Corpus of Modern Scottish Writing (CMSW) - www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk/cmsw/ Document : 104 Title: The Disruption of the Scottish Church-Establishment, by an Elder of the Free Church Author(s): Craufurd, Lord James THE DISRUPTION OF THE SCOTTISH CHURCH-ESTABLISHMENT. BY AN ELDER OF THE FREE CHURCH. "God alone is Lord of the conscience." "It is better to suffer than to sin." EDINBURGH: JOHN JOHNSTONE, HUNTER SQUARE. MDCCCXLIII. Price 4d.] Printed by JOHN JOHNSTONE, High Street, Edinburgh. THE DISRUPTION &c. This is an earnest and a stirring age, which tests the strength of conventional relations, and tries the foundations of ancient institutions. The most efficient and the least oppressive of National Churches has been riven in twain, not by sudden wrench or hasty passion, but by the calm and resolute movement of a religious and reflecting people. The cause of Church Establishments has been shaken to its centre; and another proof has been given, that not on antiquity, but on truth, — not on authority, but on utility, British institutions must henceforward rest. To explain briefly and simply the causes and the principles which have led to the disruption of the Established Church of Scotland, is the object of this little pamphlet. The right of patronage, or presentation to livings in Scotland, is unquestionably a civil right. It rests on the foundation of civil statute; it passes from hand to hand by gift, sale, or succession; it is a marketable property, and may be bought with money and attached for debt; it requires no religious qualification for its exercise, but may be validly vested in, and effectually enforced by, a Jew, a Socinian, a Deist, or an Atheist, if he purchases or succeeds to it. This civil right does, however, in its exercise, deeply and directly affect the spiritual interests of the people adhering to the Church of Scotland, of whom it has ever been, since the Reformation, the distinguishing peculiarity, that they prize highly their religious privileges, that they view with reverence and affection the pastoral relation, and have the strongest repugnance to violent and unacceptable settlements. The history of Scotland, from the first dawn of the Reformation to the present day, is crowded with illustrations of this peculiar feature of the Scottish character; and it is not surprising to any one at all acquainted with the annals of the last two centuries, that the subject of Church patronage, as affecting the rights of congregations, should have been, to the Scottish people, one of the most intense and exciting interest. The right to present or nominate a minister to a parish might be bought and held by any one, whether a Christian or not; on the exercise of this right depended the dearest interests of Christian congregations; and, hence, it became a question of urgent and paramount importance to every Presbyterian, whether the law of patronage could be so modified and regulated as to be tolerated, or whether it was so inconsistent with the principles of religious liberty, and the vitality and efficiency of the Church, that it ought to be swept away altogether. At no period of the history of Scotland was absolute patronage, or the right of compelling the settlement of a minister in spite of the congregation, tacitly acquiesced in, except when Presbyterianism was prostrated by arbitrary power. It was well and truly said by Luther, that the doctrine of justification by free grace is the test of a standing or a falling Church; and it may be truly said, that hostility to absolute patronage has been, in Scotland, the test of a standing or falling Presbyterianism. The enemies of Presbyterianism have always been the friends of absolute patronage. The mere summary of the dates of the leading statutes on the subject, brings this clearly out. Compare the state of the Presbyterian Church at the periods of 1560, 1592, 1649, 1690, and 1834, when patronage was denounced, resisted, or controlled, with the state of the same Church in 1606, 1660, 1669, 1711, 1736, and 1798, when patronage was acknowledged, acquiesced in, and approved of, and let any candid man say whether the statement which we have made is not correct. In every period distinguished by the revival of vital religion, patronage has been protested against on principle, and restrained in exercise; and at every returning era of a dominant and high-handed patronage, liberty and evangelical religion have declined together. Many good men have thought it possible so to restrain the exercise of the civil right of patronage as to preserve the religious rights of congregations; but among the names of the worthies whose piety, and fervour, and zeal will be kept in the undying recollection of Scotsmen, there will not be found one who was the advocate or the apologist of absolute patronage. The principle that "no minister shall be intruded into a parish contrary to the will of the people," called in modern times the principle of "Non-intrusion," has subsisted in the Church of Scotland from her infancy; it is embodied in her Standards, declared by her highest authorities, incorporated in her constitution, graven in the hearts of her people. By men of the world it has been despised and disregarded, but on the religious feeling