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tion towards their flocks. The priest assumes dominion over his convert; the Protestant minister professes to release him from the bonds of priestcraft. True, he may have a leaven in himself of what he condemns in the other, and we have seen in the annals of religious life in Scotland as much of that spirit of clerical dictation, sometimes called "the popery of Protestantism," as perhaps the history of any other Protestant country is likely to supply. But it never could be in Protestantism as in the Popedom, that a great hierarchy, spread over Europe, and closely combined for unity of action, should assert complete command over thought and opinion, demanding authority over the education of youth, and the diffusion of knowledge among men. Hence the acquisition of a proselyte was not the same triumph to both classes of clergy. To the priest of the old Church it was not only the bringing over of a fellow-creature to his own opinion of the truth as he held it: it was a material personal conquest, followed by subjection to his authority.

The adherents of the old Church had of course their peculiar devotional literature. Old books of devotion are, as collectors know, peculiarly rare, from their liability to be thumbed out of existence. But the books of a prevalent Church had chances of life denied to those of a repressed community. A breviary or missal was a dangerous possession, and such books found no place of refuge in public institutions or the libraries of miscellaneous collectors. Since the Reformation the printing of Popish literature had not been tolerated, and no such books appeared as the produce of the native press after the catechism known as Hamilton's and the "Twopenny Faith." The separate breviarian "Uses "—such as that of Salisbury for England, and the Aberdeen breviary for Scotland-were superseded by the Breviary and other standards issued by the Council of Trent. Of these no separate edition was required for Scotland, and those who ventured to possess copies of them would seek them abroad.

1 See chapter xxxvii.

But it was part of the policy of the Church of Rome to fight its battles in popular vernacular literature. We have seen how the Church of the Reformation in Germany expressed its devotion in vocal praise through vernacular songs and hymns. The old Church competed for popularity in the same form; and which had the better of the competition in the literary or æsthetic sense, is matter of open criticism.1

Ninian Winzet, Quentin Kennedy the Abbot of Crossraguel, and John Tyrie, known as "Tyrie the Jesuit," obtained somewhat of a historic notoriety as men who had measured swords with John Knox. The great battle over, and the parties to it holding the relation of conquerors and conquered, the voice of this latter ceased to be so loud as to have a share in history. It can only be traced in a few books of extreme rarity.

John Hay, a Jesuit father, of the family of Dalgetty, in Aberdeenshire, put a bundle of questions, two hundred and five in number, to the clergy of the new religion, beginning with one often put in the great controversyDid the Protestants believe that all their ancestors who died before the reformation of religion were assuredly damned to all eternity, or did they not? 2

1 Among the oldest of the Romish vernacular hymn-books appears to be Ein neu Gesangbüchlin geystlicher Lieder, vor alle gutthe Christen nach Ordennung Christlicher Kirchen. Leipzich, 1537.' Reprinted, Hanover, 1853. One might read a considerable portion of this collection without noting the marks which appropriate it to a school opposite from that of the Lutheran hymns.

2 In the German 'Zu ewigen Zeiten verdampt seyn, oder nicht.' I have not been able to trace a copy of an edition of this book in the Scots vernacular. That there ever was one is only known from the title of the French translation: Demandes Faictes aux Ministres d'Escosse touchant la Religion Chrestienne, par M. Jean Hay d'Escosse, de la Compagnie de Jésus, Professeur en Théologie, et Doyen des Arts, en l'Université de Tornon, Revenues et de l'Ecossois mises en Langue Francois. 1595.' The only copy of this translation known to me is in the Advocates' Library. In a small bookshop in Berlin I happened to find a contemporary German translation: Fragstuck des Christlichen Glaubens, an die nieuwe Scotisch Predigkandten, erstlich durch den hochgelehrten H. Johann Hayum auss Schotten der Societat Jesu Theologum Franzosisch

John Hamilton, a secular priest, has already been referred to as a renowned assassin. But he had that subtle gift, the empire over language; and the words came to him at his bidding,-words expressive of Christian meekness, humility, charity, and all that might seem appropriate rather to the secluded anchorite, than to the man of storm and strife-the unscrupulous champion of the Catholic league.1

beschriben, demnach duch Sebastian Werzo Pfurz Pfurzherzn zu Freyburg in das Teutsch gebracht. Freybourg, 1585.' As the French title-page carries a later date, there must have been at least two translations or editions in French.

1 It is a strange transition to pass from that wild scene in the French histories where Hamilton hangs the jurist Barnabé Brissot in the Hôtel de Ville, to his little book of prayers and meditations, and to suppose him ruminating on such passages as this, when he returned from his work: "Ane Evening Prayer." "I render most humble thanks to your divine majesty, most gracious God, wha of your free mercy has conservit me in health and prosperity this day, and preserved me from all danger of body and soul, and brought me to the soft repose of this night, to refresh my tired body and recreate my weary spirit after the day's pains and travails of my lawful vocation. Forgive me, Father of all pity, all my sins and negligences I have committed this day, either by thought, word, or deed. Receive me to your mercy, and grant that I may rest this night in peace and security under the favourable wings of your mighty protection. Defend me against all the ambushments, incursions, and invasions of all my enemies, visibles and invisibles. Preserve me from all dangers of body and soul; be unto me ane God, ane protector, and ane strong tower to save and defend me against all external forces; for ye are my rock and defence-ye are my refuge and fortress against all my enemies." "Grant to me, most merciful Father, the peace and tranquillity of this night's rest, that at my joyful wakening I may render to you humble thanks for my soft repose, and rise the morne with a joyful heart, to travail in my lawful vocation, and magnify your haly name, to merit after this life to repose in you eternally, through Jesus Christ our Lord, wha lives and reigns with you in unity with the Haly Spirit, for ever and ever.

