History of the Presbyterian Church in South Carolina, Vol. I pt 1, Part 4

Author: Howe, George, 1802-1883
Publication date: 1870
Publisher: Columbia, Duffie & Chapman
Number of Pages: 722


USA > South Carolina > History of the Presbyterian Church in South Carolina, Vol. I pt 1 > Part 4


Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).


Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37


* This led to energetic efforts on the part of the Protestants. England furnished subsidies. Beza, now an old man, went on a pilgrimage from Geneva to the Protestant prinees of Germany, and succeeded in obtaining a large auxiliary foree to aid their cause. The two armies met at the battle of Coutras, in 1587. The army of the Leaguers glittered with gold and silver, like that of the Persians of old; that of the Protestants, led on by Henry of


33


EDICT OF NANTES.


protection, procured the assassination of the Duke of Guise, and sought an alliance with the King of Navarre and the Prince of Conde, who were at the head of the Protestant cause. They supported him till his death by the hand of an assassin, in 1589, when the King of Navarre, with the title of Henry IV., succeeded to the throne. He was obliged to contend however still for his crown, and proved himself equal to every emergency. At the battle of Yvry, with an army of 10,000 men, he engaged the Leaguers, who brought to the field a force which was double of his. "If you lose sight of your standard," says he to his soldiers, "bear my white plumes in view; they will ever be found in the path of honor and duty." His efforts were rewarded with a complete victory. As he saw no hope, however, of putting a stop to the civil wars, he at length, to the great grief of the Protestant nobles, professed the religion of Rome. Many have believed that he was wholly influenced to do this by motives of policy ; but Sully, who well knew his heart, believed that, though these "first suggested to him the idea of conversion, he brought himself in the end to regard the Catho- lic Church as the more certain of the two." In April, 1598, the King, not unmindful of his former friends, and dreading lest any longer delay should convert them into enemies, caused the celebrated Edict of Nantes to be published, which consisted of 92 original articles, with 50 subsequently added as explanatory, in which free toleration and liberty of conscience were pro- claimed throughout the kingdom for the Huguenots. This edict also gave them equal civil rights, equal privileges in the universities and schools, eligibility to office, courts half Prot- estant and half Catholic for the trial of their causes. The XVth National Synod of the Huguenot Church assembled in the month of May, 1598, at which time the number of Reformed


Navarre, were clad in threadbare garments, without any ornaments, weather- beaten men, inured to toil and hardship. No sooner were they formed in line of battle than they raised, after the manner of our forefathers in Scot- land, the 118th Psalm, and then knelt while a short but fervent prayer was offered. The officiating minister, D'Amours, no sooner than he had conclu- ded this act of devotion, drew his sword and mingled with the foremost combatants, with his head uncovered and with no other defensive armor than a corselet. The attitude of prayer was regarded by some of the younger cavaliers of the opposing army as the result of fear. "'Sdeath ! they trem- ble," cried they, " the cowards are at their devotion !" A veteran officer, however, who knew them better, turned to Joyeuse, the general, and assured him that after the Huguenots had been so employed, they fought to despera- tion. The armies joined battle. The King of Navarre exhibited the great- est coolness and valor, and was ever in the thickest of the fight, and inore than 400 royalists of honorable birth, and 3,000 soldiers, were left dead on the field of battle.


2*


34


PRESBYTERIANISM IN SCOTLAND.


churches amounted to 760, and some of them were very large, and had three, four, and five pastors ; others were very small, in great poverty and distress, and were united two or three together under one minister. The Edict of Nantes was hon- orably observed by Henry till his lamented death, which was caused by the dagger of Ravaillac, a fanatic, on the 14th of May, 1610.


When Cardinal Richelieu became prime minister under Louis, he set himself at work to suppress the liberties of the Huguenots, and preparations were made for the capture of Ro- chelle, their chief stronghold, which yielded after a siege of nearly 18 months, during which the garrison was reduced from 27,000 to 5,000, and out of nearly 600 Englishmen, left in the city by Buckingham, only 62 survived. Privas was taken, plundered and burnt, and one stronghold after another yielded to the royal arms. Measures were now set on foot for the conversion of the Protestants. Men of high birth were won by the prom- ise of rank and honors. It was declared to be "essential for all the subjects of a sovereign to have the same creed." In- ducements of every kind were held out to abjure the Protest- ant faith. Laws were passed to prevent a relapse after abju- ration. Protestant ministers were forbidden to expostulate with any who had expressed their conversion. An edict against emigration was issued in 1669. Edict followed edict. The revocation of the Edict of Nantes began even now to be contemplated. At length the King fell under the influence of Madame de Maintenon, the grandchild of Theodore Agrippa D'Aubigné, who had renounced the Calvinistic faith, and adopted that of Rome. Protestants were declared incapable of exercising the office of notary, of acting in any branch of the legal profession, of practising medicine. The trades of the apothecary, grocer, printer, and bookseller were forbid- den them. No Protestant of any trade was allowed to liave an apprentice. Those who abjured the Protestant faith were allowed the delay of three years for the payment of their debts, while the greatest rigor was used in relation to others.


