Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 2.djvu/94

 annoying, for more reasons than one; and accordingly it was not surprising that he should have been disposed to take the sharpest measures with a recusant of so much popular influence as Bruce. "Ye have heard me, ye have heard my minister, ye have heard my council, ye have heard the Earl of Mar," exclaimed the enraged monarch; yet all would not do. The chancellor then pronounced a sentence dictated by the council, prohibiting Bruce and three of his brethren to preach in the kingdom under pain of death.

Bruce was not the man to be daunted or driven from his purpose when the liberties of his church and the maintenance of a good conscience were concerned. He had made up his mind to withstand, at all hazards, the now undisguised machinations of his infatuated monarch to crush the Presbyterian cause. In 1596, when the privy council was prosecuting David Black, minister of St. Andrew's, for certain expressions he had uttered in the pulpit, Bruce headed a deputation of ministers to the king, to endeavour to bring about an accommodation. He declared with solemn earnestness, on behalf of himself and his associates, "that if the matter concerned only the life of Mr Black, or that of a dozen others, they would have thought it of comparatively trifling importance; but as it was the liberty of the gospel, and the spiritual sovereignty of the Lord Jesus that was assailed, they could not submit, but must oppose all such proceedings, to the extreme hazard of their lives." This declaration moved the king at the time, and wrung tears from his eyes, but the relentings of his better nature were soon overcome by his courtiers. He was but too anxious to get so formidable an opponent as Bruce out of the way, and the present occasion afforded him a favourable opportunity. Bruce, after spending some time as a prisoner in Airth, his paternal seat, embarked at Queensferry on the 5th of November 1600, for Dieppe in Normandy, which he reached in five days. Next year he was allowed to return to his native country, although not to reside in Edinburgh. He had two interviews with James, one of them at the very moment when his majesty mounted horse on his journey to England. But the minions of the court and friends of the episcopal religion contrived to prevent his offers of submission from having their due weight. He was formally deposed in 1605, and sent to Inverness, which was then a frequent place of banishment for obnoxious clergymen. There he remained for eight years, only exercising his gifts in a private way, but still with the best effect upon the rude people who heard him. In 1613, his son procured permission for his return to Kinnaird, upon the condition that he would confine himself to that place. There, however, he soon found himself very painfully situated, on account of the comparatively dissolute manners of the neighbouring clergy, who are said to have persecuted him in return for the freedom he used in censuring their behaviour. He obtained leave from the Privy Council to retire to a more sequestered house at Monkland, near Both well, where, however, he soon attracted the notice of the Bishop of Glasgow, on account of the crowds which flocked to hear him. He was obliged to return to Kinnaird. In 1621, the Scottish parliament was about to pass the famed articles of Perth, in order to bring back something like form to the national system of worship. Bruce could not restrain his curiosity to witness this awful infliction upon the church; he took advantage of some pressing piece of private business to come to Edinburgh. The bishops watched the motions of their powerful enemy with vigilance, and he was soon observed. They entered a petition and complaint before the Council, and he was committed to Edinburgh castle for several months, after which he was again banished to Inverness. Some of the lords of the council, who were his friends, wrote to court, in order to have the place of confinement fixed at his family seat; but James had heard of the effect of his preachings at that place, and returned for answer,—'It is not