The old order changeth, yielding place to new, And God fulfils himself in many ways. These forces the clergy took heed to only to flout and frown upon. Not unnaturally, perhaps. Commerce and industry, as mirth and music, as indeed love and laughter, with their fathers were viewed with some suspicion, as developing the lust of the eye, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. Hence arose a new condition of things in Scotland. Diverse interests produced diverse feelings and opinions, and in the next twenty-five years we have the first indications of a real disintegration of public opinion, and of a departure by the laity from the old paths. Men had begun to observe and find out which was matter of opinion and which was matter of fact; to look at reality and lay the ghosts of their own mind. On the one hand, the clergy clung to the mediaval spirit, and slowly came to have a defined position as the professional teachers of religion: on the other, the laity began to think and act apart on secular affairs. Leisure, reflection, and intercourse with other minds were beginning to tell upon thinking men. In other words, from about this time and coeval with the rise of the industrial spirit, the clergy fell from the lofty position they had held for a hundred and fifty years, as the most intelligent, the most practical, the most patriotic men in the nation. They no longer guided its intellectual tendencies. They no longer could. A turn in the road, to use a common metaphor, had been made, and lo! an unexpected change in the familiar scene. Instead of the sombre, narrow glen, with its one solitary, winding way along which many earnest souls had travelled, the broad plain stretched smiling far onward, and various pathways invited the lighter-hearted way-farer. The day of exclusive theocratic ideas was nearly over: the donatism of the Covenant was being quietly ignored. And while commerce and industry slowly but steadily filled the villages and burghs with a stir they had never known (but should have known generations before, had fate been kinder), and silently gave men's thoughts a wholesomer tone, and drew all into a nearer bond of brotherliness the clergy, divided into two parties, fascinated and frost-bound by the medieval spirit, were mainly interested in entrenching themselves against the new influences. The race of great ecclesiastics, of reformers, scholars, and statesmen had died out. Their successors were plain, commonplace men, who were untouched by "the tender grace" of a chequered, pathetic past, and were unable to comprehend fully the pressing need of a wise, broad, and practical policy if the Church they loved was to be restored to its former place as a national Church. One man, and one only, of that number was equal to the times. But he was unique; single in kind and excellence. Four times in eleven years he was moderator of the General Assembly a certain proof of his acknowledged worth. A clergyman, a citi zen of the world, a royal counsellor, above all, a Christian of the rarest type, the type of apostolic charity, William Carstares, was the one man who saw clearly before and after, and has been justly named"the second founder of the Church of Scotland."* He died in 1715. His most remarkable contemporary was Thomas Boston, who may be taken as the representative of the old Calvinistic party. Never were two men more unlike, nor two lives which were ruled by the same motive and spent in the same cause. Weakly and melancholic, yet resolute and keenly intellectual, Boston spent his life in rural seclusion, evolving that system of theology already referred to, which made him in the eighteenth century an influence second to none. To many "The Fourfold State" solved the riddle of existence and made plain the mystery of death. Next to the Bible it was the one book which the Scottish peasant made his companion, and from which he drew his strength for this life and his hope for the life to come. His "Memoirs" is his own self-portraiture, in which he describes his moods, his self-examinations, his fastings, his vain efforts to reach his own impossible ideal. There is nothing more morbid and painful in all our religious biography. Duty to him was certainly the one thing laid on him to do, and we are bound to believe that nothing was so precious as the comfort which came from doing it that flowers laughed before him in their beds, and fragrance filled the air he daily breathed; but if we may judge from his own words, it was not so. Life, indeed, was not worth living. "The world" - these are his last words "hath all along been a stepdame to me; and wheresoever I would have attempted to nestle in it, there was a thorn of uneasiness laid for me. Man is born crying, - Stanley: Second Lecture. See also Struther's Hist. of Scotland, vol. i., pp. 276-9, for one of the earliest opinions of his career. See a good passage on this in Walker's Theology and Theologians, pp. 186-7. lives complaining, and dies disappointed | taught them the full sweep of the fundafrom that quarter." VII. mental principle of Presbyterianism. How they answered his call we know; and it is one of the finest things in history. BETWEEN the poles of thought repre- How the spirit of these men continued sented by these two names lay all that into the next century we also know; and was properly Scottish in religious opinion the wrestlings and wreckage which fill it and feeling; and these were true to the are among the saddest things in history. severest Calvinistic rule. No other was Parish schools were few enough in the known. No other was possible. Cradled first half of the seventeenth century,* yet in and brought up under Calvinism as it the intelligence of the people astonished was drawn out day by day from the Bible their Episcopal well-wishers, Bishops in reverent household reading, and from Burnet and Leighton, who were amazed, the Shorter