CHAPTER II.


PRESBYTERIANISM IN SCOTLAND.


THE scene now changes to another country. It was on the soil of Scotland that the Presbyterian Church chiefly bore her


35


COLUMBA. IONA.


testimony and wrestled unto blood, for Christ's Crown and Covenant, against royal tyranny and prelatical domination. The doctrines of our Confession had been known there at a far earlier day. According to Tertullian,* who lived in the second century, "those portions of Britain which were inac- cessible to the Romans had submitted to Christ." Scotland appears to have received the Gospel directly from Asia at that early period. About the close of the third century the Scot- tish race occupied Ireland, which bore the name Scotia as late as the eleventh century. About A. D. 410, Succath, whose historic name is Patrick, was born at Bonnaven (called after him Kil-Patrick, or Kirk-Patrick), which is midway between Dumbarton and Glasgow. After being twice in bondage as a captive, he became the Apostle of Ireland, and was the instru- ment of making it what it afterward became, " Insula Sancto- rum," "Island of Saints." In his day, the Saxons, then a pagan race, invaded and conquered England, and the flying Britons escaped in different directions, carrying the gospel with them, to the north of Scotland, to Wales, the north of Ireland, and the north of France,t where their descendants remain to this day. Columba was born in Ireland, A. D. 521, and first preached Christ, with great success, in his own country, and afterward went on missionary labor to the Picts of the neigli- boring coast of Scotland. His preaching was attended with great results, and the King of the Picts gave him the small island of Iona, t as a reward for his disinterested exertions. He returned to Ireland, secured twelve assistants, and established himself on the island he had thus obtained by the royal gift. Numbers resorted to them for religious instruction, their little huts and rude chapels were soon superseded, and in a few years the island was covered with cloisters and churches, and inhabited by a numerous body of students and clergymen. The establishment at Iona has been called a convent, but many of the convents of that day were hardly more of monastic in- stitutions than are colleges and theological seminaries now. It was an extensive theological seminary and missionary school. The grand design and effort of Columba and his as- sistants was to train up men for the holy ministry.


From this institution preachers were sent to England, Ire-


* Advers. Judæos, c. 7; also Chrysost., t. vi., p. 635; Euseb., 1. iii.


+ Hence called Brittany.


# Called also I, Hii, and Icolmkill. The original name was I, i. e. Island : I-columb-kill, the island of Columba's cell, or retreat. Jamieson, Ancient Culdees, pp. 3, 4, 5, 354-357.


36


THE CULDEES.


land, Scotland, and Wales, and they even crossed the Channel and carried the light of the gospel into Belgium and Germany. Not less than a hundred similar institutions, modelled upon that of Iona, were said to have arisen in different parts of Britain, in which missionaries and ministers were also trained.


Such were the institutions of the ancient Culdees of Scot-, land, who maintained the pure doctrines of God's word, and our own the Presbyterian and apostolic form of government, when "all the world were wondering after the beast," and one thousand years before Calvin was born. They held to the parity of ministers, and knew nothing, except by hearsay, of the prelatical form of government. They opposed the celibacy of the clergy, rejected the auricular confession, penance, abso- lution, confirmation, the use of the chrism in baptism, the wor- ship of saints, angels; and the virgin, and relied solely on the merits and righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ. They com- menced their efforts in England about the same time that Augustine and his forty monks arrived from Rome-they la- boring in the north, and the Romish missionaries in the south. Their opposition to Rome may be judged of by the following extract from the poems of Talliessin, who is supposed to have lived about A. D. 620 :


" Wo be to that priest yborn, That will not cleanly weed his corn, And preach his charge among : Wo be to that sheperd, I say, That will not watch his fold alway, As to his office doth belong : Wo be to him that doth not keepe From Romish wolves his erring sheepe, With staff and weapons strong.";


The kings of England, however, favored the splendid ritual of Rome : the Romish priests were intolerant and overbearing, and the Culdees, who could not conscientiously conform, returned to Scotland, leaving the plains of the south to the ministers of Rome.t And, thanks to God! the spirit of the