and the popular mind of Scotland, it has never lost its hold. There is very little of what may be called doctrinal dissent in this part of the United Kingdom. The great body of Dissenters or Seceders were, about a century ago, driven from the Established Church by the arbitrary exercise of patronage; and while the value of their faithful and zealous labours has been acknowledged by all candid men, the truth and importance of the principles for which they contended, and for the sake of which they seceded, has always been attested by a party within the Church who witnessed against patronage as a grievous and oppressive yoke. There were thus in the Church three parties, the first (and till lately the great majority) composed of those who inherited and maintained the principles and policy of the men who compelled the Secession of the Erskines, and deposed "the godly Gillespie;" — the second, of those who, without being strongly opposed to the law of patronage on principle, were desirous of regulating and restraining it; — and the third, of those who protested against patronage altogether, as unscriptural, tyrannical, and intolerable. About ten years ago the Evangelical section of the Church, comprising both those who wished to restrain, and those who wished to abolish patronage, acquired the ascendency in the General Assembly, and obtained the power of carrying out the principles for which they had long contended in the minority. Accordingly, an attempt was made to place the rights of patrons under such restrictions as the constitution of the Church acknowledged, and the interest of the Church required. The form of "a call" or initiation by the flock to the pastor proposed to them had never been lost sight of, even by those who rendered it a mockery in practice. Of this call, as a step in ecclesiastical procedure, it was supposed that the Church Courts were entitled to judge, and on this supposition the General Assembly of 1834 enacted the "Act anent the calling of Ministers," or, as it is popularly, but inaccurately, termed, "the Veto Law." It has been frequently alleged that this law was intended to overthrow patronage; but, in truth, it was intended so to regulate it as to prevent its gross abuse, and to give it a chance of permanence. Of all limitations on the exercise of patronage, consistent with the principle of Non-intrusion, that is to say, consistent with the recognition of the right of the congregation to prevent an unacceptable settlement, the Veto Law was the mildest; and it was on that account recommended by many avowed friends of patronage. Every parishioner who did not object to the settlement, and solemnly declare that his objection did not proceed from factious motives, but solely from a regard to his own spiritual interests, and those of his family and the congregation, was held to concur in the call, and counted as in favour of the person presented by the patron; and it was only when an actual majority of male heads of families, being communicants, solemnly and deliberately objected to the presentee, that the settlement could not proceed. The declared opponents of patronage not only considered the Veto Law objectionable, as tending to preserve the rights of patrons which they desired to abolish, but they also thought it inadequate as a protection to the people against intrusion. Experience did to some extent verify this opinion, for the working of the law, which was on the whole very satisfactory, proved, that, notwithstanding the privilege of veto, settlements would occasionally take place which were not harmonious or acceptable; and some such cases actually occurred. Still, the Veto Law worked well, the disputed settlements were of very rare occurrence, the power of rejecting, vested in the congregation, made the patrons cautious, and the Church, even on the admission of the strongest opponents of the veto, was steadily becoming more useful, more popular, and more stable. This happy state of matters was first broken up by the attempt of Lord Kinnoul to force his presentee into the parish of Auchterarder, contrary to the deliberate will, solemnly declared, of almost the whole of the parishioners. The call or invitation to Mr Young, the presentee to this parish, was signed by the factor of the patron, and by two members of the congregation! Nearly all the communicants were decidedly, and on conscientious grounds, opposed to his settlement. The Church courts, acting on their avowed principle, refused to ordain this man as pastor over this flock; they felt that it would be a mockery and a sin to do so, they believed that his ministrations among that people could not be profitable, and they resolved, at all hazards, to resist every attempt to force his settlement. It was then thought that by the constitution of the Establishment, and by the conditions of the Union, the Church had power to protect the spiritual rights of the congregation by the exercise of her own independent jurisdiction; and for the defence of the people, the Church asserted and maintained her right to act independently in the formation of the pastoral relation, as a spiritual matter, at the sametime admitting the authority of the civil courts in all matters civil. A long and severe struggle ensued, during which, in