than to betray the church's inherent rights, that had been so flagrantly invaded by the Duke of York and the Popish party. Without waiting for the king's authority, the council issued an Act on the 3rd of November, wherein they renounced all pretences to the intrinsic powers of the church; but left entirely to her all the ecclesiastical power, authority, and jurisdiction which was exercised by the church for the first three centuries; which, being the whole that could be asked, the breach was healed, and the deprived clergy were restored.

On the 24th of November, Shaftesbury was indicted at the Old Bailey for high treason; but the grand jury, being packed by whig sheriffs, ignored the bill. Shaftesbury was in close correspondence and league with the leading covenanters in Scotland; hence his principles, and hence the origin of the party and of the name of the whigs; and part of his indictment was, that he "intended to reduce this ancient monarchy into a republic."

Although this explanation had in some measure drawn out the Erastian teeth of the Test Act of 1682, yet it was still Many churches were

a source of great trouble to the clergy. rendered by its operation vacant, and about twenty of the clergy had fled to England to avoid it; where, Burnet says,

they were well employed and well provided for." The Pres byterians objected to the Test, because it contained a renunciation of their covenant, and bound them not to attempt the extirpation of the established episcopal church, which, says Hetherington, implied the "abandonment of every Presbyterian principle." Accordingly, an armed body of them entered Lanark, burnt the Test Act, and the Act recognizing the Duke of York's right of succession, and posted their proclamation against the king as a tyrant and persecutor, &c. In retaliation

the council fined the burgh of Lanark, and burnt all their covenants and seditious proclamations by the hangman.

One of the many difficulties with which the church in Scotland had to contend, was the numerous arbitrary acts which they were compelled as clergymen to perform, which often put them at constructive enmity with their parishioners. One of these, in the year 1682, was to report to the bishops the names of those that were irregular in their attendance at church; and then the bishops were alike obliged to report these names to the privy council, which appointed the sheriffs to summon non-attendants, and to require them to sign a bond to promise regular attendance.

The firmness and moral intrepidity of the bishops preserved the whole kingdom from the infliction of the Test, and their opposition saved the Presbyterians also from its pressure; for they had the same conscientious objections to it as the Episcopalians had. In short, the Test was a cunningly-contrived plot of the Jesuits, for the eventual establishment of Popery on the accession of James to the throne.

Field-preaching had nearly subsided; but one Renwick had not only revived them this year, 1684, but he had issued a declaration in the name of his sect, in which he excommunicated the king, and disowned his authority; denounced informers, witnesses, judges, juries, constables, and every one who were or might belong to the government or courts of law, that had any hand in bringing covenanters to justice; which excommunication exposed every one, as the law then stood, to the knife of the assassin. Their treasonable declaration was affixed during the night to the market crosses of several royal burghs. Many of the clergy were obliged to seek shelter in other places, and several murders were perpetrated by the fanatics.

The declaration was declared by the Court of Session to be

high treason, and the council made an act to meet it, more tyrannical and atrocious than anything they had ever enacted: "Whosoever shall own the said most execrable and treasonable declaration, or the assassinations therein mentioned, and the principles therein specified; or whosoever shall refuse to disown the same, in so far as it declares war against his sacred majesty, and asserts that it is lawful to kill such as serve in church, state, army and country, shall be tried and executed to the death." No one in the Presbyterian district was allowed to travel without a pass.

In 1685, the episcopal clergy in the southern counties were kept in constant terror of their lives, several of them were murdered, and others were obliged to fly to towns and distant places for protection. All these murders and distractions were the result of the principles of the covenant; and they caused the adoption of retaliatory measures, which they and their historians considered martyrdom and unprovoked persecution. "If," says the author of the work which we have been abridging, "the Jesuits could feel either shame or compunction, the fruit produced by their instrument, the Covenant, would move them to both; but in this covenant which mur dered both souls and bodies, they thought they were doing service to Him whose attribute is Love. Whereas their works, but especially the covenant, are chiefly calculated to advance the kingdom of him who was both a liar and a murderer from the beginning of time."

The clergy in the southern counties lived in perpetual fear of their lives, and many of them resigned their cures and removed out of the country; but Mr. Peter Pearson, incumbent of Carsphairn, in Galloway, being of a more intrepid character, was murdered at midnight on his own threshold, having provoked the whigs by saying he was not afraid of

unwar

them; he taught the orthodox doctrines of the church, which were fiercely denounced by the Calvinistical whigs as Popery and Arminianism; and this is called by Wodrow an rantable provocation." Therefore, there was a combination among his neighbouring whigs, to compel him by murder to desist from preaching sound doctrine, which they called persecution. In approbation of this and other murders, Wodrow says, "several of his brethren, about the time of the society's declaration, had the caution to retire for a little, but he (Pearson) would needs brave it out; in his narrower sphere, he came the nearest to the primate who met with the same fate." Such is Presbyterian principles! The council ordered the whole parish to be prosecuted for the murder of their

minister.

On Monday, the 2nd of February, 1685, King Charles was seized with an apoplectic fit, and he died on Friday, the 6th, at Whitehall, in the 55th year of his age, and the 37th of his reign, about twenty-five years after his restoration. Few princes have descended to the grave more generally lamented than Charles II. was, except by the whigs; Eachard says, "Sure it is that since the murder of his father, there never was a deeper sorrow, nor more tears shed in England, than appeared upon the first news of the death of this beloved monarch." It is alleged that he completed his apostacy of long standing, by being received into the Popish communion on his death bed, when he was no longer capable of knowing his right hand from his left; but of this there is not one word in a description of his last illness and death, by the Bishop of Ely's chaplain, who was present during the whole scene. It says, "The Bishop of Bath and Wells (Kenn) watching on Wednesday night, as Bishop Turner had done the night before, there appearing then some danger, began to discourse

to him as a divine, and thereupon he did continue the speaker for the rest to the last; the other bishops giving their assistance, both by prayers and otherwise, as they saw occasion, with very good ejaculations and short speeches, till his speech quite left him, and afterwards, by lifting up his hand, expressing his attention to the prayers, he made a very glorious Christian exit, after as lasting and as strong an agony of death almost as ere was known."

It was communicated to Charles, that it was said of him, "That he never said a foolish thing; but never did a wise one." But the merry monarch readily accounted for this severe but unjust censure by saying, that "nothing could be more reasonable than that, for his discourse was his own, whereas his actions were his ministers'." He had an amiable manner and a popular address; he was neither proud nor vain; but he was both affable and well-bred. "His professions were plausible, and his whole behaviour engaging, so that he won upon the hearts, even when he lost the good opinions, of his subjects; and he often balanced their judgments by their personal inclinations. And upon the whole it appeared to many [to be] cruel and even iniquitous to remark so rigorously, the [political] failings of a prince who discovered so much facility in correcting his [own] errors, and so much lenity in pardoning the offences committed against himself."

THE WRECK OF THE ROYAL CHARTER.

ON Saturday last, We, says the Editor of the Liverpool Mercury of yesterday, paid a second visit to Moelfra by way of Bangor. From an early hour on that morning till late in the day, High-street presented an unusually busy aspect, but of a melancholy character-very different to