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ticular attention; nor did she forget those brave men who had served the country during the war, and were now likely to have no other resource but its bounty. The lords were, as usual, somewhat refractory, and, though they did not explicitly dissent from her majesty's sentiments, avoided any specific approbation of the peace, except in so far as it secured the protestant succession; but the commons expressed their entire satisfaction with it, and their admiration of her majesty's steadiness, notwithstanding the many difficulties that had been so industriously laid in her way. The example of the commons, with regard to the treaty of peace, was followed by the principal corporations in Britain, though they very soon found themselves under the necessity of petitioning parliament against the commercial part of it, and, in a short time, would gladly have parted with it altogether

There were also addressers, Scotish Jacobites, who, without waiting for the signing of the treaty, but, anticipating its benefits, had sent up to the queen their hearty commendations thereof, gratefully applauding "the set of patriots, who were not only the faithful advisers of this great transaction, but, in spite of an impiously bold opposition, have been its wise and daring administrators; thanking her majesty for recommending the insolence of the press to the consideration of the late parliament, hoping the ensuing will improve upon the progress of the former, and work out a thorough reformation; that they may be no more scandalized, nor the blessed Son of God blasphemed, nor the sacred race of Stuarts inhumanly traduced, with equal malice and impiety." They conclude with declaring, that they will be "happy, if, after her majesty's late demise, to put a period to our intestine divisions, the hereditary right and parliamentary sanction could possibly meet in a lineal sucThis was got up at the instance of the earl of Marr, the commissioners sent up with it, were introduced by lord Bolingbroke to the queen, who received them most graciously, commended the warmth of their loyal attachment, and rewarded the chief of them with pensions.

cessor.

Rae's History of the Rebellion, p. 32. Supplement to the History of Queen Anne, pp. 225, 226.

This, and other addresses of a similar kind, printed by public authority, excited the utmost astonishment in the more thinking portion of the community, while they emboldened the friends of the pretender, to make, in their usual manner, most foolish displays of their feelings, in almost every part of the kingdom, by which, laying open their secret purposes, they alarmed all the more prudent among themselves, and gave particular uneasiness to the queen, to whom nothing was so terrible as the prospect of internal commotion. By these means also, they gave new life and increased activity to those jealousies that had for some time past been secretly brooding in the minds of the ministers with regard to one another, and which produced those indecisive and sometimes jarring measures, that, in the end, subjected them to disappointment and ruin. The lord chancellor Harcourt, and the lord treasurer Oxford, were particularly piqued at the forwardness of Bolingbroke, who, they were afraid, by countenancing these gross flatteries, was gaining too much of the ear of the queen; and several of the leading members of both houses, whose veneration for the queen had led them hitherto to support the ministry, alarmed at these dangerous proceedings, began to clamour, even more violently than the whigs, for additional securities for the protestant succession.*

In the meantime, the assembly of the church of Scotland met at Edinburgh, on the thirtieth of April, 1713, John, duke of Athol, being appointed commissioner, and Mr. William Wishart, one of the ministers of Edinburgh, chosen moderator. In her letter to this assembly, the queen was profuse in compliments, and expressed particular zeal for the protestant succession: "We take," she says, "this solemn occasion to renew the assurances we have formerly given you of our firm purpose to maintain the church of Scotland as established by law. The address of the late General Assembly did so much manifest their loyalty and good affection to our royal person and government, and their true concern for the succession in the protestant line of the house of Hanover, as established by law, that it could not but be very

* Supplement to the History of the reign of Queen Anne.

acceptable to us: and your moderation and unanimity amongst yourselves, is not more for your own good, than it will be for our satisfaction. And we assure ourselves, that there will be nothing in your procedure but what shall be dutiful to us, and shall manifest the wisdom of your conduct.”*

Nothing in the form of an admonition could be more soothingly sweet than this, and the assembly copied after it with admirable felicity. After thanking her majesty for so kindly accepting their expression of loyalty and affection to the protestant succession, as presented by the last assembly, they go on to say: "We beg leave to testify to your majesty, how much it did rejoice us to be acquainted by your commissioner from the throne, with the great care that your majesty has been pleased so conspicuously to show for the protestant religion, and the continuance of it to succeeding generations in your own dominions, and that your majesty has further extended the same pious care to the churches abroad, and that God has blest your endeavours for obtaining the release of those who were in the French galleys for their religion; and also, the consent of France to redress the hardships to which the protestant churches in Germany were liable." This was all well, had it been true, but, unfortunately for the veracity of the commissioner, and the intelligence of the assembly, there was not one word of it but what was utterly false; and a principal ground of dissatisfaction with the peace, among all serious and good men, even of the communion of the church of England, was the shameful manner in which the interests of the suffering protestants, both in France and in Germany, had been neglected by her majesty's ministers.f Rae, who certainly had no intention of derogating from the honour of the assembly, writing in the year 1718, asserts, that though the late queen Anne, as the head and guarantee of the protestant interest, had granted commission to the marquis de Miremont, to act in concert with all the other plenipotentiaries, for the enlargement and re-establishment of these suffering protestants in France, and he accordingly presented to them, at the congress at Utrecht, an excellent memorial,

* Printed Acts of Assembly, 1713.