Catechism in school and in as the former of them tells us, to see how church, it was the one influence during the very meanest of them, even their cotthe seventeenth and eighteenth centuries tagers and their servants, could argue on constantly at work moulding and disci- points of government and the power of plining every young mind. It was the princes in matters of religion. Upon all first and the last lesson of the day, the these topics they had texts of Scripture at one chief end of education. In the dame- hand, and were ready with their answers school as they stood at the mistress's to anything which was said to them. This knee, in the parish school (where they was in 1670. It was not the parish were fortunate in having one), and in schools, therefore, which equipped these the burgh school, the rudiments of Cal-"cottagers" and "servants;" it vinism, the national faith, were the prime Presbyterianism with its ideals, its probsubjects taught every boy and girl. They lems, its aims, its assured faith, above were taught to read if taught nothing more that they might at any rate be able to read the Bible, the Word of God. This was the proud pre-eminence of every Scotsman of those days: he could read his Bible and knew its meaning word for word, equally with the most learned in the land. Alone of all the peasantry in Europe the Scottish peasantry as a body could do this, and often by fireside and wayside reasoned high Of Providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate, Fix'd fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute. And this they owed not, as has been often and most mistakenly said, to their parish schools as schools, but to their Presbyterianism. The parish school system properly belongs to the eighteenth century; Presbyterianism was the one educating power in the country from the Reformation to the Revolution. At the Revolution parish schools became a fixed part of the State machinery, and added much to the previously existing means of education, but it was Presbyterianism which gave them their distinctive character as schools, which gave them a republican and a religious spirit. They spread its leaven by the constant use of the Bible and the Shorter Catechism. What that leaven was we have seen. Knox at the Reformation awoke the Scottish "com. monalty" from the lethargy of a long vassalage; kindled in them the first stirrings of intellectual liberty and desire, and was all, its constant appeals to the individ. ual mind, and to the sense of individual responsibility. And, rightly considered, it is Presbyterianism which has made Scotland what it is, and given her a peo ple which for intellectual fire and sustained strength of purpose and endurance, has had no equal. Long distracted and spent in conflict and self-defence, these high qualities shone out in brilliant individual forms when peace and quiet prevailed; and in Hume, Burns, Scott, Livingstone, and Carlyle, has given us. types of human nature of universal interest, and the most commanding influence.† The scoffing spirit is offended at these men. Be it so. Yet the great soul of the world is just. They were pilgrims and *How few, see Cunningham's Church History of Scotland, vol. ii., pp. 62-63; Lee's Lectures on the History of the Church of Scotland, vol. ii., pp. 28-9. † Macaulay's well-known description of the effects of the establishment of parish schools (History of England, ch. 22) is palpably unhistoric-is untrue to facts, and indeed, when carefully considered, is a result "Before one which could not possibly have happened. generation had passed away,' he says, certain "wonderful" changes "began" to appear. History is silent as to them as direct results of the estabüshment of a general system of parish schools. It is a fine bit of rhetoric, however, and an excellent example of the too common mistake of confounding different periods and of forming an opinion of a former period according to ideas borrowed from our own. Not less unhistoric and untrue is this: "To the men by whom that system was established posterity owes no gratitude. They knew not what they were doing. They were the unconscious instruments of enlightening the understandings and humanizing the hearts of millions. But their own understandings were as dark and their own hearts as obdurate as those of the founders of the Inquisition of Lisbon." strangers on the earth. They did not try to make the best of both worlds. The ideal of their daily conduct was the one so magnificently set forth by the apostle to the Philippians: all things they counted loss that they might win Christ and be found in him. Light-hearted they were not; gay and frivolous they could not be they took their pleasure not sadly but soberly. As men who were soured and unkindly? As men whose hearts could not leap up when they beheld a rainbow in the sky, or on whom the beauty of childhood or the glory of the landscape did not often bring thoughts too deep for tears? No: but as men who were overawed by the Infinite, as seeing him who is invisible; as men who had a profound reverence for the divine powers, and a strong realizing sense of their nearness and exceeding awfulness. And with the vision of the New Jerusalem, that glorious fantasy of the early Church, ever in their eye, what were the passing shows and vanities of time to them? One thing they had to do, and that was to hate sin, to renounce the Devil and all his ways. Who will say they did not, with the intensity of intense, "strongly realizing" natures, strive to do this? And the scoffing spirit fancies that these men did not enjoy life. Be it so. Still as it was, and seriously regarded as a trust given them by the Most High, life to them was precious. The descriptions which we have of their life of their common pleasures and their common cares in the poems of the century, in "The .Gentle Shepherd," "The Farmer's Ingle," and "The Cottar's