several other parishes, especially in those of Marnoch, Lethendy, Culsamond, &c., similar attempts were made by patrons to compel the settlement of their presentees, contrary to the deliberate wishes of the parishioners solemnly expressed and steadily adhered to. Into the merits of the questions of ecclesiastical and constitutional law, raised in the course of this struggle, it is unnecessary now to enter. They have one and all been decided in favour of the patrons and presentees, and against the congregations. The law of the Establishment has now been fixed. The settlements in Auchterarder and Marnoch must now be held to be legal and effectual, to spiritual as well as to civil effects; and every attempt within the Establishment to enforce either a right of election, or call, or veto, on the part of the congregation, is now unlawful. If the majority, or the whole body of parishioners are deliberately opposed to a presentee, the law of the Established Church of Scotland now is, that their opposition must be in vain, unless they can substantiate grave personal objections, at least to the satisfaction of the presbytery, if not also, as seems probable, to the satisfaction of the civil courts. Thus stands the law, and the Government and Parliament refused to amend it. It became, accordingly, the duty of every man who honestly held the principle of non-intrusion, to choose between the maintenance of that principle, and the enjoyment of the benefits of the Establishment. The two could not co-exist, — either the principle must be abandoned for the sake of the Establishment, or the Establishment must be abandoned for the sake of the principle. No one who knew the people of Scotland, could doubt the result. The principle involved had at once the strength of a popular right, and of a religious sentiment: they who struck down the nomination burghs, could not brook the nomination parishes; and they who thought the settlement at Auchterarder and Marnoch sinful, could not remain in an Establishment of which these settlements were types and illustrations of the standing law. Several offers of arrangement or adjustment were made by the members or the friends of Government, but they all resolved into the concession of power to Church courts, and the refusal of power to congregations; they recognised no popular choice, call, or veto, and, in so far as they merely extended the right to state objections, they gave no more weight to the will of the whole body of parishioners than to the will of any one man. To the honour of the Church these offers were rejected. She had taken her stand on a principle of congregational, not of clerical right; she disavowed all claim for ecclesiastical domination; and she refused to sacrifice the people, even though she could have obtained power for her own Church courts. The existing constitution of her courts, in whose hands the interest of the congregations would, for a season, have been safe, made these offers the more tempting: her ministers had been recently engaged in defending the Establishment which they were called on to quit, and every thing combined to render this choice a severe trial of their faith and constancy. But, strengthened by the hand of their Divine Master, they were enabled to stand fast; and nearly 500 ministers, with a numerous body of elders, and a countless multitude of people, have preferred principle to endowment, and have quitted the Establishment. What may be the effect of this movement, concerns those most who have declared the Establishment to be incompatible with the rights of congregations: they profess to be its greatest friends, but they have now placed it on a footing which it will be very difficult to maintain. The Established Church is no longer the National Church of Scotland — she is now the Church of the minority. The Established Church is no longer the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Scotland, — the very soul and spirit of Evangelical Presbyterianism has gone out of her, and a strong leaven of Arminian and Episcopalian sentiments pervades those who remain. Such an Establishment cannot long be secure in this country. It is not to be expected, it is not to be desired that it should. They who have now seceded were indeed friendly to the principle of Establishments, but they were so, because they thought it the duty of the civil magistrate to promote the true religion, and because, looking on an Established Church as a means, not as an end, they thought that the objects of the gospel ministry were thereby best promoted. As the Establishment is now declared to be constituted, they feel that it tends to the frustration, not the advancement of the great objects, as means to promote which they had alone supported it, and, therefore, it has become their painful duty, not only to withdraw from their connection with the State, but to bear their testimony and their protest against that connection, such as it is now declared to be. But another and a still more sacred principle was involved in this contest. It is the clear doctrine of the gospel, that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only Head of his Church, that the true Church all over the world is His body, and that in respect of His headship over the Church, every true