and complete, in his own death, the ruin and the | We would have you anoint his body with the tears overthrow begun in the hours of his life. You will observe, as has often been noticed by commentators, that the sepulchre in which Christ was laid was a new one, in which no person ever was laid before, and that it was without the gates of the holy city, and the property of a rich man. Now, the evident purposes and intents of Providence, in this arrangement, were to fulfil the ancient prophecy already alluded to," that he should be with the rich in his death,"-to accomplish the type involved in the command to carry the ashes of the sacrifice without the camp, and to render the evidence in support of the resurrection more complete and impregnable; for had not the tomb been a new one, men might have questioned whether it was Jesus that arose or some other, or they might have traced the resurrection, if demonstrated, to some miraculous power resident in the sleeping ashes of some olden saint, and imagined that Christ awoke to life just as the body of an ancient Hebrew was quickened and re-animated when it touched the bones of Elisha; but, inasmuch as the sepulchre was new, and dug out of the solid rock, many difficulties and objections are obviated, and we are brought into contact with the fact of the resurrection, and the proofs that substantiate it, without encountering prejudices and cavils, which otherwise would have encumbered our path. Let us, like these disciples of other days, stand by the grave of Christ, and when we contrast his deep humiliation with his essential greatness and his primeval glory, and witness, in his lifelessness, the infliction of the curse pronounced against transgression, let us learn the odiousness of sin in the sight of the Eternal, the vastness of the evil as evinced by the greatness of the remedy, the boundlessness of God's grace in not sparing his own Son but giving him up to the death for us all, the condescension of the Redeemer in entering the gloomy mansions of the dead, that he might walk as a very brother with his chosen through the dark valley and the shadow of death, the completeness and sufficiency of the satisfaction offered for sinners by Immanuel, exhausting every threatening of the law, and enduring all its penalties; but above all, let us learn to look on Jesus as one whom we have pierced, and who has purchased our ransom from eternal death by sorrows and sacrifices which neither time nor eternity will enable us to estimate. Ye children of Zion, who have oft repeated the prayer: Grant "that we may know him, in the power of his resurrection, in the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable to his death," there is that in the scene now present to your view fitted to excite your sincerest contrition, and your liveliest gratitude; the language of the event is this: "Scarcely for a righteous man will one die, peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die, but God commended his love to us, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us," and the emotions which befit the occasion are those of unaffected penitence and of glowing affection. of godly sorrow, and swathe it with the fine linen of undissembled love. If David, in that sweetest and most plaintive of all elegies, breathed on the slaughtered Saul and Jonathan, thus addresses the virgins of Zion, "Weep, O daughters of Jerusalem, over Saul, who clothed you in scarlet, and put ornaments of gold upon your apparel," much more may not we say, Weep, ye believers in Jesus, over the King of Salem, who clothes you with righteousness, and crowns you with salvation; but let there be gladness mingled with your grief, hymns and hallelujahs intermingled with your sighs to "Him that loved you, and washed you from your sins in his own blood." The grave has received its precious treasure, for it is said, "There laid they Jesus," and it is interesting to mark its locality,-it was in a garden-a lonely but a lovely grave-yard-constructed amid the bowers and flower-walks, and near its margin there would grow many a plant and shrub, whose flowers, painted by divine wisdom, would seem like ornaments of exquisite beauty, designed to relieve the gloom that overhangs the dwellings of the dead; there is little in the place to remind us of death at all, no sickening vapours of corrup tion steam forth from the charnel-house, no fragments of mutilated mortality proclaim that this is a place of skulls; the odours of Araby, the incense and fragrance of the spicery of the East, breathes around, the aromatic sweetness of precious ointments exhales from the grave, so that even here the description of the royal prophet is realized, "All thy garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia, out of the ivory palaces, whereby they have made thee glad." And is there not mystery and meaning in all this? It proclaims how death and the grave have been divested of all their appalling features by the work of