the Divinity Students in Glasgow University were on their side.

On the 20th, the hall was graced by the presence of the Marchioness of Breadalbane and Lady Hannah Thorp, who were accompanied by Mr. Campbell, of Monzie, M.P., and were received by the meeting standing and loudly cheering. Reports were received from different sections of the Provisional Committee. That of the Building Section, through their chairman, said that a primary object was to build Churches with as little delay and at as moderate cost as possible. They regretted that "great proprietors refused to grant the smallest portion of ground." There were, however, modes of obviating this difficulty. Large tents might be provided, and might be carried without difficulty from place to place. In some places an old vessel could be obtained, and anchored along the shore for the reception of worshippers.

Dr. Chalmers produced the Report of the Financial Section; it stated that for the Building Fund there had been collected 150,3417.; for the Sustentation Fund, 72,6877. total 223,0281. He afterwards announced that 3,000l. had been added to the Building Fund, and 1000l. to the Sustentation Fund, since the previous day. It was afterwards stated that the Marchioness of Breadalbane had contributed 1,000l. towards the Free Presbyterian Fund.

Another Section reported on the commemoration of the Bricatory of the Westminster Assembly, which had previously been contemplated by the General Assembly. It was recommended that a Committee be appointed to correspond

the Westminster Standards, to make arrangements for a commemorative meeting. Those Churches were to comprise the Seceders and the Presbyterians of England, Canada, and the United States, not excluding other Churches. In making this Report, Dr. Candlish intimated a wish that Edinburgh should be regarded as the capital of Presbyterianism, and be the scene of the meeting.

The following day, being Sunday, was one of unusual bustle and excitement on all sides. Besides the regular services of the day, there was a prayer-meeting at St. Andrew's Church, which the Lord High Commissioner attended, with his suite, and the Church would not contain the crowds which sought admission. Dr. Chalmers preached in the evening at the Hall of the New Secession, and here, too, the building was insufficient to contain the multitude. A new Church, the first of the Free Presbyterian Churches, which had been built in six weeks, was opened for the first time, and Dr. Candlish and Dr. Macfarlane preached there to crowded congregations.

The General Assembly, consisting of the members who adhered to the Establishment, met on the 22nd, and transacted some important business. Lord Belhaven, having called attention to the Queen's letter, moved the following resolutions:

"That it is the opinion of this house, that the Act of Assembly of 1834, on the subject of Calls, [the Veto Act,] should be rescinded: and that instructions be given to the Presbyteries of the Church to that effect.

"That the Act of Assembly of 1834-5, by which ministers of

bers of this Court be rescinded. At the same time, this house, deeply impressed with the vast benefit thus obtained for the people of this country by the extension of the blessings of religious instruction by means of the services of quoad sacra ministers, and feeling most anxious that these great and useful services should be secured to the country on a proper and permanent basis, desire to express a sincere hope that measures will be taken to have the unendowed districts created legally and properly into parishes, and endowments granted to their ministers; and that a Select Committee be appointed to draw up a loyal and dutiful address to the Queen, praying that she would be graciously pleased to take the same into her most favourable consider. ation."

After some discussion and amendments moved, the former resolutions were unanimously affirmed, the consideration of the second being deferred. The subject of the deposition of the Strathbogie Ministers, who had been deposed by the sentences of the General Assembly, was last entertained, and after a good deal of debate, the following resolution, moved by Dr. Hill, was carried by a large majority. "That whereas there are upon the records of this House sentences passed in the years 1840 and 1841, against the Reverend Mr. Cowie and others, ministers of Strathbogie; and whereas the said sentences were unjust, and were passed by the General Assembly in excess of jurisdiction; the General Assembly do therefore rescind the same, declaring them to be ab initio null and void; and declaring further, that the said Rever

nisters of the Church of Scotland, and entitled to all the rights and privileges belonging to them as such, as if the said sentences had never been pronounced; ratify their proceedings as members of the Presbytery of Strathbogie, and sustain the commissions in favour of Mr. Cowie and Mr.Thomson."

On a following day, the repeal of the acts whereby the quoad sacra Ministers were admitted to sit in Church Courts came under discussion.