believer is a member of His body, spiritually united to Him, and by His grace entitled to draw strength and light and life from Him as from the Head. This doctrine, mysterious or ridiculous as it may seem to men of the world, is, by every enlightened Christian, received with undoubting faith as a most precious and momentous truth. The membership of individual believers, is the corollary and the counterpart of the proposition, that Christ is the sole Head of "the Church, which is His body, the fulness of Him who filleth all in all." This principle is not held on the narrow and exclusive grounds of ecclesiastical distinction on which it is sometimes supposed to rest. It is a religious principle, not a mere ecclesiastical dogma — a doctrine of personal faith, not a mere tenet of church government. Every man who truly entertains and believes it, clings to it, as the foundation to his own title to be treated by his Almighty Judge as a constituent part of the spiritual Church, as a branch grafted into the spiritual vine, and privileged to abide therein, as a member of the spiritual body of which Christ is the Head. From this it follows, that, without reference to the standards of any particular Church, it is the duty of every individual believer, to recognise, at all times, this principle of the Headship of Christ, and, in accordance with it, to refuse to acknowledge any authority in matters purely spiritual, except that which flows from Him. Accordingly our brethren, now our fellow-dissenters, the Voluntaries hold this principle as an article of faith, and, because of it, they repudiate all connection with the State, as, in their opinion, necessarily involving a surrender to human authority of a portion of the dominion of Him whose kingdom is not of this world. If such a surrender be involved in the acceptance of Establishment by a Christian Church, then assuredly our Voluntary friends have come to the right conclusion. But hitherto we have believed, that by the constitution of the Church of Scotland, her spiritual freedom from secular authority was not only left unimpaired, but was confirmed by the terms of her Establishment; and that by the constitution of the British empire, this freedom stood ratified and guaranteed by the Revolution settlement, and the Treaty of Union. It is declared in the Confession of Faith, and that confession was approved by Parliament, and embodied in the statute law of this country by the Act 1690, c. 5, that "there is no other Head of the Church but the Lord Jesus Christ," and again, that "the Lord Jesus, as King and Head of his Church, hath therein appointed a government in the hands of Church officers distinct from the civil magistrate." By Act of Parliament 1567, c. 12, it is declared "that there be no other jurisdiction ecclesiastical acknowledged within this realm, other than that which is, and shall be within the same Kirk, or that flows therefrom, concerning the premises," these premises being "the preaching of the word, correction of manners, and administration of the holy sacraments." By the Act 1592, c. 116, it is specially declared, that the jurisdiction of the sovereign and his courts should "be in no ways prejudicial, nor derogate any thing from the privilege that God has given to the spiritual office-bearers of the Kirk concerning heads of religion, matters of heresy, excommunication, collation, or deprivation of ministers, or any such like essential censures, grounded and having warrant of the Word of God." By the Act 1690, c. 5, this Act of 1592 was ratified and confirmed; and by the Act 1693, c. 22, it was declared and enacted that no minister should be admitted unless he owned the Presbyterian Church government to be "the only government of this Church." The free spiritual jurisdiction of the Kirk thus recognised and ratified by repeated statutes, was especially guaranteed as "a fundamental and unalterable condition" of the Treaty of Union. Thus it appears, that by the constitution of the Church of Scotland, standing on the statute law, and guaranteed by national treaty, the establishment of the Church did not necessarily enslave her; and her acceptance of endowment did not necessarily involve any surrender of her spiritual freedom, or any compromise of the doctrine of the sole Headship of Christ. On her reading of this constitution, on her construction of these statutes, and of this Treaty, she felt and believed that she had retained her spiritual independence, and that, while receiving endowments from the State, in virtue of the duty of the State to advance the truth, and in return for services done to the State by the free preaching of the Word, she nevertheless acknowledged no authority in matters spiritual, save that of her great and only head. Under this belief she maintained the defence of her Establishment against the Voluntaries, and from the principle of that defence, both in regard to the duty of the State in granting, and the lawfulness of the Church's acceptance of Endowments, she has made no departure. The State has failed in her duty, by annexing to the Endowments which she bestows, conditions which render their acceptance by the Church no longer lawful. On her own interpretation of the conditions of connection, the Church accepted, retained, and