* Usher, Religion of the Ancient Irish, p. 83, where the original Gaelic may be seen. See also Mason's Primitive Christianity in Ireland, p. 43.


t Jamieson, Hist. of the Culdees, p. 91. The name Culdee is of uncertain etymology. It is derived by some from the Latin Cultor Dei, worshipper of God, while others derive it from the Gaelic Kyldee, from Cylle or Cuil, a cell, in the plur. Celydi, those who occupy religious retreats .- Jamieson, p. 5. Au- thority for the above facts may be found in Bede, Hist. Eccl. Anglorum, lib. ii. c. xix., lib. iii. c. iii., iv., v., xiv., xxv., xxvi., lib. iv., c. iv. See Opera, t. iii. Jamieson, Hist. Account of the Ancient Culdees, 4to. Edinburgh, 1811. Archbp. Usher, Disc. of the Rel. anciently professed by the Irish and British. Mason's Primitive Christianity in Ireland, Dublin, 1836. Stuart,


37


THE COVENANTS.


old Culdees has never since been, wholly extinguished in Scot- land, North Ireland, and Wales. It is honorable to St. Columba and his establishment at Iona, that forty-eight kings of Scot- land, four of Ireland, eight of Norway, and one of France, lie interred on that island-a fact which shows how much the Cul- dees were revered, and how widely their influence had extended. It was not till the fourteenth century, about the time that Wickliffe* arose in England, " the morning star of the Refor- mation," that the Culdee establishments were subjected by the Scotch kings to bishops connected with the see of Rome, and gross darkness covered the land.


Scotland received the light of the Reformation almost as soon as it shone forth on the continent of Europe. In 1528, thirteen years after D'Ayllon's visit to Carolina, and ten years before the expedition of Hernando de Soto to Florida, Patrick Hamilton, her first martyr, sealed his testimony to the truth with his blood. John Knox, the great Reformer of Scotland, received his remarkable call to the ministry in 1547, and ten years after this, on the 3d of December, 1557, the First Covenant, in this land of covenants, was signed by the Earls of Argyle, Glencairn, and Morton, Archibald lord of Lorn, and a great number of distinguished men among the lesser barons and gentry. On the 31st of May, 1559, the Sec- ond Covenant was signed by " the Lords of the Congregation ;"+ for it was a remarkable fact in Scotland, as well as in Germany and France, that the nobility and gentry came forward, and often took the lead in the Reformation. The Queen-mother, Mary of Guise, then Regent of Scotland, of the illustrious house of Lorraine, which had so successfully headed the persecution of the Protestants of France, assisted by the ecclesiastics, did all in her power to oppose the Reformation, and was aided by French troops furnished by Francis II. In 1560, December 20th, the First General Assembly of the Church of Scotland was held, consisting at this its first convocation of but forty members, only six of whom were ministers of the gospel. These six constituted, however, one-half of all the reformed


Historical Memoirs of the city of Armagh, Newry, 1819, particularly Appen- dix Nos. v. and xiii. Munter's Early British Church, Bib. Repository, vol. iv. p. 551, et seq. Dr. Pond's Essay on the Convent of Jona, Am. Quarterly Reg- ister for 1839, p. 153, et seq. Introd. by McGavin to John Knox's Hist. of the Reform. in Scotland. And the interesting account of the ancient Culdees, in " Presbytery not Prelacy the Scriptural and Primitive Polity," by Rev. Dr. Smyth of Charleston, b. iii. c. i. and ii. See also the Culdee Church, by Rev. T. V. Moore, D. D.


* 1365-1384.


+ Hetherington, p. 38.


38


FIRST BOOK OF DISCIPLINE.


