if God has not given over to an infatuated spirit certain parties, it were just as well that they did not, by forcing them up to the surface, compel men to investigate certain principles, and re-consider certain facts, which those who love things as they are would do well to suffer to remain in that quiescent state in which they have lain dormant for some centuries.

Lord Cuninghame having, as he imagines, overwhelmed his clerical antagonists on his own territory of law, or, as we would call it, of fanciful analogies, and also on the neutral territory of history, like a victorious general, resolves to push his conquests even into their own prescriptive domain of theology. But on this point we must give his own words, as we find them in the columns of the Witness. After setting aside, as he imagines, an argument the presbytery had employed, to this effect,-that as an Anglican prelate cannot be compelled by civil courts to grant orders against his own conscientious convictions of what is right, so a fortiori much less can a Scottish presbytery,-Lord Cuninghame proceeds thus, If the English practice may be referred to, it is understood, that any candidate for holy orders in England, when refused ordination by one bishop, may apply to another, who is not precluded from giving ordination if he find the candidate qualified.' And pray, what then? Can any man infer from this analogy,

that therefore the Court of Session can at all move in this matter? Or even though it should, that it can remit to a minority of a presbytery, or to any other body whatever, to grant orders? Let Lord Cuninghame make the most of his analogy, and it will amount to no more than this, that one presbytery-the term corresponding to the prelate in the analogy-is not precluded from giving orders to a candidate, if satisfied with his qualifications, merely because another presbytery had previously rejected him: a very harmless doctrine at the least, and one, moreover, that has been acted upon over and over again under the operation of the Veto law.

Having settled this point in a manner so very satisfactory for his argument, Lord Cuninghame thus proceeds, In other respects ordination in England and in Scotland are essentially different rites.' Essentially different rites? Indeed! In what respects ? In England,' continues his lordship, ordination is given by the bishops, as the successors in an unbroken line of descent from the apostles, and a peculiar spiritual effect is supposed to attend ordination when received from episcopal authority."

Lord Cuninghame, sitting, as he did, upon the bench of justice for the interpretation of acts of Parliament, must, of course, be understood to mean, that he has here given the received interpretation of the Anglican statutes in the matter of orders. But does

he refer to any statute in support of his dictum ? Not one; and for a very sufficient reason; because there does not stand upon the statute book one single act which affords a shadow of support to his assertion. We really had imagined, that by this time it was understood by all in any measure conversant with the subject, that according to the laws of England, the crown is the fountain of all authority, spiritual as well as temporal; and that it would be remembered, in illustration of the operation of this constitutional maxim, that the prelates under Henry VIII. and Edward VI., (as we showed in our last Number,) took out commissions from the crown to qualify them to give orders, or perform any spiritual function whatsoever. The law of England is in absolute contradiction to the assumption of Lord Cuninghame.

But as he refers to the Scottish Reformers in evidence of what he asserts to be the opinion in regard to orders in this country, it may, perhaps, be supposed, that he refers to the Anglican Reformers as his authority for his view of English orders. But this will stand him in no more stead than his appeals to the English law. We have shown in our Number for October last, that Cranmer and his principal coadjutors were of opinion, not only that prelates and presbyters in the primitive church were identical; but that election by the people, or an appointment by the crown, constituted of itself valid orders, without any other rite or ceremony at the hands of either presbyters or prelates.

It is perfectly true, that the dogma referred to by Lord Cuninghame did obtain currency among a section of the Anglican Church two centuries ago. But then it is as true, that it never obtained the sanction of either Parliament or Convocation; and, as we have shown in our Number last referred to, by the constitution and authoritative formularies of the Church of England, there is no more peculiar spiritual effect supposed to attend ordination when received by episcopal authority,' than when obtained by the laying on of the hands of the presbytery, or the mere nomination of the crown, or even the election of the people.

Lord Cuninghame evidently knows nothing of the opinions of the Church of Scotland on the question of orders. We wish exceedingly, before he again commits himself to a judgment on the subject, he would read the works of our great divines of the second Reformation,-of Henderson, Gillespie, Calderwood, Rutherford, or even of Baillie. And as we do not wish to impose upen him too heavy a task, we would be satisfied if he read Gillespie's Aaron's Rod Blossoming,' and Rutherford's Due Rights of Presbyteries,' or even book ii. chapter viii. of the former, and from page 183 to page 231 of the latter. He will there discover the views which the Church of Scotland in all ages has maintained

6

regarding ordination, and be prevented in future from committing such mistakes as he has done upon this occasion.

In the total lack of statutes to support his views, Lord Cuninghame draws largely upon his powers of analogy to make out his case; and the Church and kingdom of England seem to be his favourite fields for the display of such powers. Thus, in one place he says, In England as much as in Scotland our Saviour is the great spiritual Head of the Church.' If Lord Cuninghame never read the preamble of the canons of 1603, or the thirty-sixth canon of that code, he must surely, as a lawyer, have read the Act of Supremacy, in which it is enacted by the three estates in Parliament, that the king is the supreme head or governor of the Church of England in all matters spiritual and ecclesiastical, as well as in matters temporal and civil. But if he has read that act, it certainly surpasses all our powers of comprehension to conceive how he could possibly have said that in England as much as in Scotland our Saviour is the great spiritual Head of the Church.' We can assure Lord Cuninghame, that had he committed himself to such an assertion in the halcyon days of good Queen Bess,' or of bluff Harry' her father, his ermine would not protect his person from the penalties of high treason. Many were the noble Puritans who suffered death for no other crime than simply maintaining, that in England as much as in Scotland our Saviour is the great Head of the Church.'

