Presbyterian Church of Scotland

“ By committing herself to this system the Church of Scotland established between herself and the Church of England a division which became more and more apparent and was the cause of much of her subsequent sufferings. It is no doubt strange that she should have endured so much Presbyterian principle. not for any great Christian principle, but for a question of church government. On the other hand, Presbyterianism stood in Scottish history for freedom, and for the rights of the middle and lower classes against the crown and the aristocracy ”

“ Since the union the growth of the Church has been considerable. Presbyterianism is comparatively strong in three districts of England, namely Northumberland, Lancashire and London. Elsewhere it is either weak or nonexistent. Even where it is comparatively strong it is largely exotic. The membership is mainly Scottish, and the ministers have been imported principally from Scotland. To English people, therefore, the Presbyterian is still the "Scotch Church," and they are as a whole slow to connect themselves with it. ”

“ The leaders in that day also, such men as Henderson, Gillespie, Rutherford and Baillie, understood the spirit of Presbyterianism and the need of the Church quite as fully as did any leaders of either an earlier or a later day. It is not to be forgotten that, in an age that produced men whose names must never be omitted when the roll of Scotland's greatest sons is called, the Presbyterian Church stood firmly for absolute liberty in worship from prescribed forms. ”

“ Nearly the whole of the people have left the Establishment with their ministers—so that the Free Presbyterian Church, instituted by those who have left the Establishment, may be considered the Church of Scotland. The general impression in Scotland is, that the residuary church cannot long exist. About £240,000 have been raised in less than ten weeks, for the erection of new churches, and for the support of the seceding clergy ”

“ But the new ideas continued to grow, and the sentiment in favour of letting clergymen as well as lay church members put a lax construction on the doctrinal standards drawn up in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, has spread as widely in Scotland as in England. The Presbyterian Churches in America and the Roman Catholic Church now stand almost alone among the larger Christian bodies in retaining something of the ancient rigidity. ”

“ Of course these men became troublesome dissenters, notwithstanding all that could be done to disperse or silence them. In reality, the substitution of a new bishop-approved minister for one who would not submit to bishops, was a matter not very immediately affecting congregations, for, under the late alteration in the church, the forms of worship and professed Christian doctrine remained the same as before. But the Scotch, during the last twenty-five years, had been generally instructed regarding the Presbyterian polity, and trained up to regard it with veneration ”

“ A very short time will see the Free Church, the United Presbyterian Church, and the Reformed Presbyterian Church—all the large Presbyterian communities who have protested against patronage, and whose leading principle is the liberation of religion from State control—absolutely united in their work, and partitioning Scotland between them. ”

“ This minority of not more than twenty-seven ministers and as many congregations, mostly located in fastnesses beyond the Grampians, is now the Free Church of Scotland, with Presbytery, Assembly, Moderator—in short, with the offices and institutions, on a condensed scale, which are essential in Presbyterian polity. These few determined people claim to be the faithful remnant of the Disruptionists. ”

“ The Presbyterians of the United States are quite distinct from the Congregationalists of New England, the descendants of the English Puritans, although the two fraternize together to a great extent. The Presbyterian Church is the daughter of the Kirk of Scotland, having its home in the Middle States, whence it has spread through the country, especially toward the West. Its government is more vigorous than that of any other church except the Methodist, and its doctrinal strictness surpasses that of all other large societies. ”

“ On the marching north of a party of Argyle's army, the Presbyterians took advantage to threaten those Clergy with imprisonment, which put those who could do so under the necessity to abscond." As showing that the military were acting at the instigation of the Presbyterian authorities, and that the persecution was quite as much a religious as a political one, it is noticeable that in the churches of the Aberdeen Diocese, where the extempore mode of worship still continued, the Clergy were not at first interfered with. ”

“ Recreation in clubs and reading-rooms is often easy to contrive, and hours for worship can also be arranged. In hospitals periodic services are possible. In any regiment there are likely to be various denominations of Christians, and minorities must sometimes do without their own type of chaplain. Hymns and Holy Scripture serve as uniting influences, and the fair and friendly feeling among the chaplains in this vicinity makes work easy. Work here makes it evident that the Church of Scotland as by law established is only one of a wide Sisterhood of Presbyterian churches. ”

“ At this period of its history, therefore, we find the Church of Scotland more pronounced than any other section of the Reformed Church in its desire for freedom from prescribed forms in the worship of God. Indeed, we are probably not in error in judging that in different circumstances, with an educated ministry in the Church and those appointed as leaders of worship who had received training for that important work, Knox would have felt even such a book as that which he prepared, to be both unnecessary and undesirable. ”

“ The United Presbyterian Church in America, the result of so many happy unions, has always regarded simplicity in worship as an end earnestly to be desired, and worthy of all serious effort to secure. Its influence has, therefore, been uniformly in favor of that avoidance of forms against which the Seceders of Scotland, whom it represents on this continent, so often protested. ”

“ As regards the repetition of the Creed by the congregation, it is certainly a question open for discussion whether or not the frequent repetition of a formulary of doctrine is a safeguard to the faith of the Church. In this matter also we are not without the light of experience and history; the Presbyterian Churches of Scotland and America, which have never adopted any such practice, have certainly a record with respect to soundness in the faith which compares favorably with that of Churches which have for ages adopted this as a custom in their worship. ”