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These fragments of prayers are taken from "A facile Treatise, contenand, first, Ane infalible Reul to discerne Treu from False Religion; nixt, A Declaration of the Nature, Numbre, Verteu, and Effects of the Sacraments: togidder with certain Prayers of Devotion. Louvain, 1600.' The contents of this volume are heterogeneous. Among them are expositions of mistranslations in the Geneva version of the Bible which can only be estimated by Biblical and Oriental scholars. This part of the book is wound up by a curious

For the chief book of devotion in use among the adherents of the old Church in Scotland, we must look to a foreign authorship. Peter van Hondt, a native of Nimeguen, was the first Provincial of the Jesuits for the Teutonic or German nations; and among the illustrious names of the order, his stood next to that of Ignatius Loyola himself, as the missionary who carried the new organisation into northern Europe. His name, translated from Walloon into English, would mean "of the dog," or doggish. Hence, in the whimsical method of the period, he took in his books and public life the Latinised name of Canisius. By this he was known in his day, and is still known over all the communities adhering to the Church of Rome as the author of the Larger and Smaller Catechisms of Canisius.1

In 1588 there was printed in Paris a translation of the Smaller Catechism by Peter King, a Scotsman, and a native of Edinburgh. It has an ample calendar, and tables for calculating the time of high water at the various ports of Scotland as far as Orkney. From these and other adjuncts, showing that the volume was adapted to practical life-to serve as an almanac as well as a book of devotion—we may believe that it was the indispensable devotional manual of those adherents of the old Church in Scotland who were not rich enough or learned enough to use the Breviary.

In the Popish literature of Scotland some quarter of a century after the Reformation a new feature becomes visible. Before the year 1580 the new Church had lived long enough to send over proselytes to the old. The clerical

admonition as appropriate to the partiality of the Scots to the Geneva Bible: "Therefore, I beseek you, dissaivet people, to burn your corrupt Scots Bible in the fire, that your sauls be not tormentit with the intolerable pains of the fires of hell. This was the only cause why our Catholic bishops forbade the reading of the English Bible, that the corruptions thereof should not infect their sauls to that eternal perdition."

In the Dictionnaire Historique of the Abbé de Feller-the best biographical and bibliographical work of reference as to Romanist ecclesiastics-it is said, "Il y a peu de livres qui aient été si souvent imprimés, et traduits en tant de langues différentes."

convert is not always a valuable bargain. Full of the impatient zeal peculiar to his position, he was especially disqualified for service in a clerical army trained to pursue with skill and patience a subtle tactic bequeathed through centuries of tradition. In the early stage of the dispute the acrimony had been chiefly on the Protestant side. Lack of zeal was at the beginning among the heaviest imputations against the clergy of the old Church. They had, in fact, in many instances, no greater amount of that quality than was needed to induce its owner to accept of a rich benefice burdened with a few restrictive conditions. No doubt the priests, who showed the better temper, would have handed over the heretics to the civil power to be burned; but this would not have been from personal rancour, but the fulfilment of a great public policy, associated with the theory that the fire in this world neutralised the doom to eternal fiery torture in the next. Afterwards the bitterness went over from the other to their side, and was aggravated in the transition. Nothing was so injuri ous to the personal position and character of the Romish clergy in Scotland as the foul calumnies repeated by them against John Knox; and the earliest to trumpet these were two proselyte priests-Archibald Hamilton and Nicol Burne.1

1 Hamilton was the author of 'Dialogus de Confusione Sectæ Calvinianæ apud Scotica Ecclesia Nomen ridicule usurpantis, Paris, 1577,' and of an Answer to an opponent, printed in 1581. Dr M'Crie says Hamilton "left Scotland, and, going to France, made a recantation of the Protestant religion. As an evidence of the sincerity of his conversion to Popery, he published 'De Confusione,' &c., a book which I have frequently referred to, and which strikingly exemplifies the adage, 'Omnis apostata osor acerrimus sui ordinis.". Works, i. 258.

Burne wrote in the vernacular, and his book, like the others of the same kind, is full of the odd misprints incidental to a foreign press. It is called 'The Dispvtation concerning the Controversit Headdis of Religion, haldin in the Realme of Scotland the zeir of God ane thousand fyue hundreth fourscoir zeiris, betuix the pretendit Ministeris of the deformed Kirk in Scotland and Nicol Burne, Professor of Philosophie in S. Leonardis College, in the Citie of Sanctandrois brocht vp from his tender eage in the peruersit sect of the Caluinistis and nou, be ane special grace of God, ane membre of the halie an

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