6

He follows up the last clause by adding, but the English acknowledge the king as the temporal head of their Church on earth, a doctrine, which the Scottish disown.' Instead of making any remarks upon this very singular clause, we prefer, as our space is very limited, to quote the passage that follows, containing certainly the strangest doctrine which is maintained in this very strange Note: But this,' continues his lordship,-viz., the statement contained in the sentence last quoted, but this, instead of giving the Scottish clergy more power than the English, actually operates as an essential limitation of the Scots ecclesiastical jurisdiction.' Indeed! How so? Because, says Lord Cuninghame, in England ecclesiastical courts, composed of professional judges, have been established with extensive jurisdiction under the king as sole head of the Church, their proceedings being only cognisable by the temporal courts in cases of gross irregularities and excess of power.'

To expose the singular ignorance and inaccuracies contained in this statement, would require more time and space than at present we can command. A remark or two, however, will sufficiently answer our purpose. And, in the first place, as it has no bearing upon the point at issue, we shall grant that the Anglican ecclesiastical courts do possess a more extensive jurisdiction in causes civil

than are claimed by ours; although, since these causes relate in England to matters connected with wills and matrimony, we might deny the assertion, and, as we think we could do, establish the opposite conclusion. But granting the point for the present,-in the second place, we ask, does Lord Cuninghame mean that the simple fact of the judges in the Anglican ecclesiastical courts being lay professional judges, render their jurisdiction and decisions less controllable by superior civil courts' than must necessarily happen in ours, where the judges are clergymen? This, surely, cannot be his meaning. Well, then, in the third place, does he affirm that ecclesiastical courts, which recognise the king as sole head of the Church, must be more exempt from his control than are ecclesiastical courts which deny that he has any jurisdiction whatever in spiritual causes? No one can imagine that he can affirm anything so absurd. But if not, does he mean to say, in the fourth place, that there must be grosser irregularities, and a greater excess of power, in the proceedings of the Anglican ecclesiastical courts to warrant the interference of the temporal courts, than are requisite to authorise the Court of Session to interfere in the decisions of our courts? His words, construed grammatically, would necessarily lead to that conclusion. But we would rather believe that Lord Cuninghame writes ungrammatically, than impute to him a statement so destitute of foundation. Does he then mean, in the fifth place, that a court which possesses jurisdiction only in matters spiritual must necessarily possess less authority in these spiritual matters than if it also possessed jurisdiction in civil causes? Such a proposition is surely as absurd as any of the preceding. And yet, if this last be not Lord Cuninghame's meaning, we cannot so much as divine what it can possibly be.

Amid all this uncertainty, however, one thing is most abundantly obvious, and that is, that Lord Cuninghame is determined that our courts must be placed under the control of the Court of Session, and that, not satisfied with claiming for that court the same degree of jurisdiction in spiritual causes, and over ecclesiastical courts, which is possessed by the temporal courts in England, nothing less will now satisfy the Court of Session than an amount of jurisdiction and control over ecclesiastical causes and courts, which confessedly the English temporal courts never possessed. Had such assumption of power been manifested five years ago, we can well imagine the wild surprise it would excite throughout the empire. But we live in strange times, and must economise our stock of wonder.

There are many other portions of this Note which we should much desire to have space to advert to, and yet we begin to apprehend that it by no means deserves the notice it has already received. We cannot conceal from ourselves that the only claim the Note

possesses on public attention it derives, not assuredly from anything intrinsic, but simply and solely from the quarter from which it has emanated. We will undertake to say, that, had the Note appeared anonymously, there is not a publisher in the three kingdoms who would venture to publish it at his own risk. Nor are we sorry that the Note has appeared. On the contrary, we rejoice at it. We have been accustomed, from the commencement of the controversy, to show the legitimate consequences to which the principles maintained by our opponents must inevitably lead. Our opponents, however, denied the accuracy of our predictions. But Lord Cuninghame has honestly and consistently acted upon the principles of his party, and practically arrived at the conclusions we from the first foretold.

Before we close, there is just one point more in this Note to which we must advert. Lord Cuninghame, from the frequency with which it is insinuated, would seem to wish his readers to believe that ecclesiastical courts have always been the sworn foes of civil liberty and the rights of men, while the temporal courts have as uniformly stood forward as the vindicators of the rights and the liberties of the subject; and in consequence, he congratulates the country on the guarantee they possess, in the decisions of the civil courts against all the tyranny of the church and churchmen. Apprehensive, however, it would appear, lest such an insinuation might require some proof, he refers, as his authority, to a page or two of Mr Hallam's Constitutional History of Eng

land.

We shall not trust ourselves to make any animadversions on this insinuation. But since Lord Cuninghame has appealed to history in support of his insinuation against our courts, and in favour of that in which he himself sits, we ask him to point out one factjust one single fact-in the whole course of our Church's history, which can even be distorted into evidence that the Church of Scotland has ever violated the personal rights or the civil liberties of the people. But we could tell Lord Cuninghame who have ever been the tools of arbitrary power, and who its sternest antagonists. We could tell him of a time when a tyrannical despot, an inquisitorial council, a venal parliament, a craven aristocracy, and a papistico-prelatic hierarchy, united their powers to trample the Church's rights and the people's liberties in the dust. And where, then, did freedom find an asylum? In the temporal courts? No; but in our ecclesiastical assemblies. Whence, then, did the laws and the privileges of the nation find their vindicators? From the temporal judges? The temporal judges! No, no; but from the ministers of the Church of Scotland, aided by a few patriot commons and a few heroic peers, who, through the blessing