Page:Sketches of the History of the Church of Scotland.djvu/19

 , Hamilton, and Leighton, who were well inclined to a restored Episcopacy, were selected, and after being ordained Deacons and Priests per saltum, were consecrated at Westminster in 1661; and from them the present Scottish Episcopal succession has continuously flowed. The small element of Presbyterian Resolutioners, or Moderates, as those indulged ministers would now be called, made no opposition to the restoration of the hierarchy; but on the contrary were generally inclined to welcome it. Dr James Sharp, who was nominated Primate,—he was a native, I may mention, of the Diocese of Aberdeen, and was educated at one of its Universities,—is a specimen of those well affected Presbyterian Moderates, who in their hearts were never far from the principles of Evangelical Truth and Apostolical Order combined; and for these principles, moderately carried out under the restored Episcopacy, he incurred the implacable resentment of the Covenanting Presbyterians, and died under their hands a Martyr's death; but his name to this day is covered with obloquy and slander by the descendants and admirers of the Covenanters, who continue to justify and applaud the murder, as an act of righteous vengeance.

The Synod of Aberdeen met, and was largely attended; about sixty ministers appearing. Without a dissenting voice, it agreed to a petition to the King in Council, which was signed by all present. After describing the miserable condition of the Church and Kingdom during the great Rebellion and the Cromwellian usurpation, they prayed the Royal Commissioners to transmit their Petition to His Sacred Majesty, "that he would be pleased in his wisdom and goodness to settle the government of this rent Church, according to the Word of God, and the practice of the Ancient and Primitive Church;"—there is no mistaking the meaning of these words;—"and this Paper," the Synod added, "we have ordained to be registered in our Synod Books, ad futuram rei memoriam; and in testimony of our unanimity herein, we have all subscribed it with our hands, at King's College, at Aberdeen, the 18th April, 1661 years." We notice that the date of the Document is nearly six weeks before the King's return on the 29th of May, so eager was the Diocese of Aberdeen for the restoration of the Church and order.

But matters were not so peaceable in other parts of the kingdom. The snake of disaffection and rebellion, though scotched, was not killed. In the western districts, ever the hot-beds of turbulence and schism, the Covenanting preachers, to the number of about a hundred, refused to acknowledge an uncovenanted king. They had entrapped the poor king, when only a boy, to subscribe and swear to the Covenant. Probably he would have subscribed and sworn to anything when a prisoner in their hands, and they were perfectly aware of his insincerity while doing it, and so were sharers in the sin, far more deeply so than the poor youth whose life would likely have