BY DR JOHN LEE.
MOST certainly that description is not historically correct; there never was such gloom attending the observance of the Sabbath in Scotland as that celebrated writer alleges. The Sabbath, though observed with the greatest reverence, was a day rather of sober and cheerful piety than of any painful restraint. It may be, as the question has been asked, not improper to state that the greater part of the description applying to the religion and morals of that class of persons in Scotland, who are known by the name of Covenanters, must have been supplied almost altogether by the imagination of the writer. He seems equally to have forgotten the state of things which supervened upon that event, which was certainly hailed as joyfully by the Presbyterians of Scotland as by any other class of his Majesty’s subjects, although they had great cause afterwards to complain of the harsh treatment which they experienced, in violation of the solemn promises which that monarch had repeatedly made to them. But on that subject, as I believe the authority of the celebrated writer referred to is often thought almost the best that can be quoted, I think it right to state that he seems to have been utterly unacquainted both with the observances of the Presbyterian Church and those of the Episcopalian Church which succeeded it. He imagines, for instance, that the liturgy was observed after the Restoration of Charles II.: whereas, in point of fact, the only change that took place in the worship in the churches consisted in the discontinuance of the Directory and the adoption of three Articles, which had not been thought offensive in the days of Knox, viz., the use of the Lord’s Prayer, the repetition of the Creed by parents when they brought their children to be baptised, and the use of a doxology in connection with the singing of the Psalms. These were the only marked deviations from the worship which had been previously observed; and the whole objection of the people of Scotland arose from their belief that the hierarchy and his Majesty’s claims of supremacy in matters ecclesiastical were not divinely warranted, and that the power of the Church, patronised by the King, had been exercised formerly, and they were afraid would still continue to be exercised in a manner inconsistent with the full enjoyment of their religious privileges. I refer to these particulars merely as specimens of the inaccuracy of the descriptions which have probably made an impression not easily effaced, though it has done great injustice to the characters of an oppressed and persecuted race, who, derided as they have been as feeble-minded fanatics, did more than any other body of men both to maintain the interests of religion and to secure for their posterity the enjoyment of civil liberty.
But, in point of fact, there was neither in the form of worship on the Lord’s Day, nor in the general tone of the preaching, that marked difference which that same author would have us to suppose is so strong? There was a difference, but not such as he represents . . . At the same time it is right to observe that there was a very marked and glaring distinction between the character of the ministers of the one denomination and of the other at the period referred to; and in my apprehension the description given by Bishop Burnet, who could scarcely be suspected of undue partiality to Presbyterians, is in some respects one of the most candid which is to be found. The strictest Presbyterian, in his anxiety to defend the outraged and insulted character of his forefathers, may also be content to refer to such an honest chronicler as Burnet. He owns that the Presbyterian ministers who were turned out of their livings in 1662, were grave, solemn, diligent and faithful, whereas the new incumbents put in the places of the ejected preachers, were generally very mean and despicable, the worst preachers he ever heard, ignorant to a reproach, many of them openly vicious, a disgrace to their order, and to the sacred functions, and indeed the dregs and refuse of the northern parts.—Report of the Select Committee of the House of Commons on the Observance of the Lord’s Day with the substance of the Evidence, pp. 33, 34.
* The above is Dr Lee’s answer to a question asked him when he appeared as a witness before the Select Committee of the House of Commons on the Observance of the Lord’s Day, which sat in 1832. The question put to him was: “Can you say, from your knowledge of history, whether the description given by a celebrated novelist of the period of the Covenanters is historically correct, and whether their precise manners were as strongly marked in contrast to the other party as that ingenious writer would have us to suppose?” “The celebrated novelist” whom the querist had in view was Sir Walter Scott, whose unfair treatment of the Covenanters has misled so many, and which called forth Dr MacCrie’s trenchant reply, in which Sir Walter cuts rather a sorry figure. Dr MacCrie’s famous criticism was reprinted in his works.—Editor.