Lord Belhaven again moved the resolution which he had before proposed, which was affirmed.

Thus the three points which had occasioned so much controversy were definitively disposed of, and the steps by which the Non-intrusion party had most signally transgressed the limits of the law were revoked by the orthodox remnant of the Assembly.

The next step was to declare the exclusion of seceding members from the offices and emoluments of the Church. Dr. Cook moved a resolution affirming that the Ministers who had signed the protest read on the 18th had ceased to be members of the Church, and were disqualified from receiving any presentation, parochial appointment, or other spiritual charge, until reponed by competent ecclesiastical judicatories: declaring the subscribing elders no longer elders of the Church; and instructing the Presbyteries to make a similar declaration respecting any other seceders, and take steps for filling vacant offices.

The motion was affirmed, and the House having joined in prayer, the churches and chapels of the

Admission also is an ecclesiastical act.

The Church Court alone can create the pastoral relation between the presentee and his parish; or dissolve it, when it has been created.

The license, then, which precedes presentation, is in the power of the Church; the examination and admission which follow it, and without which presentation is ineffectual, are fully conceded to the Church; and, unless it be con.. tended that patronage itself must be either directly or indirectly abolished, the matter in dispute is reduced to narrow limits."

He then pointed out that, but for the obstacle of the illegal Veto Act, the respective rights of the patron to present, of the congregation to object, and of the Church Courts to hear, to judge, and to admit, or reject, would be clear and well-defined. In conclusion, he referred to the attempt made by Lord Aberdeen in a former Session of Parliament to compare the points in dispute by a declaratory statute, and the willingness of the Government to attempt legislation on the same principles, with the hopes of settling the existing differences, ending, however, with an emphatic avowal of the unalterable determination of the advisers of the Crown to uphold established rights against the claims of the memorialists. "The acts of the General Assembly, the Claim, Declaration, and Protest, the Address against Patronage, the Demand of the Repeal of the Statute of Anne, have unhappily diminished, so far, at least, as the Church is concerned, these reasonable hopes; and her Majesty's Ministers now understanding that

gation of the rights of the Crown and of other patrons will satisfy the Church, are bound with firmness to declare that they cannot advise her Majesty to consent to the grant of any such demand."

Such was the main substance and tenor of this important Declaration of Government, the interesting character of which will fully justify the copious extracts which have been given. As might have been anticipated, however, it failed in the then attitude and temper of the conflicting parties to pacify the feelings, or remove the objections of those to whom it was addressed, and the crisis of the apprehended disruption now approached by rapid steps.

One of the questions on which the two parties in the Assembly were much divided, and on which also the decision of the Law Courts had been appealed to, related to the legality of certain acts of the General Assembly under which a certain class of ministers commonly styled the quoad sacra ministers, being the incumbents of Parliamentary churches, chapels of ease, and other nonparochial places of worship, were admitted to the status and privileges of parochial ministers. On the 20th January the Judges of the Court of Session announced their decisions in the Stewarton case which involved this question, delivering their opinions seriatim. Eight judges declared the law to be against the claim of the quoad sacra ministers, five pronounced in favour of its legality. Notwithstanding this decision of the Court, however, at a meeting of the Commission of the General Assembly on the 31st January, the quoad sacra ministers who

mission being then present, a mótion by Dr. Cook to exclude, them as disqualified by law from the deliberations of that body was overruled by a majority of ninety-two votes. Dr. Cook and the minority, protesting against the illegal constitution of the Court, thereupon retired from the meeting. Dr. Candlish then moved a series of resolutions, by which the the propositions of Sir James Graham's letter were controverted, and a Committee was appointed to prepare a petition to Parliament on the subject of the Non-intru. sion claims. This petition was presented by Mr. Fox Maule in the House of Commons on the 7th March, when that gentleman moved for a Committee of the whole House to take the petition into consideration. This Motion led to a long debate, terminating in its rejection by 211 to 76. On that occasion Sir Robert Peel, after enforcing the views developed in Sir James Graham's letter, expressed himself in these emphatic terms:-" Should her Majesty's Government think it necessary to legislate on this question, their measure would be based on the view developed in the communication made by my right honourable friend near me (Sir J. Graham). I wish most earnestly that the impediments to the Veto Act were removed; but I do not see at present any prospect of making a satisfactory settlement of that question. My belief is, that there is abroad, both in this country, in Scotland, and in other countries, after a long series of religious contentions and neglect of the duties of religion, a spirit founded upon just views in connexion with these subjects. But

