Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 6.djvu/110

480 house of lords, in reversing a sentence of the magistrates of Edinburgh which shut up the meeting-house of a Mr Greenshields, the first clergyman who introduced the English liturgy into the service of the Scots Episcopal church. The full harvest was the act of toleration, with the oath of abjuration annexed, to be imposed upon all the ministers of the Scottish church ; the act restoring lay patronage ; and the act for the observing certain holidays, all of which were prepared by Mr Lockhart, and by him and his friends forced upon the ministry, contrary to the expressed opinion of the people, and with the avowed purpose of undermining the presbyterian interest.

At the same time that he was so deeply engaged in forwarding the particular views of himself and his friends, in regard to affairs purely Scottish, Mr Lockhart was also employed upon the more general business, or what may be called the drudgery of the house. He was one, and the only Scotsman, who was upon the commission of the house for examining the national accounts, with the view of criminating the ex-whig ministers; and, as chairman of that commission, gave in a long report, intended to implicate the duke of Marlborough, a person whose conduct was certainly not pure, while it still affords a pleasing contrast to that of his accusers. The report, however, when it came to be examined, discovered only the headstrong party spirit of its authors, and not much against the accused, but the usual political corruption, too characteristic of the period.

The duties of a commissioner upon the national accounts, did not, however, by any means absorb the whole attention of the indefatigable Lockhart, for while he devoted himself to the service of the pretender, he also proposed a bill in parliament to bestow upon curates the bishops' rents, to resume all grants of church property that had been made to the universities, which he declared to be public nuisances, mere nests of rebellion, which could not be soon enough annihilated. The service to be accomplished in favour of the exiled family by these measures, is not very clear, and we are prevented from knowing the effect their proposal would have produced, from his friends declining to adopt them. So high, indeed, was he borne by his zeal, that an order was obtained by his friends from St Germains, recommending to him moderate measures, and dissuading him from attempts to openly force the English ministry upon desperate projects, as they were themselves well enough disposed, and were the best judges of the means whereby their good intentions would be carried into effect. This order he dared riot disobey, but he owns it was much against his inclination, and takes the liberty of affirming that it injured the pretender's interest.

On the duke of Hamilton being appointed ambassador to the court of France, he selected the subject of our memoir to wait privately upon him, and to act according to his orders upon an affair of extraordinary moment, which he never explained, but which Lockhart understood to be the pretender's restoration, and he was just leaving Scotland with the hope of being called to accompany the duke upon that pleasing duty, when he heard that a quarrel betwixt Hamilton and lord Mohurt had brought both these distinguished noblemen to an untimely end. This circumstance he affirms to have been fatal to the hopes of the pretender, no one having been found capable of conducting so delicate a business till the period when disputes in the cabinet and the death of the queen rendered the case hopeless. But these circumstances did not damp his ardour, or prevent him from impeding the government, which he could not overturn. Accordingly, on the attempt to extend the malt tax to Scotland, in the year 1713, he made a desperate effort, in which he was seconded by the earls of Mar, Eglinton, Hay, &c., for the dissolution of the union, a project which narrowly failed of success, as we have narrated more at large in the life of John, duke of Argyle. The attempt to assimilate the Scottish to the English militia which fol-