, the excellency of the power was of God, and not of man!” They were “troubled on every side, yet not distressed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed.” In all things they approved themselves as the servants of God, “in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labour in watchings, in fastings, by pureness, by knowledge, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness, on the right hand and on the left, by honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold they lived; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, and yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing all things.” Their mantle yet lingers upon the hills and dales of Lesmahagow; and though the parish has been, for a long time, given to spiritual slumbers, yet there are indications, of late years, that a better spirit is returning; and that the inhabitants are awakening to a juster sense of the importance of those matters, which their covenanting ancestors held so dear. Let them beware of putting their hand to the plough, and then looking back.