an attempt will not be made to establish a spiritual or ecclesiastical supremacy above the other tribunals of the country; and that, in conjunction with an increased attention to the duties of religion, the laws of the country will be maintained. If the House of Commons is prepared to depart from those principles upon which the Reformation was founded, and which principles are essential to the maintenance of the civil and religious liberties of the country, whether it proceeds from the Church of Rome or from the Presbyterian Church of Scotland, nothing but evil would result; the greatest evil of which would be the establishment of religious domination, which would alike endanger the religion of the country and the civil rights of man."

Great preparations were now made in Scotland for the secession of the Non-intrusionists from the Church. Members of that body perambulated the country, giving lectures, and canvassing for support for the "Free Presbyterian Church." The project, in which the celebrated Dr. Chalmers took the lead, was to collect by subscriptions a general fund to be distributed in allowances for the several Churches and their Ministers. Great efforts were made to stimulate the liberality of the people in the promotion of this object and with considerable success. the 20th March the Special Commission met and recorded a minute, reasserting the reasonable nature of the Church's claims. This document stated that the Church had always recognized the right of the State to fix the conditions of their connexion. She believed, however, that Non-in

On

ciple; she had asked for the protection of Parliament, and her claim had been conclusively rejected.

"In these circumstances, the Special Commission deem it incumbent upon them to announce to the Church and country, as they now do with the utmost pain and sorrow, that the decisive rejection of the Church's claims by the Government and by Parliament appears to them conclusive of the present struggle, and that, in the judgment of the Commission, nothing remains but to make immediate preparation for the new state of things, which the Church must, as far as they can see, contemplate as inevitable. It is true that the Special Commission have no power to bring the momentous question to a final close, but must report their proceedings to the General Assembly. They feel it, however, to be their duty, in so unprecedented a crisis, and considering the urgent necessity of preparing for the event which must be anticipated as then likely to occur, to give forth now their deliberate judgment in regard to it, and to warn the Church and people of Scotland, that, so far as the Commission can see, no course will be left for the Assembly, or for those who hold sacred the principles now at issue, to adopt, but to relinquish the benefits of the Establishment."

A public meeting was held next day, over which Mr. Fox Maule presided. The Chairman declared that they had now the final answer of Parliament, the time for advocacy was passed, and he came there to associate himself with them in the great cause of civil and religious liberty. Dr. Cand lish delivered an energetic speech,

them but to make vigorous and systematic preparations for the institution of the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, and said," whether with or without the Queen's Commission, they would have a Free Assembly in May. God grant, that immediately thereafter we may be able to show what the free Gospel is which a free Assembly are prepared to give forth. We shall, indeed, cultivate our own districts; we shall have stated congregations, with stated elders and ministers; but we shall have our tours of preaching too-our visits to all corners of the land; and I believe that yet, by God's blessing on our free and faithful preachings, in the highways and hedges, in barns and stables, in sawpits and tents, we shall yet regenerate Scotland, and have multitudes of those who are now perishing for lack of knowledge to listen to the glad tidings of salvation. Oh! this will be a blessed reward for all our agitation." Other animated speeches were delivered, breathing a similar spirit of enthusiasm.”

The election of Commissioners to the General Assembly was now looked to with much interest. Several of the Presbyteries, obeying the decision of the Court of of Sessions in the Stewarton case, rejected the quoad sacra candidates, and an expectation gained ground that the "Moderates" as they were called, would be found in a majority. The Marquess of Bute was nominated by the Crown High Commissioner. The Marquess of Breadalbane, who had for some time lent his countenance to the Non-intrusion party, was ap plied to by a member of that body to allow himself to be named one