eye to those possessions of the Church which, under the dissolution of the English religious houses, they had seen become the prey of their brethren in England." The disgrace of this defeat broke the proud spirit of the king. He retired to Falkland Palace, where he died brokenhearted on 13th December 1542, in the thirty-first year of his age and twenty-ninth of his reign. Two sons had been born to him, but they both died in infancy. On his deathbed news was brought that his wife had given birth to a child in Linlithgow Palace. Upon inquiries he was answered that the child was ane fair dochter." He is said to have murmured: It came with a lass and it will go with a lass "-in allusion to the throne coming to the Stewarts through the princess Marjory, daughter of Bruce. The "lass" was the hapless and lovely queen Mary whose life has added more to the romance of Scottish history than that of any prince of the Stuart line, excepting perhaps prince Charles Edward's. So ended the unbroken succession of "The Five Jameses," who followed each other as kings of the Scots for nearly a hundred and forty years. All of them were minors, some of them mere infants, on their accession to the throne, and none of them lived out his natural days. Murder carried off the first and third; the second and fourth fell in battle on the Borders, fighting with "the auld enemy"; and the fifth died, weary of the strife. Comparison has been made between James V. and James I. of Scotland, but their characters afford more material for contrast than for comparison. They had similar literary tastes and were both gifted with the faculty of poesy; but there is not much resemblance in character between the moral and sententious James who wrote The King's Quair, and the gay and rollicking James, known to his subjects as "The Gudeman of Ballengeich," who wrote XXIX JAMES V. CONTRASTED WITH JAMES I. 519 Peblis to the Play and the Gaberlunzie Man. Another work, Christis Kirk on the Grene, has been claimed for both of them, though the balance of authorship is in favour of James V. Both kings pursued the same policy of crushing the nobles, and the energy of James V. in this direction was really remarkable. True, he alienated many of the nobles by his preference of ecclesiastics to the chief offices of State. The archbishop of Glasgow was chancellor; the bishop of Dunkeld, keeper of the privy seal; and the abbot of Holyrood, treasurer. Sadler, the astute ambassador of Henry VIII. in Scotland, remarks on this dominance of ecclesiastics, but admits that in the absence of an educated nobility it was a necessity. The compulsory Education Act of 1496 may not as yet have borne much fruit. "To be plain with you," writes Sadler to a member of the English privy council," though the Scottish nobles be well-minded, and divers others also that be of the council and about the king, yet I see none amongst them that hath any such agility of wit, gravity, learning, or experience to set forth the same, or take in hand the direction of things. So that the king, as far as I can perceive, is of force driven to use the bishops and the clergy as his only ministers for the direction of his realm. They be the men of art and policy that I see here, and they be never out of the king's ear." Had there been a king in Scotland with a strong will and firm hand it is certain that the illiterate barons who posed as reformers of the Church would never have been suffered to rob and plunder her as they did without scruple or shame. But where the carcase is the eagles will be gathered together.2 The temptation to greedy, turbulent, and unscrupulous barons and lairds, who shrewdly foresaw in an ecclesiastical revolution a rich chance of plunder, besides the crippling of a rival or superior power in the State. view here taken strips the Reformed Church that succeeds of some of its gilding, but it is far better in the long run to be strictly impartial and draw as true a picture as we possibly can of the Roman Church in Scotland, which was our forefathers' church as well as Roman. We can never ourselves be beyond the reach of revolution, and were such fate to overtake us we can conceive how bitter it would be to have our good qualities forgotten or caricatured, while our faults were exaggerated and gibbeted.” May future historians deal kindly with the learned minister of Muthill, and not forget among his good qualities that most excellent quality-historical candour. CHAPTER XXX QUEEN MARY-REGENCY OF THE EARL OF ARRAN, 1542-1554 Imprisonment of the cardinal-Conventions and council of clergy, assessing themselves for the war and for Council of Trent— Brawl in Glasgow Cathedral between the primates- Persecutions and burnings for heresy in Perth-George Wishart martyred Murder of cardinal Beaton-John Knox in St. Andrews-Defeat of Scots at Pinkie-Bad bishops-Abuses of patronage-James Beaton, archbishop of Glasgow-Bishop Hamilton of Dunkeld translated to St. Andrews Dunbar of Aberdeen and Reid of Orkney—Provincial councils in Linlithgow and Edinburgh and canons enacted-Deplorable condition of the Church-Hamilton's Catechism and the Twopenny Faith--Discussion on the Pater Noster-Burning of Adam Wallace for heresy. Bishops MARY, when six days old, succeeded to an inheritance of sorrow. In her ninth month she was crowned queen of the Scots at Stirling by cardinal Beaton. The cardinal played for the regency which he alleged the late king had assigned him in his will, but he was no favourite with the nobles, and they defeated his purpose and elected the earl of Arran regent and governor. He was head of the house of Hamilton and next heir to the throne, but a weak and vacillating man who changed his policy and religion from time to time under the influence of stronger minds than his own. Beaton, in place of being put into the regent's chair, was seized and put into prison. He was taken successively to Dalkeith, Setoun, Blackness, and St. Andrews, where he was to remain during the governor's pleasure. The effect of his imprisonment was a virtual interdict in many parts of the country, during which the churches were closed and the voice of religion silenced.1 After three months the cardinal was liberated, and on the 2nd May 1543 he writes a pathetic letter to the pope, excusing his absence from the Council of Trent, to which he had been cited the previous Christmas, and detailing his imprisonment and restoration to liberty, which latter, he says, was accompanied by the congratulations and sympathy of all good people.2 One of the first acts of the cardinal on regaining his liberty was to summon a meeting of the prelates and other clergy of the province to St. Andrews to raise money for the war with heretical England. In January of this year (1543) the pope had given power to the king to raise a large subsidy from the revenues of the Scottish Church to wage war against "that son of perdition and Satan," as Henry VIII. is styled in the bull.3 James had died before the bull passed the Seals at Rome. The clergy in the convention at St. Andrews agreed with much enthusiasm to raise ten thousand pounds by a tax upon all prelacies and benefices of the yearly value of forty pounds and upwards. They vowed that they would spend their own and the Church's plate, and even take the field in person, rather than that the war should languish. The clergy failed in much, but they never failed in patriotism. They were as loyal to the principle of national independence when threatened now by Henry VIII. as the clergy were who supported Wallace and 1 See Tytler, Hist., iv. 279, and Robertson, Statuta, cxlii. 2 Theiner, p. 614. The Council of Trent did not meet until 13th December 1545. It held ten sederunts, extending over irregular periods of eighteen years. It closed finally on 4th December 1563. 3 Robertson, Statuta, cxxxvii. note. |