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Updated: May 29, 2025
The new services sometimes turned into scenes of utter disorder where the ministers wore what dress they pleased and the communicant stood or sat as he liked; while the old altars were broken down and the communion-table was often a bare board upon trestles. Only in the few places where the more zealous of the reformers had settled was there any religious instruction.
Beneath the pulpit on ordinary occasions stood the Communion-table; but on evenings when the rite of baptism was prepared, this table, and a boarding on which it stood, were removed, revealing a tiled baptistry, that is, a tiled tank, about eight feet long, and six wide, with steps on each side descending into about four feet of water.
The general had been faithfully attached to the establishment; he had gone, as usual, to the parish church, in spite of the introduction of the surpliced choir, of "Hymns Ancient and Modern," the richly adorned communion-table, and several other additions which had been cautiously introduced; but when he heard from the lips of the vicar the doctrine of transubstantiation clearly and unmistakably enounced, and afterwards saw him habited in a robe resembling that of a Romish priest elevate the elements, he felt compelled to absent himself, and on the next Sunday to attend the service at a Congregational chapel.
In his company, far removed this day from the smoke of cannon and the din of battle, walked more than one gallant brother-in-arms, the Marquis of Anglesey, Lord Hill, &c. The chapel was also made sumptuous for the occasion. Its carved and painted roof was picked out anew. The space within the chancel was lined and hung with crimson velvet, the communion-table covered with magnificent gold plate.
Few boys ever approached the communion-table for the first time in a more devout mood, or with hearts more open to all good things, than did we two brothers that day on our mother's right and left hand. No matter how much I may have erred, Middendorf's teachings and counsels have not been wholly lost in any stage of my career.
He has likewise given a handsome pulpit-cloth, and railed in the communion-table at his own expense.
This mixture of religion and worldly pride seems incongruous at first; but have we not at church at home similar relics of feudal ceremony? the verger with the silver mace who precedes the vicar to the desk; the two chaplains of my Lord Archbishop, who bow over his Grace as he enters the communion-table gate; even poor John, who follows my Lady with a coroneted prayer-book, and makes his conge as he hands it into the pew.
The armorer gave my wife a rag from each of these banners, consecrated by so much battle-smoke; also a piece of old oak, half burned to charcoal, which had been rescued from the panelling of the Douglas Tower. We saw better things, moreover, than all these rusty weapons and ragged flags; namely, the pulpit and communion-table of John Knox.
The hay-trusser deposited his basket by the font, went up the nave till he reached the altar-rails, and opening the gate entered the sacrarium, where he seemed to feel a sense of the strangeness for a moment; then he knelt upon the footpace. Dropping his head upon the clamped book which lay on the Communion-table, he said aloud
On Sabbath days, whenever a babe was to be baptized, the sexton filled his basin here, and placed it on the communion-table of the humble meeting-house, which partly covered the site of yonder stately brick one.
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