defended the lawfulness of her Establishment, and in her view of these conditions she had the satisfaction of being supported by six judges of the supreme civil court of Scotland, eminently distinguished for learning, ability, and worth. It has now, however, been otherwise decided. The statutes and the Treaty have been otherwise read. The terms of Establishment have been otherwise declared. Not one fragment of real spiritual independence is now left to the Church; and by the law, the Government, and the Parliament of this country, it has been now proclaimed, that, practically, the acceptance of Establishment does involve the surrender of spiritual freedom, and the recognition of secular authority in matters spiritual. The civil courts have accordingly of late years adjudged matters which, till recently, were believed by the Church to have been beyond the reach of civil jurisdiction. A few of these may be briefly mentioned. The civil courts have interdicted presbyteries from admitting to the pastoral charge, although no civil interest was involved. They have ordained a Church court to take on trial and admit to the office of the holy ministry. They have prohibited the communicants of a congregation from intimating their dissent from a call to a proposed pastor. They have interdicted the preaching of the Gospel, and the administration of ordinances, under authority of the Church throughout a whole district. They have interdicted the execution of the spiritual sentences of Church courts. They have suspended these sentences when pronounced, and have annulled the deposition of ministers for ecclesiastical offences regularly pronounced by the highest Church courts. They have judged of the right to sit in the General Assembly, and interdicted members from taking their seats. In these, and many other instances which might be specified, the jurisdiction exercised by the civil courts was plainly quite inconsistent with all idea of spiritual independence. But by the law as now fixed, by the terms of the Establishment as now declared, this jurisdiction legally pertains to the civil courts; these interdicts were each and all of them just and lawful, the Church had no right to complain of them so long as she retained her endowments, submission to them was part of the price of her Establishment, and she can only escape the jurisdiction of civil courts in these matters, over which it has been already exercised, and in all similar matters, by severing her connection with the State. Blame has been sometimes imputed to the judges of the civil courts; but, while occasional expressions might have been better spared, it is now authoritatively settled, and we are bound to acknowledge, that in the judgments themselves, their Lordships did not err, but faithfully administered the law of the Established Church as it must now be received. But how stands the controversy with the Voluntary now? The condition of the argument is altered: the connection between the Church and the State in this country, can now be defended only on the assumption of the entire ascendency of the civil power. The acceptance of Establishments has been declared, by the highest authority, to involve the surrender of a principle of religious belief which we, and our Voluntary brethren, hold in common. The result of the struggle in which the Church has been engaged for the last ten years, is, in one sense, a triumph to the religious Voluntary. He has taken the view which, by law, is now declared to be in this country practically correct. The question as to the duty of the civil magistrate to promote the true religion, remains where it did: the question as to the Christian lawfulness of the Church receiving endowment without the surrender of spiritual independence, remains where it did: no act or law of a civil power can touch these questions, which can be decided only on grounds of scripture and of reason: but to every practical purpose, the controversy as to the Scottish Establishment is settled, and that institution can no longer be defended except on the admission of that subordination to civil authority in matters spiritual, which we repudiate as heartily as our Voluntary brethren. This may be explained by an illustration which every friend of civil liberty will at once appreciate. Suppose that I were engaged in a controversy with a Republican, who maintained that there could be no security for personal freedom under a monarchy; that I replied to him, that by the constitution of this country personal freedom was secured to the humblest subject; and that, at this stage of the argument, the Government and Parliament interposed, saying, "You may have dreamed of such a British constitution, but the fact is otherwise; and the entire surrender of your personal freedom is the price you pay for the protection of the Crown." This authoritative declaration, if I believe it, cuts away the very foundation of my argument in defence of monarchy, and compels me to adopt the Republican principle. The application is obvious. The only ground on which the friends of religious liberty can defend a Church Establishment is cut away from them, when it is declared that, for her endowments, the Church must pay the price of the surrender of her own independence and the liberties