Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Volume 2 (of 3)

Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Volume 2 (of 3) - Consisting of Historical and Romantic Ballads, Collected in the Southern Counties of Scotland; with a Few of Modern Date, Founded Upon Local Tradition

Scottish Music, an Ode Introduction to the Tale of Tamlane The Young Tamlane Erlinton The Twa Corbies The Douglas Tragedy Young Benjie Lady Anne Lord William The Broomfield-Hill Proud Lady Margaret The Original Ballad of the Broom of Cowdenknows Lord Randal Sir Hugh Le Blond Graeme and Bewick The Duel of Wharton and Stuart, Part I. Part II. The Lament of the Border Widow Fair Helen of Kirkonnel, Part I. Part II. Hughie the Graeme Johnie of Breadislee Katherine Janfarie The Laird o' Logie A Lyke-wake Dirge The Dowie Dens of Yarrow The Gay Goss Hawk Brown Adam Jellon Grame Willie's Ladye Clerk Saunders Earl Richard The Lass of Lochroyan Rose the Red and White Lilly Such are the verses, in which a modern bard has painted the desolate state of Scotland, during a period highly unfavourable to poetical composition. Yet the civil and religious wars of the seventeenth century have afforded some subjects for traditionary poetry, and the reader is here presented with the ballads of that disastrous aera. Some prefatory history may not be unacceptable. That the Reformation was a good and a glorious work, few will be such slavish bigots as to deny. But the enemy came, by night, and sowed tares among the wheat; or rather; the foul and rank soil, upon which the seed was thrown, pushed forth, together with the rising crop, a plentiful proportion of pestilential weeds. The morals of the reformed clergy were severe; their learning was usually respectable, sometimes profound; and their eloquence, though often coarse, was vehement, animated, and popular. But they never could forget, that their rise had been achieved by the degradation, if not the fall, of the crown; and hence, a body of men, who, in most countries, have been attached to monarchy, were in Scotland, for nearly two centuries, sometimes the avowed enemies, always the ambitious rivals, of their prince. The disciples of Calvin could scarcely avoid a tendency to democracy, and the republican form of church government was sometimes hinted at, as no unfit model for the state; at least, the kirkmen laboured to impress, upon their followers and hearers, the fundamental principle, that the church should be solely governed by those, unto whom God had given the spiritual sceptre. The elder Melvine, in a conference with James VI., seized the monarch by the sleeve, and, addressing him as God's sillie vassal, told him, "There are two kings, and two kingdomes. There is Christ, and his kingdome, the kirke; whose subject King James the sixth is, and of whose kingdome he is not a king, nor a head, nor a lord, but a member; and they, whom Christ hath called and commanded to watch ower his kirke, and govern his spiritual kingdome, have sufficient authorise and power from him so to do; which no christian king, no prince, should controul or discharge, but fortifie and assist: otherwise they are not faithful subjects to Christ."Calderwood, p. 329. The delegated theocracy, thus sternly claimed, was exercised with equal rigour. The offences in the king's household fell under their unceremonious jurisdiction, and he was formally reminded of his occasional neglect to say grace before and after meathis repairing to hear the word more rarely than was fittinghis profane banning and swearing, and keeping of evil companyand finally, of his queen's carding, dancing, night-walking, and such like profane pastimes.Calderwood, p. 313. A curse, direct or implied, was formally denounced against every man, horse, and spear, who should assist the king in his quarrel with the Earl of Gowrie; and from the pulpit, the favourites of the listening sovereign were likened to Haman, his wife to Herodias, and he himself to Ahab, to Herod, and to Jeroboam. These effusions of zeal could not be very agreeable to the temper of James: and accordingly, by a course of slow, and often crooked and cunning policy, he laboured to arrange the church-government upon a less turbulent and menacing footing. His eyes were naturally turned towards the English hierarchy, which had been modelled, by the despotic Henry VIII., into such a form, as to connect indissolubly the interest of the church with that of the regal power.[A] The Reformation, in England, had originated in the arbitrary will of the prince; in Scotland, and in all other countries of Europe, it had commenced among insurgents of the lower ranks. Hence, the deep and essential difference which separated the Huguenots, the Lutherans, the Scottish presbyterians, and, in fine, all the other reformed churches, from that of England. But James, with a timidity which sometimes supplies the place of prudence, contented himself with gradually imposing upon the Scottish nation a limited and moderate system of episcopacy, which, while it gave to a proportion of the churchmen a seat in the council of the nation, induced them to look up to the sovereign, as the power to whose influence they owed their elevation. But, in other respects, James spared the prejudices of his subjects; no ceremonial ritual was imposed upon their consciences; the pastors were reconciled by the prospect of preferment,[B] the dress and train of the bishops were plain and decent; the system of tythes was placed upon a moderate and unoppressive footing;[C] and, perhaps, on the whole, the Scottish hierarchy contained as few objectionable points as any system of church-government in Europe. Had it subsisted to the present day, although its doctrines could not have been more pure, nor its morals more exemplary, than those of the present kirk of Scotland, yet its degrees of promotion might have afforded greater encouragement to learning, and objects of laudable ambition to those, who might dedicate themselves to its service. But the precipitate bigotry of the unfortunate Charles I. was a blow to episcopacy in Scotland, from which it never perfectly recovered. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 12882
Author: Scott, Walter
Release Date: Jul 11, 2004
Format: eBook
Language: English