Thoughts concerning the Peace.

which," he adds, "I have now before me, yet, instead of restoring them to their ancient privileges, those glorious confessors were put off with a faint request by our managers, that such of them as are confined to galleys or other prisons, might be set at liberty; and I have not yet heard that they obtained so much."

In unison with their address, the assembly passed "an act for maintaining the unity and peace of the church," referring to the oath of abjuration, which had made, as we have seen, and was still making so much noise in Scotland. The object of this act was to inculcate forbearance with regard to taking or not taking that oath, and, after the full elucidation it had now received, still maintained it to be a matter of indifference. This act is a curious document, and shows most distinctly that it is no new thing, even in the church of Scotland, for men to cover the most glaring departures from the simplicity of christian faith, the purity of gospel practice, and that unity which the scriptures more especially inculcate, by a pretension of zeal for the success of the gospel, and the interests of practical godliness.+ This assembly also, "for the more decent performance of the public praises of God, do recommend to presbyteries, to use endeavours to have such schoolmasters chosen as are capable to teach the common tunes; and that presbyteries take care that children be taught to sing the said common tunes; and that the said schoolmasters, not only pray with their scholars, but also sing a part of a psalm with them, at least once every day." The books of the society for propagating christian knowledge were also examined by a committee of members appointed from each synod, their managements entirely approved of, and a recommendation to presbyteries passed in favours of the society.

A number of important matters were, no doubt, transacted by this assembly, but, taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration, this was, perhaps, the least faithful of any assembly since the revolution, and one from which the public

* Rae's History of the Rebellion, pp. 28, 29. † Vide Printed Acts of Assembly, 1715.

interests of religion seem to have derived almost no benefit. The disputes between the jurant and nonjurant presbyterians, instead of abating were becoming still more violent, and threatened a disruption, the consequences of which appeared to both parties terrible. The insolence of trafficking priests, however, especially in the north, where popery was found to be greatly on the increase, with that of the episcopal clergy in the same bounds, who lived with these priests upon the most brotherly terms, while they could not so much as bear the sight of a presbyterian minister, awakened in the commission of this assembly, a lively feeling of danger, and determined them to publish a serious warning against the errors and dangers of popery, and to address the queen, in a style of great plainness, to have the laws put in execution against these incendiaries, who were undermining the foundations of the constitution, civil and ecclesiastical. So far, indeed, were the ministers of the church of Scotland, in general, from being in unison with the assembly, in respect of the queen's care of foreign protestants, that when the thanksgiving, for "the safe and honourable peace" was appointed, because the poor Catalans, as well as the protestants of France and Germany,

* Rae's History of the Rebellion.

+"The Catalans [inhabitants of Catalonia] were a people who had enjoyed several rights and immunities while Spain was subject to the house of Austria. As they had a just value for their privileges, they were desirous to secure them for themselves, and transmit them safe to their posterity. Accordingly, in the year 1705, having received several assurances from Mr. Crow, queen Anne's minister at Genoa, from the earl of Peterborough, and Sir Cloudesly Shovel, that if they would acknowledge Charles III. as king of Spain, and renounce the house of Bourbon, her British majesty would use her utmost endeavours to procure the establishment and confirmation of their rights and privileges, and the settlement of them on a lasting foundation; the Catalans acknowledged and received that prince as their sovereign, raised men and money for his service, and, during a war which abounded with extraordinary turns of fortune, gave signal proofs of their unshaken fidelity and zeal for the cause they had espoused. After king Charles came to the imperial crown, and Spain was at last given up to the house of Bourbon, the Catalans, far from being guided by a spirit of obstinacy and rebellion, as has been represented, were willing to acknowledge king Philip V. for their lawful sovereign. At the same time, as they hoped to be protected by the emperor, a prince for whom they had exposed their lives and fortunes, and, as they relied upon the repeated assurances they had received that England would never abandon

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