“ Dr James Sharp, who was nominated Primate,—he was a native, I may mention, of the Diocese of Aberdeen, and was educated at one of its Universities,—is a specimen of those well affected Presbyterian Moderates, who in their hearts were never far from the principles of Evangelical Truth and Apostolical Order combined; and for these principles, moderately carried out under the restored Episcopacy, he incurred the implacable resentment of the Covenanting Presbyterians, and died under their hands a Martyr's death ”

“ It is but right that in reviewing public worship outside of the Established Church, reference should be made to the practice of those large sections of the Presbyterian Church which, originating in Scotland, have grown strong in other lands. ”

“ From all which (without noticing the Erastian form of these acts, &c.) it may be observed, that there is somewhat done that is materially good; but then there is nothing importing the contrariety of Prelacy to the scriptures of truth, nor the divine right of Presbyterian church government, so that the whole of this settlement is purely political, done for the pleasure of the good subjects of Scotland: for, 1st, the only reason why Prelacy is complained of and abolished, is, because it was grievous and contrary to the inclinations of the generality of the people. ”

“ The period of the disruption in Scotland was one of such struggle concerning great and fundamental principles of Church government, that the Free Church, during the first quarter of a century of its existence as a separate communion, had little time to devote to a consideration of the subject of worship ”

“ It was with much satisfaction, therefore, that the news was received in Scotland that the Assembly had affirmed the necessity of public baptism.
The Directory for Public Worship in the Presbyterian Church states, accordingly, that baptism “is not to be administered in private places, or privately, but in the place of public worship, and in the face of the congregation, where the people may most conveniently see and hear; and not in the places where fonts, in the time of Popery, were unfitly and superstitiously placed,” that is, near the church door, and behind the backs of the congregation. ”

“ The Church of Scotland then, it may safely be said, moved ever in the direction of securing greater liberty in worship, rather than towards an increase of ritual and an imposition of form. Every succeeding period in her history, whether we judge from the general spirit characterizing the people or from the official acts of the Parliament and the Church, shows a growing distaste for a liturgical worship and an increasing appreciation of liberty in all matters pertaining to the approach of the soul to God. ”

“ English people, in speaking of the Established Church of Scotland, seem to forget how much Episcopalians are mixed up with their Presbyterian fellow-countrymen in promoting common charitable and religious objects. For example, take my own experience: the administration of a very valuable charitable institution called the Paterson and Pape Fund, is vested jointly in the incumbent of St. John's, Edinburgh (Episcopalian) , and the two clergymen of St. Cuthbert's (Established) Church. Even in matters affecting the interests of our own Church we may find ourselves closely connected. ”

“ During the six years of the existence of the Free Church, it has drawn to itself a large share of the numbers and vitality of the Presbyterian body of Scotland. The Old Kirk has a great deal of wealth, a great many churches, and a great deal of pomp. ”

“ The choir, which is the oldest part and of Norman architecture, is used as a chapel for the soldiers, and the nave as one of the parish churches of the city. Both are in use, and services are held in them at the same hours. The military church is under the English government, and of course the service is Episcopalian; while the other is Scotch Presbyterian. Of course the church was originally Roman Catholic, but in the old times John Knox often preached there. How little endures! One set of people exist and build and occupy. ”

“ The Lords Spiritual.—Finally, there are the ecclesiastical members—not peers, but "lords spiritual." In the fifteenth century the lords spiritual outnumbered the lords temporal; but upon the dissolution of the monasteries in the reign of Henry VIII., resulting in the dropping out of the abbots, the spiritual contingent fell permanently into the minority. At the present day the quota of ecclesiastical members is restricted, under statutory regulation, to 26. Scotland, whose established church is the Presbyterian, has none. ”

“ We do not, however, hold our Presbyterian friends and fellow-countrymen responsible for the sayings and doings of their forefathers. They have inherited their religion, with all its qualities, good, bad, and indifferent, and cannot help its history. ”

“ Symptoms of rebellion, however, are of late cropping up in favour of its restoration as a day of religious observance. Places of worship, both Established and Free, are being opened in increasing numbers on Christmas Day, in some cases with ornate ritualistic services. A few years more, and the edict against High Days and Holy Days will probably be formally repealed, and Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost be observed throughout Scotland, as those Festivals are among the Lutheran communities in Germany and Scandinavia, and even in Presbyterian Holland. ”

“ It is a disadvantage which affects the history of all churches, that it is almost inevitably viewed through the medium of the ecclesiastical prepossessions of the historian. This has been peculiarly the case with the history of the viiearly church in Scotland, which has become the battle-field on which Catholic and Protestant, Episcopalian and Presbyterian, have contended for their respective tenets ”

“ The religious Establishment of Scotland is at present selected, from its supposed weakness compared with the Church of England, as the object of the combined attack of the dissenting bodies which at various times have forsaken its communion. Episcopalians, as we are called, let us say in passing, never having belonged to the Presbyterian Establishment, cannot properly be termed dissenters from it; and they never make common cause with dissenters against the present Establishment. ”

“ He had wide experience, a comprehensive grasp of facts, abundant sympathy, an extensive knowledge of men, and a great capacity for teaching. In 1870 he was one of two representatives chosen from the Free Church of Scotland to attend the united general assembly of the Presbyterian churches of the United States. He prolonged his visit to make a thorough acquaintance with American Presbyterianism, and this, followed by a similar tour in Europe, fitted him to become the real founder of the Presbyterian Alliance. ”