silly, and litle better, and dyed. His daughters, one was maryed, and her husband lost all his stock at sea, twice or thrice; his goodfather stocked him once or twice, and all was still lost, and they and their children are miserable. The other daughter fell into a distemper, wherein she lost her reason. The man himself, after that time, never throve; his means wasted away insensibly; and throu all things, he fell under melancholy, and turned silly, and dyed stupide. All this fell out in some feu years after what passed above; and my relator kneu all this particularly, and had occasion to be upon the man's bussiness and affairs.’ Wodrow's Analecta, vol. ii. pp. 175, 176. See also, in another work by this eminent Scotch divine, an account of what happened, when ‘a rash young man’ having destroyed the property of a clergyman, named Boyd, ‘it was observed that that family did never thrive afterwards, but were in a decaying condition till they are reduced almost to nothing.’ Wodrow's Collections upon the Lives of Ministers of the Church of Scotland, vol. ii. part. i. p. 215.
457
See Fraser's Life of Himself, in vol. ii. of Select Biographies, edited by the Rev. W. K. Tweedie. ‘Nothing now remained of all my father's great fortune but a small wadset of sixteen chalders, liferented likewise by my mother. And about the same time a new (though an unjust) adversary charges both her and me for 36,000 merks, and a reduction of our rights; so that our whole livelihood was either gone or at the stake. For four years did this adversary vex us, and was like to have undone us as to our temporal condition, had not the Lord prevented.’ p. 196. ‘I, ignorant what defences to make, had in my company a registrate horning, which I accidentally and without premeditation (God putting it in my mind at the same time) did cast in, by which he, being the king's rebel, was incapacitate from pursuing me. And the Lord so ordered it that he never after compeared to trouble me, by which means I was delivered from a loss and a fashery, and had but one court to wait upon.’ p. 202. ‘My condition during this time was a wrestling condition with the sons of Zeruiah that were too strong for me; little or no overcoming, yet violent wrestling.’ … ‘For I humbled myself under the sense of the calamities of our family, and my own particular wants; I besought him to keep us from utter destruction. And the Lord was pleased to hear; he destroyed by death my chief adversaries, I found shifts to pay my many petty debts, gained our law-action, and was restored to some of my ancient possessions again.’ pp. 227, 228.
458
‘So hazardous a thing it is to meddle with Christ's sent servants.’ Life of Mr. William Guthrie, Minister at Fenwick, by the Rev. William Dunlop, reprinted in Select Biographies, vol. ii. p. 62. To arrest a clergyman on a civil or criminal process, was an act full of danger, inasmuch as the Deity would hardly fail to avenge it. This applied even to the officers who executed the arrest, as well as to him by whom it was ordered. See, for instance, Some Remarkable Passages of the Life and Death of Mr. John Semple, Minister of the Gospel, p. 171 (in Walker's Biographia Presbyteriana, vol. i.). ‘Some time thereafter, he gat orders to apprehend Mr. Semple; he intreated to excuse him, for Mr. Semple was the minister and man he would not meddle with; for he was sure, if he did that, some terrible mischief would suddenly befal him. Mr. Arthur Coupar, who was Mr. Semple's precentor, told these passages to a Reverend Minister in the church, yet alive, worthy of all credit, who told me.’ Durham boasts that, ‘when Ministers have most to do, and meet with most opposition, God often furnisheth them accordingly with more boldnesse, gifts, and assistance than ordinary. Christ's witnesses are a terrible party; for as few as these witnesses are, none of their opposits do gain at their hand; whoever hurteth them shall in this manner be killed. Though they be despicable in sackcloth, yet better oppose a king in his strength, and giving orders from his throne covered in cloath of state, than them: though they may burn some and imprison others, yet their opposers will pay sickerly for it. This is not because of any worth that is in them, or for their own sake; But 1. for His sake and for His authority that sendeth them. 2. for the event of their word, which will certainly come to passe, and that more terribly, and as certainly, as ever any temporall judgement was brought on by Moses or Elias.’ Durham's Commentarie upon the Book of the Revelation, p. 416.