Christ; how Immanuel hath planted the flowers of heavenly promise around the margin of the tomb, perfumed the sepulchre itself with the odours of his eternal love, and imbued the hateful cerements of the dead with the fragrance and the freshness of a certain immortality. Yes, there is nothing now about the damp and the chill of the grave to alarm the fears and embitter the prospects of a dying believer; Jesus has been there; he has left within it the impress of his own form, he has changed its aspect and altered its end; it is no longer a prison-house, a vestibule of hell, but a pathway to heaven, an appointed house of rest, where the children of the kingdom repose wearied and exhausted frames for a season, ere they enter in glorified form on the uninterrupted enjoyments, and ceaseless occupations of a blessed eternity. Dear brethren, are there those amongst you who are mourning the loss of sainted relatives, I bid you look into the grave of Christ, "Come, see the place where the Lord lay," and learn what it is to have sorrow sweetened by grace, and sanctified by truth. If their covenant Head strengthened them amid the weakness of a frail mortality to glory in his cross, and practically to exclaim, their "O death, where is thy sting; O grave, where is | thy victory;" if they paused on the threshold of the eternal world to cast back to earth a look of triumph which proclaimed that the everlasting arms were underneath them, and that the Lord was their rod and their staff; and if now you feel that the sweetest flowers you can strew over their memories are those which composed their garlands of faith, and hope, and love, why should your hearts be heavy, and your spirits faint? Know ye not that Christ hath laid them in his own resting-place, and that all who sleep in Jesus he shall bring with him? In conclusion, I would simply say, the grave of Messiah teaches that all must die, and that after death there is the judgment. It appeals to inconsiderate and thoughtless man, with the searching inquiry,- When shall thy spirit rest? When corruption preys upon the frame, it asks, Are you by faith united to the Saviour? Have you submitted to the righteousness of God, and renounced your own, as a sinner guilty and hell deserving? Have you fled for refuge to lay hold on the hope set before you, or are you still dead in trespasses and in sins, a willing wretched captive to Satan and to sin, a vessel of wrath fitting for destruction? Men and brethren, the fashion of this world passeth away, the place of your final rest is preparing for you all, and it is high time to awake out of sleep, and attempt, at least, to reply to the momentous question,-Whether, when you die, you shall be swept off with the besom of destruction to the fellowship of the condemned, or wafted along, amid the hymns and hozannas of conducting angels, to the presence of the Lord. Amen. "GLORY TO GOD IN THE HIGHEST." SONGS of praise the angels sang, Songs of praise awoke the morn Heaven and earth must pass away: And shall man alone be dumb, Borne upon their latest breath, Songs of praise their powers employ. MONTGOMERY. CHRISTIAN TREASURY. Encouragement to Christian Exertion.-If we be employed in gathering together materials, let us not repine though we should not be honoured in fashioning or laying one stone of the entire building. It is enough for us to know that our labours will be accepted. And O, when we think of the reward of our Redeemer's sufferings, and that, in thus working, we are laying ours at the shrine of his cross, how should it silence our unbelief, and make us willing to suffer though it should be unto death! If we are true Missionaries, we shall go forth with our lives in our hand, ready to sacrifice them, or to devote them to the sermeet. It is a delightful thought that there will be no vice of the heathen, as our heavenly Father shall see interruption to His service. If life is prolonged, it will be for this purpose; if death comes, it will usher us into a world where we shall be furnished with new and higher capacities for its performance. A greater devotedness and more ardent love for the souls of men has to us, and by looking to that brightest manifestation can only be obtained by believing the love that God of it-the death of his Son.-Memoir of Mrs Wilson. Clamour. Those that are the loudest in their threats, are the weakest in the execution of them. In springing a mine, that which has done the most extensive mischief makes the smallest report: and again, if we consider the effect of lightning, it is probable that he that is killed by it hears no noise; but the thunder clap which follows, and which most alarms the ignorant, is the surest proof of their safety.—LACON. To love our enemies, to love them to that extent that Love your Enemies.-What is the perfection of love? they may become our brethren. So love thine enemies, that thou mayest wish them to become thy brethren. So love thine enemies, that they may be called into thy society. For thus did He love, who, as he hung upon the cross, exclaimed, "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do!"