of her people. On this point, therefore, as on the point of non-intrusion, the Church was called on to make the choice between her spiritual independence and her temporal establishment. She could not be both free and established; she must acknowledge the authority of the State in matters spiritual, or forfeit the aid of the State in matters civil. In this choice there was to firm and faithful men no room for hesitation; and the secession of those who had avowed their principles as in their view scriptural and paramount, followed as a necessary consequence. They are now the members of a Free, but no longer the members of an Endowed Church; while the Establishment remains based on the principle of intrusion, as illustrated by the settlement of Marnoch, and the principle of subordination to secular authority, as enforced in the interdicts of Strathbogie. It is scarcely necessary to notice the bill of Lord Aberdeen, now apparently on the eve of passing into a law. Irrespective altogether of the serious constitutional objection to this bill, that it professes to declare the law in the teeth of the recorded judgment and deliberate opinions of the supreme courts, the measure is, on principle, not only inadequate, but injurious. It places the power of preventing the settlement of the presentee in wrong hands; it creates what is in itself a great evil, and what those who have left the Establishment always deprecated and denounced — an ecclesiastical domination; but it affords no protection to the parishioners. It is an Erastian measure; for it rivets the fetters of the Church, and perpetuates her subordination to the civil courts. And it is an intrusion measure; for it excludes altogether the expression of the congregational will as such; and, while it does not permit the presbytery to reject the presentee on account of the repugnance of the congregation, it enables the presbytery to intrude the most unacceptable minister whenever they may be disposed to do so. It is a law subjecting the spiritual to the civil courts, and subjecting the people to the patrons and presbyteries; and the only effect which it can produce on the minds of those who have seceded, must be, to satisfy them of the propriety and necessity of the step they have taken. Such is a brief and simple narrative of the causes of this secession — certainly the most striking and interesting, and likely to prove the most important movement in our days. The secular tie which bound men together in a professedly religious institution has now been broken. Our union henceforward must rest on other grounds. The communion of the State Church was necessarily of a mixed character. It united many who differed, and divided many who agreed, on the highest truths of vital Christianity. Let it now be the aim and the prayer of all, that the faithful of every sect and denomination of Christians may know and love each other better, and that, without any compromise of conscientious opinion, some plan may be devised for securing the co-operation in their great common cause of all gospel ministers and gospel hearers. Towards our brethren who remain in the Establishment, let us exercise kindness, charity, and forbearance. It would be uncandid to deny that some good and pious men still adhere to her. But against the principle of the Establishment, as now constituted, we must steadily maintain our protest; and no feeling of spurious or mistaken charity should induce us to depart from it. Let us accord to all others that right of entire freedom of conscience, which, for ourselves, we have vindicated; and let us on all subjects abide by those great principles of civil and religious liberty, on which, in this movement, we have acted. Let us seek peace, while we adhere to the truth; let us be tolerant, while we are stedfast; let us do all in a firm and faithful, but nothing in a contentious spirit. Great prudence, charity, and temper, are required in the present position of the Free Church; and these qualities are in no degree inconsistent with earnest zeal and unflinching fidelity. On the contrary, the union of sincere charity and unfeigned faith, is the peculiar excellence of Christian virtue. It is easy for a bigot to be zealous, for a latitudinarian to be tolerant; but the gospel teaches us to love much, to endure much, to hope all things, and yet to rejoice in the truth, and to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints. The Government, who have, by refusing redress, compelled this secession, have much to answer for. But, let it not be forgotten, that there also rests on every one who has shared in the secession a very heavy responsibility. It has been no trifling step, and it calls for no trifling exertions from those who have taken it, — exertions in the way of cheerful Christian liberality, and of wary walking and exemplary conduct. No greater misfortune could befall the cause of truth, than that those, who have borne so good a testimony, should discredit it by their lives; and all the struggle, and all the testimony, and all the sacrifices will be vain, unless by earnest prayer and active effort this movement be made to work the extension of the knowledge of the gospel and the revival of true religion. Printed by JOHN JOHNSTONE, High Street, Edinburgh.