459
‘These who are trusted by Christ to be keepers of the vineyard, and his ministers, ought also to be respected by the people over whom they are set; and Christ allows this on them. Where Christ is respected and gets his due, there the keepers will be respected and get their due.’ Durham's Exposition of the Song of Solomon, pp. 450, 451. Fergusson complacently says, that to affront a clergyman by not believing his statement, or ‘message,’ as he terms it, is a ‘dishonour done to God.’ Fergusson's Exposition of the Epistles of Paul, p. 422.
460
‘As it is true concerning vs, that necessitie lyeth vpon vs to preach, and woe will bee to vs if wee preach not; so it is true concerning you, that a necessitie lyeth vpon you to heare, and woe will be to you if you heare not.’ Cowper's Heaven Opened, p. 156.
461
The following order was promulgated by the Kirk-Session of Aberdeen on the 12th July 1607. ‘The said day, in respect it wes delatit to the sessioun that thair is sindrie landvart gentillmen and vtheris cum to this towne, quha mackis thair residence thairin, and resortis not to the preching nather on Saboth nor vlk dayes; thairfor, it is ordanit that thrie elderis of everie quarter convene with the ministrie in the sessioun hous, immediatlie efter the ending of the sermone on Tuysday nixt, and thair tak vp the names of the gentillmen and vtheris skipperis duelling in this burgh, quha kepis nocht the Kirk, nor resortis not to the hering of Godis word; and thair names being taken vp, ordains ane off the ministeris, with a baillie, to pas vnto thame and admoneis thame to cum to the preichingis, and keip the Kirk, vthervayes to remowe thame aff the towne.’ Selections from the Records of the Kirk Session, Presbytery, and Synod of Aberdeen, p. 58. It was not enough to go occasionally to church; the attendance must be regular; otherwise the clergy were dissatisfied, and punished the delinquents. In the Presbytery Book of Strathbogie it is recorded that, on the 29th September 1649, ‘Mr. Johne Reidfurd being posed quhat diligence he had vsed to the Lady Frendraught, reported, shoe had hard three sermons, and so, as he thought, shoe intended to continow ane hearer. The bretheren, considering her long continowed contumacie and delay of her process, by heiring a sermon now and then, thought not that kind of heiring satufactorie, quherfor Mr. Robert Watson, and Mr. Robert Irving, ver ordained to goe with Mr. Johne Reidfurd, and requyre the said Lady to subscryv the Covenant, quherby shoe might testifie her conformitie vith the Kirk of Scotland, quhilk, if shoe refused, the said Mr. Johne vas ordained to pronounce the sentence of excommunicatioun against hir before the Provinciall Assemblie, as he vold be answerable therto.’ Extracts from the Presbytery Book of Strathbogie, p. 115. Neither distance, nor illness, might be pleaded as a valid excuse. Under no circumstances, would the preachers tolerate the affront of any one displaying an unwillingness to hear their sermons. In 1650, ‘compeired the Lord Oliphant, being summondit for not keeping his parish kirk of Abercherdour, vho declared his inabilitie of bodie many tymes, and the want of houses for accommodating him and his familie so farr distant from the same, vas the onlie caus, quhilk he promised to amend in tym comming. Mr. John Reidfurd ordained to report the same to the presbytrie, and vpon his continowed absence, to processe him.’ Presbytery Book of Strathbogie, p. 149. See more on this subject in Registers of the Presbytery of Lanark, pp. 5, 33, 67; Minutes of the Presbyteries of St. Andrews and Cupar, pp. 67, 68, 90, 153; Minutes of the Synod of Fife, pp. 18, 55, 132; and Spalding's History of the Troubles, vol. ii. p. 57. Spalding also mentions (p. 114) that at Aberdeen, in 1643, the clergy discoursed every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, in the afternoon; on which occasions, ‘the people is compellit to attend their Lectureis, or ther cryit out against.’
462
‘And it may be truly said, as the Church of Scotland hath had no detractors, but such as were ignorant of her, or misinformed about her, or whom faction, partiality, prejudice, wickedness, or love of unlawful liberty did inspire; so no person or party hath endeavoured hithertil to root out Presbytery, but the Lord hath made it a burdensome stone unto them.’ Naphtali,
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