-ST. AUGUSTINE. THE COVENANTERS OF 1638. BY THE REV. THOMAS M'CRIE, EDINBURGH. THE state of parties in Scotland, at this remarkable era of our history, was very singular, and in some respects unprecedented. It is customary with High-Church historians, to speak of the country as having been divided into two parties, -the royal or prelatical, and the Presbyterian; and they would have us to believe that the latter was a mere "faction," composed of rebelliously disposed persons, and guided, or rather goaded on to excesses by a set of fanatical leaders. Nothing can be further from the truth; and as these writers continue to repeat the slander brought against our fathers by their prelatical opponents at the time, we must just beg leave to repeat, that the real state of matters was precisely the reverse. The two parties mentioned, certainly existed in the country, but it is quite ridiculous to say that the nation was divided by them. The prelatical party may be said to have been composed of the bishops alone, with a few of their underlings among the clergy, whom they had intruded into the Church; a party so insignificant, in point of numbers, rank, wealth, or influence, that they may truly be called a faction,—a faction opposed to the whole nation. At the head of this faction, however, Charles, unhappily for himself and the country, had now openly placed himself. It was long before his Scottish subjects, in the excess of their loyalty, would believe that he could be the author of the harsh and arbitrary proclamations which frequently issued against them from the English court; they ascribed the whole to the machinations of Laud and his prelates; and to the malicious representations of the Scots bishops, who, pretending to be frightened by the uproar about the Liturgy, had fled to court, carrying to the ears of his majesty, and disseminating through England, by means of the press, the most false and exaggerated reports of the state of matters. There can be no doubt now, from unquestioned documents, that these prelates, by their infatuated counsels, were the principal means of plunging the nation into a civil war; but their loyalty, it seems, taught them to transfer all the responsibility, and consequently all the odium, of their measures from their own heads to that of the monarch, on pretence of supporting the royal prerogative. To this mean-spirited policy, Charles, with an infatuation which seems to have been inherent in the race of the Stuarts, was induced to yield; for he sent down a message, informing his faithful subjects in Scotland, to their grief and dismay, that the Liturgy had been imposed by his own express orders, and that the measures of the bishops had his entire approbation; and, as if this had not been enough to complete the breach, he gave the sanction of his name to an infamous libel against the Scottish nation, drawn up by a fugitive minister named Balcanquhal, and filled with the most unfounded statements and injurious reflections, which was published under the title of The King's Large Declaration. Thus the whole was converted into a personal quarrel between Charles and his subjects; and the question came to be, Whether the people of Scotland should submit, in the matters of religion, to the arbitrary dictates of the sovereign, irrespective of either Parliament or General Assembly, or at once assert their privileges as Christians, and their rights as freemen. they were identified, than an attempt to force their consciences. Every thing like personal violence was deprecated and repressed by the leaders of the Covenant; and both Rothes and Baillie lament that their good cause should have been injured by any approach to such evil practices. So far from persons being compelled to sign the Covenant, great care was taken to prevent improper or incompetent subscriptions. None were allowed to sign but such as had communicated in the Lord's Supper. "Some men of no small note," says Henderson, "offered their subscriptions and were refused, till time should prove that they joined from love to the cause, and not from the fear of man." "The matter was so holy," says the Earl of Rothes, "that they held it to be irreligious to use violent means for advancing such a work." A unanimity so singular can only be ascribed to a remarkable effusion of the influ ences of the Holy Spirit; the genuineness of which was attested by the general revival of practical religion which marked the whole progress of the work. "I was present," says Livingstone, "at Lanark, and several other parishes, when, on Sabbath, after the forenoon's sermon, the Covenant was read and sworn; and I may truly say, that in all my life-time, excepting at the Kirk of Shotts, I never saw such motions from the Spirit of God. All the people generally and most willingly concurred. I have seen more than a thousand persons all at once