ministers in the entire kingdom. This assembly adopted the First Book of Discipline drawn up by the Reformer John Knox, and others, which, while it embraced some provisions of a temporary character, embodied the main features of the Presbyterian polity. The ordinary officers of the church were four-the pastor or minister, whose duty it was to preach and administer the sacraments; the doctor or teacher, who was to interpret the Scripture and refute error, among whom were included teachers of theology in schools and universities ; the Ruling Elder, who aided the minister in the exercise of disci- pline ; and the Deacon, who had special charge of the poor and the revenues of the church. To these permanent officers were added two others of a temporary character, Exhorters or Readers, who having received a good common education, were to endeavor, by reading and exhortation, to propagate the truth. The other temporary officers were Superintendents, of which five were appointed to traverse the country, to preach, plant churches, and search out men who might be appointed Ex- horters. No person was appointed to the ministry without "a call." " Ordinary vocation consisteth in election, examination, and admission." "It appertaineth to the people and to every several congregation to elect their minister." The examina- tion was to take place " in open assembly, and before the con- gregation," to satisfy the church as to his "gifts, utterance, and knowledge." Admission to the ministry, or ordination, took place by the candidate being set apart by prayer, at first with- out imposition of hands, which afterward was appointed to be done. The affairs of the congregation were conducted by the minister, elders, and deacons, wlio constituted the Kirk ses- sion, which met regularly once a week, and, if necessity required, oftener than this. A meeting, called the weekly exercise, or prophesying, consisting of the ministers, exhorters, and edu- cated men in the vicinity, was held in every town for expound- ing the Scriptures. This eventually became the Classical As- sembly or Presbytery. The Superintendent met with the min- isters and delegated elders of his district twice a year, in the Provincial Synod. And the General Assembly, composed of ministers and elders commissioned from different parts of the kingdom, met twice or tlirice in a year and attended to the interests of the National Church. The revenues which con- stituted the patrimony of the Church under the Romish sway, it was proposed should be appropriated to the support of the ministry, the schools, and the poor. The revenues of bishoprics, cathedrals, and the rents arising from monastic


39


SECOND BOOK OF DISCIPLINE.


endowments were to be divided and appropriated to universi- ties and to the churches within their bounds. Discipline was to be strictly administered for "reproving and correcting of the faults which either the civil sword doth neglect or may not punish."*


The Protestant Church of France had adopted its Confes- sion of Faith the year before, consisting chiefly of articles of doctrine, declaring for the Presbyterian polity, the equality of all true pastors under one sole chief, sole sovereign, and sole universal Bishop, Jesus Christ. In 1581, the Second Book of Discipline was adopted in the third year of James I., and became the Standard of the Church of Scotland, as to government and discipline. In it the office of Superintendent has disappeared ; and the " ad interim" office of exhorters or readers, the ministers being now sufficiently numerous, has been discontinued. The officers of the Church are of three kinds :- ministers who are preachers and rulers ; elders who are merely rulers; and deacons who act as distributors of alms and managers of church funds. Ecclesiastical courts are either particular (consisting of the office bearers of one con- gregation, or of a number of neighboring congregations), pro- vincial, national, or ecumenical or general, and were arranged substantially as with us.


The patrimony of the Church, according to the Second Book, consists of whatever has been appointed to her use by donation, law, or custom. And it belongs to deacons, according to this book, to receive the property of the Church and apply it according to the direction of presbyteries.


The revenues of the Bishoprics never did fall into the hands of the Church as reformed ; two-thirds were retained by the prelates incumbent ; the whole was grasped at by the nobles, who attempted to continue the prelatical order, so as through nominal prelates to obtain themselves possession of the funds. Robert Montgomery, minister of Stirling, was nominated Archbishop of Glasgow. This brought the Church of Scot- land into immediate conflict with the civil power. The Pres- bytery of Stirling summoned Montgomery to its bar, and in- hibited his acceptance of the prelacy. The General Assembly ratified this sentence, and declared that he had incurred the sentence of deposition and excommunication. He submitted himself to the Assembly, but the Presbytery of Glasgow were appointed to watch his conduct, and, if he violated his engage-


* Hetherington, pp. 53-56.


40


ATTEMPT TO ESTABLISH EPISCOPACY.


ment, to report him to the Presbytery of Edinburgh, who were empowered to pronounce the sentence of excommunication against him. Montgomery revived his claim to the prelacy under the instigation of the Duke of Lennox, to whom the rev- enues of the Archbishopric were granted by the privy council. The Presbytery of Glasgow met, therefore, to do as they were directed by the General Assembly, but Lennox having obtained an order from the King, entered the place where they were sitting, dragged the moderator from his chair, insulted, beat him, and cast him into prison. Presbytery, however, pro- ceeded as directed : the Presbytery of Edinburgh appointed one of their number to pronounce the sentence, which was accord- ingly done, and published abroad. A proclamation of the civil council declared this excommunication void, and in vari- ous ways the indignation of the king and his courtiers was shown. But the Church in this juncture was firm to her trust. An extraordinary meeting of the Assembly was called, and a bold remonstrance addressed to the sovereign. In stating to him their grievances, they do not mince their words: "Your majesty, by device of some councillors, is caused to take upon you a spiritual power and authority, which properly be- longeth unto Christ, the only King and Head of the Church, the ministry and execution whereof is only given to such as bear office in the ecclesiastical government of the same. So that in your Highness's person some men press to erect a new popedom, as though your majesty could not be full king and head of this commonwealth, unless as well the spiritual as temporal sword be put in your Highness's hand ; unless Christ be bereft of his authority, and the two jurisdictions confounded which God hath divided, which directly tendeth to the wreck of all religion."


