What the peculiar constitution of a Church is may be discovered by ascertaining what makes her position distinctive as compared with that of other ecclesiastical bodies in the same locality. No Church has any right to a separate existence if there be no difference between her testimony and that of the others. Now there are two large Presbyterian Churches in Scotland — the Established Church and the United Presbyterian Church — each of which till very lately, when the latter materially altered the Confession, professed to adhere to the Westminster Standards. The difference between the Free Church and both these lies in her being neither Erastian nor Voluntary. She protests against interference with her spiritual jurisdiction by the civil ruler, and holds the scripturalness, and highly values the benefit, of a connection between Church and State. It is this which makes her constitution peculiar as a Church in Scotland. Any action, therefore, on her part which is inconsistent with this peculiarity, must be unconstitutional. She was constituted on an intermediate site, with the Erastianised Establishment on the one hand, and the Voluntary Dissenters on the other. She abuts beyond her proper site — she goes off her distinctive position — when she inclines either to Erastianism on the one side, or to Voluntaryism on the other.
This was the view of her distinctive position held by the acknowledged leaders of the Free Church in 1843, and by the whole body of the Church as well. “Though we quit the Establishment,” Dr. Chalmers, as the moderator of the first Free Church Assembly, said, “We go out on the Establishment principle — we quit a vitiated Establishment, but would rejoice in returning to a pure one. To express it otherwise, we are the advocates for a national recognition and national support of religion and we are not Voluntaries.” Dr. Candlish was equally explicit in his disavowal of Voluntaryism. “I trust,” he said, “we shall be enabled in our Assemblies, and, if possible, in our outward and tangible acts, to maintain uncompromised our principle of a religious establishment. I trust we shall resist every motion or proposal of an incorporating union with any Church that differs from us on that point.”
But it may be said that we are not to be bound by the utterances of any men, however eminent their position and however great their influence may have been. But that cannot be said as to the authoritative declarations of the Church, in those documents
which form the basis of her position, as to those acts of Assembly which indicate what are her constitutional principles, and as to those engagements which require a faithful adherence to those principles.
The Claim of Right is the document in which, in 1842, the position of the party afterwards composing the Free Church, was formally defined. She is no longer the Free Church of Scotland if she ceases to demand what was claimed in 1842, and abandons the idea of occupying the position in which alone she could accept the concession of that claim. That Claim is in these terms — “The General Assembly do, in name and on behalf of this Church, and of the nation and people of Scotland, and under the sanction of the several statutes, and the Treaty of Union hereinbefore recited, Claim as of Right, that she shall freely possess and enjoy her liberties, government, discipline, rights and privileges according to law.” Now, this is a Claim which can be conceded only to a Church in connection with the State, or to a Church willing to enter into such a relation to the State as Establishment constitutes.
The Protest of 1842 declares, “that the Claim, Declaration, and Protest of the General Assembly which convened at Edinburgh in May, 1842, as the Act of a free and lawful Assembly of the said Church, shall be holden as setting forth the true constitution of the said Church;” and that the rejection of the Claim of Right is the only reason why the Disruption took place. The concession of that Claim, at any time, should therefore suffice as a reason for the Free Church’s return to the position of an Establishment.
In Act XII., 1846, “Anent Questions and Formula,” it is declared “That the Church firmly maintains the same scriptural principles as to the duties of nations and their rulers, in reference to true religion and the Church of Christ, for which she has hitherto contended, “both against Erastians and against Voluntaries.
In Act VII., 1853, “Anent the Principles of the Church,” it is declared — “That this Church maintains, unaltered and uncompromised, the principles set forth in the Claim, Declaration, and Protest of 1842, and the Protest of 1843, relative to the lawfulness and obligation of a scriptural alliance between the Church of Christ and the State, and the conditions on which such an alliance ought to be regulated — as well as the position which, in the maintenance of these principles, the Church was called upon to take in 1842 and 1843, as a Church protesting against invasions of her just and
constitutional rights, and demanding redress of the wrongs thus inflicted.” The Church is thus fixed down in the position of a claimant in relation to the State, till redress is granted. To depart, in any other circumstances from that position is to cease to be the Free Church of Scotland.
And further, we are required, so long as we do not formally repudiate the Claim of Right, “highly to value the connection” of the Church with the State; and in its closing sentences we are directed to pray for the restoration to Scotland of a rightly constituted Established Church. And the Protest reserves a right “to strive, by all lawful means, as opportunity shall in God’s good providence be offered, to secure the performance of this duty” — viz., the maintenance and support of an establishment of religion in accordance with God’s word by the civil magistrate.
The Free Church, therefore, in terms of the authoritative declarations of her distinctive testimony, is bound to continue — 1. To assert “the right and duty of the civil magistrate to maintain and support an establishment of religion in accordance with God’s word.” 2. Highly to value the benefit of such an establishment. 3. To pray for this benefit for Scotland. And 4. To “strive by all lawful means to secure” this boon.
Such is the position and such the action to which as Free Churchmen we are solemnly pledged; and any action inconsistent with those engagements must be unfaithful and unconstitutional, and therefore both unwise and sinful.
(F.P. Magazine Vol. 1 p. 62).