lifting up their hands, and the tears falling down from their eyes; so that through the whole land, excepting the professed Papists, and some few who adhered to the prelates, people universally entered into the Covenant of God." Nay, such was the enthusiasm displayed in the cause of the Covenant, that some subscribed it with their blood, and others would not be prevented from signing, even in the presence of the prelatical ministers, who, with oaths and imprecations, and in some cases with drawn swords, attempted to intimidate them from coming forward. In opposition to the contemptible faction to which we have referred, the whole body of the Scottish nation, including the Parliament, the If we search for the secondary causes which most ancient and respectable of the nobility, produced such an excitement among a people probarons, and gentlemen, with the mass of the com-verbially sober, steady, and intelligent, the whole mon people, were decidedly Presbyterian. Nothing, indeed, is more remarkable, in the whole of this singular period, than the unanimity which prevailed in the country, on all the questions at issue between them and the court. With the single exception of Aberdeen, which was under the influence of the Marquis of Huntly, and the Aberdeen Doctors, who, owing to their distance from the immediate scene of action, information, and intercourse with their brethren, remained attached to the cause of prelacy and arbitrary power, the whole nation cordially joined in the cause of the Covenant. No compulsion was used to procure subscriptions, for none was needed. Some individuals, indeed, among the conformist clergy, who refused to sign, might be treated somewhat unceremoniously; but this was rather an expression of the popular dislike at the measures with which might be traced to three sources of general dissatisfaction and alarm, namely, Arminianism, Popery, and arbitrary power. It would be easy to enlarge on each of these topics, showing the close connection in which they then stood to each other, and the ample grounds which our forefathers had for their apprehensions regarding them. To ignorance of these causes, or to a wilful suppression of the facts relating to them, we may trace all the misapprehension which still exists, in so many quarters, regarding the struggles of our reforming ancestors at this period. Suffice it here to say, that Arminianism, as then maintained in England, was fitted, if not intended, to pave the way for the introduction of Popery,-that Land and his divines were substantially Popish,—and that Popery was then, as it ever has been in theory and practice, whatever it may be in profession, decidedly favourable to absolute despotism in the State. The doctrine | his wonted emphasis and deliberation, these words advocated by these divines, and by the doctors of as his text, " Verily, verily, I say unto you, He Aberdeen, was that the king was supreme judge that entereth not by the door into the sheepin all causes, ecclesiastical as well as civil, and fold, but climbeth up some other way, the same that though the whole subjects in the kingdom is A THIEF AND A ROBBER." These words, so should be massacred in one day, or ordered to literally applicable to the manner in which he submit to the Turkish religion, under the penalty had entered upon his ministry at Leuchars, went of being spoiled of liberty, goods, and life, they like drawn swords" to his inmost soul. He who had no alternative but to submit to the will of the wished to conceal himself from the eyes of men, ruling monarch. This shows you what sort of felt that he was naked and opened before the eyes people our ancestors had to deal with. The ques- of Him with whom we have to do. In short, tion was not about obedience to the law, but sub- the discourse of this powerful preacher was, by mission to an arbitrary prince, who held that his the divine blessing, the means of Henderson's will was above all law, with divines supporting conversion; and ever after he retained a great him in these extravagant claims, with Popish affection for Mr Bruce, whom he called his spipowers urging him to exercise them, and with a ritual father. You may easily conceive that the large army in England prepared to enforce them. sermon, however powerful or appropriate, would In such circumstances, had Scotland yielded, she have produced a very different effect, had Henwould have entailed on herself indelible disgrace. derson discovered that Mr Bruce knew he was She did not yield; and the consequence was a present, and preached at him; this, if true, he struggle which, commencing in this country, was could easily have ascertained, but there is not the soon transferred to the plains of England, and slightest ground for such a supposition. issued in the temporary triumph of liberty and true religion. During this contest, whatever may have been the designs of parties in England, the Scots distinguished themselves as much for their loyalty to their prince, as