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The synods flourished; the presbyteries were uninterrupted in their work; the congregations enjoyed quietness and refreshing. The strife that existed in the Church was chiefly among the shepherds, not among the sheep. There were 14 synods, 68 presbyteries, and 900 congregations, when the persecution began under King Charles II.
Let the congregations of the same town or district be connected by a Presbyterial Court, consisting of the assembled ministers and the ruling lay-elders of all the congregations, periodically reviewing the proceedings of the said congregations individually, or hearing appeals from them; and let these Presbyteries or Presbyterial Courts be in like manner under the authority and review of Synods, embracing many Presbyteries within their bounds, and, finally, of National Assemblies of the whole Church.
Such were the methods by which the new-born ambition of the clergy moved; and that ambition had become active, simply because it had suddenly seemed to become practicable. The presbyteries, as being the effectual electoral bodies, are really the main springs of the ecclesiastical administration. To govern them, was in effect to govern the church.
These oaths were, therefore, a deep compliance and dire abomination a sin and a snare, and a danger and a defection. But this shibboleth was not always exacted. Ministers had respect to their own tender consciences, and those of their brethren; and it was not till a later period that the reins of discipline were taken up tight by the General Assemblies and Presbyteries.
That London, reckoned by a radius of ten miles from its centre, be one of the Synodical Provinces, and that the number of Classes or Presbyteries in the Synod of London be fourteen. Baillie, II. 271, 272.
It has a throat bigger than the whale that took down the minister who declined the call to Nineveh, and has swallowed whole presbyteries and conferences of clergymen. A Brobdingnagian goes down as easily as a Liliputian. The largest story about business dishonor, or female frailty, or political deception, slips through with the ease of a homoeopathic pellet.
But in cases of common concernment, difficulty, appeals, and the like, the preserving of the ordinances and church-members from pollution, doth belong to presbyteries and synods. He saith of me, p. 9, “He ascribeth this power of purifying men, and means of advancing the power of godliness afterward, to government.” A calumny.
That parochial or congregational elderships, consisting of preaching and ruling elders, are of divine right, is manifested, Part II. chap. 12. 5. That classical presbyteries, or assemblies, and their power in church government, are of divine right, is demonstrated, Part II. chap. 13. 6.
The exhortations of the preacher drew forth such sighs and sobs and weeping, that the House was turned into a Bochim; and when those present were asked to signify their entrance into a new covenant with God, the congregation rose en masse and held up their hands. Similar scenes took place in the Synods and Presbyteries to which the movement extended.
The result was, the confinement in the Tower of Andrew Melville, and his subsequent banishment to France; and the prohibition of his nephew, James Melville, to return to Scotland. Having thus succeeded, by fraud and force, in cutting off the leading ministers, James next summoned an Assembly to meet at Linlithgow, in December 1606, naming the persons who were to be sent by the presbyteries.
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