Saturday Night," prove this. If to these we add some songs and ballads "crooned" over by the cradle and the spinning-wheel and the quern, or sung as the brewster's "two penny" went off in successive hornfuls, we shall have scenes not less human than historically true. Their "humor," so unlike English wit and banter, is biting and grim, is quicker to smite than to smile. They give and take it, however, with most infectious laughter. And in their old-fashioned games of golf and bowls, in their cockfights and penny weddings, in their annual fairs and curling matches, and in the ever-varying play of human love and sorrow, the common lot of all, we may be perfectly sure there was no lack of sound natural feeling, of mirth and merriment, if also of sadness, too, sometimes. "Looked at broadly," says one who sees clearer on these points and is sounder in his judgment than most "looked at broadly, one would say they (the Scotch) had been an eminently pious people. It is part of the complaint of modern philosophers about them that religion or superstition, or whatever they please to call it, had too much to do with their daily lives. So far as one can look into that commonplace round of things which historians never tell us about, there have rarely been seen in this world a set of people who have thought more about right and wrong, and the judgment about them of the upper powers," etc., etc.* Such is the estimate, such is the notion, we have formed of the character and of the condition of the people of Scotland at the time of the Union. Do the old times live again? Do they seem "the good old times"? Do our forefathers seem to have been better or wiser or more happily placed than we? It is not, as we said at the outset, a picture which would charm; now that it is drawn, it is surely a confused, inharmonious, unfinished picture, a picture of partial, imperfect civilization, of arrested national development. It is pleasant to know that now nearly all the wrongs which bred confusion in those bygone days have been righted, and what was bad changed for the better. But it was slowly done. This was mainly the work of the eighteenth century. Το all who love to mark the dawning of better days to the oppressed the growth of a nation's free development the rise of original forms of literature and philosophy -the history of the eighteenth century in Scotland is indeed a moving and neverto-be-forgotten chapter in the story of human progress. been left by the desertion of the faithless Challoner; and heartily did he wish, as many another has wished before him, that the damaging strokes and brilliant runs which came so easy when no one was by and when no game was on, would sometimes fall to his lot when they could be of any real value. He never could make head against an enemy - he always could win by himself. Just now, when his mind was full of Challoner and Matilda, and, moreover, of poor sick Juliet Appleby, he played like one possessed by the very genius of the game; he really wondered at himself; and insensibly grew colloquial and profound, as Teddy always did when under a soothing influence. "Well, now, they will take it very civil of us to go over to the Applebys' this afternoon they will think it quite the right thing; and if only Matilda and I could have gone alone but I suppose we could hardly do that. Anyway, I shall take the flower out of my button-hole he had put in a Christmas rose — "it would not look at all correct to be calling to inquire after poor Juliet with a flower in my button-hole. Challoner may keep his in- I dare say he will. Let him the Applebys are nothing to him; it was all very fine his looking so concerned and all that just now; he put it on to please Matilda and, of course, he is quite right to please Matilda — but he can't take me in. Too sharp for that dodge, I am. Well, now, I am glad I thought about calling any way; and I must take care that they knew it was I who thought of it. I wish there was something else I could do. I must ask Mrs. Appleby or Marion if there is not anything. Marion will put me up to it if there is. Matilda is no good on an occasion of this sort: she is flighty-that's why. There," having succeeded at last in extracting the rose "there, Matilda would never have thought of that. I do believe now that if Robert were to die she would go to inquire for him with a whole peacock's tail waving from her hat. Unless I caught her, that is the very thing she would go and do." At luncheon he was full of the same reflections, and ready to communicate such as he deemed fit. "I hope the Applebys will be in," he said, taking jelly with his venison. "You are going to the Applebys'?" said Overton. "Oh! it will snow, you know." "So I have thought all the morning," Challoner agreed with him. "Lady Matilda thinks otherwise; she has made up her mind to have another night on the ice." "There will be no skating tc-night, or I am mistaken," replied Lord Overton, who was a student of weather. "I have had my walk; I went out early, to make sure; but if you are only going as far as the Applebys', a little snow will not matter. Are you going to invite them here, or anything? Invite them here! Good gracious! have you not heard - not heard about poor Juliet?" gasped Teddy. "Eh? About Juliet? Oh yes, poor Juliet. I am very sorry," said his brother. "Bread, please," to the footman. "Pon my word, you take it coolly," rejoined Teddy, now really aggrieved. "How would you like to have small-pox yourself, I wonder? Small-pox! just fancy! It is about the beastliest thing anybody can have, and I don't suppose you are even going to inquire, or- or anything," looking down at his unadorned coat; "neither you nor Challoner care a bit," resentfully. "Dear Teddy, it will do if we take Overton's card," put in Lady Matilda, a shade of anxiety in her tone and look, for she knew how rapidly the horizon might be overcast were an impending