for their fidelity to their God and their patriotic affection to their country. After this wonderful change on his sentiments, which went much deeper than a conversion to Presbyterianism, Henderson continued to discharge the duties of his retired parish in a manner much more conducive to the edification of his people; and laid up those stores of learning for which he afterwards found so much use. He became a decided opponent of the prelatical measures; and when matters came to an extremity, his talents as a public speaker, his piety and learning, his gentlemanly and ingratiating manners, and his profound sagacity in business, pointed him out to all his brethren as the fittest person for taking the lead in the management of their affairs. It is usually seen that when Providence has some great work to accomplish in behalf of the Church, instruments are raised up admirably fitted for the part which they are destined to perform. At this exigency, it is astonishing to find that, notwithstanding the oppression under which the Church had laboured for thirty years before, individuals arose, out of the ranks of the nobility, the barons, and the clergy, who, in point of talents, piety, Among the nobility who entered with heart and natural dispositions, seem to have been exactly and soul into the cause of the Covenant, the most adapted for the struggle in which they were to distinguished were the Earls of Loudon and engage. Among these, the first place is due to Rothes. John Campbell, Earl of Loudon, was a ALEXANDER HENDERSON, then minister of Len- man whose patriotism, prudence, eloquence, and chars in Fife, and who, from the prominent share fortitude, justly entitle him to be regarded as the he had in the transactions of this period, deserves chief asserter both of the civil and religious liberparticular notice. In the early part of his life, ties of his country. From his youth, he attached Mr Henderson had been, to say the least, indif- himself to the Presbyterian interest, which he ferent in the contest between Presbytery and saw was identified with the cause of civil liberty. Episcopacy; there is reason to think he was a On the commencement of the civil broils in 1638, defender of the corruptions introduced by the he took an active share in opposing the despotical bishops. As a proof of this, he accepted a premeasures of the court; and on one occasion sentation from Archbishop Gladstanes to the roundly told the king's commissioner, in language parish of Leuchars, and so strong was the repug- which was soon re-echoed in a voice of thunder nance of the people there to his induction, that, from every part of the kingdom, "That they on the day of his ordination, they nailed the knew no other bands between a king and his subchurch-doors, and the ministers who attended, to-jects, but those of religion and the laws; and if gether with Henderson, were obliged to break these are broken," he said, "men's lives are not in by the window. Some time after this, having dear to them; boasted (threatened) we shall not heard that Mr Robert Bruce was to preach at a be; such fears are past with us." Loudon may communion in the neighbourhood, Henderson, be said to have been the Brutus of Scotland, attracted by curiosity, went secretly to hear him, during this epoch of her history; firm as a rock, and placed himself in a dark corner of the church nobly upright, sternly conscientious. The Eart where he might remain most concealed. Mr of Rothes, with the same unbending integrity, Bruce came into the pulpit, and, after a pause, was a man of a different stamp. Lively and faceaccording to his usual manner, which fixed Mr tious, polite in his address, and indefatigably active Henderson's attention upon him, he read, with in all his motions, this young nobleman, who died at the age of forty-one, was at the head of all the enterprises of the Covenanters, and rendered essential service to the cause. to them their beloved ministers, the Marquis was deeply affected with the scene, and protested the had the king been present to witness it, he would never think of obtruding his obnoxious measures on such a people. It is needless to dwell on the temporising mea sures by which Hamilton endeavoured to bring over the Covenanters to the wishes of the king One of his plans deserves notice, as showing the unprincipled character of the means resorted to b the king to gain his purposes. With the view counteracting the Covenant as sworn in the pr vious March, and sowing dissension among the Covenanters, he ordered Hamilton to subscribe in his name the National Covenant, as sworn in 1581, and to require all his subjects in Scotland to subscribe it. The design of this manœuvre was very obvious. In the Covenant, as sworn in 1581, no particular mention was made of Prelacy or any of its corruptions, though the subscribers bound themselves to maintain "religion as then In the month of June following the swearing of the Covenant at Edinburgh, the king sent down as