non-Calvinist âenemy withinâ, it needed English protection. The overthrow of Mary, Queen of Scots, meant Scotland was firmly allied to England.
Scotland was weak in other respects, as Thomas Johnston noted nearly a century ago: âScotland was not a nation: it was a loose aggregation of small but practically self-supporting communities, and scanty supplies and high prices at Aberdeen may quite well have been coincident with plenty and comparatively low prices in Dundee and Glasgow.â 6
But fortunes would change for the Scottish king. In 1603, Elizabeth of England on her deathbed named James VI as her heir. When news reached Edinburgh he took off to London with alacrity, not surprising given his experience of being abducted, threatened and bullied. As he travelled south, James VI was impressed at the wealth of the English lords who joined him on his journey to be crowned. They no longer lived in fortified castles; in Scotland they still did.
Once he had settled in London, he wanted more than the Union of the Crowns, thinking of the possibility of direct rule from London, but sensed that the Scottish nobility would resist any attempt to bring that country under one rule. Despite the best efforts of his Calvinist teachers, James believed in the divine right of kings, but he had a poor hand to play. The English Parliament, which he did not control, held the purse strings and was reluctant to finance any royal army. Nevertheless, James played this hand well, extending royal power in Scotland where he could. But this good governance would not last long.
The War of the Three Kingdoms
In 1639, the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, Alexander Henderson, wrote: âThe people make the magistrate (king) but the magistrate maketh not the people. The people may be without the magistrate but the magistrate cannot be withoutthe people. The body of the magistrate is mortal but the people as a society is immortal.â 7 The Union of the Crowns in 1603 created a British state but there were, as yet, few cross-border institutions. The two kingdoms ran their own affairs. Yet it would be a rebellion in Scotland against Jamesâs son Charles that triggered the English Revolution of the 1640s and war throughout Britain and Ireland.
For more than a century a battle would be fought by those who wished to retain a church hierarchy, bishops appointed by the Crown, and more radical Calvinists who held that there was no justification in scripture for this. A year later in 1638, Henderson was the principle author of the National Covenant, a dour, religiously orthodox document, but which rallied the majority of Scots against the king.
In 1581, a radical Calvinist blueprint for the Kirk, drafted by the theologian and scholar Andrew Melville, had been agreed by the General Assembly, which did not permit bishops, with church government based on the General Assembly, Kirk sessions and presbyteries, and superior to royal rule. In 1640, the issue returned. Previously, James VI had succeeded in getting the General Assembly to pass five articles requiring observance of holy days, confirmation of ministers by bishops, private baptism, communion for the infirm and kneeling at communion. Radical Presbyterians had consequently refused to accept these measures and formed private conventicles boycotting Kirk services on holy days and communion where they were required to kneel. In Edinburgh, âThey provocatively opened their shops at the time of services, and tried to persuade others not to attend ⦠Every communion was a dramatic event, as people watched to see who would kneel when the sacrament was given.â 8
James did not push matters further, sensing that to do so would prompt resistance. In particular, he allowed local presbyteries considerable control of their parishes, which appeased the nobility who generally controlled them through patronage. Nevertheless, it raised fundamental issues for
Scotland was weak in other respects, as Thomas Johnston noted nearly a century ago: âScotland was not a nation: it was a loose aggregation of small but practically self-supporting communities, and scanty supplies and high prices at Aberdeen may quite well have been coincident with plenty and comparatively low prices in Dundee and Glasgow.â 6
But fortunes would change for the Scottish king. In 1603, Elizabeth of England on her deathbed named James VI as her heir. When news reached Edinburgh he took off to London with alacrity, not surprising given his experience of being abducted, threatened and bullied. As he travelled south, James VI was impressed at the wealth of the English lords who joined him on his journey to be crowned. They no longer lived in fortified castles; in Scotland they still did.
Once he had settled in London, he wanted more than the Union of the Crowns, thinking of the possibility of direct rule from London, but sensed that the Scottish nobility would resist any attempt to bring that country under one rule. Despite the best efforts of his Calvinist teachers, James believed in the divine right of kings, but he had a poor hand to play. The English Parliament, which he did not control, held the purse strings and was reluctant to finance any royal army. Nevertheless, James played this hand well, extending royal power in Scotland where he could. But this good governance would not last long.
The War of the Three Kingdoms
In 1639, the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, Alexander Henderson, wrote: âThe people make the magistrate (king) but the magistrate maketh not the people. The people may be without the magistrate but the magistrate cannot be withoutthe people. The body of the magistrate is mortal but the people as a society is immortal.â 7 The Union of the Crowns in 1603 created a British state but there were, as yet, few cross-border institutions. The two kingdoms ran their own affairs. Yet it would be a rebellion in Scotland against Jamesâs son Charles that triggered the English Revolution of the 1640s and war throughout Britain and Ireland.
For more than a century a battle would be fought by those who wished to retain a church hierarchy, bishops appointed by the Crown, and more radical Calvinists who held that there was no justification in scripture for this. A year later in 1638, Henderson was the principle author of the National Covenant, a dour, religiously orthodox document, but which rallied the majority of Scots against the king.
In 1581, a radical Calvinist blueprint for the Kirk, drafted by the theologian and scholar Andrew Melville, had been agreed by the General Assembly, which did not permit bishops, with church government based on the General Assembly, Kirk sessions and presbyteries, and superior to royal rule. In 1640, the issue returned. Previously, James VI had succeeded in getting the General Assembly to pass five articles requiring observance of holy days, confirmation of ministers by bishops, private baptism, communion for the infirm and kneeling at communion. Radical Presbyterians had consequently refused to accept these measures and formed private conventicles boycotting Kirk services on holy days and communion where they were required to kneel. In Edinburgh, âThey provocatively opened their shops at the time of services, and tried to persuade others not to attend ⦠Every communion was a dramatic event, as people watched to see who would kneel when the sacrament was given.â 8
James did not push matters further, sensing that to do so would prompt resistance. In particular, he allowed local presbyteries considerable control of their parishes, which appeased the nobility who generally controlled them through patronage. Nevertheless, it raised fundamental issues for
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