Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 5.djvu/268

328 and to seek his safety in concealment. Apprehensive of falling at last into the hands of his enemies, he, after having led a vagrant and miserable life for many months, at length sought an asylum in the castle of St Andrews, which had been in the possession of the cardinal's assassins since the period of his death, and which they had held out against repeated attempts of the earl of Arran, then regent of Scotland, to take it. Knox entered the castle of St Andrews at the time of Easter, 1517. This step he had been prevailed upon to take by two of his warmest friends, the lairds of Langniddrie and Ormiston, at a time when he had himself determined to retire to Germany.

The circumstance of Knox's having taken shelter, on this occasion, with the assassins of Beaton, has given rise to reflections on his character, involving charges of the most serious nature. Some of them are wholly unfounded, others unreasonable. He has been accused of being one of the conspirators who projected the death of Beaton; which is totally unsupported by any evidence, and must, therefore, in common justice, be utterly rejected. He has been said to have made himself accessory to the crime of the cardinal's murder by taking shelter amongst those by whom it was perpetrated; a most unreasonable and unwarrantable conclusion. His own life was in imminent danger, and he naturally sought shelter where it was most likely to be found, without reference to place or circumstances, and we cannot see by what reasoning he could be reduced to the dilemma of either sacrificing his own life or submitting to be accused as an accessory to murder; the one consequence threatening him by his remaining at large, the other by his flying to a place of refuge. He has been accused of vindicating the deed in his writings. This length he certainly has gone; but, considering all the circumstances connected with it, such vindication on the part of Knox is not much to be wondered at, nor is it calculated to excite much reasonable prejudice against him. Beaton eagerly sought his life; he was his personal enemy, and a relentless and cruel enemy to all who were of the same faith. If, therefore, we are called upon to disapprove of Knox's justification of the death of Beaton, we should at the same time be permitted to remark, that it was an event which he had but little reason to regret.

After entering the castle of St Andrews, Knox resumed his duties as a teacher, and proceeded to instruct his pupils as before. He also resumed his lectures on the Scriptures, and regularly catechised his hearers in the parish church of the city. Hitherto Knox's appearances as a disciple and teacher of the reformed doctrines had been rather of a private character, or at least only before select audiences, such as his own class of pupils, or a few neighbours congregated together as at Langniddrie. He was now, however, about to come forward in a more public, or at least more formal capacity. At the time that he sought refuge in the castle of St Andrews, there were three persons of note there, all zealous reformers, who had also fled to it as a sanctuary. These were Sir David Lindsay of the Mount, Henry Balnaves of Hallhill, and John Rough, a celebrated reformed preacher, and who was at this moment publicly preaching in St Andrews. These persons were so much struck with Knox's talents and his manner of instructing his pupils, that they earnestly exhorted him to come publicly forward as a preacher of the reformed doctrines. This, however, Knox declined; not from any unwillingness to expose himself to the dangers which then attended the discharge of such a duty, nor from any reluctance to devote himself to the great cause which he had espoused, and of which he was afterwards so singular a promoter; but from a feeling of diffidence in his own powers, and a deep sense of the awful importance of the charge to which he was invited; he besides entertained some scruples as to the regularity of the call which was now made upon him, and with a conscientiousness and feeling of delicacy which became his