his Commissioner to Scotland, the Marquis of Hamilton, a man of insinuating manners, chiefly with the view of conciliating the Scots, and inducing them, if possible, to renounce the Covenant. The Covenanters had by this time become very suspicious of the designs of Charles, for which they had too good reason. From a correspondence between the king and Hamilton, afterwards discovered, it was found that Charles was at this time making preparations for a hostile invasion on Scotland. After describing these preparations, he says to Hamilton, "Thus you may see, that I intend not to yield to the demands of these traitors the Covenanters. And as concerning the explanation of their damnable Covenant, I will only say, that so long as this Covenant is in force, whether it be with or without explana-professed." There could be no doubt that the retion, I have no more power in Scotland, than as a Duke of Venice, which I will rather die than suffer." On his arrival in Scotland, however, Hamilton soon found that he had to deal with a people who were determined to "die rather than suffer" such an infringement of their rights. The Covenant had been declared by the law officers of the crown to be perfectly agreeable to the laws of the land. And besides they had now adventured too far to retract either with safety to themselves or with a good conscience. No sooner, therefore, did Hamilton give a distant hint of his instructions, than the Covenanters declared, "that they would as soon renounce their baptism as the Covenant." Alarmed at the arrival of some military stores at Leith, they blockaded the castle, and placed armed guards at the city gates; and it required all the artifice of the Commissioner to allay the storm which he had injudiciously excited. On the 9th of June, Hamilton, who had been residing at Dalkeith, entered Edinburgh with great pomp, and it was arranged that the manner of his reception should present a display of the power and zeal of the Covenanters. For this purpose, the circuitous road by Musselburgh, along the beach of the sea, was selected. The nobles, to the number of thirty, and all others who had horses, rode to the end of the long sands at Musselburgh, to accompany his grace to the palace. The people, to the number of sixty thousand, were ranged under the directions of Sir George Cunningham, in ranks along the sea-side, extending to several miles. At the eastern extremity of Leith links on the side of a rising ground, there stood six or seven hundred ministers, all in their cloaks, a demonstration of their numbers and unity in the cause. While riding slowly along through this prodigious array, and hearing ten thousands of tongues beseeching him on all sides, with tears, that he would advise the king to deliver them from the bishops and their books, and to restore gion then professed was the Presbyterian, but under this ambiguous phrase, Charles, by a piece of chicanery, tacitly understood the Episcopal form of religion. When Hamilton, therefore, proposed to the ministers that they should subscribe The King's Covenant,' as it was called, they, with great propriety refused to do so, having already sub scribed that Covenant with an express stipulation in reference to Prelacy and its evils, which they considered to be a violation of its obligations, "If we should now enter upon this new subscrip tion," said they, "we should think ourselves guilty of mocking God, and taking his name in vain; for the tears that began to be poured forth at the solemnizing of the Covenant are not yet dried and wiped away, and the joyful noise which then began to sound forth hath not yet ceased. As we are not to multiply miracles on God's part, so ought we not to multiply solemn oaths and cove nants upon our part, and thus to play with oaths as children do with their toys, without necessity" up All the manœuvres of Charles and his bishops to outwit, to intimidate, to divide, or to gain over the Covenanters, having thus signally failed, the king found himself under the necessity of complying with the wishes of the people of Scotland, and summoning "a free General Assembly," which was indicted to meet at Glasgow, on Wednesday 21st November 1638; and the Marquis of Hamil ton was appointed his Majesty's Commissioner. This Assembly was to inquire into the evils that distressed the country, and to provide suitable remedies; and the bishops having been generally accused as the authors of all the disturbances, were subjected, by his Majesty's proclamation, censure of the Assembly. to the Printed and Published by JOHN JOHNSTONE, 2, Hunter Square. Edinburgh; and sold by J. R. MACNAIR & Co., 19, Glassford street, Glasgow; JAMES NISBET & Co., HAMILTON, ADAMS & Co., and R. GROOMBRIDGE, London; W. CURRY, Junr. & Co., Dublin; W. M'COMB, Belfast; and by the Booksellers and Local Area in all the Towns and Parishes of Scotland; and in the principal Towns in England and Ireland. Subscribers will have their copies delivered at their Residences. |