A deputation, with Andrew Melville at their head, presented this bold remonstrance to the king in council. Its reading having been finished, Arran, looking over the assembly with a, threatening countenance, asked, " Who dares subscribe these treasonable articles ?" " WE DARE!" replied Andrew Melville, and seizing a pen, immediately subscribed them, and was fol- lowed by his brother commissioners.


Melville was arraigned for these and other declarations, and fled for his life. These conflicts for the spiritual independence of the Church became more and more severe, and many clergy- men sought safety to their persons in the neighboring country of England. The Church of Scotland stood nobly, amid severe contendings and sufferings, up to her testimony for the sole


41


PANEGYRIC OF THE KIRK.


Headship of Christ. Yet she made common cause with James against those schemes entered into by Popish sovereigns of Europe for the utter extermination of Protestantism, which, as to France, reached their acme in the massacre of St. Bar- tholomew's, and as to England and Scotland, in the Spanish invasion. These distinguished services drew forth from James his famous panegyric on the Church of Scotland, in the General Assembly of 1590. "He blessed God that he was born in such time as in the time of the light of the Gospel, and in such a place as to be king of such a Kirk, the sincerest Kirk in all the world. The Kirk of Geneva," says he, "keepeth Pasch and Yule. What have they for them? They have no institu- tion. As for our neighbor Kirk in England, their service is an evil-said mass in English ; they want nothing of the mass but the liftings. I charge you, my good people, ministers, doctors, elders, nobles, gentlemen, and barons, to stand to your purity, and I, forsooth, so long as I brook my life and crown, shall maintain the same against all deadly."*


Thus full and clear were the declarations of the king, un- der the influence of probably his sincere convictions, united with a grateful remembrance of the assistance and loyalty of the Church in the past season of peril.


When he had in view the possibility and probability of his succession to the English throne, he was willing enough to favor prelacy; and this, too, put ecclesiastical power and pat- ronage into the royal hand. Two years after, in 1592, the Parliament of Scotland ratified the General Assemblies, Synods, Presbyteries, and particular Sessions of the Church, with their jurisdiction and discipline, to be in all time coming most just, good, and godly, notwithstanding whatsoever statutes, acts, and laws-canon, civil, or municipal-made to the con- trary.


Thus matters stood, the Church of Scotland clearly estab- lished by law, the king's supremacy declared to be in no wise prejudicial to it in matters of religion, commissions to bish- ops and other judges in ecclesiastical causes declared to be null and void, and nothing now to prevent the prosperity of spiritual religion, and the public peace, but the worldly am- bition or avarice of the nobles, and the royal thirst for power.


These influences were neither slow nor scrupulous in their operation. In his Free Law of Free Monarchies, and his Basilicon


* Hetherington, pp. 93-94.


42


JAMES AS ENGLAND'S KING.


Doron addressed to his son Henry, James claimed for a king that he should be a " free and absolute monarch ;" that his office is of a mixed kind, partly civil and partly ecclesiasti- cal; that a principal part of his function is to rule the Church, that parity in the Church should be banished, episcopacy set up, and all who preached against bishops vigorously punished. And yet the same king could " lift up his hand and vow, in the presence of God and of the Assembly, that he would, by the grace of God, live and die in the religion presently professed in the realm of Scotland, and defend it against all its adversaries." In the next year, March 31st, 1603, news having reached Scotland of the death of Eliza- beth, James was proclaimed King of Scotland, England, France, and Ireland. His arrival in England was hailed with something of enthusiasm by the English people, and all sects of religionists presented him addresses and sought his protec- tion. But he had resolved to part with his old friends, and to do it with some show of decency. He therefore appoints a conference between the High Church party and the Puritan non-conformists, he himself appointing the parties to be pres- ent on both sides. It would afford him an opportunity to show off his theological learning, of which he was not a little vain. In this conference he became a party instead of an um- pire, browbeating the Puritans, who were few in number, while he took care that the chief dignitaries of the English Church should be present. "No bishop, no king," was tlie maxim he more than once emphatically pronounced. To the remarks of Dr. Reynolds on the power of excommunication, he replied, that he found them aiming at a "Scot's Pres- bytery," which, said he with profane levity, "agrees with mon- archy as well as God with the devil." "If this be all," says he, "which your party have to say, I will make them conform, or harry them out of the land, or else do worse."*




Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.