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 the Assembly without a libel, merely for having accepted a charge in another church, "in which (says he), I presumed, they could find nothing criminal; for often had ministers resigned their charge upon different accounts, and justifiable; nay, some have given it up for the more entertaining and elegant employ of the stage, who were not called in question or found delinquents. This was a palpable hit at Home, the author of "Douglas," who sat in the Assembly as a ruling elder, to aid Dr Robertson in punishing Bayne. After a ministry of 60 years, Mr Bayne died at Edinburgh, on the 17th January, 1790, in his eightieth year. He was 24 years minister of the College Street Relief congregation, Edinburgh. His popularity as a preacher, his talents for ecclesiastical affairs, his acquirements as a scholar and a theologian, and his sound judgment and weight of character, gave him great influence; and it was mainly to his large and enlightened views that the Relief church was indebted for the position to which it attained, even during his lifetime, as well as for retaining, till it was finally merged in the United Presbyterian church, the catholic constitution on which it had been founded by Gillespie and Boston. Mr Bayne was an uncompromising opponent of whatever he considered to be a violation of public morality. In 1770 he published a discourse, entitled, "The Theatre Licentious and Perverted," administering a stern rebuke to Mr Samuel Foote for his Minor; a drama, in which the characters of Whitefield, and other zealous ministers were held up to profane ridicule. The dramatist considered it necessary to reply to Mr Bayne's strictures, in an "Apology for the Minor, in a letter to the Rev. Mr Bayne," resting his defence upon the plea that he only satirized the vices and follies of religious pretenders. A volume of Mr Bayne's discourses was published in 1778. 

, or, who held the rectory of Campsie, the abbacy of Aberbrothick, the bishopric of Mirepoix in France, the cardinalship of St Stephen in Monte Cœlio, and the chancellorship of Scotland, and who was the chief of the Roman Catholic party in Scotland in the earlier age of the reformation was descended from an ancient family in Fife, possessed of the barony of Balfour, and was born in the year 1494. He was educated at the college of St Andrews, where he completed his courses of polite literature and philosophy, but was sent afterwards to the university of Paris, where he studied divinity for several years. Entering into holy orders, he had the rectory of Campsie and the abbacy of Aberbrothick bestowed upon him, by his uncle, James Beaton, Archbishop of St Andrew's, who retained one-half of the rents of the abbacy to his own use. Possessing good abilities and a lively fancy, David Beaton became a great favourite with James V., who, in 1519, sent him to reside as his ambassador at the court of France. He returned to Scotland in 1525, and, still growing in the King's favour, was, in 1528, made lord privy seal.

In the year 1533, he was again sent on a mission to the French court. Beaton on this occasion was charged to refute certain calumnies which it was supposed the English had circulated against his countrymen, to study the preservation of the ancient league between the two nations, and to conclude a treaty of marriage between James and Magdalene, the daughter of Francis I. If unsuccessful in any of these points, he was furnished with letters which he was to deliver to the parliament at Paris, and depart immediately for Flanders, for the purpose of forming an alliance with the emperor. In every part of his embassy, Beaton seems to have succeeded to the utmost extent of his wishes, the marriage excepted, which was delayed on account of the declining state of health in which Magdalene then was. How long Beaton remained at the French court at this time has not been ascertained; but it is certain that he was exceedingly agreeable to Francis, who, perceiving his great abilities, and aware of the influence he possessed over the mind