United States or Tanzania ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Both the commissioners and Engagers, hostile as they were to each
It seems that in Scotland none of the lessons of misfortune had been learned. Since January the chiefs of the milder party of preachers, the Resolutioners, they who had been reconciled with the Engagers, were employing the Rev. James Sharp, who had been a prisoner in England, as their agent with Monk, with Lauderdale, in April, with Charles in Holland, and, again, in London. Sharp was no fanatic.
A copy of this Engagement, said by Presbyterian authorities to have been signed by nearly 100,000 hands, with an accompanying Petition in the same sense, which had been addressed by the Engagers to the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Common Council, was brought before both Houses on the 24th of July.
Three things may seem necessary herein to be noted; the act, the approbation, and the reason; and here we have them all. The act, engaging; or the persons, the engagers of themselves. Thou hast avouched, set up God this day to be thy God, not only in thy conscience by the act of faith, but even by thy mouth thou hast uttered this, probably in some solemn league and covenant.
All professed to have in view the same object the restoration of the young king; but all were divided and alienated from each other by civil and religious bigotry. By the commissioners, the Engagers, and by both, Montrose and his friends, were shunned as traitors to their country, and sinners excommunicated by the kirk. Charles was perplexed by the conflicting opinions of these several advisers.
No largeness of parts, greatness of place, eminency in gifts, of wisdom, learning, wit, not amplitude of rule, nor any high thoughts can exempt; but he must subject himself to the condition and courses of the lowest sort. Heaven regards not the goodliness of the person, looks not as man looks; for God regards the heart. Second, Soldiers, for you also are engagers.
These who are so taken up with a king, as they prefer a king's interest to Christ's interest; which was the sin of our engagers. 3. They who will have no duty done to a king, for fear of prejudicing Christ's interest. These are to be allowed, who urge duty to a king in subordination to Christ.
These were the HAMILTONIANS or ENGAGERS. Not the less in Parliament itself was there a strong opposition party, headed by Argyle, Eglinton, Lothian, Cassilis, and some half-dozen other nobles, aided by Johnstone of Warriston; and, as this party rested on the nearly unanimous support of the Scottish clergy, it had a powerful organ of expression, apart from Parliament, in the Commission of the Kirk.
Hamilton, Lauderdale, and all the engagers were admitted into court and camp, on condition of doing public penance, and expressing repentance for their late transgressions. Some malignants also crept in under various pretences. The intended humiliation or penance of the king was changed into the ceremony of his coronation, which was performed at Scone with great pomp and solemnity.
The letter-writer, Baillie, now deemed "that it were for the good of the world that churchmen did meddle with ecclesiastical affairs only." The Engagers insisted on establishing presbytery in England, which neither satisfied the Kirk nor the Cavaliers and Independents. Nothing more futile could have been devised.
Word Of The Day