Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 8.djvu/261

Rh But, like many other such flattering combinations, the Veto satisfied neither party, and a few years of trial sufficed to show that this balancing of two antagonistic claims could only aggravate as well as protract the conflict. But, whatever may have been the diversity of opinions among the evangelical portion of the Church of Scotland upon the subject of patronage, the case became very different when the civil courts interposed their authority, and thrust obnoxious presentees into the cure of souls, in defiance not only of the deprecations of the parishes thus encumbered, but the authority of ecclesiastical tribunals, to whom alone the sacred right of induction belonged. It was no longer the rights of patronage, but the existence of the Church itself that was at stake, in which every question about the fitness or unfitness of the Veto utterly disappeared. Here was a result upon which there could be no divided opinion, a common ground upon which all could take their stand; and the sentiments of Dr. Duncan upon the subject, as well as the energy of his character in such a crisis, were so well understood, that at one of the most trying periods of the controversy (the year 1839) he was elected to the important office of moderator of the General Assembly. It was there that the cases of Auchterarder and Strathbogie were brought forward, while that of Lethendy was impending, in which a presbytery, for its obedience to the highest ecclesiastical court in a case of ordination, was threatened by the civil authorities with an interdict. His duties of moderator during this trying period were discharged with that dignity, firmness, and discretion which the occasion so urgently demanded. In the following year he was subjected to a still more critical test, in consequence of his being sent, at the head of a deputation, to London, by the commission of the General Assembly, to congratulate the Queen on the occasion of her Majesty's marriage. It was thus that the Church of Scotland had been wont on former occasions to express its loyalty, and as the representatives of a national church, its deputations had always been hitherto received with royal courtesy and regard. But late events had made it be regarded in the high places of the state with dislike, and it was now suspected as tending to radicalism at least, if not to downright rebellion. To punish, therefore, if not to reclaim the offending church, it was announced to the deputation by the minister of the crown, that their address could not be received on the throne, as had hitherto been the custom, but at a private audience. To have yielded to this would have been to degrade the church which they represented; and Dr. Duncan therefore frankly stated to the crown minister, that the address could not be presented unless it was received with the usual tokens of respect. This firm resolution, which he expressed both in personal interviews and by written statement, prevailed, and the deputation was at last received according to the wonted ceremonial.

The proceedings of Dr. Duncan in the subsequent measures of the church, which ended in the disruption, may be easily surmised. In the most important of these he bore an active part; and when the convocation was assembled in Edinburgh, in 1842, he attended as one of the fathers of the church, and gave the benefit of his experience to its deliberations. Up to this period, when so important a change was at hand, his position was a happy one, beyond the lot of most country ministers. "His manifold blessings," his biographer writes, "had been alloyed with few painful ingredients, and his sorrows had all been singularly mingled with merciful alleviations. His family had grown up without accident or serious evil of any kind, and without a breach. His two sons had voluntarily embraced his own profession, and were settled tranquilly, with their V.