storm not averted at the outset. "We can take Overton's card; he never does call anywhere, you know." "Take my card, by all means, if you can find one," said Overton; "I wonder where they are? I have not seen any since My dear man, I have them; Mr. Challoner will think us dreadful barbarians," cried Matilda, laughing to their guest; "we really have not much manners among us, Mr. Challoner" "What on earth do you mean?" burst forth Teddy in his angriest voice. "I am afraid he is not going to be good," said Matilda, following Overton apart presently. "I am rather afraid of Teddy to-day. It is the reaction after last night; you know how little he can stand, and anything the least out of his usual way always tells upon him. He did too much last night, and was over-excited and over-heated; to-day he is feeling out of sorts in consequence. Poor dear boy! I do hope, I do trust," apprehensively"Overton, what shall we do if he has one of his bad turns now? It would be so very, so particularly unfortunate." "I think," replied he quietly, "you had better not take him with you this afternoon.' "Not take him to the Applebys'! My dear Overton, it was he who proposed going. It is his own especial expedition. Nothing would induce him to stay be hind." "Then you had better leave Challoner." She was silent. "I really mean it," said Overton. "But I don't understand." "Yes; I think you do. Now, take my advice; leave behind one or the other. If Teddy will not stay, make Challoner." "And suppose he won't be made?" "Then you must stay yourself." That, however, was not to be borne. The walk was just what she wanted, and just what she knew Challoner wanted; and whatever Overton might hint about Teddy's jealousy - she supposed that was what he meant well, surely she could manage her own Teddy. She had done so hitherto with consummate success. Only on one occasion during Challoner's first visit had any ill feeling ever broken out in public, though none knew better than herself how often it had had to be charmed away in private, and how many fond words, attentions, and consolations had gone to keeping her poor boy in that mind towards his friend, which made him still think Matilda's lover the best of fellows and good companions. That a mood was now imminent, and that it would require care, tact, and patience on her part to avert it, was plain; but, alas! Teddy was now no longer the first. For his sake she knew she ought to have stayed at home. She ought not, for any pleasure of her own, to have run the risk of rousing further his already disturbed emotions and suspicions; but Challoner wished her to go and she went. Overton came to the door to see the party start. He showed no displeasure at having had his advice disregarded; indeed he felt none. In the depths of his heart he was strangely touched and moved by this very disobedience and pertinacity on the part of one who usually was only too ready to fall in with his slightest suggestion directly anything was wrong with their common charge; and there was an almost visible tenderness and wistfulness in his look and voice, as he stepped forward to his sister's side and saw how the other side was claimed. Was there anything he could do for her?any way in which he could help her? "Take care of her, Challoner; take care of her," he said again and again, and involuntarily his hand pressed Matilda's arm as he spoke; then, as if afraid of having betrayed his inward thoughts by such earnestness, "I do not like the look of the day. The clouds are banking up in the north. There will be a heavy snowstorm before long, and the snow will lie when it falls." "Ha!" cried Challoner, exultation in his tone. "Snow, do you say? Three feet of snow round Overton Hall! I, for one, wish for no better luck." He was in spirits so gay, and monopolized the conversation so entirely, that the ill-fated third person, to whom neither query nor response was made, and who would not laugh at jests with which he had nothing to do, found fresh fault with his companions and their society at every step. What an abominable afternoon it had turned out! How infernally dark the sky was! What a devil of a state the roads were in! Well knowing what such language meant, and why expressions were thus made use of, which she had long ago forbidden, and which had in consequence dropped out of Teddy's vocabulary, and were never heard except as birds of evil omen, Matilda could but turn a deaf ear and give herself more and more to Challoner as the walk went on. It was no time to speak to Teddy now; not by the gentlest whisper durst she risk an outbreak, and she would not, even to herself, allow that she had been to blame in bringing about the situation. No, she had not been to blame; a brother must sometimes go to the wall; she had but few pleasures, and this - this was more than any mere passing enjoyment; it meant could say what it might not mean? Challoner had asked her to go, and at such a time she could not afford to refuse his slightest request, nor seem to disregard anything that was to him a subject for hope or fear. Was he not already enough troubled with misgivings? She read that in his eye and voice, which made every trifle of importance; the anxiety he could not hide, the agitation, the tremor, the one thought of his breast, which was at length become too dominant for any effort to conceal it, all wrought in her a kindred emotion, and an indifference to aught be side what passed between them two. who And this indifference was dreadful to poor Teddy, dimly as he might perceive it. He felt that something was wrong; he was, as Matilda had said, out of sorts, the reaction from two days' severe exercise and turbulent jollity; and what he would now have liked to have done more than anything would have been to have taken himself off then and there, and left the all-engrossed pair to themselves for the rest of the way. Nothing but the |